The One-Room Apartment on the Sand

here.

It seemed to be trying to escape the fire, stretching out its tendrils as if saying it wanted to live.
However, their edges were scorched by the flames, and it slowly turned to ash.

“…Kh!” This wasn’t the time to be absorbed in the strange sight.
Recalling his objective, he stepped inside the lab.

Immediately, he spotted her.

Behind a desk, a man in a white coat was pinned under a collapsed shelf.
Sanakura Sakimi was clinging onto his chest, unmoving.
He rushed up to her.

“Sakimi!”

When he called out, she stirred slightly.
He then pressed a finger on the man’s carotid, and checked his pupil.

The man was dead.

He turned over the man’s nametag, which read: Sanakura Kengo.

He remembered.
This was a face he saw all the time six years ago, when he was still tutoring Sakimi.
A kind father who loved his family.
Soji often witnessed him getting scolded by his wife and daughter for munching on his favorite donuts when he had a chronic heart disease. Did he not make it in time when the accident occurred? Soji closed his eyes and mourned for a moment.

“Sakimi!” He called out once again to the young woman who had just lost her father, but there was no response.

Her side was stained red. She’s injured!

I’ve got to take a closer look and check how bad it is, but there’s no time for that! He lifted up the motionless Sakimi.

It hurts to breathe.
The conflagration had grown in intensity.
There was no time to head back the route he’d taken.
They were on the second floor, but most of the windows were shut and could not be opened.

He had to find a way out somehow.

…Tch. From the corner of his eye, he caught sight of a moving red dot belonging to a surveillance camera in motion.

“That’s weird…” the short man grunted in doubt.

“What is it this time?”

“I can’t seem to find the man who barged in just now anywhere.
He’s not showing up on the cameras.” He pointed at the monitors sequentially.
“Well, my guess is he probably ran out of juice somewhere and collapsed.
Even then, I should’ve at least seen him running around in circles somewhere.
And yet, the only time he showed up was back at the entrance, he just went poof after that.”

“Huuuh?” Goto stroked his stubble.
“Don’t tell me it’s that.
He’s moving about while hiding in the blind spots of the cameras?”

“That might be thinking too far.
It’s entirely possible that he just buckled right near the entrance.”

’

“Is it? Hmm, maybe you’re right.” Goto went silent for a few seconds.
“Why don’t you rewind the footage a little? Back to when that guy showed up.”

“Sure thing.
You curious?”

“Yeah, I am.
The thing about a job is, you gotta be bold yet delicate when it comes to the details.”

“Nice line, but I’m 100% sure it’s bullshit you just made up.” The short man froze the display on one of the monitors, and wound back the footage until it showed the scene of interest.

“That’s our guy?”

“Yep.”

The playback quality was atrocious.
They could tell that someone just dived into the building, but his outline was blurry.

“I can’t tell from the still.
Play it for a bit.”

Without blinking, Goto followed the man in the video closely with his eyes. 

As he instructed, a brief clip of the man running was played over and over on the monitor.

“Did you figure something out?”

“Nope… but something about him…” Goto scratched the side of his head.
“Reminds me of someone I’ve seen before, but I can’t find a name.”

“You mean it’s someone in the trade too?”

“Highly possible.
Argh, where have I seen this guy…”

Just then, on another monitor, the silhouette of a person could be seen cutting across the screen.

“Ah.”

“Oh.”

They wound back and replayed the footage.
It showed the same man from earlier, only this time with a much better clarity than before.
A man in his twenties, carrying a young woman in his arms and walking with a steady gait.

His face could not be seen.
It should have been visible from their perspective, but somehow it was completely hidden.

“He’s totally aware of the camera.”

“What’s more, he’s moving like he knows that we’re watching here,” Goto muttered, seemingly impressed.

His lips curved into a fiendish smile.

“What it means is this—I don’t know who or where this guy came from, but he’s no doubt an enemy who’s come to get in the way of our job.”

’

With the heavy rain beating down on his body, Soji took a deep lungful of the outside air.

The sudden influx of oxygen to his brain caused him to be struck by a bout of severe dizziness for a second.
He staggered a step, but somehow found it in himself to stand straight.

The escape was a success.

And in a stroke of luck, he was at the opposite side from the entrance and there were no prying eyes around. It should be possible for me to leave this area without anyone knowing.

His upper body was in direct contact with Sakimi. Something feels a little out of place. Although the bleeding looked severe, the wound on her flank was apparently rather small.
Nonetheless, it was still an injury he couldn’t leave as is.
It irritated him to no end that the situation did not allow for him to stop to apply first aid even now.

There’s no need to even think about it.
They’ve noticed.

He hadn’t been able to take a path that was completely in the blind spot of all the cameras.
In order to make their exit from there through a window on the unshuttered recess floor, he had no choice but to reveal himself to one of the cameras.
The only consolation was that he’d managed to hide his face, but that only attested to the fact that he, the intruder, wasn’t just a random passerby.

I’ve got to leave the area ASAP.

The rain was a great ally at this time.
It hid his figure and masked any sound he made as he ran.
Taking care to avoid being seen, he created some distance from the research institute with Sakimi in his arms.

Concealing himself in the shadows, he took out his handphone.
Even though it was waterproof, a layer of water had made the screen difficult to navigate.
With some struggle, he managed to phone the Chatterbox.

‘What were you thinking, Mr.
Ema?! Are you mad?!’

From the words of rebuke that immediately greeted him, it seemed that the Chatterbox already had an idea of where and what Soji was doing.

“Yeah… I guess that’s it.
I’ve gone mad.”

‘I can’t believe it, jeez! You alright?! Are you still alive?!’

“For the moment, yeah.
Can’t speak for an hour from now, though.
Goto seems to have sniffed out my presence.”

He could almost hear the speechless incredulity on the other side of the line.

“That’s why I’d like to ask a favor of you—”

‘Oh my god! You’re suuuch a hopeless idiot!’ A loud voice roared from the phone as if—no, precisely—to vent its owner’s frustrations.
‘If you’re around that area then, uh, head towards Fukamichi 3rd Street.
As it happens, I have an unused safehouse over there.
Hide there and lie low for the time being, you hear me!?’

Almost at the same time, his phone received a deluge of messages.
They contained information such as the apartment’s address and appearance, and the depository where its key was being kept.

“Thanks, you’re a lifesaver.
By the way, since you’re already in for a penny, there’s something else I want to ask of you.”

‘What?!’

“Is it okay if I bring a girl over there too?”

There was a long silence.

‘Huh? No, seriously, what?’ The other voice asked back in a low tone.