Watch For the Death
"Here is a status report. There are twenty people left alive. You have one hour left. Good luck."
"Twenty! Really?"
Shōta gave me a look of astonishment with his eyes and mouth wide open.
"I suppose it's possible that this experiment could wipe us all out."
"I agree. If the clones had a little bit more wisdom and cohesion, we'd be dead for sure."
Kazuhiro and Risa were talking as if nothing had happened, but the content of their conversation was so cruel that I distanced myself a little from them. as Minami was walking weakly like a puppy right behind me.
As we come to the stairs leading to the second floor, I could hear the screams of men and women more clearly.
"I think it would be better for the us to go out to the schoolyard. So I'm going to go downstairs."
Kazuhiro then walked quickly downstairs, followed a little later by Risa.
"What shall we do?"
I asked my friends around me, who were a little less reliable than Risa or Kazuhiro.
"Of course, we will follow them."
"That’s right."
"Just follow Kazuhiro in everything and we'll be fine."
Unanimously, we too ran down the stairs in unison.
Minami hesitated to go down on the second floor, but we pulled her along. As we came downstairs, we were confronted with the smell of iron that seemed to be blood, walls stained with blood to the point of trauma, and puddles made of blood that felt like we were walking on a rough road after a rain. No wonder Minami hesitated when she saw such a scene.
Because I had rushed down the stairs and stepped in a pool of its blood when I landed on the ground, the blood splattered all over my uniform pants.
"Oh god. This isn’t good."
"I too started to feel dizzy."
Shōta and Keisuke managed to stay conscious, but the moment Minami saw the dead male student sitting with his back to the bloodstained wall, she lost her position. Keisuke caught her as she was about to dive straight into the pool of blood, and she remained unconscious.
I myself thought that the only way to see this much splatter was in cartoons or horror movies. Then a question came up my mind.
"Why there are so much blood…?"
"That’s because they are hurt so bad, so that they would bleed eventually."
"But this experiment is either catch or run away. All you have to do is touch them with your hand. Injuries would only be like a scrape on a limb from a fall. Nothing like this should have happened."
"No…that’s not right."
Suddenly, a male student emerged from the classroom by the stairs.
"You’re…"
"Reiji. Reiji Kurihara."
When I was about to hug him in a moment of joy and relief that there were survivors, Keisuke stepped out in front of me.
"Keisuke…"
I am sure that Keisuke must have realized the same question I had and, thought that we had to get the truth out of Reiji first, who was talking as if he knew the answer.
"Whoooo! I'm so glad you came back to life, my friend!"
Keisuke pushed the diminutive Reiji down.
I lamented to myself that I had thought that Keisuke could think a little bit properly, even if only for a moment.
Moreover, from third perspective, it looked like a stiff-armed man abusing a slender girl, and I wanted to turn away.
"Hey Keisuke. Where is Minami?"
"What about me?"
Minami, who should have been leaning on Keisuke with a face as white as a dead man's just a few minutes ago, appeared next to me with a face like innocence.
"Oh. nothing, if you are okay."
I coughed once and forcibly removed Keisuke from Reiji's embrace.
"Reiji. Why are these brain-dead students covered in blood?"
"Ahem. Aw thank you for saving me."
"Yeah? I don't remember helping you."
"No, from Keisuke. He choked me so hard I almost died."
That gorilla. Doesn't he know how to control himself? I glared at Keisuke who has tears on his eyes.
"Well, glad to hear that. And…"
"Yeah. We found out that the clones had unlimited stamina, which was too disadvantageous for us who were trying to escape from them. When we're at a loss thinking about how to survive this experiment, some guy thought that they could fight back. I think it was probably the guy who was in the leader's position among the middle school students. Following him, the others tried to fight back against the clone with something that could be used as a weapon. Then…"
"They themselves got beaten up."
A look of sadness was reflected on Reiji's face.
"Then, why don't we just have someone else stop the clone while someone else escapes? Buying time, I guess."
"I think it's possible, but I saw it. When Taichi was trying to get Kana away from the clone, the clone exploded as soon as Taichi accidentally touched the clone's palm."
"You mean it’s against the rule?"
I bit my lip.
"That shocked Kana, and she just sat there."
Taichi Tsugaru and Kana Nanbu were classmates of us. I was not particularly close to them, but they always seemed to get along well with each other, and I even thought they were going to get married.
"No way…"
After hearing Reiji's story, Minami almost fell unconscious again, but Keisuke and Shōta, who were on both sides of her, supported her and she managed to stay on her feet.
"We're going to the schoolyard now. It's easier to get away from them on the field."
"No, thank you. Unlike you guys, I'm not athletic, and as I said before, my clone's physical strength is bottomless. The only way to overcome this is to confine them somewhere or use obstacles to lose them. The schoolyard can be seen for a long distance, so even if a clone finds you, you can run right out, but on the other hand, there are few places to hide. Unless you are very confident in your instantaneous power and stamina, it is difficult to run away from the race. I'll be quiet and hide inside the building. I'm small, so I can easily fit in the small teacher's platform. If we can squeeze out the unique human wisdom that clones don't have, I'm sure we can survive for another hour and a bit. Good luck to you all."
I am sure his last words were just a bluff to inspire himself. However, we got encouraged by those Reiji's words and left the classroom.
"Hello! You guys."
When we had a little more room in our hearts, soon a blood-covered male student came over and gave us a fresh smile.
I instantly realized that the male student was insane. In his right hand, he is holding a scalpel, perhaps brought from the science lab.
"Have you seen my clone, haha?"
"Umm, no."
I answered honestly.
The boy walked past us with smile keeping on his face.
"That is the one who got manipulated."
I took a slow, deep breath, and suddenly someone came running from the other side of the hallway.
"Run, you guys!"
At first I thought it was a clone, but when we heard Kazuhiro's voice, I was relieved again, but soon started running.
Something was chasing us. That's what we know instinctively.
"Why are you here? Aren’t you guys headed to the schoolyard?"
We chased after Risa and Kazuhiro.
"We tried to go, but I thought there must be a clone at the front door, so we went out the back door, but it was locked. So we went to the staff room to have it opened, but there was nobody there. The key stocker was locked, so we had no choice but to go out from the front door, and eventually, these guys showed up."
Kazuhiro spoke so fast that I could hardly hear him, but there was no doubt that they bumped into the clone as they were trying to escape.
"Then, is that Kazuhiro?"
"No, one is Risa."
Kazuhiro pointed his thumb at Risa, who was running hard on the right.
"And another one is you."
"What, me!?"
