Chapter Text
8 oz. water.
5 ice cubes.
The first time Himeko meets Kafka, she waltzes onto the Astral Express with a story on her lips and not even the slightest desire for a drink.
"I have a story for you, darling."
The striking stranger walks right up to the bar, leaning against the solid wood countertop with a dangerous smile on her face and exhaustion in her eyes.
Himeko frowns.
This is not how it's supposed to go.
Soft jazz music filters through a phonograph in the corner of the train car that is Himeko's bar. The almost-gritty strains of the song fill the space comfortably, giving one something to grip as they come to terms with the moment of reality that stretches before them.
It helps, Himeko finds.
A modicum of familiarity in an otherwise unfamiliar world.
Most people wander into her bar by mistake, dazed and confused as they try to make sense of the marvel that is the Astral Express. Himeko offers them a comforting presence and a warm smile — or so she hopes.
They will all inevitably approach the bar. The reassuring sights of several rainbows worth of glass bottles on the shelves behind the bar and the shiny chrome of a humming espresso machine draw them in like a moth to a funeral pyre.
Not this stranger though.
There was no lost hesitation, or wary uncertainty in her steps. Every stride was quick and sure.
“What would you like to drink?” Even if things aren’t going as expected, Himeko wasn’t going to let her deviate too far from the script.
This is a bar, and there is only one reason to approach the bar.
A drink.
“Oh. No.” The woman smiles at her flirtatiously, resting her chin on her hand and her arm on the counter as she looks up at Himeko from beneath long lashes. She seems to let out a relaxed sigh of relief as she settles in at the bar; a sense of familiarity guides the way that she plucks a maraschino cherry from the container just below the bartop and pops it into her mouth, stem and all.
“No?” Himeko repeats, thrown off. Her script has flown right out the window. She can’t even bring herself to reprimand the cherry thievery in front of her.
“I’m just here with a story for you.” The woman’s tongue pokes out slightly and she reaches up to pull the cherry stem from between perfectly rosy lips. A neat little knot sits, tied in the center of the stem.
“I offer drinks in exchange for stories,” Himeko informs her, trying her best to maintain control of the situation.
“I know,” the woman sighs.
She knows?
Himeko wracks her brain, trying to search for this woman in her memories. She has certainly never met this woman on the train before, and her memories of her previous life — if you could call it that considering that she was technically already dead, were largely a grey haze. There’s no way that Himeko would have forgotten someone like the woman who stands before her.
“I’m sorry, do I know you from somewhere?” Himeko asks, puzzled. She doesn’t like the way that this woman seems to know her while Himeko knows nothing about her.
The flicker of warmth and something else in this woman’s eyes sputter out like Himeko’s words were the breath on the candle within. A polite sort of pleasantness replaces it, not unkind, per se , but guarded, like she was facing a stranger.
And they are strangers.
Right?
Himeko prides herself on being able to dissect emotions and feelings from facial expressions — a hard-learned skill after working behind the bar for so long on the Astral Express. But there’s something else in this woman’s eyes that she can’t quite read, can’t quite understand.
Sorrow, perhaps?
Himeko can’t be sure.
A lot of her patrons feel sorrowful, for sure.
Sorrow for their death; the people that they would leave behind. Sorrow for the life that they lived, or perhaps did not live.
“Sorry, how rude of me. I’m Kafka.” Kafka holds her hand out across the bar.
Himeko shakes it. Their hands linger in the warmth between their palms. It’s comforting. Most people who came through Himeko’s bar only ever reached out to her with words, never with open hands and familiarity in their gaze.
The moment stretches; thin at the edges as it swells to contain the mysteries of this moment, a moment that Himeko would replay over and over in her head like a record on the phonograph. Until the record itself would wear out, grooves ground down into nothing, Himeko would wonder.
Just a moment too long, just a lifetime too short.
“Himeko,” she says after a long moment of silence.
Kafka gives Himeko’s hand one more firm shake before letting her go. “A pleasure to meet you.”
It’s a nicety that people say, Himeko knows that much. But the way that Kafka says those words — Himeko thinks that Kafka really means it.
How strange.
How interesting.
Kafka does know where they are right? She does know that nothing will come of this moment, this chance encounter amongst thousands of others like it, right?
"Well, Kafka." Himeko says slowly, trying the name out for herself.
It’s a good name. Rolls off the tongue nicely.
A shame that she would only ever get to use it just this time.
"Let me welcome you to the Astral Express."
"Just a lifetime away," Kafka mimics in a slightly squeaky voice.
"Is that supposed to be Pom-Pom?" Himeko feels bad for smiling at the very bad imitation of the beloved and very hardworking conductor’s favourite catchphrase.
“It was,” Kafka smiles at her, clearly delighted. “Don’t tell them, they’ll come around and rip — actually maybe do tell them. I might get to-”
“Pom-Pom would never rip you a new one,” Himeko interrupts, finishing Kafka’s sentence for her. Only so much Pom-Pom slander can be tolerated here, especially given that Pom-Pom had been her very first companion on the Express, appearing on the train in a moment that seemed like a different lifetime ago.
Kafka looks like she’s about to say something else, and then shoots Himeko an apologetic half-smile. “Sorry, sorry. Right. Of course. That was rude of me. Pom-Pom is very welcoming.” There’s definitely something else on her mind.
That’s not uncommon though. Many of the people who approached the bar had something on their mind. And there is nothing like a good drink, hot or cold, alcoholic or not, to help ease the burden of such things.
Himeko strikes at the opportunity. “Pom-Pom is. Can I get you one of Pom-Pom’s favourite drinks?”
Kafka shakes her head, parrying what Himeko had thought to be a subtle push with a wry smile on her lips. “No thank you. I’m not here for a drink.”
“No?” Himeko pauses hand partway to grabbing a glass. She had been certain that she had gotten Kafka there. “You do realize this is a bar.”
“Yes.”
“We serve drinks at this bar.”
Kafka laughs.
A delightful sound.
“I’m not here for a drink. I just have a story that I want to share.”
Perhaps if Himeko wasn’t so perplexed, she would revel in the moment a little longer. Instead, she frowns.
“Hey now, no need to make that face. I’m not questioning your skills in making a drink. I’m certain they're delicious. I just don't feel particularly drinky right now,” Kafka tells her with a nonchalant shrug.
Himeko’s frown only deepens. Most people would jump at the idea of a story for a drink. In an unfamiliar setting, having something in hand, something like a drink, is comforting. It gives the anxious something to fidget with, the nervous something to sip from.
This was perhaps the last known entity on the journey into the unknown. Even the strongest willpower or the most stalwart soul was willing to share a few words of their lives for that simple comfort of a lifetime past.
“Alright, if you really don't want a drink, that's fine. But why don't you make yourself comfortable on a stool or something? Doesn't feel right for you to just stand there on your last train home.”
Himeko doesn’t actually know where the train stops and where people go when they finally disembark from the train. For all the stations that the train pulls into, she never really sees anything beyond the grey stone of the platform. Nobody else would know except the person leaving until they leave.
All she can do is stare out at the grey and hope that there’s something beyond the grey nothingness, hope that the passengers are going home.
Home, what a distant concept.
Himeko hasn't had one for as long as she can remember, constantly moving from one place to the next, searching for the next…
The next what?
She doesn't know anymore.
It's been so long.
Has she ever known?
Warring emotions flicker over Kafka's face, too quickly for Himeko to parse, like a glitch in a program, before finally settling on an unreadable expression that Himeko doesn't quite have the wherewithal to figure out.
Or perhaps she simply hasn't lived life enough to understand. Having more of her hourglass run to the steady pistons of the engine than the beat of her own heart would have that effect. Even with all the stories that she's traded for and the lives she's vicariously lived, there isn't anything in her meticulously kept memories that would perfectly colour in the Kafka-shaped blank sitting before her in a way that Himeko would connect with.
"I suppose a drink would be nice on my last train…" Kafka trails off mournfully, wistfully — almost like that last word has escaped her. Magenta eyes meet golden ones, searching, hunting, and not finding. What Kafka is looking for, Himeko doesn’t know. But quick as that moment comes, Kafka is already pivoting to other things, seemingly unwilling to linger too long there."Just surprise me with a drink. I don't want to cause you any more trouble than I've already caused.
"It's no trouble at all," Himeko quickly reassures her. Kafka's ever-shifting expressions have her on the back foot in this game that she has inadvertently started playing. But she's catching up. "What kind of drink would you like?"
Kafka shakes her head, a glint in her eye and a smirk on her lips. "I said surprise me."
Himeko huffs, frustration simmering under her skin. "You're not going to give me any preferences? Hot? Cold? Caffeinated? Alcoholic?"
"Nope!" Kafka pops the 'puh' sound obnoxiously.
Himeko considers giving her a shot of hot sauce.
No, she'd like that. Kafka seems like the kind of person to be amused by the idea of such a drink. She’d probably drink it too.
“Alright, I’ll make you a drink,” Himeko relents, placing the glass that she had reached for once before her. “Why don’t you tell me your story in the meantime?”
“ Now you want to hear my story?” The tone of Kafka’s voice is light, teasing — more reminiscent of a conversation between friends.
Another oddity. Himeko has never struck up such a candid conversation with any of the people who have come through her bar.
She shoots Kafka an increasingly fond but exasperated look.
Kafka relents with a smirk. “Have you ever heard the story of the trotter and her treasure?”
“A trotter?” Himeko doesn’t mean to sound so disbelieving. But it’s hard not to. Of all the stories that she expected from Kafka, one about trotters is not something that she expected.
Assuming, of course, that trotters still referred to the same thing that Himeko was familiar with in life — it's impossible to keep up with all the new (and old) words and terms of a universe that's always changing.
"Yes, those black and white creatures — run through a portal to escape the first chance they get."
Himeko nods. Some things, or well, at least trotters, never change.
"There was a trotter once, a lonely little creature. She wandered the universe searching for her treasure. Dedicated her whole life chasing after this one thing."
There's a musing to the way that Kafka tells the story, half-speaking to herself and half-speaking to Himeko. Though her eyes never leave Himeko's, Himeko gets the feeling that this piercing gaze is not seeing her but rather through her.
Past her.
Beyond her.
Perhaps a different person altogether. Who does Kafka see when she looks at Himeko like that?
“What was this one thing?” Himeko asks curiously.
A mysterious smile graces Kafka’s face, eyes crinkling softly at the corners. “The trotter’s treasure of course!” Kafka says as if it's the most obvious thing in the world.
“Of course, of course,” Himeko sighs, playing along. “The trotter’s treasure.” She gestures for Kafka to continue with the metal scoop she keeps on the side of the bar.
Ice cubes clink softly into the glass as Kafka strikes up her story again. “But as much as this trotter wanted this treasure, she was also just as scared. And every time that she came face to face with the treasure she sought, she ended up fleeing.”
A cowardly trotter, Himeko decides. Who would flee from the very thing that they wanted? To go through all that work, spend all that time, spend all that life, only to flee when the very thing that you wanted was standing before you?
Himeko would never, she resolves.
She hadn’t had very much life, to begin with.
She has plenty of death though.
Maybe later she’ll let March 7th paint her nails that crimson flowery shade of red that she’s always thought was too bright. What does she have to lose?
“You’re not going to ask why she was going to flee?” The rhythmic tapping of a leather-gloved hand on the wooden countertop makes Himeko look up.
She blinks, dazed for a split second. By the second blink, she’s recovered, wit intact. “I didn’t realize that this was an interactive story, Teacher Kafka.”
Kafka takes it in good fun and stride. “You know that stories are more fun when the audience is into it too.
“Well, if you so insist,” Himeko replies easily. “Why did she flee?”
She’s never gotten so involved with someone’s story before but something about Kafka draws her in. Perhaps she is the unwitting moth to the bright flare of Kafka’s flame. No, a flame doesn’t quite cut it.
Kafka is a star.
A star with her own galaxy and planets and moons. A star who travels through the universe, bound by laws of her own making and nothing else. A star with mysteries and wonder, shining distantly on the horizon.
Intriguing.
There’s nothing more that Himeko wants than to examine her and tease out the puzzles and mystery until there is nothing left for her to know. She hungers for such unknowns, brought before her all nicely bundled up in a long black coat whose sleeves seem to have not seen proper use.
Such unknowns are fascinating. The tangible ones within an arm’s reach, discoverable so long as she reaches out for it. Safer, like a carefully practiced science, underlined and bolded with predictions, and facts, and testimonies.
Galaxy-lengths worth of distance between these unknowns and the giant one outside.
(Because there’s no coming back once you step off.)
So there’s nothing that Himeko can do but study and wonder about all the things that Kafka has seen. What marvels and miracles has she witnessed? What tribulations and horrors has she experienced? What moments has she lived through?
And what brought Kafka to the Astral Express?
There’s so much to know.
There’s so much that Himeko doesn’t know.
A flash of jealousy knifes through her veins like ice.
“Because she was scared that she would never measure up to the treasure.” Kafka continues her story, blissfully unaware of the thoughts that war furiously behind golden eyes. “She would spend her whole life chasing after this treasure, but she was just a trotter. How could a trotter be worthy of such beauty?”
A trotter with a self-confidence problem.
Himeko pours water from the soda gun, filling the tall glass to the brim. Condensation beads quickly on the outside of the glass as Himeko sets the drink on a paper coaster and slides it to Kafka.
“Your drink.”
If Kafka looks surprised at Himeko’s choice of drink, she says nothing. Rather, she smiles at the sight of the tall glass. “Of course.” She does pick up the glass, lifting it up to the light like a small toast, before taking a long pull from it. The pale curve of her throat bobs slightly as she drinks, finishing off most of the glass.
“Maybe you were right,” Kafka remarks as she puts the glass back on the coaster, leaving one mouthful at the bottom. “Water is exactly what I need.”
Himeko resists the urge to say ‘I told you so’.
The sharp blast of the train whistle signals the approach of the train into the station. Bottles rattle slightly against the metal railings that secured them to the shelves as the train slows. “Careful,” Himeko says, reaching out to steady Kafka — most people, after all that has happened, are thrown off by the many stops and starts of the train.
This is unnecessary, Himeko finds. Kafka hasn’t so much as stumbled, still leaning cooly on the counter.
The Astral Express rolls to a smooth stop.
“This looks like it’s my stop,” Kafka says, staring forlornly out the window — the first time that she has taken her eyes off of Himeko.
Himeko frowns. That’s usually her line. Kafka has taken her usual script and flipped it on its head.
She doesn’t like it.
“Well,” Kafka pushes back from the counter, fingers gripping the wood even as the rest of her body moves away like her hands are fighting against herself. “It’s been really nice spending time with you. Really nice to meet you.” She adds on the latter part as an afterthought.
“Yes,” Himeko agrees. “It’s been very nice talking to you.”
Kafka gives her another long and unreadable look, a small but regretful smile on her lips. “I wish…”
“Yes?” A sudden eagerness overtakes Himeko. She doesn’t know where it comes from, nor does she want to dig too deeply into what is ostensibly just a one-time conversation.
“I wish you all the best,” Kafka finally says after a pause. “Thank you for everything, Himeko.”
“You’re welcome.”
Himeko watches the other woman turn sharply on her heel and head out the door. Just as she is about to step off the train though, Himeko calls out to her. “You never told me how the story ends.”
Kafka stills, turning her head to meet her gaze. “Sorry?”
“Does the cowardly trotter ever get her treasure in the end?”
Kafka laughs softly. “Cowardly. You’re quite right.”
The corners of her lips tick upwards, but there is no joy in the movement.
And then she disembarks, disappearing into the grey beyond the Astral Express. The first and last time that Himeko would ever see her, someone so captivating and distant.
Truly, a star.
And she is nothing more than a moth staring after the long set sun, something that is far beyond her reach, far beyond her understanding.
It isn’t until Pom-Pom comes running into the train car a few moments later that Himeko realizes that she had been staring at the spot that Kafka had last occupied.
“Miss Kafka-” The conductor pauses, puzzled upon seeing Himeko by herself in an otherwise empty car. “Oh, she’s already gone.” The little conductor pauses at the doorway, stooping down to pick something up off the floor.
Red and gold flutters in Pom-Pom’s paws, ruffled by the breeze coming in through the open door.
A ticket.
A ticket to the Astral Express.
The one that every passenger gets when they board their last ride.
“I wish passengers wouldn’t litter. Pom-Pom just swept!” Pom-Pom grumbles as they, in a move that shocks Himeko, tear the ticket into tiny pieces and toss the newly formed confetti into the air.
The scraps of ticket bursts into bits of rainbow light and magenta sparkles, showering down on Pom-Pom. Without any explanation for that strange behaviour, Pom-Pom dusts themself off and totters back out of the train car, humming.
Oh, Himeko thinks, as she collects Kafka’s water glass. (The red imprint of her lipstick is the only evidence that she ever boarded this train. That and the distinct memories that Himeko has diligently filed away for later replays.)
Kafka never answered her question.
///
Darkness.
Perhaps the only end befitting someone like her.
A void of nothing.
An abyss which had swallowed her up the second that her foot hit the grey stone.
After all the things that she’s done, impossible feats that she’s achieved, and accolades that she’s collected, it’s about time.
Rest at long last.
It doesn’t matter how much life she has lived, how much more she could’ve had. She’s tired, striving for a woman who no longer exists — she’s gone looking, believe her she’s tried. All that she would have was a moment of silence, standing in the devastation of an explosion that had decimated several acres of land, leaving nothing but a crater for a grave marker.
The brief moments that she could have, trading away pieces of her life for a cup filled to the brim with precious time, meant everything to her. How she hungered for more, thirsted for a lifetime.
A lifetime that seemed to be out of reach.
She has whet her appetite on the hope that it would.
It was her own cowardice to blame; never able to say the words that she wanted, to grasp the hand that she wished to hold. When she was finally ready, ready to push the door open to a home that she’s always wanted, she realized that the home before her wasn’t hers.
This wasn’t a home that was ready to be lived in.
This was the fragile skeleton of a building.
Walls of a heart, but nothing for her in between.
Ironic.
Fitting.
All that life for what?
A cruel twist of time.
There is no more time left, not for her at least.
She has nothing to trade anymore. The glimpse of what could have been is a poor substitute for an abode.
But she is so, so tired.
Nothingness would be a rest.
Hands grasp at her through the darkness, shaking her, rousing her.
Even nothingness won’t let her be.
“Did you think that I wouldn’t have an epilogue written for you?”