Weight Of A Soul

It was heavy. Fukei had never touched a gun in his life until now, but even then, he didn’t expect that it was this heavy.

His palms sweated a river. His breathing became haggard. His pupils dilated. The boy had to muster all of his strength just to not shiver on the spot with the piece of metal in his hands.

Goh, seeing this, only shook his head. “Geez, stop shaking, will you?” The boy scoffed.

“How can I not shake?” Fukei almost shouted, but managed to lower his voice at the end.

“It’s just a gun, duh.”

“Just a gun? Did you not hear what you just said? It’s a gun!”

“So? I see it all the time,” Goh shrugged. “I even played with it too, on a couple of occasions.”

Fukei had forgotten the fact that Goh’s father was a policeman. Perhaps for the latter, the sight of a gun had already turned into something ordinary in his life. But his nonchalance in taking the killing object from Fukei’s hand and twirling it around like a cowboy was still something to be in awe of.

“And besides,” the young boy continued. “We’re obviously not gonna just shoot them with this thing.”

“Wait, we’re not?” Asked Fukei.

“Of course not,” Goh answered, opening a paper scroll that he took from the corner. On the piece of paper was a detailed design of all the rooms in this very orphanage they were in.

“We’re in a secret base down underground; here, to be exact.” Goh pointed towards the tail end of the building. His fingers moved upward, back to his room’s position on the hallway. “Our rooms are right next to one another, but that’s not the issue. The problem lies in this very building.”

Taking a step away from their original spot, Goh lightly knocked on the walls. To Fukei’s surprise, a large, empty sound of clanging metal echoed.

“Complete shock proof and bullet proof,” answered Goh. “This thing might look run down, but it’s more solid than an actual bunker. It does mean that every move we make, if not careful, will be waking those monsters up.”

“Wait, didn’t you say that they wouldn’t wake up at any sound?”

“Yes, but it’s not the sound that I’m worried about. Look.”

Goh pointed up the ceiling. Fukei followed his finger, but the boy could only draw a blank.

“There’s nothing,” Fukei added.

“Exactly. What I want to point out is what you don’t see. Namely, a ventilation system. Meaning that any smell that’s in the house is here to stay. Including metal and gunpowder.”

“Then…”

“Don’t worry, we’re not gonna just break into their rooms and shoot them. It’s too risky that way.”

“Then what do we do?” Fukei took a deep breath in expectation.

Drawing a line with his finger towards his own room, Goh answered. “This is where we start our attack.”

“How come?”

“I can’t explain well for now, since I left my props in my room. Let’s go.”

The two took no time to return to their original meeting point. From the drawer in his room, Goh once again took out a new prop – a small liquid pack.

“What’s this?” Asked Fukei.

“Fake blood. Look,” following his answer, Goh lightly squeezed out the pack, letting the crimson liquid dripped over his hand. “This is gonna be our main key to victory.”

“... What do you mean?”

“Well,” gesturing over to his drawer, Goh ordered. “Take a look.”

As Fukei opened the drawer, his breath almost stopped. Inside was a second gun.

“I have two, yes,” nodded Goh. “But this is the important part; one of them is fake.”

“Fake? What for?”

“It’s when the blood pack comes into play,” the young boy grinned. “Remember that these guys are attracted by smell, right?”

“Yeah?”

“The fake gun also has a ton of sulfur in it. In short, it will smell like a real gun when shot.”

“And…”

Putting the gun from the drawer into Fukei’s hand, Goh said, the joke dropping from his expression.

“I want you to shoot me with this.”

“... Excuse me?”

“Don’t worry, it’s fake,” the young boy shrugged. “Maybe it’ll leave a bruise, but nothing I can’t handle. But the important thing is that they will wake up and see that you ‘killed’ me. As you run away from them and separate them, I can then use the chance to snipe them with the real gun. They’ll never expect a dead person to ‘revive’, after all.”

“Then why not do it in reverse? You can shoot me, and…”

“It doesn’t work that way. These guys haven’t known you long enough. If you’re dead, they’ll treat you more like my dad.” Goh shook his head. “I have to be the one who gets shot.”

“I…” Fukei hesitated. However, as he was backed against the wall, a new idea came up. “Wait, why aren’t we just shooting these guys in their sleep?”

Answering his question was only a light chuckle from Goh as he nodded towards his room’s exit. “Try opening the door. You’ll see.”

The moment Fukei touched the doorknob, a sudden shock ran through his entire body. And it wasn’t just any static electricity; it was enough to jolt his entire body into jumping almost half a meter upward – if he hadn’t immediately let go as soon as he felt the sensation, Fukei would have likely been charred meat right then and there.

“What the heck was that?” The boy, still shaking from the shock and fear, asked with his hands twitching uncontrollably.

“Biometric-identified electric current,” answered Goh. “Basically, if you’re not the room owner, when you touch the door, you’ll get shocked to oblivion. The monsters are trained to numb themselves from pain like this, but not us. That’s why you never see me opening any door unless it’s this very room… and the bunker of course.”

“Then…”

“I reiterate, this is our most feasible plan,” Goh pushed the gun towards Fukei once more. “We can’t hope to outmaneuver them in broad daylight. This is the best plan I can think of.”

“But… I…”

“I told you, the gun is fake. Why are you so scared of shooting a fake gun?”

“I… No, why are you so calm about shooting a gun?” Fukei argued in return. “It doesn’t matter that it’s fake, you’re still shooting someone with a gun! We’re still children! Aren’t you supposed to be just a little scared?”

Fukei expected his words to make sense. However, all he received was a slap to the face, then a sudden but forceful pull of his collar downward, so that his eyes matched Goh’s line of sight.

And within those eyes, he saw a flare of rage unlike anything he had ever seen before.

“Then let me ask you this,” Goh said. “Do you think behaving ‘like a normal child’ can help us escape this place?”

Fukei was silent. He already knew the answer to this. After everything he had gone through, he was painfully aware. In order to live, any sense of normalcy must be discarded.

“I take it that you get it,” Goh nodded. As he finally let go of Fukei’s collar, he switched to his wrist with the gun, then raised it to match his chest.

“Now, shoot! This is our best chance yet!”

Fukei took a deep breath, then exhaled. He knew that it had to be him. It was fine. It was completely safe to do so.

He slapped his face once, as if to wake himself up from his dreams. The weight of the gun was still there, imitation as it might have been. The muzzle had already found its mark. He couldn’t even miss. It was a simple shot; in and out. The blood pack would break, and Goh’s “death” would be perfectly staged.

That was the key word. Staged. It would not be real. There was no chance for it to be real. There was nothing in his conscience to stop him.

His hand was still shaky. His palms were still sweating, and so was his forehead. The metal handle on the gun had already taken a glistening shine. Fukei knew that he had to shoot. He had to be the one to kickstart this plan.

“Ahhhhhhh!”

With a loud scream, he pulled the trigger.

There was a banging sound as loud as a real gun. The smoke coming out of the muzzle was black and charred, just like a real gun. The force of the bullet made Fukei recoil; it was as strong as a real gun too. Goh’s falling was incredibly lifelike, almost as if he wasn’t acting at all. The blood pack hidden within his body broke and splattered into pieces, the crimson liquid inside gushing out like a river, carrying even the same metallic smell of real blood.

“I did it…” Fukei panted. He turned to Goh lying on the floor, covered in red. “Get ready for their arrival, Goh.”

There was no response.

“... Goh?”

There was a hole in Goh’s chest. A fake gun, no matter how real, couldn’t have made a hole in his chest.

Now that Fukei had finished the act, he realized one important thing.

The blood pack was still in Goh’s hand.

The gun was heavy, but not anymore. The smell of gunpowder was distinct, yet somehow wasn’t as prominent.

It wasn’t a fake gun that he shot. It was real.

Fukei had shot a real gun, and along with it, bore its full weight of taking a human soul.