“N… No. You were curious… but so was I. I’m… I’m not used to having strange men come up and ask me if they have met me before, you see… so I was afraid you were stalking me before we came to the hospital or something, ha… haha. In such a strange environment… it… it is understandable, r-right?” Pushing up your slipping spectacles, you stutter and stammer your way through the rebuttal, facing down Mori nervously. The glare from the monitor screens behind him casts his face into shadow, but you can still make out that his eyes are wide with surprise.
Then, he laughs.
“Stalking you? I see, I see. Heh. Rabbit-chan has fangs, it seems.” Mori arbitrarily provides you a pet name with a patronizing air – he seems intent on provoking a reaction from you. You stare at him sullenly. When an outburst does not happen, he nods slightly and continues, “If that is your reason, then yes. I understand. We got off on the wrong foot, didn’t we?” Mori holds out his hand, offering to shake on a new understanding. “I assure you that I have nothing but good intentions. I’ll steer clear of you as best as I can from now on. Don’t want anyone to think I’m stalking you or anything, eh?”
You raise your hand with trepidation, wondering if you should accept his gesture of goodwill. Without warning, Mori seizes your hand and waves it up and down in a vigorous handshake. His grip squeezes the bones in your fingers and palm together painfully, and with a tug he pulls you close enough that you can smell the tobacco on his breath. “Watch yourself, Shinoseki Adachi,” he whispers.
“S-s-s-same to you, Mori Akio-san,” you respond defiantly.
He lets go of your hand with a dismissive snort. Stumbling backwards, you almost trip over your own feet. Somehow, miraculously, you manage to stay upright.
“Oh well. We have more important things to worry about, Rabbit-chan,” Mori scratches his beard and shrugs, turning back towards the screens. The big man is clearly still suspicious of you, but he seems willing to let things stay as they are for now. “Like where Okuyama is. You wouldn’t happen to know where she is, eh?”
“You have been k-keeping an eye on me all the this while, haven’t… haven’t you? Of course I wouldn’t know.’”
“Relax. I was just asking. No need to get all worked up about it.” While he works on the terminal, you look up at the myriad displays. Here and there you glimpse some of the companions who have been trapped with you together in this hospital. The others are probably somewhere the cameras cannot see at the moment. There is no sign of Okuyama anywhere.
A slight movement draws your attention. Turning your eyes towards one of the monitors, you see a long-haired girl in school clothes. The design looks familiar – the uniform appears to be the same as the ones that Uehara and Sakimura wear.
“…Mori-san, where is that?”
Mori squints at the screen in question – the girl is standing in the middle of a darkened hallway, hands behind her back as she rocks on her heels. After a while, she spins around and walks off-screen. There is something off about the image that you are looking at; you have a feeling that this hallway is not located in the main building. “I have no idea,” he admits after a while. “I need Tokigawa or Okuyama to confirm this, but from the looks of it, it could be one of the other buildings. There, see the lines on the wall?” He taps the glass sharply with one blunt finger.
“Y-yeah… are those… to show the way to different locations?” Though you cannot make the colours out clearly through the monitor, they appear to be different for each line, and the top-most one bends off at an intersection halfway down the corridor.
“Yes. It’s not used in the main building. I’m thinking that’s the research and imaging facility that Tokigawa spoke of. They use these as navigation guides over there,” answers Mori.
“You seem to know a lot about hospitals, Mori-san…” you mumble.
“Interrogating me now?” he chuckles. “A middle-aged man like me can be surprisingly knowledgeable by virtue of age well used. Don’t forget that now, Rabbit-chan. Still, this means that we are not the only ones trapped here. We should find a way over to the other buildings as soon as we can, and-” Mori pauses. It looks like something has caught his eye.
Following his gaze to find the panel he is monitoring, you see the cafeteria displayed. The junk food is still lying on the tables. And there, pacing around as if searching for something – or someone – is Okuyama.
***
“Where have you gone?”
When all of you return to the cafeteria, Okuyama explodes with emotion upon seeing everyone. She is berating Tokigawa and waving her finger in his face. On his part, Tokigawa just seems relieved that she is alright.
“Why did all of you disappear to the basement without saying a word?” Okuyama seems rather confused and upset. “When I got to the cafeteria, no one was there. There wasn’t even a note left behind!”
“We left to go looking for you, Midori,” Tokigawa clarifies.
“We should be asking you that question, Okuyama-san.” Maeda seems slightly annoyed. “You were the one who went missing in the first place. I thought you were following us up the stairs? How did you get separated from us?”
Okuyama’s gaze darts around and finally settles upon you. “Hey, Shinoseki-san! Can you explain it to them?”
You are struck by surprise and almost wither away under the collective stares of the group. “H-huh? Me? What? Explain? What?” What does she want you to explain?
“While climbing the stairs, I saw you running around in the basement and decided to chase you down before you got lost,” says Okuyama. “I thought I told Kayano-san to wait up before I did so.”
“I’m… I’m sorry,” apologizes the office lady softly. “I must not have heard it.”
“Well, no matter… but where were you hiding, Shinoseki-san? I couldn’t find you, and when I gave up looking and returned to the cafeteria, nobody was there. For that matter, I thought you were with Kou’s group. What were you doing in the basement?”
“Adachi-san?” Uehara looks at you quizzically.
You shake your head in confusion. “What? N-no, I wasn’t down there… I mean, I was, just now, but not when you saw me.”
“Shinoseki was with us right until we learnt that you were missing, Okuyama-san,” says Sakimura.
Okuyama is baffled. “That can’t be. I’m sure I saw you.”
“It’s a doppleganger,” whispers Amanozaki suddenly. “You are going to die, Shinoseki…”
“Amanozaki-san, can you cut it out?” snaps Uehara ill-temperedly. “If you are talking about European tradition, dopplegangers are only considered an omen of death if you meet your own. That isn’t the case here. Besides, they don’t exist anyway.”
“Hah!” Amanozaki sneers, waving her crystal skull about. “What would a girl like you, with no grounding and training in the ancient mystical occult traditions of East and West, know of the true nature of dopplegangers? Everyone, don’t listen to her lies!”
Uehara bristles. “You-“
“He… Shinoseki-san was undoubtedly with us,” says Tokigawa quickly, trying to shut down the argument before it goes further. "Perhaps you are too tired and stressed, Midori. You could have imagined seeing Shinoseki-san."
"I think I would know my own condition best," she pouts. "Don't get all doctor on me, Kou-chan."
“I'm not. I just think there's something going weird going on here... I'm not exempting myself from this. In fact, I actually got a call from you while we were on the fifth floor.” Taking out his phone, he shows her the call history.
“W-wait, I didn’t call you, Kou. Why would I? There’s no reception in here,” she mutters, pulling out her own phone. True enough, there are no signs of her having dialed Tokigawa’s number there. “See?”
“Exactly. This is just… too strange,” sighs Tokigawa. He absent-mindedly presses the redial button on his phone.
Seconds later, a mournful enka song is emitted from Okuyama’s phone. She gasps, staring at the screen. “Kou, the call made it through! Hold on, let me try getting it!” She does so, answering the call and putting her cellphone up to her ear.
Tokigawa does the same. He gives her a tentative greeting. “H-Hello?”
Okuyama nods twice. “It works. It works! Even though there are no signal bars on the phone! But... I don't understand."
“The symbols are sometimes inaccurate,” Taketatsu speaks up. He is already holding his own phone in his hands. “It looks like we still cannot reach outside numbers, unfortunately. Perhaps we can only connect to phones within the hospital.”
Sawada seems slightly disappointed – it looks like he was one of the first to try dialing a number. “Too bad then,” he says. With a graceful sigh, he pockets his phone and turns to face the group. “So, what shall we do next? Should we take a break? If it is as Kou-san says, perhaps that might be best for everyone.”
"That would be nice," mutters Sakaki lazily from the back of the group.
“Before that, there is some information I need to share,” Mori says, stepping up. "Firstly, we saw another person through the security cameras."
There is a murmur of interest from everyone.
Taketatsu frowns. "I thought those were broken."
"They came back to life, I guess. Now, from the uniform, it seemed to be someone from your school. Sakimura, Uehara? I remember that you said you came here with your friends. Were they male or female?"
"One guy, Kozaki Touma, and one girl, Shiba Tsukimi, pops," answers Sakimura.
"I see." Mori nods. "She could be in the research building. Tokigawa, I'll need you to help me verify that."
Tokigawa nods. Meanwhile, Sakimura turns to Uehara, and the two of them begin whispering excitedly about possibly meeting up with their friends.
"Secondly..." Mori holds out his hand towards you. “The note, Rabbit-chan.”
“Rabbit-chan?” You hear Uehara giggle.
“Rabbit-chan?” Maeda is frowning at you.
“R-R-Rabbit-chan?” Amanozaki is looking at both you and Mori suspiciously. For some reason, she starts blushing.
“Here… here you go,” you stammer, passing Mori the torn note.
“This will give us the passcode to the hallways that connect to the other buildings,” Ignoring their reactions, Mori places the note on the table. “As long as we solve the puzzle, that is.”
Everyone crowds around, peering at it.
“Witches… Kukukukuku. I already know the answer,” hisses Amanozaki immediately. “It’s 6,6,6,6!”
She is ignored by everyone else, who seem to be puzzling over the riddle seriously. Mitsuki, seemingly concerned, breaks off from the group and walks shyly over to Amanozaki.
***
02:18
A. You have already solved it in your mind some time ago, when you read the puzzle. The answer is 1153.
1. You share the answer with them. This will save time, in addition to letting them know you are not dead weight around here.
2. You keep the answer to yourself. They might not appreciate you butting in, and you are sure they can solve it themselves anyway.
B. You were unable to solve the puzzle by yourself. Perhaps they might succeed where you failed.
1. You join in with them, trying to solve the riddle together as a team.
2. You keep out of it – they are smarter than you are, and you would only be dragging them down.
