We passed the school gates. Behind me, the laughter and the roar of motorcycles from my classmates faded like a radio losing its signal—growing distant, blurred, and eventually vanishing. Ahead, there was only the back of The Pest, walking with a steady rhythm, as if she had already calculated the exact number of steps from here to the edge of the world.
"Hey, Pest... where are we going?" I hissed.
She stopped abruptly in the middle of the crowded sidewalk. Without fully turning, she tilted her head slightly, catching my figure trailing far behind from the corner of her eye. She raised her left hand, giving a small sign with two fingers—a casual gesture that seemed to command me to keep dragging what was left of my strength.
I was forced to move, trying to keep a distance so I wouldn't lose her trail. Since she was voiceless, I had to examine her every movement as my compass. In this noisy city, I studied the way she moved. The Pest weaved through the crowd with haunting efficiency. Every now and then, she would stop at a red light, standing tall without touching anyone, then glanced briefly back at me just to ensure the scrap metal behind her hadn't completely collapsed in the middle of the street.
Every time her eyes met mine, I felt my rusted soul being forcibly pulled to stay upright.
As we reached a crossroad in a narrow alley squeezed by old buildings, she stopped again. This time, she truly faced me. Her face was flat, but her gaze stripped bare the cold sweat beginning to flood my temples. I could only respond with labored, broken breaths.
She pointed toward a green hill in the distance with her chin. A silent instruction that made my chest tighten before we even got there.
We entered the alley. Click. Silence. It felt as if the city's sound had been cut off by a giant master switch. The concrete asphalt was slowly replaced by damp, stony paths. The air, once suffocating with exhaust fumes, turned cold and fresh—the scent of cedar trees and ancient moss began to pierce my senses. To me, this clean air felt sharp, like an ice blade slicing through my respiratory system. The cold air entered my throat, heavy and dense like wet cement beginning to harden.
Ahead, a massive wooden gate (Torii) stood in our way. The Pest stopped right under it. She stood still, letting the mountain wind play with the ends of her hair, then she looked at me, arriving with a breath that was utterly shattered.
She tore a piece of paper from her book and dropped it right in front of my trembling feet.
[ "Old Radio, the city's frequency was too noisy for you. Here, the sound is clearer. But to hear it, you must climb. Don't let your breath jam just because of a slight slope in the earth." ]
I stared at the note, then at the stairs ahead. I looked up at her with my remaining strength, as if wanting to say I could die at any moment on these steps. The Pest remained silent, frozen in her absolute voicelessness. She took one step closer instead, staring right into my eyes. There was something strange in her gaze—a silent instruction that felt louder than a scream. Her eyes seemed to lock onto my existence, commanding me not to give in to gravity just yet.
Through that gaze, I caught a command: "Don't die here. Not yet."
After ensuring I caught the message, she turned and stepped onto the first stair. Her movement was light, soundless, merging with the silence of the temple. I took a deep breath—a mistake that made my chest creak in protest—and lifted my right foot.
This damn ordeal had only just begun.
One step. Two steps.
My world narrowed to the size of the tips of The Pest's white sneakers. I didn't dare look up; gravity felt like a giant hand pressing on my shoulders, forcing me to keep staring at the ground. Every time my feet hit these cold, mossy stone steps, I could feel the vibration crawling up to the base of my throat.
Crack. That wasn't the sound of a snapping twig. It was a sound from inside my chest. I stopped at the tenth step, leaning over with my hands resting on my violently trembling knees. The cold air in this temple was a traitor. It entered my lungs like molten lead, heavy and searing, then turned into instantly freezing cement.
The breath that was previously jammed now felt completely clogged.
I watched The Pest. She stopped about five steps above me. I saw how she stood there—her back straight, her shoulders not heaving from gasping for air, even the ends of her hair didn't look wet with sweat. "What is she made of?" I asked myself.
Under the dim light filtered by the tree canopy, she looked too solid. Too whole. A stark contrast to me, who felt like a pile of loose bolts about to scatter across these stairs. I studied her small but stable calves. No straining muscles, no signs of fatigue. She climbed these stairs as if the laws of physics didn't apply to her.
The Pest turned slowly. She didn't come down to help me. She just stood there, staring with her usual flat gaze. Her eyes captured my face, which had probably turned ashen gray. She pulled out her notebook again. This time she didn't tear the paper; she just showed it to me from above.
[ "Don't just count the pain. Listen to the resonance of the stairs. You're being too noisy, Old Radio." ]
I snorted—a mistake that triggered a painful dry cough. "Noisy?" I thought. Of course, I was noisy. My entire system was blaring a danger alarm.
I started moving again. The eleventh step felt like lifting a ton of weight. I observed every time she started moving again after I managed to get closer. She always kept the same distance. It was as if she were a magnetic pole, pushing me to keep moving forward while simultaneously forbidding me from actually touching her.
"Hah... hah..."
The sound of my breathing was pathetic in the midst of this sacred temple silence. I felt like noise pollution. Meanwhile, The Pest remained the center of stillness. I saw her fingers occasionally touch the stone pillars by the stairs; her movements were fluid, almost as if she were performing a sensory check on the ancient stone surface.
Something was wrong with this girl. The higher we climbed, the more "alive" she appeared in her silence, while I drifted closer to the point where my consciousness might stall. I looked up for a moment at the rows of stairs still stretching ahead. My vision began to fill with black static spots, exactly like a television losing its antenna.
"One more step," I commanded my legs, which had almost lost all nerve function. "One more, before this circuit completely burns out."
We finally reached a flat terrace before the main gate. On the left, there was a large stone basin with water continuously flowing from the mouth of a bronze dragon. Temizuya. The sound of the splashing water should have been calming, but in my ears, it was drowned out by the broken frequency from my own chest.
I collapsed near a wooden pillar. My chest rose and fell erratically, trying to pump oxygen into a system already filled with "wet cement." Every time I tried to breathe, there was a small friction—a painful static—that echoed in my own ears.
The Pest ignored me. She walked toward the water basin with steady steps. I observed her movements as she picked up the hishaku—the long wooden ladle. Her movements were precise, as if she were following a secret rhythm I couldn't hear. She washed her hands in perfect order. I studied her fingers; her skin was pale white, almost matching the color of the cold temple stone. "Is her soul just as cold?" I wondered.
After finishing, she brought the ladle filled with water toward me. She didn't offer it for me to drink; instead, she just stood before me. She tilted the ladle slightly. Cold water hit my open palms.
Thump. It didn't feel like water. It felt like an electric shock that forcibly cooled an overheating engine. I choked, trying to wash my face. As the water touched my skin, I saw The Pest watching me. Her empty eyes seemed to be recording how the scrap metal in front of her reacted.
She put the ladle back, then wrote something in her book. She held it right in front of my eyes:
[ "Wash your face, Old Radio. The frequency in your chest is getting noisier. This water can dampen that foul echo for a moment." ]
I stared at the note, then at her. She was right. The sound of my breathing in a place this quiet was like a broken radio forced to turn on in the middle of a library. Utterly offensive.
I peeled back with my eyes the way she dried the remaining water from her fingertips with a small handkerchief. Her movements were slow, deeply methodical. I realized one thing; she wasn't just silent in voice, but her soul seemed "tuned" to not emit even a shred of emotion.
She gave another sign with her chin toward the main temple building. I forced myself to stand. My knees made a loud creaking sound, a protest from hardware that was long worn out. This damn ordeal wasn't over. And for some reason, I felt The Pest was waiting for me to truly "snap" at the highest point of this place.
We stood before the main temple building. The ancient, black-stained wood seemed to absorb all the remaining evening light, leaving only thick darkness behind the sliding doors. Here, even the wind dared not rustle. The silence in this place wasn't just quiet; it was a judging kind of silence.
And in the heart of that silence, the frequency in my chest became even more pronounced.
Every short breath I took triggered a sharp crack, followed by the hiss of air jamming in my throat. It felt like someone was dragging a radio needle across a charred circuit. Static, noisy, and broken. In front of this sacred altar, the sound of my illness felt like an insult.
The Pest stood right beside me. She pressed her palms together in front of her chest, closed her eyes, and bowed in silence. I watched the profile of her face; her eyelashes didn't move, her breath wasn't even visible. She merged with the silence of this temple as if she were a part of the building's structure.
I tried to mimic her. I lifted my heavy hands—feeling like I was lifting two rusted iron bars—and brought my palms together.
Clap!
The sound of my clap (the ritual to summon the deity) rang out discordantly. The vibration rippled through my chest, triggering a pain that made my vision fill with black spots again. I coughed, trying to suppress the sound so as not to ruin the sanctity of the altar, but I failed. The cough exploded, raspy and full of "old iron" echoes.
I saw The Pest open her eyes. She didn't turn dramatically; she only glanced at me through her cold, peripheral vision. She pulled out a note she had already prepared, as if she knew this machine would malfunction right in front of the altar.
[ "The Gods won't hear a prayer from a frequency that chaotic, Old Radio. You aren't praying; you're protesting your own fate through the sound of your lungs." ]
I stared at the note while wiping the bitter residue from my lips. I wanted to retort, wanted to say that I didn't choose this foul frequency. But I could only remain silent, clutching my chest that felt burning hot.
The Pest tucked her book back in. She didn't perform the coin ritual or bow for long. She just stared straight into the darkness of the altar, as if having a voiceless conversation with whatever was there. Then, she turned and looked at me. This time, her gaze no longer stripped my pain bare; it seemed to be waiting. She was waiting to see if the broken echo in my chest would subside as the sun went down, or if it would shatter completely right here.
I dragged my steps toward the rows of Ema wooden plaques hanging by the side of the altar. The mountain wind, growing colder, made the plaques clatter against each other—a dry, hollow sound. I saw thousands of other people's hopes there—passing exams, family health, requited love. All of it felt like frequencies from another world. A healthy world.
The Pest took two wooden plaques. She gave one to me, and she began to write with incredibly calm movements.
I stared at the empty plaque in my hand. My fingers trembled violently; the circuits in my hand seemed to have stalled. I wanted to write "I want to stay here", but my chest creaked again. The crack sound reminded me that my request was an anomaly. I forced the pen's tip, but only jagged, broken ink strokes came out. Messy. Just like the condition of my lungs.
Then, I glanced at The Pest's plaque before she hung it up.
There was only one short sentence written in very neat handwriting, as if every letter had been measured with a ruler:
[ "I hope he has no regrets." ]
My world seemed to stop spinning for a moment. I stared at the writing, then at her face. She didn't look back. She hung the plaque with a methodical motion and stepped back.
"Regrets?" I thought bitterly. She didn't even ask God to fix me. She already viewed me as scrap metal waiting to be discarded. Her prayer wasn't about life; it was about how I should face the end.
I looked at my own plaque, which contained only unreadable ink scribbles. Suddenly, the tightness rose not from my lungs, but from the pit of my stomach. I felt rejected. Not just by my body, but by the God behind those black doors.
I didn't hang my plaque. I let it slip from my hand. It fell, hitting the stony ground with a hollow Clack!.
The Pest looked down at the fallen plaque. She then lifted her face and looked at me. This time, her eyes weren't empty. She stared at me with a gaze like tangled thread carried by the wind. A gaze so messy, resigned, as if she were looking at something impossible to fix, yet she could only let it fly away, driven by fate.
It was here that I truly stopped guessing at God. If the sound in my chest was a sin, then God's silence and The Pest's tangled gaze were the answer. I pulled out my grey notebook. Under the dying twilight, I wrote the first digit for my remaining days. I didn't need God to count them. I would be the accountant for my own destruction.
The sun had fully set, leaving only a thin, purplish-red line on the western horizon—like a wound that hadn't quite dried. I stood at the edge of the stairs, preparing to fight gravity once more on the way down. But my movement stopped.
Under the faint glow of the stone lantern, I watched The Pest.
She didn't immediately lead me down. She stood a bit further away, her back to me. Her shoulders were slightly hunched. I studied her hand movements; she was writing something in her notebook. Not tearing a page to give to me as usual, but writing on the back pages that seemed already filled with dense scribbles.
Her movements were fast, as if she were chasing time that was constantly thinning.
I tried to step closer, wanting to know what the girl who prayed for me to have "no regrets" was writing. Was it a list of people whose deaths she had witnessed? Or were they other frequencies that had stopped ringing before mine?
Before I could reach a proper vantage point, The Pest suddenly stopped. As if she had sensors in her back, she closed her book with a firm snap!. She tucked her pen into her jacket pocket and turned around.
Her face was flat again, as if the moment of writing had never happened. But I caught a glimpse—just for a split second—of a look in her eyes that was no longer like tangled thread, but something much sharper and colder. Something that made me realize she wasn't just a passive "partner in death." She had her own agenda in this broken symphony.
She stared at me, then signaled with her chin toward the dark stairs. "Let's go home," she commanded with a slight shrug.
I drew a breath—the crack in my chest sounded muffled but heavier now. I followed her light footsteps down the stone stairs. Behind her, I felt like a shadow being led home toward the junkyard. My world was now officially the numbers in my grey notebook. And in front of me, The Pest walked, carrying her own secrets locked tight within the book she had just written in. We were two machines walking in silence, each carrying a load of scrap that could never be shared.
The way down felt longer, but at least I no longer felt the need to guess at God. I only needed to watch the back of this girl, until one of us truly lost our signal.
Descending was far more agonizing than the climb. Every time my feet hit the stone steps, the vibration felt like it was punching my lungs from the inside. I wasn't breathing anymore; I was trying to shatter blocks of hardened cement in my throat.
Crack. Hiss. Crack.
My steps grew chaotic, dragging an invisible, heavy burden. As our feet finally touched the -- pavement at the bottom of the hill, I collapsed. I knelt, clutching my chest with violently trembling hands. The suffocating city air rushed back into my system, and I coughed so hard that my vision went pitch black for several seconds.
I felt a shadow standing before me.
I looked up, gasping for air. The Pest stood there. Under the flickering streetlights, she was no longer looking at me with that resigned "tangled thread" gaze.
This time, her stare shifted into something far more intense. She looked at me as if my skin and clothes had vanished, leaving my body naked under her observation. She wasn't seeing a human; she was examining every inch of the wreckage inside my chest. It was as if she could see my blackened lung valves, my short-circuiting nerves, and the remnants of my life burning away. It was the gaze of a mechanic inspecting a piece of scrap metal beyond repair.
I felt exposed, humiliated, yet truly seen.
Then, without her notebook or pen, she did something unexpected. She balled her fingers into a fist, then raised her thumb right in front of my ashen face.
She gave me a thumbs-up.
The gesture was incredibly bizarre. There was no sympathy, no smile. That thumb stood there as a sign—a cold validation that this junk machine had somehow managed not to explode up there. "You survived, Old Radio," perhaps that was the message.
After a few seconds that felt like an eternity, she lowered her hand and turned away. She walked off, merging back into the city's darkness without looking back.
I remained frozen there, clutching my creaking chest. One thumb for one day stolen from death. I opened my grey notebook, writing down one more digit with a hand that was still shaking. Tonight, my frequency hadn't died yet.