A Favor For An Anxious Heart

Getting back to our apartment complex the very first thing I noticed was Saki leaning against the upper floor railing with a worried frown riding on her face. The anxious tapping of her feet could be heard until downstairs. Even as I waved at her to get her attention, she kept dreamily glaring out in the distance as if waiting for something, or rather someone to pass through the roads ahead.

"Miss Saki…" Calling out to her as I arrived on the same floor, I pressed a finger against her shoulders to break her out of the trance. "Are you okay? It's getting really late, what are you doing outside?"

Being in a dubious neighborhood, it was far from safe for her to be standing outside at this hour all alone. On my visits to her apartment even, she only opens the door slightly to make sure it wasn't a mugger first. Thus making her stay out in the corridor at this hour even more peculiar.

"Miss Saki?" I called out, poking her again to bring her back to the conscious world.

"Wh-what?!" Like a terrified squirrel, her body jerked away. However, realizing it was me, she placed a hand on her chest and let out a relieved sigh. "It's you, sorry, I was lost in thought."

"Is something wrong? Anything I can do to help?" For whatever reason, seeing her visibly worried tugged at some sensitive strings in my heart.

"Uhm…I don't know," leaning against the corridor railing again, she lifted her upper body lightly and looked down at the lower floor. "The girl, what was her name? Hibiki?"

'How does she know about her?' I couldn't help but wonder. Still, pushing my curiosity to the side, I tried to focus on the more pressing matter.

"Yeah? What about her?" Darting her gaze sideways, she stared at me for a while as if gauging her options.

"Sakura hasn't come home yet, and well, I can reach her through her phone either," clutching her fist tight on her phone in hand, Saki turned her head to look at me directly. "That girl, Hibiki, she came out of her room looking worried, so I asked her what was going on, but she left without saying anything. I don't know why, but I feel like something's wrong, and since Sakura isn't responding to my call…"

Pursuing her lips trying to hold back bitter words, Saki did her best to not burst into worried tears. 

"I just…Can you stay here and look after my place? The wares are still drying inside and I don't want them to be stolen," seeming ready to blot after her daughter and Hibiki, Saki's whole body was shaking out of pure angst.

"Gonna help her? We still have to check the camera from Akane, remember?" Mizuki whispered, trying to dissuade me from going after the girls instead of letting Saki go herself.

"Just stay here, I'll go look for the two," with that said, I put my school bag down for her to take in.

"But-"

"Look after my bag okay? That's quite literally the only thing I have that is worth anything at the moment," interjecting before she could utter her thoughts, I turned around and headed right for the stairs.

"Wait!" Expecting her to try and stop me again, I didn't turn to look at her. "T-thank a lot!"

Instead, it was just her being thankful. Leaving the bag with her as well as the camera that was inside, I headed straight for the only place where Sakura and her friends could still be around.

'Last I went to the shop, I was Daichi and not Akira.' Reminded of the time Sakura and her friends visited the store, I felt almost some sort of longing for the peace and quiet the store provided me. 'Reminiscent later, gotta find Sakura and-'

"Wait!" Interrupting my thoughts, Mizuki moved in front of me and even held me back with her hands. "I can sense another demon close by…No, more than one, two to be exact I think."

"Any idea if it's Ifrit?" I asked.

"Possibly, but the other, I have no clue," her response was anything but comforting. 

"So we could be heading into the lion's den head first if we charge in?" Unsure how to feel about the situation, I put a pause on my feet to think things through.

"We really should've bought a weapon from Mikato instead of all the useless junk," there she went talking to herself about this Mikato person again. "Either way, I suppose it's time we face another demon."

"I expected something useful, but mindless blabber is alright to guess," ignoring her mutterings, I began walking through the deserted streets again.

After a while, I did reach the store I used to work in, but it seems that ever since the incident of my suicide the place was being kept shut down in the evenings. The flier plastered out on the shutter voiced an apology from the owner, reading along the lines of lack of safety for the employees at night. Apparently, ever since my suicide, many others have tried to use the same spot to end their lives, but the police handled the situation without an iffy. As for the owner, despite being foolhardy stubborn has decided to put up a for sale sign on his shutters along with the flier with information about the unsafe incidents.

"You ran this man out of business it seems," Mizuki said, walking up beside me from behind.

"I suppose so," squeezing my fist tight, I tried not to blame myself for what had happened to the place. "We should keep moving."

Right as I finished my sentence, the sudden screaming of girls echoed in the distance. 

"Sakura!" I exclaimed.

At least one of those girls sounded exactly like her.

"Dammit, we're getting my babies right after we deal with this!" Blabbing about something again, Mizuki followed behind me as I rushed in the direction of the voices.

The closer we grew, the louder the screams got, strangest of all, a third voice of a girl chimed in with soul-chilling laughter. Had it not been for the flames and Ifrit standing beside her as we got to that abandoned dark alley, I would've never believed it was Hibiki doing all this.

"Finally here are we?" Said Ifrit, looking at us from over his shoulder.

Glancing past them both, I noticed not just Sakura but also Matsuri lying beside her on the ground with their clothes nearly all torn up.

"What happened here?" I asked, and the moment I did Hibiki turned around with a crazed look in her eyes.

The fear, the shock, even the embarrassment that she'd maintained around me all day, was all gone, and replaced with something far more sinister.