【T.C.】【Ageha’s Apple and Sugared Water】【Interlude】
It was a damp night.
That evening, Luce had no customers.
Artificial rain fell outside, tapping against the bay window.
A small holovision placed in a corner of the bar kept auto-zapping through news from around the world.
The sound was muted—utterly silent.
Then the door opened.
Suspicious client, Ageha thought instantly.
A man of indeterminate age.
Still wearing his mask, he stomped straight to the counter and sat down.
“Highball.”
“What kind of highball would you like?”
“Anything.”
“Then I’ll make it with Talisker.”
As Ageha quietly prepared the drink, the man murmured:
“…I need you to hide me for a bit.”
“…Excuse me?”
The next moment, several men barged into the bar.
The air tightened.
Each of them radiated a silent, heavy intimidation.
“Master, how long’s that man been here?”
Ageha answered calmly, swirling the ice in the glass.
“Let’s see… about an hour.”
Their eyes drifted toward the masked man.
Without a word, they walked out.
“…Thank you.”
The masked man said this, then pulled an apple from his bag.
Just an ordinary apple—nothing special.
“As thanks. …This apple can change the world.”
He laughed, rolling it across the counter.
Ageha picked it up and examined it, but to her, it was completely normal.
She thought, Huh, and simply left it where it was when she closed the bar.
---
The next day.
A middle-aged man wandered into Luce.
His eyes stopped on the apple resting on the counter.
“…That apple?”
Ageha briefly recounted the events of the previous night.
“…Sounds like a myth, doesn’t it?”
The man stayed silent for a while, then finally said:
“May I… taste it?”
“Certainly. Shall I make it into a cocktail?”
“That’s fine. I’d like that.”
Ageha sliced the apple, added gin, and mixed it into a cocktail.
She finished with a twist of lemon peel, tracing the rim of the glass.
The man, hands trembling slightly, drank it slowly to the last drop.
Nothing happened.
But then he began to speak.
Little by little.
His upbringing.
How he never fit in—neither at school nor in society.
Meeting his wife. Marrying.
Divorcing her.
How he had carried that weight for years.
Ageha listened in silence for over thirty minutes.
“…You’ve been through a lot.”
“I have.”
“So what was the world-changing apple?”
“I don’t know. But… somehow, I feel lighter.”
“That’s good.”
The counter’s hologram flickered, butterflies—the bar’s emblem—flowed across it, then dissolved.
The man thanked her and left.
The lounge girl teased Ageha.
“What’s that? Some world-changing nonsense and he just poured his heart out to you, that’s all.”
Ageha lifted her glass and replied softly:
“Even so… if his world changed, that’s enough.”
She pulled a glass bottle from the fridge and poured it.
“Ageha, that’s…?”
“Cola. It suits me.”
“Rare to see you with cola…”
Ageha took a sip and laughed under her breath.
“Sometimes. Instead of changing the world, this sugared water is enough for me.”
—Well… cola won’t change the world anyway.
