“I can’t believe Daiki just ran away”

“Really? Cause I totally can”

Asa and Botan lay on Daiki’s bedroom floor, staring at the ceiling and talking. 

Junichiro had left to go meet a few townspeople and discuss forming a search party for Takashi and Daiki. Kaede had been inconsolable all morning but by noon she’d settled down and was going about her business; dusting the couch, sweeping the floors, cleaning the fridge, all in silence. Kaito had distracted the twins with his gaming console, to keep them from wandering about while their mother was busy and he was out picking up groceries. 

“Boy, we really are bad friends”, Botan said, rubbing his forehead.

“What do you mean?”, Asa asked.

“You, me, and Daiki – I thought we were supposed to be a team”

“A team?”

“Yeah, a team”, Botan turned towards Asa, “Before summer vacation, back in uni, we always teamed up. For assignments, presentations, bunking lectures, having our lunch, going drinking. Us three were always together. And we were so excited to spend the summer together as well.”

He looked at his friend, deep in thought. “So what are you trying to say?”, she asked.

“I’m just saying…now Daiki is in a really dangerous situation and we’re just here”

“Daiki went off on his own though. How does that make us bad friends?”

Botan thought in silence. 

“Asa”

“Mm”

“We’ve gotta help him”, he said.

Asa took a long breath and sighed exhaustedly, “Yes, I agree. We gotta. I’m just trying to think how, exactly.”

“You know, Junichiro-san must be out there talking to people about a search party right now”

“And..?”

“And I think we should join it too”

“Botan”, Asa fished out a tennis ball from under Daiki’s bed and began bouncing it against the floor next to her, “I don’t really think anyone will join the search party”

“Huh?”, Botan sat up, “Why not??”

“Because they’re already trying to reopen police investigations for all the disappearances”

“Yeah right. The police have done nothing since we got here. I heard they tried to investigate once before, when all this began, and went missing as well”

“That’s true”, Asa said, “But now with the two fresh missing person cases, people might be more hopeful about the whole investigation being reopened, you understand?”. Asa looked at Botan who had a sour face, and looked away, focusing on the tennis ball again, “I feel pretty sure about it, Botan. No one would risk their lives by going on a search party now”

Botan sighed and laid back down on the floor, burying his face in his hands, “But I wanna help Daiki. How are we gonna do that?? Should we just talk to the police??”

Asa turned her head to give her friend the side-eye. She was amazed by the duality. One second, Botan would complain about being stuck in this strange situation that they were in, and then the next, he was all about jumping in and helping Daiki, getting themselves into more similar situations that he would probably complain about later. 

“It’s no use”, Asa replied, “the town committee is already talking to the police about getting the investigation reopened”. She sighed, hopelessly. There was a board hung on Daiki’s wall, opposite her. Their awkward smiling faces from their first semester in uni, stared back at her from many unmemorable polaroids that were carefully pinned to it. 

She remembered the first time that Daiki pulled out a cheap polaroid camera from his backpack and took a random unannounced shot of her working on an assignment. She’d been furious back then and made him apologise. Hanging out and taking pictures with friends was something she’d never done, growing up. But it grew on her over time. Daiki photographed almost everything that they did together during those five months. She hadn’t noticed the board before but now she knew where all those pictures went.  

Something suddenly dawned on her.

“Botan”, she said.

“Mm”

“I think I know something we can do to help Daiki”

Botan turned to face Asa in a heartbeat, “What? What is it??”

“You remember that old dude who had escaped from the mountains and returned to the village?”

“Yeah?”

“And you remember Yua Fujisaki who saw something outside her room?”

“Uh huh, so?”

“So think”, Asa urged, “who is the one person that treated the both of them after they got traumatised??”

Botan’s eyes lit up, “Takashi’s aunt!! The witch doctor! Dude she must know so much more than everyone else does about what’s going on!”

“Exactly”, she got up to her feet and extended her hand to Botan, “Let’s go talk to her. Maybe we can figure out who’s behind everything and hunt that bitch down.”

“What if we go missing looking for Daiki? I mean he went missing looking for Takashi”

Asa smirked, “We won’t. We’re gonna figure this whole thing out, and hunt it down our way”

“And what way is that? Cast some spells? Sprinkle salt? Catch it in a jar??”

“Shut up, moron, we’ll figure it out when we know who we’re up against”

The two of them hurried down the stairs and sneaked out of the house when Kaede wasn’t watching. Then, eagerly, they made their way towards Takashi’s.

Daiki and Takashi on the other hand, were on their journey, deeper into the mountains towards Kojima Pass. 

“Duuude thanks for the coffee!!!”, Daiki jostled about, jumping and throwing punches in the air. They’d sat down for a coffee break and were now beginning to resume their trek. Takashi collected a couple of empty coffee cans and wrappers in a plastic bag and shoved it in his backpack.

“My pleasure dude. Don’t mention it”, he stood looking at Daiki with a wide grin, waiting for him to quit hyping himself up and start walking again.

“U-uhh yeah.”, Daiki said and chuckled nervously. A sense of discomfort slowly crept up his spine. Man, Takashi is so weird today, he thought. 

“S-so umm”, Daiki began, shaking off the negative thoughts, “Heyyy you ready to discover this.. Kojima Pass.. thing?”

Takashi’s smile faltered momentarily, before he began beaming once again, “Hell yeah! Come on, let’s go!”

The two of them made their way through the lonely uphill climb of the forest in silence. The cry of cicadas surrounded them from all directions as Daiki stepped on dried up leaves and twigs. Sunlight bled in through tree tops and the forest looked warm. There was no one around. No one was coming to attack them. Not yet, anyway. Daiki had anticipated more danger coming in. The beautiful mountains of his childhood had been tainted for the past week with a presence so intimidating that, being there now felt almost illegal. But the calm that he was greeted with surprised him. Finding his lost friend and getting to explore the mountains with him was a bonus that made him nearly forget all about how threatening the mountains were supposed to be. 

But there was still the slightest hint of an uneasy feeling. At the back of his neck, his hairs stood up from time to time, making him look back constantly. Someone’s here, someone’s watching, Daiki thought. Takashi walked quietly in front of him. They hadn’t spoken a word since they left their coffee-break spot and it was beginning to bother him. He knew that his friend wasn’t really the social type but that he’d always been comfortable around Daiki. Even their silences were comfortable and not off-putting in the least. This silence was not just off-putting, it was piercing. 

“Ahem…” Daiki cleared his throat out loud and looked at his companion. Takashi kept walking.  

“Ahem ahem..”

“You alright?”, he blurted out, emotionless. 

“Uhh yeah, think I have a cough or something”

“Ohh?”

“So I guess you and I ended up carrying out my original plan huh?”

Takashi turned his head, “What original plan?”

“Wow, you don’t remember? My plan to go into the mountains”, Daiki said, “Before you chickened out and presented your drone idea instead”. He chuckled and punched Takashi on the shoulder. Takashi stumbled, taken aback. He seemed strangely nervous all of a sudden.

“Ohh haha”, he managed, “that plan.. Yeah”

Daiki frowned, “Dude, you okay?”

“Uh yeah?? W-why’d you ask? W-why would I not be??”, Takashi fidgeted and tried to laugh it off.

“I don’t know, man you just seem so...fidgety. You’re not acting like yourself”

“W-what do you mean?”

Before Daiki could say anything else, a sudden and strong wind blew across the forest. 

“Whaat the fu-”, he began to say when another powerful wind wave swept across the trees. The two of them stood in silence. Daiki looked bewildered at Takashi who looked back at him with an unsurprised look.

Then the wind came again. Stronger this time. Then again; and again; and again. When it came again, it was accompanied by a loud noise. If Daiki had to describe it, it sounded like a thundering flapping of wings. It got closer and closer. Like some giant bird was flying in their direction. 

Daiki froze and his eyes went wide. His mouth fell agape. Above them, hovering over the treetops was a giant humanoid bird with an even more humongous pair of wings – fully extended and covering half of the sky’s view. It wore a robe that looked red and there was a katana on his side. The kotengu, Daiki thought.

“Dude”, he called out to Takashi, eyes still glued up above “Dude, are you seeing this???”

“Yes”, Takashi replied, calmly.

“Can you believe this???”

“Yes. I can.”, Takashi replied, in the same tone. Daiki looked down at his friend, staring back at him with a stone-cold look. 

“Takashi what’s wrong with you??? Look at this shit!”

“I am”, he said.

Daiki gasped loudly. The bird turned his gaze towards him. A ferocious pair of eyes looked down at him from a face that looked like something between an eagle and a raven. His heart beat loudly in his ears, as the bird flapped his wings again and began descending onto the ground. 

“Oh no no no no no no”, Daiki put his hands on his forehead. He wanted to run but his legs were frozen. He looked over at Takashi who was now fixating on the bird creature. To Daiki’s absolute shock, it briefly seemed like he was smiling at the thing, as it landed next to him. When its feet touched the ground, Daiki felt a violent shake.

“Hello..friend”, the thing said in a deep, croaky, but almost welcoming voice. 

It talked, Daiki thought, the yokai talked!! He gulped hard, swallowing any coherent sentence he could have said in that situation. He remembered how the creature they met at Yua Fujisaki's backyard said hello too. But that was different. That was a long creepy drawn out hello that you would expect to hear from a scary mindless creature. This one, on the other hand, sounded intelligent and almost human. 

Also did he just call me "friend"?? Daiki's mind rushed with a million fragments of thoughts. What should I do? Is it friendly? Should I just run? And WHY THE HELL IS TAKASHI SMILING AT IT???

“H-hi”, Daiki managed to say, realizing that he still couldn't run with his frozen legs. 

“So you’re the strange drone owner’s friend?”

Strange drone owner??? Did it mean, Takashi? Does Takashi know this thing???, Daiki screamed in his head.

“U-uhhh y-yeah! That’s me. The strange drone owner’s friend. Daiki.”, he pointed at Takashi standing next to the creature, his finger was beginning to shake, “h-he has a name, by the way. It’s Takashi”

The bird thing looked from Daiki’s finger to Takashi. “This one?”, it croaked in a deep voice again.

“Y-yeah”

“This is not your friend”

Daiki scoffed nervously, “Believe me, the dude’s changed so much in a day that I’m beginning to think the same”. He laughed until he realized that the other two were not following. Oh I hope to God that Takashi drops the act right now!

“No, I mean it. This is not your friend.”, the creature said matter-of-factly, “This is Nolowi. She’s one of us. She only disguised as your friend, the strange drone owner.”

Daiki's heart almost beat out of his chest. Suddenly it all came back to him. All the discrepancies, how weirdly un-Takashi Takashi was acting all this time; how weirdly cheerful and awkward their conversations have been. It was all because some yokai was disguised as him. But why? he thought, why did they go through all that trouble? 

“D-disguised... a-as Takashi?? W-why? Why would you do that?”

“To deceive you”, it said blankly. 

“Why????”, Daiki breathed heavy. He felt lightheaded and a cold sweat was slowly forming on his skin. He rambled on, “Why would you deceive me? Also what do you mean, “one of us”??? One of who?? W-who are you guys?? Are you yokai?? A-and how can you just…disguise as someone??? I mean, that is a pretty damn good disguise. Th-that’s a whole new level of cosplaying right there.”

“Be quiet”, the creature demanded. Then he turned to the girl, Nolowi, who was still in her disguise and spoke in a language that Daiki had never heard before. The sounds they made as they talked were strange and spooky. To Daiki they sounded out of this world. The creature seemed to ask the girl a question, to which she made an odd hand gesture. She then opened her backpack and took out one of the empty coffee cans. The creature then made another odd hand gesture and they both turned to face Daiki.

The coffee!

Soon, his vision got blurry and his knees began to give in. They have been shaking for a while but Daiki had just chalked it up to fear and shock. Up until now, the notion that the coffee was possibly drugged didn't even occur to him. His vision got worse and worse until everything went black and he lost control of his body, completely passing out. The last thing he saw before blacking out was the creature and Nolowi, beginning to walk towards him.

Miles and miles away in Haguko, Asa and Botan finally reached Takashi’s house and stood outside the door. 

“Dude we’ve knocked three times now, nobody’s home, I say we come back later”, Botan fidgeted.

“Why, you afraid of Takashi’s aunt?”, Asa retorted.

“It’s not being afraid, Asa, it’s called having common sense. If no one is answering the door, then you don’t stand there the whole day”

Just as Asa was about to knock for a fourth time, the door opened. Himari stood in the doorway, looking confused. “Yes?”, she said softly.

“Takashi’s aunt!” “Ito-san!” 

The two bowed together but addressed Himari in two different ways. She laughed quietly.

“You're Taka-chan’s friends, aren't you?”, she asked.

“Yes. B-but we know he’s not here”, Botan rambled. Asa rolled her eyes. Great. Right off the bat reminding the poor lady that her nephew is missing, she thought to herself. “We just um, wanna talk to you.. actually.”, he finished and smile awkwardly. 

“Hima-chaaaaan! Come baaack we miss youuu!”

“Shut up, Akiko, she’s speaking to someone”

They heard a male and female voice from inside the house.

“You seem to have guests over, Ito-san”, Asa said, “We can come back later”

“No wait”, Himari held Asa’s shoulder, “You kids can come in. We were discussing Taka-chan’s and Daiki’s disappearances anyway. I’m guessing that’s what you wanted to talk about also?”

Asa and Botan exchanged glances and nodded. 

Himari led them through a hallway to the left side of the living room, where her practice room was. She opened the door and invited them into a dimly-lit room fragrant with incense and other herbs. Various religious idols were placed neatly on shelves on every wall. There was an air of sacredness all around. 

In the middle of the room, sat a group of people, all dressed in variations of the same robe that Himari was wearing – one that was different from her usual robe. Asa and Botan gasped in unison. One woman among them was manipulating a flame in her hand and another man with a bald head suddenly materialised out of thin air. The rest of them lounged lazily in the middle of the room as if nothing extraordinary was going on around them. They appeared to be part of some organisation. Asa wondered if the room had some hallucinatory effect on her.   

“These are my friends”, Himari introduced. 

A woman that looked a bit younger than everyone else in the group leaned forward, “Hima-chan are these new recruits?”

“Recruits?”, Asa questioned, “Recruits for what?”

Himari looked at her friend. “No. They’re Taka-chan’s friends”, she said. Then she turned to Asa and Botan, staring back at her in confusion.

“Recruits for our project”, she answered.

“What project?? Also did I just see that man over there appear out of nothing? And that lady is just straight up firebending! Wow is my head okay??”, Botan babbled on in nervous confusion.

Himari’s face turned determined and she sighed a breath of relief, “As you kids can see, I've invited my friends over for.. a small meeting." She then looked over at the group, exhaled again, and looked back at Asa and Botan, "We’re going to find Taka-chan and Daiki and put an end to Haguko's curse”.