Shuya let out a small breath and resumed walking. When he reached Yoshitoki's body, on the floor directly in front of Noriko's desk, he stopped.
Though he had said he was going to close Yoshitoki's eyes, he couldn't help but freeze. The boy's skull had burst open just above the ear, caused by the insincere soldier's violent confirmation of the kill. His short hair was matted with blood, and up close now, Shuya could see a thin layer of tissue and something white. Skull. When the bullet ate its way into the boy's head, it had made his eyes bulge out even more than usual. Yoshitoki's eyes were vacant and pointed upward in their sockets, like those of a starving refugee receiving his food ration. A pink mixture of blood and spittle oozed from the crack of his open mouth, and dark blood trickled from his nose, the liquids lazily flowing into and being absorbed by the vast sea of blood that had escaped his chest. An awful sight.
Shuya lowered his bag and crouched down. Yoshitoki had slumped forward, and Shuya sat him back up. The boy's uniform was torn in three places on the chest and stained dark red, and when Shuya lifted him up, blood gushed out and splashed to the floor. The body felt enervated and incredibly light—probably because of all the blood that had drained out.
With Yoshitoki's corpse in his arms, Shuya's mind became icily clear, his sadness and fear overcome by rage.
Yoshitoki, I will avenge you. I'll do it. I promise.
He hadn't much time. Using his palm, Shuya wiped the blood from his friend's face and gently closed his eyelids. He laid Yoshitoki back down and folded the boy's arms atop his chest.
Then, taking some time to gather up his bag, Shuya turned his mouth to Noriko and whispered quickly, "Can you walk?"
That was enough to send the three soldiers' hands back to their sidearms, but Shuya caught Noriko's nod. He faced Sakamochi and the three soldiers, but with his hand low where only she could see, he made a fist and jabbed his thumb toward the door. I'll be waiting for you. I'll wait for you outside.
Shuya couldn't see Noriko, but out of the corner of his eye, he thought he caught Shinji Mimura, seated across from Yoshitoki's empty chair, still looking straight ahead with his arms folded, forming a smile at the corners of his mouth. Maybe he had noticed Shuya's gesture. The thought helped Shuya pull himself together. He's Mimura. If we have Mimura, we just might be able to escape.
But Shinji Mimura might have been more fully aware of their situation. His smile might have been a goodbye. But for now, the possibility didn't occur to Shuya.
Shuya continued walking up the aisle. Before he collected his black daypack, he thought for a moment, then went to Fumiyo Fujiyoshi's body and closed her eyes as well. He wanted to pull the knife out of her forehead but decided not to.
The instant he stepped through the doorway, part of him wished he had.
40 STUDENTS REMAIN.
The hallway was unlit, save for the light from the doorway shining onto the wooden floor. The classroom windows, like those on the outside wall, had been covered by black metal panels—possibly to provide protection from any students who, like Shuya, were determined to escape and attempted to assault Sakamochi's location. Whatever the case, none of them would be able to get near once they left and the school became a forbidden zone.
To the right, Shuya saw a door to an identical, adjacent classroom, and farther down, another. Beyond that, double doors—the exit, perhaps—stood open into darkness. To the left, the hallway dead-ended with another room.
Was it the faculty room for this small, remote school? The door was open, and the lights were on. Alert soldiers sat at cheap folding tables, fidgeting in metal folding chairs. Were there twenty of them, or thirty? No, there were more—one man for each student in Ninth Grade Class B.
Shuya had been considering that if his daypack contained a gun (which was a possibility—the Program news reports always included the number of11 deaths by firearms" alongside the "deaths by blades" and "deaths by strangulation"), or if any of the students waiting outside had one, they could storm Sakamochi and his guards before everyone had left—before the school became one of the forbidden zones. But now, all such hopes were dashed. The three with Sakamochi weren't the only soldiers around. It seemed obvious now that he knew it.
One of the men turned his head to glance across his teacup at Shuya. Like the trio in the classroom, this soldier wore an expression that was oddly blank.
Shuya quickly turned on his heels and hurried to the exit. An impatient frustration occupied his thoughts. Well, all that's left to think about now is to meet up with everyone else. But what if soldiers are waiting outside to prevent anyone from sticking around until the next of us comes 1
Shuya left the dark hallway through the double doors of the exit and descended a small staircase of three or four steps.
The schoolyard was a desolate moonlit space the size of three tennis courts. Woods lay beyond it, and a small mountain loomed to the left, while the right opened into inky darkness—the sea. Tiny points of light dotted the distance. Land, probably. The Program was always held in the same prefecture as its chosen junior high. The locations varied; Shuya had heard of a few, including a mountain surrounded by high-voltage fences and a prison slated for demolition. But in Kagawa Prefecture, islands were the norm, as local news invariably revealed (though only after each Program had ended). Sakamochi hadn't given the island's name, but Shuya thought that he might be able to recognize its shape once he got a look at his map. A sign on one of the buildings might even reveal the name.
A light breeze bore the smell of the sea. The night was cold for May, though not unbearable, at least as long as he was careful not to let the chill sap his body of too much strength in his sleep.
But first things first.
No one was around. No soldiers, nor any of his classmates, as he had hoped to find. Everyone had taken Sakamochi's advice and hidden themselves. Even Hiroki Sugimura had gone. Only the salty breeze crossed the playground dirt.
Shit. Shuya scowled. Once they scattered, they would be playing right into the government's hands. If any of them managed to meet up with their close friends and form a group, like Sakura Ogawa and Kazuhiko Yamamoto, or Kiriyama's gang, then some hope remained. But if they all hid alone and stumbled upon each other one by one, anything could happen in the resulting confusion. And wasn't that confusion an essential element of the game?
Okay then. I, at least, will wait for the rest. Starting with Noriko Nakagawa.
Shuya turned around for a quick look into the darkness back inside the school. Sakamochi had said, "If you loiter in the hallway, you'll be shot and killed,"but none of the soldiers at the end of the hall seemed to be paying particular attention in Shuya's direction. Not even chatting, the men were simply sitting around, with weapons not at the ready.
Shuya licked his lips and decided it would be a good idea to step away from the doors. He turned back around.
That was when he noticed it.
Before, he had been too preoccupied with the scenery to notice the object at his feet. It looked like a garbage bag.
At first, he thought someone might have dropped their daypack, but soon his eyes widened.
It wasn't a garbage bag, and it wasn't anyone's daypack. One end had hair. Human hair.
A person. Wearing a girl's sailor-suit school uniform. She was face down and curled into a fetal position, but Shuya recognized the single braid and the wide ribbon that tied it. How could he not—he had just watched her from behind when she left the classroom three minutes before. She was still, with not even a twitch. Girls #14, Mayumi Tendo.
From the back of her sailor fuku, beside the lobster tail of her braid, a dull metallic pole stuck out at an angle like a radio antenna twenty centimeters long. Four tiny objects resembling the tail of a fighter plane were affixed at its end.
What. . . what is that?
Instead of immediately seeking cover as he should have done, Shuya froze in astonishment.
Sakamochi's answer to Kiriyama's question echoed in his mind. Wh
en does this game begin? As soon as you leave here.
Had someone really done this? Did someone return and do this to Mayumi Tendo the moment she left?
Shuya hurriedly cowered and glanced around.
Whatever the reason, the attacker was nowhere to be seen. No arrow had flown at him during his momentary distraction. Had the killer fled, satisfied once he took out the lone girl? Or was this some kind of false flag tactic, done by those soldiers at the end of the hall to convince the others that some of their classmates had already started playing the game? That didn't quite sound right.
Shuya realized that Mayumi Tendo might not be dead yet. She might be seriously wounded and unconscious. He should check her, at least.
Shuya was about to step forward. He would have found a swift exit from the game had he not sensed something and stopped—
A whizzing sound split the air, and a silver object flashed past his eyes, downward, from above. A new antenna sprouted from the ground.
Shuya was shaking. If he hadn't waited for Noriko at the doorway, he would already be dead. The attacker was on the roof.
Shuya pinched his lips and plucked the arrow from the dirt, then sprinted to his right. He moved without thought, only hoping that it was in a direction the shooter hadn't anticipated. He spun and looked up. On the gabled roof of the one-story school, a black silhouette loomed across the pale moonlit sky.
Is that. .. Sho—
He had no time to think. The shadow turned its aim on him.
Shuya launched the arrow at the figure. He had only hoped to startle his attacker and buy some time. But the arrow moved incredibly fast and traced a graceful arc straight at the shadow. Had anyone other than the ace shortstop, Shuya, attempted it, events might have gone differently.
The figure grunted, brought its hands to its face, and bent over. Then it began to sway, and fell.
Shuya recoiled back a step and watched the figure slowly tumble down the more than three-meter drop before thudding to the earth, the weapon clattering alongside.
Light spilling from the school's entrance revealed the large, uniformed figure keeled over on the ground. He was Yoshio Akamatsu, the first to leave, who had left so terrified. He was completely still— unconscious, or worse. Lying at his fingertips was some combination of a rifle and a bow. A kind of crossbow, maybe. Yoshio's daypack had fallen by his feet, half open, the bundle of silverish bolts visible inside.
Shuya felt the blood drain from his face. He started it, he really did! Yoshio Akamatsu started the game! He got his weapon, came back, and killed Mayumi Tendo!
He sensed someone approaching from behind.
He spun to see Noriko Nakagawa, who gasped at the scene before her. Shuya's eyes fell back to Mayumi Tendo, and he dashed to her side and touched his hand to her neck. She was dead. She really was dead.
His mind was a spooled fuse, and he felt it burn. What if there are others who're thinking like Yoshio? When they come back, what if they have guns ?
His perspective on the game had been forcibly altered. This is how it is. This is what Sakamochi meant. As soon as you leave here.
Shuya sprang to his feet, ran to Noriko, took her by the hand, and said, "Run! Run as fast as you can!"
He ran, tugging along the injured girl. But which way to go?
He didn't have time to think it through. For now, he ran for the woods. Shuya thought, We could wait behind that tree, and—but he had to dismiss the idea. In her current state, Noriko wouldn't stand a chance if anyone should attack. Nothing would be more dangerous than to remain anywhere near that school.
Any thoughts of waiting outside the building for his classmates had vanished. He rushed Noriko into the woods, with trees mixed with bushes and a carpet of ferns.
Shuya turned, thinking to shout some warning in the direction of the school, where eleven of his classmates remained. (With twenty-one pairs of boys and girls, twelve more should have come after Shuya and Noriko, but Fumiyo Fujiyoshi had made it eleven.) He discarded the idea. The others aren't stupid. They're not stupid like me. They'll run for their lives the instant they step out of those doors. Besides, Mayumi Tendo's corpse is waiting for them too. Shuya convinced himself he was right. For a moment, he thought of Shinji Mimura's face, but he dashed the image from his mind. He forced himself to believe that they would be able to meet. He would find a way, later. But for now, he didn't want to spend one second longer near that school.
Holding Noriko Nakagawa tight, he continued haphazardly through the brush. A nearby bird cried and flapped its wings into flight. He didn't see it, but he hadn't the time to watch anyway.
39 STUDENTS REMAIN.
Yoshio Akamatsu regained consciousness almost immediately, but after blacking out from a terrible blow to the head, he felt like he was coming out of a deep slumber.
The first thing he noticed was the incredible pain. He was in a daze. What happened? Did I stay up too late playing video games last night? So was yesterday Saturday, or even Sunday? Is it Monday now? I have to get to school. What time is it? It's still dark out. Maybe I can sleep a little more.
The sky and the ground were sideways, and before him he saw an empty dirt field, and beyond it the curved, bowlike shape of a mountain, darker than the night sky.
Suddenly, everything came back—meeting Sakamochi; seeing Mr. Hayashida's corpse; leaving the room,- taking cover in a shack and finding the crossbow inside his daypack; returning to the school; watching Takako Chigusa (Girls #13), her face harsh yet beautiful and then tense, and she was sprinting away, carried by those ace track runner legs; desperately climbing the narrow steel ladder on the side of the school to get to the roof; loading the first arrow as quickly as possible, but too slow, and Sho Tsukioka (Boys #14) was getting away. And then—
He turned his head and saw a girl lying there in her sailor fuku.
To no great surprise to himself, the flood of memories had been accompanied not by guilt over killing his classmate, but by terror. For inside him terror was a giant billboard rising in a wasteland, and on it his classmates, armed with axes and pistols and all kinds of weapons, jumped out at him like in a 3D movie, with the tagline, I'll kill you! written in blood.
He was under no illusion that killing his classmates wasn't wrong. And maybe it was foolish to even try to survive when every one of them would die once the game's time expired. But that was only logic. Yoshio didn't want to die. He feared his classmates because he thought they would turn on him. You have to understand, these killers are prowling all around.
The decision to pick off his would-be enemies in the most efficient way possible had not arisen from a conscious decision, but from somewhere deeper, from the primal fear of death. This wasn't a matter of determining friend from foe. All were foes. When someone like Ryuhei Sasagawa bullied him, hadn't the others only looked away?
Yoshio scrambled to his feet. First things first, he needed to deal with Shuya Nanahara. Where is he, anyway? My crossbow, my crossbow, I need to pick up my crossbow. Where is my crossbow?
Suddenly, something like a club struck the back of his neck.
Yoshio lurched forward and fell. His body twisted into a V, and his face raked against the moist earth. That the skin scraped off his forehead and cheek didn't bother him at all. By the time he had fallen, he was already dead.
Sticking out the back of his neck was a silverish bolt, just like the one he had put in Mayumi Tendo.
38 STUDENTS REMAIN,
Kazushi Niida (Boys #16) had emerged from the school two minutes after Noriko Nakagawa. He stood now, frozen in place, trembling. The crossbow next to Yoshio Akamatsu's body had been loaded, and Kazushi picked it up without intending to use it. But when Yoshio had stood, Kazushi's finger squeezed the trigger reflexively.
Kazushi tried to move his clouded mind into action. That's right, he thought, I have to get away from here. That's the first thing. That's what I should have done in the first place, instead of paying any attention to Yoshio Akamatsu or Mayumi Tendo. I
need to get out of here. See, Yoshio is clearly the one who killed Mayumi. So I didn't do anything wrong.
Kazushi was very good at making excuses, and doing so stirred sense back into one part of his numbed brain.
He lowered the crossbow and scooped up Yoshio's daypack with its bundle of bolts nearly without a thought. He started to move on, but stopped and picked up Mayumi's bag as well. Then he ran.
38 STUDENTS REMAIN.
They had been running for what seemed like ten minutes. With the arm he had around her, Shuya motioned Noriko to stop. Faint moonlight filtered through the treetops. She looked up at him. Their ragged, heavy breathing seemed an overwhelming wall of sound, but Shuya tried to listen past that wall for any noises concealed in the surrounding darkness.
He heard no pursuing footsteps. Though too busy gasping for air to be able to let out a sigh of relief, he did feel a little reassured. He had been carrying both of their bags over his right shoulder, and when he set them down, his muscles protested sharply. Shuya was out of shape. Sure, his electric guitar was heavier than a bat, but he didn't spend the whole time swinging it. He put his hands on his thighs and took a rest.
Shuya prompted Noriko to sit, and helped her down into the shadowy brush. He listened again for any sound around them, then sat beside her. The thick mass of leaves crunched faintly beneath him.
He felt like they had run a long way, but having zigzagged through the undergrowth, they had likely gone off course on their way up the mountain. They might have been no more than a few hundred meters from the school. At least he couldn't see its artificial glow, whether it was because of the rolling mountainside or the folds of trees between.
Shuya felt safe in this darker place. Coming this way had been a snap decision, but one assuredly safer than heading for the open seaside.
He looked at Noriko and whispered, "You all right?"
Softly she said, "Yeah," and nodded.
Battle Royale (Remastered) Page 6