Volume Twenty: Sorrow The Night of 9/11 Written by Kashiwae Masato Illustrated by Chayamachi Suguro Summary by Amparo Bertram September 11, 2001

In 1977, New York suffers a blackout. Nobuyuki is too young to understand the full scope of the event. All he knows is that, for once, his father is home and his mother has come out of her bedroom. His family and Sidney's get together to play cards by candlelight.

In the present, Nobuyuki is awakened from a nap at the Sky Travel office to hear a newscaster reporting that Lower Manhattan has been hit with a blackout. The collapse of the Twin Towers itself seems to him like a bad dream. Though night has fallen, Sidney and Henry are still out doing whatever they can in the wake of the terrorist attack. They're disgusted to hear that people of Arab descent are already in danger of being lynched.

Sky Travel is desperate to figure out what to do with the extra tourists stuck in New York while the airports are closed. Everything depends on how soon flights to Japan resume. Watching reports of police officers and firefighters on the news, Nobuyuki thinks of Sidney. He's dying to relay a call to Sidney, but he knows he can't, both because it would interfere with Sidney's work and because hearing Sidney's voice would make the tension that has been keeping him going all day vanish.

Remembering the brief recorded message from earlier, Nobuyuki muses that hearing Sidney's voice over the phone isn't good enough. He wants to hear Sidney's voice in person, to see his blue eyes and golden hair, to hold him and feel the warmth of his body and the beating of his heart.

Steve is still working as well, even though it's been a full twelve hours since his shift ended. The rescue workers have started to call the site Ground Zero. Steve keeps plugging away at clearing the rubble for hours. Sidney and Henry are pissed off at the people who are misusing the already overloaded 911 system to make prank bomb threats and who fraudulently collect donations. They hope it doesn't rain for the next few days, because that would slow rescue efforts, and the first 72 hours are vital for locating survivors.

Nobuyuki is finally sent home to get some sleep. He greets Dmitri the security guard, who has been on duty since the previous day because subway closures have prevented anyone from coming to relieve him. When Nobuyuki gets to his empty apartment, he collapses into bed, calling Sidney's name even though he knows there will be no answer.

In the morning, Sidney and Henry happen by Rod's condominium. They stop in and check on the place, getting a chance to talk to Rod's current boyfriend, a lawyer named Edgar O'Neil. Sidney has spoken with him several times before, but this is Henry's first time meeting him.

Nobuyuki is awakened by a phone call from Steve's nephew, Jerry, who is worried because his father's in the hospital and he hasn't heard word from Steve. Nobuyuki assures him that Steve is safe, just busy working. He then leaves a note for Sidney and sets off back to Sky Travel, chatting with the security guard Ronnie on the way out. It's early afternoon before Sidney gets home.

[Note: This is the first time we've directly seen a security guard other than Dmitri on duty.]

Sidney reads Nobuyuki's note, which explains about Steve and Jerry. Then he turns it over and finds written on the back, "P.S. I Love You." He nearly cries.

Paramedics finally convince Steve to return to the hospital to have surgery on his foot. He is stricken to hear that his friend Andy died. Meanwhile, the Sky Travel agents try to come up with safe yet pleasant things for the tourists to do in New York so they won't have to spend the whole time cooped up in their hotel. Once they settle on a plan, Nobuyuki goes to Saint Vincent's to check on the two tourists there. Sidney also heads to the hospital after a brief rest. He spots Nobuyuki there. Ignoring the fact that they're in plain view, they rush into each other's arms and kiss passionately.

When Steve wakes up from his surgery, Nobuyuki and Sidney pay him a visit. Nobuyuki hugs Steve. Sidney glares, but he says he'll make a special exception just this once.

Nobuyuki reminds Steve to call his mother and tell her he's all right. At the same time, Sidney calls his parents and Nobuyuki phones Youko. As soon as he hangs up, he contacts Serizawa, who is stuck in San Francisco--where he went for a conference--with his cat. Sidney and Henry are then summoned away to handle a murder case.

Steve returns to his rescue efforts, while Sidney and Henry are kept busy countering attempts at fraud and looting. They run into the World Trade Center janitor they met during a previous investigation and find that he is also doing what he can to help. Nobuyuki works to get tourists back to Japan, particularly the ones who missed their scheduled flights due to the airport lockdown, and encounters Serizawa, who is being hassled by people who think he's Arabic. Serizawa happens to be accompanied by Sidney's friend Ashley, who was on the same flight from San Francisco.

Sidney visits Steve and brings him a seatbelt to replace the one that got tossed along with his ruined clothes from the eleventh. Steve teases him about how interested Nobuyuki was when Steve showed him the way he makes equipment belts.

Ashley rings up Sidney on his cell phone and gets him to escort her to see Ground Zero. She is being called to active duty for the U.S. response to the attack, and she wants to see the site of the tragedy before she goes. She has them drive past the Sky Travel office on the way so that she can see it, just as Sidney had wanted to see the Sky Travel office when he visited San Francisco.

When Ashley phones Sidney, she greets him with, "Good morning, Mr. 'Nobu's boyfriend.'" ("Ohayou, Nobu no koibito-san.")

Nobuyuki returns to the Sky Travel office from seeing off a batch of tourists at the airport and is welcomed by Youko and Garth, who brought home-cooked Japanese food refreshments for all the travel agents. The future of the agency is discussed. Once the present tourists leave, there won't be many others coming to take their place, since 90% of the reservations have been cancelled. Few tourists are scheduled to arrive in New York until the New Year holiday. The try to look at it in a positive light by saying it will give the travel agents a chance to take a break and visit their families Japan.

On the twenty-third, Nobuyuki attends a service at Yankee Stadium for the victims of the attack. He goes to sit with Steve in the bleachers. However, when Bette Midler sings "Wind Beneath My Wings," Steve gets up and leaves, Nobuyuki following out of concern. Steve is upset because the firefighters don't consider themselves heroes, they were just doing their job, the same as they had done every day before the attack. Nobuyuki just puts an arm around his shoulders and gazes up at the sky.