Yuto Kisaragi couldn’t sleep again. Two days had passed since the strange waves first messed with every camera in his city. Glitched photos, blurred screens, dreams he knew couldn’t be real.
“There’s that taste again,” Yuto muttered, chewing on his cold ramen. Outside, the old communication tower buzzed like a moth fighting glass. His sister Hina poked her head into the tiny kitchen.
“You staying up? Too many coffee cans, genius,” she said, tossing him a stale packet of instant soup.
Just then, every light flickered. The laptop screen sizzled, blinked, and showed a kind of symbol instead of his normal search history—three rough circles, nested, edged with dotted lines. Not words. Symbols didn’t make great Google searches. Hina nudged him.
Something deep hummed. Someone else was reaching out.
Guys from school talked about it too. Phones randomly drew that symbol. A few even claimed to see figures from other worlds in static bursts during calls, sleeves just out of frame. Yuto was supposed to care about exams. He only wanted to find the truth. Ask yourself: if strange lights started sending messages into your world, would you follow the lead or hide and hope it passed? Can’t blame him for his choice.
That night, each streetlamp near Interval Green died in order—a row of them, dim to black, like guided hands.
Mika Sato, Yuto’s best friend and first voice of reason, wore out her torchphone battery in the cold. She scanned the grass and said, “No joke, it’s too perfect. Someone wants us here.”
Halfway between their school and the river, everything stopped. Not just the lights, but street noise, too—the cicadas quit, even the last bus halted before their bench. What’s worse: total dark, or a silent city? Yuto touched Mika’s shoulder and pointed at the field ahead.
Five tall figures moved there, slow as actors on wires, shaped in streaks of white lines. Not quite people. They didn’t walk—they glided a few inches clear of the useless damp grass. No faces—smooth, shifting.
Hina, racing in from the south path, almost slipped in the ditch below the hill. “They’re here! Did you see the lights? Yuto! Mika! They’re not human!” Her backpack caught, squealing against damp dirt.
One of the beings raised its thin arm. The ugly symbol filled the sky, scribbled in blue glow eighty feet up. Time hobbled, yawning apart.
Sudden pressure built in all four. Air ached with static shots, each strand pulling at locks and ears.
How far could Yuto step without running? He felt his foot sink too much anyway.
Do you take a step closer to the unknown, knowing every cell shudders ‘danger’, or stay still and hope things fix themselves?
Now things twisted fast. A badly-tuned voice, made of hiss and words misplaced, echoed everywhere:
“LISTENERS ACROSS THRESHOLD: NAME IS ______ INTERSECTOR. YIELD ILLUSIONS. BE NOT AFRAID.”
Voices crashed, layered, some soft, some stuck in slow echo.
Mika froze. “Is that…a translation error? Yuto! Can they even hear us?”
The aliens all watched, blank. Yuto, bold in spite of dread, tried to call out.
“What do you want?” A charged cold ran through his mouth, copper on his tongue.
The main figure answered.
“EXCHANGE SIGHTS. UNDERSTANDING WITHOUT FEAR.” Their words not quite making sense. Not language. Ideas. “WHAT MAKES PAINT ON REVERSE GLASS?”
“We…draw? Communicate? It tells a story,” Hina replied, lips numb with the odd thrill.
Things dart. The blue symbol snapped into a circle just over Yuto’s palm. All four teens saw every memory not their own—thousands of nights, cities so bright clouds glowed underneath, hundreds of beings curious, lost, shaking in joy. Fast tears rolled down Hina’s face. She glimpsed families, shapes changing, unknown science. Yuto collapsed to his knees, brain crushed with signals.
Didn’t last three seconds. The world spun back. Sweat ringed his collar.
Cliffhanger:
Above the field, the alien leader knew the symbol was sharp, broken. Their arm dropped. Static built, no sound, shaking metal all nearby. Yuto gasped out, “Don’t go!”
An entire block blacked out behind them. One final word burned out on cracked cell screens: “DUPLICATE.”
Mika screamed. Something big was coming—both from space and from within.
Quick: would you trust memories sent by strangers, or your own eyes?
