🌙 Episode 21 – “The Curator Opens the Archive”

Ren Misaki wakes to the sound of humming. It’s coming from the kitchen, but it’s not a tune he recognizes. It sounds almost… reversed, like a melody being sucked into a drain. He sits up, only to freeze — there’s a shadow flickering on the wall, moving like a woman but in jittery frames, as though whoever cast it was glitching through time.

Nara is in his kitchen wearing his shirt — only his shirt — and making tea. Except she’s not pouring water into the cups. She’s pouring it onto the table, watching it pool and drip to the floor, her expression delighted.
“Do you know,” she says without turning around, “that humans think tea is for drinking? In FOLD, liquid is for remembering. You bathe the thing you don’t want to forget.” She dunks one of Ren’s textbooks into the puddle. “Now the book will remember me. And I will remember… the book.”

Ren grabs it before she can ruin another one. “Stop! You’re going to get us kicked out!”
She stares at him for three long seconds. Then, without breaking eye contact, she sticks her finger into the wet book and licks the page. “Mmm. History tastes arrogant.”

Ren can’t decide if he’s more disturbed or tired. But the day doesn’t let him choose.

That morning at school, a new student is introduced to the class — Atsuko Tange, a tall girl with severe eyes and a posture that seems more military than high school. She’s polite but distant, scanning the room like she’s evaluating threats. Ren notices her gaze linger on Nara a moment too long.

At lunch, Atsuko approaches Ren under the cherry blossoms. She doesn’t bother with small talk.
“You’re close to the transfer girl. Keep her away from the east side of the city. If you value your life.”
Ren tries to press her, but she only says, “The Rectifiers are not your only problem,” before walking away.

That night, Ren and Nara take the train home. Nara keeps staring at people, whispering questions like,
“Do you think that man would scream if I pulled his eyelashes out one by one?”
“Why is she pretending she’s not lonely? Her mouth corners keep trying to fall.”
Her questions come so fast that Ren has to keep shushing her.

Then the train jerks violently — lights flicker, the carriage plunges into darkness. An announcement crackles in a language Ren doesn’t know. A woman screams.

When the emergency lights flare, there’s someone — or something — standing at the far end of the carriage. Too tall, head tilted at an unnatural angle, clothes rippling like they’re submerged in water. It’s staring directly at Nara.

The thing speaks — not aloud, but in Ren’s skull. Return the fragment.

Nara smiles. “If you want it, you’ll have to take it from my mouth.”
And before Ren can react, she opens her mouth too wide — jaw unhinging like an animal — and a faint blue light glows in her throat.

The figure surges forward.

The episode ends mid-motion — the train lurching again, passengers screaming, Ren trying to grab Nara’s arm as she steps toward the thing, her eyes glinting with a hunger Ren has never seen before.