Hoowee, so here's the thing, this chapter was originally a lot longer. By the far the longest thing I'd written. A pure test of writing endurance, is what it was. It was about 17,000 words before I started editing it, and I realized there is such a thing as a chapter that is TOO long. So, I chose to cut it in half to give it some breathing room. The good thing is I've already made some major headway with the back half of this chapter which is what Chapter 27 will be, so expect a new update within a few days. Thanks for your patience y'all!
Chapter 26
"Man, I'd say you guys need to hit the target range, but considering how shoddy your aim is, you'd probably miss that too," I shouted from behind the ruined van serving as my cover. "I mean, come on, you guys shoot like five year olds. That's embarrassing. Unless you really are five year olds, in which case, why are you playing this game?!"
"Interesting method of distraction," Noya noted.
"Tried and tested," I said.
It had been about a half hour since we left the suburban neighborhood bordering the northern forest of the map. Skirmishes with other squads were few and far between. Everytime the satellite scan passed, we checked Yokai's location and found them inching ever closer to the same city we were heading towards. If we were going to have any chance of beating them there, we'd have to move fastlike.
We thought our luck would turn once we came across the jail. Three stories high, decrepit with cracks and wear on its stone surface, but otherwise untouched. If our luck held, there would be a vehicle inside big enough to take us all to the city. Noya and I volunteered to check it out, leaving the others in the relative safety of a nearby gas station down the street. Halfway across the parking lot, we realized two things: the front gate was shut, and the ones responsible were poking their guns out between the gaps of the wooden boards nailed to the jail's top windows.
We scrambled for cover as soon as the shooting started and hadn't moved since. At first glance, there was no easy way inside. Even if there was, the enemy squad had the high ground. They'd mow us down before we could get close enough to look.
Which led to our current plan of attack. Noya and I would stay put and hold the enemy squad's attention while Llenn, Pitohui, and Rei snuck around to find a way in — and hopefully a way to open the gate.
"I think I know where one of them is," Sinon whispered through my earpiece. She had volunteered to climb up onto the gas station's roof to set up shop — providing overwatch via Hecate. "Just say the word and he's gone."
"Okay. Hold off on that for now," I said. "If you snipe him, the others will react. They might change their tactics. Let's take it slow and steady while we can predict their next move."
"Roger," Sinon replied.
"What happens when they decide to throw a grenade?" Noya asked.
"I guess we find out who's the fastest runner," I said, throwing a grin his way. "Let's hope the others will get to them before that happens," I cleared my throat and kept on doing what I did best. "So fun factoid for you guys. Did you know that 1,878,000 bullets on average are fired in GGO every day? And that's just in Japan! That's pretty crazy when you think about it. And of those, 1,220,700 bullets hit their target. That's a 65 percent accuracy rate! Not too shabby right? Basically what I'm saying is, could you please actually hit me? You're bringing our overall accuracy down, guys! We're going to look back in front of the other MMO's."
Maybe they weren't fun fact enthusiasts. Another smattering of automatic fire pelted our cover, sending sparks flying over our head.
"Guess it's down to 64 percent now," I said. I leaned out of cover and pulled the trigger of my MP7. It was the closest thing to useless, admittedly, but as long as we held their attention, it would serve its purpose. Noya peeked out himself, his M60 belting out a torrential rain of lead at the jail's top floor.
"Llenn, how's it looking?" I asked over the gunfire.
"We still haven't found a way in yet," she replied.
"At this rate, these guys are gonna murder you two," Pitohui said. "Hey, Llenn, why can't we just throw ya up and over the wall? You're small enough."
"B-But then I'd be by myself!"
"Llenn, if you move fast and find the security booth to open the gate, Noya and I can get in there to back you up," I said. "Or if you think it's too hot, you can book it with us and get to safety. That alright?"
Llenn sighed, and she made an effort to make her voice sound a shade more confident. "Okay, alright, I got it. Just leave it to me."
I nodded and looked over my shoulder. Noya nodded in return and started reloading his machine gun. "Sinon," I said. "As soon as I give you the signal, shoot whatever target you can get a bead on."
"Already on it," she said.
"Okay people, get ready. We're moving as soon as Llenn hits the ground," I said.
I reloaded my MP7, and created a mental image of the battlefield in my head, mapping out the best way to get inside the jail. We didn't have much of a prayer being out in the open, so moving between the few cars between us and the gate was going to be our best chance of getting inside without getting filled with holes.
"Alrighty, come here, Llenn. I'll get this in one shot, just ya watch," Pitohui said.
"Okay, here goes nothing," Llenn said back.
The cords of my muscles tightened with tension, and Noya and I both peeked out just enough to see what was going on. Llenn let out a shout of effort and a second later, a little pink figure sailed high up and over the left side wall. A heartbeat later, Llenn spoke.
"I'm in!" she said.
"Sinon!" I shouted.
In the time it took me to blink, a dull bang pierced the air as Hecate's bullet outran its own sonic boom. An instant later, the rightmost window in the jail's top floor exploded in a hail of concrete and wood. The debris hadn't even had time to hit the floor before Noya and I sprang out of cover and broke into a dead sprint for the gate.
For the record, Noya was, in fact, the faster runner.
His M60 blared with deafening intensity as he moved, and I had to admit, it was pretty damn impressive. Carrying a large gun like his, to say nothing of the fact that he was able to run while doing it, well, Argo knew how to pick her help.
I kept up with him as best I could, adding my gunfire to his. When the bullet lines appeared from the jails' windows, Noya and I weaved between husks of long dead vehicles, waiting for a break in their fire, and moving again when it came, advancing ever closer to the jailhouse's outer wall.
Noya didn't warn me when shoved me aside with his shoulder. It robbed me of my balance and I fell to the ground, flailing and cursing. Then the ground I was standing on mere moments ago was pelted with searing hot lead.
I nodded my thanks to him. He gave me his hand and half-pulled, half-dragged me up to my feet. We sprinted the last twenty feet, ignoring any attempt at suppressive fire for raw speed, and planted our backs against the brick wall. The security booth on the other side of the gate, and I could barely make out the door controls within.
"Llenn, you there!" I shouted over the cacophony of gunfire. I leaned out just enough to look past the gate into the main yard.
An instant later, Llenn came running right at us, moving in a fast, graceful serpentine pattern that reminded me of a professional figure skater.
I pointed a finger at the booth. Llenn changed course and, in a display of pure agility I've seldom seen, hopped and broke into a no-hands cartwheel midway, dodging a clump of bullet lines aiming for her legs. She hit the ground running and all but dove into the security booth away from harm.
"I gotta grind more," I muttered under my breath.
The metal gate shook with an ancient metallic groan and lifted itself from the ground, reeling up with a slowness that seemed to last even longer with the furor of battle still raging around us. I rolled underneath as soon as the gap was wide enough while Noya covered my advance, emptying a belt of rounds into the people inside the jailhouse. Half a dozen bullet lines popped out of a boarded window and lined themselves at my chest. I started to move, then found out I shouldn't have bothered.
Another boom from Hecate thundered in the distance and the window's boards splintered and flew apart into dozens of deadly projectiles. The bullet line vanished.
"Bless your soul, Sinon," I said.
"Get going," she replied coolly.
Noya bent at the waist to get under the gate and joined me as Llenn came out of the security booth. We turned our guns towards the jailhouse. The gunfire had stopped. Every window looked deserted; not a sound came from within them. Sinon's precise shots combined with our entry into the prison yard must have spooked them badly enough to change tactics.
"No return fire, no visual contact. Not ideal," Noya said. We walked towards the main building, never lowering our guns.
"Yeah, I kinda preferred it when they were shooting us. At least we knew what they were up to," I said. "Don't let your guards down. Let's look for anything useful and scram. We're not here for these guys."
Noya grunted in affirmative. "I've got your back covered. Check behind the building. There might be a garage or employee parking."
"Good idea. Sinon, keep your eyes open," I said.
"Always," she said.
Llenn and I took the lead with Noya covering our rear. We rounded the building, never pulling our guns away from it — every window and door getting a long, hard look. It wouldn't do us any good to get complacent. Not while the enemy team was still out there.
I took a deep breath and focused my hearing, parsing through the ambient noise to listen for any strange sounds. Wind sighed with subdued gusts, sun bleached grass crackled and snapped with every step we took. But nothing that could warn us of an impending attack or enemy movement. If I didn't know any better, I'd say the building was absolutely lifeless.
We came around the back of the jailhouse ready to shoot the first person we saw. But instead of coming face to face with a group of pissed off enemy players, we found a grassy backlot, another security gate probably meant for the coming and going of prison faculty, and a two story garage building big enough to house, of all things, three full length prison buses.
"Ladies and gentlemen, I think we just struck gold," I said. "Llenn, mind checking out the garage for any hostiles?"
She nodded and headed towards the garage in a light jog while Noya and I approached the closest bus. I gave it a once over. Rust stains marred the entire length of the bus, but otherwise it was mostly intact.
"So what's the verdict? Have we found our ride?" I asked.
Noya stepped up onto the bumper. "Check the dashboard. There should be a lever that unlocks the hood."
I nodded and entered the bus. It was nothing special compared to any other you'd find out in the real world, if you ignored the bars covering the windows in a criss-cross pattern, the iron loops bolted to the floor where prisoners' chains would be secured, and the open cell door separating the driver's cabin from the rest of the seats.
Other than that, it was as homey as can be.
The dashboard had several unmarked switches around the steering wheel, and when faced with such a conundrum, there's really only one logical course of action. I flipped them at random. After the fifth or so attempt, a mechanical clunking noise came from the hood.
See? Works every time.
Noya flipped the hood open. The damn thing was big enough to completely block my view from the windshield so I poked my head out of the driver side window to look at him. "Everything is where it should be," I heard him say. "And if you're looking for something to carry the whole squad, it doesn't get much better than this. But you should be aware that she's going to handle like a brick."
"She's got it where it counts, that's good enough for me," I said.
Noya nodded and turned his mirrored goggles to me. "The key's in the sun visor. Give it a try."
"How do you know that?" I asked.
"It's GGO. They always put it there."
I gave a lazy salute and ducked back inside. I flipped open the sun visor. Sure enough, the key was there, held in place with a metal clip. I grabbed it, stuck it into the ignition, and gave it a firm twist. The engine sputtered and coughed to life, the entire bus rumbling with industrial-level power. "Haha! She lives!" I tapped my earpiece. "Pitohui, Rei, come inside through the front gate and come around the back. We'll be getting the bus ready in the meantime. Sinon, stay put. We'll come to you."
I didn't catch their replies. Something else drowned them out.
I'd been so absorbed making sure the buses were in working order that I didn't notice the jailhouse had a backdoor. Because as soon as Noya slammed the hood back down, four enemy players pouring out of it with their guns pointed at his back.
"Noya!" I shouted.
He dropped down out of my sight, and the enemy team started shooting. In the corner of my vision, his health bar dropped.
My heart pounded with sudden and violent intensity, jolting the rest of me into action. I pulled Charon free from the waistband of my pants and leaned out of the driver side window at the same time a player turned his shotgun on me. Time slowed to a crawl as my sights lined themselves up on his head.
I couldn't say who fired first, but the enemy player's head snapped back like someone had slugged him with a bat at the same time I felt the air vibrate with searing intensity. Most of the pellets passed me, but not all of them. A spray of pixelated blood exploded from my left arm and shoulder. Numbing pain shot down my limb in ice cold spears. I barely registered Charon flying out of my hand, and ducked back inside to ready my MP7.
"Llenn, bad guys out front!" I barked.
The remaining hostile players fired on the windshield. I ducked. Glass shrieked and crackled. I expected the entire thing to shatter into pieces under the never-ending assault. But to my surprise, it held.
"No, you can't come into the bus. Your parents didn't sign the permission slip!" I poked my head out the window again and fired wildly back at them. The three remaining enemy players dispersed, taking cover behind dumpsters or concrete jersey barriers "Llenn?!" I shouted again.
Glass broke, but it didn't come from the windshield. It came from above me. The second floor of the garage.
A series of rapid thumps resounded over my head like someone was running on top of the bus, and then a second later, the pink ball of terror herself kicked off the bus with a roar of challenge, sailing twenty feet high, right over the head of the player hiding behind a dumpster. Her little P90 chattered and emptied its entire magazine into his head and shoulders. Llenn landed beside the body, and turned to engage the other two, but they were wise enough to know fighting us now was a losing proposition. They turned tail and ran right back the way we came in, around the side of the building, heading towards the front. Llenn sped after them. I rushed out of the bus to give chase as well, my left arm flailing uselessly at my side.
Despite the headstart they had, killing them would only be a matter of time. I'm a decent shot even at the worst of times and Llenn was a verified speed demon. If I didn't gun them down, she'd do it herself and break an Olympic record in the process. Even assuming they managed to evade us, Sinon would put a round in both of them the second they left the safety of the walls.
But none of those things happened.
Pitohui and Rei rounded the corner right in the nick of time. The one closest to them didn't even have a chance to act as Pitohui grabbed his unprotected head and slammed it hard into the rough stone of the jailhouse wall. There was a heavy crunching sound of impact and just like that, he slumped to the ground, lifeless.
"Going somewhere?" She asked the last man. Her voice dripped with mocking sweetness. The man sputtered as she raised her assault rifle and squeezed the trigger, cutting him down in a spray of lead and pixelated blood.
Motion caught the corner of my eye. I whirled to meet it and stared in surprise as the man Llenn killed earlier got back up in a very non-dead fashion. He raised his assault rifle, and its bullet line planted itself right at the back of Llenn's head.
I couldn't get a sound out in time. Two harsh bangs filled the air. The man flinched and two neat holes appeared on his neck and above his eyebrow. He stumbled, swaying from side to side until finally his legs gave out from under him. A 'Dead' sign popped up over his head with the silence of finality.
I turned towards the source of the shots and found Noya crawling out from underneath the bus with a smoking pistol in hand.
"Jeez, Noya, you okay?" I asked, jogging over to him. "How the hell are you still alive? I mean, not that I'm disappointed you are, but I thought those guys gunned you down."
Noya let out a breath that may have been an awkward attempt at a laugh. Like he wasn't used to doing it, "Kevlar's rated for endgame raids. It can take a beating."
A quick check of his health bar backed him up on that. He took enough hits to kill me several times over, yet his health was still sitting pretty at halfway full.
"I really gotta grind some more," I said, smiling and helping him up.
Llenn scampered over to us wearing a grateful smile. "Hey, thanks a bunch for watching my back."
Noya stared at her for a moment. Then he nodded and said with a stilted tone. "Part of the job, Ma'am."
I slapped the back of my hand against his arm. "No need to be so formal, man. We're all friends here."
He fell silent. I couldn't make out his expression behind the balaclava and goggles, which very well may have been the reason he wore them. Finally, he said, "Welcome...Llenn."
She bobbed her head in acknowledgement. "So is the bus okay?"
"The damage is probably superficial," I said, turning to examine it. She should be able to move without a problem. If anything, that firefight was a good stress test for it. Now we know it can take some damage."
I clambered inside the bus, checked the indicators on the dashboard and quickly realized I didn't understand what most of them were for. There was gas, obviously, and the speedometer, and...then the rest. Well, nothing was on fire at least. That qualified as road-worthy in my book.
"Are you going to drive?" Noya asked, standing just outside the door.
"Yeah, right," I snorted. "Last time I drove something, not only did I crash, I blew up a building."
Noya grunted. "I can take over then."
"No argument from me."
While everyone piled inside, I went out to retrieve Charon and headed to the guard booth to open the back gate. Noya drove the bus out and once I was back in, we headed straight for the gas station a little ways down the road. The enemy squad was at least magnanimous enough to not hit the entire windshield. Most of the bullet holes were scattered all over its surface, but Noya could still see decently enough to pull up in front of the station without issue. He stopped in front of the gas station's main building, made a cursory scan around the area for any unwelcome guests, and then hit the horn.
Sinon appeared on the roof with Hecate secured to her back. She raised an eyebrow at the bus, her eyes a mix of curiosity and disbelief, and jumped off to meet us.
Noya opened the door with one of those old fashioned levers attached via a metal ball joint instead of a more modern switch mechanism. I leaned out to greet her.
"Hey Sinon, like my swanky new ride?" I asked.
"Your swanky new ride has bullet holes," she said.
"I like to call it character."
Sinon eyed the bright red holes on my left shoulder and arm. "I was going to ask about your wounds, but knowing you, you'd just say you were brimming with character or something like that."
"You think so? Damn, I'm starting to get predictable."
Sinon's smile showed more through her eyes than her mouth. She came in and settled herself a few rows away from the driver's cabin while Rei took up the seat behind her.
"How long until the next satellite scan?" I asked. Next to me, Noya put the bus into gear and set us off down the barren stretch of road leading towards the city. He checked his watch without letting go of the steering wheel.
"We still have several more minutes," he said as the bus travelled down a barren stretch of road.
I chewed on the inside of my cheek. Thirty teams entered the Squad Jam, including ours, and twelve had been eliminated since the last time the satellite scan came through. Hopefully that meant we'd be hitting less and less resistance the longer the tournament drew out, giving us more breathing room to take Ikuchi down.
Hopefully.
"Alright, keep me updated." I patted Noya's shoulder and went to take my own seat. That is, until I glanced at Sinon and noticed her staring intently at the window next to her. Normally I wouldn't have given it much thought, but the stiffness to her posture and the way her fists were clenched in her lap made me think otherwise. I briefly debated on whether or not I should disturb her, and decided to stick my nose into her personal business.
"What's up?" I asked, taking the seat next to her. She straightened, looking over to me in surprise.
"Nothing special," she said. She pointed with her chin towards something outside the window, "Just watching that."
I followed her gaze. A glowing set of blue concentric circles roughly the size of a soccer ball sped across the dry plains a good distance away from us. In its center were simply the letters 'REC' typed out in red. My seasoned deduction skills led me to believe it to be one of the camera drones Sinon talked about.
"Guess we're getting more attention with less people around," I said. "Will they catch on to Rei?"
I looked over the back rest at her. It didn't take long for Rei to notice the camera as well. She frowned and pulled her hood down even further.
"Those cameras don't have the best quality. I don't think Rei's in any danger of being found out right now. Not unless they get really close to her at least," Sinon said.
"Thank goodness for that," I said. "Still, you're looking kind of tense. Something up?"
Sinon looked at me, eyes searching my face for something, her lips working silently. "There's something that's been bothering me for a while now," she said a moment later, her voice uncertain. "Ever since I got kidnapped back in Old South. And no matter how hard I think about it, I can't come up with a good answer."
"Two heads are better than one. What's wrong?" I asked.
Sinon made a face like she was trying to swallow broken glass. The next words that came out of her mouth must have taken a great deal of effort on her part.
"The...Black Star. How did Ikuchi find out about it? How did he know that was what Death Gun used?"
I blinked. I was too concerned with rescuing Sinon back then, but now that she brought it up, the question came to my mind too. How did Ikuchi piece it together? How did he know to use the Black Star specifically? It's not like Sinon went blathering about it. The only other person who would know was Death Gun himself and he was behind bars along with the rest of his flunkies as far as I knew.
Maybe he saw it in a recording of the BoB tournament? It was certainly feasible. With the Death Gun incident being as big as it was, it wouldn't be particularly hard to find video of the man himself carrying the Black Star. I suggested as much to Sinon.
"It can't be that," she said.
"Why not?"
"I had the same idea," Sinon said. "So yesterday, I looked through every BoB recording I could find. But it was no good. Either the camera was too far away from Death Gun to get a decent look or the footage was too blurry to make out the details. Unless Ikuchi found a video I didn't, it's almost impossible he got it from a recording."
I drew out a medical syringe from the pouch on my belt and stabbed it into my wounded arm. "So if it wasn't that, then...what?"
Sinon stayed quiet for a long time. Then she said, "I don't like thinking about it, but...it's possible someone might've told him."
A pregnant silence fell between us.
"Do you think it was Shinka—"
"No," Sinon said abruptly. "It couldn't have been him. He's still being kept under observation. The doctors won't let anyone near him. They still won't let me see him."
"What about his brother?" I asked.
"I don't think so. He was arrested, too, and I hear he's under more security than Kyouji," Sinon bit her lip, "But...there was a third person in the Death Gun plot who got away. The police still haven't found him. Um," She scratched the side of her head, as if attempting to drag the memory out of the deepest, darkest recess of her mind. "Atsushi Kanamoto. I think his name back in SAO was...Johnny Black."
That made me more than a little nervous. Knowing someone had tried to kill her was bad enough, but finding out one of them got away and was still at large was a whole other terrifying issue. If this Johnny Black guy ever got ideas about coming back and finishing the job…
I shoved the thought aside before it could take root, but the alarm must have shown on my face anyways, because Sinon tried her best to give me a comforting smile.
"Hey, it's alright. He has no reason to come after me anymore."
A grimace fought to take over my face, but I beat it down with a stick. I wanted to believe her. Nothing would make me more relieved than to take her at her word, to know beyond a shadow of a doubt she'd always be safe. But I couldn't. After enduring two years in a death game, where people died often and without warning, where murder guilds gleefully took the lives of others, there was still a part of me expecting death around every corner. I wasn't sure it would ever go away.
I swallowed and allowed myself to make a tiny nod of agreement. It was the best I could do.
"Right. So it has to be someone else," Sinon said, evidently just as eager as I was to get away from the subject.
"Okay. So let's think on it. Who else could possibly know about the connection between Death Gun and the Black Star?"
Sinon let out a low breath. She propped an elbow on her knee and covered her face with her hand. Her foot tapped an impatient rhythm on the floor. "A man named Kikuoka was handling the case about the Death Gun murders. But he's part of the government and he didn't seem suspicious to me when I met him. Some of my friends know too, but I know for a fact none of them would do this."
"So if it's not the guys behind Death Gun, and it's not your friends, then…" I let the sentence hang in the air.
"...It might be someone I don't even know about."
We traded a look.
Sinon tried to hide it, but her expression turned sick. "I really want to be wrong," she said.
I couldn't blame her. If there really was someone out there spreading the secret of her trauma around, then that meant they managed to figure out her fear of the Black Star without being connected to Death Gun. Even worse, this mystery person had a reason — or a bad enough grudge — to go spreading it around. Anyone would be rightfully terrified of that.
What's more, if one person found out about Sinon's phobia, then that meant others could as well. I didn't dare voice that thought aloud.
"We'll figure it out. Once Ikuchi is dealt with, we can track down whoever told him," I said.
"And if it's too late?" Sinon asked, crossing her arms tight over her chest. "What if Ikuchi isn't the only one who knows now?"
"Sinon," I said, turning to face her. "How many rumors pass through GGO every day? Hundreds, at least? And most of them are unsubstantiated nonsense people throw around in order to hurt their competition."
Sinon fell silent for a minute, then she said. "Like when XeXceed lied about agility builds being the strongest meta."
"Yeah, exactly like that. So I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts that ever since then, people have become a lot more skeptical about what to believe," I said. I put as much comfort into my words as I could. "It'll be alright, Sinon. Your trauma is real, but to everyone else, it may as well be another drop in an ocean of gossip. Besides, if people were really finding out about the Black Star, then you know Argo would be one of the first to hear about it. She would have told us what was going on. "
Sinon paused. She turned to face the window again — at the pale blue camera floating in the distance. "But if I panic today, and everyone sees it, it'll be all the proof they need to know the rumor is real."
I frowned. She was right. With so many eyes watching the Squad Jam today, it would be near impossible to hide it if a camera recorded her panic attack. Ikuchi wouldn't even need to do much to make it happen on his part. Pull the gun on her as soon as a drone was around to watch, and that would be that. Hell, it could have even been his plan for today. He'd defeat Sinon and destroy her sense of strength in one fell swoop.
"Sinon, if there's anything I can do…" I said.
She took a shaky breath and then turned and faced me, her features smoothing into a neutral expression. "Stick by my side," she said solemnly. "That's enough for me."
I stared into her arctic blue eyes filled with fear and anxiety, determination and resolve — and knew without a shadow of a doubt that she meant it. She didn't need me to hold her hand or protect her from every awful thing the world would throw at her. She didn't want a savior. She wanted a partner. Someone who would be there to stand against the dark with her.
"You sure?" I asked.
"Yes."
I appraised her, then leaned back into my seat. "Okay, I suppose I can fit it somewhere in my busy schedule."
Sinon knocked a fist against my shoulder. "You better. Otherwise, what am I keeping you around for?"
"My boyish charm and side splitting humor?"
Sinon snorted and shook her head, though the way the corners of her eyes wrinkled didn't go unnoticed. I grinned. Even when things were tense, it made me happy to know some good natured teasing never failed to lift her spirits, even if it did make her want to smack me sometimes.
It was worth it.
We fell into a companionable silence. I closed my eyes, letting my mind wander aimlessly amidst its own thoughts. Everything about the Black Star didn't sit right with me. It's mere existence made the entire situation delicate, and the possibility of Sinon being hurt because of a mistake scared me more than anything else. If we didn't play this fight right, she would suffer for it. If anyone saw her having a panic attack, GGO would cease to be a safe place for her.
Unless...
I snapped my eyes open, blinking rapidly, following that the thread of logic.
What if they didn't? What if no one saw it happen? Sure there were going to be cameras around, but what if, rather than see Sinon battling her trauma, they saw something else? Someone else?
Excitement started to race through my heart as I turned and said, "Sinon, when we confront Ikuchi, I can watch your back no problem. But if you'll allow it, there's something else I can do to stack the deck in your favor."
She looked at me, furrowing her brow together. "What do you mean?" she asked.
"I can't protect you from the Black Star. That's something you want to do on your own and I'll respect that. But I can make sure no one will know about it if…"
"If I...have a panic attack."
"Yeah," I said. "We just have to make a small change in the plan."
Rei poked her head over the backrest. "Um, do you need me to do something, Master?"
"Depends," I said. I met Sinon's gaze and said, "I want to do my best to help you, but this is your decision, Sinon. Whatever you decide, I'll follow your lead."
Twice her eyes jumped from me and Rei. Finally, she lifted her chin and nodded. "Okay. What did you have in mind?"
We were busy working out the details in the plan when elsewhere in the bus, Llenn's watch started beeping. It was time for the satellite scan. Sinon and I took out our PDA's to watch it pass. It didn't take long for our position on the map to appear. We were leaving the city outskirts and entering the city proper.
Along with ten other teams.
The rest, including Yokai, weren't far behind.
"What the heck?" Sinon muttered. "Why's everyone gathering at the same place?"
I chewed on my lip, thinking. "My guess? Because that's where the people are. We came here for Ikuchi, someone came to get us, another came to get them, so on and so forth," I frowned. If that were the case, it wouldn't be long before the entire city became infested with enemy combatants. Confusion and havoc would become inevitable. And deadly. "This is going to be a problem."
"For who? Can't be us," Pitohui chirped. "At least they're not hiding at the edges of the map like last time."
I tapped a finger against the PDA's screen. We had to take exacting care not to get caught in the crossfire of an ensuing gunfight. The best way to do that would be to avoid lines of fire, move through the areas least likely to contain any enemy players or places with an inherent tactical advantage, but with so many people descending on the city, with varying degrees of tactics and strategies, it would be the next best thing to impossible to be able to predict all their movements.
"Whether it's a problem or not, we shouldn't take unnecessary risks. Once we're in the city, we should head to higher ground," I said.
"Hm," Sinon hummed. "The highest ground there is would be those two skyscrapers—"
A harsh shattering sound reached my ears and the bus suddenly lurched to one side, tires screeching wildly. The sudden swerve in motion forced me to brace a hand against Sinon's window to keep from bodyslamming her against it. I tried to hold on, but the bus veered even sharper than before in the other direction and I couldn't stop myself from falling backwards into the center aisle.
"Contacts! Everybody hang onto something," Noya barked.
"Wish you would've warned me earlier," I muttered.
High pitched metallic pings hit the truck like a heavy storm. Sinon, with one hand on the backrest, reached out to pick me up despite the constant swerving. I took it, wobbling in place. I grabbed the backrest as well to keep steady and looked over to the front of the bus. The windshield was getting even more banged up than back at the prison. Its entire surface was riddled with so many bullet holes that I couldn't even see where we were going. A quick look outside the other windows made it clear. We were in the city now, and the other player squadrons weren't wasting any time trying to kill us.
Noya wrenched the steering wheel to one side and the entire bus violently shook as it scraped against a parked car. But no matter how much he tried to dodge them, bullets kept hitting in a neverending torrent. I grit my teeth. They weren't causing any lasting damage, but it was only a matter of time before someone with a bigger, badder gun decided to take a shot at us.
"Oi Noya, unlock the emergency exit will ya?" Pitohui said as she got up from the rear of the bus.
Noya slammed a button on his dashboard and a hollow thunk echoed from somewhere behind me. I turned around and watched as Pitohui stood underneath the emergency hatch embedded in the bus' roof, slapping a fresh magazine into her assault rifle. She ushered me over with a tilt of her head.
"Hurry and lift me up would ya?" she asked,raising a foot and waggling it to and fro.
I went over and twined my fingers together, bending slightly at the knees, and boosted her up as high as I could. Noya's constant swerving didn't make it easy to keep my balance, especially with my hands being as occupied as they were, but I managed not to fall over long enough for Pitohui to push the hatch open.
"Hey, hey, smile wide!" she cackled, firing her assault rifle in wild bursts. "Shoot me! C'mon, show me how badly you want to die!"
Apparently it didn't occur to her that her rifle's bullet casings were piping hot and raining down on my head. Or maybe it did and she just didn't care. Luckily, virtual heat was nowhere near as intense as the real world. The brass casings stung in the same way poking a papercut did. Annoying, but far from the most painful thing I've ever felt.
Llenn, the poor girl, was lying on the ground nearby with her arms wrapped around a seat's metal legs. It was the only thing stopping her from sliding across the floor. "We need to get off of this bus!"
"We're working on it," I said. "Noya, we're working on it, right?"
He flashed a thumbs up, then took a sharp turn down an intersection. The bus' back end took such a wide swing as he did that I was afraid it would tip over. My balance wavered, and I had to lean hard against a seat to avoid falling and taking Pitohui down with me.
"Hey, drop me and this gets stuck up your ass," Pitohui said, digging the sole of her other foot into my shoulder.
I get no respect.
"Just trying to make it interesting for you," I said.
"Pitohui!" Noya said. "RPG! 12 o'clock high!"
The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. And there was the bigger, badder gun.
Between the noise coming from the bullets pinging all around us, Pitohui's rifle firing, the screeching wheels of the bus, and the frenetic beating of my own heart, came the stark whining of a rocket being propelled straight at us.
And there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it.
Noya tried to swerve and avoid the full force of the explosion.
In a snap-judgement I dropped Pitohui, wrapped my arms around her waist, and brought her down to the floor with me.
Then it happened.
In a split second, the front of the bus was consumed by fire and broken glass, and a shockwave hurtled into me like a semi, knocking me down like I was nothing more than a feather against hurricane winds. I fell and there was nothing pretty about it. Something struck my hip and back hard enough to make it actually hurt as gravity or force or some other unstoppable power tossed me around like I was inside a washing machine set to overdrive.
My senses were overwhelmed by a debilitating flurry of light and sound. I couldn't even tell if I was still alive. Not until I heard a horrible crushing sound and the dying whine of an engine.
An enternity passed before I pried my eyes open, but I couldn't see anything. Or rather, it was too dark to see anything, as if night had suddenly fallen. I quickly realized why. Thick black smoke was rapidly filling the bus' interior, the noxious miasma strangling my lungs. I rolled onto my side to avoid breathing it in.
Someone shouted from far away, the thrill of combat thrumming in his voice. "They're in there! Snuff them out!"
I cursed under my breath and opened my menu with a swipe of my fingers, using its light to look around. A flash of teal hair caught my eye. I aimed the glow of my menu towards the area where I saw it and coughed out, "Sinon?"
A figure emerged from the smoke. I focused my eyes, letting the light of my menu hit them, and found Rei staring back at me from the depths of her hood.
"Master? Are you okay?" she asked. She hurried to my side.
"Could be worse," I said. "You?"
"I'm operating at one hundred percent efficiency. No significant damage to report, Master!"
"Thank god for that. Sinon?"
"Here," I heard her say, as she too stepped into the light of my menu, bringing her muffler up to cover her mouth and nose. "We need to leave. I can hear enemy players getting closer."
Rei helped me up. My head throbbed with a dull pulse of not-quite-pain. I leaned my weight against the seat next to me to keep from falling over and I raised my voice, saying. "Everyone else still alive?"
"Pitohui and I are okay, more or less," Llenn said, coughing into a clenched fist.
I turned to face the little girl kneeling behind me. She was fine. Pitohui was sitting upright a few feet away, wiping dust and soot off her face. She appeared to be more or less unharmed as well. Pulling her down with me right before the rocket hit may have damn well saved her life. The explosion could have taken her and…
Noya. Crap.
"There it is! Search the bus! Make sure no one is still alive." Someone shouted. They were getting closer.
Sinon shot me an urgent look.
"Everyone out. We need to leave right now," I said, shutting off my menu to shroud us in darkness once more. I headed towards the front of the bus, waving a hand to disperse the thick black smoke. I steeled myself, ready to see Noya injured beyond saving.
I reached the driver's seat and felt my mouth drop open. Noya's armor was scorched and falling apart at the seams, exposing the burnt and dented steel plates sewn inside. Dozens upon dozens of glowing cuts and burns covered his body, pixelated blood oozing from them in steady rivers down his torso and arms. The mirrored goggles he wore were shattered on one side, leaving a visible storm grey eye looking back at me.
He was beat to hell, but still in one piece.
"Noya, jeez man, you're still okay," I said.
"I'm hanging on," he said, his tone hoarse.
"You're definitely getting five stars after this," I said, pulling another medical syringe out and sticking it into his chest.
"Argo...pays for the best," he said. "Explosion did some nasty splash damage. Can't move too well."
"Don't even think about sacrificing yourself in a blaze of glory. They're not as cool as the movies make them out to be," I said. I pulled his arm over my shoulder and yanked on the lever to open the door. It took a couple of hard pulls to get it open.
I dragged Noya out with me and looked around, trying to get my bearings. The bus crashed halfway into the lobby of what looked to be a rundown office building. The reception desk was straight ahead, old and covered in a thick layer of dust. A hallway leading deeper into the building was on its right and on its left was a door labeled Stairwell Access. Several paintings hung on the walls, but most were torn to shreds or otherwise faded beyond recognition.
Sinon stepped out of the bus and quickly made her way over to a window next to the front door. She pushed aside the thick curtains, a frown growing on her face. "I got a look outside. There's a lot of people heading our way. More than one squad."
I blinked at her in disbelief. "Seriously? They're working together?"
"It's not uncommon for people to team up during tournaments. I did it back in the BoB," Sinon said.
That just wasn't fair. Bad enough we were essentially on our own against numerous other squads trying to kill whoever they came across, but now it was us against multiple squads working together. Squads that were more than capable of sending us into the Great Hereafter.
I chewed on my lip, thinking. No way were we going to survive a fight in our condition, not without taking some casualties of our own. "We can't stay holed up here. Sinon, Rei, take Noya out of here, look for a rear exit. Pitohui, watch their backs. Llenn and I will keep them away from you guys for as long as possible."
Sinon stared at me like she wanted to argue, but then she nodded. I carefully transferred Noya to her and brought my MP7 to bear.
"Don't do anything stupid," she told me.
"C'mon Sinon, how long have we been together now? You know me — stupid comes with the package," I said with a wink.
Sinon rolled her eyes, but there was no mistaking the twinkle of mirth in them.
"I'll radio you once I find an exit," she said.
"Appreciate it."
Sinon nodded. Rei took Noya's other side and between them, they were able to drag Noya out into the hallway with Pitohui in tow, leaving Llenn and I to hold back the oncoming horde of gun-toting bad guys.
"You told Noya that it wasn't cool to sacrifice yourself in a blaze of glory," Llenn said.
"Yup," I answered, marching over to the window next to the front door.
"But now you're doing it."
"Yup."
I could feel the flat look she was giving the back of my head. "So then…"
"Hey, as long as I don't die, it's technically not a sacrifice."
"I'm not sure that's how it works."
I crouched down on my haunches and parted the curtains just enough to peek outside. Right away, I spotted an easy dozen of enemy players encroaching on the building's driveway. Some of them were moving towards the back end of the bus still jutting outside. Others were going around the building to what I presumed to be an alley. That wasn't good. If there was a rear exit and they found it before Sinon did, then she and everyone else wouldn't be able to escape. We'd all be trapped inside. I couldn't let that happen.
"Llenn, get ready. We're going loud," I said, letting the curtain fall back into place.
Llenn swallowed, nodding. She flicked the safety off of her P90 and aimed it straight at the window. The curtain was thick enough to stop her bullet lines from piercing through it. I grabbed it, looked over to Llenn, and held out three fingers.
I counted down, closing each finger with every passing second, then ripped the curtain open.
Llenn's little P90 utterly pulverized the window, shattering it and sending countless pieces of glass into the air. The sour scent of gunfire practically shoved itself up my nostrils, and I felt tiny, almost imperceptible stings bite my face as shards of glass cut into my skin. But I still whipped my MP7 out and fired alongside her. Our bullets cut a wide swath through the unsuspecting crowd, their shouts of surprise drowned out by the storm of automatic fire.
Four went down in the initial attack, and more could only raise their weapons up before our bullet lines found them. The people furthest away from the center of the group were the lucky ones. They managed to escape getting killed long enough to return fire while others dashed for cover.
My MP7 clicked empty. I ducked down and ejected the magazine with hurried precision, almost smashing the fresh one in with my impatience. I peeked out again, loaded gun in hand, but a torrent of return fire tore through the window, forcing me back into cover.
The sound of more glass breaking hit my ears. A window on the other side of the lobby had been smashed open, and someone was crawling inside. I pulled Charon free from its holster, lined up the shot, and put three rounds into his chest, the sound echoing off the cavernous walls. They weren't kill shots, but it hurt him badly enough to make his foot slip from the sill and send him sprawling in a tangle on the floor with a cry of pain. I took several long strides towards him to put him down, but on the way I spotted more hostiles heading towards the same broken window. I unloaded the MP7 into them, catching one in the shoulder and another several times in the chest. It dissuaded them from trying to get inside long enough for me to empty the rest of Charon's cylinder into the fallen player's head.
"We found an exit!" Sinon shouted into my earpiece. "Take the first left in the hall and keep going down it until you hit the third hall on the right. It's dead ahead."
I just about gave the order to retreat when something skittered across the ground to my feet, almost formless in the lobby's poor lighting. I squinted at it, and spotted the telltale shape of a hand grenade.
"Oh crap!" I shouted. In an instant of pure instinctive reflex, I jerked my leg and kicked it back hard as I could. It spun into the air and caromed off the window's frame into the parking lot beyond. Shouts rose up in sudden alarm. The grenade detonated and the entire front wall of the building rattled in place, shaking dust and flecks of old paint from the ceiling.
I gave a short shout of victory, a fierce grin taking hold of me. Then it fell along with my stomach as one grenade after another was thrown into the lobby, bouncing off the ground and walls in random directions.
Llenn noticed the danger we were in, but she was quicker on the draw than I could ever hope to be. She turned, dug her heels in, and broke into a dead sprint into the safety of the hallway, almost kicking up a cloud of dust as she went.
"Not again," I growled through clenched teeth. I didn't have a prayer of making it to the hallway. Instead, I ran for the reception desk. I took two long strides to get the timing right, and flung myself over the top, knocking over ancient computer monitors and telephones, and hitting the ground with my shoulder to curl into the smallest ball I could.
No matter how many times I end up in them, explosions never stop being disorienting. Especially when they happen over and over again. The shockwave of every grenade going off one after another hit me like a giant swinging a pillowcase filled with bricks, knocking the breath out of me. The pressure of each detonation squeezed my head like a vise, and I was sure my eardrums were on the verge of popping from the intensity.
Then as quickly as they came, the grenades stopped. Silence fell. I pushed myself up into a sitting position, a dull pain racking my body, and peeked over the receptionist's desk. I almost spat a curse. Outside, more people were pulling grenades from their belts and pockets.
Llenn leaned around the corner and said, "Are you okay?"
"Llenn, go!" I shouted.
"But what about you?"
"Don't worry about me, I'll be right behind you. Go! "
She tensed her slender shoulders, nodding, then hurried back into the hallway and out of sight.
I crouched down, gritting my teeth as another round of shockwaves slammed into me, and it was all I could do not to fall over under the relentless battering of invisible force.
I couldn't stay here. Even if I did survive the next several seconds, it wouldn't be long before enemy players started swarming the place to snuff me out personally. I needed an escape route. The hallway was too dangerous to go through without taking a few dozen pieces of shrapnel, which left me with only one option.
As soon as there was a breath of silence, I rose and ran the other way, throwing open the stairway access door and slamming it shut behind me. With a few harried gestures of my hand, I set one of the plasma grenades Noya had given me into the wall as a motion activated mine. It'd buy me time — a few seconds at least, but more than enough to bring my odds of survival up.
Trust me, running away from things trying to kill you is an art unto itself. Never let anyone tell you different.
I raced up a couple of flights of stairs and pushed the door open to the second floor. My boots slapped hard against the tile floor as I sprinted down the long length of the empty hallway. I stopped at an intersection, looking for stairs to take me back down to another section of the first floor or at least an empty elevator shaft I could jump down. But there was nothing of the sort. I tried to go through a nearby door, but the handle wouldn't budge.
A flat, heavy boom echoed behind me.
Time's up.
I whirled in place, desperate for any means of escape, and found it in a window further down the hall. I went to it and looked out to an empty alley down below.
"Beggars can't be choosers, right?" I said, stepping back and drawing Charon from its holster. "Don't mess up, don't mess up."
Charon barked twice in my hand, and the window fell apart into pieces. Ignoring all the property damage I was causing today, I rolled down my jacket sleeve and used it to brush aside stray bits of broken glass still stuck to the window frame.
I got one leg out the window when the door to the stairs was thrown open and a mob of enemy players came storming out, guns at the ready. Their bullet lines landed right on me.
"Right there! Kill him!" One of them shouted.
I didn't have a choice. I leapt out, and I didn't have any time to be graceful about it. Instead of a somewhat cushy tuck and roll to absorb the impact, I plummeted straight onto my back, my head bouncing off the concrete floor hard enough to make me lose health. White, eye-searing flashes flooded my vision, and my sense of balance was subjected to a hellish bout of vertigo. If it weren't for my keyed up brain trying to keep me alive, I probably would have forgotten where I was.
My limbs quavered. They felt like sand, but I managed to coax them into sluggishly following my commands, forcing them to pushed me up to my feet. I shoved air into my lungs, and bolted down the alley in a lopsided run, throwing myself around the first corner I came across.
Sinon's voice crackled through my earpiece. "Are you okay? Where are you?"
"I'm still kicking," I panted, keeping up my sluggish run. "Going through an alley. No idea where I'm going to end up."
"We made it out into a cafe. Noya and Pitohui are healing right now so they should be okay soon."
"Groovy," I said, coming to a stop. I braced my hands against my knees and closed my eyes, riding out the vertigo until it died down enough for me to stand."Soon as you guys can move, head towards the skyscrapers like we planned. I'll meet you there."
Sinon didn't answer right away. I assumed she was relaying orders to the others. "Roger. Don't go out into the main roads. It's chaos out there."
She wasn't lying. The alley was empty, but far from peaceful. I could hear the fighting coming from all around me — countless battles raging in every direction, dozens of players shooting and killing one another, orders being barked amongst cries for backup, all while missiles streaked overhead, exploding with heavy roars. It's the kind of thing you only experience living in an actual warzone.
That pleasant thought made me shudder a little.
"Chaos is definitely a word for it. Keep yourselves safe, ok?" I said.
"You too."
I cut the connection. The alleyway grew increasingly narrow as it went. I had to turn to one side and shuffle on through, thinking happy thoughts, and definitely not, oh, ones where an enemy squad stumbles upon me whilst in this disadvantageous position before proceeding to fill me with holes. I mean, it'd be pretty embarrassing to die like that after coming all this way.
I got half of my body out of confined space when someone hit the ground right in front of me, a bright red hole on his back. Charon appeared so fast in my hand that I hardly even registered it happening, aiming it straight at his head. Time stretched on for what felt like hours, but it couldn't have been more than a couple seconds before the 'Dead' sign popped up over the corpse. I let out a low breath, pulled myself free from the narrow passage, and gave myself a small moment to relax. It didn't last long.
"Contact! Bearing 135!" Someone shouted from high above me. Three heavily armed goons were standing at the edge of the rooftop with their rifles aimed right at me.
I snapped the business end of my revolver up at them and fired a hasty shot. It missed. And they retaliated in kind.
I raced down the length of the alley, boots pounding as frantically as my heart, doing my damndest to dodge the incoming fire by moving in erratic directions. Bullets broke apart bits of concrete at my feet, chipped pieces of brick at my sides, and then a numbing pain hit my back. My health dropped into the yellow and I stumbled.
I hit the ground, but rather than fall on my face, I dropped to one knee and pivoted around to face my pursuers in a crouch. I aimed at the first pursuer I saw and Charon bellowed twice. He jerked at the hips, staggered, and fell from the rooftop, plunging to the ground.
I didn't dare try to finish him off with his friends still on my tail. I kept on running. A red-bricked building stood at the end of the alley, it's backdoor partially opened, and I spurred on, crossing the last few meters with hot lead flying past my ears. At the last possible moment, I rammed my shoulder into the door so hard that the momentum carried me through it. I tripped over a pile of discarded cardboard boxes and fell hard to the ground, sliding a good five feet before hitting a wall in a tangled sprawl.
I lay there, partially stunned, limbs pulsing from exertion. A little nagging voice in the back of my head yelled at me that it wasn't safe here. That I needed to keep running. To get away.
A black ball bounced into the room a second later. It beeped rapidly, rising in pitch.
"For crying out loud!" I shouted. I half-crawled, half-jumped through a nearby door and kicked it shut behind me. The room on the other side popped and boomed and sizzled. Pure plasma trickled out from underneath the door, burning so brightly that it put spots in my vision.
"Getting real sick of this grenade spam," I said, drawing up a medical syringe and stabbing it into my neck. I got up and looked around while my health slowly climbed back up. The room was filled with dilapidated shelves of scorched or destroyed books; even the floor was littered with them. A table to my left held stacks of encyclopedias and to my right were various posters of cartoon animals reading everything from comic books to novels. A small library.
I took a peek outside through the library's front window. The two towers where I was supposed to meet with Sinon and the others were dead ahead, on the other side of the street. There was no one in sight. It seemed too good to be true.
I slipped out the door and took in the sight of the towers. I didn't notice it when we were out in the outskirts of the city, but halfway up both towers was a half-finished skybridge connecting the two. No doubt it had a great view of everything around us. If things got dicey, we'd be able to escape into one of the towers, too. It was a perfect sniper's nest for Sinon to work her magic. Assuming she got here safely.
I checked up and down the street. At the very least, the place needed to be secured before the others arrived. I ran for the tower's heavy wooden doors, grabbed their brass handles, and pulled. No one even so much as spotted me.
Remember when I said it was almost too good to be true? Here's a tip.
Never hand the universe a setup like that. It likes a punchline.
The moment I pulled on the door with the slightest bit of force, someone on the other side kicked it right in my face. Pain erupted across my face. The world spun on me and I fell to one side like a stone, my cheek burning against the sun-baked concrete, and my head throbbing with numbness.
Someone grabbed the back of my jacket and pulled hard when I barely got my feet under me. They threw me inside the tower onto a cool marble floor, and by the time I groggily got up onto my hands and knees, a pair of heavy boots came to a stop in front of me. I tilted my chin looking up.
Gozu stood right over me, his face twisted into a contemptuous scowl.
Behind him, Mezu slid a heavy metal security bar across the doors.
"Bout time you showed up," Gozu said, sneering at me. "We've been waiting for you."