Just A Bullet Away

“Ugh, this pisses me off, and you have no idea how much. I don't know how this happened, but you're going to regret it. I'm going to do it – oh yes, I'm going to do it. I'm going to kill you even without permission. Even if I do, at worst I won't suffer too harsh a punishment. My behavior will be justified. You're going to regret it.”

Leo was shouting to make himself heard. He took pleasure in making me hear his words, which was evident from the laughter that followed.

I squinted. Leo was carrying something in his hand – a black, long object. It didn’t take me long to recognize its shape and understand what it was.

“An assault rifle?” I whispered.

Leo lifted his arm and gripped his weapon with both hands, ready to shoot.

A second later, a bullet whistled right past my ear. He had fired, but thankfully it hadn’t hit me.

I couldn’t understand anything as several bullets flew past me, none touching me – perhaps because Leo was still running and hadn’t closed the distance yet.

My legs moved on their own before I could even think. I began to run in the opposite direction, terrified, fleeing from the shooter.

“What am I doing? Why am I running? Why am I scared? What should I be scared of? I can’t die from this!”

I filled my lungs with as much air as I could, taking a deep breath to shout.

“So why am I running away from him? I don’t understand!”

I was sure he heard me, but it wouldn’t change anything – for him or for me. I didn’t understand. Why did I run? Why? Nothing made sense. If I couldn’t die, fear shouldn’t have existed. And yet I couldn’t stop myself from running, running as if my life depended on it.

Dodging bullets and feeling relief as nearly all of them missed me and disappeared into the abysmal red end of the corridor, I tried opening doors along the way, hoping to find the right one.

“At least not the escape – just a hideout… quick! Quick!”

But I wasn’t lucky. Luck refused to stay by my pitiful side on this terrible day.

I tried another one. A miracle occurred. It opened. I smiled.

I opened it wide.

My joy crumbled at the sight of a brick wall barricading the other side.

I struck hit hard with my fist and ran to the next door.

Another miracle. Another smile. Another opening.

But once again, my joy found no answer.

This time, behind the door, was a hole. It looked like a room plunged into darkness, with a gaping hole replacing the floor. If I had rushed inside without looking, I would have fallen straight into it – into some kind of terrible hell, whatever that hell might have been.

“Last one… last one, and after that I’ll just run until he has no bullets left…”

Every now and then, the bullets stopped flying for a few seconds, but it was only the time Leo needed to reload before they rained down again. I didn't know how many magazines he had, but it didn't matter. All I knew was that bullets were constantly flying around me.

I opened another door, but this time I didn’t smile. I didn’t want to be deceived again.

The door creaked open. A dim light illuminated the center of the room, and beneath it stood a strange figure, their back turned toward me, water overflowing from their lower body. I tried calling out to them.

But in response…

The figure turned abruptly, revealing their face… its face… strange… fear… scary… horror.

A wide smile stretched from ear to ear – a smile with no teeth.

Eyes – there was none. Only blood flowing from empty sockets, the skin contorting as if trying to mimic an expression to match that demonic grin.

I slammed the door shut the instant I saw it. Fear was written all over my face.

I didn’t have time to waste. The last few bullets flew past me before falling silent. Leo was reloading.

But Leo was already here, just a few meters away, laughing as he caught his breath and stopped running.

We stared at each other – me swallowing hard, fear etched into my features, him laughing as if victory were already his.

He loaded a new magazine into the weapon. A click echoed, signaling he was ready to fire.

“Is this the end for me…? Wait… why am I scared…? I don’t understand… or does my body know there’s something more… something beyond the insignificant impact of those bullets – something that could truly kill me? Or maybe it’s because I was put to sleep so easily before… and it could happen again without me even noticing...”

As we sized each other up, waiting for some unknown trigger to break the stalemate, a massive blue shape passed through the wall and appeared behind Leo. At the same moment, the alarm cut out, bringing a fragile calm – one that was immediately shattered by the presence of that terrifying mass.

“It’s there! Ryota, there it is!” The doll shouted in panic from my backpack.

“Who talked, Ryota? What are you hiding in there?” Leo asked, staring at me, unaware of what was behind him.

“It’s that thing again… why did it come to traumatize me like the other day…? Just because I can see what it resembles now doesn’t mean I’m not afraid… I felt it coming… but why…?”

My eyes could no longer focus on Leo. This creature absorbed all my thoughts. It resembled some kind of ghost, its translucent blue body allowing everything behind it to be seen clearly. It floated in the air, its lower body an enormous, shapeless mass impossible to relate to anything real – perhaps a distorted sphere. Its upper body resembled that of a gigantic serpent, round and covered in scale-like textures. But the most shocking detail was its arms – enormous, muscular, veins bulging like those of a man on the verge of bursting.

And its head... terrifying. A perfect sphere with a single enormous eye at its center, the iris resembling that of a cat.

“My gut is screaming it at me – it's definitely that thing!”

The fear that had briefly faded while facing Leo surged back stronger than ever.

I stepped backward as Leo tightened his grip on his weapon, still oblivious to what loomed behind him.

He began pressing his finger against the trigger, the rifle barrel aimed directly at me – no chance of missing this time.

At the exact moment, the ghost surged forward, hurling itself into Leo’s body, passing through him just as it had done to me before.

I wasn’t the one enduring it this time, yet the sensation felt too real in my chest, forcing me to clutch it tightly to keep myself standing.

I watched the scene unfold, unable to move, paralyzed by shock.

Leo screamed and froze, his arms dropping, though he never released his grip on the weapon.

The screams and the ghost’s assault lasted only a few seconds before stopping, as if the entity had grown bored.

It passed through Leo’s body one last time, drawing out a final scream, before turning toward me, laughing, and slipping back through the wall.

I couldn't tear my eyes away from the ghost, completely frozen by what I had witnessed.

“This laugh…” I whispered, eyes wide open.

Once it vanished, I refocused on Leo. His eyes were glassy. ​​I could hear his heavy breathing, yet it felt as though all life had drained from him.

He began to levitate above the ground, startling me.

Before I could process anything, he was hurled into the walls at a horrifying speed. I stood frozen. Blood splattered from his body but vanished almost instantly beneath the light.

He didn’t scream. He didn’t cry. It was simply happening, right before my eyes.

It didn’t last long. His suffering ended quickly, and his body floated back toward me, stopping a meter away. I could hear faint mumbling and ragged breaths escaping his mouth.

“For… you… to … play…”

A strange voice came from Leo’s mouth – but it wasn’t his. It was more deeper, more unstable. Hearing it left me no room for hesitation.

I punched Leo hard in the face, sending his floating body flying back several meters. I did nothing else.

“I don’t want this gift!” I shouted, stepping backward slowly, searching for the right moment to run.

Footsteps thundered from behind Leo at an alarming speed – not the sound of shoes or feet, but something wooden, like clogs… or worse.

“Don’t tell me it’s–”

The puppet from earlier leapt out of nowhere onto Leo, and with the force of its momentum, swept him along in its trajectory. They flew past my ear at a dizzying speed, yet the puppet still managed to tear off the tip of my ear with a mouth that had appeared – one I barely had time to glimpse on its wooden face.

The puppet likely hadn’t known this would happen, because my ear regenerated instantly. The severed piece in its mouth shattered it and returned to me, reattaching as if nothing had happened.

I turned around as soon as they passed, only to see them vanish deep into the corridor. I stood here, utterly stunned, unable to process everything that had just happened. Too much had occurred. My head throbbed violently. I grabbed it, my fingers digging into my scalp as my nails bit into my skin.

I sank to the ground against the wall, placing my backpack in front of me. The doll remained silent. I needed to rest – just for a moment.

I wasn’t safe. Saying the contrary would have been a lie with all these threats roaming freely. But without rest, I couldn’t do anything at all.

So I waited.

Waited until my breathing slowed.

Waited until my heart stopped pounding against my chest.

Waited until my mind stopped spiraling in every direction.

A few minutes later, once everything truly calmed, I heard the puppet’s footsteps approaching. I braced myself, jumping to my feet, fists raised.

But despite my resolve, the puppet walked right past me as if I didn’t exist. I noticed that its eyes and mouth were gone. It had returned to the state it was in when I first saw it, but silent and empty this time.

It disappeared down the corridor until its silhouette vanished from sight.

I stared in the direction it had come from, unsettled.

“What should I do now…? Should I keep searching for a way out? And what happened to him?”

I put my backpack on and ran.

A few minutes later, I found Leo’s body lying on the ground.

“They flew farther than I thought…”

He wasn’t moving, his face pressed against the floor, his weapon still in hand. I examined him from a distance, using only my eyes.

“No wounds… That’s strange… the puppet tore my ear off and attacked him, yet didn’t hurt him at all?”

I set the backpack down and opened it as I felt movement inside.

“So… what’s the result?” The doll asked calmly.

I grabbed Leo’s wrist and pressed my fingers against it, checking for a pulse.

I sighed deeply before answering.

“He’s…”