3Shinichi lay on the grass in the forest, staring up at the clouds as they passed him by. This was an escape for him. Before Miki woke up. Before he had to take out another wandering, volatile parasite. Before he had to confront any of the conflict between him and his friends. Breathing deeply, he watched the white cirrus wisps turn gold, the sky becoming illuminated in the warm light of the steadily rising sun. He closed his eyes, only feeling the breeze on his skin, only hearing the music playing in his ears. He allowed his body to fully relax, going limp. His mind then reached the climax, the complete bliss only music could offer. He smiled in the moment, shivers on his spine and chills playing at the back of his neck, the hairs standing up. As he inhaled his next breath in the cool, pine forest, his body felt revitalised, the energy he had released into the atmosphere given back to him in the oxygen with even more vigor than what it contained before it had left his body.
He then stood up, stretching after the ritual that gave his energies back to him. He exited the clearing, with its tall trees and swaying grasses, in no more than a few minutes. The suburban neighborhood he called home greeted his eyes, and as he continued walking, Miki awakened. The parasite blinked, analysing their surroundings and checking for any signals from entities like himself. Finding none, he spoke.
"Shinichi, while I was asleep, I was able to detect a a tingling sensation that ran through your whole body. It was quite similar to an orgasm, but I sense that it was produced by chemicals in your brain, not your genitals. What exactly was that feeling, Shinichi?" the host thought for a moment, not the most studied in neurological responses to human pleasures like music. He shook his head, replying to the small creature.
"I don't really know what it is, in technical terms. But I do know I experience that feeling whenever I'm focused on an incredible song. I know other people experience it too, maybe everyone does. Everyone experiences it through something different I think, different stimuli."
"Hm... this must be the "autonomous sensory meridian response" phenomenon that I've read about. Do you think this is something that is experienced solely by humans, that it is something too complex to happen to other species on this planet?" Shinichi laughed, noticing how eager Miki sounded as he asked these questions.
"You must want to experience it too, if you're so curious about how it affected me. I think maybe, parasites in human bodies, with really advanced comprehension of human enjoyment and aesthetic understanding could experience it. They'd need fully functional ears, obviously, and probably headphones too. It's easier to feel when you're completely surrounded by it. I guess it feels like it's becoming apart of you."
"That sounds pleasant. Though I've never met any of my kind with the emotional spectrum required to connect with something like music. The closest we know is Tamiya Reiko, and this is solely because she never stops investigating what it is that qualifies people as humans. She is very intelligent; I'm sure she could dissect the beauty of this organised noise I find you listening to so often. You do call it music, right?"
"Yes, that's right." Shinichi agreed, awed by his parasite's sudden interest in something so beyond logic and the principles of matter.
"Play a piece for me on your stereo while you prepare for school. I'd like to understand the therapeutic effects it seems to have on you. It's something akin to a mood altering substance, I believe." the host could hardly believe his ears. Miki's sudden interest in the joy that music brings... could it be that he's... growing more human? Shinichi finished his walk back home, heading to his room and connecting his i-Pod to the stereo with an auxiliary chord. He picked something he thought would genuinely impress Miki, selecting the title "Krone," by Sawano Hiroyuki. The parasite listened intently as the soft piano began, separating from his host as the boy began redressed into his school uniform.
He reattached as the right arm, and the heartbreaking intro and its greater part had finished, paving the way to a more motivational battle anthem. In his mind, Shinichi could imagine dirt being kicked up by hundreds of soldiers, rushing at the enemy. The climax then hit, a combination of the emotion from the beginning and the power from the rising action coming together beautifully. The song ended with a victorious brass section, and Miki's eye indicated a melting pot of emotions he didn't think the small creature was capable of, previously. Confusion, amazement, content, sympathy, bliss... they all swirled in the single eye, Miki, obviously piecing his words together in his mind.
"I can see the appeal this form of media holds for humans. Objectively, it was a very well written, well expressed piece. But it stirs feelings in me that I don't understand. I can't make sense of them. And I hate being confused about things."
"Gomen. I wish you could experience music the same way I do." Shinichi said, a bit sad.
"Arigato. I will add this to my index of cures for when you need something to shake you from your mild depressions. I have plenty of solutions memorised now, to maintain our psychological wellbeing." Miki replied, clearly proud of his ability to organise information so well.
"Well isn't that just nice of you?" Shinichi mused, starting his walk to school with a boxed breakfast in hand. Sensing a familiarly cheerful presence halfway through his walk, he opened his bag and slid the bento in, closing it just in time to be tacklehugged by Kana.
"Ohayo, Shinichi-kun!" she said, smiling as always.
"Ohayo, Kana-san." he replied, glad to see his friend, though he was sure that Migi was cringing inside.
"So what did you do on Wednesday , while I was busy?" she asked.
"Not a lot, really..." he replied, thinking back to what happened that day. "I went to visit Murano in the park, but she called me there to tell me she doesn't like the person I am compared to the person I was." he thought he sounded genuinely disappointed, but in his heart it was nothing more than the faintest regret. I don't feel it... why not? He wondered. It was near as if she hadn't ever meant anything to him.
"Ah, that's too bad," Kana sympathised. "But you don't really need to feel bad about it, if she can't accept who you are. People change, that's just a fact of life. But, because I've always known the strong, brave Shinichi-kun, that's the Shinichi-kun I've come to enjoy being with." she blushed, holding his right hand, but not lacing their fingers together. She kissed his cheek, shyly, and said "Even if you weren't the strong person I know you to be now, I'd still want to figure out. You're a precious puzzle to me, Shinichi-kun."
"Arigato, Kana-san." he said. It was unbelievable how much better her words made him feel. She was so kind. As he entered his first class, regretfully having to say goodbye to her, he began mulling over the reasons for his attraction to her as he ate while working. She's kindhearted, but she's also analytical and realistic. She's more talkative than me, but she's also considerably introverted. She's more of a sensing type than an intuitive type, that much is true based on her ability to know when I'm close. But when she goes by her intuition, she's near always right... I'm attracted to Kana because she's a dreamier combination of my current and past self.
"Shinichi," Miki whispered as the teacher was droning. "I need to talk to you about something." the host excused himself to the restroom, sitting in one of the stalls.
"Do shita?" he asked, curious as to why a parasite hadn't been brought up yet.
"I've been reevaluating my views on that female, Kana. I may have been unfair to assume she was a threat to us. She seems to considerably ameliorate your apathetic and anxious moods. I won't bother you about being around her anymore, if she improves your psychological state."
"Miki..." Shinichi was speechless. His parasite was showing signs of remorse, empathy, and possibly kindness. Is it really possible... he's becoming more human?
"Don't be emotional about it. I'm only maintaining our wellbeing."
"Still, if other humans saw this, they'd think that you were being understanding of me."
"I suppose my research of your kind is paying off."
"Ah. No kidding."
"Shinichi. One of my kind is near." The host left the bathrooms, following the instructions Miki gave as he walked. Soon enough, Shinichi had entered a large warehouse, full of farm tools and bodies, propped up on hay bales. The parasite suddenly came from the ceiling, near slicing Shinichi in half if he hadn't moved out of the way quick enough for the blade ended muscle to scrape his flesh. The wound dripped blood onto his uniform, staining the light coloured clothing. Miki was paying full attention to the enemy, severing the tentacle that had wounded his host.
The parasite flung its remaining armed tentacle at Miki, who quickly countered the strikes, knocking him into the wall and aiming for its chest, but the creature defended its fatality point at the last second. The flat line of a mouth curled into a hideous smile, and it melted into the wall behind it, somehow fusing the sharp farm tools with its appendages. Miki switched his blades to a defending position, protective.
"Damn it!" Shinichi shouted, looking around for something to defeat the volatile parasite with.
"Shinichi! See what you can find on the wall behind you." Miki suggested, frantically batting away each swipe that could further injure the boy. Shinichi grabbed at the options behind him. Rusty, dull, fragile... his eyes finally landed on what looked to be a mint condition sickle. Watching Miki's frenzied counters of the attacks, he found the opening he needed, throwing the sickle quick in a circular motion. The blade quickly sliced the lower body from the top, half the heart ceasing its beating in the mid chest area that had been pinned to the wall from impact. Shinichi stayed a moment, watching the head of the once parasite controlled body shrivel up and wither away into ashes.
"You might want to consider keeping that sickle." Miki pointed to the weapon still oozing with blood from the body half it had nailed. "Your throw was quite impressive." Shinichi laughed, remembering the time Miki had imitated the shape of a gun after he'd researched human defense tactics. His father would throw a fit if he saw any weapons in the boy's room that resembled the one that took his wife from him. That is, the knives that shredded some parts of him to ribbons before he escaped to the hospital, the night that a parasite took over the woman's mind. Miki, sensing Shinichi's bad nostalgia, decided to make talk on a discovery he'd made about the corpses in the shack.
"Shinichi. While we were fighting the parasite, I detected faint odors of decay, not just from the bodies, but from traces of my kind left over in their blood."
"Are you saying it was a cannibal?" the boy asked thoughtfully.
"That's the only explanation. When he cut you on the chest, I could smell the death of my kind on his breath."
"There were so many though... there's no way it could have killed so many."
"It's very possible. His signal was intensely full of the intent to kill, I've never seen that much blood lust in any of my kind before."
"There can't be that many of your kind left, with how many bodies were stacked in that warehouse..." he trailed off.
"You say that as if you feel sympathy for me." Miki noted. "You hate parasites, do you not? As far as I'm concerned, you considered me a hindrance when we first met."
"Ah, but... you're different from them. You're intelligent, you can listen to reason, and you have understanding."
"Shinichi. Keep in mind we have learned to coexist because you prevented me from reaching your brain. If I had, you would not have anything positive to say about me. Please remember that, if I have to leave you someday."
"You said that in such a cold manner, but it was still so kind of you. Do you think that maybe you're becoming more like a human because of me, and I'm becoming more... more like a parasite because of you?" He choked back his fear on the last part.
"...Gomen, Shinichi. But it's better that I don't answer that."
