Feeding My Guide
That day too was another grueling day, nothing special.
After giving his final battleship control orders to Vice Captain AJ, Heichi returned to his quarters and took off the long coat he was wearing to hang it on the coat rack. High-grade Espers generally had assigned servers to attend to various needs, but Heichi had long since refused even that.
To Heichi, who had led the space battleship on space exploration for a long time, even that assigned server was bothersome and annoying. This was because he possessed senses far superior to those of ordinary high-grade Espers, incomparably so, which is why Heichi’s quarters were always fixed deep underground at the very bottom of the battleship, no matter how much they updated it to a new model.
‘Captain, this planet is really different. You can look forward to it.’
Planet ‘Epsilon’. Heichi’s home planet, which had an ecosystem almost identical to Earth.
In fact, Heichi had no great expectations even when going to ‘search’ the newly discovered planet Earth. Even when the Planetary Exploration Bureau, which oversaw space exploration, made a fuss saying this planet Earth was different, it was the same. In truth, it was because Heichi, Epsilon’s sole Admiral, had already searched or conquered over hundreds of planets.
It wasn’t particularly because Epsilon’s planetary doctrine itself was aggressive or friendly to other planets. To find Guides for the countless Espers on Epsilon, there inevitably had to be fleets exploring other planets. Most of Epsilon’s Espers kidnapped… no, brought Guides from other planets in that way.
The Espers of planet Epsilon had a structure where they strangely couldn’t survive on their own. Even if they brought a Guide and conceived a child, that child was invariably born as an Esper. There were no naturally occurring Guides on Epsilon.
Thanks to that, Epsilon’s ancestors quickly mastered the way to advance into space. Even Heichi was grateful to the ancestors who had passed down such genes to him, at least for that point.
—Captain. In one hour we will enter the stratosphere above planet Earth. We will divide into teams from the stratosphere.
Vice Captain AJ’s voice was transmitted through the link. When he responded with silence because he didn’t particularly want to open his mouth, AJ also disconnected without any particular response. It was a very insolent attitude to unilaterally disconnect a link with his superior Heichi, but it was because Heichi himself wanted that.
Epsilon’s sole Admiral, the one and only Prime-grade Esper, and ruler of the entire universe.
Heichi, who had all those glorious nicknames, suffered from terrible lethargy.
His lethargy was so severe that Heichi didn’t take a single step outside his quarters unless absolutely necessary. And if you asked what he did alone inside quarters that were wider than most mansions, he did nothing.
Heichi wasted almost all his time lying on his bed with his eyes closed as if dead.
But whether he was lethargic because he lay in bed, or became lethargic from lying in bed, even Heichi didn’t know. For him, who had awakened the only Prime-grade ability on Epsilon, there was no Guide befitting him, and because of that, he suffered from terrible ability side effects until at some point even moving became difficult.
All that remained for him was only death. That is, if he couldn’t find a Guide that matched him.
When he had just become Admiral, young Heichi too had held numerous expectations. Wondering if there wasn’t a single Guide of his soul that matched him in this vast universe. So Heichi didn’t even return to his home planet Epsilon and devoted dozens of years’ worth of time to planetary exploration.
The time in space had many very mysterious and enigmatic aspects, so in Epsilon terms, Heichi’s age was about twenty-nine. However, that was merely Epsilon’s calculation method. Heichi had folded space, traversing the entire universe, wandering in search of his Guide for over dozens of years in Earth time.
—Captain, we’ve entered Earth’s stratospheric airspace, and will dock in the troposphere afterward.
And over those dozens of years, Heichi had worn down and broken considerably. His current lethargy was both a conclusion about death that he couldn’t escape no matter how much he struggled, and also the end of a transcendent being who had grown tired from repeating expectations and collapse for too long.
Heichi, who had been lying in a formal position as if the bed were a coffin, opened his mouth without even opening his eyes at AJ’s voice coming through the link. It was a voice he was producing after quite a while.
“AJ.”
—…Yes, AJ 986. Did you call?
AJ’s voice answering the call was a beat late. Perhaps it was because it had been too long since he’d heard his superior’s voice.
“This planet… Earth, what kind of place is it?”
Heichi suddenly recalled the voice full of anticipation from the Planetary Exploration Bureau that he’d heard through communications before coming here from the last planet. Saying it was okay to look forward to it.
This wasn’t actually the first time he’d heard those words. When was it, he seemed to have heard the same thing about looking forward to it during the planet before last. For reference, the reason was that the population of higher intelligent life forms residing on that planet exceeded 30 billion.
—It’s a beautiful place. Because this place is pale blue.
At those words, Heichi closed his eyes and recalled the pale blue dot in the black universe he had seen. What thoughts had he had when seeing Earth, which had a similar color to Epsilon? He tried to recall, but nothing came to mind.
“I see.”
—Captain, our Terra Team 1 plans to dock in the East Asian airspace of Earth’s Northern Hemisphere.
“Understood.”
—Captain.
AJ suddenly called Heichi. Heichi, who didn’t disconnect the link first, made a short sound as if telling him to speak.
—Seoul, South Korea was analyzed to have the highest population density within a narrow central autonomous administrative area among neighboring countries.
“And so.”
—…That means there are that many Guide candidates. If it’s alright, how about taking a look around, even just nearby?
AJ’s suggesting voice was very cautious. They had settled on numerous planets so far, and on one of those planets, fortunately even AJ, who was classified as a high-grade Esper, had coincidentally met his match and formed a pair. Not just AJ, but most Espers met their Guides in that way.
Only excluding Admiral Heichi.
From around the time the planets Heichi had visited exceeded three hundred and eighty, he rarely even set foot on the surface of those planets. After all, if there was a Guide with remarkable abilities, even without him stepping forward directly, his vice captain AJ would take care of reporting.
In truth, more than that reason, he didn’t want to be consumed by the anxiety that his Guide might not exist anywhere in this universe.
Heichi, who didn’t particularly answer AJ’s suggestion, moved his hand after a long time to press firmly behind his ear. And closed his eyes again. He should open his eyes around the time they left the planet after safely completing exchanges on this planet and finding enough Guides to satisfy the Espers. After that, the battleship would need his abilities again.
“…”
He definitely intended to do that.
Heichi got up from his seat for no reason. It was a rare behavior from Heichi, who hadn’t budged from lying in bed while visiting the last fifteen planets. He suddenly grabbed his coat and put it on, then went outside.
It wasn’t particularly that AJ’s suggestion had appealed to him. But somehow, just for today, he wanted to do so. He did so even knowing that his current steps had no meaning.
Was the pale blue dot he’d seen with his own eyes leading him somewhere? He didn’t need the landing-specific jump suit and stabilization boots that other Espers commonly wore when landing on planetary surfaces. When Heichi lightly used his ability, space changed.
A dirty, narrow alley in some noisy city.
One fortunate thing was that since it was still early by this place’s time, there was less noise, and the damn thing was that the street was too dirty and messy that he didn’t even want to stand with his feet on it.
Heichi, who didn’t particularly need to walk if he could fully use his abilities, stood still at the spot where he’d arrived and looked around. For now it was quiet because it was early morning, but it would soon get noisy, so he had to leave before then.
As he was looking around like that, he suddenly felt signs of a life form not far away. Feeling that it was weak enough not to need to be wary of, Heichi faced the approaching life form from an observer’s perspective. From top to bottom. In the middle of the dirty road, a male with thin, scrawny legs was running toward him.
On the path the man was running, there was a single pebble that would be hard not to see if you had normal vision. Heichi thought, surely he won’t fail to see that and trip over it, yet strangely couldn’t take his eyes off that man and stared.
“Uh…”
But the man’s foot caught on that pebble just like that. And he tumbled forward. If Heichi hadn’t grabbed his arm with a tsk, it would have been a fracture with high probability.
“Ah, th-thank you.”
Without much thought. Though Heichi didn’t particularly like contact with others, it was just an arm he grabbed because he suddenly wanted to do so right now.
Heichi would remember that moment forever.
The sensation of ecstatic guiding that was transmitted when his gloved hand grabbed the man’s cheap cotton-filled outerwear, unable to be blocked even by the layers of that outerwear.
“Um… I’m in a hurry, thank you so much.”
The reason Heichi couldn’t hold back the man who turned his back and moved away from before his eyes was because he hadn’t yet recovered from the sensation of guiding he’d felt for the first time.
If that hadn’t been the case, if he hadn’t blankly watched the man moving away on transportation and informed AJ, who contacted him just then, that he had found his Guide, and if AJ hadn’t earnestly urged him never to treat the Guide carelessly.
Heichi would have lost his reason right then, used his ability to kidnap the man before his eyes, and locked him away forever in his room buried at the very bottom of his battleship.
Heichi is certain. That being able to wait calmly without losing his reason that day was truly a miracle.
That he is grateful for not breaking all the limbs of his Guide whom he met for the first time and locking him up in his room.
