Battle Royale

The rattling sound echoed through the room. Chisato was shot in the back three times as she crashed against the side table, slid down, clutched onto its edge, and fell face forward onto the floor. There was no need to check—she was dead.

"Satomi! What are you doing!?" Yukie's eyes opened wide as she screamed. Her voice was breaking.

"Oh, please." Satomi held her smoking Uzi and glared at Yukie. "She went for the gun. Because she was guilty."

"So did you though!" Haruka screamed. "Yukie! Shoot Satomi!"

With a clicking sound, Satomi pointed the Uzi at Haruka. Her face darkened. She seemed ready to shoot Haruka at any moment.

Yukie looked anguished. At that moment she had her hand on the Browning in the back of her skirt. After hesitating, she must have...intended to shoot Satomi's arm or some other part of her body.

Satomi then quickly shifted the Uzi and fired...at Yukie.

Yukie was blown back with the rattling sound. Blood burst out of the holes in her chest and she fell backwards.

Haruka stood still for only a moment and then made a dash for the Browning Yukie had dropped. Satomi's Uzi followed her body and burst out, blowing off Haruka's side along with the fabric of her uniform. Her body slid against the floor.

The table was in between them now. Satomi pointed the Uzi at Yuko. She said, "What about you?...You're different, right?"

Yuko could only tremble. As she trembled, her eyes were fixed on Satomi's face.

There was a pop. There was a hole on the left side of Satomi's forehead. She opened her mouth...and looked down at her left hand. Blood burst out of the hole in her forehead, splashing against the inside of her glasses. Then it continued to drip downward.

Yuko's neck moved stiffly like some gadget as she followed Satomi's eyes and found Haruka, her torso raised in pain from her fallen position, somehow still holding the Browning.

Satomi's Uzi burst out. It wasn't clear whether she pulled the trigger intentionally or whether it was from her nerves twitching. Rows of bullets tore along the floor and pierced Haruka's body which got tossed over and back. A bloody mist burst upward, nearly tearing off Haruka's neck above her metal collar.

Satomi's body fell forward slowly and landed with a thud over Yuka Nakagawa's corpse. She remained absolutely still.

Completely alone in the room, Yuko just kept on trembling. Her body was stiff as a rock. With the look of a child wandering into a freakish museum exhibition, she gazed at the floor covered with the corpses of five of her classmates.

9 students remaining

63

When he heard the shattering sound, Shuya just thought, oh, one of those clumsy girls must have dropped a dish, but when the sound was followed by an argument, he got up from his bed.

He felt a sharp pain run through the left side of his stomach and his shoulder blade. Shuya groaned, but using his right arm he managed to get out of the bed and stepped onto the floor with his bare feet. He was only wearing his school uniform pants. The heated argument continued. He thought he heard Yukie shouting.

Shuya walked over to the door and put his hand on the doorknob. The knob turned and as he pushed...the door seemed blocked. Through the one-centimeter gap he could see a wooden plank diagonally set against the door. As Yukie had warned him, they had constructed a makeshift bolt lock.

Shuya grabbed the doorknob and shook it vigorously several times, but the door wouldn't budge. He poked his fingers through the gap, but the plank, set against the door, refused to move.

On the verge of giving up, he took a deep breath when he heard the all-too-familiar rattling sound through the gap. There were several screams.

Shuya turned pale. Were they being attacked...but if that was...in any case, something was wrong!

Shuya managed to keep his injured body from tottering over. He raised his right foot and kicked the door with the heel of his bare foot, using the front kick technique he'd learned from Hiroki. But the door easily spurned his kick, throwing him off balance. He fell back onto the floor and felt a searing pain go up his side. He also realized he needed to pee, but that would have to wait.

BRRATTA. More rattling. And then more BRRATTA.

Shuya turned back to the bed, stood up, and lifted the edge of the bed that was made of steel pipes with his right hand. The bed landed on its side with a thud and the blanket and sheets slid off.

Shuya dragged the bed, pressed one end against the door, and went around to the other end. He then shoved it against the door with all his might. The door made a cracking sound. One more shove.

Bang. Gunfire. This time, one shot.

The bed pummeled into the wooden door. The door bent in half with a crack and opened into the hall. Shuya yanked the bed from the front of the door with his right hand and let it fall against the floor.

The typewriter-like rattling gunfire was now clearly audible through the open door.