Embers of Hope Part 5

No matter how much my senses had dulled over the past few weeks, I still felt every scrape on my body caused by the cold floor when Yamori dragged me along it. It’s only when the scraping stopped I knew that I was back in my cell. Eventhough I was back in my cell, I was still out of it….my body was limp, and I couldn’t move or speak….or even scream.

I had no option but to lie there, motionless while the only thing that assured I was still living and breathing was how I periodically threw up blood as the toxin started to dissipate in my body. The fact that Yamori administers HP potions immediately afterwards indicates how much pleasure he takes watching people squirm in pain from his inhuman creations.

At the moment, I was just a lump of flesh with an intact brain. A brain that was convinced that the opportunity to break out was closing. And I had to think of some way to figure out the combination on his fingerprint lock. But I didn’t last for long, as I ended up blacking out anyways from the exhaustion

For the past couple of weeks, that’s all that remained in my memories… The different types of pain, and the blacking out that came afterwards. And after an unknown amount of time, I woke up, curled on the floor with my face lying in a small pool of blood from what I had coughed up…. little by little…. I regained control over my body, and with every little control I gained, I used it to inch myself towards the wall next to my cell door, and after a dozen painful attempts of pulling myself across the floor, I managed to lean my back on the wall, with a clear view towards Tsuneo’s cell and the man himself within.

It didn’t take long for me to realize that he wasn’t doing so well… looking lifeless with every breath sounding like it takes a lot of effort. Even through all I have been put through by this maniac, I could only imagine what he had to go through.

“Tsuneo-san….Tsuneo-san” I called out to him, to which he raised his head slowly from his chair

“Still with us time?” He asked

“So far…. You don’t look so good” I commented

“Nothing out of the ordinary. Already gone through worse storms of shit, this is no different.” He reassured

“Jayden… you there?” I checked as I couldn’t see him being in the neighboring cell

“I think so….” Jayden said, matching my subtle tone.

“While you were out, the humble lunatic put him through a few as well…. You really think you can get out of here?” asked Tsuneo

“We just need that one last piece of the puzzle, and then I am certain of it. Actually it needs to happen in the next few days.” I said

A brief pause followed and Jayden broke the silence “Why’s that?” he asked

“Because he got his sights set on a new batch of prey… Siblings…To be exact…Twins”

I could hear the panic in Jayden's voice after I said that “Annie and Lily….” He strained himself and started to flinch in pain.

“Or Meguru and Mai…. Jun trusts this bastard, and he will going to exploit that to get to them” I brought Jayden upto speed

“We can’t let him do this any longer…. This has to end with us” said the weakened Tsuneo

“It doesn’t stop there, he’s made some kind of… poison, he calls it Abyss Venom… It’s nothing like he has tested us with. According to him it cannot be stopped by HP vials. That gets out there, it won’t only be Helios, but the whole of Ark Sanctuary will suffer-”

“It reduces your max HP on a daily basis, until there is no bar left….. Abyss Venom, that’s what he killed Ann-chan with” Tsuneo interjected.

“A poison that slowly kills you, and there is nothing you or anyone can do about it.” Jayden monologued.

Tsuneo leaned back on his chair and sighed… but the hopelessness on his face never left.

After sitting down for a while, I tried to push myself back to my feet while Tsuneo looked upon. I limped my way to the brazier and tried to pull out the blade from underneath. The flame terrified me, but the thought of having to hear the screams of people I once knew scared me even more. Hence I fought off my trauma successfully for the first time ever since that day.

When I pulled it out, Tsuneo’s sight caught it.

“What’s that?” Tsuneo inquired

“The girl… she had it with her, somehow got it past that bastard’s prying eyes.” I answered

“Wait, what is it?” Jayden asked since he couldn’t see

“It’s a knife” Tsuneo answered

I slowly walked back towards the cell and wedged it between the lock.

“What are you doing?” Tsuneo asked

“Trying to pry this lock open ... .we get out now, we won’t have to worry about the door code.”

“STOP!” both of them called me off in unison

“Huh?” I said in confusion

“You idiot! The cells are rigged…. You force that lock and it will trigger the hidden trap in the cell. I’ve seen it happen” Jayden warned me off

“So have I… That’s why we gave up hope trying to escape” Tsuneo backed him up

To think I was that close…. I fell down on my ass, as that potential near miss shook me.

“But it’s a start, we got a weapon we can use-” Jayden tried to find the bright side but I parted the reality to him

“It’s no use… There is no place I can hide it, pockets count as inventory and our inventories are locked down here.

Another silence followed “Well… you can hide it in your glove” said Tsuneo

“What?” I asked

“It’s a small blade… Can’t you just push it under the metal glove on your hand.” Tsuneo clarified

I tried exactly that and to my surprise, it worked. However, I couldn’t bend my wrist as the force started to crack my weakened gauntlet. However, now I have a way to get this out of this cell without Yamori catching onto it.

“It worked” I said…I looked at Tsuneo and he had the slightest semblance of a smile on his face.

“Akio-san….Can I ask you something?” Tsuneo asked

“What’s that?” I inquired

“Were you really a fake?” I had forgotten that Tsuneo hated me all this time…after all that happened

“All this time I had been telling myself that all you do is lie. But you weren’t lying about how you don’t have any pain reduction”

Huh? Why was I hesitating to answer?

“He wasn’t” but Jayden answered for me

“How do you know?” Tsuneo questioned Jayden

Jayden took a second and answered “Because I was the one who set him up”

At least he still remembers it.

“You? You were in-”

“In Team RTG? I wouldn’t blame you for not even noticing…it’s the reason why I did it”

As much I had gone through in this place, that whole scandal is something that still haunted me.

“You said you did it because you were tired of being ignored, that you wanted to bring me down….. You succeeded, but you brought down a whole lot more with you” I said

“I never told you the whole truth…. I never did to anyone…. And in the end, it didn’t matter.” Jayden said from the other side of the wall

“So what was it then…. What drove you to do what you did? What was so important enough for you to-”

“I HAD A KID COMING!” Jayden exclaimed, to get over my tone which was getting louder the more I spoke…. But it also ended up hurting him.

What he said caught me completely off guard

He took a second to recover “After CG became what it did, I got carried away….My pride and stupidity lead to…. A year before we faced off, she let me in on it. I was no scumbag Akio….after she proved she was telling the truth… I took it upon myself to care for them. But my career was on the wire.”

I didn’t even think of interrupting him, as from his tone alone, I knew he wasn’t making this up on the fly.

“I might’ve been RTG’s IGL, but I never stood out. I was a tactician, not a playmaker…. But all the fans found pleasure in, was one man triumphing against many…clutch kills that turn losing games on their heads… The ones who usually do the heavy lifting get left in the dust. It’s how it always has been…… There were rumors flying around that my org was going to let me go. And after they said that Zero’s Tadashi Chifuyu was taking over my role and they were relegating me down, I…. I freaked out. What was going to happen to them if I was let go from all I built? This is all I knew how to do.”

He took a moment to catch his breath “I knew that no matter how hard we tried, even with Chifuyu with us, there was no way we could beat Zero with you leading them. But I couldn’t afford to lose... if I had a single major win under my name, they couldn’t risk cutting me loose…even if they did, other orgs would be jumping at the chance to recruit me…. So with the help of a friend, I plotted to have you framed for match fixing…... Once the pressure piled up, I was hoping you would quit, or perform poorly enough to get eliminated in qualifiers…. I wanted to weaken you, break you ironclad mindset.”

I honestly didn’t know what to say right now

“I know you’d never forgive me for it. I did what I had to do, but I never meant for your family to get hurt in the process. I never thought that people could go that far just to force you to quit”

Me and Tsuneo remained speechless and the only sound that followed was the dripping water from the ceiling.

“You wanted me to kill you that day…. You were okay with leaving your kid behind?” I asked

“No…. I would give anything if I could just get to see his face one more time. But what are the chances? Even if we get out of here? How old would he be? He would’ve grown up without a dad…. What are the chances he will accept me back even if I do make it?” Jayden said

“You forgot our golden rule from back in the day….. You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take…. So never let a chance go…. You’ll make it out of here, and you’ll get to see your kid again…. I’ll get you both out of here… I promise” I told them both

Tsuneo chuckled “Let me give you a word of advice… don’t make promises you can’t keep”

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The awakening I got the next day was another rude one. I suddenly felt a splash of ice cold salt water tossed on me, which started irritating my slow healing wounds. The sting was sharp enough to instantly shake off all the drowsiness from my body.

There were no words exchanged…no more early morning taunts…. No more questions which I didn’t have answers to.

“You are awfully quiet, Yamori-san… This isn’t like you” I inquired from the man typing away at his PC

The man still ignored me, but this gave me a chance…. Don’t focus on the burning wounds, try to find anything that indicates what his code is. It has to be something he doesn’t forget… something he would never forget. I look around but to no avail, all I see are torture tools…many tables of them… Tall barrels full of god knows what, a computer with a multi monitor display setup, one having a direct camera feed on his precinct. The only thing that is even remotely noteworthy is that our restraining chairs have been moved and secured to the floor of Yamori’s lab instead of the middle room now, and Jayden and Tsuneo were strapped to them still unconscious. There is no physical clue I could see that hints to the code…meaning if I am to find it, I have to pick his brain…..Which I can’t do if he doesn’t talk to me.

Okay calm down, reset….think of everything you know about him, and then hit him where it hurts.

“Jun told me that you had a sense of justice once… Was that a lie as well?” I asked but to no answer “He told me about his time at the University…. That it showed no mercy to who fell behind….. about the suicide” And once I said that, the sound of his fingers striking the keyboard stopped “He also said that you were what kept him going for as long as he did. Was there an ounce of you that was legit, or were you that good at lying.”

But just as I said that, he slammed his table loudly, sending echoes through the room which followed to an eerie silence.

“You buddy Chifuyu has been busy” Yamori said

“What?” This was the first time I heard about something about the outside world in a while, and to think that Tadashi would be the one to break the silence.

“I guess I should’ve believed you the first time around. There have been two people asking around for Isaac….” Yamori brought up two separate videos he had on two separate monitors. While the location was different, the contents were the same. One was in the streets of Helios, a bloody massacre in an open area, it's as if they were ripped apart by a wave of sharks. The other was a bar, but the kills were much cleaner.

“Both of these were hit at around five minutes apart from each other. The first one was a gathering of some of Isaac’s top lieutenants, judging from how grouped up they were in a circle formation, I’d judge that they tried to gang up on Chifuyu, and they obviously… bit off more than they could chew. Chifuyu didn’t care that he got seen, but it was brutal to the point that clans are gathering to implement what they call ‘Night rules’… I can’t see Isaac taking that fairly well ”

He extended his gear baton and pointed at the second monitor “This however, is an anomaly…. The bar was full of rank and file goons…Bartender was a spark, testified that a woman came in asking for Isaac Taylor ... .In hindsight there would be no reason to actually attack such a place, unless this…. woman…. knew exactly what she was looking for….. Does that answer your question, Akio-san?”

“Huh?”

“You said that Junichi told you about how brutal we had it…. What did he ever know about it? If he did talk to you about it, I’m sure you would know more students quit or got expelled than the number that graduated.” He turned to the desk next to him, away from his PC and laid out a series of lab equipment “ In an era where automation has taken over most jobs, only the most dedicated will survive the trials of the University. And unless you have a strong enough driving force, the pressure will end up crushing you.”

He put on a pair of lab goggles that complimented that bloodied lab coat of his, and started making….something “ That’s why Junichi…. didn’t survive. His drive was to avenge his friend, be better than the people that did his friend wrong… He didn’t last because he wasn’t doing it for himself.” He said, splitting his attention between me and his creations.

“And you had a nobler ambition? Like what? You don’t hesitate to kill or torture, even children. How is that better than-”

“I told you Akio! I don’t take pleasure in unnecessary bloodshed.” He stopped his work, took his goggles off and turned around to cut me off. “Do you think I want to do this? There is nothing that teaches us on how this place works, and the only way I can learn is by doing it all myself” He turned back around to his desk “And after all this time, even in this place…. It only confirmed what I knew.”

I sense there is more to this than what he is letting on. I had to pry further but I had to watch what I said or else he would get suspicious.

“However you are in luck; Junichi and his sisters get to linger in the outside world a little longer…. As right now, I have to make sure my prey doesn’t get stolen” He started to walk away once again, but I couldn’t let him, especially since I rarely get him this talkative

“Is that what human life means to you? Jun trusts you…. he looks up to you. You know that more than I do, and you don’t even hesitate in thinking to put him and the twins through your twisted schemes. You say you do this for knowledge but what’s the point?” I asked him, intended to stop him from leaving this room…and it worked

Yamori stopped and looked over his shoulder “You got a lot of questions for someone you declared that you were going to kill”

Crap…did he catch on?

He turned around and started taking steps towards me. “One of the things Junichi taught me about CG was to never underestimate the value of even a little bit of information, it's only those little bits that add up to a big advantage….. That was some advice that carried me through some dark times in my career. While you put your energy into reading and predicting what actions your opponents make mid-match, I do the same to the outside world.”

He crouched down to my level “The more secrets I learn about this place, the more ways I have to exploit them. To keep people afraid…afraid of what could happen to them if they cross a line that they weren’t meant to cross…. Doesn’t that sound familiar? Doesn’t that sound like… how the Psychosis Index works back in the real world?”

He got back up and stepped away, turning his back to me “However, that isn’t a world I want to recreate…..where control by fear can be easily manipulated…. and right now, people don’t fear anything…. That’s the reason the well known Immortal Tyrant can walk any street now…. how can someone be called a monster for killing, if murder is now commonplace.”

He went back to his desk “I take control of Isaac’s regime, all of that changes…. Helios will be the first and it will slowly expand to the other cities, until order is fully restored ... .and then, the cycle will repeat, for every layer until I save everyone ... .The perfect justice system.”

“Do you even hear yourself?…. That isn’t justice, what you are preaching is slavery-” I expressed my opinion but I was cut off

“That is the only thing people understand Nakamura, you might call it slavery…. But man cannot be trusted. I learned that the day my sister was forced to take her own life… threatened otherwise with her Index Rating by the damn police commissioner of all people.”

“What?” while I wanted to pry deeper something Yamori held dear, what I found was not what I expected it to be

“If I didn’t sneak into her office that day, I would’ve been in the dark along with my parents. They wanted to distract the media from a scandal that involved that sad sack of shit and…. I remembered everything about that day. 2029 January 8th, young and stupid me wanted to surprise my sister at work so I snuck into her office… and she ....”

Yamori brushed his face off as if the memory was still painful “I knew what it was like to lose loved ones right in front of your eyes. That’s why I sympathized with you when we first met…. Because I knew exactly what you were going through…. And that is why I thought you would understand me….And it is that ambition, that kept me going. And I worked for it, I made it…. And I exposed the commissioner for what he was and what he did. I did what I had to, blackmailed his family, kidnapped them… forced him to confess. I finally did it, until my partner decided to try and report me.”

He paused and took a deep breath, “At first I assumed that it was his sense of justice that pushed him to do that but the more I talked to him, the more I realized that he was doing it to fast track himself to a promotion. It’s only then I realized that one’s sense of justice is just a front to serve their own selfish ambitions. After putting him in the ground myself I realized, I was no different from him…. After that I left a few…footnotes, to the commissioner to be. I didn’t reveal myself, but I revealed what I had done, and that I will be watching. And to think it worked, the new commissioner never strayed from his path… because he was too afraid to.

He then looked at me and approached me “Considering you will be dying soon, I will let you in on the one thing I have learned through all those years….. Loyalty and duty are both lies that people use to hide their true selves, the only thing humanity understands, is fear.”

I got a lot more than I bargained for, but I knew that Yamori wasn’t dumb enough to let me in on all of this

“Why are you telling me all this?” I inquired.

“Because in the next few days, you’ll most likely be dead. And there will be someone else who takes my secret to the grave…. The reason you are alive is because I want to use you as bait for Isaac, but if Chifuyu or our other assailant does my job for me, there is no reason for me to keep you alive” Yamori revealed

My time was running out.

“Of course since you have been a crucial part of my research, I’m willing to give you a rather, quicker death. I won’t make you suffer with Abyss Venom, instead I’ll be giving you something…experimental” Yamori said

Why am I not surprised….

“But since I’ll be out for the day, might as well leave you in the company of my latest creation” And he came at me with another syringe

Oh give me a break already….

He emptied its contents into my neck and the effects started kicking in almost immediately…. The feeling like my blood is turning into molten lava and how it was going upto my brain giving me a killer headache

And just like that, Yamori left the room without a word more to catch up on lost time, with the sound of a large door confirming his departure. Leaving it clear to me that the next time he comes around, is when I’ll have to face him head on.

Don’t pass out… I don’t have any more time left to sleep it off. My head was pulsating, but I had to fight through it and gather my thoughts together. Grunts of agony escaped from me at first but I acclimatized myself after a few moments of struggling. But through that, I felt the shackle on my left arm loosening….. Guess Yamori slipped up when he has been strapping me to the same acid damaged chair for the past few weeks.

However with Yamori’s newest witches’ brew coursing through my veins, I couldn’t find the strength to break the shackle free, which meant as much as I didn’t want to at this point, I was given one more chance to regather my thoughts.

I stood silent for a moment to compile my thoughts through my killer migraine, and to put myself in Yamori’s headspace;

So I got to set a 4 digit code only I would know…. What would I use? My birthday?.... Unlikely, anyone who is close to me would know my birthday…. I want to have the possibility of discovery at zero, but it has to be a code I could never forget. My badge number? No…. I turn on my interrogation recorder in front of many people… it’s even more unsafer. How about my sister’s day of death? It wouldn’t stick in the memory of others. I think I would go with that…. Hmm, but the numerical date is 6 digits…

But as I was deep in my space of impersonation and deduction, I was snapped out of it by a more welcome company

“Akio? What’s going on? Holy shit what did he do to you?” asked the now woken up Jayden

I looked down at my chest and noticed all my veins were now blackened and visible.

“Yeah… not exactly rocket science at this point” I replied with a side of sarcasm in the hopes of calming myself “And guess this might be the last time we might meet…. Turns out I’ve outlived my usefulness to the almighty Sheriff…. He plans on killing me after he returns” I brought Jayden upto speed

“You sure?” Jayden asked

I looked at him lifting my head that felt like it had a bag of rocks placed on top of it “Yeah I’m sure…. Came straight out of the mouth of the man himself”

“Fuck…. Which means we only got only a few hours left to find his code. Or all of this is for nothing.” Jayden commented while looking around

“Actually… I think I might have it. January 8th 2029… But the code is 4 digits, you turn that into a date and we have 6 digits. 08…01…and 29” I said

“Are you certain a date is the code?” Jayden tested my confidence

“No…I’m not, but it’s the best I got… Nishigaki is smart… too smart. When he had fool proofed this place that no one can escape or know about it, he wouldn't be dumb enough to set a code that anyone could figure out…. Turns out this was the date that his sister was murdered…. Considering he remembered the date to the letter, I am confident that this has to be the code.” I said

“So meaning there are 3 possible combinations, 0129, 0829 or 0801…. That last one is more probable if he remembers the exact day, omitting the year might throw trespassers off.” Jayden deduced

“Actually there is one more…. 8129. Only he knows the full date, so what if he took all zeros out. Misdirects anyone who would try…except him” I said, drawing a conclusion

“Chances are you can take a couple of risks….. I don’t think it will trigger the trap for guessing wrong a couple of times but…it’s still a risk.” Jayden iterated.

Afterwards, I started to break my arm free. I still barely had any strength left but I kept struggling to break the lock on my left hand shackle. Didn’t help that the blade under my gauntlet was starting to cut my hand underneath. And a few minutes later, the lock broke. However, there arose another problem I didn’t think of.

I tried to free my other hand, but to avail. The lock on the shackle was strong and even with the blade I hid, I couldn’t get it free.

“No, No, No…. We’ve come this far” my thoughts leaked, and that’s when I remembered

“Wait…How did Tsuneo-san break out of this?... Oi, Tsuneo-san!” I tried to call out to him but there was no answer, his head was hanging downwards, away from my line of sight.

“Tsuneo-san, this is no time to be passed out. I need your help right now” I called out to him desperately, but there was no answer

“As a matter of fact, he might’ve told me how he got out when you were out of it. But you are not going to like the answer” Jayden said

I looked at him expecting him to answer, and when he did, I was caught off guard

“He did WHAT?” I asked, just to make sure I wasn’t hearing things

“I told you that you were not going to like it” Jayden reiterated

“Yeah, I wish you guys told me earlier that I had to dislocate my thumb if I was to slip out of this chair” I said with my annoyance clearly showing.

“Well, it can’t be worse than getting beaten to a pulp and being poisoned on a daily basis… Do you even remember how many bones you’ve already broken?” Jayden stated.

“It’s not that easy. I’ve done first aid on myself in here sure but, dislocating my thumb? That’s a whole different ball game.” I replied

“You are already halfway past the point of no return, it’s the only way.” He said

I sighed “Kill me already.” My inner thoughts leaked once again

I looked at my thumb and grabbed it with my free hand. “What the hell am I supposed to do?”

But Jayden stood silent

“RILEY!” I exclaimed to snap him out of it

“I don’t know…. I don’t know how to dislocate a thumb…. Fuck why couldn’t Tsuneo hang on just for bit longer” he said, looking towards Tsuneo “Look, I’m just guessing right now, but I think you have to pull you thumb to find where joint locks and pull down as hard as you can… I don’t know if you would break it, but even with your slow healing, it will fix itself back up. All you need to do is slip your thumb out of that shackle and the rest of the hand will follow”

I moved my thumb around till I felt my joint locking, and I tried pulling, but doing it yourself is way easier said than done.

“What if I try cutting it off with the blade?” I said holding the knife next to my thumb

“You idiot, you will bleed to death in here. You are weakened and your inventory is locked so you don’t have any HP potions.” Jayden said to call me off.

“And even if I dislocate my thumb and Yamori comes back in here, I won’t be able to fend him off. My right hand is my dominant” I said

“Then you better hurry up” said Jayden

“Yeah, easy for you to say” I retorted

While I was trying to gather the courage to go through with this, Jayden had more to say to me moment later

“Akio… I need you to promise me something”

“Huh?” I said confused

“Once you get out…. You have to leave me behind” Jayden’s words caught me by surprise

“Not an option. I’m not letting you throw your life away-”

“If you take me with you, we both are going to get caught way before we leave this place” he said to cut me off

“What are you talking about?” I inquired, to which Jayden lifted his legs from his knees towards me. And that’s when I saw it

“Ah shit….” I said involuntarily

“He did it last night…. Even if you do free me, I won’t be able to stand. He will punish us for you escaping but it can’t be worse than what he has already put us through” he said

“No, no, no, no that isn’t an option… I promised you and Tsuneo-san that I’ll get you both out of here-”

“It’s a bit too late for that Akio, especially for Tsuneo” what he said alarmed me.

“What?” I moved as much as I could and crouched down in the hopes of getting a look at him. But I saw enough. Blood was dripping off his face, and his eyes were definitely open.

“Tsuneo was suffering for a while Akio, he mentioned that his health kept draining even when he was given HP potions and that day by day his overall health bar was getting smaller.” Jayden confessed

“Abyss Venom” I deduced.

“Neither of us knew until you told us yesterday. We heard him say the name when he gave it to Ann-chan but we never knew that was what Tsuneo was given as well. She was just a frail kid, she didn’t even last a week. Tsuneo held on… but he passed a couple hours before you woke up” Jayden brought me up to speed on what I wasn’t told.

Now when I think about it, what he told me last night suddenly made sense

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep”