The days following their ascent to the residential floors changed something fundamental in the Imperial War Correspondence Office. Not healing—Buki was learning to distinguish between healing and shift, between recovery and adjustment. Kaito had begun spending nights upstairs again, in rooms that had been sealed for twelve years, sleeping in spaces that still carried the ghost-scent of medicine and mortality.
But he couldn't do it all at once. Couldn't simply move back in and pretend the rooms were just rooms, that the building was just a building, that twelve years of avoidance could be undone through a single decision.
So he told Buki the story in fragments. Between deliveries. During quiet moments sorting letters. In the early mornings before the office officially opened, when the world was still dark and confession felt safer somehow, as if darkness provided cover for speaking unspeakable things.
"Hana was diagnosed on a Tuesday," Kaito said one morning, three days after they'd opened the upstairs rooms. He was sorting civilian correspondence with mechanical precision, his hands moving while his mind existed elsewhere. "September thirteenth. I remember because Tuesdays were her favorite day—less homework at her school, more time for drawing. We'd been to the doctor twice already that month. Thought it was just something else."
Buki continued his own sorting, giving Kaito the freedom to speak or not speak, to continue or stop, to exist in whatever way he needed.
"The doctor called us back for test results," Kaito continued. "We went together—me, Yumiko, Hana. Hana was excited. Thought she was getting a clean bill of health, thought she could finally return to normal activities. The doctor's face when we entered—I knew immediately. Had seen that expression before on other doctors' faces, delivering other terrible news to other families. The look that said: I'm about to destroy your world and there's nothing I can do to soften it."
He paused, accessing memories that clearly still caused physical pain. His hands had stopped moving. Tremor frequency: 4.1.
"The sickness was cancer." Kaito said, pronouncing each syllable with careful precision, as if the accuracy of pronunciation somehow mattered. Buki set down the letter he'd been holding. Gave Kaito his full attention.
"Yumiko asked intelligent questions," Kaito continued. "About treatment protocols, about success rates, about clinical trials. She was always better in crisis—could compartmentalize, could focus on actionable items instead of emotional response. I just sat there. Couldn't speak. Couldn't think. Just kept looking at Hana, who didn't understand what the doctor was saying, who was confused about why her parents looked so devastated by medical terminology she couldn't parse."
His voice had taken on a distant quality, like he was narrating someone else's tragedy.
"She asked if this meant she'd miss school. That was her primary concern. Not death—death wasn't real to eight-year-olds. Just school. Just drawing time with her friends. Just the ordinary routines of childhood she thought were permanent."
The office clock ticked. Outside, Shin-Tokyo was waking—people beginning their days, unaware that across the city, in a postal office that leaned slightly left, an old gramps was reliving his daughter's death for the first time in twelve years.
"Treatment began immediately," Kaito said. "Aggressive. The kind designed for rapidly progressing cancer. They warned us about side effects—nausea, organ damage. They used clinical language that made horror sound manageable. Made systematic poisoning of a persons body sound like reasonable medical intervention."
He finally looked at Buki directly.
Buki's heart rate had increased. 7.2. 8.4. Because he understood this intimately—watching someone suffer while being unable to help, being complicit in suffering while calling it care, witnessing the cruel destruction of someone you loved.
"It continued for months," Kaito said, and his voice had gone flat now, affect disappearing as he recounted details too painful for emotional inflection. "Every week. Sometimes twice a week. Different meals. Different combinations. Experimental protocols when the standard ones failed. Therapy that didn't help, eating impossible, that very sickness turned her into something that barely resembled the person she'd been."
He stood abruptly, moved to the window, stared out at the snow-covered city.
"She lost her mind at times. Emotional rage fits. She'd find everything dangerous and annoying. Cried the first time. After that—just accepted it. Eight years old and accepting confused anger with more grace than I accepted anything. Said it didn't matter because she was fine with it. Except we all knew she really wasn't. Not at all. Not ever."
Buki approached but didn't touch. Just stood nearby. Proximity as comfort.
"The worst part," Kaito continued, voice barely audible, "was watching her understand. Watching herself crumble as she realized the treatments weren't working, that sometimes people died despite everyone's best efforts. She stopped asking when she'd get better. Started asking different questions: Does the afterlife hurt? Would Grandma be there? Would we remember her after she was gone?"
His reflection in the window showed tears running down a weathered face.
"Month five, the doctors changed tactics. More aggressive treatment. Higher treatments. They said it was her only chance. Didn't mention the chance was approximately seven percent. Didn't mention that survival at that point meant living long enough to die from treatment complications instead of a worser sickness. Just said: more aggressive, better outcome, trust us."
"Did you?" Buki asked quietly. "Did I what?" "Trust them."
Kaito was quiet for a long moment. "No. But what choice did we have? Let her die immediately or make things worse for her with treatments that might—might—extend her life by months?"
He turned from the window. Returned to his desk. Sat heavily.
"The final month, she couldn't leave her bed. Couldn't eat—everything came back up. Couldn't sleep properly—pain woke her up constantly. Couldn't do anything except exist in agony that medications barely changed. Some did help though. Made her drowsy, confused, not-quite-present. But present enough to know she was dying. Present enough to be terrified."
Buki felt his own throat tighten. Because this was his story too, in a different form. Watching Hana die in Tokyo. Watching his mother deteriorate from grief-induced madness. Watching General Hazami torn apart by artillery. Always watching. Always unable to prevent. Always carrying the weight of witnessed suffering.
"She died on a Sunday," Kaito said. "Early morning. Maybe 0500 hours. Yumiko and I had been taking shifts, staying with her constantly because we knew—knew it was close. I was on duty that morning. Holding her hand. Watching her breathe with increasing difficulty. Watching her body struggle against the inevitable."
His hands were shaking violently now. Tremor frequency: 8.7.
"Her last words—I told you before they were about the afterlife postal services. But there was more. She asked me—" His voice broke completely. "—she asked me if dying hurt. If I'd ever died so I could tell her what to expect. And I had to say no. Had to admit I didn't know. Had to watch my eight-year-old daughter face the biggest unknown of existence without any guidance because I'd never died, couldn't tell her what came next, couldn't do anything except hold her hand and lie about it being painless."
"What did you tell her?" Buki asked.
"I told her it would be like falling asleep. Gentle. Easy. Peaceful. I lied to my dying daughter because the truth—that I had no idea, that it might be agony, that death might be the worst thing she'd ever experience—that truth was too cruel to speak."
He wiped his face roughly.
"She believed me. Smiled. Said okay, she wasn't scared anymore if it was just sleeping. And then—then she closed her eyes. And her breathing slowed. And I thought: this is it. Peaceful. Like I promised. But—"
He stopped. Couldn't continue for nearly a minute.
"But it wasn't peaceful. Her eyes opened again. Wide. Terrified. She couldn't breathe—drowning in her own breaths. Couldn't speak—just made these gasping sounds, these desperate attempts to get air that wouldn't come. Grabbed my hand with strength she shouldn't have had. And I—I could see it in her eyes. The betrayal. The terror. The understanding that I'd lied, that dying hurt, that this was the worst thing she'd ever experienced."
"How long?" Buki asked, though he wasn't sure he wanted to know.
"Three minutes. Maybe four. Felt like hours. She fought for every breath. Panicked. Suffering. Dying in terror instead of peace. And I just—held her. Couldn't do anything else. Couldn't ease it. Couldn't stop it. Just witnessed my daughter's terror and suffering and final moments that were nothing like I'd promised."
The silence after was absolute. Devastating.
"When it was over," Kaito continued in monotone, "when she finally stopped breathing, stopped fighting, stopped being—there was this moment of relief. Not grief. Relief. That her suffering had ended. That I wouldn't have to watch her struggle anymore. That it was finally over. And then immediately: guilt. Profound, crushing guilt that my first response to my daughter's death was relief."
"That's normal," Buki said quietly. "Relief that suffering ended doesn't mean you didn't love her. Doesn't mean—" "Doesn't it?" Kaito interrupted sharply. "What kind of parent feels relief when his daughter dies? What kind of freaking moron—"
"The kind who spent six months watching her suffer," Buki said firmly. "The kind who loved her enough to want her pain to end even if it meant losing her. That's not monstrous. That's human."
Kaito absorbed this. Didn't seem convinced but didn't argue further.
"Yumiko started showing symptoms six months later," he continued after a pause. "Same fatigue. Same bruising. We didn't wait for doctor appointments this time. Went immediately. Got the diagnosis within days: Cancer... the same annoying damn disease."
His voice had gone completely flat now. Reciting facts. Documenting horror with clinical detachment.
"She progressed faster than Hana. More aggressive. Less time between diagnosis and death. Eight months total. Same treatments. Same failure. Same watching someone I loved destroyed slowly by disease and cure simultaneously."
"Was it different?" Buki asked. "Watching your wife die versus your daughter?"
"Yes and no. Harder because Yumiko understood exactly what was happening. Couldn't hide behind innocence. Knew she was dying Hana's death. Knew what awaited. Spent eight months in terror, counting down to the suffering she'd witnessed, knowing her ending would mirror her daughter's. That's—that's its own torture. Living while knowing how you'll die. Watching the calendar, calculating remaining time, understanding that every day brought her closer to drowning in her own lungs."
He paused.
"But also easier because she could express it. Could tell me she was scared. Could ask for what she needed. Could make peace with dying in ways Hana couldn't because Hana was eight and you can't make peace with death at eight. You can only be confused and terrified and too young to understand permanence."
Buki understood with the most perfect clarity, what he meant.
"Yumiko died asking me to take care of Ren," Kaito said. "Her final words were literally: 'Promise me you'll help him live. Promise.' And I promised. And three months later—"
He stopped. Took several breaths.
"Three months later, Ren started showing the same symptoms. And I knew. Before the diagnosis. Before the tests. Knew with absolute certainty that I was going to watch my son die the same way I'd watched my wife and daughter die. That the universe wasn't done destroying me. That there was one more death I had to witness before—before whatever came next."
"He refused treatment," Buki prompted gently.
"Yes. Fifteen years old and making end-of-life decisions with more clarity than I'd ever possessed. Said he'd watched what treatment did. Seen it fail twice. Seen it prolong suffering without providing cure. Said he'd rather have three good months than eight bad ones. Asked me—begged me—to respect his choice."
Kaito's face twisted with old anguish.
"I honored it. What else could I do? He was fifteen. Old enough to understand. Old enough to choose. And he was right—the treatment had tortured Hana and Yumiko without saving them. Why put Ren through the same? Why add months of chemical poisoning to his remaining time?"
"That must have been impossibly difficult," Buki said.
"Impossibly difficult doesn't begin to cover it. Doctors argued with me. Said I was giving up on my son. Said experimental treatments existed, that survival was possible if we tried everything. But they hadn't watched Hana drown in her medicine fluids. Hadn't watched Yumiko deteriorate into something barely human while chemicals systematically destroyed her. I had. And I couldn't—couldn't do that to Ren. Couldn't torture him for my own comfort."
He was crying openly now. Not hiding it. Not ashamed.
"So we had three months. Three months of Ren getting progressively weaker while pretending he wasn't. Three months of him teaching me his delivery routes even though we both knew he'd never implement them. Three months of talking about the future as if he had one. Three months of lying kindly to each other because the truth was unbearable."
"And then he died," Buki said softly.
"And then he died. Thursday afternoon. Sunlight coming through his window. I was holding his hand. Watching him breathe slower and slower. Waiting for the end. And it was—" Kaito struggled for words. "—it was peaceful. Actually peaceful. Like I'd promised Hana it would be but wasn't. He closed his eyes. His breathing slowed. Stopped. And he was gone. Gently. Easily. The way death is supposed to happen but rarely does."
"That's something," Buki offered.
"Is it?" Kaito asked bitterly. "Is it better that one of them died peacefully? Does that balance the two who died in terror? Does that make me less of a failure?"
"You're not a failure."
"Aren't I? I promised to protect them. Promised to keep them safe. And I watched all three die. Couldn't save any of them. Couldn't even ease their suffering. Just—witnessed. Just carried their deaths like I now carry these letters. Proof of my complete inadequacy as a father, as a human, as an exact human being entirely."
Buki moved closer. Placed his hand on Kaito's shoulder. "You loved them. That's not inadequacy. That's—that's everything. You loved them enough to witness their suffering. Loved them enough to make impossible decisions. Loved them enough to keep living after they died, even when living felt impossible. That's not failure."
Kaito looked up at him. Eyes red. Face ravaged. Seventy years old and looking ancient, worn down by decades of grief. "Then why does it feel like failure?"
"Because you're still here and they're not. Because you survived what killed them. Because—" Buki paused, accessing his own similar feelings. "—because surviving when others do feels like betrayal. Feels like you should have died too. Feels like your continued existence is theft from their ended existences. But in the end you are my friend Kaito. So don't throw it all away."
"Yes," Kaito whispered. "Yes. Exactly that kind of suffering."
They sat together in the Imperial War Correspondence Office. Two survivors carrying guilt for surviving. Two witnesses carrying weight of witnessed horrors. Two people learning that sometimes persistence was the only victory available, and victory was too grand a word for barely managing to continue breathing.
"Thank you," Kaito said finally. "For listening. For witnessing. For—for not telling me it'll get better or that time heals or any of the other comfortable lies people tell grieving people."
"Those are not lies but wouldn't help you," Buki said simply.
"No. They wouldn't." Kaito stood slowly. "Come upstairs with me. There's one more thing. One more piece of this story. And then—then I think I'll be done. I think I'll have told it all. Given it all to you to carry with me."
They climbed the stairs together—both of them this time, neither fleeing, neither avoiding. Entered Ren's room. Kaito moved to the desk, opened a drawer Buki hadn't noticed before.
Inside: medical records. Hana's, Yumiko's, Ren's. Complete documentation of their diseases, their treatments, their deaths.
"I kept everything," Kaito said. "Every test result. Every scan. Every doctor's note. Documented their dying with obsessive precision. And I've read it. All of it. Multiple times. Looking for—for what? Some moment where I could have intervened? Some treatment we missed? Some way their deaths could have been prevented?"
"And?" Buki asked.
"And nothing. No missed opportunities. No alternative treatments. No preventable deaths. Just—randomness. Three people I loved destroyed by biology that didn't care about love or protection or promises. Destroyed by nothing. By chance. By the fundamental unfairness of existence."
He closed the drawer.
"That's the worst part. Not that I failed. But that there was no way to succeed. That love and effort and the desperate trying meant nothing against defective DNA. That I was always going to lose them and there was never anything I could have ever done differently to."
Buki understood this completely. Understood that sometimes tragedies had no villains, no preventable causes, no satisfying explanations. Just—happened. Just destroyed. Just left survivors carrying weight that couldn't be put down.
"What do we do with that?" Buki asked. "With the understanding that some suffering can't be prevented?"
"I don't know," Kaito admitted. "But I think—I think we do what we've been doing. Persist. Deliver letters. Witness other people's grief. Carry our dead without demanding they mean something. Accept that randomness is cruel and life is unfair and sometimes everyone you love dies and you just—continue anyway."
"That sounds like Ren's final order," Buki observed. "To live despite everything."
"Yes," Kaito agreed. "And I'm trying. Finally, actually trying. Not just surviving. But living in these rooms again. Facing these memories again. Telling this story again. Choosing discomfort over avoidance. Choosing to exist where they existed. Choosing—" He looked around Ren's room, at evidence of life interrupted. "—choosing to honor them by persisting in their presence instead of fleeing from it."
They stood together in that room, surrounded by maps and plans and dreams of a fifteen-year-old who'd died believing in futures. And something settled. Not healed. Not resolved. Just—settled. Acknowledged. Witnessed. Shared.
"Tomorrow," Kaito said, "I'm moving my things upstairs permanently. Going to live in these rooms properly. Going to make them home again. Going to—to try living instead of just surviving."
"That's good," Buki said. "That's—that's blooming, maybe. The way General Hazami wanted me to bloom. The way Ren wanted you to live." "Maybe," Kaito agreed. "Or maybe it's just the next stage of barely surviving. But either way—it's something. It's movement. It's trying."
They descended the stairs. Returned to work. Letters waited for delivery. Other people's grief required witnessing. Life—or whatever existed instead of life for people like them—continued.
And upstairs, in rooms about to be inhabited again, three ghosts waited. Not sadly. Not desperately. Just—waited. For their father to finally, truly, begin living the life they'd ordered him to live.
One day at a time. One breath at a time. One impossible moment of persistence at a time.
TO BE CONTINUED...