999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors Part #77

Part 77: Morphogenetic Sorrow

[Video: Preview A]

Before we continue, you might wanna watch this now. Since you can.

...As you might expect, this normally plays immediately after the Safe Ending but they still managed to slip what was a spoiler at that point in here.

[Video: Morphogenetic Sorrow]

Very definitely recommend watching this.

[Music: Morphogenetic Sorrow]

But I didn't lose myself...

I was living in 2 realities at once.

One was the present, and the other was the future.

"Come on! Over here!" That was my brother, Aoi. He was screaming.

I followed him.

Around me were 7 other children. They all looked like they were about my age.

We ran down a long straight hallway, and burst into the large hospital room.

It has been 2 hours since the Nonary Game began. We were starting to fall apart.

The fights died down, and we gathered around him.

As he spoke, he pulled something from his pocket.

In his hand were 9 4-leaf clovers.

"Every one of you has a brother or a sister in Building Q with Clover. For their sake, we have to survive. We have to get off this ship. Do you understand?"

"Did you know that the leaves on the 4-leaf clover mean 'faith', 'trust', 'love', and 'luck'? Those words are leaf words. So, if you believe what I've told you, and you understand, then I want you each to have one of these. They're a promise, between friends..."

He gave a clover to each of us. I took one too.

Eventually, he was left with only a single 4-leaf clover.

When he finished, the tension of only a few minutes before was gone. We were...calm.

After that, we ran around the ship for a while longer, and opened several of the numbered doors until we finally found a door with the number [9] on it.

Before long, we all found ourselves in a room with a ceiling that looked like an upside-down funnel.

For some reason, this room had another number [9], but this time, it was the only 1.

But if there was only 1 door... That meant only 5 people could escape.

We began to panic...

Then, as if things had not gotten bad enough already...

Warning.

Warning.

Emergency incineration command has been acknowledged.

Please evacuate the incinerator immediately.

Repeat...

Emergency incineration command has been acknowledged.

My brother Aoi swallowed hard and answered.

"I think it means this room is gonna burn..."

"...Burn..."

"The plaque on the door says [incinerator]. And that voice said that the incineration is about to start... And incinerate means to burn..."

Every pair of eyes were filled with despair.

Then...

"Don't worry, kids! I'm not your enemy! I'm one'a the good guys! I'm a detective. I'm here to rescue you."

The rest happened just like Seven had said it did.

We crawled through the vent, away from the incinerator, and slid down into the hall.

On the wall opposite the door was a set of double-doors...

We went through those, and began to run up the spiral stairs.

As we ran, I lead the way.

We ran, and ran, and ran...

We leapt across as many stairs as we could, and kept running.

The stairs spiraled upward like a tornado.

Eventually, I pulled ahead of the rest.

Perhaps Nona had slowed them down.

It's easy to overlook it, but this very handily answers one of the many lingering questions.

I had to go back. I had to!

But I knew I couldn't tell the others.

They would stop me; I was sure of that.

I didn't stop to think, I simply moved.

I ran to the central hall, the room that connected to all the other areas of the ship.

And hid in the shadows, and moments later I felt a run of wind as they ran past me, up the staircase.

I waited until they were out of sight, and then I ran.

I moved as quietly as I could, down and down and down.

Finally, I reached the bottom deck.

[Music: Silence]

It was just where I'd thought it would be, sitting under the opening of the vent.

"Ah, how wonderful to see you decided to come back."

His smile made my blood run cold.

It looked mechanical, as if someone had simply pulled up the corners of his mouth.

"Come with me. We must continue the experiment."

I shook my head, eyes wide.

Slowly, I began to walk backwards.

1 step...2 steps...3 steps...

Then I spun around, and broke into a run--

I felt Hongou's hand close over my left wrist.

[Music: Tinderbox]

I pulled as hard as I could.

"No, I don't want to! Let me go! Please, let go of me!"

I shook my body and flailed my arms, trying desperately to get Hongou to let go of me.

He heaved on my arm, trying to pull me into the incinerator.

I screamed.

"Help me! Somebody, help me!"

Then, suddenly--

"Akane!"

"Akane!" He cried my name again as he leapt toward Hongou.

"Aaaaaah!"

The force of it threw me to the floor.

I scrambled to my feet, and looked toward the open number [9] door.

...But those fists never reached Hongou...

[Video: End]

With the cold, heartless screech of metal on metal, the door slammed shut.

Then he turned away, and walked to the RED that sat next to the door.

He waved them both over the scanner panel.

2 asterisks appeared on the RED.

He checked the screen, then tossed the bracelets carelessly onto the floor.

He said nothing at all, and walked past me as though I were nothing more than a rock by the roadside.

A few moments later...

The double-doors slid shut as well.

Faintly, I could hear someone pounding on the door behind me.

I turned around and ran toward the door with the [9].

"Where's Hongou!?"

"He went out the other door!"

"Wh-What!?"

Then it started again.

[Music: Silence]

[Sound Bite: Warning]

Warning.

Warning.

Emergency incineration command has been acknowledged.