Q10 Episode 1 (Edited)

Cute, funny, quirky, sweet and heart-warming! An interesting approach to life and love! 🙂

Note: The dialogues are basically roughly translated. Japanese isn’t really my first language. And it’s very hard to translate. I’m waiting for the fansubs but for now, hope you find this helpful.

Episode 1

Take, for example… a person on this earth who is more important to you than yourself. Does a person like that truly exist? Take, for example… something that seems like it should change my life…giving a confession of love like the ones I’ve seen on TV…wearing clothes I found in a magazine…going on a date at a place everyone lines up to get into …kissing someone in a scene just like a movie… In the dead of night, I ask myself over and over “it would have been good even if it wasn’t me, right?”… “It would have been good even if it wasn’t you, right?”… “The guy next to me would’ve done just as well, right?”… “Was there any reason it had to be the two of us in the first place?”  It can begin at any time and end at any time. Something that disposable … is that really love? It isn’t sold anywhere and it doesn’t have a name. Falling in love with someone like that is that some… incredible miracle?

Our show opens with a “girl” (Maeda Atsuko) sitting on the road. But then something’s wrong! How come she appears so lifeless?! Don’t worry she ain’t dead, just turned off.

Assuming that the “girl” is really dead, some youngsters took it upon themselves to throw the girl in the trash.  Thankfully, a drunken old man (Kishimoto Jiro– Principal of Shikahamabashi High School) happens to pass by and picks her up. And just imagine his shock when he wakes up the next morning! And like any other spooked, freaking out, panic-stricken high school principal, he brings the girl to school!

Fukai Heita (Sato Takeru). Heita is a 3rd year high school student at Shikahamabashi. He had a heart by-pass when he was young and lives like a normal aimless high schooler. He acts cool, but still unpopular with girls. He never fell in love and never bothers to fall in love.

On a typical school day, he sees a girl sleeping in one of the abandoned rooms.  Curiosity kicks in and he presses the girl’s right molar-  just to check if a sound will come out if he did so. Yeah, he’s weird!

Lo and behold! He hears a whooshing sound! Who would have guessed that a humanoid’s switch button is in its mouth! The girl wakes up and asks for a name. Initialization begins and she starts to countdown. In sheer panic, he blurts out Q10 ( Kyuto), a word written on her sole.

Heita: I’d met a girl… who sounded the note “la.”

Confused and frightened, Heita runs for his life. He hides in the safety of his classroom. But Q10 follows him there and effortlessly removes the door as he tries to lock her out. His classmates were utterly surprised. And from surprised they turned stupefied when Q10 suddenly squeezes Heita in a tight bear hug!

And since it’s not like everyday you pick up a lifeless girl in the trash, so the Principal seeks some help from Ogawa (3B’s homeroom teacher) and Yanagi Kuriko (a University Professor who somehow ends up living in the school premises). But then to the group’s astonishment, they find the girl alive and worst, hugging one of the students!

Curious on how Heita turned Q10 on, the trio showers him with endless prying questions. But then, it’s quite embarrassing to admit that he stuck his finger in her mouth, so Heita stammers and refrains from answering. And just his luck, Q10 runs out of battery and shuts down. Remember that she’s still hugging Heita! Haha! He struggles to stand and stumbles on the sofa. Later, the trio finds out that the only way to recharge Q10 is to use an adaptor and plug it in an electric socket.

All the while, Heita hides inside the Principal’s office with the “sleeping” Q10. Suddenly, his classmate Makoto Fujioka sneakily comes in and rips the principal’s chair using a cutter. Hearing the Principal’s approaching steps, Fujioka immediately runs off, accidentally leaving the cutter behind. The Principal is obviously angry with what happened and asks Heita who the culprit is. But Heita pretends not to know.

Now, this is my favourite scene. Recharging takes so much time and Heita must definitely go pee. Just in time, Q10 reaches full power and wakes up. She stands straight, pulling Heita in the process. Haha!

Afraid that his exploits will be revealed, the Principal decided to let Q10 attend his school. She will be staying at Ogawa’s and Heita will take care of her during school hours. Of course, Heita didn’t agree, but the trio blackmailed him and threatens to expose his “secret” (the pressing of molar thingy).

The next day, Q10 and Heita gets ready for school. Heita desperately wants his hands off her and asks Q10 if she had any reset button (to erase his profile in her memory or something). Q10 answers that she has and opens her mouth. Haha! Her reset button is ALSO inside her mouth?! Heita is mortified and gets angry for telling him such details.

Q10’s name is a little weird, so Sensei adds Karen. Thus, her full name becomes Kyuto Karen.

Sensei introduces Q10 as a transfer student and Heita’s childhood friend. Q10 amazes everybody when she recites each of the classmate’s name.  Of course, Heita isn’t a bit happy!

He tells Q10 to act normal and never stand out, saying it’s a school rule. He then writes her name and instructs her to copy the characters. She wrote the kanji alright, but in exactly the same handwriting. Haha! Now, that’s another problem. He tells her to write the same characters but in different style. So, she writes it backwards. Haha!

Heita then resolves to ask help from Kubo (a 2nd year and fellow heart by-passer) and let him wrote Q10’s name. Unlike Heita, Kubo’s operation didn’t go well and must undergo another surgery this year.  Kubo had always thought that life is unfair. When they were young, Heita and Kubo buried a time capsule under a steel tower, wishing that the world vanish by 2012.

Because of health issues, Heita can’t join his classmates in doing runs and other physical activities. Q10, innocent as she is, tries to press his reset button and make him normal again but sadly, she can’t coz humans doesn’t have any.

Q10: What does a human do if he wants to reset?

Sensei makes a roll call. Q10 notices that he left out Makoto Fujioka’s name and raises her concern. It turns out, Fujioka is having some family problems and wasn’t able to pay the tuition fees. He isn’t even in the register. Fujioka feels embarrassed and walks out. Q10 follows him out but Heita stops her. Heita: “There are things other humans can’t understand that’s why they pretend not to know. That is kindness”. Still, Q10 wants to comfort Fujioka.

Heita mulls over the event. He stares at Fujioka’s cutter and notices a very intriguing doodle. He has seen this before! In fact, the sign is used to vandalize. Worried that Fujioka might do something rash, Heita nervously looks for him and  Q10. Fortunately, nothing bad happened!

Fujioka shares that his family problem is getting worst. He can’t even understand what’s going on. The only place he could express himself is at school, doing some disagreeable deeds.

Q10: Humans don’t have a reset button that’s why when they want to mend things, they call for help.

And then she pulls an awkward, childish stunt she saw on TV. She’s cute!

Q10: When you yell in a loud voice, there will always be someone to help you. That is the human rule.

Fujioka ponders on her words and hopes it’s just as easy as she says. Heita, however, thinks that she’s right. And on the school grounds, he loudly shouts for help. Fujioka and Q10 joins in. The rest of the classmates hear the yells and somehow felt sorry for them. The class then decides to help them send the SOS signal to the sky, shouting and at the same time believing that their voices (along with faith) would reach the heavens.

The whole class waited patiently. They almost loss hope, until they hear a weird sound. Anticipation builds up and time seems to stop. A small flying object comes to view. It gets bigger and bigger… It’s just an aircraft. Haha! But then it’s enough for the students to feel overjoyed.

In the end, nothing or no one came to help them. But it’s okay. At least, they understood something.

Heita sees Kubo on the way home. They talk about their childish wish to end the world. Heita relates that before, he thought everything was his fault. His Mom and Dad always felt tired. His sister got lower grades. But later, he learns that nobody’s at fault.

Heita notices Q10 strolling and looking around the town. She points at the stores and uses offensive words to describe each of the establishments. Heita nearly faints from embarrassment. Haha! Q10 was just parroting his words. She sees everything like an exciting new discovery. Looking at Q10, Kubo realizes that he doesn’t want the world to end either.

They went to the steel tower and digs the time capsule. But the only thing left is a piece of paper with “the world” written on it.

Q10: “The world” has been born.

Kubo sweetly smiles at her. Hmmm… someone got love struck!

Later on, Heita finds out that Kubo gave Q10 his number. He wonders at the absurdity of Kubo’s action and uncaringly uses the paper (the one with Kubo’s number) as a gum wrapper. Q10 wants the paper back though.  Heita offers to write the number for her but Q10 specifically wants the paper with Kubo’s handwriting. And after that, Q10 stopped talking.

Though Fujioka is still not included in the roll call, at least Sensei greeted him and didn’t pretend he’s invisible.

Thinking that Q10 got angry at him for throwing the paper, Heita went to the hospital and asks Kubo to re-write the number. Of course, Kubo got chirpy and excited. Heita (in voice over): “Stop being so happy. She’s a robot! Not human. It’s just a THING”. Oh, I smell jealousy!

The funny thing is, it’s not that Q10 won’t talk but can’t talk. She ate a gum and her mouth got glued. Haha!

Heita: A switch I didn’t know existed… one no one had told me about… had been flipped.