Was it Arthur Rimbaud who said, “When it rains, go out and enjoy the rain”? If a guy was going to go to such great lengths to insist that he hadn't lost, it almost seemed like positive thinking. Having missed the opportunity to ride the bus, I who might have used Rimbaud as an example, decided to go to school by bicycle as I gazed at the route lying before me.
Making my way past the neighborhood convenience store and video rental shop, I passed under the monorail station leading to Odaiba. Beyond that point, countless tall buildings could be seen on the other side of the bay. Tokyo Butei High School was located on a rectangular Mega-Float that lies to the south of Rainbow Bridge and was roughly two kilometers from north to south and five hundred meters from west to east. This Mega-Float, nicknamed “Academy Island,” was the site for a general educational institution whose purpose was the cultivation of Butei.
Butei were people who served as a countermeasure against violent crimes under a newly established and internationally acknowledged qualification. Those who were in possession of a Butei license were permitted to carry firearms and were given the power of arrest, and they could operate within the jurisdictions of the police force. However, the difference between the police and the Butei was that the Butei were driven by money. As long as someone was footing the bill, a Butei would take on any job regardless of how dangerous or trivial it may be, provided it was in accordance with Butei regulations. In other words, they were a jack-of-all-trades. At Tokyo Butei High School, in addition to general academic subjects, students could take specialized courses related to Butei activities just as the school’s name implied. There were a variety of specialized courses to choose from. The building I just passed on my right, for example, was specifically for the Inquesta department and all related classes. It was the division I transferred to during the third semester of my first year here, and the students learned about traditional deduction methodology and all kinds of techniques used in detective work. I guess you could say it was the most normal department this school had. Up ahead was the Connect department (communications), and beyond that was the Repier department (forensics). These were all fairly peaceful places to study, but if you continued ahead a little farther, you’d arrive at the department I was affiliated with up until the end of my second semester last year, the notorious Assault department.
I changed directions and made my way towards the gym.
Great. Looks like I’m going to make it in time for the opening ceremony.
This school was certainly out of the ordinary, but it still wouldn’t be a good idea to be late to the opening ceremony of the first semester.
“A bomb has been freaking planted on this bicycle.”
I heard a strange voice utter the kind of line one reads in an anonymous blackmail note with the letters clipped out of fliers and pasted together. “If you freaking get off the bicycle or freaking reduce your speed, it will freaking explode.”
Oh, I know what this is. It's an artificially made voice like the one used by that popular Vocaloid on the Internet.
It wasn’t until after having made such an analysis that I remembered a certain detail in the statement just made.
…A bomb…? What’s this all about? Who’s the idiot behind this? Is it some sort of joke?
Furrowing my eyebrows, I looked around me, and was surprised to discover that I had been unaware of a strange object speeding along beside my bicycle. It was an awkward vehicle with only two tires side by side and resembled a scarecrow on wheels. I had seen such a vehicle on television a long time ago. It was called a “Segway”.
“Do not attempt to call for help. The bomb will freaking explode if you use your cell phone.”
There was no one driving the Segway, however. In place of a person who should have been riding the machine was a speaker—that and a single mechanical barbette.
“…!”
Attached to the barbette was the muzzle of a gun pointed directly at me. An Uzi—a submachine gun manufactured by Israel IMI Co., capable of firing ten rounds of nine millimeter Parabellum ammunition per second.
“Wh-what the hell?! What kind of prank is this?!” I yelled out towards the Segway but there was no response. It simply raced along beside me with the muzzle pointed in my direction.
What the hell is this?! What’s going on all of a sudden?!
In a state of confusion, I searched the bike with my hands and found that there was something strange attached underneath the saddle. I traced it with my fingers, as I repeatedly told myself to calm down.
This is bad.
I wasn’t able to identify the type, but it seemed to be Composition C-4. And it was of considerable size. It was large enough to completely obliterate a car without leaving a trace of it behind, let alone a bicycle.
Are…you…kidding me?!
A chill ran down my spine, and I broke out into a cold sweat.
They got me. I can tell. This is no prank. I fell right into their trap. My bike’s been taken over. This is unbelievable. My bike has been hijacked!
Damn it! Damn it! Why me? Why did it come to this?
Preparing myself for the worst-case scenario, I raced around looking for a place void of any people and wound up heading for playing field number two. Peering through the wire-mesh fence, I noticed that playing field number two was empty, just as it always was in the morning. Left with no other choice, I pedaled my bike towards the entrance. The Segway continued to follow with its gun aimed right at me. This tactic the criminal was using….It was a copycat crime of the Butei killings Shirayuki had mentioned.
That’s not important, right now. What am I going to do?! That’s the issue!
I had been desperately racking my brain for a plan on the way here, but was unable to come up with any ideas.
Come on, Kinji! Are you…going to die? In a place like this?
At that moment, I noticed something that made me cock my head. In this already highly unlikely situation, I saw something yet even more unlikely. It was a seven story apartment complex located nearby the playing field—if I recall, it was the girls’ dormitory—and on the edge of the roof stood a girl. She was dressed in Butei High’s sailor uniform and had two pink pigtails long enough to be seen clearly from even this distance.
When she jumped down from the building, it looked as if she was leaping over the moon, still vaguely visible in the morning sky.
Jumped down from the building?!
For an instant, my foot almost slipped off the pedal, but I frantically regained my balance and continued pumping my legs. With her pigtails like rabbit ears streaming in the wind, the girl seemed to be dancing in midair. She must have been preparing to glide across the skies while atop that roof, because next, I heard and saw a paraglider open up above me. As I continued to pedal with eyes open wide, astounded at the scene playing out before me, I realized that this girl with her pigtails streaming in the wind was actually headed right for me!
“Y-you idiot! Don’t come this way! This bike is rigged with a bomb–” The warnings I yelled out were too late. She had been plummeting at a rate faster than I anticipated. Swerving her body as if she were on the swings of some playground, she suddenly turned at a right angle, and with her left and right hand, drew two large pistols, one silver and one black, from the hostlers she was wearing around each respective hip.
“Hey, you idiot over there! Hurry up and duck your head down!” she yelled out.
Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam!
Before I had time to lower my head, the girl unsympathetically fired at the Segway. The average optimum firing range for a pistol is said to be seven meters. But this girl was over twice the distance from her target. Not only that, but she was hanging from an unstable paraglider, and to top it off, she was firing with her arms fully extended outwards and the pistols tilted at a ninety degree angle. But in spite of all these disadvantages, the bullets she fired hit their mark as if they were being magically led to their target. The Segway wasn’t given the opportunity to fire back even a single shot and fell to the ground, its barbette and wheels falling off as it broke into pieces.
Amazing. Her shooting skills are phenomenal. I didn’t know we had a girl like that in our school.