Against a Perfect Sniper (4 page)

“What are you trying to do…bastard?” Rentaro said.

Yasuwaki walked briskly over to Rentaro, and just as Rentaro thought he had drawn a large knife from his hip, Yasuwaki thrust the side of Rentaro’s face into the wall of the restroom as hard as he could. Yasuwaki brought his mouth next to Rentaro’s ear and whispered in a stifled voice, “Rentaro Satomi, turn down this job. It is
my
job to stand behind Lady Seitenshi.”

“Huh?”

“You make me sick. Who cares if you’re the hero who defeated a Zodiac? You just happened to be the one by the abandoned railgun
module, you whelp. If I had been there,
I
would have defeated the Zodiac.”

Rentaro didn’t say anything.

“Why you?” Yasuwaki continued. “Lord Tendo left Lady Seitenshi to me while he was gone. To
me
. Lord Tendo’s usual position by her side should be mine.”

“You’re always by her side protecting her, aren’t you?”

Yasuwaki gave a snort. “Idiot. It’s not the same as being with her in the car or during meetings. Besides, Rentaro Satomi”—Yasuwaki leaned over and grinned, licking his lips repulsively—“Lady Seitenshi has grown up beautifully and will be sixteen this year. Don’t you think it’s about time Tokyo Area’s ruler had a successor, as well?”

“Oh, is that how it is? In the end, it’s always that, huh?”

Yasuwaki drew his gun from his hip and thrust it between Rentaro’s eyebrows. “Shut up. Now, I’ll have your answer.”

“I’m not gonna listen to you.”

Yasuwaki put away his handgun quickly and headed for the hallway with a jerk of his chin. “Crush the bones in his arms and legs.”

Were these guys serious?
Held down by guards on his left and right sides, he was disgusted and flailed wildly until suddenly the hold on his right hand loosened. The next instant, before he could even think about it, his hand had reached out to the gun on his hip. He aimed slightly to the right of Yasuwaki’s astonished face and pulled the trigger.

The bullet flew straight and grazed Yasuwaki’s cheek, and then the explosive sound of small-arms fire in a small room thundered throughout the palace. Then, there was a brief moment of silence, and the smell of gunpowder smoke stung Rentaro’s nostrils.

“This guy…”

“I can’t believe you fired in the Seitenshi’s palace.” The guards were shocked.

Yasuwaki roared at the guards, who had started to look nervous. “Get yourselves together, idiots!”

Holding his cheek where the bullet had grazed him, Yasuwaki narrowed his eyes that were burning with hatred. “I’ll kill you…… I’ll kill you, you son of a bitch!” Spitting out his parting threat, he and the guards quickly retreated.

In their place, workers rushed in in great numbers. “Are you all right?” they asked Rentaro.

As Rentaro waved away the hands reached out to him in his confused state and stood up, he glared at the exit Yasuwaki and the others left from. Apparently, the Seitenshi’s personal guards were far from being honest or diligent.

Rentaro received simple treatment and was interrogated by the staff and found innocent. By the time he was led out of the palace by the staff, he had decided to take the job.

When Rentaro left the palace, the sun was low, and the sky was dyed red. He stretched hard, and the bones in his body made delightful popping sounds. Every time he had to undergo this kind of questioning, it made his shoulders stiff.

Suddenly, he felt a sharp pain and pressed his hand to the bandage on his forehead.

On the other hand, despite the extremely serious matter of boldly shooting a gun in the Seitenshi’s palace, he had been allowed to go home surprisingly easily. For some reason, the staff understood his situation, but when Rentaro tried to turn the conversation to Yasuwaki and the other guards, the staff gave a start and looked down.

It looked like the staff inside the palace had some knowledge of the arrogance of the Seitenshi’s personal guards. At least, enough to figure out immediately that something had happened between Rentaro and the guards when they saw Yasuwaki and the others leave the restroom, with Rentaro inside with blood dripping from his forehead. Rentaro sighed. It had turned into something annoying.

Then, he looked up and thought,
Oh?
There was a bicycle circling the elaborately designed fountain in front of the Seitenshi’s palace. It had been circling this whole time. Riding the bike was a girl about the same age as Enju with hair that could probably be called platinum blond. The wind blew her beautiful hair up, and it reflected the red light of the setting sun, sparkling brightly.

However, the girl was wearing baggy pajamas, her feet shod in house slippers, she had a serious case of bedhead sticking out from her head, her mouth hung half-open, and she pedaled the bike with a self-effacing expression on her face. It was hard to watch.

The people walking by had expressions on their faces that made it clear they did not want to get involved with what looked like a sleepwalker on a bike caught in an endless loop around the round fountain, and they quickened their steps to pass her.

Rentaro had a bad feeling about this and hunched his shoulders, walking quickly to pass the girl on the side, leaving plenty of space between them. With a feeling of relief, he stroked his chest and tried not to look back as he headed home.

Suddenly, there was the sound of something falling behind his back.

“Hey…! What the…?! Watch where you’re going!” The thunderous voice carried a hundred meters, and when Rentaro reluctantly turned back, there were three delinquent boys with bleached blond hair surrounding the girl from before. The girl had been thrown off her bike and looked like she didn’t know what had happened. Surprised, she looked left and right, but then the kicks started mercilessly, and Rentaro closed one eye.

The girl’s back crashed into the edge of the fountain, and the muffled voice that escaped when the air was knocked out of her lungs even reached Rentaro.

“Why aren’t you saying anything? Say something, bitch. You ran over my foot with this bike. Get it?”

“Aw man, that foot’s probably broken.”

“You’ve gotta pay compensation! Compensation!”

One of the boys started stomping on the vainly spinning spokes of the inverted bicycle in a fit of anger. The girl didn’t know what was going on and just stood with her mouth open. There were more people around them who avoided the girl and walked by, and some started appearing who didn’t want to get involved and turned away completely.

Rentaro felt bad for her, but he wasn’t such a good person that he would act like a hero and go in to help. His feeling of not wanting to get involved won, and he turned around, but when he suddenly thought of what Enju would say if she were here, his legs stopped as if they were glued to the ground.

Rentaro ruffled his fingers through his hair.
Damn it. Might as well call her parents
, he said to himself as he put his hand on the
spiky-haired one who was poking the girl and who seemed to be the leader, forcing him to turn around to face Rentaro.

The spiky-haired boy scowled unpleasantly and said, “Huh?”

Rentaro regarded the boy with little in the way of enthusiasm. The pure violence of this type of scary-faced loudmouth was definitely easier to deal with than the underhanded, spiteful Yasuwaki.

When Rentaro didn’t say anything, the boy said, “Who the hell are you?” and put his face close to Rentaro’s to threaten him.

Rentaro didn’t say anything and just tapped his own back twice where his gun was stuck into his belt.

The spiky-haired boy’s reptilian eyes gave off a dangerous light, and there was an oppressive silence. The fibers of Rentaro’s clothes poked his skin.

He didn’t know how much time had passed, but the spiky-haired boy finally turned on his heel and said, “Hey, let’s go,” and left, taking his friends with him.

Exhaling softly and relaxing his shoulders, he swore to himself that he would never do this again. As Rentaro turned back reproachfully, he saw the blond girl looking at him with her mouth open.

“A hero… It’s my first time ever seeing one.” The girl in pajamas that he saved looked at him with an absentminded expression.

“You don’t have to thank me. Just hurry up and go home! Later.”

As he waved carelessly and was about leave, the girl grabbed the sleeve of his uniform. “Where are we?”

Rentaro covered his face with his palm and shook his head softly. Damn it, he had gotten involved, after all.

Sitting the girl on a bench in a green park in the neighborhood, Rentaro went all the way to a water faucet, got a towel wet, and brought it back. Wringing out the towel, he wiped the girl’s face. “Stay still for a sec.”

The girl lifted her chin, narrowed her eyes, and stayed there. “You seem to be…used to this.”

“I’ve got a freeloader about your age at home, that’s why. There, all clean.” Rentaro took a step back to look at the girl, putting his hand on his hip and nodding once.

The girl lowered her head to bow in thanks—but strangely, she never lifted her face back up. Rentaro thought this was suspicious and peeked at her face from below. Her eyelids looked heavy, blinking sleepily as she started falling asleep.

“Hey…”

Suddenly raising her head, the girl dug around in her pocket and pulled out a bottle with an English label on it, took a pill out of it, and put it in her mouth. Rentaro thought she was eating something and stole a look at the label on the bottle and frowned. Apparently, they were caffeine pills.

“I’m…nocturnal, so if I don’t do this, I can’t stay awake during the day.” As she spoke, she tossed a large number of pills in her mouth one after another, chewed sleepily, and swallowed. Rentaro did not know much about this type of pill, but he could tell that this was more than a normal dose.

“Where did you come from? What’s your name? Where’s your guardian? Why are you wearing pajamas and house slippers?”

The girl looked down at her own clothes and tilted her head slowly. “Dunno…” It had taken her about ten seconds to react.

“What do you mean, ‘dunno’? Jeez… What about your name, then?”

“My name is…” For some reason, the girl’s eyes shifted for a moment, but then she seemed to give up and lifted her face. “Tina…… It’s Tina Sprout.”

“I’m Rentaro Satomi.”

“Call me Tina.”

“Then, you can call me Rentaro.”

“Rentaro…?” Tina looked at Rentaro absentmindedly with her mouth half-open.

“What is it?”

“I just…wanted to try it out.”

Rentaro slumped his shoulders. This was tiring. “Well, Tina, I’ll ask you again. Where’s your guardian?”

“I don’t have one.”

She didn’t? “Where did you come from? You can just tell me what you remember.”

With her eyes half-closed, Tina tilted her head front and back, left
and right, stuck her forefinger on her chin, and started to speak slowly. “All I remember is that I think I woke up in my apartment today, took a shower, changed my clothes, and went out.”

“Don’t lie! Not only haven’t you changed or showered, you look like you just woke up!”

Tina opened her mouth and said, “Oh,” softly, her eyes still half-closed. “You know me better than…I know myself…don’t you?”

“Hey… The bike that was broken was yours, right?”

“Bike? Was I…riding something…like that?”

“Never mind. You should go to the police box and ask for directions.”

“I can’t…really…”

“Just do it. I realized now that I can’t deal with you.”

“Don’t…say that.”

Rentaro wrote his phone number on a piece of paper and handed it to her. “Here, if you get lost again, you can call me, so just go to the police box. Please.”

“Then, can I try calling you as a test right now?”

“Why do you have to do something like that…?”

“Because you might have given me a fake phone number.”

Rentaro had no words.

Tina turned her back on him and fiddled with her cell phone, and then Rentaro’s chest pocket started to vibrate. “I know this is sudden, but you are interested in ten-year-old girls, right?”

“Wh…what…?”

“I was keenly aware of you gazing at the skin peeking out from my pajamas.”

“Go see an eye doctor.”

“I was afraid to say it to you in person, but you really have an unfortunate face, don’t you, Rentaro?”

“Shut up.”

“I also didn’t get a chance to say this, but I know where my apartment is.”

Rentaro felt foolish.
Then, what was I hanging out with this kid for?

Tina smiled faintly and folded her cell phone shut slowly. “Today was a very fun day.”

Apparently, in this girl’s mind, this farce was saved in her memory as a fun day.

It wasn’t fun at all for me, you know
, he almost said, but kept it to himself after seeing her happy face.

Tina slowly slid off the bench and smiled. “I hope we can meet again.”

Rentaro scratched his head, then gave up and gave a big nod, shooing her off with his hand.

“Well then, good-bye, Rentaro.” The girl bowed politely and walked falteringly out of the park. Rentaro watched her go, not exhaling with relief until he couldn’t see her anymore. She didn’t seem like a bad kid.

Thinking he had another story he could tell Enju, he walked in the opposite direction of the girl.

Cars were passing by so quickly they made Tina’s ears hurt before going off into the distance. The temperature had cooled down, and it had gotten a little chilly. As Tina trudged down the highway, before she knew it, she had turned her face toward the cars with their headlights turned on.

The sky was dyed with darkness and the moon shone in stark contrast.
Night is coming. It’s my time.
One by one, the cells in her body started to awaken, her mind became clear, and her body became filled with energy.

Just then, Tina’s cell phone vibrated. Looking at the caller’s name, she put the phone to her ear. “Master?”

“Give your report.” It was a hard, businesslike voice.

“I have infiltrated Tokyo Area successfully. I will now return to my apartment and then head to the designated location to retrieve the items.”

“Anything out of the ordinary to report?”

“There was some trouble, but it was nothing serious.” Tina put her hand on her chest and closed her eyes as she continued slowly. “……a kind person helped me.”

The person on the other end of the phone spoke, sounding irritated. “I thought I told you to avoid contact with other people if possible. In
order to avoid information leaks, make sure you give a false name if possible.”

“Yes, sir…… No problem.”

“Tina Sprout. What is your mission? Let me hear it again.”

Tina lifted her face and looked at the moon. She was completely awake now. “Do not worry, Master. I will carry out the assassination of the Seitenshi.”

Tina’s feet took her back to her apartment. The wooden apartment building was old, built based on old building standards with pillars that had been rebuilt time and time again in order to extend its life. The white paint was peeling, and there were cracks in the wall. Tina’s master probably thought this would make the best hideout for her because there were no conspicuous buildings around, and it was a quiet area.

Still, what was up with still using a pinfire gun in the year 2031? she wondered, remembering her classes on espionage as she put her key in the lock and turned.

The minute she opened the door, she was met with stagnant, moldy air. Just like the outside, the inside did not consider the comforts of its renter, but this was a temporary mission, so she just had to bear with it while she was here. Thinking that, she took off her slippers.

Tina blushed as she stood in front of the full-length mirror left behind by the previous occupant.
I stood in front of that man dressed like this? If I dressed up a little, I would look cuter than this
, she thought regretfully as she took off her pajamas and went to take a shower.

Changing her clothes, she replaced the battery pack of her cell phone with one that was fully charged and put a futuristic-looking spindle-shape wireless headset over her right ear. Then, she called her master back as she left the apartment.

She headed toward a seedy place where freight containers from the suburbs were stacked neatly together. They were a kind of rental boxes called trunk rooms. After the Great War, apparently, there were a number of people who started a business by simply installing freight containers on vacant land. Because of Tokyo Area’s chronic land shortage and with the price of land going up gradually, it was a practice that continued steadily until the land was sold off and the owners withdrew.

“Master, I have arrived.” Tina held an IC card up to the unmanned gate and went inside, looking for the container he was talking about. Before long, she found the number she was looking for on a conspicuously large container. Inserting the key in the lock, she entered the numbers into the padlock as she was told and opened the door.

When she stepped inside, Tina was shocked.

“What do you think, Tina?” She could hear the pride in his voice over the phone.

The interior of the gigantic container, about the size of six tatami mats, could be called an armory. Of course, there were small arms and sniper rifles, but there were also rocket launchers, recoilless guns, antitank rifles, and other superior weapons overflowing from the walls and ceilings. It seemed like he had gotten one of everything that looked like it could be of use, just to be certain not to be lacking something.

Getting a peek at his neurotic eccentricity, Tina chose an antitank sniper rifle and put it in her gun case. However, as she tried to lift it up, it wouldn’t budge off the ground even when she used all the strength she had as a weak girl.

Left with no choice, she calmed her breathing and released her power. She could feel her whole body gradually growing warm and felt her five senses physically expanding. She didn’t have a mirror, so she couldn’t see for herself, but she was sure her eyes were red.

This time, she was able to lift the case easily, and she passed through the gate with her head down so her eyes wouldn’t be seen and walked quickly toward her apartment. All that was left was to get back home. Perhaps because of that self-conceit, she froze when high beams from a car suddenly shone on her from the side.

“Miss, where are you from? You shouldn’t be out right now. Do you know what time it is? Where do you live?” A door slammed, and someone came out of the car.

Promptly covering just her face with the palm of her hand and seeing the sirens on top of the car, Tina reported the situation very calmly. “Master, I’m sorry. There has been an unforeseen situation. I have been stopped by the police.”

Apparently, they thought she was a runaway.

“Have they seen your face?”

“No…”

“Oh, well…” The man seemed to nod on the other end, and then gave her the order coldly and evenly. “Kill them.”

“This is terrible…” Holding the spoils of the evening limited-time sale war in their reusable bags, Rentaro’s and Enju’s feet stopped. The police car sunk into the concrete wall was in a sorry state —it looked like it had been kicked by Godzilla.

The sirens were smashed, the hood was crushed, and the exhaust pipe was bent in a strange direction. Outside the cordoned-off area, a large number of onlookers were crowded around, taking pictures with their phones with one hand.

Rentaro approached one of them hesitatingly and said, “Hey, do you know what in the world happened here…?”

“Who knows? It looks like they haven’t caught the perpetrator yet. But aren’t the only ones who can do something like this the Red-Eyes?”

Rentaro ground his teeth in frustration at not being able to refute this presumptive reasoning. It was true that even though it wasn’t strictly speaking
impossible
for a human to do this, the probability that it was a human was low enough to ignore.

“There are no leads, and the officer attacked is still unconscious in critical condition.”

“Critical condition? He’s not dead?”

“Hmm? Yeah, what about it?”

“Nothing…” Rentaro felt bad saying it, but because the car had been so thoroughly destroyed, he had thought that the officer driving it would have left this world, as well. Rentaro gave a quick bow in thanks and returned to Enju.

Enju had covered her eyes, still holding her shopping bag. Rentaro stopped for a second and approached her slowly. “Enju,” he said quietly, “you’re not the one who did it. It was one of the other Children.”

Enju gave him a quick, bitter smile but then soon showed him a full smile. “Rentaro, you are too kind. Yes, I am fine now.”

“All right, let’s go home, then.” On the way home, he and Enju had
a rambling conversation as she swung her shopping bags back and forth.

“And then, you know the new cartoon
Go, Zengar!
that just started…?”

As Rentaro snuck a peek at the side of Enju’s face, he wondered if he should say it. Should he just mind his own business?

Rentaro said diffidently, “Enju, don’t worry about it. You weren’t the one who did it.”

Enju tilted her head and looked at him like she didn’t know what he was talking about. “Hmm? Whatever is the matter, Rentaro?”

“You weren’t the one who did it.”

Enju’s gaze wavered, and she seemed flustered. “Wh-what’s the matter, Rentaro? You seem strange.”

Rentaro put his hands on Enju’s shoulders and turned her toward him, saying each word clearly and distinctly. “I said, you weren’t the one who did that, Enju…”

Enju made a perplexed face, but then unconsciously, her face crumpled and her expression wavered. Enju looked down and wiped her eyes quickly with her sleeve. “R-Rentaro, you’re amazing! How did you know that I was still concerned about that? Even though Kisara and Sumire wouldn’t have realized…”

Rentaro put his hand on her head and let out a long breath. “Because it’s you…”

“Why can’t everyone just get along, Rentaro…?” Enju’s voice was hoarse, and it sounded like it would disappear at any moment.

“I don’t know………” Even as Rentaro tousled Enju’s hair, he saw a bleak future for the Cursed Children. Born at almost the same time as the Great Gastrea War ten years ago, the Cursed Children were ten years old or younger. As such, it was probably too much to ask for them to possess wise judgment.

However, each time a crime like this was committed, the hatred the Stolen Generation—who already hated Gastrea—had for the Cursed Children grew stronger. The girls didn’t know. They didn’t realize that hatred would swing in the opposite direction of where force was applied, like a pendulum. Sometimes with far more force.

Each time one of the Cursed Children committed a crime, it was as if Enju’s neck was being strangled slowly with a silk rope, and it made Rentaro’s chest hurt to watch it. No, more accurately, it was
as if the net trapping the Children was getting tighter, in a way they couldn’t see.

Rentaro narrowed his eyes and looked back once more at the scene behind them. He didn’t know who’d done it, but Rentaro doubted he could forgive the perpetrator.

Enju finally separated herself slowly from Rentaro and wiped her face one more time with her sleeve. “All right, this time—this time—I am surely fine!”

Rentaro smiled. “Yeah… Okay.” In order to dispel the solemn atmosphere, Rentaro exhaled deeply, puffing out his chest and laughing loudly, looking down at the shopping bags. “By the way, Enju, we got a good haul at the limited-time sale today, huh?”

Enju grinned mischievously. “I did not think we would be able to purchase meat so cheaply, either.”

Rentaro pumped his fist. “We’re having sukiyaki today!”

“Sukiyaki…!” Enju hopped happily.

As soon as Rentaro got back to their rundown eight-tatami-mat apartment, he put on an apron and went to the kitchen. As he cut the vegetables into bite-size pieces, Enju capered around Rentaro, chattering excitedly about the cartoon she was currently into,
Go, Zengar!
It sounded like it was based on those old shows about fighting squadrons and transforming robots.

“And then, and then, there’s the robot of justice, Zenin Zengar, and the evil robot, Akuin Akkar. And the storyboards for episode eighteen were—”

“
Zenin zenga
, like ‘one good turn deserves another’? And
akuin akka
, like ‘what goes around comes around’? Aren’t those Buddhist terms or something? That’s a pretty advanced cartoon.”

Enju proudly put both hands on her hips, as if impressed that Rentaro had noticed. “That’s right. And the most amazing thing is that the squadron consists of four chief priests and a Buddhist nun, and they are all bald, and their five temples combine to form one large transforming robot.”

“R-really……”

The cartoons you watch are so weird,
Rentaro thought as he put
konnyaku
noodles, leeks, chrysanthemum leaves, and mushrooms on a
bamboo draining basket and then unfolded a low table that was leaning against the wall. Putting on oven mitts, Rentaro moved the sukiyaki pot from the kitchen to the gas burner on the table and turned it on. Before long, the ingredients were boiling gently, and the warm steam was rising to meet Rentaro’s and Enju’s faces. As the sweet smell of the sauce filled the room, Rentaro started salivating. He couldn’t wait to eat. It had been days since he’d had such extravagant food for dinner.