“Gotcha,” DD answered.
The car had by now left Shinjuku and entered Harbour Ward; they were probably only a few minutes away from the enemy’s location. Minoru glanced out the side window.
Under the cloudy gray sky, the town was virtually deserted, as it was early afternoon on New Year’s Eve. Although the heat was on in the car, Minoru still felt a bit of a chill, and he rubbed his hands over his sleeves.
Somehow, Minoru had expected South Aoyama to consist of tidy streets lined with stylish, trendy shops, but as the Delica slowed, all he saw was a slew of gray multitenant buildings. A little farther south, he could see the overhead structure of the Route 3 Shibuya Line, and he heard the distant rumble of cars passing by.
“All right, I’m going to bring us past the building now, so try to remember the way,” said DD.
“Right,” Minoru responded, turning to watch attentively through the front windshield. The car passed slowly along the two-lane street, which was lined with parking meters. On the large screen of the car’s navigation system, the map scrolled along at the same pace, until finally a red marker appeared to indicate their destination.
“That’s it on our right. The concrete five-story building there.”
DD pointed at a very mundane, commonplace-looking apartment building. It didn’t seem to be occupied by any tenants, and there were no signs on the walls. All the windows, too, had the blinds closed from inside. Overall, it was as if the building was hidden away between the slightly larger ones on either side.
“…Since the Professor called it a safe house and all, I was kind of expecting something more…like a fort or a stronghold, I guess,” Minoru mumbled.
DD laughed drily. “Wouldn’t it defeat the purpose of a safe house if it stood out? Our headquarters don’t exactly look like a secret hideout, either, right?”
“It’s just a shabby apartment complex,” Yumiko added. With her trademark expression of slight irritation, she looked over her shoulder. “Listen. The Professor said to focus on intelligence gathering and avoid combat if possible. Safety is the highest priority here, got it? If you sense even the slightest bit of danger, you’re to stay in the protective shell and escape as quickly as possible—jump through a window if you have to.”
“R…right, of course.” Minoru nodded apprehensively.
“I don’t think there’s anything to worry about,” DD drawled easily. “There aren’t any Ruby Eyes within a ninety-one-meter radius of that building. If there were, I could sniff ’em out from this distance whether they used their powers or not.”
“And yet you can smell food from a mile away,” Yumiko observed mercilessly. Meanwhile, the car passed by the front of the building and stopped in front of a parking meter, just about ninety meters away.
“We’ll be on standby right here, and Oli is already in the area keeping watch on the building. If there’s an emergency, use the light communicator…or, well, I’d like to say that, but I guess it doesn’t work very well when there’s stuff in the way of the line…”
“Well, we couldn’t very well have set up transmitters all over the place. Apparently the Professor is researching miniaturization technology right now, but…for now, we’ll just have to use our phones for communication.”
Minoru was only half listening to DD and Yumiko’s exchange. He was more worried about his most difficult mission yet, and that wasn’t referring to the reconnaissance. It was the SFD-made “back-mounting harness” in his hands. Staring down at it, Minoru mumbled a bit hoarsely, “…Um. Couldn’t we, like…tie our legs together like a three-legged race…or like a centipede race or something?”
“I’m not good at either of those,” Suu responded coolly.
Minoru’s mind was still churning as he clambered into the back of the Delica. In the driver’s seat, Yumiko was in her usual blazer, but Minoru and Suu had changed into black jackets reminiscent of some kind of military special-ops uniform. Reluctantly, Minoru fixed the front half of the harness around his shoulders and waist, clicking the buckles into place.
“Go ahead, M-Ms. Komura…”
He turned his back toward Suu’s direction, and she responded with a dry “Pardon me,” soon followed by a faint, sweet scent, the feeling of something soft, and finally a moderate amount of weight on his back, the three-way assault forcing Minoru’s thoughts to grind to a halt—
“Need some help there, Utsugi?” Yumiko inquired sweetly. Minoru flinched and shook his head.
“N-no, thank you! Um, K-Komura, can you get the buckles all right?”
There was an additional round of clattering sounds, followed by a small voice. “I can’t reach the ones near your waist.”
After two tension-laden minutes, the setup was finally complete, all the belts fastened tightly. Tentatively, Minoru shifted back and forth. The high-tech harness held Suu firmly in place, even without her hanging on.
“O…okay, I’m ready.”
“Me, too.”
Looking sour as ever, Yumiko nodded and got out of the car first, checking their surroundings. Then she pounded on the rear door, signaling Minoru and Suu to activate their abilities.
“Um…after you, then, Komura,” Minoru said, trying to calm down. Near his right shoulder, he felt Suu nod.
“Very well.”
There was a whoosh of static, and Minoru’s body disappeared from view. Even though he’d experienced it before, it was still very bizarre. He had to reach out with an invisible hand and pat his body to assure himself that it still existed before he spoke again. “O…okay, um…here I go.”
But he hesitated for a moment before activating his ability. So far, he had brought Suu into his protective shell only under experimental circumstances, with very little consequences if he failed. This would be the first time they’d attempted it in an actual mission—one that could involve combat with Ruby Eyes.
If he failed now, the barrier would probably break the harness and send Suu flying. If she was thrown into the side of the car, Third Eye user or not, there was no way she wouldn’t be injured. In other words, failure was not an option from here on out.
Minoru’s back stiffened as the sudden surge of stress overwhelmed him. At that moment, he felt warm breath on his right ear, carrying a quiet voice.
“Don’t worry.”
It was just two words, but it was enough. Minoru nodded, shook off his hesitation, and activated his protective shell.
The world around him turned blue and silent, and his body floated ever so slightly. To his relief, he could still feel Suu’s weight on his back. Minoru tapped on the back door of the car, and Yumiko opened it and took a step back.
With both their powers activated, Suu and Minoru were completely separated from the outside world. Yumiko couldn’t see, talk to, or touch Minoru. And yet, Accelerator seemed to look straight into his eyes as she mouthed two words:
“Be careful.”
Reading her lips, Minoru nodded. “I will,” he said, though he knew she couldn’t hear him. Then he began to walk north along the road.
Though it was a walk of only about ninety meters, it was a very strange walk, indeed.
Naturally, Minoru had never gone anywhere while carrying a girl on his back before. It would probably have made a very strange sight, but nobody they passed on the sidewalk so much as glanced at them. Of course, the other pedestrians made no effort to avoid them, either, so Minoru had to give them an extra-wide berth to avoid brushing against them. And out of fear that a bicycle or something might suddenly come up behind them, he looked over his shoulder frequently as well, adding even more time to what should have been a fairly brief journey. Despite all this, they managed to make it to the front of the building without incident, other than a quizzical look from an alley cat.
“…This is the place, right?” Minoru whispered.
“It should be.”
Doing his best to ignore the strange feeling of the girl shifting around on his back, Minoru examined the building’s rather d
ark entryway. There was nothing particularly suspicious about it. On the left was an elevator door, and on the right was a staircase.
“I’m going in,” he announced shortly, gathering his courage and walking in.
Glancing to the left and right, he decided to start by exploring the first floor.
“…Huh?”
There wasn’t one. Aside from the elevator and the staircase, there wasn’t a single door or hallway in sight. He thought there ought to be some kind of entrance in the front wall, but there was nothing but a blank concrete surface.
As Minoru looked around uncertainly, he heard Suu’s voice behind him. “Minoru. The wall in front of us…it seems different from the walls on the left and right.”
“Huh? Really?” He squinted, but as everything was tinted blue by his barrier, it was difficult to tell. Drawing closer, he cautiously pushed on the wall through his shell, but this brought him no closer to any kind of revelation. “You don’t think…they figured out that we found this place and sealed off the entrance with concrete or…?” he murmured uncertainly.
“We just found it yesterday, so I don’t think they would’ve had time for that.”
“R…right.”
“I’m sorry. It must have been my imagination. Let’s try the second floor.”
Still feeling a bit uncertain, Minoru withdrew from the wall and headed up the dimly lit staircase, emerging into a hallway on the second floor. This time, there was a metal door in the sort of wall he’d expected to see downstairs, and he cautiously approached.
Before they’d entered, DD had confirmed with his prized nose that there were no Ruby Eyes in the building, but it was possible that people unrelated to the Syndicate could be inside. In order to verify that and to unlock the door, he would need to deactivate his ability. Minoru checked that there were no security cameras in the stairwell.
“I’m going to turn off the shell for a moment,” he announced as he did so. His body sank back down, the soles of his shoes landing on the floor. Suu, too, deactivated her ability, and the two of them became visible again.
For a moment, both of them focused all their senses on the incoming temperature, sounds, and smells. They felt only the midwinter chill, the noise from the street, and the dry, dusty air of the building; the wild, beastly smell of the Ruby Eyes was nowhere to be found.
Breathing a quick sigh of relief, Minoru pulled out a small mobile phone from his jacket and pressed the speed-dial button that would connect him simultaneously to the waiting car outside and SFD Headquarters. Holding it to his ear, he whispered into the receiver.
“This is Isolator. Refractor and I are now infiltrating the second floor.”
There was a short “roger” from the Professor and a “no Ruby Eyes detected” from DD. Minoru promptly ended the call. As he was doing this, Suu, still strapped to his back, was pressing a stethoscope-like device to the wall with her right hand.
“No sounds from inside,” she reported, pulling it away. “I don’t think anyone is there.”
“Ah…all right. I’ll open the door, then…,” he whispered, reaching into a different pocket. This time, he produced a lock-picking gun and held it to the keyhole. When he pulled the trigger, the gun unleashed a barrage of complexly shaped needles into the hole. After a bit of resistance, he felt them slide all the way through and gently turned the gun to the left.
Click!
The door opened, and Minoru breathed another short sigh. Putting away the gun, he reached out with a thinly gloved hand and turned the doorknob. The door opened away from him surprisingly smoothly.
The other side was shrouded in darkness. All he could see was a faint stream of light from a window much farther down the hall. As the air from inside drifted over him, Minoru caught a faintly familiar scent. It was heavy, sort of like rust…
“…I smell blood,” Suu said quietly.
Minoru felt a knot forming in his stomach, but they couldn’t very well turn back now. He walked into the entrance hall, closing and locking the door behind him. At the same time, both of them reactivated their abilities, and the metallic smell vanished.
Trying not to think about where that smell had come from, Minoru turned on the small high-luminance LED light in his left hand. A dim circle of white light appeared in the murky darkness.
“It’s…sort of like a pretty normal home…,” Minoru observed, his voice a low whisper despite the fact that his barrier would lock in any level of noise.
“Like a two-bedroom apartment,” Suu agreed on his back. Perhaps sensing his anxiety, she continued, “Don’t worry. Nobody’s going to ambush us. If anyone was here, I would’ve seen their line of sight.”
“Ah…that’s true.” Minoru nodded, took a deep breath, and continued into the hallway. This building still had three more floors above this one. There was no sense in wasting too much time on the second floor.
The layout of this floor was that of an ordinary apartment, but it didn’t seem very lived in. There wasn’t a single pair of shoes or slippers by the entryway. Minoru peeked into the bathroom on the left of the hall, but it didn’t appear to be used, either.
Next, he carefully opened a door that was about halfway down the hall. Fortunately, it had a push handle instead of a knob, so he was able to open it without deactivating his shell. This room seemed to be about forty square meters. The first thing his LED light illuminated was a simple pipe bed. There were blankets folded on top of the bedsheets, but in a somewhat disorderly fashion. Unlike the bathroom, it seemed like this room had been used.
Moving the light around the room, Minoru saw a small sink and refrigerator in the corner and a pile of cardboard boxes nearby. When he approached the refrigerator and opened it with some difficulty, he was a bit taken aback by its contents. Bottles of mineral water lined the door, but more oddly, the shelves were full of nothing but glass jars. The jars were painstakingly labeled, but Minoru had no idea what the words meant. As he furrowed his brow, Suu spoke quietly over his shoulder.
“Antibiotics…styptics… They’re all medicine. And all of them are for external wounds.”
Minoru straightened up and looked in the cabinet above the sink, finding neat stacks of gauze and bandages. The one object that seemed out of place was a small bottle of what looked like whiskey, but he supposed this could also be for disinfecting.
“So this room is…a sickroom…? Or a treatment and recovery room, I guess…?”
“So it seems. It may very well be a place for treating wounds they’ve incurred in battle with us.”
“Then…the blood we smelled before must have come from here…” Instinctively, Minoru pointed his light at the floor, but the smooth resin tiles appeared to be devoid of bloodstains. However, he suspected that if he were to use some sort of powder that reacts with blood like a TV detective might, it would light up the room.
Minoru shuddered a little as he continued to search, but this medical treatment room didn’t seem to contain any documents or computers, so they soon moved on to the next room. Minoru was terrified, convinced that the next door would surely lead to a gruesome scene of bloodstained floors or even a corpse. However…
“…Huh?”
The room was almost disappointingly normal. Or more accurately, it was empty.
The thirty-by-thirty-meter room didn’t even have a tiled floor, just gray concrete that was beginning to peel. The walls were in a similar state, too, with concrete and exposed plasterboard. The only furnishing was a single LED light that hung from the ceiling.
Minoru gingerly stepped inside, pressing his foot down on various parts of the ground through his shell, but the floor seemed to be of uniform firmness, with no secret hatches or the like to be found.
“…I’m moving on to the next room.”
“Go ahead,” Suu responded after a moment. It seemed as if she, too, had a gut instinct holding her back, but since the room was clearly empty, they couldn’t afford to spend any more time there.
Returning to
the hallway, Minoru opened a glass door toward the back end. The interior was very spacious, possibly as much as ninty-one square meters, suitable for use as a living room. However, this room, too, was mostly unfurnished. Light slanted into the room through the blinds of the windows on the south wall, enough so that Minoru decided the LED was unnecessary. He switched it off and put it away, then scanned the room quickly.
“Ah…”
“Ah.”
The pair reacted in unison.
Against the western wall of the room, there was a simple desk and chair. And on top of the desk, at last, was what they had been searching for: a slim rectangular shape that was undoubtedly a notebook computer. In addition to the power cable sticking out from the side, there was a LAN cable connected to a port in the wall.
“…We…have to take a look inside, huh?” Minoru commented nervously.
“Of course.”
He nodded somewhat reluctantly. In order to operate the computer, he would have to drop his barrier.
Glancing back toward the entrance to confirm there was no movement, Minoru again deactivated his ability. The soles of his sneakers made a soft thump as they came back down to the floor, and the sounds and smells of his surroundings all rushed back in.
It didn’t seem like anybody was going to rush in and attack them. He reached into his pocket for the cell phone, but since Suu’s ability was still in effect, he couldn’t see the screen or his own hands. Luckily, since it was an old flip phone and not a smartphone, he could manage by feeling around the buttons, but it still took him three tries before he managed to call the SFD line again.
“This is Isolator. We’ve successfully infiltrated the second floor, and we found a laptop. It seems to be connected to the Net.”
“Great!” the Professor responded immediately. “Plug the flash drive I gave you into the USB port and boot it up. It should automatically copy all the data and then return the laptop to its regular state. Once the program starts, you’ll be able to close the lid without affecting it.”
“R-roger.”