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It wasn't very hard to connect with people in Sekai. The virtual world was practically teeming with them. Even now, as Ena wandered the place, she couldn't walk a step without brushing shoulders with someone. It's for this reason that finding a specific person in Sekai is like searching for a needle in a haystack.
Muttering apologies under her breath, she finally decides to find a higher vantage point. Though she cannot physically feel their forms, the odd sensation of clipping through others is starting to annoy her. Nearby is a warp point she can use to escape onto a high balcony. Just a few more minutes of the awful non-sensation of bumping into people without actually touching them and she'd be free.
Of course the very girl she's looking for had the same idea as her. She doesn't see Amia immediatly of course, but the telltale call of 'Enanan~' in that voice she'd recognize anywhere catches her attention pretty quickly. Somehow, the pink haired girl has managed to climb onto the building's rooftop.
"Aren't you out of bounds?" Ena asks her.
Her glowing hot pink cat ears twitch in amusement. "Nothing is out of bounds if you try hard enough!" she winks. "But there isn't a boundary here if that's what you're asking."
She reaches a hand out and Ena takes it, allowing her to pull her up. Maybe she just imagined it, but she swears she sees a spark of something in Amia's sharp pink eyes.
"What, was the balcony not good enough for you?" she asks.
Amia only hums. "I should be asking you that. I mean, it's not every day you see the great Enanan hiding away from her dedicated fanbase~"
"You say that like I'm some huge celebrety or something."
"Sixty thousand followers and counting isn't anything to sneeze at, you know."
She cringes at the reminder. Sixty thousand and counting, and yet none of them saw her as anything but a pretty face. None of them saw her as the artist she wants to be, not even Amia. Still, a small sick part of her feels pride in it. Even if she wasn't known as an artist she was still known. That counted for something, right? Better to be seen as a pretty face than as a failure.
"I guess it's something. What are you doing up here, hiding away from the world?"
The hot pink glowstick Amia calls a tail bristles in mock indignance. "I'm not hiding from anything! I'm just a lone wolf is all!"
Ena hums. "Would a lone wolf have invited me up so readily?"
Silence. Then, "Not usually, but… you're special, I guess."
Her heart flutters at the words. "Yeah?"
Amia blinks rapidly. "I mean, as far as attention seekers go. It's not every day you find one so plain looking!"
And to think she'd gotten her hopes up. Of course all Amia see's her as is a weird attention seeker, a lot of people think that way, if some of the comments she gets are any indication. Still, to hear it from her stings a lot more than it should.
"What are you jealous or something," she fires back, their usual bickering feeling a bit more charged now. "I mean it's not every day you see someone dressed like that who doesn't want attention."
Amia's tail flicks, but her smile stays firmly on her face. Ena finds it infuriating. It's as if nothing ever gets to her. It almost makes her want to dig deeper. She wants to be able to push her buttons as easily as she does.
"You could do it you know," she adds, "If you really wanted to you could be a variety streamer. You have that kind of personality. You'd go viral instantly."
Her smile is softer now, looking a bit more natural on her face. "Nah. If I did that, I wouldn't have as much alone time with you. I'd really miss that I think."
"How come?" Ena asks. It's times like this when she doesn't know how Amia feels about her.
The other girl simply shrugs, her soft pink hair shifting with the motion. "I just would."
Then she stands and stretches. "Anyway, whadaya say we take a walk. I can't just sit here forever, you know!"
Then she leaps.
"Wait, hang on—"
Ena's shout is too late. With no other choice she follows her lead.
She's never gotten completely used to the non-sensations Sekai had to offer. It was odd experiencing something but not feeling the sensation that typically came with it. Food had no taste, being hurt came with no pain, the ground she walked on and the walls she touched had no feeling to them, as though there was a layer between her and everything else. It was all scarily uncanny and she didn't believe she'd ever get used to it.
So of course, she screams when she jumps after Amia, despite the feeling of rushing air against her body, and everything else that came with falling being missing.
Amia is laughing at her when she sees her again (well, sees her face again, the glowing cat ears and tail were difficult to lose sight of).
"Can it," Ena grumbles.
"Oh Enanan you should have heard yourself!" she laughs. "I don't think I've ever heard anyone scream so loudly! I think you may have attracted a bit of attention!"
Her right ear flicks to the side and Ena glances down, finding a few netizens looking back up at the ruckus. Mortified and turning beet red, she turns back to her irritating companion.
"Shut up," she hisses, "And don't just jump off of buildings like that!"
Amia only smiles, a glint of something Ena cannot place in her eyes.
"You've just given me a great idea. Enanan, why don't we do something dangerous."
Her eyes go wide as she processes the proposal.
"No. No absolutely not."
"Awwww," Amia whines, "Enanan's such a killjoy~"
"Amia, I'm serious. We could get hurt."
She laughs again. "Enanan, you know none of this is real, right?"
"I know, but—"
"For all you know, I could just be some super intelegent AI or something~"
That idea scares Ena more than Amia could ever know, because that would mean she truly had no one.
"And you could be AI too." Amia sounds bitter as she says this, "There's a chance you aren't real."
She reaches for her hand, disappointed she can't feel it in her own.
"I'm real," she says, staring into sharp rose eyes, "And you are too, aren't you?"
She only shrugs. "Maybe."
"Do you… do you want to get coffee with me?"
That earns her a small smile, "Sure thing."
Mizuki hates every moment she spends in the real world. She hates every single moment of being Mizuki.
Unfortunately, things such as school and work require her attention, and she's caused her parents too much trouble to end up a NEET.
Now, she sits on the schools rooftop, opting to skip her last period. They're thinking about Enanan, as they often do whenever they're alone in the real world.
They don't love her, because she isn't real. None of it is real. Amia isn't real, as much as Mizuki may wish she was. Even if Enanan was real, she didn't love her. She didn't even like her, because she didn't know her. She knew Amia. She liked Amia (probably). She didn't know Mizuki existed. She didn't know that she wasn't like other girls. She didn't know about how she skipped school and made her family worry all the time because she couldn't just be normal. She didn't know that her whole lone wolf thing was involentary. They'd talk to the other netizens if they could but they were scared for some reason.
Mizuki's head falls into their arms. She doesn't know why Enanan is an exception to that. Maybe she isn't. Maybe they're scared of her too.
She's feeling the itch again. The itch to do something dangerous. The itch to forget everything. It makes sense, Enanan had stopped her yesterday, but it's frustrating to know she won't have access to her headset for a while.
She doesn't know how long she sits up there for, but when she looks up at the sky the sun is starting to set, tinting the sky a pinkish orange. Last period is long over by now and she's been sitting here for far too long. It isn't as if they had any plans, but staying out too late might worry their parents again which is the last thing they want.
Still, they can't seem to will themself to move just yet.
The door to the rooftop opens shortly after, making Mizuki jump just a little bit. A girl with short brown hair steps out, carrying a messenger bag. They stare at each other for a bit, like deer in headlights before the other girl clears her throat and decides to move.
Mizuki tracks her with cautious eyes as she sits facing the sunset, a few feet away from them.
"You don't mind, do you?" she asks them.
"I guess not. I mean it's not like I own the school rooftop or anything."
She doesn't respond. Her brown eyes don't even look in their direction. She just opens her bag, pulls out her sketchbook, and starts to draw. It's nice to have nobody pay her any mind, even though she can't keep her eyes off of her.
She's pretty. Easy on the eyes. Maybe a little plain looking, but there's nothing wrong with that.
That tiny voice in their head is telling them that they're being exactly what the girls at school warn eachother about. Using their cuteness to make this poor girl let her gaurd down so they can ogle her like a creep.
They tear their eyes away, but it's not long before they drift back to her. She looks at the focus in the other girls eyes, listens to the controlled scratching of pencil. It's mesmerizing to watch an artist so deeply focused on her craft.
Unfortunately, her staring doesn't go unnoticed for too long.
"What is it?" she asks sharply, "What are you staring for?"
"Sorry. It's just… it's nice seeing you draw."
She stares at them for a moment in silence and Mizuki wonders if she's said something wrong.
Then she says, "I guess it's okay as long as you aren't breathing down my neck like a creep."
Then she turns her attention back to her art.
They blink. Does she really not mind their staring? She said as long as they weren't breathing down her neck everything was fine, so surely it'd be okay if she kept looking. So look she did. She watched as the other girl refocused, her pencil rhythmically scratching against the paper again. She should have been satisfied, but she isn't. She wants a closer look. She wants to see what the artist is drawing.
Feeling as though she's commiting some kind of cardinal sin, Mizuki scoots slightly closer. The artist looks up, briefly and she freezes, but she looks back down indifferently. She hasn't crossed any lines. She scoots closer, trying to be as quiet as a mouse. Again the artist looks up. Again she doesn't seem bothered. The cycle repeats.
After the fourth time, the artist puts the pencil down and pats the ground beside her twice. For a moment they sit eerily still, unsure if they've crossed a line.
"You're distracting me, shifting around like that," she explains, "so come here. You wanted a closer look right."
"I did," she admits, "sorry for distracting you."
In lieu of an answer, she pats the same spot again.
Taking the hint, Mizuki moves to that spot. From here, they can see that the artist is drawing the sunset in front of her from the view behind the rooftop's fence. The fence wire in the foreground gave the piece a caged feel. It felt as though Mizuki could touch the sky if only the stupid fence were out of the way. She supposes the rooftop has always felt that way though. It was both her sanctuary and her prison. She wonders if the artist thinks of it the same way.
"Do you ever feel like this place is a bit suffocating?"
The artist looks up. "Not really. I think it's fairly spacious up here."
"It is," Mizuki agrees, "But it just… it feels like this fence is confining me. Theres so much more I could do if it weren't for this fence."
"If you really wanted to leave the fence nothing's stopping you. You could use the door, or climb the fence. If you really wanted to you could cut through it."
She didn't get it, not that they expected her to at all. It's not just the fence that suffocates her, the world does as well. The rooftop may be her form of solitary confinement, but ultimately it protects her from the world and it's sharp fangs. She's comfortable enough here. It's better here than out there.
A bell rings even though school has long been out for them. Night classes must be starting now. The artist stands. "I've gotta go to class. Don't stay up here for too long, okay. It's supposed to get cold later tonight."
She sounds like their mother.
They stand anyway. "Actually, I'm probably going to head home now."
"Well if we're going the same way anyway, we may as well go together."
They walk together in silence. Though she wants to, Mizuki can't explain why she can't just leave the confines of the rooftop. She can't tell the artist about how the world itself suffocates her.
They reach a fork in the hallway, not the first they've come across, but the one they'll have to part at.
"My class is this way," the artist says, pointing down one of the paths, "So I guess this is where we part ways. It was nice meeting you… sorry I never got your name."
"Mizuki," she says, "Akiyama Mizuki."
"Shinonome Ena." the artist says in turn. "Then I guess I'll see you again, Mizuki."
She doesn't answer, watching her retreating back. A suspicion is cooking in her head, one that absolutely cannot be true because Enanan isn't real.
Maybe Amia would have asked her. Maybe she'd be able to explain why exactly the rooftop was a prison.
None of that mattered though, because Amia is fake and Mizuki is real. Amia isn't confined by rooftops or society. Amia knows how to lead a proper conversation, how to ask the right questions and make the right jokes. Amia could be popular, could have friends if she wanted to. She could be surrounded by people who adored her if she wanted, but she chose not to, because it was simply more fun that way. Amia does as she pleases and dresses how she wants and nobody ever comments on it. Mizuki doesn't have that luxury.
As much as they want to be, they aren't Amia. No matter how much time they spent in Sekai, they'd never truly be Amia. Because Amia doesn't really exist, and Mizuki does.
In order to become Amia, they'd have to first destroy Mizuki, and yet without Mizuki, Amia ceases to exist.
If only there was a way to destroy both in one fell swoop.
There is a way, Mizuki knows, but as she is now, she's too cowardly to go through with it, at least here in the real world.
Maybe the fence was never the problem to begin with.
Now that Amia has been a constant in her life for over a year, Ena knows to go to the rooftop when looking for her. Lo and behold, Amia is up as high as she can be.
"Are you always up here, or what?"
"Not always," she says, her pink hair swaying as she turns to face her. "I was just hanging out with a friend of a friend earlier."
"What, you have friends?"
"You jealous?"
"Of course not!" she says indignantly, "It's just that you've never mentioned them before. It's weird."
Her ears flatten a bit, "Are you sure you aren't projecting?"
"I'll have you know I have plenty of friends," Ena says.
"Is that so? You've never mentioned them before now."
"…Yeah, I see your point."
An akward silence stretches between them. Amia looks as though she has something to say, but for some reason she isn't saying it.
Soon, Ena can't take it anymore. "Spit it out already, would you?"
She looks surprised, staring at her with those beutiful wide pink eyes. Ena knows crushing on her would be stupid. She's an internet stranger that she knows practically nothing about. Still, that doesn't stop her from having eyes. Amia has a pretty avatar and that's all there is to it.
Eventually she recovers from her shock and stands, back to the glowing neon blues and purples of Sekai. This view is certainly not helping Ena's case in the slightest. She knows she must have the most dumbstruck look on her face, but her original defence still stands. Having eyes is not a crime.
"Enanan," she says, holding a hand out to her, "Wanna do something crazy?"
"By crazy you mean dangerous, right?"
"You know me so well~"
"Then the answer is no."
Amia tilts her head. "Why not? None of this is real, you know."
She steps away, climbing up onto the roof of a higher building.
"Amia, whatever you're thinking, stop thinking it."
She doesn't listen, allowing herself to fall back toward Ena. She does nothing to right herself or to land in a way that isn't dangerous. She just allows herself to fall, landing face first in front of her. For a moment, irrationally, Ena fears the worst has occured, though she knows it isn't possible. Then, Amia stands as though nothing happened at all.
"See, nothing happened," she says, "because nothing here is real. We could jump off of as many buildings as we wanted. We could go skydiving without a parachute and nothing would happen. It'll be fun, trust me."
Ena glares at her. "It doesn't matter if nothing actually happens!" she shouts.
"Sure it does. If nothing actually happens then nothing actually matters."
"It matters to me!"
For once, Amia is at a loss for words, something Ena has wanted for a while now, but instead of feeling the rush of pride she's always imagined she'd feel, she feels a crushing dread.
"Wha—"
"Even if you don't care, even if it isn't real, it worries me every time. I care about you, Amia. I don't like seeing you do things like that."
She's sure she's crying now, but she finds that she doesn't care.
Amia is silent for a moment before she speaks again. "I was wrong. You're not an AI, you're way too real."
She sits. "I still don't think it matters that much, but if it upsets you that much, then I'll be safer about it."
"You promise?"
"Yeah. I won't try jumping if the gap is too large, or if the drop is too high. I'll treat it like it is real, so you won't worry about me. I don't want you to worry about me."
"Why not?"
She stares out into the cityscape for a long while, many things reflecting in her sharp pink eyes.
"Not sure," she says with a smile that doesn't quite reach her eyes, "I guess I just… want you to smile more."
"I smile plenty."
"Not when you worry about me."
They're both silent for a while before Amia speaks again. "What exactly do you think of me anyway?"
"What kind of question is that?"
She doesn't elaborate.
"Hey," Ena elbows her, "You're being weird."
Amia laughs, her tail swishing back and forth. "Sorry, sorry, stupid question. Say, there's this new zombie game that I wanted to check out. Did you wanna come with me?"
She agrees, despite that never having been her kind of game. Something about Amia has been nagging at her for a while now. She's getting the feeling that there's something more to her than her too wide smiles and her too loud laughs. She wonders if there's something she isn't telling her. Maybe there's a deeper reason for her constant presense on the rooftop, away from everyone. Lately, she's noticed a certain distance in her eyes, as if she knows their story is reaching it's conclusion and she just wants one last ride. Why is that?
No matter the reason, Ena refuses to let the future she sees play out. She isn't ready to end what she has with Amia. She isn't ready to let go just yet. Call it love, call it stubborness. Maybe she really is just that lonely.
Whatever the reason, Amia was now a mystery Ena was determined to solve. She was going to learn everything about the strange girl.
Mizuki doesn't expect Ena to come to the rooftop again. She certainly doesn't expect her to ask to draw her. She has no real reason to say no, though the idea of being examined so closely does make her a little nervous.
If she were Amia, she'd feel no such thing. Or maybe she would if it were Enanan. Mizuki gets the feeling she's onto her. Soon enough, she'll realize that Amia never existed.
"I want you to talk to me," Ena says, "Really talk to me."
"How come? Don't artists usually want their subjects to stay still?"
"Yeah, but recently something came up," she replies, already beginning to sketch. "And besides, I've been thinking since last time. I think I want to try capturing all of this."
Mizuki tilts her head and Ena looks as though she may be slowly connecting dots in her head. If they're right and she really is Enanan, they may be in big trouble, especially after their conversation yesterday.
Maybe this was a terrible idea.
Still, for a reason she cannot place, Mizuki wants to let Ena draw her. She wants to watch her draw again. Logically she knows that doesn't mean she has to be the subject.
"Why do you want to draw me so badly? I can't be that interesting of a subject."
"Theres a friend of mine who kind or reminds me of you is all," she says, looking up from her sketchbook. "There's a lot more to both of you than meets the eye. I think that's intriging, even if I find it infuriating sometimes."
"I don't think you'll find much," they say, "I think you're far more interesting than I am."
"It's only our second meeting," Ena points out. "It only seems that way because we hardly know each other. I want to get to know you."
Maybe Mizuki is starting to understand her a bit. Art is how she comes to understand the world.
"You really are an artist."
The brown haired girl goes red at the compliment.
They talk about things that don't really matter as Ena draws. It isn't nearly as scary as Mizuki believed it would be. Ena never asks her about the rooftop being suffocating, or why she's always up here by herself. For a few hours, the two of them just talk, like real friends do.
If their suspicions are correct, Mizuki prefers the artist Ena to the attention seeker Enanan by a long shot. Enanan's eyes never held that joyous spark of an aritsan focused on her craft.
"You know, I think I like you better like this," Ena mutters under her breath.
Mizuki is inclined to agree.
Ena finishes her sketch, refusing to show it to her until it's painted. The only way she'll ever see it completed is if they continue to meet here. It's a fair deal, Mizuki thinks. She's already up here often on days she bothers to go to school on.
She's looking foreward to it.
(Later, when Mizuki becomes Amia, she and Enanan sit and talk like they're real friends instead of two people who tolerated eachother's company over that of the masses. For the first time she feels as though Mizuki and Amia are beginning to merge.
She wonders if Ena and Enanan are doing the same.)