As the door opens at her knock, the cold tingle of dread shoots down Akiko’s spine. Her respiration increases as her eyes dart around Koji’s room.

Her first incoherent thought is that he’s obviously playing a prank on her. But there room was small and the closet was open. There was nowhere to hide.

There’s a few boxes of his things that she recognized, and his jacket was draped over the back of the chair at his desk. There wasn’t any doubt that she’d knocked at the right room.

He was gone.

She swallows to wet her dry throat before pulling out her phone to try and text him. Her fingers tremble on the black screen. Dead. Just like the TV.

Akiko grits her teeth and closes the door. She makes her way back down the stairs with much less urgency than she climbed them.

When she arrives back in the common room, her gaze moves to Yoshiro and darts away almost guiltily. “He’s… not there.”