The story this time is one of my all time favorite short stories. Since I don't want to give anything away, I'll just say that if you are familiar with the old table-top RPG Mage:the Ascension then just picture a world where the Technocracy won.
Original Title: 「ピーターパンの島」
Wendy and the rest of the crowd of
children all at once let out a shout of joy. A pirate ship. Just now, the pirate ship that they had only
seen in their dreams was here. The
blackened hull of the wooden ship. The
deck plastered in pitch. The fat ropes soaked with the scent of the sea.
The
children all ran along the side of the ship. Each and every child gently
brushing it with their hands, pressing their arms against it, rubbing their
cheeks against it, breathing in its scent. Filled with excess happiness, their
shouts of joy were tinged with echoes of sobs, and continued rocking the ship
along with the sea breeze.
And
then there was the mast. After setting out on the vast ocean the sail would be
fully stretched out, the mast would catch the wind and push the ship along.
There was also a rope ladder hanging off the mast, and at its top a black flag
fluttered about. It went without saying that the figure that was dyed in white
on it was the symbol of pirates.
And in
the sky high above that flag a thin crescent moon shined gold; its brightness had
been increasing little by little for a while. Twilight had begun to envelope
the port.
Of
course, there were no other boats like this one in the port. Having neither
masts nor smokestacks, they were all made from light alloys and had intricately
shaped antennas; ships that only possessed the ability to merely head to their
destinations while slipping through the water without kicking up any waves. The
passengers of those ships were simply happy to pass the time until they reached
their destination as if had never left dry land.
“Oh,
it’s the Captain.”
Once
more, the cheers of the children rose up. The Captain had appeared on the deck
of the ship. At least that figure was, down to the smallest detail, exactly the
same as the one painted in the hearts of the children.
A long
coat. The distinctive hat. A parrot that looked like it was deep in thought
perched on his shoulder. A sword at his waist.
He held a long telescope in his right hand. And in his left hand there
was nothing at all. That was because his left hand ended in a hook. Right up to
the sharp, cold and seemingly cruel look in the Captain’s eyes, everything was
already lifted straight out of their dreams.
The Captain
gave an order. Although he spoke in a low voice it was sharp and cold like his
stare, and echoed into the nooks and crannies of the ship. It sounded like
nautical jargon but, even though the children did not understand what it meant,
the tone of the Captain’s voice was the same as they thought it would be.
The
children shouted in imitation of the Captain. While this repeated itself for a
while, the ship slowly left the wharf, slipping among the glittering light of
the sleek ships and began to turn towards the outside of the port. None of the
children could move their eyes off the sails unfurling one by one, and the
turning of the rudder.
Night
spread across the ocean surface. The port grew more and more distant; a glowing
cluster of buildings coated in luminous paint made up the illumination that
gushed forth like a fountain, grew smaller. Once it had become like a single
firefly dancing on the ocean surface it was already sinking below the horizon.
The
children finally entered a cabin. But, without anyone falling asleep they sat
in a circle, their flushed faces turned to face one another as they continued
to clamor about each and every thing that had caught their eye.
While
the waves scraped against the belly of the ship below the window, causing the
ship to shake and letting out a sound gave the children goosebumps. At the same
time a lamp hanging from the ceiling caused the children’s shadows to shrink
and grow.
The
sound of waves. The repeating rocking. It was like being in a giant cradle, but
no one could imagine when the children’s excitement would quiet down.
“There’s
a small child living inside the tulips.”
It was
about a year ago, when Wendy uttered these words, her parent’s complexion
changed. And for a little while they
stared at each other without saying a word, and then, not knowing which of them
it came from, let out a deep sigh.
“How
could this happen to us?”
“I
really cannot believe that such a child could be born to us.” While muttering
this they hoped it was all a lie.
Of course,
until now there was no one who told Wendy about fairies. Her parents would not
have told her such stories, and they would not have appeared on the television
screen or in any printed matter either. It was because that sort of thing had
been strictly prohibited from a long time ago.
“Let’s
try the only thing we can do.”
“Yeah,
although it probably won’t do any good.” For the time being, her parents would
deal with the problem themselves. They brought home educational videos that
they borrowed from the library, determined to project them on the big screen on
the wall. The structure of plants and the cross sections of flowers and other
things appeared on the screen one after the other. There was no feeling in the images at all,
but there was a scientific correctness.
“Here,
this is a flower! Take a good look.”
“Hey.
There’s no tiny child inside the flower, is there?”
Whether
or not Wendy was watching the videos, the look in her eyes that was as if she
were dreaming continued from under her long eyelashes.
When
the videos ended she softly murmured, “There is a small child living in the
flowers!”
And
yet, her parents continued all their efforts without giving up. When they
noticed that Wendy seemed to encounter fairies and monsters in the dark, they
filled the house with a soft light. When they noticed that Wendy made it dark
by putting a blanket over herself, they raised the temperature of her room and
took her blanket away. However, it was impossible to completely take the dark
away from her. Because there was no way of taking away the darkness that was
created when she closed her eyes.
Still,
when they realized there was nothing more they could do, they had already
resigned themselves and decided to enroll Wendy in a special school. It was
also their duty to society. If it was left alone, it could have an influence on
other children, and that had to be guarded against.
This
era. At the present the fairies and monsters that had happily spent time with
mankind until then, had disappeared from everywhere. When the forests were
cleared they disappeared from the forests. When there were highways that passed
through the depths of India and Africa they disappeared from there as well;
they had even disappeared from the bottoms of lakes and seas. Already they were
gone from beneath the ice of the South Pole, the craters of the moon, the
deserts of Mars, and they had even been from the many asteroids silently
floating in space.
Could
it be that the fairies and monsters hated the scent of science? The fog of
divine mystery had been purged from the solar system, and mankind came to know
that fairies and such were not to be found in outer space. The fairies and
monsters had been driven from every space but, until a short while ago, they
were still living in time known as the past. Young scholars were waving around
a type of machine that emitted honking sounds.
“Nothing.
Isn’t it already pointless to check?” while muttering this they proudly
continued their job of dredging the swamp and destroying totem poles. Under the
circumstances, there was also a feeling of embarrassment that the people who
believed in those kinds of monsters were their own ancestors.
In this
way the monsters that lived in that time known as the past were also destroyed.
However,
the fairies and monsters still had one last refuge. The refuge left to them was
at the bottom of the consciousness of a part of humanity. Of course, for the
vast majority of humanity there was no such hidden base left for them. Still,
from time to time, a person who had such a base would be born.
Like
this girl, Wendy.
“Wendy
will be placed in Class B.” The director of the special school said after he
had concluded a thorough examination of Wendy.
“What?”
her parent’s expressions had already darkened. Children for whom it was thought
that a remedy was possible were placed in Class A. Class B admitted those
children for whom that was not thought possible.
“It is
regrettable. Still, it is not as if there is no way that she may still recover.
There are cases of children placed in a reversed environment making a
spontaneous recovery.”
Although
he said so, it was not really something that could be expected.
Class B
of the special school was in a region that was completely cut off from the
city. In that place there was an old castle that had not been demolished for
this very purpose.
Ivy
entwined its stone walls, and behind the castle was a deep forest; the interior
of the castle was dark, pleasantly cool and an ever-present smell of mold hung
in the air. After climbing the spiral staircase while gasping for breath, one
could see the ocean far off in the distance from the top of the tower.
From
every region of the world children like Wendy were brought here. Contrary to
their parents’ expressions the children’s eyes were suddenly sparkling more and
more. If this were an ordinary city school housed in a building covered in
bright glass, the pure teachers would only teach their pure students about pure
subjects. Flower picking, dissecting
snakes, mixing chemicals and peering into high-powered microscopes; in this way
healthy and constructive people are perpetually produced in service to the
advancement of society. For the gears of the great machine called society must,
to the last, be standardized and fit precisely.
On the
other hand, Wendy’s school was completely different. Searching for fairies they
would gently peer all around the flowers and call out to the little birds. The mixed up magic potions to create gems,
and when it turned to night they joined their voices and sang a song to call
upon the prince of the moon.
When the
students of a normal school were learning about the types of genes in a 3D
projection classroom, at the special school the students lost themselves in
competing with stories while pointing at pictures of the Arabian Nights that had been drawn on the walls.
It was
night again. In the underground pools of the city’s buildings, when the
children who had entered small plastic submarines and, in the bright underwater
illumination, playfully clashed against each other, Wendy and the other
children, trying to see the dances of ghosts, held hands nervously wandered
aimlessly inside the forest.
Sometimes
Wendy’s parents would, the same as the other children’s parents, come to visit.
Wendy’s little brother, whom they brought along, would, as if he had been given
detailed instructions, would always soon say to her, “there’s no such thing as
fairies” as he tried to convince her.
“Yes,
there are!” Wendy would reply.
“Oh, so
you’ve seen one then? So, where are they?”
“They’re
in the darkness, of course.”
“If
they’re in the darkness then you can’t see them, right?”
“That’s
how it appears.”
They were talking past each other.
“Even
if fairies were real, they’re so small I bet they must be pretty stupid.”
“That’s
not true! They’re really smart!”
Without
any points of agreement during their conversation her brother took on an
expression that resembled disdain, and her parents took on looks of sorrow. This
was not limited to just Wendy, it was the same case for all the parents. In the
end all of them dejectedly returned home.
For the
children of the castle, whether it was in a shady hiding spot, on top of the
tower, on the bank of the brook in the middle of the forest, or elsewhere, a
number of them would gather and tell each other stories about fairies, witches,
mermaids, ogres, snow maidens, and a variety of other apparitions all day long.
When they
ran out of things to talk about they would seek out their teacher and demand
new stories from her.
“Hey,
teacher, tell us a story about the curses of ancient Egypt, or the one about
the divination that did in the pirates.”
“Or
stories about the monsters at the bottom of the ocean, or the about the planet
where giants live would be better instead.”
All of
these were stories that could not be told if this were an ordinary school. Even if they were to be told, if they were ordinary
students it would be a story that got smirks and laughs. This was because the
Sphinx and pirates had absolutely nothing at all to do with the present day,
and were properly said to be things that existed in the past; the deep sea and
even the other planets had every nook and cranny investigated by people, and
all that was found was nothing at all.
Their teacher
did as they demanded of her and told them story after story. Because personnel
that had been chosen to serve here had been given special permission to read
the forbidden books, she was able to tell these stories to the children. Also,
while telling those stories she would secretly observe the children and would
later keep a detailed record of data on their reactions to the stories. If a
child appeared that started to embrace doubts about these kinds of stories it
would be reported and they would be transferred to Class A, but contrary to the
personnel’s expectations there were very few cases of this.
In this
way Christmas grew closer. This was the only place where the custom of Christmas
remained. There were no other people who thought to celebrate a scientifically
meaningless day, after all. The anniversary of arriving on Mars, the
anniversary of virus synthesis; on those sorts of days ordinary people would
dance the time away with their backs to abstract movements spreading out of
color screens, music that sounded like a machine that had run out of oil, while
being stimulated by their primary colored cocktails.
However,
when Wendy and the other children noticed the date they held a festival.
“Today’s
the anniversary of Sinbad’s voyage!” someone would call out, and so it would
be. That night, light was provided by a clay Aladdin’s Lamp.
“Today
is Son Wu-Kong’s birthday.” When that was decided everyone acted like monkeys
and threw confetti into the air.
However,
Christmas was a real festival. Santa Claus would bring them anything and
everything. The children discussed what they should ask Santa to bring them and
they decided that their request would be the thing they coveted the most.
“We
want to sail on a pirate ship, go to an island where people with wings like
angels live. Once there we want to meet fairies, witches, mermaids and all the
rest.” This will happen for sure. They wrote
this wish into their letter and handed it to their teacher.
Their
teacher, who had read their letter, placed a call after the children had left
and gave a report while her face twisted up.
“That’s
right; as usual I must ask you for a favor.”
The snow
falls and piles up, and it becomes Christmas Eve. A sleigh races over the snow;
as promised Santa Claus has come to the castle. The sleigh stops next to the
fairy and ghost shaped snowmen.
At which they all let out a shout
of joy, and asking unanimously, “Hey, when are you going to take us there?” “You’ve already asked that I come pick you up
tomorrow.” Santa Claus answered in a gentle voice. That night the inside of the
castle was filled until late with candle light and singing voices. The next
day, a man appeared dressed in old-fashioned sailor’s clothes.
“Well, shall we get going?” he
greeted them. The children rode on the sleigh,
transferred to a horse drawn carriage at the end of the snow covered areas and
headed for the port. Along the way they passed through the city’s streets and the
large orderly buildings standing in rows.
“All those buildings are lies,
right?”
“Yeah, gotta be some kinda mistake.”
They talked about other things like
that. Their teacher, who was riding in corner of the carriage, listened to them
gloomily.
The carriage soon arrived at the
port, and there they separated with their teacher; the children boarded the
pirate ship that had been prepared at the wharf with shouts of joy.
Dawn.
Letting the sails sell out the ship continued south. In the salt wind that had
grown a little warmer the children ran around the deck and climbed up the mast.
Borrowing the Captain’s telescope, there was even a child that solemnly turned
towards the horizon. Whenever they felt like it they would sing pirate songs as
a chorus.
Sometimes a white seabird would fly
past them overhead, and flying fish would glide across the waves.
When it again turned to night the
children pestered the crew to tell them stories. Sea monsters, ghost ships. Everyone
listened enthusiastically. Here, there was not even one pure child among them
that remembers the endless sensation of destroying a stranger’s imagination.
After several days of sailing were
behind them, the tiny silhouette of an island came into view.
“It’s gotta be that
island!”
“Yeah, I just got it too.”
While listening to the chatter of
the children, with a few words the captain gave the order to aim the ship for
that island.
The island grew closer, white waves
landing on the sandy beach, a dense forest, a slightly tall mountain; they
already clearly understood. When night comes mermaids would appear on that sandy
beach; the light of the moon causing their singing voices to resound. There was
probably an old witch with a long cane walking along a path in the forest, and
there had to be a gnome’s house under a big tree.
There was hidden treasure deep
inside a cave. They also had to investigate that secret. It’s dangerous to
ignore the werewolf that suddenly appears. There were probably giants working
hard guarding a huge diamond on top of the mountain. On the other side there
was the fairies’ flower garden…
The ship lowered its sails and
stopped its advance.
“Lower a boat.” The Captain ordered,
and the children piled in. “Shall we accompany you until the shore?” the crew
called out.
“We’re fine. We can do the rest
with just us.”
“Well then, you’ll be needing
these.”
The crew handed them rifles and
knives. When the songs of goodbye were over, in the quiet cove the boat turned
towards the beach. Since there were two or three people rowing each oar, their method
of advancement was awkward.
When their boat reached the beach
the children let out a shout and charged as a group into the forest. Their shrill
voices passed over the sea and even reached the ears of the crew.
“What was the date of the
experiment again?” one of the crewmen asked the Captain.
“The day after tomorrow.”
“Then we have to hurry, don’t we?”
“Aye. Advance the ship.”
With the push of a button the ship’s hidden
jet engines began soundlessly moving. The ship began to glide over the sea. The
island grew more and more distant.
“So that island is the target for
this experiment and will be completely blown away?”
“No, not to that extent. There probably
won’t even be a moment of pain. Thanks to the power of the Neo-Energy, the island
will disappear in an instant.”
“The speed of scientific
advancement grows faster and faster. The future of the human race has no
limits. And yet, why do suppose it is that odd kids with those sorts of
thoughts don’t die out?”
The island was already hidden by
the horizon. The parrot in its birdcage squawked something, but it was
something completely unrelated to his question.
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