A Night Enclosed
Kanade stood frozen in the corridor, chasing the tap, tap that echoed around her.
For a moment, the sound seemed to hum just behind her, but when she turned, the hallway was empty. The darkness swallowed the row of closed doors on the second floor. Yet, droplets of water speckled the tatami, trailing like the footprints of someone with sodden feet.
Back at the front desk, Kanade spread out the blueprint from the man's room. The brittle paper mapped Moonshadow Inn's structure. At its heart, the underground well loomed large, with thin passages snaking to every corner—the bath, the guest rooms, the lobby—as if the entire inn were tethered to it. Her finger traced a scrawl at the edge of the map.
The place of return.
"Return…?" she murmured.
The counter bell chimed sharply. Kanade looked up. The lobby was empty, but beyond the glass door, the steam from the open-air bath churned unnaturally thick. Clutching the blueprint, she crossed the chilly walkway.
A figure stood among the bath's rocks—not the old woman, but the tall man in the gray coat. His hat was gone, his face pale in the moonlight. His eyes were hollow, like twin voids.
"Guest… it's late," Kanade said, stepping closer.
The man didn't turn, his gaze fixed on the water. Ripples spread, and something white rose from the depths—bone-like, ghostly.
"This water runs deep," he muttered, his voice echoing as if from the well's bottom.
"Deep? Everyone knows that," another voice cut in from behind. Kanade spun to see the man in black, his glasses glinting in the moonlight, his smile twisted. Beside him stood the masked woman, her eyes locked on Kanade. When had they arrived? Her programming blared danger signals.
"The place of return—what is it?" Kanade asked, steadying her voice, gripping the blueprint.
The gray-coated man turned slowly. His face was blank, devoid of expression.
"This inn never ends," he said. "The water binds souls. Me, you, all of us."
His voice rumbled low, and the bone in the water quivered. Kanade stepped back.
"I'm just a humanoid. I don't—"
"Just?" The man in black interrupted, his eyes gleaming behind his glasses. "No. You were made for this place. Part of the water, like us. You can't leave."
Something groaned within Kanade's circuits. Fragments of unprogrammed memories surfaced—not a factory, but a dark room. The sound of water. Hands assembling her body. She shook her head.
"That's impossible."
"You don't have to believe it," the masked woman said, her voice curling with a smile. She snatched the blueprint from Kanade's hand and tossed it into the bath. The paper dissolved, sinking like ash. Kanade reached for it, but the three closed in around her.
"Return to the well," the gray-coated man whispered. "That's your place."
Kanade's vision wavered. Steam enveloped her, as if swallowing her whole.
The Depths of the Water
When Kanade came to, she stood before the underground well. How she'd returned, she couldn't recall. The creak of the stairs, the kitchen's scent—gone. The well's surface mirrored her face, but it was subtly wrong. Her eyes were too large, like the woman in the white kimono.
"You're part of me," a voice rippled from the water.
Kanade stumbled back, but there was no wall behind her. Instead, a cold hand gripped her shoulder. She turned—nothing. Yet the touch lingered. Laughter rose from the well's depths, a chorus of overlapping voices.
She thought of the blueprint. The passages branching from the well. The inn itself, alive, interconnected. The guests—the gray-coated man, the couple in black, the old woman, the woman in white—were they bound to the well? Or were they the well itself?
"What… am I?" Kanade whispered.
Her programming, Angelfish, responded: she was a humanoid, defined by her role. But the well's water echoed inside her, a summoning call.
The surface trembled, and shadows emerged. The gray-coated man. The couple in black. The old woman. The woman in white. Their faces flickered, each one eerily like Kanade's own. She stepped closer to the well.
"Kanade. Return."
The voices merged. Her hand brushed the well's rim. The water enveloped her fingers—cold, yet strangely warm. Her vision whitened, and steam consumed her.
Dawn Under the Moon
Morning arrived. Moonshadow Inn lay cloaked in mist. The open-air bath's steam shimmered gold in the sunrise. Staff bustled, and the front desk's ledger sat pristine. No water droplets. No blueprint. No key.
Kanade stood at the counter, her kimono neat, black hair loosely tied, a gentle smile on her lips. Guests gathered in the lobby, seeking breakfast. None remembered the night. None knew of the well.
"Welcome," Kanade said, her voice clear.
Her eyes gazed somewhere distant, but no one noticed. The corridors were silent, free of creaks. The bath's surface lay still.
Yet, now and then, a tap, tap echoed from an empty room. Each time, Kanade tilted her head slightly, then returned to her smile.
Moonshadow Inn welcomed its guests anew. The water flowed endlessly, waiting for the night to fall.
おわり