12

By the time she returned home, it was 9:00pm; even with the Napping Club as an excuse, this was clearly too late. She entered the house and shut the door behind her, prepared to get yelled at.

“I’m home...”

There was no response. The lights in the entrance hall were off, and the light from the living room was spilling out through the half-open door.

She started to take off her shoes, then stopped despite herself.

The dream she’d had before flashed back into her mind. The dark hall, the light from the living room. Where Midori had been her little sister, and though she’d been distracted by the illogical events that could only have happened in a dream, that scene had taken place in her own familiar home, too.

She proceeded down the hall with quiet steps and peeked into the living room. Only the TV was on, a muted news program displayed on screen.

No one was inside the room. Normally, at this time of day, her parents and elder sister should have been around, yet today there was no sign of anyone in the living room or the kitchen.

Going over next to the window, she pulled back the curtains. Unlike in her dream, there wasn’t a wide yard out there, just a wall made of concrete blocks a stone’s throw away, with the parking lot beyond it.

This should be obvious, but there was no bear.

Checking the locks on the windows, she closed the curtain once more. The moment she turned around, she saw someone standing in the room, and she screamed despite herself.

“Wahhh?!”

“Woah, what?! You startled me.”

“O-Onee-chan?”

The one who had reached out towards the wall and flicked the lights on was Aya. The way her sister looked under the fluorescent lights was so normal, it was... disappointing.

“What were you doing in the dark there? And hold on, you’ve been home?”

“I just got back... Where are Mom and Dad?”

“Didn’t you see they sent a message saying a person at work died and they’d be going to the wake?”

“Uh... sorry, no. I didn’t notice.”

“Saya, you haven’t eaten, right? Should I make something?”

“Nah... Don’t bother. I’ll grab something later. Thanks.”

About to head to her own room, the lights went out. With no time to be surprised, someone leaned over her from behind.

“Why did you leave me behind, Saya?” someone whispered in her ear in the pitch dark room.

Saya awoke in her bed.

It was her own room. Still dark. Looking at the clock, it was four in the morning.

“...Was it a dream?”

She noticed one of her hands was feeling around above the sheets as if searching for someone. Feeling awkward, she pulled it back in. Combined with the shock of the nightmare, a bed with no one in it beside her felt awfully wide and lonely.

Starting to feel uncertain, she meshed her fingers and pulled on them. They resisted, like they were supposed to. This was definitely Dayland.

While she was looking up at the ceiling and trying to calm herself, something cut across her vision.

It walked through the air with faint glow, like a constellation that had started moving around on its own feet. It passed over Saya and slipped out the window to the veranda, then vanished out of sight.

A Suiju.

Jumping up, she raced to the window, then went out onto the veranda.

The Suiju was nowhere to be seen, but there was no doubting it now. The Suiju were active in Dayland.

Once she noticed it, there was no turning back. Saya encountered twelve Suiju that day. They jumped into her vision one after another, almost as if she had just gained a special ability that let her see fairies.

In the house. On the way to school. Around the school. These aberrant beings that seemed neither living nor artificial moved around under the light of day with no one noticing.

The Suiju appeared to be wandering aimlessly, but she had no way to discern what their motives might be. Even if she did know, Saya couldn’t do a thing about them when she wasn’t Sleepwalking, and the Suiju showed no apparent interest in Saya.

During class, she spotted a Suiju that looked like a mashup between a seahorse and a set of bagpipes floating through the gap between desks. How did this happen all of a sudden? Saya worriedly thought to herself,

The Suiju were supposed to only exist in Nightland. That was what she’d heard from Ran and the others, and Saya hadn’t experienced anything that would have suggested otherwise. If they were coming out into Dayland, the entire premise behind the Sleepwalkers would collapse. It would be impossible to make the distinction between what was in sleep, and what was outside of it.

No... Now that she thought of it, there had been just one exception.

Just before she encountered Hitsuji for the second time, when Saya was wandering around the school searching for her, in her hazy state of consciousness, she had spotted a Suiju heading towards the roof.

That time, Saya’s insomnia had gone beyond her limits, and it wouldn’t have been odd for her to be hallucinating. However, Saya was no longer tormented by a sleep disorder.

She had already messaged her companions. It turned out that it really was just Saya who could see the Suiju, but the urgency of the situation seemed to get across.

Saya: We’re going to gather at the warehouse after school, but can we do an emergency Sleepwalk for now? I want to know what’s going on.

Ran: Agreed.

Hitsuji: When and where?

Saya: Lunchtime, the health room.

Ran: Got it.

Hitsuji: Kay. I’ll go ahead and secure the bed.

The bell signaling the end of 4th Period rang. Leaving the rising noise of the classroom behind, Saya hurried to the health room.

When she knocked and opened the door, she saw the school doctor passed out at her desk, sleeping. Tip-toeing past her to the beds, Saya pulled back the curtain to find Hitsuji lying there.

“Sorry for the wait,” she said, but Hitsuji’s eyes stayed shut and she didn’t move. “Oh... She’s already asleep.”

Even when Saya sat down on the bed, Hitsuji didn’t wake up. While looking down at Hitsuji, her light hair spread out over the sheets as she breathed softly, Saya thought to herself.

It was kind of a fresh experience, staring at Hitsuji’s sleeping face like this. It might even have been the first time. When they went Sleepwalking, she was dragged down into sleep quickly, and the first time they encountered one another it had happened in no time at all.

The only reason she was able to stay awake now was that she had been getting proper sleep. Even with that, her eyelids were gradually drooping. Hitsuji’s Blanket ability was really something.

Fwahhh, she let out a yawn. Just as she was thinking it was about time that she lie down herself, she heard the door opening. Peeking out from behind the curtain, it was Ran coming in, as she had expected. Shutting the door behind her, Ran came over quickly.

“I’m late. Let’s hurry and—” Ran started to say, but then had to cover her mouth to stifle a big yawn. “Whew... Sorry. Let’s hurry and get this finished. We can’t have this place to ourselves forever, after all.”

“I’d feel bad stealing the school doctor’s lunch break from her.”

Following Saya’s lead, Ran took off her shoes and got up on the bed, too. Obviously, one of the health room’s single size beds was going to be a tight fit for the three of them.

“Aizome-senpai, will you be all right with the way you move around in your sleep? You won’t fall out?”

“Oh, shush. I’m sensitive about that, you know...”

“I was saying it out of concern, but...”

Before they could finish talking, the pure drowsiness unleashed by Hitsuji mercilessly engulfed the two who were laying next to her.

Looking down from a high-rise building, there were fires rising up here and there around the city. The sound of sporadic gunfire echoed off the walls of the building.

There was the roar of a combat helicopter flying overhead. Armored cars and soldiers raced around the office district, and tank fire reduced one building to rubble after the next.

I looked down at the scene below me in terror. War had broken out at last. What was going to happen now? Would I survive? Would my family and school be okay...?

Right... speaking of the school, was Hitsuji okay? That girl was a bit out of it, so I worried. I had to hurry up and go get her, but where was I supposed to go?

At that point, a phone left out on the roof began to ring. It was an old, red phone. The kind you might see in a museum or something.

When I picked up the receiver and pressed it to my ear, Hitsuji’s voice was on the other line. “Saya, this is a dream.”

“Of course. I know that, Hitsuji.”

“Do you really?”

“Talking to you cleared my mind.”

On the other side of the phone, I felt like I could see Hitsuji frowning with doubt.

With a swish of her coat, Ran set down on the roof.

“Senpai.”

“Hokage-san, are you lucid?”

“I’m lucid, lucid, lucid.”

“Are you sure? Well, okay. Look at that.”

When I looked in the direction she pointed, beyond the city, there was a massive, walking Suiju that rose much higher than any building. Following the cylindrical legs upwards with my eyes, I spotted the form of something like bridge girders up in the clouds.

“It’s big.”

“Yes. And it’s not alone.”

I flew up into the sky with Ran. The city and surrounding wasteland were swarming with long-bodied Suiju. They looked like bridges across a great river that had come to life and started walking around.

“...The Suiju are growing in number, aren’t they?”

“It clearly looks like it.”

While Ran and I were talking, Hitsuji joined into the conversation, still on the other side of the receiver.

“I can’t see it all that well, but what do you think they’re doing?”

Squinting, I saw that the top of the massive, bridge-shaped Suiju was packed tight with smaller Suiju.

Both ends of the bridge were hazy, wrapped in the clouds. On one end, more and more Suiju slowly appeared, and they were heading towards the opposite end.

Trying to watch where the uneven and awkward procession was heading, Ran and I approached the walking bridge. When the clouds cleared, we could see the bridge was over the sea. The legs of the bridge stepped over the smoothly rising curvature of an island, proceeding even further forward.

“I’m starting to smell a sea breeze,” Hitsuji said from the other end of the phone.

“Well, we are out to sea. Where are you watching from, Hitsuji?”

“I don’t really know. Where is this, I wonder...”

Suddenly, Ran gulped. “No way. You’re kidding me.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I may have figured it out. Where they’re going.”

“Where would that be?”

“Hokage-san, that island: look at it closely. Do you see anything?”

I focused on the island the bridge’s legs were stepping over. It was an odd one. No trees growing out of it, and no rough rocks, either. The outline of the island was bewitching. If you were to compare to something, it was almost like a human body.

My jaw dropped.

“...Hitsuji?”

“Whaaaat? What about me?” The receiver dropped from my hands, fallng to the sea far below.

It wasn’t an island. It was Hitsuji. Hitsuji Konparu. My precious lover. Crossing Hitsuji’s body as she lay down to sleep, the Suiju marched forward. The sea around her was no longer water, but white sheets.

Ran and I were on either side of Hitsuji, too. Lying atop those sheets. It was like I was tied down, my body felt so heavy. When I moved my eyes, at some point a bridge had risen over me, too, and its weight was making me sink into the sheets. Mustering my willpower, my body finally budged, and with all my strength, I sat up. The bridge walking on my body tilted, flipped over, and fell with the many Suiju that had been on top of it.

I screamed.

“Hitsuji! Wake up! They’re getting into Dayland—”

Saya awoke as if peeling herself away from sleep.

She meant to scream, but only managed a whimper. She felt the hazy thoughts indicative of having forced herself awake, and the sensation of something clinging to her entire body. Trying to clear her head, Saya sat up in bed.

“Konparu-san, wake up,” she said in a hoarse voice, shaking the sleeping Hitsuji’s shoulder. Hitsuji’s eyes stayed closed as she grimaced and groaned.

“Nngh...”

There was something like smoke rising from Hitsuji’s body as she awakened. As Saya looked up, she saw a translucent construct over the bed. Like an insect hatching from a cocoon, the Suiju that appeared from Hitsuji’s body melted into the light of the world of day. She had already lost sight of it, but it wasn’t gone; Saya could still feel its dense presence.

On the other side of Hitsuji, who was rubbing her eyes, Ran sat up, too.

“Hokage-san... What just happened?”

“It was a Suiju. One came out again.”

Saya’s words made Hitsuji cock her head to the side. “I didn’t see it. Where did it crawl out of?”

“...Out of Konparu-san’s body.”

“My body?”

Saya nodded. “The Suiju, they’re crossing into Dayland... through our sleep!”

13

Their emergency Sleepwalk ended before the fifteen minutes they had planned; the three who had awakened in a drowsy state hurried to fix their clothes and get out of bed. The noise might have stirred her, because the school doctor raised her face from the desk, looking surprised.

“Huh? Sorry, I didn’t notice you there. What’s up?” she asked, shaking her head in an attempt to clear it. Behind her, Saya could see a Suiju riding on her like some sort of ghost. It looked a lot like the one that had come out of Hitsuji’s body.

The school doctor yawned. “Are you not feeling well? If you want to sleep, the beds are—” she began to ask absentmindedly.

“Oh! Nah, we’re good.” When Saya waved her hands and declined, the school doctor let out another big yawn.

“...Hahh. Sorry. My head’s feeling a little hazy, too.”

“You okay...?” Saya hesitantly asked.

“If you three aren’t going to sleep, maybe I’ll take a little nap myself,” the school doctor said.

As the three watched over her, the school doctor pulled back the curtain and vanished behind it.

“Ohh... Did you three already sleep before asking me? The sheets are a mess,” her sleepy voice came from the other side. “Well, it’s fine, but... If you use the bed, at least make it when you’re done...”

Without waiting for a response, there was a dull thud.

“...Sensei?”

When the three quietly pulled back the curtain, the school doctor was already collapsed face down on the bed. She’d gone to sleep without pulling the blanket over her; her clothes, shoes, and even her glasses still exactly as they were before.

Saya was vaguely able to see the form of the Suiju over top of the school doctor. Maybe as some reflection of the human state of sleep, the Suiju changed slightly with each breath and eyelid movement. Watching it, it looked less like a beast, and more like a translucent miniature city breathing on top of a human.

“The Suiju’s infected her. Can you two see it?” Saya asked, but Ran and Hitsuji shook their heads.

“I can’t see it.”

“Me, either.”

“I’m the only one who can see it, huh...”

“Looks like. What now? Do another Sleepwalk?” Hitsuji asked. Saya looked to Ran before replying.

“Let’s not. I think we need to figure out what these guys have been doing to us first.”

“That’s true,” Ran agreed. “Let’s save the Suiju hunting till after that. See you after school, at the bed & bedding store.”

“Got it.”

Leaving the sleeping school doctor behind, the three left the health room; it was the middle of lunch break, and the school was bustling with activity. As they walked around in it, Saya gradually turned pale.

“What’s wrong, Saya?” Hitsuji asked, perhaps having noticed something was off.

Saya gulped. “This... could be bad.”

“What could?” Ran peered at Saya’s face.

“The Suiju... they’re increasing in number.”

Saya could see several Suiju walking between the students as they went back and forth. There were some sticking out of people’s bodies, or riding on their heads or shoulders. She even saw some students that had been infected by several Suiju, and it was if they were dragging some bizarre construct behind them as they walked.

There hadn’t been this many half an hour ago.

The cause of the change was blatantly obvious: it was because the three of them had Sleepwalked.

There had been no mistake in what she’d seen in Nightland; the Suiji had built a bridge into Dayland in the three Sleepwalkers’ sleep.

The Suiju were rapidly expanding their power... This was the terrifying truth that the five who had gathered at Sakaimori Bed & Bedding had to face.

“We should have noticed sooner, huh,” Ran said, sounding frustrated.

“Has nothing like this happened before? Ever?”

Saya asked. The other four shook their heads.

“Not once. I’ve never heard of it happening elsewhere, either,” Midori answered.

“There’s no stories about this sort of thing in your house, Aizome-senpai? In books of legends, or something like that?”

“Not in the materials I’ve inherited, at least.”

“There’s nothing in your house, either, Sakaimore-san?”

“No, nothing.”

“That means this is a new phenomenon...”

Saya murmured, and Midori hung her head.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t be of help.”

“Don’t sweat it, Midori. Let’s all think about it together, okay?” Kaede comforted her in a gentle tone of voice.

“Let’s sort this out. What’s happening isn’t that complicated,” Saya said as she rose from the sofa. “First off, there are Suiju coming into Dayland. Only I can see them, but if you believe me, it’s an undeniable fact.”

“I believe you,” Hitsuji, who had been quiet up until this point, said quietly. The other three nodded.

“Thanks. Next, as for how they came, that’s something Aizome-senpai and I have both seen. The Suiju have been passing from Nightland into Dayland through our sleep.”

Ran nodded. “It was a large, bridge-like Suiju. There were several of them, using us as stepping stones to build a path into Dayland... and there were smaller Suiju crossing over it,” she added.

“I noticed because I saw the bridge being built over Hitsuji in Nightland, but it wasn’t just Hitsuji. Aizome-senpai and I, we both thought we were lucid, but at some point they made us into stepping stones. I noticed while it was happening, but by that point a lot of Suiju had already gotten into Dayland.”

Midori furrowed her brow. “That’s ridiculously scary. Do you mean that if you hadn’t noticed, it would have been even worse?”

“I think so,” Saya replied. “I mean, who knows how many times something similar has happened before now...”

“Seriously...?”

In response to the dubious look on Kaede’s face, Saya said, “We’ve been losing control in our dreams a lot lately, right? Thinking about it now, I bet that was the Suiju’s handiwork, too.”

“They may have been experimenting,” Midori interjected.

“Experimenting?”

“This is working under the assumption that the Suiju are intelligent, but... What if they let us believe we were acting with lucidity, while they actually seized control and used us as stepping stones? Doesn’t it feel like they’re pulling off something rather advanced here?”

“Like a computer virus, huh...” Ran said, deep in thought.

“But viruses aren’t intelligent. They aren’t, right? Maybe they can do advanced stuff whether they’re intelligent or not? Whoa, I just said something super smart. Am I awesome, or what?” Kaede said.

Midori patted Kaede on the head as she finished talking with a look of surprise on her face. “That’s certainly true. Either way, there’s no question that the Suiju have been looking into us.”

“They used us, and infected even more people in Dayland... but what reason do they have to bother coming out into Dayland in the first place?”

“Sleepwalkers get in the way in Nightland, so they think they’ve outwitted us this way, or something...? That’s just a guess, though.”

“This has become a problem. At this rate, there’s going to be an explosive outbreak of Suiju in Dayland and we’re going to be at the center of it,” Ran said with a deep sigh. “In Dayland, there’s nothing we can do about the Suiju. But, that said, if we Sleepwalk, they’ll seize control and the infection will spread.”

“Then... does that mean there’s nothing we can do?” Saya plopped herself down on the sofa.

“That’s not true, Hokage-san. You and the others were able to notice what the Suiju were doing to us in our sleep. We weren’t able to figure out why we were in bad condition before, but now things are different. If we all stay on guard, whoever notices can make the others lucid,” Midori said.

“Yeah. We know from the get-go that they’ll be trying to trick us.” Saya nodded.

“Let’s do this thing!” Kaede passionately exclaimed. “I hate that they’ve gotten away with this so far.”

While Saya and the others were talking, Hitsuji had just been sitting there hugging a cushion, her eyes on Saya. Unable to handle the awkwardness any longer, Saya turned the conversation to her. “Do you have anything to add, Hitsuji?”

“Huh?” Hitsuji blinked like a student who’d been called on by the teacher while dozing off in class. “Oh, uh, nothing really.”

“Are you okay, Konparu-san?” Ran looked dubiously at Hitsuji’s face.

“Sorry, I was a bit out of it.”

“Keep yourself together, Hitsuji,” Saya said.

Ran smiled. “You’ve gotten awfully close with Konparu-san, haven’t you?”

“Huh?”

“Her name,” Ran said. “Hokage-san, you were so stubborn about calling her Konparu-san before, so when did you end up using her first name instead?”

“Oh...” Saya was taken aback by the unexpected call out. She hadn’t been conscious of it at all, nor could she remember when she’d started doing it. When she looked in Hitsuji’s direction, Hitsuji averted her eyes. Had she been acting overly familiar? It looked like she still hadn’t been forgiven for kissing her when she was still sleep-addled the first time they met.

While Saya was feeling awkward, Kaede slapped her on the back. “It’s good to get along. Sayacchi’s always been holding back. Right, Hitsujicchi?”

“...Maybe,” Hitsuji whispered curtly.

Ran downed the rest of her tea and then stood up.

“Okay. Let’s go, then. It’s open season on Suiju.”

14

While I was lying in bed, Mom called from downstairs. She was going to go see my grandmother in the hospital, so she wanted me to drive with her.

It was a pain, but my grades had been less than stellar of late, so I wasn’t in a good position to refuse. In any case, it wasn’t like I was doing anything I couldn’t walk away from at the moment, so I dragged myself downstairs, and left the house with Mom. I went into the garage, got in the car, turned the key in the ignition, somehow managed to get out onto the street without hitting anything, and drove towards town.

I quickly regretted it. I didn’t have a license, after all.

Why in the world had I told her I would drive? I was going to crash, and crash hard. There was no way I wouldn’t. With a frightened grip on the wheel, I drove along, swerving occasionally, as I did my best to imitate the other drivers on the road. I could just barely understand the brakes and the accelerator, but I had no grasp for exactly how much force to put into either. I’d think I was stepping lightly on the gas, only to go far faster than I’d ever expected, and then when I hurriedly pressed the brake we screeched to a stop. The way I was driving was terribly awkward, and I could tell the cars around me were bothered by it.

While I was busy breaking into an unpleasant sweat, we headed onto a bridge over a river. The bridge was congested with traffic, and there were a lot of cars separated into a number of lanes slowly progressing across it.

That’s when my driving finally fell apart.

In a situation with cars both ahead of and behind me, with nowhere to go, I stepped down on the accelerator too hard. I panicked, and spun the wheel. That spared me from a collision with the car in front, but I rammed into the bridge’s railing instead.

That I didn’t do it at high speed was a small saving grace, but the engine stopped, and the car stopped moving entirely. More and more cars stopped behind me, creating a traffic jam, and I could only watch on with a feeling of despair.

It started to rain lightly. The layer of water running across the windshield blurred the scenery outside as I watched.

I heard the rear door closing. Looking in the rear-view mirror, there was no sign of my mother, who should have been riding in the back. In the rain-blurred scenery outside the vehicle I could see a familiar silhouette getting further and further away. She must have gotten out because she was angry at me for crashing.

While I was listening to the sound of the rain on the car’s body, feeling lonely and in a dazed lonely stupor, there was a sudden hurried knocking on the window right beside my face.

When I turned to look in shock, a fist hit the glass again, right in front of my eyes. Knock, knock, knock! When I recoiled in fear, this time it wasn’t a fist, but a metal tool—a long wrench meant for tightening the nuts on the wheels—which slammed into the window. The glass shattered, and I covered my face without meaning to.

“Saya! This is a dream!”

I was relieved when I saw the face that popped in through the hole in the glass: it was Hitsuji standing outside the car. Without waiting for my reply, she went about using the wrench to remove what glass had remained after the shattering. Like I was coming up out of the water, my consciousness cleared rapidly.

Hitsuji looked at me right in the eye. “Hurry and get out. It’s dangerous here.”

Maybe it was because of the force of the impact, but the door was warped and wouldn’t open. I wriggled my way out through the broken driver’s seat window instead.

I fell to the road where shards of glass were scattered and then stood up, brushing my hair back behind my ear. “Hitsuji, what a coincidence. Fancy meeting you in a place like this.”

“Come on, get it together. If you aren’t lucid, we’re going to have problems.”

Her angry face was adorable, too. I wanted to hug her. Just as I was about to do so, a steam whistle sounded somewhere.

From beyond the girders of the bridge, through the curtain of rain, there was a massive, many-decked luxury cruise liner approaching. The ship was coming straight for the packed bridge.

With no sign of it attempting to stop, the prow finally made contact. There was an ear-rending screech of metal as the bridge broke and cars poured out of the open gash one after another and fell.

The ground at my feet rapidly tilted, and both my body and Hitsuji’s started to slide along the asphalt, too. Before there was any time to respond, we were cast out into the air, the black surface of the water fast approaching.

There was an intense splash, and a shadow the size of a whale jumped out of the river. Looking like what you might get if you combined a nuclear submarine with a person, it was Kaede in mermaid form. She caught us with her chest. “You awake?” she asked.

“Clearly not.”

When Kaede opened her mouth wide to laugh at what I said, shark-like teeth peeked out from inside.

The luxury cruise liner, which was still going, finally bisected the bridge. The bridge should have been made from a steel frame, but it was as cheap as crafts made with wooden chopsticks and it kept falling to pieces. The train up on top of the bridge had lost its detail, too, and now it just looked like a wad of scrap paper. When I saw all the little legs coming out of it flailing around, it finally hit me that it had been a swarm of Suiju.

Ran and Midori flew in from the air, setting down on Kaede’s shoulders. Ran looked around to each of us. “Everyone’s lucid, right? Pay attention to what the others say. If someone’s acting weird, raise the alert immediately. There’s no question the Suiju are trying to cripple our minds.”

“As a general rule, I’ll be monitoring everyone, but it’s highly likely I’ll be affected myself without realizing it. So... while I’m sorry to have to ask this of you, please subtly check on me occasionally, too...” Midori added.

“Gotcha. So, what do we do from here?” Hitsuji asked.

“Let’s search for where the Suiju are coming from,” I replied. “They’re appearing somewhere, and heading to Dayland through our sleep. We find where that is, and crush it.”

Leaving the bridge to collapse and fall into the river, we made landfall on the shore of the river. A swarm of car-like Suiju kept coming in from somewhere, and they stopped where the bridge had once been. With the traffic congestion getting worse, the Suiju up front started to get pushed and fall in.

“It’s gonna be a real pain in the butt taking them all out, huh,” Kaede said with a troubled look as she transformed into a four-legged centaur-like creature. She created a long lance out of the void, and started poking at the swarm of Suiju, but there was no end to them.

Ran clambered up onto Kaede’s back. “Let’s leave them for now. I think it would be a bad idea to let them take up our time here. We have to figure out where these guys came from, and eliminate the source of the flow, or it won’t matter how many we kill.”

“I agree. So long as we remain lucid, the Suiju can’t get into Dayland. Conversely, if we’re drowning in our dreams, our sleep will become a passage to Dayland,” Midori said.

“Uh, hey, if we get too obsessed with hunting Suiju, could that make us lose lucidity...?” When I interjected, Midori looked up, seemingly taken aback.

“That could be possible. The act of hunting Suiju might itself have been a trap to make Sleepwalkers indulge in their dreams...”

Hitsuji cocked her head to the side. “Wait, do you mean we’ve been caught in their trap for a long time now?”

“I’d prefer not to think so. It was just recently that the Suiju changed how they acted, too.”

“Hey, hey, do we have time for idle chit-chat like this? If we’re gonna find where the Suiju are coming from, shouldn’t we get moving?” Kaede said impatiently.

“You have a point. Let’s go. Don’t split up too much... We should probably stick close together.”

“You can ride on me. I’ll carry you!”

When Kaede took off running on four legs, I hurriedly jumped on her, too. The metal plating that had carried over from when she was half-submarine was, kindly enough, outfitted with ladders and handrails.

With the four of us on her back, Kaede raced across the asphalt. When Suiju came at her sometimes she avoided them, while others she stabbed them with her spear, or trampled them under her mechanical hooves as she ran towards the interior lands of Nightland.

There was a single road, atop the reddish brown soil, in a wasteland with scattered patches of dried grass, stretching on forever. Every once in a while a swarm of Suiju walked toward us from the other side, passed by, and vanished into the distance.

Eventually, the once straight road began to twist and turn. The slope of the ground grew more difficult, rising and falling, forming big waves. The number of trees in the area went up, and the next thing we knew we were racing through a deep forest.

Up on Kaede’s back, we were sitting around a tea set. Midori brought a cup to her lips and frowned.

“It’s no good, after all. There’s no flavor.”

“When did you make that...? Sakaimori-san, are you okay? Are you lucid?”

“Sorry, I am lucid. I thought the flavor would let me know I was in a dream.”

“Oh, I see.”

“You can have some, too, if you’d like, Hokage-san.”

“Nah, I’m good. Even if I know it’s a dream, drinking stuff makes me want to go to the washroom.”

“Oh, that happens to me, too,” Ran enthusiastically agreed. “It doesn’t taste like anything, so I don’t know what makes my bladder think it can make me want to go to the bathroom. It’s not fair.”

“I feel you. Any time there’s a toilet in my dreams, I get tense. Even in Dayland, there are times I get confused. It’s scary.”

Maybe it was because Hitsuji said that with a straight face, but Kaede got uneasy. “Whoa, don’t any of you go wetting yourselves on my back, okay?!” she shouted.

The way she sounded genuinely worried about it made us all laugh.

“You’ve never experienced anything like that, Kaede?”

“I always transform when I’m Sleepwalking, so I can tell it’s a dream. If you’d all do it, too, you wouldn’t wet the bed.”

“We’re just not as good at transforming as you, Kaede.”

“You all lack imagination.”

While Kaede puffed her chest up with pride, Hitsuji pursed her lips. That pouty face was so adorable I couldn’t help but interject.

“Hitsuji, I won’t laugh at you even if you do wet the bed.”

I nailed it. That was a cool line, if I do say so myself...

Or so I thought, but then I realized Hitsuji was squinting her eyes and scrutinizing me.

“Hey, I’m pretty sure she’s not lucid right now.”

“Hasn’t she always been like this?” Midori asked.

“Sayacchi’s always been this kind of girl, hasn’t she?”

“I think Hokage-san acts weird any time she’s around Konparu-san.”

Hearing them assess me, I wasn’t sure what they meant, but it was kind of embarrassing, so I scratched my head. “Aw, c’mon. Don’t compliment me so much. It’s embarrassing.”

“Ah! I knew she was no good! Hold her down!”

“Hold on! Don’t fight on my back!”

The tea in our dreams had no flavor, but the forehead flicks in our dreams hurt like crazy. It got me lucid, sure, but it wasn’t fair.

Beneath a sky full of bright stars, lucid and causing a ruckus, we continued down the twisting path. Into the inner lands of the dream, towards the Suiju’s nest... After each and every one of us had started to lose lucidity three or four times, we finally reached our destination.

In the forest, there was a slope that formed the shape of a mortar and a spring at the bottom of it. If you squinted through the trembling of the water, there was an egg that appeared to be made of hewed crystal. The egg shone from within, and the diffused reflection of that glimmer took form on top of the water, rising out of the spring as a variety of Suiju. Big ones, small ones, pretty ones, ugly ones. The Suiju crawled up the slope with awkward movements, setting out on the long road to Dayland.

“This is... a Suiju nest,” Ran whispered. For a while, we stared, entranced, at the spring. “So this was how they work.”

“You mean Suiju are born from that egg?” Kaede asked.

“That’s how it looks, but... Does it actually work the way it looks like?”

“Phenomena in Nightland often work differently than they appear to, but we can at least be sure that the Suiju are coming out of there,” Ran explained.

“Okay, so we just bust them up and we’re good, right?” Kaede let out the growl of a carnivorous beast. It seemed certain that the one with the most direct grudge against the Suiju was Kaede.

This was when I finally noticed Hitsuji had been keeping quiet. When I looked beside me, she was leaning so far off Kaede’s back it looked like she might fall, staring intently at the spring.

“Hitsuji? That’s dangerous.”

When I went to hug her close from behind, Hitsuji suddenly spoke up. “That’s it.”

“Huh?”

“I’ve... been looking for those.”

In that moment, my head was filled with a burst of memory.

The egg! Right! That was the egg Hitsuji had been searching Nightland for all this time!

Even though I had been so desperate to make everyone remember, at some point I had forgotten about them myself. Though that fact shocked me, I tried to warn everyone. “Hey, everyone, it’s the thing! The thing I kept bringing up!”

“I just remembered, too...” Ran said, sounding bewildered.

“Me, too. I think we’ve been doing the same sort of thing over and over,” Kaede added.

“It’s the same for me... Why? We should be lucid now,” said Midori.

“This memory is weird. It’s like someone’s trying to hide it. No matter how many times we try to remember, we forget.” While saying that, I looked back down and every hair in my body stood on end. The Suiju that showed no sign of recognizing us before all stopped where they were, focusing their attentions on us. The atmosphere around the spring under the moonlight, something I would even have called beautiful, changed to become tense in an instant.

“Anyway, it seems we’ve found what we’re after,” Ran said. Without taking our eyes off the Suiju, we jumped off Kaede’s back and down to the ground. “If we destroy that, we may be able to exterminate all the Suiju. Let’s take it out before we forget again.”

“Okay, let’s do this.” With a loud whooshing sound, a hatch opened up in Kaede’s back. Missile after missile launched out of it, raining down on the Suiju from above.

In the time it took them to touch down, we prepared to fight, too. Ran rode on a black lion, Midori on a polar bear, and I on an antelope with heads on the front and back of its body. Hitsuji was the only one to remain on foot, using her usual outfit with the golden gauntlets.

“Charge!” Ran raised her saber and shouted.

We rushed down the hill, slamming into the horde of Suiju. Everyone was shouting. I was firing wildly with an elephant gun as we headed for the spring, too.

With chunks of Suiju flying around like a storm, Hitsuji was the first to reach the spring. With no sign of fear, she stepped into the water, heading for the crystal egg. The Suiju that had just been born were pummeled by the golden gauntlets and blasted to smithereens.

Hitsuji’s hands lifted the egg from the water. The egg she was holding aloft in both hands began to shine even more intensely the moment it touched the air. Feeling a sense of urgency at the way Hitsuji was staring at it, as if entranced, I shouted. “Hitsuji! Smash it!”

Hitsuji had spaced out for a brief moment, but her eyes regained focus. I kept pulling the trigger to keep the Suiju that were pressing in from all sides from reaching Hitsuji. For just one brief moment, Hitsuji’s eyes met mine. Hitsuji nodded, squeezing down with both hands.

The egg was crushed, and yet more light leaked out. My vision went all white, and my consciousness rapidly grew distant—

There was a bed which spread out, with no gaps, as far as the eye could see. The sea of sheets continued all the way from my feet to the horizon. In it lay countless people. Some in pajamas, some naked, some wearing eye masks, some tied up, some covered in blood... There were people of all ages, of many races, in many positions, wearing many different outfits, but all of them, without exception, were lying down and sleeping.

Right next to me lay Ran, Kaede, and Midori. Looking a little further away, I could see some familiar faces here and there. My classmates from school, the teacher, and my parents and sister.

There was a low buzz from many people’s snores, their mumbling, and their unintelligible groans filling the air. In the middle of a scene that resembled all of humanity sleeping, Hitsuji and I were the only ones standing there, awake.

“Hitsuji, what happened here?” I asked.

“I dunno... Where is this? Nightland, right?” Hitsuji replied in a daze.

There was no way I could know that. Above us was the sky of Nightland where the moon and stars shone brightly, but I had never seen a place like this before on any Sleepwalk.

“Aizome-senpai... Kaede... Midori!” I called their names and tried shaking them, but no one woke up.

“Hey, Saya. What do you think that is?”

When I looked up in response to Hitsuji’s voice, at some point a corner of the sky had been blotted out by something big and black. Was it a Suiju? Its full form was impossible to make out, but a long, twisting, flexible structure like an elephant’s trunk was dangling from the darkness towards the ground.

Each time that nose passed through the air above one of the sleeping people, I realized it was sucking up something shiny. They looked like the Suiju egg that had been in the spring before.

When the nose approached us, there was a change in Ran, Kaede, and Midori. Unlike the people sleeping around them, concrete images were sucked out of each of them. A flying ship, a sparkling magical sword, a procession of camels, a fleet of paper airplanes, a rocket thrust into the moon, flowers of every color, students taking a class, a snow-covered mountain... These disjointed visions arose, and then were sucked up—as if being attacked with a vacuum cleaner—and vanished.

Instinctively, I thought this was bad. I didn’t have any clue what was going on, but something clearly not good was happening here. I let out an unintelligible shout, then did what I could to stop the harvesting of images. The moment I did, I was struck by a bizarre sensation, and I gasped. The gun I had to create on the spot, and the beast that was a manifestation of my hostility were torn from me before they could fully take shape.

It wasn’t just me, Hitsuji was screaming, too.

“Saya! Saya, help—They’re taking everything away!”

Doing my best to at least hold the frightened Hitsuji tight, I—

15

The five sat bolt upright, each screaming something incomprehensible.

“Ahh! Ahhhh!”

“Wh... What happened?!”

“I-I don’t understand. The dream suddenly ended, like it was shut down...” Ran said several minutes after the panic had passed and she was finally able to talk again. “What happened to the Suiju? Was anyone able to see it through to the end?”

They all shook their heads.

“I remember we smashed the egg. But only up to there...” Ran’s face was stiff as she thought about it, but eventually she looked up. “Let’s go again.”

“Can’t we rest? My head’s feeling kinda fuzzy...” Kaede said with a dull look on her face, but Ran shook her head.

“We have to figure out what happened. Once we’ve confirmed the situation, we’ll come right back.”

Saya pressed on her temples and shut her eyes tight. It felt like she’d taken an awful lot of damage, but she had no idea where she’d been hurt, or how. Looking down to where she felt a tug on her clothes, Hitsuji was looking unusually forlorn as she pulled at Saya’s sleeve. When Saya lovingly reached out and grasped her hand, Hitsuji squeezed hers back.

The five of them laid down again in a bed still damp with the sweat they had shed while sleeping in it. Even if their Sleepwalk was interrupted, if they resumed it immediately, they could enter the same dream. Saya knew this from experience.

The blanket of drowsiness Hitsuji unleashed wrapped around them all, soothing their heightened nerves, and the five resumed their Sleepwalk to the spring from before.

We woke up in bed.

Heavy clouds looked down on us from outside the warehouse’s skylight.

“Huh? What happened?”

“I thought we went on another Sleepwalk...”

We looked at one another in bewilderment. It looked like something had stirred us; Ran let out a sigh of resignation.

“Looks like it’s not going to work today... I guess that’s that.”

“Let’s rest a little. I’ll make tea now.” Midori was the first to rise from the bed, rushing off to the kitchen.

Not long after, the water had risen to a boil, and the scent of coffee filled the air. Holding our still sleep-addled heads, we sat around the sofa like usual.

“I bought guimauves for today.”

“Wow, fancy.”

“Are they fancy?”

“They were in style a number of years back.”

With the colorful marshmallow cubes laid out on the plate in front of me, I started to cheer up a bit. Midori poured coffee into each of our mugs.

“Okay, everyone—” Having picked up a guimauve as she spoke and carried it to her mouth, Midori stopped still.

Her eyes went wide like she had seen something terrifying, and she was frozen stiff. Noticing something was off, Ran tried talking to her.

“Midori...?”

In a dumbfounded tone of voice, Midori whispered: “It has... no taste.”

With those words, the guimauves on the plate turned to sand and collapsed.

We stood up in shock, and around us the tall shelves that surrounded the bedroom began to shake and the rows of boxes all immediately burst open.

From beyond the shelves, evil bugs with lots of eyes, legs, and poisonous mandibles appeared, and they began to tear us to shreds.

From the ceiling the great face of some unknown person peered in, watching us expressionlessly as we screamed.

16

“Where are you going, Saya?”

Hearing someone call after her as she put on her shoes and was about to leave the house, Saya turned to look back. It was Aya in her tracksuit, leaning against the wall, looking at her listlessly. There were terrible bags under her eyes, and her hair was a mess.

“Onee-chan... You okay?”

“Not at all. You?”

When Saya shook her head, Aya let out an exhausted sigh.

“I never really appreciated how bad you had it. This is how bad it is not being able to sleep, huh?”

Saya just nodded.

It had been days now since her sister was afflicted with insomnia. It wasn’t just Aya—her parents had, too. It seemed that for the time being, they could force themselves to sleep for a few hours with sleeping pills, but their effectiveness seemed to be gradually weakening.

“Where are you going?” Aya asked.

“I’m gonna go see my friends.”

“Ohh, the Napping Club, was it? Are they all managing to sleep?”

“Uh... Not so much lately.” When Saya gave a sort of evasive answer, Aya gave her a vague nod.

“I sympathize. Seriously. I hope you can all get some good sleep.”

“Yeah.”

“If you’re heading out, be careful. You’re out of it from the lack of sleep, too,” Aya said, then turned to leave. Saya could vaguely make out the indistinct outline of a Suiju from her neck to her shoulders. Saya guiltily averted her eyes, opening the door to go out.

Dream Impoverishment—Midori had told her there was a term like that.

It referred to the state of being unable to remember dreams when one woke. Ever since becoming a Sleepwalker, she had remembered the dreams she was lucid in clearly, but now she hardly remembered a single thing they did in Nightland.

At the same time, she was also struck by an intense sense of déjà vu. The barely lingering scraps of dreams she remembered would make her feel that she must have experienced the same things before, and it was common that as she tried to escape the loop in which she was trapped, she would wake up.

It was also becoming more and more common for her to get confused as to whether she was in Nightland or Dayland. She might be walking through the school when she kicked off the ground in an attempt to fly, only to land flat on her face, or unconsciously start trying to cross a busy street. Because she had repeatedly had chilling experiences like that, she had developed a habit of pulling on her fingers all the time.

While trying to encourage each other, the five of them had tried Sleepwalking a number of times, but the situation only got worse.

“We’ve been cast out of sleep...”

Those words Ran mumbled were an apt representation of the current situation. Their Sleepwalking abilities had fallen to pieces, as if afflicted by an infection. Hitsuji’s Blanket was unstable, knocking out her companions in situations where she didn’t intend for it to. Kaede couldn’t control her transformations, and she would turn into unsightly monstrosities that caused both her and the others to panic.

Worse yet, even their normal sleep had been eaten away at. They had completely lost control of their dreams, and it was nothing short of terrifying for them to enter Nightland with their memories unstable. They had simply returned to dreaming normally without lucidity, but having experienced life as Sleepwalkers, it was an unbearable experience.

To top it all off, number of Suiju overflowing into Dayland was gradually increasing. Saya would spot the Suiju wandering about in open daylight and possessing those who passed by whether she wanted to or not. The number of people around her who experienced Suiju-induced sleep disorders was increasing proportionately, too. At home and at school, there was nothing but people possessed by Suiju. They stumbled around, bags under their eyes, some suddenly collapsing and falling asleep, while others would see nightmares and scream... The explosive outbreak they had feared had begun. The Suiju invasion of Dayland was rapidly progressing, and this town was at ground zero.

Saya and the others had been set up; as time went by, her suspicion of that grew deeper. The Suiju used their curiosity about the Egg as bait, leading Saya and the others to open a pathway to Dayland. Even the fact that their memories of the Egg became vague was most likely a trick to catch their interest. No one had thought the Suiju could think like that. They’d completely outwitted Saya and the others.

Whenever she went out, like it or not, she was forced to confront the reality they themselves had brought about. But even if she stayed in the house, her sense of guilt was agitated by seeing her family suffering with insomnia. When she finally couldn’t take it anymore, Saya went outside, hanging her head and walking in silence. She visited Sakaimori Bed & Bedding for the first time in a long time.

No one was in the warehouse. She heard nothing but her own footsteps, the dust dancing transiently in the light that poured in from the skylight.

It was like the first time she came here.

The king-size bed laid out in the middle of the bedroom had been left as it was when they last used it, the sheets and blankets wrinkled.

If someone else were here, she thought that might help assuage her feelings, but she had guessed wrong. Now that their success with Sleepwalking had fallen off entirely, their spirits were broken and no one came here anymore.

She collapsed on the large bed.

What was going to happen now...? While she lay there silently in the warehouse, still burdened with her insecurities, she suddenly sensed a presence.

Clop, clop. Clop, clop. The sound of something hard on the floor. Not shoes... hooves.

The hooded man riding the goat appeared from between the shelves.

“We meet again, Neversleeper.”

“This is... a dream?”

“Is this dream or reality? Whichever it is, all will become a dream soon. They set you all up.”

The man pulled on the reins when he was in front of the bed, turning to face Saya.

“The Suiju have done this many times. Luring Sleepwalkers into a trap, and turning Dayland to Nightland. That which had been reality turned to dream, and a new Dayland began as if nothing had ever happened. Thus, the Sleepwalkers turned to dreams, too, and vanished. Just as we once did. And as, at this very moment, you are all in the process of doing.”

“Then... You’re a Sleepwalker, too?”

The man nodded his hooded head.

“In my Dayland, I was a member of the CIA’s Dreamwatchers unit. Our team, GOAT, cooperated with Dreamerwatchers around the world, working to chase down the Suiju as an organization. However... That fact no longer exists— it became a dream and vanished. My entire team is gone, too. I’m no more than a lingering fragment of a dream, wandering Nightland. And so, you people will be the next to go through the same.”

“We’ll be... made into dreams, too?”

“Yes. But there is a factor in play for you that wasn’t for us. It may become your last hope.”

“What?”

“You, Neversleeper.”

The man reached out his from where he sat in the saddle, pointing at Saya.

“You alone can maintain your sanity when insomnia lasts too long. So, too, can you alone see the Suiju that have appeared in Dayland. In short, you are able to exist in both Dayland and Nightland at the same time.”

“Even if that’s true... What do you want me to do about it? How am I supposed to stop what’s happening now?”

“No one shall sleep,” the goat-rider whispered cryptically in response to Saya’s irritation.

“Hokage-san?” Saya came to when Midori called her name.

When she sat up in bed, Midori was looking down at Saya.

“Oh... Hey.”

“Heya, Sayacchi. How ya doing?” Kaede poked her head out from behind Midori.

“What are you two doing here?”

“I could ask you the same, Hokage-san.”

“I just thought... someone might be here if I came.”

Midori and Kaede exchanged glances, then smiled a little.

“We were thinking that, too. Right, Midori?” Kaede asked.

“Right.”

“I know we can’t Sleepwalk and all, but it felt so lonely not being able to see everyone.”

“Have a seat on the sofa. I’ll make tea.”

At Midori’s urging, Saya stood up. She looked around, but the goat rider was nowhere to be found.

Well, of course not. There’s no way that was real. While she was trying to refocus herself, Saya’s eyes were drawn to the floor. Next to the bed, there were four small indentations gouged into surface of the concrete that looked like hoof marks.

“Sakaimori-san... Were those always there?”

When Saya pointed at them, Midori turned around to look, then furrowed her brow.

“I’m not sure. They look like marks left by a pallet... Was there something about them?”

Marks left by a pallet? Now that she said that, it certainly did look like that’s what they might be. It was a more logical explanation than to think a man riding a goat had been there. But...

Saya went over the earlier experience in her head. For some time now, likely due to Suiju interference, Saya and the rest of the group had been unable to bring back memories from Nightland, but she had been left with an awfully clear recollection this time.

The words that man had spoken stuck in her head.

“...No one shall sleep.”

Saya’s mumblings got an unexpected response.

“Is that Turandot?”

When she looked up, Ran had appeared from between the shelves, sitting down on the sofa like everything was perfectly normal.

“Senpai, why are you here?”

“For the same reasons as you, I suspect.”

With what almost felt like calculated timing, Midori brought out mugs and started pouring coffee.

“What’s Turandot?”

“The title of an opera. Long ago, Princess Turandot of China is given a riddle by a prince. If she can’t guess his name by sunrise, she must marry him, but if she does, he will give up on the marriage and offer up his life. That’s where the princess proclaims to the people of her country: until they discover the prince’s name, no one shall sleep.”

“Huh? Harsh much?!” Kaede raised her voice in criticism.

“It is harsh, isn’t it? I can understand her not wanting to get married, though.”

“What a slave driver. Like, it has nothing to do with the people.”

“The people... huh,” Saya mumbled to herself, looking at the one mug on the table that remained empty. Hitsuji’s mug. “Do you think Hitsuji will come?”

“I... don’t think she’ll be coming.” Ran said.

“Why is that?”

“Her Blanket ability has always been too powerful. When Hitsuji sleeps, whether she means for them to or not, the people around her fall asleep, too. That’s why she was choosing deserted places to sleep before, but now it’s gotten so strong that little tricks like that aren’t enough anymore.”

Kaede chimed in, “I was worried about Hitsujicchi, too, so I tried going to her house, but it was no good. Even getting close was risky.”

“Risky how?”

“You get sleepy. It’s totally nuts. Her range has expanded, so it’s really dangerous. The only way someone could get close to Hitsujicchi and take it would be if they were a Neversleeper like you, Sayacchi.”

While she listened, internally, Saya was shocked. Hitsuji had never said a word of this to her.

“Hokage-san, could you go check on her later?” Ran asked. Saya didn’t respond.

“Hokage-san?”

“Huh? Ohh, sorry... Listen, I have a question. Just how far can Hitsuji’s blanket ability stretch?”

“Konparu-san is always suppressing it, but if she wanted to... I can’t imagine how far she might be able to spread it.”

“Oh, yeah...?”

As Saya thought about it, the other three looked at her dubiously. Eventually, Saya raised her head. “I have an idea—Will you hear me out?”

17

When she opened the front door to greet Saya, Hitsuji had bags under her eyes, making it clear as day that she had not been getting proper sleep.

“Whoa. Your face looks awful.” Saya said, prompting an angry look to appear on Hitsuji’s face.

“What do you want?”

“I’ve got something to discuss. Can I come in?”

“...You can.”

Though she acted suspicious, Hitsuji invited Saya inside. The house was silent, with no sign of anyone but the two of them.

“You’re alone?”

“Yeah. My parents evacuated to my grandparents’ place. Because, of course... being my parents, they’re well aware of my sleepy, sleepy powers. I’m enjoying the single life, now.”

“Oh, I see... My family, on the other hand, are all suffering from insomnia. Come over and play sometime. For their sake.”

“I’d be fine with that, but it’s the getting there that’s the problem. When I’m walking down the road, passing drivers fall asleep at the wheel.” As she spoke, Hitsuji cocked her head to the side and scrutinized Saya. “...You’re not sleepy, Saya?”

“I’m super sleepy. But I can still take it.”

Even as she said that, a yawn slipped out. If Saya was like this despite her resistance, someone who wasn’t a Neversleeper wouldn’t have lasted thirty seconds.

“Hmm. Well, don’t push yourself too hard.”

“I know that... Fwah.”

When they entered Hitsuji’s room, she was met by the gazes of stuffed animals lined up on Hitsuji’s bed.

“Just sit wherever,” Hitsuji said curtly, sitting down on the chair at her desk. When Saya tried to sit on the floor, Hitsuji pointed to the bed.

“You sure?”

“I’ll give you special permission. I’ll even let you hug just one of my stuffed animals, too.”

“Okay. Well... Don’t mind if I do.” Saya sat down on Hitsuji’s bed and hugged a big owl. The soft terrycloth smelled just like Hitsuji.

“So, what did you want to talk about?”

“Before that, why didn’t you tell me?”

“Hm?”

“That your Blanket ability had gotten so strong you couldn’t go outside. When I found out everyone but me knew, it was a real shock.”

“I didn’t want to make you worry any more than I had to.”

“That’s being way too distant! Okay, maybe if this was back when we’d just met, I could have accepted it, but now... we’re already... well, you know! Am I wrong? Was I the only one who felt that way?!”

“That’s... got nothing to do with this.”

“It does, too! This plan... if no one had told me, I could never have come up with it!”

“What plan?”

“The plan that’s going to get us out of this mess. So we can take out the Suiju, and rest peacefully.”

“Oh, yeah...?”

Urged on by the dubious look Hitsuji gave her, Saya began to explain her idea.

“For all this time up until now, you’ve been leading me to sleep, right? I was wondering what’d happen if we tried the opposite.”

“Hm? So, basically... What does that mean?”

“Instead of having you sleep at my side, I sleep at yours. Basically, I act as your Blanket.”

“And what happens then?

“We can make everyone but us insomniacs.”

“Huh?” Hitsuji blinked. “Erm... First off, aren’t they kind of turning out that way already?”

“It’s not enough. We’ll take even more from them. Make them completely unable to sleep. Sorry to say it, but if you call yourself an insomniac when you can still use sleep meds to get to sleep, you’re just a poser. I’ll show them what real sleeplessness is.”

While Saya rambled on quickly, Hitsuji gave her a suspicious look.

“Saya, when did you betray humanity?”

“I don’t mean forever, obviously. It’ll be temporary. Probably. Just for a little while...”

“This is already sounding dodgy.”

“You were saying all of Nightland is connected, right? If the Suiju are using humans as a medium to increase their numbers, that means they can’t survive without sleep. With humans, when there’s someone awake, someone else is asleep, and if they move from sleep to sleep they can exist forever. Normally, at least.”

“And you want to eliminate that sleep? Is that possible?”

“Not on my own. But you have your Blanket ability, don’t you? We’ll share a bit of my insomnia with everyone using your power. The only sleep left in Nightland will be mine and yours. If we do that...”

“If we do that...?”

“If there’s no one else sleeping, the Suiju have no choice but to come into our sleep, right? Then we wake up together.”

“Take them all out in one fell swoop. You’ve thought this through,” Hitsuji said in a quiet voice. Saya felt a tinge of uncertainty as she continued to string her words together.

“I mean, obviously, I question whether it’s okay to do it. We’d be affecting all of humanity. But I think we have to do it now. If we don’t, we’ll all turn to dreams...”

Hitsuji stood up and came closer. She stood next to the uncertain Saya, then sat down on the bed next to her. The mattress sank in, and their shoulders touched.

“Hitsuji?”

“Okay. Let’s do it.”

“You... You’re sure?”

“You were the one who suggested it. So, what do I do? I always go to sleep on my own, so I’ve never had someone put me to sleep before.”

Hitsuji lay on her back in bed, looking up to Saya.

“Sleep next to me, Saya.”

“Uh, o-okay.” Saya carefully lay down next to Hitsuji.

They would steal the last of humanity’s sleep, so that they could sleep soundly themselves.

18

Her heart racing with tension, it was hard to settle down to sleep. This was something she’d done countless times before, but the drowsiness just refused to come.

“...Hey, are you done yet?” Hitsuji said.

“Sorry, it’s just kinda...”

“You’re feeling tense?”

When Hitsuji said that, her voice sounded deeper than usual, and it felt gentle.

“Yeah... I wonder why. I should be able to just do it like I usually do.”

“Let’s try breathing in sync. Breathe gently. Keep an easy pace. Don’t worry about me. I’ll keep up just fine.”

“Got it. Okay... Here goes.”

Saya focused on her breathing.

Breathe in... Breathe out...

Breathe in... Breathe out...

She could hear Hitsuji breathing right beside her. Matching Saya’s breaths. Breathing in, breathing out...

In a room with the curtains drawn and the lights out, the sound of a ticking clock caught her ear. It felt like she was gradually relaxing, but there was still no drowsiness yet.

Hitsuji let out a giggle. “I don’t feel sleepy at all when you’re squirming around next to me,” she whispered in a hoarse voice.

“Sorry.”

“Why don’t you try singing a lullaby or something?”

“Whaa...”

“What do you mean, whaa? Are you serious about putting me to sleep or not?”

“I am... Just hold on a bit...”

While Saya was trying to find a way to get to sleep, Hitsuji turned on her side so she was facing her.

“Okay, then talk to me.”

“About what?”

“Like about how you feel about me.”

“What do you mean?”

Hahh, Hitsuji let out a deep sigh. “Saya, you loved me in Nightland, but not in Dayland, right?”

“Y-Yeah, I guess.”

“Is that still true?”

“Huh?”

“You’ve recently been calling me by my given name, so maybe you’ve gotten a little more familiar with me.”

“Familiar... I guess you could say that, but...” Saya trailed off.

“I’m still no good?”

“No, that’s not it. It’s the opposite—Ah! No.”

“The opposite...?” Not meaning to tease the flustered Saya, Hitsuji spoke softly. Saya let out a little sigh and confessed.

“I know I’m probably going to weird you out when I say this, but...”

“Mm-hm.”

“I don’t know when it started... My feelings for you, the gap for them in Nightland and Dayland’s been disappearing.”

“Mm-hm.”

“It seems like... I love you now, too.” The moment she spoke the words, she felt a rush of regret. “Ahh! Hold on, wait. That’s not it. That’s not what I came here to talk to you about. Sorry, just forget I said that.”

“As if I’d ever forget. I’m thrilled.” Hitsuji’s tone was unexpectedly warm.

“B-But, Hitsuji, you’re... you know, you only like me in Nightland, right?”

“Nuh-uh. From the very beginning, I loved you whether it was in Nightland or Dayland.”

“Wha?!”

Saya sat bolt upright despite herself, while Hitsuji stayed horizontal and looked up at her.

“...From the beginning?”

“Ever since you suddenly appeared in front of me in the health room, I’ve always felt that way.”

“Huh? Huh? But...”

You were the one who suddenly showed up, Hitsuji, Saya wanted to say that in response, but her mouth refused to form proper words. Hitsuji, meanwhile, carried on.

“I’ve never once said I don’t love you in Dayland.”

“No way...”

Looking up at a dazed Saya, Hitsuji giggled.

“You’re so heartless. Just because you only loved me in Nightland, I bet you assumed I had to be the same way.”

“...No fair.”

“I’m not being unfair. You just misunderstood. Don’t try to make it anyone else’s fault.” Hitsuji placed her hand on Saya’s back, the former utterly speechless. “I wanted to tell you someday. I’m glad I could... Because you opened up to me, I was able to muster the courage to do so. Thank you.”

“N-No, I sh-should thank you..”

“Pull yourself together. You’re barely coherent,” Hitsuji said in amusement. Saya was hooked into laughing at herself, too. Laying back in the bed again, they looked at one another and shared a hearty guffaw.

“Geez, be quiet. Weren’t we going to sleep here?”

“R-Right, we were. Let’s calm down.”

They tried to take deep breaths, but even having their eyes meet was enough to trigger a cascade of laughter.

“This is hopeless. Let’s lie on our backs.”

“Mm-hm.”

The two laid facing the ceiling, trying to steady their breathing.

“Fwah...” Hitsuji covered her mouth to stifle a yawn. It was infectious, and Saya let out an even bigger yawn.

“...Haww. You getting tired?”

“Now that I’ve said what I wanted to, maybe it’s the sense of relief, but I’m suddenly feeling sleepy.”

“Me, too...”

“Don’t pass out before me, okay? You promised you’d be the one to put me to sleep.”

“I know...”

When the two of them closed their mouths and were quiet, the drowsiness gradually crept up on them.

With her eyes closed, Hitsuji whispered, “Good night, Saya.”

“Good night, Hitsuji—”

Beneath the bright night sky, atop the sheet-covered land, countless humans were sleeping.

The scene I’d seen when the crystal egg was shattered spread out before my eyes again. Was this the result of all veneer being stripped away from Nightland? There was a massive Suiju that looked like a stretched out elephant stepping over the sleeping people.

When we descended to the sheets, Hitsuji and I looked at the line of sleepers stretching off into the horizon.

“We’re... going to wake all these people up?” Hitsuji asked.

“Every last one of them, yes.”

“It looks like a lot of hard work, you know.”

“We use the power of imagination in Nightland, right? Isn’t that what all of you taught me?” I crouched down, grasping the sheet at my foot. Hitsuji grabbed the fabric beside me.

“We’ll do it on three.”

“Got it.”

“One, two...”

“Three!”

Shouting the last number together, we pulled with all our might.

“Good moooorniiiiiing!” we both shouted.

The sleeping people rolled over, one after another. Their eyes snapped open one moment, and in the next, they were gone. Their surprised faces were hilarious, and we both laughed ourselves silly.

“Everyone, get up! No more sleeping!”

Hitsuji shouted and then burst out laughing. At some point we’d grown to be the size of mountains, and we were driving the miniature people at our feet out of Nightland one after another. The massive Suiju realized something was amiss and tried to approach, but with its feet caught up in the waves of the sheets it couldn’t get close. Taking advantage of that, we kept pulling on the sheets for what seemed like forever.

How much time had passed? Eventually, we ran out of sheets. The land became a pull-out mattress, and there was not a single person left sleeping on it. We’d returned to our normal sizes, too.

In place of the vanished humans, we saw a towering wall closing in from the entire horizon. Made from countless Suiju, it was a horde larger than anything we had ever seen. The sea of sleep had dried up, so all the Suiju had poured into our sleep.

“Whoa, what a sight.” Hitsuji said in amazement. “There were that many Suiju, huh. When I think about how they’re all in our dreams, it feels kind of strange.”

“I’ll bet Nightland’s never gotten this small before, though.”

“Now if we just wake up, we can wipe out the Suiju... You’re so smart, Saya.”

“Yeah, kinda.”

“Ran, and Kaede, and Midori—Do you think we’ll all be able to Sleepwalk together again?”

“I’m sure of it.”

“Okay, well, I guess it’s about time... Let’s wake up.”

While embracing a sense of accomplishment, we tried to wake up.

“...”

“...”

“...Huh?”

Wait, how were we supposed wake up again?

19

We couldn’t wake up.

It took some time to accept that horrifying revelation.

We could jump and fly, we could pinch our cheeks and pull on our fingers, but no matter what we did, we couldn’t leave Nightland. We could only look at one another in a daze.

It was probably impossible to make Nightland disappear completely. The collective unconsciousness that connects all of humanity—if that interpretation of dreams was true, even if we expelled the rest of humanity from Nightland, the consciousnesses of those people in Dayland would not let go of Nightland. And so, we were left behind, the last two dreamers in Nightland. The price of robbing people of sleep was that we had been imprisoned in it.

It could be that just one of us might have been able to wake up. However, in that case, the other would be left behind. One of us was guaranteed to be sacrificed—it was a deadlock.

“Well, I’m beat. Guess it’s time for a double suicide,” I said out of desperation. Hitsuji thought deeply about it.

“...I understand. It’s okay.”

“No, don’t understand.”

“I mean, I wouldn’t want to wake up alone. I’d rather we disappeared together.”

“Well, yeah, I feel the same, but...”

Sitting down on the mattress, looking up at the encroaching wall of Suiju, we were at a loss for what to do for a while.

“Thinking this much is making me sleepy again.” Hitsuji tilted her head onto my shoulder. I didn’t know how long we could stay like this, so I stopped holding myself back and leaned my head against Hitsuji’s, too.

“You smell nice, huh, Hitsuji. Even in dreams.”

“You do, too, Saya. Didn’t you know?”

“I never knew. I don’t just stink of sweat?”

“Not at all. I love it.”

Hitsuji pressed her nose against my neck, making me shrink my neck into my body because it tickled.

“Hey, now.”

“It’s a relaxing smell. When you’re beside me, I feel like I can sleep really well.”

While I was at the mercy of her sniffing, I had a flash of inspiration.

“...That’s right.”

I picked up a set of sheets that was right by us, rolled into a ball. The sheets had seemed to stretch out to infinity, but now that I held them in my hands, they were a perfectly normal size.

As I stood, Hitsuji looked up at me.

“What about the double suicide?”

“We’re not doing that. Just hold on.”

I spread out the sheet on top of the mattress.

“What are we going to do?”

“Sleep.”

“Here?!”

I put my memory and imagination to work. The pillow I always used appeared in my hands. I passed that to Hitsuji, making another identical one for myself.

“Sorry to make you use my pillow, though.”

“Wait, this is your pillow?” Hitsuji hugged the pillow and sniffed it. “It is.”

“Hold on! Stop that, you’re embarrassing me.” While I was protesting despite myself, I used my imagination to produce another tool. A light summer bed cover. I put the pillow down on the mattress, laid out the bed cover, and invited Hitsuji to join me.

“Come on, we need to sleep quickly. Scary things are coming.”

“What do you mean...?”

“If you sleep during a Sleepwalk, you’ll be swallowed up by Nightland—I’m pretty sure that’s what I was told,” I said.

“Yeah.”

“It’s all or nothing. Let’s bet on that. Just maybe, like the Suiju turn Dayland to Nightland, we might be able to turn Nightland to Dayland with our Sleepwalk. This could be a double suicide, it could be an escape, but we won’t know which it is until we find out ourselves.” Taking a wide-eyed Hitsuji’s hand, I sat down on top of the covers and pet her soft hair.

“Sorry. This is about all I can think of. If you’ve got anything better, tell me.”

“No. Saya... if I’m with you, I can handle any nightmare.”

I kissed Hitsuji on the forehead. “You be the one to put me to sleep this time, Hitsuji. Like always.”

“Okay, my beloved.” Hitsuji got under the covers with me. Together in bed, the two of us side-by-side, we looked at one another. I saw myself reflected in Hitsuji’s eyes.

“Good night, Hitsuji.”

“Good night, Saya.”

When Hitsuji closed her eyes and relaxed, her Blanket immediately wrapped around me.

In the middle of this apocalyptic scene, as Suiju rushed in from all sides, we went to sleep in Nightland.

20

Hokage Aya suddenly awoke, sitting up lethargically in bed. The late afternoon sun had warmed the room to the point she was sweating, but despite that, it wasn’t that unpleasant of an awakening.

The dream she’d been having was an odd one. She was in a wide tatami room with a lot of other people, unable to get to sleep even if she tried. While she was tossing and turning as if from nightmares, even though she was already in a dream, suddenly the bedding was pulled from beneath her and she was cast out... Was that the shock that woke her up? With her vague memories growing indistinct, she was soon unable to remember.

Standing up to go wash her face, she went out into the hall. She passed by Saya’s room, but there was no sign of her little sister. Now that she thought of it, she felt like she had a hazy memory of seeing her sister’s face in that dream. It had looked like she was having fun. The way she’d been having a riot while her sister was tormented by nightmares, it was a little frustrating, but... It had been completely different from the usual taciturn impression she gave off.

Going down to the first floor, she washed her face in the washroom. Even though she hadn’t been asleep long, her head was clearer than it had been in a while. On her way back to her room, she looked towards the entrance hall. Saya’s shoes hadn’t returned yet. Come to think of it, she’d said something about going to see a friend.

The jolly laughter of Saya from the dream returned to her ears. It had been a surprising impression, but maybe that was how she acted when she was with her friends.

Aya threw on a pair of sandals and opened the front door. The mix of light purple and crimson created by the setting sun was beautiful, and for a while she remained captivated by it. A quiet evening had settled over the town. Behind Aya, there was a sound from the house. Her parents had apparently woken up, too.

I wonder if she’ll be back by dinner. Standing in the entrance hall, Aya subconsciously searched for Saya as she watched the town at twilight.

In the bedroom at Sakaimori Bed & Bedding, three people simultaneously regained consciousness.

They’d been sitting together on the sofa, and they fell asleep... Or it felt more like they’d had a momentary lapse of consciousness. Though they were surprised by the short rift in their memories, the three realized. For the first time in a while, the three had been able to sleep without resistance.

Had they done it, then? Had Saya and Hitsuji defeated the Suiju, and regained the sleep they had stolen?

The three looked to one another, nodding, and then leaned back on the sofa again. With Ran in the center, Kaede and Midori both leaned their heads against her. Closing their eyes, they went to sleep again, this time of their own volition. It was no match for Hitsuji’s power, but the feeling of security from having one’s companions nearby steadily lead them toward sleep.

They still did not know what Nightland was like now. However, if Saya and Hitsuji were still there, they had to go and get them.

Sparkling patterns danced in the darkness behind their eyelids. As they dove deeper into sleep, those patterns gradually transitioned into Nightland’s starry sky.

I woke in bed. It was quiet outside the curtained windows, and pitch dark inside the room.

Reaching out, I felt around beside me; when my fingers touched warm flesh, I was relieved.

I didn’t know what sort of place we had reached by traveling through Dayland and Nightland yet, but for now, I couldn’t sense any Suiju.

Her eyes opened, and I could feel her beginning to stir.

“...Morning.”

“Good morning.”

Even if I couldn’t see her, I knew she had smiled. Her eyes sparkled, reflecting the little light that shone in through the curtains. As if a beast in human form was lying there.