There were three new arrivals when the Gantz team appeared in the room. Two women and a man. Each time a mission started, the new players just got worse. Nishi glanced at the man hugging himself in the corner of the room, he was rocking himself back and forth, and the teen rolled his eyes. Great, someone who belongs in a mental hospital. Nishi sighed and leaned against the wall, his team standing close by. Yoko leaned next to him, purposely brushing her arm against his; the two had no desire to acknowledge their relationship, but they were almost sure Ryo and Jiro were aware of it. The two women stood on the opposite side of the room looking quite calm considering, though their confusion was palpable. Their clothing was similar in style, dark in color, with a short skirt and the other leather pants, but had the same Satan symbol printed on their t-shirts.

Ryo leaned close to his group and whispered, "Those girls are freaking me out more than that rocking guy over there."

Jiro didn't try to explain anything because he knew it annoyed their youngest member; Nishi never forgot the Daikai incident and would not trust anyone else. However, Jiro did introduce himself and the rest of the team, much to their dismay, and they proceed to then observe the new arrivals. The newbies held no interest in the black ball, and after a few minutes, the man stood up and began to freak out.

"Here we go," remarked Nishi. "This is becoming extremely annoying."

Jiro smiled. "We could always try and explain it to them, keep things interesting."

Nishi grimaced and huffed, "And sign our death warrants while we're at it." The boy frowned at Jiro while shoving his hands in his pockets. "I died once already, I don't plan to die again, certainly not here anyway, do you?"

Jiro clapped his hand on Nishi's shoulder. "Certainly not, my boy."

Nishi shrugged off Jiro's hand. "Then take my advice and keep quiet."

The man continued to freak out, and he soon started muttering about conspiracies while desperately checking for bugs in the walls. "It's the government! They've trapped us, we're all doomed, I knew it all along, they're using us for their sick plans, they've been watching us from the very beginning I tell you!"

Nishi suddenly smirked. "Of course, we can always play along."

Although Yoko nudged Nishi with a frown, she couldn't help but chuckle when Ryo replied, "You're awful, kid, that's cruel."

Nishi shrugged. "Who wanted the hippies around because they were entertaining?"

Ryo stammered because he knew Nishi was right, "Hey! We all wanted that, shut up."

Suddenly, the Gantz ball began the next part of the stage, causing the man to freeze up, and the two women finally pay attention to the ball. As usual, the ball told them their lives were over, and their new lives were in the ball's hands. The guy freaked out again and pulled at his hair before slapping the ball a few times and then jumped back in terror when it burst open. He soon started to shout theories about cheating death and patterns to remain ahead of death, to which Ryo began to connect with the horror movie franchise final destination. "What a lunatic," Ryo muttered to his team.

"It's all real! We're going to die! No one has broken the chain, we can't cheat death!"

Yoko and Jiro shared a concerning look, and the old man smiled sheepishly, "Well, we know why he was sectioned, I suppose." Yoko hid her giggles behind her hand.

Nishi gritted his teeth, his fists clenched, he wasn't sure why he was suddenly angry, but he shouted, "Instead of coming up with ridiculous assumptions and basing your theories off fictional movies, try thinking about the reality of what's happened so far and actually do something useful!" The guy froze and crouched to the floor, wrapping his arms around himself to rock again.

The rest of Nishi's team were startled by his outburst, Ryo wanted to remark something sarcastic considering all he had said so far was to not relay any information to the new arrivals, but he chose not to risk it because whether he liked it or not, Nishi was his teammate.

Nishi sighed with frustration, mainly at himself, and wasn't sure if it was because the team he had now were the only ones who would ever understand, and he was left with this annoying fear that if they died, then he would be all on his own. It frustrated him more when he thought about them scoring a hundred points before him; either way, he would be on his own. I have to score a hundred points before them, I have to, I will not be left with the likes of these fucking morons.

Yoko glanced at the two females whispering to each other, but she didn't think it was to do with what was going on when they turned their attention on her and gave a slight grin. Yoko shuddered for a moment; she was almost sure they looked familiar, and the t-shirts they wore gave her creepy vibes. I swear I've seen them before. Were they on a news broadcast recently?

Nishi and the rest of the team shifted their attention to the mental patient when he started shouting about keys to stopping the patterns. The guy then turned swiftly to point at them, almost getting in their faces, and said, "Them! They are the keys to stopping this death cycle, it has to be them, they are not like us!"

Ryo stepped forward since he was the closest and shoved the man away. "Back off, nutcase, geez, we're not some kind of key, the only way out is to – ow!" Ryo turned to see Nishi glaring at him, and it was obvious he was the reason behind the assault. "All right, I won't say anything, geez, no need to shove me."

Everyone turned their attention to the ball when the screen changed and revealed their target, and even the two females were showing interest now.

Name: Spid-rat.

Likes: Sewers.

Traits: Fast, has sharp teeth.

Ryo scrunched his nose up and said, "Aww man, the sewers, really? That's gross."

Jiro chuckled and placed his hand on Ryo's shoulder. "Imagine huddled together for warmth with men who are covered in grime and haven't showered for days, the sewers are nothing compared to that."

While the two women gazed at the ball's contents, and the guy spoke to the man inside it, Ryo and Jiro left the room to change. Nishi and Yoko were already wearing their suit and stood inside the archway farthest on the left, placing their gloves on while Yoko addressed her concerns to him for the two women. "Nishi, do you recognize them?"

Nishi didn't make it evident by glancing their way and stood with his back to them. "I knew it was them the moment I saw them, they were on the news back just before we got here, do you know why?"

Yoko shook her head. "I saw the photos the media captured, but the reports were vague."

"They're cult leaders who believe in the devil and they want to summon him, they were almost caught when a lot of reports for missing people happened in the same area, but they got away."

Yoko stared at Nishi in surprise and asked, "How do you know that?"

Nishi shrugged. "I found their website, it's not a secret, they advertise it around public places. My guess is, they lure people with lies of being saved or whatever crap they choose to say, and they trick those people into sacrificing themselves in order to summon the devil. Their website is a front, it doesn't mention anything about the devil, but you get the idea."

Yoko gulped and tried her best not to look at them. "I guess their shirts are a dead giveaway."

Nishi sighed in annoyance, "They're the least of our concerns, they're only a threat to those who can't think for themselves, who need something to believe in and will do anything to get it. Our main concern is the patient, since he has already claimed us as a threat, he strongly believes he'll be safe if he kills us."

Yoko gasped, "Just like Daikai."

Nishi narrowed his eyes. "Yes, and I will not hesitate this time to blow his fucking head off if he so much as tries to lay a finger on me."

Yoko gripped her gun tightly from within her jacket at the mention of someone trying to kill them, to kill Nishi. "He won't have the chance."

Nishi chuckled, "Oh right, because you'll kill him, right?"

Yoko rolled her eyes; Nishi still didn't believe her promise, but she would prove it to him.

The team was ready with their suits and weapons, standing back in the main room, and it wasn't long before Gantz began transporting them. The man began to scream hysterically, and even the two women became afraid when they started to disappear. Nishi and the guy were the last to transfer, but before they did, the man suddenly grabbed him before the boy had a chance to react. "You must die! You must die for us to live! It's the only way to stop the pattern!" Nishi gritted his teeth and managed to pull his weapon free, but even without the suit, the guy was more robust than he looked, but Nishi thought it was due to hysterics and his own surprise. When they appeared outside, there was a struggle between them, and the guy had Nishi pinned to the floor. Jiro, Yoko, and Ryo immediately turn their attention to the scuffle, and surprise etched on their face when they realized. Nishi kept the gun out of reach while trying to get free of the guy's grasp and shouted to his team, "Get this fucking nutcase off me!"

Anger flooded through him, and Nishi used his suit to his advantage and launched the guy off him with his feet. When the teen stood up clutching his weapon, the guy remained hysterical and acknowledged the rest of the team as he said, "They must die to stop the cycle, and it starts with him!" They realized that despite neither of the new arrivals wore suits, they had the weapons.

Jiro and Ryo move to act; Nishi narrowed his eyes, but before he got the chance to use his gun on the maniac who was blatantly trying to kill him, Yoko was the first to react.

"Answer me this, putting my previous question to one side for now. You tell me to call you if I'm, as you put it, 'in danger,' but what if that situation occurs and you have no choice but to kill the person endangering my life; let's use the mercenary as an example, he has a gun to my head, I'm defenseless, I have no suit to protect me, would you pull the trigger of the gun in your hand to save me?"

Soon enough, the man's head exploded, causing blood to spurt up and coat the ground. Yoko turned to Nishi with a frown and said, "Do you believe me now?"

Nishi blinked at her in mild surprise and then tucked the gun back in his pocket when he saw her grin and said, "I could have done that, but point proven." He glanced to the side to avoid her gaze, still unsure whether he should accept it.

Jiro and Ryo exchanged their own look of confusion, but they shrugged, and Ryo suggested they start looking for the aliens, not caring one bit about the two missing girls or the fact that they were responsible for the death of a Gantz player. Jiro didn't say a word about it because he knew Nishi was right, don't rely on other people if they couldn't figure it out for themselves; after Daikai, and now the mental patient, it became all too clear.

Jiro and Ryo were the first to encounter one of the aliens; its appearance was just as its name suggested, a furry spider-like creature, with a shell for its torso, and it was fast. Ryo and Jiro made sure to stay clear of the spid-rat as it scampered in all directions; they could see the sharp teeth clearly. "As long as we stay at a distance, we should be fine," said Ryo as the two move in time with the alien. "I don't see any other attacking features on it, do you?"

Jiro skidded to the side and managed to land a kill shot to its head. "You're right," Jiro replied as he stood up straight and breathed deeply. "But they are fast, and we must be faster." Two more suddenly appear before them, their feet scampering along the ground was loud enough to be heard from a distance.

"Skittering little devils," Ryo gritted out and saw one of them crawl closer, baring its fangs ready to attack, but he poised his gun forward to blow it up. "Damn." Turning to the other alien, Ryo and Jiro fire their weapons simultaneously, but they soon discover its strong point when nothing happened to the body, and it scampered away into a nearby hole leading to the underground. The hole was large enough to suggest it was not the cause of humans, but likely the aliens.

Nishi wiped his face on his sleeve as he appeared solidly after killing his second alien; he breathed deeply as sweat trickled down his face. It was the first time he'd used the suit to the best of its abilities because the alien spiders were more resilient than the others he had faced. Nishi looked at the GPS and realized why they were hard to find; some were underground leading into the sewers. "Great." Nishi switched the map's angle and opted to find the ones still above ground because he thought there might be a nest somewhere below and was positive they would discover the stronger one there. "The more of the little ones I take out up here, the easier the boss will be." Nishi thought about Yoko and wondered how many she had taken out, or if his team would discover the sewer nest. "Whatever."

Yoko groaned in annoyance that she was by herself again because Nishi always insisted on splitting up, unlike Jiro and Ryo, who seemed to have subconsciously started forming a partnership of sorts, though she suspected Ryo was just tagging along and Jiro didn't have the heart to tell him to get lost. Yoko tried not to worry about them as she continued her search, the aliens seemed smarter, and she had a feeling the sewer was the next location, but there would be no room to hide or avoid attacks down there. Yoko smiled as she held up her GPS and said, "Good thing I have you." Except for Nishi, they had yet to use the stealth mode.

The two females walked unaffectedly through the wade of water in the sewer tunnel below; each of them held a weapon tightly in their hand. The slightly taller one wearing the leather pants spoke when they step onto gravel, "We'll just wait this out and get them later, it's that simple, we let them do all the work of fighting whatever it is and hide down here, then, whoever is left alive, we'll take with us. The mental patient will be easy to convince, and how hard can the rest be, there's two kids, an old man and some hippy, it'll be a cinch."

The other female nodded in approval and smiled. "I hope the hippy guy survives, he was kinda cute. He'll make a perfect sacrifice."

The taller one chuckled and clasped her hands behind her head. "Maybe you could have some fun with him before the sacrifice, wouldn't be the first time."

Neither realized they were walking straight onto the aliens' location until one of the smaller ones scampered into view off to the side. "Look," came a whisper from the shorter one as the alien froze when they locked eyes. "It's – it's big, that's the alien thing, right?"

The taller one stepped forward and waved her arms to try and shoo it away; the other followed her example. There was a sudden explosion alongside the wall, and it missed the spider by inches, and as a result, spooked the alien, causing it to run after the two women. Yoko appeared behind it with a frown of frustration because of her miss and shouted, "Shoot it!"

The two women's eyes widened, and before the spider reached them, the taller one grabbed the other and shoved her forward with a grin, "Rather you than me."

The shorter one screamed as her partner stepped back and let the spider wrap its legs around her; fangs came down and sunk into her neck, devouring her head whole. Yoko stared in shock, not because of the attack, but how easily the other woman pushed her friend to her death so she could live. Yoko watched her scramble away while the spid-rat tore apart the other, and before she had a chance to shoot it now that the girl was gone, the head of the alien exploded. At first, she wondered if the other woman was responsible until she saw Nishi appear on the opposite side.

"Too slow," Nishi told her with a grin.

Yoko rolled her eyes with a huff as she stepped toward them. "I was seconds out, you could have let me have that one."

Nishi chuckled at her as he stopped in front of her and said, "Too bad." The two teens heard a gasp from the woman and turned to face her.

"You used me as bait? You're sick! What kind of people are you?"

Nishi raised an eyebrow and took a step forward. "Who are you calling sick, aren't you doing the same thing by luring people to your cult and sacrificing them?" He grinned when her eyes grew wide. "Didn't you just push your friend to her death in order to save yourself, hypocrite." The woman backed up against the wall, trying to stammer out an excuse, but Nishi scoffed, and he and Yoko disappeared.

Ryo and Jiro joined Yoko and Nishi fifteen minutes later, and Nishi reluctantly agreed to locate the boss together after making sure there were no more spid-rats above, and since there was no room to separate, he didn't have much choice. Halfway through the tunnel, the ground started to shake, and the small flow of water between the two pathways rose a few inches, along with three spid-rats. The team stop and raise their weapons to attack, but the ground shook again, and this time, a much larger alien appeared. Ryo and Jiro were on the left, and Nishi and Yoko stood on the right side, staring at the alien with surprise. The enormous alien was slimy, and in place of legs, there were long tentacles, but the same hard-looking torso remained the same. The spid-rats circled quickly around them, and the small space made it hard for the Gantz members to attack them. Nishi suspected the alien behind was responsible for creating the smaller ones in the first place when it suddenly retreated back into the water, so he left the others to deal with them and disappeared. Yoko jumped into the water when the last spid-rat tried to bite her shoulder, and she aimed her gun to blow its head off. Jiro and Ryo cheered for her and celebrated their small victory before noticing that Nishi and the larger alien were no longer with them.

Ryo let out a grunt of frustration, "Fucking kid, can't he wait for us? He'll get himself killed if he keeps doing that."

Yoko huffed and pulled out her GPS. "He's gone after the alien that's for sure, and they're not that far away, come on, let's catch up." Yoko hid her concern well and took the lead, causing Jiro and Ryo to follow as she followed the signal.

Jiro, Ryo, and Yoko heard explosions once they were close enough, and they ran the rest of the distance with fear for their missing teammate. When they arrived, Nishi was stood in the middle of the open area. The slippery ground separated him from the water and the alien. Hearing their footsteps behind him, he gritted his teeth and glanced at them over his shoulder. "What the hell were you doing back there, give me a fucking hand already!" Neither of them reacted to his harshness and immediately started to fire their weapons along with him, but considering its body was the same type as the spid-rats, they desperately aimed for its tentacles and head.

The alien screeched out when its tentacles started to explode after several shots; however, two of the ones intact fly forward; Nishi and Yoko quickly jump out of its path, leaving Jiro next in range; the old man fired his gun, but the aim was off, and the ground was hit. Before the tentacle grabbed Jiro, Ryo jumped forward and pushed him out of harm's way, causing the alien to wrap its limb around him. Jiro tried to grab his hand to keep the alien from pulling Ryo back, but he missed the chance, and Ryo screamed as the tentacle dragged him off. Nishi and Yoko also tried to fire their gun, hoping to land a hit before the thing could pull Ryo down, but it was too fast, and Ryo disappeared into the water.

"Ryo!" Jiro ran to dive in, but Nishi stopped him and pulled him back.

"We don't risk our lives!"

After a few moments, there was a massive explosion from underneath, causing a body of water to crash over them. The three stood just before the edge, ready with their weapons, waiting for the alien to rear its ugly head, but they startled when instead of a head, a hand burst out; it was Ryo.

Jiro shouted with relief, "You're alive!" The old man pulled Ryo from the water, but the moment he did, the team realized his condition was near-fatal; a chunk of his side was missing from the waist up, deep gashes adorned the rest of his body, and his eyes were glassy. "Ryo, don't die on us, you hear me?"

Nishi and Yoko knelt, and the boy pointed out the liquid that seemed to be leaking from the suit. "Your suit failed, I think it must have reached its limit."

Ryo smiled weakly but didn't reply to Nishi's statement because he knew what was happening.

Yoko huffed a laugh though her eyes glistened. "You did it Ryo, you'll get points for sure this time," she said, but something told her he wouldn't be coming back with them, and sadness filled her heart.

Ryo managed to chuckle before looking at Nishi and said, "Sorry for taking the boss points kid."

Nishi rolled his eyes and stood, hands in his now wet jacket. "Shut up, you just stay away from them next time, got it?"

Yoko looked up at him, and he nodded at her, telling her he knew what she was thinking, and she smiled, for once, in his own way, Nishi showed the slightest bit of empathy.

Jiro grasped Ryo's arm, tears filling his eyes; he knew it too. "Thank you, you're the reason I can once again return to my wife, and I'll never forget you."

Ryo shook his head. "Hey… I would have done it for any of you." He looked at Nishi and slightly grinned. "Even you."

Nishi frowned but didn't retort; it annoyed him to think there was one less on their team now. Shit.

Ryo smiled. "Take care of yourselves, I know you guys will make it… you're the best. I would even call you all my friends."

Jiro tightened his hold on Ryo's arm. "You too, Ashi." The old man chuckled, "Even if you did hit me with a truck."

Ryo choked out blood before chuckling, "Sorry about that, but, at least I died saving you this time…"

Nishi and Yoko were the first to transfer, Yoko gave Ryo a little wave through her tears, and Nishi nodded at him in farewell.

"Take care of the dog for me, old man…"

Ryo's eyes closed, and Jiro released his arm when he began to disappear. "Goodbye, Ryo…."