Ch 2 - Makoto - Follow your heart

The words dug their claws into Makoto's brain. Kill Hajime. Kill another human being, someone who he didn't even know, who hadn't wronged him.

But if he didn't, then whatever deranged person set up this killing game would end his family. But there was no proof that they—

"Huh?"

Someone had just spoken, but it was quiet, soft. It was a woman's voice. Makoto glanced at Sayaka; she was still dead, there was no way this could have been her.

The disc! There was more to the message! He rewound it a few seconds and held it up to his ear. It was barely perceptible.

"…Follow your heart…."

He waited for more, but the player only clicked as it ended. It definitely wasn't the "gamemaster." If anything, it sounded like—

"Y-you're not going to kill me, are you?" Hajime asked. His entire body shook, his clothes and face were smeared with blood. He was a mess. Makoto's answer was immediate.

"No, I could never kill someone! There has to be another way out." The words didn't seem to do anything to calm Hajime. "Whoever did this planned this out," Makoto continued, "they cleared out this room, they made these tapes, they made sure we would find them and use them. If all they wanted was you dead, they would have done that already.

"This…it's some sort of puzzle for us to solve." Saying it aloud made it sound right. This was too much effort, too whimsical for simple murder. "You heard the voice, we have to decide if we live of die! We can't succumb to despair, we need to keep hoping for a way out."

"M-maybe." Hajime seemed to have calmed down, at least. He paced, as much as the chain allowed him. "Those messages served as motive for us to want to live, but they were pretty different."

"Right." There hadn't seemed to be a hidden message at the end of Hajime's, at least, it ended quite fast.

"You have an extra win-condition, which is to kill me, and an extra motive, which is to save your family. Doesn't that seem unfair?"

"Maybe they don't know anything about you," Makoto offered. It was possible that Hajime had no loved ones that could be used as collateral. Maybe he was too self-centered to care about others.

"No, that's wrong, the tape was too specific. They know my sleeping habits, which would take more than a day of following me. There's a reason why they picked me, just like there was a reason they picked you, and probably for Sayaka, too. There must be something connecting the three of us outside of this room, we just don't realize it yet."

How? Makoto had never even heard of a Hajime before awakening. Perhaps through work? But that wouldn't explain Sayaka; he knew who her managers and producers and assistants were, and he wasn't any of them.

Unless she… He balled his fists. No, it doesn't matter. She's gone. Something inside of him snapped. I'm not going to let them get away with this! I'll get out of here, no matter what!

He looked over to Hajime, who was still pacing and talking.

"…plus, if I escaped and then got help, no one would have to die. If your family was abducted, someone would notice. People would be looking for us. There's plenty of opportunities for the killer to leave clues if they abducted so many people."

He really doesn't know anything about me. That came as a relief, but it also brought a new sense of dread. Komaru and Toko had plenty of reasons to be unheard of for days at a time, while his wife frequently was unreachable for weeks. But the chances of someone overpowering her were slim. That only left Makoto's coworkers, who he doubted would care; they probably assumed he just quit and ghosted everyone.

No one is going to save us. We have to use whatever's in this room. But there was nothing obvious. The light switch and door were within Makoto's reach, but all he could do with those were turn the lights on and off. The door was locked, of course, and there was no knob or other obvious methods to open it. It looked industrial, almost like something you'd see on a freight elevator.

Were they in a warehouse? It seemed like a cliche location for someone to set up a killing game, but there were plenty of reasons why that was so. No one would chance upon them if they were locked up in the middle of nowhere. The only thing else in his reach were the pipes.

With nothing better to do, he started to search them thoroughly. Maybe a bolt was loose, maybe a scrap of paper was tucked into a corner. There had to be something.

"Oh," said Hajime, "are you looking for something?"

"There might be other clues to find."

"Right, good idea."

As time wore on, it became increasingly clear that there wasn't going to be anything to find. This doesn't make any sense. If I'm supposed to kill Hajime, how can I do that from across the room? I can't reach the gun, nor can he, and unless I get lucky throwing my shoe, there's nothing I can use as a weapon from here.

But the recording said that there were, that there's treasure hidden somewhere. But I don't see an X… The stains and smears on the wall didn't hold any patterns or recognizable shapes…at least from this angle.

"Hajime, did you find anything?"

The other man got up from his spot inspecting a pipe entering the floor. "No luck. What about you?"

"Nothing. What about something that looks like writing?"

"Let me see…." Hajime first looked around the floor. "Those might be lines, or I might have made them when I was trying to get up, I don't know."

"But no X?"

"No, nothing that looks like that." Makoto waited patiently as he scanned over everything. They had nothing but time, so they could afford to be thorough.

Maybe there is an X and he just won't tell me. He might think there's a weapon there for me…but then why would it be on his side? Am I supposed to convince him to kill himself? Would the mastermind have that count as me killing him?

"I think I found something!" Hajime called out.

"What?" An ember of hope, this might be the break they needed.

"On the side of the toilet tank, there's a heart."

Follow your heart!

"But the tapes didn't say anything about a heart…," Hajime pondered.

"There could be something in the toilet!" Makoto said. "You have to look."

Hajime stepped forward and peered into the bowl; he wrinkled his nose. "That's…"

Makoto sighed. "We don't have much of a choice! You're the only one who can reach it."

It took a few moments for Hajime to respond. "I'll check the tank first. At least that water should be clean." He pried off the heavy ceramic lid, unglazed edges screeching against the porcelain. "Ha, I knew it!"

"What is it? Tell me!"

"Hold on." Hajime pulled out a soaking wet bundle of…something. He placed it on the floor and worked on opening it. "It's a shirt, it's tied up around something." The sleeves slapped against the tile. "Whatever it is, it's pretty flat, I think it's—yes!" His head shot up. "We're saved!"

Makoto craned his neck to see but couldn't tell what dark object laid on the dark shirt. Hajime grabbed it—them, it was two things—and rose to his feet triumphantly. "We can get out with these!"

In either hand he held a hacksaw.

"We can cut through the chains!" Makoto cried. "Throw me one!" By the time he caught it, Hajime was already on the ground sawing at the chain. Makoto took a moment to examine it: the plastic handle was attached to a wide, U-shaped frame, the blade strung between either arm. Flecks of rust signified it was old, something sitting in a garage for several years, not new from a store.

Is this going to work…? He kneeled down and pulled the chain taught with one hand, cautiously drawing the blade against a link with the other. Metal scratched against metal, a horrid sound that set his nerves on edge. He tried again, noticing the resistance and the bend along the blade.

It's too weak to—

A metallic snap shook the air.

"Fuck!" It was Hajime.

"Are you okay?"

"Of course not!" he snapped. "This fucking thing broke!" He glared at the saw, at the chain, back to the saw. He rose to his feet. "This is bullshit!" With a scream he threw it.

"Don't!" Makoto cowered, but only heard the saw clatter to the floor, along with something else. He lifted his head to see a corner of the mirror had broken off.

"This isn't fair." Hajime slid to the floor. "Why even give us that hope if we can't even escape?" His voice shook, his chest heaved. Even if he was a stranger, one he was tasked to kill, it still hurt to see him like this, to not be able to do anything to comfort him.

But he's right, no matter how careful I am, this will never cut through the chain. He looked at the shackle, the connector, the lock, they were all thick pieces of metal. What's the point of giving this to us if we can't cut our way out?

And then he realized, an all-encompassing, sickening feeling. Makoto felt the blood drain from his face, his body, just like he wanted. "We're not supposed to cut through our chains…." I should have known from the beginning!

"What…?" Hajime asked with a sniffle.

"He never wanted us to to do that."

"Then what…?"

"He wants us to cut off our feet."

"Wh-that's. No." Hajmie shook his head. "No, that can't be it. Th-that's insane! You'd die if you did that!"

"There's a chance you won't. But if you don't, then you'd absolutely die here. He wants us to choose, this is what he does." He should have realized the moment he woke up, the answer was always staring him in the face, and yet he was so naive.

"What are you talking about?" Hajime demanded.

Makoto swallowed the lump in his throat. "I know who did this…"

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