Sweat dripped down his back. He knew there were people claiming AKs were inaccurate, but there was usually a good reason for that—maybe the AK was a shoddily made copy, maybe it was so used that the rifling had gone, or maybe it had been poorly maintained. It had nothing to do with the design of the original AK-47.
The weapon Mizukawa was using was an AK-47 copy manufactured somewhere in Asia that he had assembled himself, and he was effectively an amateur. It was in bad need of maintenance, too. Still, it was a rifle with a stock, and his target was just a few meters in front of him. He should’ve been able to hit her with his eyes closed. But he kept missing, and what was even more bizarre was that she was walking toward him, closing the distance. He stared at her in disbelief, and then he understood—she’d been dodging the bullets. She wasn’t walking in a perfectly straight line toward him, and she would lean slightly this or that way when he fired, perfectly dodging every shot with those minute adjustments. How could that even be possible?
“I’ll be honest, you gave me a fright at first. You fired at a completely different point than you were looking and aiming your gun at. Your AK has a bent sight, huh?”
Chisato raised her gun, still walking toward him. She was holding it like she was about to put it down on its side in front of her face, not like a yakuza punk wanting to show off, but in some sort of proper stance which even at a glance seemed rock solid.
“Damn it!”
Mizukawa didn’t know why he was struggling so much to hit Chisato, but she was intentionally dodging the bullets. If he couldn’t hit her no matter how carefully he aimed…he’d fire at random. As soon as he switched the selector to full auto, Chisato made a move he wasn’t expecting. She crouched low and slid on the floor to quickly closing the remaining distance, firing at him as she did so. Mizukawa felt a flash of pain in his left shin. The impact knocked his leg out from under him, and he staggered backward. He fell to his knees but still had the presence of mind to pull the trigger, spraying on full auto. But Chisato wasn’t anywhere near where the gun was pointed. She was below the barrel, right next to Mizukawa. They were so close they were almost touching. Chisato crouched low, making herself small, and then stood up quickly, her shoulder bumping into the AK’s barrel from below. The bullets hit the ceiling lights. A chandelier came crashing down.
Looking down, Mizukawa saw that Chisato was pointing her gun, with that brutal-looking muzzle, at his stomach. She’d kill him if he didn’t move, but even if he somehow dodged now, she’d get him with the next shot. That was what his mind told him, but instinct took over. He bent his neck to the side to keep his head as far away from her gun as possible and tackled her, ramming her with his upper body. She fired, right next to his ear. He felt splitting pain in his head, as if someone had thrust their fingers right into his brain, but he couldn’t dwell on that.
“I’ll get you!”
She took half a step backward, but that was still well within his reach. She was the one to strike first, though, kneeing him square in the jaw. Mizukawa saw stars but maintained consciousness. He fell forward and crashed into the floor, but the impact thankfully restored his vision. He instinctively lifted his head right away, looking up…straight into the muzzle of Chisato’s gun.
He let go of his rifle and rolled to the side just as Chisato fired. The bullet hit the floor right next to his face, releasing a cloud of red dust.
“Huh?!”
What was that red stuff? He had no idea. But at least he dodged that bullet. He was still alive, which meant he could still fight.
Mizukawa dived behind a sofa. It only then occurred to him that his left leg wasn’t shattered despite being shot in the shin. It was hurting like hell, but he wasn’t bleeding. He’d seen her gun up close. It was a .45 ACP. She’d shot him at close range. How come he wasn’t seriously injured?
He touched his shoulder where Takina’s bullet grazed him. Through a rip in his clothes, he felt that the bullet gouged out some of his flesh. Blood was seeping from the wound.
So it was only Chisato’s ammunition that wasn’t normal.
“You’re not using real bullets?!”
“Oh, you noticed? I’m using plastic frangible rounds. You could call them rubber bullets, I guess?”
His shin wasn’t broken. The pain was rough, but it was just pain. He could move just fine. As soon as that sank in, Mizukawa gathered all his strength, lifted the sofa up into the air, and chucked it in the direction he last heard Chisato. He thought she might try to dodge to the left or right, but she slid on the floor, passing under the incoming sofa. That dashed Mizukawa’s hope of stalling her just long enough for him to get to his AK.
Chisato slid across the floor, coming fast toward him with her gun pointed at him. He wouldn’t be able to dodge. He was going to die… No, he wasn’t. She was using rubber bullets. That wouldn’t kill him. It would just hurt, but it wouldn’t kill him on the spot…
Mizukawa steeled himself for the pain that was to come, reached for the extendable baton he carried at his belt, and charged at Chisato. She promptly shot him in the abdomen. It felt like being kicked by a giant, but he ignored it. He had to move before his body fully registered the pain.
He roared, raising the baton. It was still folded, but the force of a downward swing would extend it. It was his special attack, coming at his foe with the shortened baton, only for it to suddenly extend just as he brought it down. The shorter length helped him execute the move faster, and his opponent wouldn’t be able to accurately judge the baton’s reach.
Chisato braced her feet against the floor and fired again while rising to meet him. She got Mizukawa in the solar plexus, but he was already mid-swing, and it was too late to stop him. Chisato got closer. There was no fear in her eyes, even though a police baton could break bone, even though her opponent was a towering man with a thick layer of both muscle and fat…