by Yusuke Kishi
My parents started giving instructions to the members of the Security Council to deal with the situation. My father, in his capacity as mayor, began giving brisk orders left and right.
“The injured who require medical care, come this way. Are there any doctors or nurses here?”
I suddenly realized someone was missing.
“Um, where’s Hiromi Torigai?” I asked Tomiko.
She grimaced slightly and shook her head.
“Huh?”
“She was always the most worried and cautious one. For all that trouble, she was killed instantly by a bullet to the head. It’s really unfortunate. Remember, she was the only one to suggest postponing the Summer Festival at the Safety Council meeting,” Tomiko said quietly in a surprisingly calm voice. “I can’t remember feeling this much hatred for anything since that fiend, K. These despicable queerats, especially Yakomaru, are going to pay for what they’ve done. I vow to subject him to agony no living being has ever suffered as he dies a slow, protracted death.”
Then she gave a cheerful smile and started gathering members of the Ethics Committee for a conference.
Shisei Kaburagi called over the crowd, “Everyone, please remember your disaster response training. Form your groups of five and assess everyone’s health. If your group is missing members, join with another group. Never walk with less than five. …patrol the village in your groups and conduct a thorough search for any remaining queerats. Even if they claim to be loyal to humans and beg for their lives to be spared, kill them on sight. Be thorough, destroy their hearts or snap their necks to ensure death. Each member keeps watch in one direction, and make sure there are no blind spots above or below.”
Satoru took my arm. “Let’s go.”
“Huh?”
“We’re the only two surviving members of our group from Sage Academy, so we have to join up with another incomplete group.”
“Yeah. What are you thinking about?”
“I don’t know. But my anxiety is gnawing away at me.”
He didn’t say more than that.
We quickly found three people and joined with them at Satoru’s suggestion. They were from the metallurgy plant. Fujita, the leader, was a middle-aged man, Kuramochi was a thirty-something year old man who was also a firefighter in his town, and Okano was a lady about two or three years older than us. One of their group members was in the hospital and hadn’t come to the festival, and the other had died from the poison gas attack. The three of them were full of grief and anger. Kuramochi showed signs of wanting to take revenge on the queerats, and Okano wept openly for the friends she had lost in the attack. Both were worried about their sick friend, so we headed to the hospital.
“Saki, be careful,” my mother said through tears as she hugged me tight before we parted.
“Even if you have cantus, it’s still dangerous if the five of you get separated. Do not drift from the pack, do you hear me?” my father warned over and over.
“Okay, I’ll be fine,” I said cheerfully.
But there was a nagging feeling of unease that I just couldn’t put my finger on.
The only hospital with wards for patients to stay in was in the town of Gold, separated from the center of the district. It was surrounded by paddy fields, where year after year, bright green shoots slowly turned into golden sheaves of rice.
We boarded a small boat and set off down the pitch black waterway. Everyone was dying to reach the hospital as soon as possible, but for safety’s sake, we had to move slowly. It was maddening. Since there was always the possibility of being ambushed in the dark, we sent an empty canoe ahead of us as decoy, but there was no guarantee the queerats would fall for the trap.
“Hey, what’s that thing you’re worried about? Can you talk about it now?”
Satoru spoke quietly, aware that the others would be listening. “Yeah. Something doesn’t add up.”
“What?”
“First of all, why would Yakomaru fight a war he has no chance of winning? You know how he is. He wouldn’t take a risk if he wasn’t absolutely sure he’d come out on top.”
“You guys know Yakomaru?”
Fujita, who was on lookout at the bow, stood and came over.
“Yes. We met him when he was still called Squealer.”
Satoru quickly summarized the summer camp incident.
“I see. It’s true that he’s exceptionally cunning, but still, I just don’t believe the queerats can win this. They probably bet everything they had on tonight’s attack.”
“That’s what I thought too…”
I got the feeling there was something Satoru wasn’t saying.
“Earlier, when we were heading to the square, we ran into another queerat troop. I killed them.”
“Did you? Good job.”
“Yeah, but when I checked the tattoos in the corpses, they weren’t the Robber Fly colony’s.”
“It wasn’t?”
I gaped. I was supposed to be the expert in queerats, and I hadn’t even noticed. That was mortifying.
“It said ‘Other’.17 That’s the Spider Wasp’s tattoo.”
“Spider Wasp? That’s the colony the Robber Flies attacked, isn’t it? I heard the Spider Wasps went over to their side for some reason,” Kuramochi, who had been listening carefully while steering the boat, said sharply.
Most people had already heard about this.
“Yes, and that’s the big mystery. I can’t figure out why they would do that.”
“Hm. What’s your theory?” Fujita asked.
“…the Spider Wasps must have believed the Robber Flies were sure to win. So in order to ensure their own survival, they betrayed the Giant Hornets.”
“As I thought, they did believe there was a chance of winning. But it looks like they overestimated the Robber Flies. …still, it must have sounded like a convincing plan,” Fujita smiled slightly and shook his head. “There’s one other thing that bothers me. The fact that the Robber Flies did manage to annihilate the Giant Hornets. Kiroumaru is an experienced commander and his soldiers are the best of the best. How were they defeated so easily? I don’t think a surprise attack like tonight’s would have as much of an impact on a queerat army.” His smile faded.
“So you think they still have an ace up their sleeve?” I asked Satoru.
“Yeah. Though I don’t know what it is yet. It might be a weapon of mass destruction from the past, as your mother said,” his voice trailed off.
“But Shisei Kaburagi said…”
He had said that it was a cantus user that had destroyed the Giant Hornet colony.
“Yeah,” Satoru said, his expression warning me not to speak further.
If the other three found out about that, it would only cause them to panic.
“…alright. They might have weapons stronger than guns and arrows, so everyone needs to be careful,” Fujita said thoughtfully.
“Ridiculous. There aren’t any weapons that can overpower cantus. It’ll be a walk in the park when we decide to attack,” Kuramochi snapped. “I’ll find those bastards, even if I have to knock down every building here. I won’t rest until I slaughter all the queerats that killed Nemoto!”
“I know how you feel, but calm down. They’ve had a lot of time to prepare. We’ll be caught with our pants down if we’re not careful,” Fujita said.
“Yeah yeah, I know.”
Kuramochi turned away. The boat swayed from side to side, as if channeling the conflicting feelings within him.
Okano, who had been silent until now, looked up.
“I…I want to kill every last one of those fiends. But I’m more worried about Oouchi right now.”
“I know. But I’m sure he’s fine. There are fifty or sixty people in the hospital. They might be sick, but they can still use their powers. The queerats wouldn’t stand a chance,” Fujita said encouragingly.
“Yeah…you’re right,” Okano murmured to herself.
“It’ll be okay. Don’t worry.” I squeezed her
shoulder.
She trembled slightly. I patted her comfortingly. I wondered if Oouchi was her lover. I remembered when I had comforted Maria like this long ago, and my heart ached.
The decoy boat arrived first at the dock, and we stopped behind it. Between here and the hospital was a narrow canal surrounded on both sides by rice paddies. Queerats could be hiding among the plants, or submerged in the mud. Crossing would be dangerous.
“Look there,” Satoru whispered, pointing at the hospital.
The windows of all three floors of the building were dark, and there wasn’t a sound to be heard. There was a black void where the front entrance would have been. The door appeared to have been left open, but looking closer, I saw that some of the wooden planks that made up the wall had been ripped out.
“What is that? Is the door broken?”
“Yeah. It’s just a huge hole.”
“That can’t be…!” Okano said, her voice rising.
Fujita clapped a hand over her mouth.
“…shh. It’s okay. Even if something did happen, they probably managed to escape. Let’s go check it out first.”
The two boats advanced as quietly as possible. Satoru, Fujita, and I scanned the paddies for any signs of an attack. My heart was beating so hard I was sure everyone could hear it. My palms were dripping with sweat and I kept wiping them on my yukata.
We arrived at the front of the hospital. Part of the entrance had been completely destroyed. What was left was a neat circular hole about two meters in diameter.
“If this was the queerats’ doing, how did they manage to create the hole? I don’t smell gunpowder or anything,” Fujita said, sniffing the air.
“Who cares about that! Let’s get in there,” Kuramochi said, rising from the boat.
“Wait. We have no idea what’s in there.”
Kuramochi brushed Fujita aside and stepped out of the boat.
We watched him go in mute amazement. We weren’t Kaburagi Shisei. The queerats would have no problem springing a surprise attack on us.
But the darkness around us remained undisturbed. Everything was silent. Kuramochi strode toward the entrance and peeked into the hole.
“…no one. Just splintered wood everywhere. Like some giant ball smashed the door in.” His voice echoed out into the night.
“Saki, isn’t this kind of strange?” Satoru whispered nervously into my ear.
“Why?”
“It’s too quiet.”
“I guess so…”
I paused. It was weird that there wasn’t even the hum of insects. And not just that; at this time of year, the rice paddies should have been filled with croaking frogs.
“…could the queerats be hiding nearby?”
“Yeah. A lot of them, I think.”
“What do we do?”
Satoru beckoned for Fujita and Okano to come closer, and explained the situation.
“…they’re waiting for all of us to disembark. They probably want to strike when we’re least prepared.”
“S-so should we attack first then?”
“Yes. But if we do it now, they would target Kuramochi.”
“We have to call him back,” Okano whispered, her voice trembling.
“No, that would give away that we know what they’re planning. And if they start shooting blindly at us, that would be dangerous too. Kuramochi may not be able to make it back safely.
“So what do we do?” I asked.
“Wait for Kuramochi to enter the hospital. Once he’s safely inside, we’ll crush the bastards.
Kuramochi hesitated outside the entrance. The inside of the building was even darker than the night outside, but it was still too dangerous to light a torch.
“Heeey. What are you guys doing? Are you coming?” he called back to us, sounding irritated.
“We’ll be right there. Just hold on a minute. We’re going to check out the surrounding area,” Satoru answered.
“Tch. What, are you chickening out?” he scoffed, then stepped resolutely into the hospital and disappeared from view.
Now! We released our cantus into the fields around us.
The rice paddies burst into flames so intense they seemed to almost reach the sky.
For two or three seconds, nothing happened. Just as I was beginning to think that we had been overly paranoid about the whole thing, an entire army of soldiers leapt out of the mud. There were hundreds of them. They drew the weapons they had hidden among the stalks of rice and fired relentlessly at us.
But the moment the queerats revealed their positions, it was over. The flames exposed their positions to us, and they were temporarily blinded by the flames after hiding in the dark for so long. Only a few arrows and bullets struck the boat; most missed by a wide margin and flew over our heads.
The four of us began a merciless attack. Fueled by fear, anger, and a need for vengeance, the images we created wrung the queerats’ necks, smashed their skulls in, snapped their spines, and crushed their hearts. We didn’t even notice the rainbow sparks made by cantus interfering with each other. The only thought we had was that not a single queerat could be allowed to live; they needed to be thoroughly exterminated. The air was filled with the crackle of burning crops and shrieks of dying queerats. It had turned into hell.
“Enough! Stop! That’s enough!” Satoru shouted ten minutes later.
The fields of rice were almost entirely burnt away, and the queerats had stopped attacking completely.
“Did we get them…?” Fujita stepped forward, unable to contain his excitement.
“Yes. They’re probably all dead.” he answered.
The water in the paddies extinguished the fires and darkness closed in on us again. The stink of charred flesh hung in the air.
“I…just…” Okano lurched forward and began puking off the side of the boat.
“Calm down, Okano. Just relax. It’s okay. No one enjoys doing this. Even if the targets are queerats.” I rubbed her back.
“Come on, it’s okay. It’s okay, it’s okay…” Fujita repeated robotically.
He seemed to suddenly remember Kuramochi and turned to shout, “Heeey! Kuramochi! You okay?”
But there was no answer.
“What happened to him?” he asked Satoru, bewildered.
“I don’t know. But as long as he wasn’t struck by a stray bullet or something, he’ll be fine.”
“There aren’t any more queerats, right? Should we go and check?”
“I guess so. There might still be enemies hiding inside though.”
“Hm. I see…so what should we do?”
In the time that we had traveled to the hospital, Fujita had gradually pushed the position of leader on to Satoru. Even now, he was probably just acting like he valued the input of a younger teammate.
“I’ll go.”
“Really? That’d be great-”
“Satoru! Are you crazy?” I shouted.
“It’s okay. We’ve already killed all the bastards that were waiting to ambush us, so now there’s no chance of being attacked from behind.”
“But still…”
“Cover me.”
Satoru stepped quietly off the boat and walked toward the hospital entrance. He checked the area carefully then came back.
“Kuramochi’s not there. He probably went farther inside.”
“I see. Could you go take a quick look?” Fujita wheedled.
My temper flared. I wasn’t going to watch him walk into a death trap.
“No! Let’s call for help! It’s too dangerous to go alone.”
“But everyone’s in trouble right now. They can’t spare more people for this,” Fujita said reproachfully.
“Stop giving these flippant suggestions when all you’re doing is sitting safely on the sidelines! Since you have such great ideas, why don’t you go instead?”
He fell silent, looking ashamed.
“Satoru, you can’t! Don’t go inside!”
Satoru looked conflicted, but came back
to us.
“But we’re not getting anywhere at this rate.”
“And your death will get us somewhere?”
This finally seemed to get through to him, and he faltered.
“No, I didn’t mean…”
Obviously he had never outgrown the bad habit of not thinking about the consequences when he got too involved in something.
“…okay. Fine. I see your point, Watanabe,” Fujita said soothingly.
“Let’s raze the entire building. There’s no other solution. That way, if there are any queerats hiding inside…”
“How could you say that? You’re supposed to be our leader.”
Surprisingly, it was Okano who had interrupted.
“There could be survivors in there. Oouchi and Kuramochi too. Razing the building… Are they all just collateral damage to you?”
“No, that’s not what I meant at all…I was thinking we could take the building apart bit by bit,” he stuttered.
“Ah, over there!” I shouted, looking up.
There was a faint light in the third-floor windows.
“What’s that?”
Satoru noticed it too. A flickering light. It hadn’t been there earlier when we first arrived. And it probably wasn’t visible when we had set the paddies on fire.
“Someone’s there…” Satoru started toward the hospital again. “It’s not a firefly. This is someone’s cantus.”
{He could have told me that it was will-o’-the-wisp and I would’ve believed him.}
“It’s probably someone signaling for help. We’ve got to go.”
“What if it’s a trap? I mean, if they have the time to make a ball of light, why not just open the window and shout for help?”
Satoru shook his head. “They might not be able to. Maybe they’re badly hurt and can’t move. Anyway, I’m going. I don’t know who it is, but I can’t just leave them there.”
He had made up his mind this time and there was no point stopping him.
“Fine. I’ll go too.”
“No, Saki…”
“If you go alone, who’s going to cover your back?”
I stepped off the boat, a little unsteadily since I still wasn’t used to my clogs.
“I’ll come too,” Okano said quietly but firmly. “It’s safer with three people.”
