Rokuro opened his eyes and he instantly realized he had been asleep for a long time. His muscles pained and he found it difficult to change sides on the bed. He then realized he was not a bed, he was laying on the floor, and in the next moment, he realized he was not in the hospital anymore. He looked around the small dimly lit room, there was no one else but him. There was a small window through which light entered the room and lit it partially.
With much difficulty, he stood up and banged his hands on the metallic door. It made a loud sound, but no one came to attend him.
What's going on, he thought.
He heard footsteps approaching the room. He could also see the shadow of someone walking towards the room from the gap between the floor and the door. His heartbeat paced as the shadow stopped right in front of the door. It made him even more anxious when he heard the clanking of the lock. He knew the door was about to be opened. He clenched his fists instinctively, probably out of fear.
"You're awake? So soon? How?" The silhouette of the big man said. Rokuro knew he was Daichi. He remembered how his voice sounded.
"Yeah. What's so surprising about that?" Rokuro said.
"None of the other people woke up. Anyway, doesn't matter if you're awake or asleep if you're going to die at the end." Daichi said.
"Just get that thought out of your head."
"Shut the hell up, you stupid creature." Daichi slapped Rokuro so hard that he fell. He didn't say anything in return. He knew he had to stay quiet at this moment. Daichi moved close to him and grabbed him by his shoulder.
"Let's take a walk, your last perhaps." Daichi said and made him stand up. He tied his hands behind his back and they walked out of the room.
"Quick." Daichi said as he pushed Rokuro slightly.
"You said it was a walk." Rokuro said.
"It is."
"Where is my mother? My friends?"
"Did you have them in the first place, to begin with?"
Rokuro's heart skipped a beat as he listened to that question. It made him frantic.
"What do you mean?" Rokuro asked anxiously.
"Oh, that's a simple question. Did you have a mother? Did you have any friends?" Daichi said.
"Stop playing with words and answer me."
"Or what? What are you going to do?"
Rokuro was growing impatience but he was trying hard not to give in to the situation. He stayed quiet.
"You'll be meeting them in a few minutes. Possible for the last time." Daichi said.
"Stop playing this game of yours, alright?" Rokuro said in his frustrated tone.
"Rokuro! My son, what have they done to you. Come to me." Mrs. Arata cried just as soon as Rokuro and Daichi entered the big hall. Rokuro ran to his mother with his tied hands. He realized his mother was tied as well. She couldn't touch him and neither could he. He looked back at Daichi with his face all tensed up and furious. He dashed towards him and in less than two seconds he hit Daichi in the chest with head. Daichi was thrown into the air with that hit. He flew back about a meter or two before falling. The guards came running from all the corners of the hall and grabbed Rokuro as some of the guards tried to help their boss get back up.
"You bastard." Daichi roared and slapped Rokuro very hard, as hard as he could. He slapped him again, and then again. He didn't stop. Rokuro's mother cried watching his son getting beat up as she tried to persuade Daichi to stop beating him. But the man wasn't going to stop. He was enraged.
That was the moment when the most unexpected of events unfolded. Rokuro stopped Daichi's hand as he tried to slap him one more time. Daichi could only just stare at Rokuro with his surprised face and perplexed eyes. It shocked him to see the kid stop his hand.
"How the heck did you do it?" Daichi asked and looked down on the floor at the pieces of the rope with which he tied Rokuro's hands.
"How did it open on its own?" Daichi asked.
"It didn't open on its own. I opened it." Rokuro said and planted a hard slap on Daichi's face, so hard that even the bulky physique of Daichi couldn't handle it and he fell on the floor. The guards took hold of Rokuro's hand one more time but they were thrown away in the air just as soon as they touched him. Rokuro walked to Daichi who was still laying down on the floor. He bent down and came close to Daichi's face and to let all his anger and frustration out, he roared right on Daichi's face. He roared like he had been holding it in for a very long time. His eyes had gotten as wide as they could. He clutched Daichi's collar and brought him even closer to his face and he roared even louder. This was the first time Daichi looked bothered for the first time. It made him contemplate what this kid could do.
"You will now know." Rokuro yelled. "What it's like to lose."
"To hell with you." Daichi said and pushed Rokuro back. He stood up and pulled his gun out. "I can't deal with this anymore..."
Daichi pointed the gun at Rokuro and in a blink of an eye, he pulled the trigger. The bullet was on its way to pierce Rokuro's body but as it reached him, he extended his hand in the air and grabbed the bullet even before it touched his body, rendering Daichi shocked. Daichi or anyone else in the hall for that matter could not believe what they just saw. This was not a scene from a movie, it was real, very real. All of them looked at Rokuro as if he was an alien or a superhero. Not able to comprehend the situation and control his anger and frustration, Daichi fired another bullet at Rokuro which Rokuro grabbed with his left hand this time, without any sort of discomfort. Daichi widened his eyes in surprise.
Rokuro held the bullet in his right hand between his thumb and index finger and flicked it at Daichi with as much force as he could. It hit him right on the forehead. Though it did not pierce him and cause any damage, it still hurt him a little to be hit by a metal nonetheless. It didn't take long for Daichi to grasp that there was something unusual going on with the kid, so he thought it was better to stop engaging with him at the time and focus on other people, which is what he did. He gave Rokuro a menacing and angry look and pointed his gun at his mother. Before Rokuro could react and run towards his mother to save her, the bullet that left the gun had already entered his mother's stomach and out of her back, it hit the wall behind her and fell on the floor.
For a moment she could not even discern that she was shot and the bullet had escaped her body as well. She then looked down at her belly and noticed the white wrap dress had started to become red and that she was now starting to feel the pain. She looked up with her teary and shocked eyes at Daichi. Her eyes asked him what he had done, though her lips didn't utter a word. Everybody in the hall froze where they were standing, especially Rokuro. Like his mother, he was still not able to trust what he just saw. He didn't even want to trust it. His eyes too spoke more than he could ever say. They were sad, shocked, and questioning what just happened.
Rokuro blinked in surprise as he heard another gunshot. He hadn't felt so helpless in his life, ever. He had to watch his mother die right in front of his eyes, but he couldn't do anything. It was her stomach that had become red earlier, and now it was her chest. He rushed to his mother who was about to fall on the floor. He reached there just in time so he could hold her in her arms. He sat down while holding her. Both the mother and the son couldn't stop crying. Tears flowed down their cheeks without looking like they were going to stop anytime soon.
"I should have done this earlier, way earlier when the matter was still in infancy." Daichi said, grinding his teeth, still maintaining that menacing and angry look.
Rokuro looked up at him with his questioning eyes, but in return, he only got a smug smile from Daichi which infuriated Rokuro even more.
"My son," Shiko said, holding Rokuro's face in her hands. "Remember that I've always loved you, and will continue to, forever."
"No, Mummy. Please don't say those things. You'll be fine. We'll get you to the hospital soon." Rokuro said, trying to console his mother, and himself as well.
"You won't take her anywhere." Daichi said and shot another bullet right into Shiko's head.
Rokuro froze in the moment. He kept looking at his mother with utmost disbelief. He wanted to think it was one of his nightmares that would soon end. But the blood seemed too real to not be true. That way it flowed out of her head onto her face made him more and more anxious. With shaking hands, he tried to touch the wound to check he was not dreaming. He gasped when he realized it was all real. Streams of tears made their way to the floor from his eyes when memories of his mother flashed in his mind. He could hear Daichi say something but only in a muffled voice as if he was at a great distance from him. His mind was empty, he went numb at his mother being shot dead in front of him. No child can watch its mother lying dead in its arms. No matter how much he cried the pain didn't subside. He felt his heart sinking to the bottom of his body, literally.
"No!" Rokuro roared at Daichi who didn't want to let this opportunity slip away, so he shot at Rokuro one more time, assuming that he was distracted. Rokuro was distracted, but his reflexes still worked fine as he was able to dodge the bullet with ease as he dashed to Daichi. Rokuro took hold of Daichi's hand that was holding the gun and twisted it in a way that made Daichi release the gun and let it fall on the floor.
It enraged Daichi, who tried to slap and thrash Rokuro for it. Little did he know times had changed. His right hand was already twisted on one side, and now the left hand that he tried to slap Rokuro with was twisted as well by Rokuro. Both his hands were now on the sides, twisted as much as they could with his face expressing how painful it was while Rokuro's face expressed how angry he was.
"Stop him!" Daichi cried out for help.
When his minions rushed to help him, Rokuro turned around while still holding Daichi by his two hands and threw him in the air directed at the men rushing in to help him. Rokuro handled this huge bulky body with so much ease that it seemed to travel in the air like it was a feather. Daichi fell onto the running men, taking them down along on the floor. One of them hit his head hard on the floor. He didn't stand up after that or opened his eyes for that matter. He was at least unconscious, if not dead.
Daichi stood up quickly and looked at Rokuro with his enraged face. He picked up a gun that belonged to one of those men and fired shot after shot at Rokuro, who dodged them with ease with his incredible reflexes. Even Rokuro seemed surprised at how he was able to do this, but he didn't seem to care too much about it.
"You're going to pay for all of this." Rokuro said and picked Daichi's gun and took a shot at him. Lucky for Daichi, he had already used up the bullets. Rokuro threw the gun at Daichi that hit him right in his face.
"Handle him, you idiots." Daichi yelled at his men, holding his forehead. The men rushed towards Rokuro, who seemed to dodge them at first, but they were too many for him to handle on his own. They eventually grabbed him and tied his hands.
"Take them all and throw them into the tank." Daichi commanded and walked out of the room.
"Take them all?" Rokuro asked, surprised.
Daichi just gave him a look and chose not to say anything. He left the hall dusting his clothes while the men took Rokuro out of the hall as well and entered the room adjacent to the hall. Rokuro was surprised to see Kairi and Miyuki tied up in the room, laying down on the floor.
The men threw Rokuro where his friends were laying. The two of them were unconscious. Rokuro spoke to them as soon as he sat up. He tried to wake them up as the men stood there staring at the proceedings.
"Quick. Wake them up." One of the men said.
Rokuro had forgotten about the powers that he had got from his father. He could have done something and got the upper hand in the situation, but he kept on trying to wake his friends. He was deeply hurt and in shock with the death of his mother right in front of his eyes and in his lap. It was probably why he had forgotten about the powers. He was distraught.
One of the men grew impatient and fired one bullet on the floor, the sound of which echoed so much in the empty room that it brought the sleeping people into senses. Both Kairi and Miyuki were shocked when they opened their eyes to realize the situation they were in. Their hands were tied, their ears had this continuous high-pitched noise because of the gunshot, and their best friend Rokuro was sitting in front of them, more shocked than them. One look at him and Kairi knew he had been crying.
"Are you alright?" Kairi asked Rokuro, who couldn't utter even one word in response to that. He kept looking at her without saying anything. But his expressions and his eyes told her how he was feeling.
"Where's Mrs. Arata? They had taken her as well, right?" Kairi asked.
Rokuro's expressions changed dramatically at the mention of her mother.
He still couldn't say anything. Kairi looked at Miyuki as the situation had become a little awkward, and then looked at the men, who were smiling smugly. She gave them a look and then looked back at her friend.
"Look at me." Kairi said. She had to say it again to make Rokuro look at her.
"Is everything alright? Is she okay?" Kairi continued.
The sadness that had clouded Rokuro's thinking capabilities began to fade as he got angrier every moment remembering his mother. Kairi could see the changes in his expressions, which worried her a little.
"No!" Rokuro yelled all of a sudden. "She isn't okay. She's no more."
The room was filled with silence, they could hear a pin drop. This would be the perfect example of pin-drop silence. Rokuro was on his knees with his face in his hands as his elbows rested on his thighs. Everybody could tell he was weeping, but he didn't make any noise at all, until when one of those men tried to grab him.
Rokuro grabbed the man by his arm without even looking at him. He stood up and turned around to face him. It terrified everybody in the room when they look at his face. His eyes were red, so much so that it didn't even appear to them that they were white a few moments ago as if red was their true color.
With one swift jerk, Rokuro pulled the man by his arm and threw him into the corner of the room. Rokuro yelled as loud as he could as he did that. Kairi started something in him that she didn't have any idea about. He looked and sounded furious.
The wall cracked as the man hit it. Rokuro looked back at the other men. He was so angry that he was breathing through his mouth. He moved towards those men, one of whom tried to hit Rokuro with the stick that he had in his hand. Rokuro stopped the stick in the air and broke it in half. He held the man's head with his left hand and with his right hand he thrust the pointed side of the stick right into this man's neck that pierced through and came out of the other side. Rokuro kept holding the man with his left hand even though he was dead the moment it pierced his neck. He only released the body after a few moments.
He turned around to look at the remaining men, the faces of whom told how terrified they were by what they just saw. All of them ran out of the room before Rokuro could grab any one of them. Rokuro kept staring at the door through which the men just escaped until finally, his two friends came up to him. They too were scared to approach him because of the state he was in. Kairi placed her hand on Rokuro's shoulder. It startled Rokuro. He looked back with his hands in a combat position, being unconsciously wary of any threat that might be waiting for him.
"Relax! It's me." Kairi said, who looked freaked out herself.
Rokuro didn't say anything in response. He tried to breathe deeply and then turned around.
"We're with you, Rokuro, in this difficult time." Miyuki said. "I've always been with you and will continue to be. We'll get through together, you're not alone."
Rokuro still didn't say anything and instead chose to leave the room, and his friends.
"He's too occupied right now, he's disturbed." Kairi said to Miyuki, who nodded back. Both of them walked out of the room and followed Rokuro.
"We must stay with him or he might do something that he'd regret later." Kairi said.
"Definitely." Miyuki said.
"Rokuro? Stop. You're not in your senses at the moment. You need to calm down." Kairi shouted but Rokuro didn't pay any heed to it. He continued to pace out of the facility. He was too fast for them to catch up. He began to run, and in a flash, he was out of their sight. He looked all around as he continued to run but didn't find what he was looking for. He ran around in the entire campus but Daichi was nowhere to be seen, nor were there any cars, or other people. All of them had run away.
Kairi and Miyuki came running searching for Rokuro to the place where he was standing, looking at the setting sun on the horizon. They slowly walked up to him and stopped right next to him. Both of them placed their hands on Rokuro's shoulders from either side and they hugged in a group but they could feel that it was making Rokuro uncomfortable. Kairi broke the hug and looked at Rokuro though he was still looking at the horizon.
"You need to calm down my friend." Kairi said.
Rokuro then looked at her with all his anger flaring through his eyes and deep breath making its way out of his nose with a sound.
"Really? After knowing everything, after seeing what happened today, you ask me to stay calm? Do you even realize what you're saying?" Rokuro said, grinding his teeth and failing to control his tears. "My mother's dead, she's no more. Her body is still laying in there, and the one who killed her is roaming like he hasn't done anything. He killed both my parents, and you ask me to be calm?"
"No! That is not at all what I am saying, Rokuro." Kairi said with a broken voice, beginning to shed tears. "But you're going to harm yourself if you let your emotions get the better of you. You need to calm down and handle it calmly or your anger might backfire."
"You know what, screw it." Rokuro said and pushed both of them away and ran as fast as he could. He soon disappeared from their view, more so because they didn't try to stop him this time.
"Let him." Miyuki said. "He won't stop until he's done. The pain that's brewing inside him is way too much for us to understand."