“Baku.”
Stop us if you think you can. You want to protect your master? Then let’s see you try. Go ahead. Fight. Resist. But you’ll fail in the end.
The hunger was overpowering. Baku was starving, and Tobi shared his hunger. It felt like every cell in his body was crying out for sustenance. He couldn’t ignore it any longer. He couldn’t resist. And he didn’t have to anymore. For once, it was obvious what he was supposed to do.
“Eat it.”
“You bet…!”
Baku stepped forward, and Shizukudani flinched, moving one step farther up the staircase. She’d retreated. Her face spasmed, and all the muscles in her body began to tighten. Her heart was pounding so violently, it felt like it was convulsing. Tobi didn’t understand how he knew that. It almost felt like he was holding the organ in his bare hand. Like if the whim struck him, he could crush it.
Shizukudani took in a sharp breath, then spun around and sprinted up the staircase, Cipher following in her wake. She’d run.
You think you can escape? That you can get away? You think I’d let you?
Baku was already chasing after her. Tobi took off as well, leaping up the stairs three at a time. “Ryuuko!” he shouted. “Take care of the others…!”
“All right!” she shouted back.
Ryuuko and Chinu had managed to bring Hiiragi under control. If it hadn’t been for them, Hiiragi would have kept creating butterfly zingai, and the damage would have only gotten worse. The situation was clearly Shizukudani’s fault—but what exactly had she done? Tobi had no idea. He just knew it was all her doing. Hers and her zingai’s.
That thing had to be eaten. It was a happy coincidence that Tobi was so hungry. Cipher was a repulsive zingai. Its movements and appearance were unnerving, but it didn’t scare Tobi. Not in the slightest. Baku could devour it in seconds flat. Tobi knew that—he was sure of it. Cipher clearly knew it as well. It understood that it couldn’t beat Baku. Baku was a lion, and it, a hare. There was no contest. If the lion gave chase, the poor, miserable hare had no choice but to flee.
Tobi and Baku made it to the third floor. Shizukudani was faster than Tobi had expected, and they hadn’t caught up with her yet. It wasn’t that she’d turned out to be surprisingly athletic—rather, she wasn’t running at all. Cipher was the one fleeing, and Shizukudani was merely clinging to its side. The creature’s four legs propelled the two of them upward at a rapid pace.
“Figures they’d be good at runnin’ away…!” Baku griped. Tobi was silent, focused on moving his legs rather than flapping his tongue.
They hadn’t caught up with Shizukudani, but they weren’t losing any ground, either. She glanced backward as she ran, clearly worried about Tobi and Baku. Scared of them. Afraid they’d consume her at any moment.
Cipher charged down the abandoned third-floor hallway, heading toward the wing of the school with the special-use classrooms. Tobi just ran, keeping pace with Baku. It wouldn’t be much longer. Any moment now, he’d finally get to eat. He’d only just eaten the butterfly zingai moments before, but they hadn’t been enough. He wanted more. He had to eat more, or he’d never be full. He felt like he was starving to death, and even if he wasn’t, that thing had to be eaten.
And then Tobi saw someone. They were standing farther down the hallway, in the direction Shizukudani was fleeing. Who? Why hadn’t they evacuated?
Shizukudani let out a yelp of joy. “The Cleaner…!”
“Wha—?!”
Baku suddenly dropped his pace precipitously. Tobi ground to a halt as well, almost falling on his face in the process. Who? Who was that man? Why was he here? Why now?
The man was large and wearing a brimless hat. He had on a coat like a flight jacket and a pair of tall boots. His hands were enormous, his eyes looked glassy and fake, and he was wearing an odd mask with a pattern on it that resembled a set of bared teeth.
Slowly and deliberately, the masked man turned and strode off. Where was he going? He headed for the stairs, but rather than down, toward the special-use classrooms, he went up. This part of the school had access to the roof, but that area was typically off-limits and its door locked.
Cipher followed the masked man, still carrying Shizukudani. Baku and Tobi went after them. There was nothing else they could do. When they reached the top of the staircase, they found the door no longer had its knob. It had been locked, but someone or something had turned the knob so hard, it had come loose and was now lying on the ground nearby.
Tobi and Baku stepped out onto the rooftop. It was bright outside. The concrete ground was wet, but it wasn’t raining. The sky was cloudy, with patches of blue here and there. Narrow beams of sunlight shone through, falling diagonally upon the world below.
“Th-that guy,” Baku moaned, clutching his head. He fell to his knees and began to curl up on himself. “Him… The freak with the mask, he’s…”
The masked man was near the edge of the rooftop, sitting on the low wall that surrounded it. He was so massive and the wall so short that he might as well have been sitting on the ground. It certainly didn’t look comfortable. Shizukudani was close to him, no longer clinging to Cipher. She and her zingai were standing with their backs to Tobi.
But that wasn’t everyone. There was someone else on the rooftop besides the masked man, Shizukudani, and Cipher. He was gazing up at the sky as if watching the light shining through the clouds. He wasn’t sitting on the parapet, like the masked man. He stood with one foot resting on top of it and his hands hidden away in his pockets. He was tall and slender and wearing a white button-up shirt.
“Master S.”
Shizukudani had called him “master.” It was a bizarre way to refer to someone, but she clearly wasn’t kidding around. Tobi could tell that much just from her tone. The way she spoke was utterly sincere and, at the same time, disturbingly saccharine.
The man turned around but, instead of Shizukudani, he looked at Tobi. He was staring straight at him.
Tobi knew that face. He knew it very, very well. Even now, he remembered it distinctly. The man was exactly like Tobi remembered him. It had been so long since they’d seen each other—so many years since they’d been separated—but he hadn’t changed in the slightest. He wore a gentle smile, the same one he’d always shown Tobi.
“…Big Brother?”
“Hey there,” said Seki Otogiri, his eyes narrowing slightly. “You’ve really grown up, Tobi.”
“You—” Shizukudani gasped, shooting Tobi a glare. Then, a moment later, she looked back at Tobi’s brother. At Seki. “…You…know him? Master S…you and Otogiri… You mean…the two of you are…related?”
“Of course I know him,” Seki said, not even sparing a glance for Shizukudani as he spoke. “I’ve always known him. Tobi is special.”
“…‘Special’…”
Shizukudani gasped for breath. She seemed incredibly shaken. Needless to say, Tobi was no better. He couldn’t even grasp how agitated he really was.
“Then, Master S…what about me…?” asked Shizukudani.
“Sorry, Rukana,” Seki replied.
“Aren’t I special, too…?”
“You are. But Tobi’s more special.”
“He’s more…? But…”
“I told you, though, didn’t I, Rukana? You have potential. Tremendous potential.”
“Potential…”
“Rukana.”
“Y-yes, Master S?”
“Do you want to be truly special? Like no one else?”
“I do!” Shizukudani wrapped her arms around her body. It felt like she was trying to destroy herself—to destroy the part of her that wasn’t that special after all. “I want to be special! Truly special! If I’m not special, then everything is pointless…!”
“I see,” said Seki.
Seki pulled his right hand out of his pocket and held it out toward Shizukudani. She stepped forward, as if drawn toward him magnetically. Her gait was unsteady, like she was a weightless paper doll, driven by momentum rather than her own bones, joints, and muscles. She clasped Seki’s hand in hers and rubbed it against her cheek.
“Then let it eat you,” he said.
“What…?” she asked.
“Let Cipher eat you.”
“You want me…to have Cipher—”
“You want to be special, don’t you? Special in the truest sense of the word? Well, you can. I know you have what it takes to become something truly special, Rukana. You have the potential. Now, go on.”
With that, Seki pushed Shizukudani away. Not hard, by any means, but he did push her. That was how Tobi saw it, anyway. When Shizukudani turned back around, she was smiling, or at least trying to smile. She spread her arms and spoke.
“Eat me, Cipher.”
Shizukudani’s zingai opened its mouth wide—so wide, it was almost like its whole body had become one massive orifice. It had to nearly split itself in half to be big enough to fit a human being inside.
Rukana nodded—then dove headfirst into Cipher’s putrid, fleshy maw. It wasn’t quite able to swallow her whole. When Cipher closed its mouth, Shizukudani’s lower half was still dangling outside. She was shouting and kicking her legs wildly. In the end, Cipher used its own armlike legs to hold her still and push her deeper into its mouth.