The argument about Ministries and Portkeys was circling back on itself, growing more frantic and less sensible, when Anthony Goldstein finally let out a sharp, frustrated grunt.
"Enough," he said, his voice cutting through Theodore's latest theory about international conspiracies. "Theories won't open this door."
He turned away from the window, his calm demeanor replaced by a grim resolve. He examined the door's lock—a simple, old-fashioned deadbolt, not a magical contraption. It was just a piece of metal in a mechanism.
"What are you doing, Goldstein?" Theodore sneered. "Going to reason with it?"
Ignoring him, Anthony braced his shoulder against the doorframe, positioned his foot just below the lock, and, with a sudden, explosive force that seemed to surprise even himself, he kicked. The wood around the lock splintered with a sickening crack. He kicked again, grunting with the effort, and the door flew inward, slamming against the wall inside.
A short, dark hallway greeted them, leading to a slightly larger main room of the apartment. It was just as sparse and dusty: a worn-out sofa, a low table, and a single, stark light source they hadn't been able to see from the bedroom.
On a small desk in the corner, a beige, boxy machine hummed with a low, electrical buzz. A glass screen glowed with a faint, greyish light, casting a pallid glow on the desk. On the screen, lines of stark white text cursor blinked steadily against a black void.
The four of them crept out of the bedroom, huddling together despite their divisions. The apartment was silent except for that persistent, alien hum.
"What is that?" Theodore asked, his voice hushed. He eyed the machine with deep suspicion, as if it might be a particularly complex Dark Detector. "Some kind of… Seer's orb?"
"It's not magical," Anthony murmured, stepping closer. He reached out a tentative hand but didn't touch it. "There's no resonance. It feels… dead. But it's lit. It's like a television, but… smaller. And it has words."
Ron, who had been staring with the same bewildered fear as the others, felt a flicker of recognition. The shape, the beige colour, the glowing screen… it tickled a memory of his father's excited, rambling explanations.
"I… I think," Ron started, his voice uncertain. Everyone turned to look at him. "I think it's a… computer."
The word landed with a thud. Anthony and Theodore stared blankly. Astoria peeked from behind Ron, her eyes wide.
"A what?" Theodore asked, his lip curling.
"A computer," Ron repeated, gaining a sliver of confidence. "It's a Muggle thing. My dad's obsessed with them. He works in the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts office. He says they're like… like really smart, logical brains that Muggles use to do sums and… and store information. He calls them 'fascinating'." Ron said the last word with a hint of his father's bewildered enthusiasm, but it was drowned by his own fear.
Anthony leaned in, squinting at the text on the screen. The characters were the same angular, impossible script from the signs outside.
> ファイルが見つかりません.
> 初期化を完了してください.
> _
The blinking cursor after the final line of text pulsed like a silent, waiting heartbeat.
"It's writing in that… Japanese," Anthony observed. "It's trying to tell us something."
"It's a machine, Goldstein, it's not 'trying' to do anything," Theodore snapped, but he couldn't hide his own unease. A talking mirror was one thing; this silent, thinking box was another.
Ron took a half-step closer, his mind racing, trying to recall his father's chatter. "Dad said you can talk to them. With a… a keyboard." He pointed a shaking finger at the rectangular thing with buttons laid out in front of the screen, each button marked with one of the strange symbols and a few familiar letters.
The four magical children stood in a circle around the humming 1996-era computer, a piece of Muggle technology that was, in its own way, as alien and terrifying as any Devil. It was a gateway to a world they didn't understand, operated by a logic completely separate from their own. The blinking cursor waited, a silent sphinx posing a riddle in a language they couldn't read, on a device only one of them had even heard of in passing. The world outside the broken door was vast and unknown, but this… this was an unknown that was staring right back at them.
The word "Japan" seemed to suck all the air out of the small, dusty room.
Theodore Nott was the first to break the stunned silence, his voice tight with a mixture of outrage and a strange, clinical coldness. "This is a kidnapping. A targeted one." He turned his sharp gaze on the others, assessing them like pieces on a chessboard. "My father has… business rivals. International ones. This could be an attempt to leverage him. You three were just… collateral. Wrong place, wrong time." He said it with such conviction, as if trying to force the chaotic situation into a box he understood—pure-blood politics and power plays.
"Don't be a git, Nott," Ron snapped, his own fear making him irritable. "Why would anyone kidnap you and then dump you in a random flat in Japan? With us? How would they even get us out of Hogwarts with Dumbledore there? It doesn't make sense!" He ran a hand through his red hair, making it stick up wildly. "This is… this is magic. Dark magic. Has to be. Maybe… maybe it's him. Black." The theory felt flimsy even as he said it, but it was the only immediate terror he could latch onto. "He could have done some… some long-range spell."
Anthony Goldstein had been quiet, his eyes fixed on the bustling street below. He shook his head slowly, rejecting both theories. "A kidnapping for ransom wouldn't leave us in a locked room with a window. We'd be in a cellar, blindfolded. And Sirius Black is a fugitive, not an international wizard-smuggler." He gestured vaguely at the city. "This feels… bigger. The magic it would take to move four people across the globe instantaneously… it's unheard of. And the destination…" He trailed off, his rational mind struggling with the improbability. "Why here? Why this specific, ordinary room?"
Theories began to tumble out, each more desperate than the last.
"Could it be a Portkey accident?" Ron suggested weakly. "A really, really powerful one that went wrong?"
"The Ministry would have found us by now," Theodore retorted, his voice dripping with scorn. "Their Trace would have lit up like a Christmas tree the moment we appeared here. Unless…" A darker thought occurred to him. "Unless the Japanese Ministry is involved. Maybe they've intercepted us."
"On what grounds?" Anthony countered, his voice rising slightly in frustration. "We're children! This is… this is like something out of a Muggle spy novel. It's paranoid."
"Or it's a test," Theodore shot back, his eyes narrowing. "Some kind of twisted Triwizard Task. A test of survival."
"That's mental!" Ron exclaimed. "We're thirteen! And first-years!" He glanced at Astoria, who flinched at the raised voices.
Throughout the exchange, Astoria Greengrass had not moved from her corner. She had drawn her robes tighter around herself, as if the thin, woolen fabric could shield her from the reality outside the glass. She wasn't processing political theories or magical mechanics. Her mind was trapped in a simpler, more visceral loop of fear.
Japan. So far. So loud. I want my sister. I want to go home. The air smells wrong. What if they never find us? What if we starve here?
The voices of the older boys were a distant buzz, their arguments meaning nothing. Her heart hammered against her ribs, a frantic, trapped bird. She focused on the steady, terrifying proof just beyond the window—the endless stream of unknown cars, the signs she couldn't read, the sheer alien-ness of it all. This wasn't a puzzle to be solved. It was a nightmare she had woken up inside. A single, hot tear escaped and traced a clean path through the dust on her cheek, but she made no sound. She just sat, small and silent, drowning in a sea of fear while the others tried to chart a map of the waves.