Shibuya, December 1st, 1999. The toughest guy in Shibuya pressed a slip of paper into my hand and walked off without even looking at me. Ten digits, ending in 0840. I'd already seen that number in a dream. I'd also seen the night he goes down in a back alley in Dogenzaka.
Shibuya, December 1999. Nostradamus's end of the world is supposedly one month away. Han Jiyu, a job-hunter from 2026 Seoul, steps into an old purikura booth. The shutter clicks, and she wakes up as Amamiya Ruka, legendary ace of the gyaru crew Honeybee. The problem: this body doesn't remember a single para para step or purikura pose. All she has is a head full of trends from twenty-seven years in the future, and a pager number from the guy who stopped a shakedown on her first day. Tachibana Ren, Head of the street gang Mugen, can't manage more than three words to her face. But every night, he sends her numbers. 0840 means good morning. 3341 means I'm lonely. Knowing the future makes her unbeatable at trends and pop songs, but it's no help at all with him. And the future she knows includes the night he goes down. She has thirty nights of trading numbers to stop that night from happening, and to find out if she can stay when the clock strikes midnight on the millennium.
- Tachibana Ren never says a word in front of his crew. Then at 3 a.m., he pages you just one thing: 3341. Only you know it means he's lonely.
- You tell him what's coming and he scoffs. Then a crowd floods into the exact alley you named, at the exact hour you said. For the first time, he looks you straight in the eye.
- As the 31st gets closer, his replies get one digit shorter at a time, until only a single number comes back.
Tachibana Ren never says a word in front of his crew. Then at 3 a.m., he pages you just one thing: 3341. Only you know it means he's lonely.
