Routine governs every man's life in this country. Every minute of every hour of every day is mapped out with careful precision.
Tick. An automatic rice cooker beeps, signaling the start of breakfast.
Tick. The morning commute, riding on a never-late train stuffed to bursting with passengers.
Tick. Salarymen by the thousands stream into the city's skyscrapers.
Tick. Work schedules.
Tick. Break schedules.
Tick. Even after-hours socializing is governed by routine. The same bars, the same women, the same co-workers downing the same beer.
And Masahashi Ando finally understands why Hiro always felt so trapped in this life, this sorry and sad excuse for a life.
Ando finds himself constantly turning around, checking the periphery of his vision for any signs of movement, for any signs of a short, bespectacled figure with a large sword and an even larger smile.
Ando's eyes always wander towards timepieces: clocks, watches, even the bar at the bottom right hand corner of his computer screen. They'll stop, someday. Second hands will halt their constant sweeping of the watch face, timers will stop blinking, and Ando will know that Hiro's back. Hiro must come back, for a hero is nothing without his companion. One day, Hiro will pop in, out of breath and clutching frantically at Ando's shirtsleeve.
"Come back with me," he'll say, and Ando will willingly follow.
But for now he's back among cubicles and computers, living without actually living, without the constant push of adventure or the constant threat of death. All he has now is Kensei's sword, hidden in the far corner of his cubicle, awaiting the return of its owner.
"Masahashi-san?"
Ando blinks at his computer. The same spreadsheet he's been working on for days stares back at him from the computer screen. He looks up, finding his manager looming over him.
"Yes?" Ando says it in English, all his traveling in America making speaking the language a habit in uncomfortable situations. He nods his head apologetically, his lips tightly pursed and his gaze down, then answers in Japanese.
"Have you any idea where young Nakamura-san could be? He hasn't arrived for work in weeks."
"No, sir. I thought he was on a business trip, sir."
"I haven't been informed of any business trip," the manager says slowly, as if the very idea had just occurred to him. "You're his acquaintance. Find out for me."
"Yes, sir."
"And don't go and disappear as well."
He checks Hiro's desk first, but this is only for public show. Hiro hasn't returned, but New York City was not destroyed in a nuclear explosion. Ando checked the news constantly in the first few days of his return. All he saw was a tiny article on Google News about the strange disappearance of New York Congressman Nathan Petrelli, which was followed up by a retraction a few hours later. No, the Petrelli family said, Nathan is just taking a well-deserved rest.
Not one mention of Hiro, naturally, but he must have stopped Sylar, why else would the city still be standing?
Ando tugs open each desk drawer, sighing at all the junk Hiro has accumulated over many many months. Vending machine toys still sealed in their spherical containers. Stacks of manga and American comic books. Issues and issues of Shukan Famitsu with videogame characters gracing each cover.
And buried at the very bottom of the lowest drawer, an old storybook: "Kensei and the Dragon". The cover of the book is worn, but the pages are in reasonably good shape, the sign of a well-loved book. Ando flicks through the pages, seeing in paper form the images he and Hiro saw in tapestry at the museum in New York.
Here, Kensei seeks the help of the great Dragon of Kiso Mountain. And here, the Dragon comes to exact his payment.
And here, Kensei and his guard protect the life of the princess by offering up their hearts instead.
Guard?
Ando doesn't remember that part of the story. He studies the accompanying illustration carefully. The dragon must curl his body into tight coils to fit into the room of the palace. But there are two figures standing between the great beast and the cowering princess. One, dressed in battle armor and holding up his legendary sword, is Kensei. The other, also holding up a sword...
"Ah! Hiro!"
The figure is unmistakable, even if highly stylized by the artist's pen. Ando traces the image of Hiro-on-paper with trembling fingers, his mouth gaping wide open. Hiro's face, like Kensei's, holds a look of grim determination.
Ando shuts the book with a snap and clutches it against his chest, his heart thumping forcefully. Hiro is alive...or was...or is...and he's in feudal Japan, with Kensei. With the man who united Japan.
Unable to concentrate on work any longer, Ando pleads for forgiveness from his manager and his co-workers, then leaves the office with the book cradled in one arm and Kensei's sword in his other hand. He makes it out of the building and halfway back to the train station before he completely stops in the middle of the sidewalk.
Where, exactly, does he think he's going? He can't travel to Hiro's side, can't warn him that he's in danger, can't protect him. Hiro is five centuries away. Ando sidles to the edge of an alleyway, using the sword to prop himself up as he squats against a wall.
He is lost.
He is desperate.
And something is tugging at the sword and threatening to knock him over.
"Hey! Stop that right now!" He looks down to check on the would-be thief.
A toy dog yaps mechanically at him for a few seconds, then steps back and does a smart little flip.
"That's all...?" Ando chuckles and picks the dog up. "Maybe it was my imagination. I must be crazy, talking to a toy."
The dog's eyes suddenly switch from friendly brown to a menacing, glowing red. Knife-sharp metal teeth appear in its mouth, and the yapping has transformed into deep, wolf-like growls.
Ando yelps and drops the toy. "I know I'm going crazy!" he exclaims, gathering both sword and book and scrambling down the alleyway with the dog in chase. He's faced many things already, mobsters, crooked Las Vegas casino men, even crazy murderers with strange powers, but why is he afraid of a tiny toy dog?
The alley has a dead end, and Ando's steadily approaching it. He already forms a plan in his head. If he waves the sword, perhaps it will distract the thing long enough for him to leap over it and make his escape.
Okay, nowhere else to run. Now.
The tip of the sword glimmers in the glow of the dog's crimson eyes. The monster growls, stops as if listening to something far away, then chomps down on the blade.
Ando tries to shake the dog off, but it's locked its jaws on the sword and refuses to let go. "No!" Ando yells. "This is Hiro's. I promised to take care of it! For when he comes back!"
Rapid footsteps echo towards him. Women's boots? Someone is definitely coming into the alleyway.
"Stay back!" Ando says in Japanese. "Stay back, it's not safe!"
"I know. It's alright," the girl replies in what Ando thinks is perfect Japanese. "I'm here to help." She is a foreigner with blond hair, and her hand clutches what looks like a blue LED penlight.
Ando repeats his warning, all the while trying to get rid of the dog, but the young woman doesn't seem to be listening. She's pushing tiny buttons on the penlight and aiming it at the dog.
"I don't know what's wrong!" the girl mutters. "He said setting four-four-two. Doctor! Doctor, it's not working!"
"Four-four-two-NINE!" another voice, male, calls from the far end of the alley.
"Four. Four. Two. NINE!" She aims the LED straight at the dog, and a strange buzzing noise emits from the pen. The dog releases the sword and plummets to the ground, an inanimate toy once more. "Four-four-two-nine? You just happened to forget the last bit?"
"Completely slipped my mind," said the man. "Sort of does that when I'm out battling ravenous remote-controlled creatures. Although..." He puts on a pair of glasses and picks up the dog, studying it carefully. "Using toys as instant soldiers in the field, that is massively clever. I mean, Tokyo's filled with shops and those shops are filled with electronically-motile devices. Things that walk, things that run, things that roll. Things that bark and roll over and all of them perfectly capable of picking up a remote signal. Brilliant, really."
"Tremendously," the girl says, handing the penlight to the man.
"Ah, excuse me?" Ando starts, unsure who he ought to be addressing. "Who are you?"
"Oh, sorry!" says the girl. "My name's Rose, and this," she points to the man, who looks up and grins briefly before turning his attention back to the dog, "This is the Doctor."
"And we need that sword," adds the man. "Fate of the world depends on it. So if you'll just hand it over to us..."
"No," Ando says, his hand gripping the hilt until his knuckles turn white. "It is not yours. It belongs to my friend."
"Well," says the Doctor. "Technically, it belongs to Takezo Kensei, greatest swordsman Japan has ever known. And," the Doctor pauses for a moment, quickly assessing if this stranger's worthy of knowing the rest. "We've got to bring it back to him."
"Then you must bring me with you!" Ando says eagerly. "Take me back there to the past. Please!" Without hesitating, he kneels on the cold, hard concrete and averts his eyes. "My friend, he is in danger. He is trapped, in the past, and without this sword, he cannot return!"
"Doctor?" Rose murmurs, clearly uncomfortable with the Japanese man suddenly begging to join them.
The Doctor shoves the toy into Rose's hands. "Well," he drawls. "More the merrier, isn't it? What's your name, then? And please, on your feet."
"Ando," he says, standing. "Masahashi Ando."
"Well, Masahashi Ando," the Doctor says, smiling. "Ever been on a Gallifreyan-made ship? Best in the galaxy."
"Please. Just...just Ando."
A man can live following the clock, or he can live following his heart. For Masahashi Ando, a man can also live following his friend through time and space.