Sachiko first clearly felt the change in the world when she was five years old.

Everything seemed to change shape in an instant, and it was as if it had been like that for a long time.

That day, she was watching a talk show on TV, where the host invited Dr. Pokémon and university scholars to chatter and argue about "time travel."

The Doctor tells the audience that there is a green Pokémon called Rabi who has the power to travel through time, and that in the distant regions, there is another mythical super-powered spirit that can lead people through time and space with rings.

The university professor on the other side looked down on people, shook his head rudely, denied Dr. Elf's statement, and repeatedly muttered complex and difficult terms such as "quantum physics", "wormhole shuttle", "grandmother's paradox", etc.

Sachiko couldn't understand that at the time, but that didn't stop her from watching the adults on TV arguing with relish......

It's like she used to be at home and watch her mom and dad fight.

On this day, I don't know what happened, neither my father nor my mother came home, and Sachiko watched TV for a long, long time.

It wasn't until late at night, when the TV station broadcast the time-traveling interview again, that the girl almost remembered all the inexplicable terms in the mouth of the university professor, and there was a familiar sound of unlocking at the entrance door.

Rarely, today Dad and Mom came home together, and the two of them walked into the house with heavy steps as if they had walked into the door at the same time.

It's really rare because Mom and Dad work in the same place, but they've been arguing lately, and even when they get home from work, they have to find ways to stagger each other. It's as if the two adults are engaged in a kind of childish silent competition, trying their best to avoid each other's life tracks.

Today, the scene of the two of them arriving home at the same time has not been seen by Sachiko for a long time.

Dad changed his shoes and didn't release the Pokémon in his hand - it was probably left at work as usual. He saw Sachiko, who was still watching TV on the sofa, and an indescribable expression suddenly appeared on his face for a moment. Sachiko thought it was because she was eating a snack on the couch that made him angry, but it turned out to be not.

I saw my father approaching me, half-crouching down, touching her head, and then walking silently to the balcony - before quitting smoking, my father always smoked there.

During the whole process, he didn't look at his mother who entered the house at the same time as him.

"Mom, Daddy is smoking again......" Sachiko wanted to report to her mother, this was the supervision oath that the whole family agreed on together when Dad decided to quit smoking, but the words couldn't be said because Mom looked strange.

After her mother entered the door, she didn't say a word, and sat directly next to Sachiko, watching TV with her in a daze.

When Dad approached her, when she leaned over the TV, when she reached out to touch her head, Mom didn't react at all — as if her eyes could pass through Dad and see the TV show on the screen behind her.

"Sachiko." Mom spoke without warning, her expression extremely serious, "We will live alone in the future." ”

Alone?

Sachiko remembers the meaning of the word in the picture book dictionary, but she doesn't understand what her mother wants to convey with it.

"What about Dad?"

Naturally, she stretched out her hand to her father, who was smoking on the balcony -

"Don't you live with your dad?"

"Well, he used to smoke there." The mother's face showed sadness that even a child could see.

Looking at her mother's face, Sachiko had a premonition that a catastrophe was coming.

"It's just the two of us from now on." Mom stared at Sachiko and said in an aggravated tone, "Daddy won't be coming back." ”

"Daddy...... Wasn't he there? ”

Sachiko pointed to the balcony again. Through the transparent glass door, the father turned his head and looked at his daughter, who was pointing at him with some bewilderment.

"What did you say?" Mom said that her gaze on the balcony seemed to be staring at the empty air.

"Sachiko, what the hell is wrong with you. There's nothing there. ”

Probably because of the overly scared expression on her face, her mother then hugged Sachiko: "I know you're scared and don't want to admit this reality, but I'll always be by your side." ”

Sachiko stiffened and couldn't move, unable to believe what was happening in front of her.

By the time she came to her senses, her father had already appeared in front of her—he had finished his cigarette.

"Have you been watching TV alone today?" Dad asked expressionlessly.

Mom is sitting next to Sachiko now, and she can't be considered "alone" no matter how you think about it, so Sachiko shook her head heavily.

"Well, I've done something else."

Dad, as before, didn't notice Mom's presence at all. Ignoring Sachiko's denial of "being alone", he looked at the somewhat scattered comic books in Sachiko's room and nodded understandingly.

"You should be a little hungry too, let's go out for some supper."

"Do you want to call Mom?" Sachiko asked as she looked at her father in front of her, and then at her mother, who was watching TV next to her.

Dad didn't answer, just sighed in silence, touched Sachiko's head again, and took her hand away from the sofa.

Mom looked at Sachiko who stood up with a puzzled expression, as if asking "where are you going", but she didn't say it.

Dad turned off the TV, turned off the lights in the house, left Mom in the dark, slammed the door, and walked with Sachiko to the restaurant he usually visited.

Before eating in the restaurant downstairs, Dad said something similar to Mom -

"After that, it's just the two of us."

The next day, Sachiko saw the news of the accident on TV, and she began to understand the reason for this strange phenomenon.

Just yesterday, there was a serious accident in the place where Mom and Dad usually worked, and a huge Pokémon suddenly went berserk at work, causing several casualties among the staff.

The names of the dead and wounded were not broadcast on television, but Dad and Mom watched the TV with very serious expressions.

Obviously, the three of them sat side by side, but their figures looked extremely lonely and sad.

"Even though Dad is gone, we have to live well."

"I'm going to work hard in the future, and I'm going to do it with my mother."

Listening to the words of her parents in both ears, Sachiko finally understood the situation she was in.

Dad can't see Mom, Mom can't see Dad, the conversation between the two can't be communicated, and the actions they carry out will be ignored. Most importantly, they both believe that the other person has been killed in a work accident.

Only Sachiko herself can see both of them at the same time.

I still remember that on the TV talk show, the amazing-looking university professor once said that if you put Mukio Meow in a magical box, so that it has half the probability of dying and half of the probability of surviving, when the box is opened, there will be two different worlds. In one world, Meow can stand up and meow to us cutely, while in another world, Meow will die tragically.

Mom and Dad live in two very different worlds.

In one world, Mom survives and prepares breakfast for Sachiko; In another world, Dad becomes the one who survives and buys her a sandwich from the convenience store downstairs.

Sachiko didn't know which one to eat, so she had to eat half of each side. Puzzled, Mom asks her why she eats so little, but Dad doesn't ask more and helps Sachiko eat the rest of the sandwich.

The girl shuttles between the two worlds, and can see both the living father and the living mother. She didn't know how she did it, but she was glad she hadn't lost either her father and her mother.

This is the truth of Sachiko's journey through time and space.

。

"We're in the parallel time and space where Sachiko's mother lived."

The little boy who is in preschool tries to explain the principle of parallel universes to Miss Detective Surrogate, making Bilan feel like she is in a dream.

"However, Sachiko, her ability to travel through parallel planes is not permanent. According to her, two parallel worlds are like two straight lines that intersect each other, and the further back you go, the farther away the worlds are, and the more difficult it is to shuttle. Recently, Sachiko has been unable to see both her father and mother at the same time—she is very worried, afraid that she may lose one of them one day in the future. ”

The little boy's gaze was sincere, and he looked pleadingly at the kind detective big sister.

"Is there any way to keep Sachiko's mom and dad by her side all the time?"

That's all for this commission.