YM778.TV Chapter 12: Chapter 12: No, You Don't Have a Choice
After all, what\'s the point in cleaning up any mess if you don\'t care about being caught?
The only reason I bothered to stealthily kill the one in the security room before collecting the twins in the first place is because it was easier than having to deal with every goddamned guard in this facility, which is what I would have to do if he decided to sound the alarm.
Since I\'d be getting rid of them all anyway, it shouldn\'t matter \'how\' I go about it or how much evidence I leave behind―it\'s not like they\'re not going to find out who did it, even if I tried my best to cover my tracks.
Roughly three minutes passed before I made it to a fork with a sign saying:
[Experimental Subject Containment]
[← Chambers 1 & 2 | Chambers 3 & 4 →]
Without hesitation, I went down the right path, and at the end of the hall, I laid eyes on two armed guards sitting lazily on the floor, conversing.
What\'s even the point of being armed if you do that? That\'s no position to safeguard something.
I don\'t understand.
Seems like once I\'m done here, the higher-ups are gonna shit themselves at the mind-bogglingly low standards, huh? Wonder how they\'ll rectify it.
It took them longer than they\'d probably like to admit to notice my existence, and even longer than that to realise I was approaching them with a gun.
Unfortunately for them, the moment they did realise...
Thud-!
―They had already hit the floor, warm blood leaking all over the epoxy-coated concrete below, slowly spreading and sticking to what was previously a pure white surface and dyeing it a devil\'s pink.
Opening the laboratory door they were "defending" by inputting the correct code into the keypad, I was hit by yet another pair of doors.
[Containment Chamber #3]
[Containment Chamber #4]
I went through the first door, and arrived at a vast lobby lined with cells on two sides, each containing one person.
If I remembered correctly, each Chamber contained 50 containment cells, right? 25 on each side, making there 200 human experiments in total.
「Yes. However, 200 is merely the figure for this Hirane Facility alone」
Ah, yeah, of course. They\'ve probably got a bunch of these facility branches all over the place.
Flicking the switch beside the door, the embedded ceiling lamps all flickered on simultaneously, almost causing my eyes to go blind from the glaring light.
"Oof, fucking hell, that\'s bright."
As soon as I did that, though, I began to regret it within an instant.
Not because of the light necessarily, but because of the commotion it caused.
"AAAAAARRRGGGHHH...!!"
―A scream here.
BOOM--!
―An explosion there.
"Oh... Ohoh, why...? God... I\'m sorry... Please, someone save me..."
―Someone crying to be rescued on all sides.
My mind blanked upon being abruptly thrust into such an atmosphere. As if caught in a mortar blast during a ferocious battle, my ears began ringing and all the noise sounded like I was underwater.
"..."
This...
"AAAAARRGHHHHH...!!"
"...Stop..."
This is...
BOOM--!!
"...Stop it."
This was just...
"Ahahahah...! Please! Ahahah! Save m--!"
――BANG--!
"Shut the fuck up!"
"""..."""
Suddenly, everything turned silent.
There was a faint reverberation of that gunshot just now, but... Peace... and quiet.
Yes... It was all nice, quiet, but I still heard that damned ringing in my ears.
Putting the suppressor back on, which I had just removed for that shot, I calmed my breath with a long inhale, hold, then exhaled.
"...Make so much as a sneeze and you die, no questions asked," I announced.
Sauntering through, I scanned every cell, trying to find the two which contained the twins, however as I was doing so, some obnoxious fool called out to me.
"He-hey, who are you?! You\'re not one of them! Are you gonna get us outta here?!"
"..."
Without a word, I turned to face him; a bratty teenager just a couple of years younger than me.
Looking at him, I opened my mouth, "I spoke in a clear-enough voice, but are you perhaps deaf?"
"Wha...? What, no! I asked who you we--"
Insolent.
Turning away from the now-ownerless cell, I declared with a frown, "I believe I don\'t need to explain what will happen if someone makes the same mistake, yes?"
Fortunately or not, no one stepped up to say anything in response.
"Good. Now keep it like that."
Briskly passing each cell only once to glance at the inhabitants, I soon found who I was looking for.
"Ah, there you are. You two, you\'re coming with me," Pointing at the twins as I said this, they didn\'t even turn their eyes to look at me.
Hm...
"You\'re not intellectually challenged, are you? I give you express permission to talk to me, so tell me if you\'d like to come with me willingly or if I\'ll have to make you."
My heart almost stopped when I suddenly thought I might have wasted my time in coming here, but when I noticed one of the girls\' gazes on me, I realised I was fortunately wrong. Looking back at the other one, the same was true there.
...Ahah. So, that\'s what it was.
Smirking, I commented, "I like quick learners." Then, I opened their cells by inputting the code on the keypad once again, and, albeit trepidatiously, the both of them waddled out to embrace each other in a sweet hug.
It was a rather awkward one because of the shackles binding their arms and legs, but it was a sugary and heart-warming scene nevertheless.
How cute.
―But I didn\'t have time for diabetic things like this.
"That\'s enough. Do you want me to bring you with force or not?"
The twins faced me, still expressionless, but their dark eyes seemed to contain profound emotions. Glancing between each other and me a few times, they eventually came to a unanimous decision.
"Do we have a choice...?" One of them asked. "We\'ll come, but please take care of us," The other followed. ""Better than this place, at least...""
Staring at them with a blank look, I asserted candidly.
"―No, you don\'t have a choice."
""...""
I could see them visibly holding their breaths in dread and grip each other\'s hands tightly, despite them showing zero external emotion.
How funny of a reaction, I wasn\'t even done speaking yet.
"―But, well, it would be inconvenient for me to not treat you well, so I suppose I\'ll be looking after you. I do have to take care of what\'s useful to me, after all."
Just like how a professional gunman takes care of his arsenal, I take care of the tools useful to me.
That goes for everything I own―whether it be my trusted Ruger Mark IV or these girls, I make sure to properly maintain and look after whatever can be utilised.
With great relief, they exhaled quietly and loosened their grips.
"Then, let\'s get going."
As I turned to exit the Containment Chamber, various moronic and fervent subjects called out to me, begging and pleading with me to bring them along too, so I quickly shut them up; a bullet being all it took for the majority of them.
There was no one here other than the twins I cared to listen to, so why would I go through the effort of saving them?
Since there was not a single thing of use left in this shithole that could compare to the potential of the twins, I didn\'t want anything more to do with it.
Rescuing people that cannot be used is inefficient and, above all else, irrational.
However, I stopped when I realised I was walking by myself. Noticing the twins weren\'t following me, I stared at them.
"Did you piss yourself or something? Hurry up."
""Um...""
"What do you want?"
Cutting me off, the twins began to talk in turns about something I didn\'t foresee at all.
"Please, if it\'s okay..."
"Can you bring someone else with us...?"
"He won\'t be a burden."
"He can be useful to you."
""We promise.""
What is this? They want me to help someone else, now? Who is it?
「Emir. 14-years-old. Male. Subject Containment Chamber #1」
...Seriously?
"You are not obliged to do anything for anyone here. Why do you care about some kid like that?"
I didn\'t care for their reasoning, but it was necessary to know why because otherwise they might refuse to listen to me, and that\'d be a huge pain in my ass in the future.
Also, if it was going to lead to them asking me to save more and more people, then I\'d have to nip this issue in the bud before it blossoms.
"He, um..."
"...Protected us from the..."
""Bad guys...""
Uh-huh. sanctimonious brat is all I hear when you say that.
"You wimps. You really want me to help some kid just \'cause he defended you once or twice?"
""...""
Lowering their gazes to the floor, the girls\' normally vacant looks appeared to sadden from my words.
Haaa... Well, seeing how they\'re this adamant about it, if it\'s only one kid, then it\'s not that much of an expense to bring him along as well.
I\'ll just hand him over to Minami to do whatever she likes with him.
"Fine, I\'ll bring him along."
""!!""
"―But! If you dare to ask me to save anyone more than that one kid, I\'m just going to put a bullet through their skull in front of your eyes instead, you hear?"
""Yes...""
"Um..."
"...Thank... you..."
"Very much..."
They thanked me, but it was just as meaningless as if it were anyone else saying it.
"Whatever. Now, get a move on."
More importantly, is there anything I can put that kid to work at? I said I\'d pass him to Minami, but if he can be used at all, then I\'ll just take him instead. What\'s he got going for him?
Asking that, it went on and listed a few things he could do, but none of it was really any different from what any other kid his age could do. In addition to that, his Measurement of Card Reading was utterly worthless too.
What is he going to do, read my fortune? Ridiculous.
That was, until I asked a certain question. I held a sliver of hope, yet was already half-convinced that the answer would be disappointing.
What\'s his Supernatural Ability, then? Since he\'s in this facility he must have one, right?
「Possesses the Supernatural Ability dubbed by the researchers, \'Absolute Contract Creation\'」
...Oh?
Now... That sounded fascinating, didn\'t it?