Echoes of Noir

The SEKAI

"Welcome, Hikiko."

How did this girl know his name? More importantly, where was he? His questions were endless.

"Get up, we're going somewhere."

"Who even are you?"

"Kagamine Rin."

"Like, the VOCALOID?"

"Yes, exactly like the VOCALOID."

Her sky-blue eyes contrasted the black-and-white city all around her, and she was wearing some sort of brown jacket, which covered a black sweater and white shirt underneath.

She led him along the winding paths of the seemingly endless city around him. He kept asking her questions along the way.

"Where are we going?"

"Why am I here?"

"Why are we in color?"

"Look, kid. I really don't want to deal with your dumbass, but since I'm the main Virtual Singer of this SEKAI, I unfortunately have to."

"Okay, first of all, you look barely older than me, so cut the "kid" crap. Plus, what the hell even is a SEKAI? It sounds like something you made up."

"A SEKAI is a sort of realm made by an individual's or a group of individuals' feelings. In this case, whatever strong feelings you had about five minutes ago led to me, or rather this version of me, coming into existence."

"Well, I know that's complete nonsense, I haven't felt anything in years and don't plan on doing so."

They eventually reached what looked to be an old-timey police station, where Rin swiftly went in another direction, leaving Hikiko.

"Oi! Rin, where are you going?"

"That's Detective Rin to you, and if you must know, it's away from you. Go sit down somewhere... or something."

He managed to find another person in the building, a boy with banana-colored hair.

"Hey, uh, where the hell exactly am I?"

"Eh? Oh, hello. Nobody exactly knows where this SEKAI is located, all we know is that your emotions created it, and I'm here to uh... well..."

His pale skin reflected the lights of the station, and he seemed to be dressed in a detective or police outfit, complete with a leather jacket and brown sweater underneath.

"He kinda looks like Detective Pikachu..."

"Ah, forgive my manners! My name is Kagamine Len, I'm the deputy of this station and the brother of Detective Rin! Feel free to ask me anything, even if I don't know much..."

"Even she makes you call her 'Detective'?"

"Yeah, she's been pretty uptight ever since-"

Suddenly, Rin entered the room, looking very determined.

"Oi, Hikiko, Len, while I'd love to let you two stay and chat, I've found a lead on the case and I need you two to help me with this. You, don't mess this up."

"But Rin, shouldn't we tell him tha-"

"Would you look at the time, we have to go."

🌹💀🌹

Then, I heard a noise coming from my back pocket, and my phone was somehow playing a song. I don't even listen to music, but this song...

It was calming yet upbeat, fast and slow, it sounded like nonsense but at the same time had so much meaning. At this point, I was starting to lose consciousness, and fell to the floor. Immediately, I noticed that the ground... didn't hurt? It wasn't soft, but I didn't feel anything.

"Oi, dumbass, get up."

"Hey, are you ok?!"

When I woke up, Rin and Len were standing over me. My father's creations, now standing over me, for what reason I don't know.

"You passed out pretty randomly, so me and Len had to make sure you didn't die or anything. Oh, also your phone fell out of your pocket and it started playing this weird song."

"Yeah,

I'll pause i-"

I was back in my bed before I could react to anything, tired out of my mind and wondering what had happened in the past 30 minutes.

"Whatever, I'll just go to sleep. There's no way that was a dream. Way too real. Not like I processed anything."

Why my doorbell chimed, I'll never know. However, I had to answer it, unfortunately.

At my front step was a box, an unassuming cardboard box, how harmful would it be to open it?

Inside was a very crudely cut-out piece of construction paper with complete gibberish on it, almost like it was a code or cipher of some sort. When I managed to transcribe it, it read:

Q29tZSBmaW5kIG1lLiBJdCdzIGZpbmUgaWYgeW91IGhhdmUgYSBzaGFkb3cuIC0gRwoKMzUuMTU2OMKwIE4sIDEzNi45Nzg5wrAgRQ==

I knew there was only one person who could possibly decipher this.

Somebody I hadn't talked to in two and a half years.

Mori.

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Author Comments:

Hey all, ASC here.

I had a lot of fun writing this chapter! Some fun facts are:

Our main character, Hikiko, and this new character, Mori, have names that make up the Japanese word hikikomori, meaning shut-in or in our western culture, a no-life. Hikiko has not touched grass in years.

Thanks to MikanTsu827 for helping with this chapter! She read the draft.

Sorry if I did a bad job describing some appearances, I'm not a very good writer and an even worse fashion designer ;-;

The emojis towards the middle of the chapter symbolize a perspective change, from the narrator's perspective (my perspective) to Hikiko's perspective. Sorry for stealing your idea @thoughtsroamguy :D