Chapter 66
[91]
“What is this?” Ryuji asked. “Some kind of ‘Revenge of the Nerds’ thing?”
“Huh? No, look why don’t I just explain this from the beginning?” Mishima offered.
“That would be helpful.” Ann said with crossed arms.
“It started just after our Hawaii trip. I was in Shibuya getting some footage of the damage for a documentary I was working on. While I was there, I saw a shop that was missing its front door, so I decided to get some interior shots. When I walked inside, I found what looked like it was once a hidden room behind a shelf. You guys wouldn’t believe what I found down there! I mean, the place looked mostly cleared out, but what I found leftover were these awesome modified drones and some blueprints for other gadgets!”
“Was the name of the shop? Ann asked. “Was it by any chance called ‘Untouchable?’”
“Yeah! How’d you know?”
“You found the workshop of the Tinkerer. The guy who armed the criminals in that gang war awhile back. You stole his equipment?”
“No! Well, not at that point. I left the store and went home after that. It was a few days later, after I heard about Spider-Man’s fight with Ms. Negative on the news, after which I saw all of these news channels bashing Spider-Man. They said that he caused too much property damage and didn’t do much to help the police. I couldn’t believe it! How could they not see how awesome he is!? How could they not see how much he does for the city!? He saved my life during Kamoshida’s attack on the school!”
“Wha? So you do like Spider-Man?” Ryuji asked, confused.
“Of course I do! I’m his biggest fan!” Mishima exclaimed. “I couldn’t just sit back and let the media bash on him like that! That’s when I got the idea for Mysterio, a villain so powerful, the police wouldn’t have any chance to stop him themselves. They would have to rely on Spider-Man! So I went back to Untouchable, grabbed the equipment, and set to work. You’d be surprised how easy it was to create these holograms, just some simple 3D modelling and wham! Instant illusions!”
“So you’re hurting all of these innocent people to raise R...Spider-Man’s popularity?” Ann questioned.
“That’s the beauty of it! Nobody’s getting hurt! Spider-Man stops the crimes before anyone can be injured or killed. And it’s working! Have you seen the news lately? The public can’t get enough of it! After today, not even Yoshida will be able to argue that Spider-Man is a hero!”
“But Shibuya...The attack that’s happening right now...There’s poison gas being spread throughout the city!”
“Don’t worry, the smoke just causes a temporary mild cough. No poison whatsoever.” Mishima said with a smile before turning back to his monitor that displayed drone footage and several long lines of code. In the footage being shown, Spider-Man could be seen fighting against Mysterio who was trying and failing to hit him out of the air. “Look, Spider-Man’s already up and fighting again. Now ‘Mysterio’ just needs to put up a good fight before being heroically defeated. I’ve got a great finale planned, you guys will love it, there’s gonna be lots of lights and explosions and I’ve got a great monologue written out.”
“Mishima! This isn’t a damn movie, someone could seriously get hurt! You need to stop this shit right now!” Ryuji said, reaching for the computer.
Suddenly, his hand was swatted away by Mishima. “No! You can’t stop it now! If the public finds out that Mysterio is fake, they’ll go back to hating Spider-Man! Just let this play out and it’ll be great! Everybody wins!” He began typing away on his computer and the Mysterio on-screen yelled out a cheesy line before sending out a legion of gargoyles.
“MISHIMA! You’re acting crazy! Stop this right now!” Ann grabbed one of Mishima’s arms and pulled him away from the computer.
Ryuji took this opportunity to step up to the computer and begin messing with it, trying to find a way to stop the drones.
“Let me go!” Mishima cried, struggling against Ann. “I have to finish this! I have to help him! I need to help Spider-Man! Let me do this!”
“No!” Ann pushed his rolling chair away and ran over to the computer, unplugging various cords at random. Neither she nor Ryuji were computer savvy at all so they just caused as much chaos to the system as they could.
“You don’t know what you’re doing!” Mishima ran at the two of them, tackling the pair to the ground. He wasn’t as strong as either of them, but he would fight like hell for the sake of his hero. “You’ll ruin everything!”
“Get off dude!” Ryuji tried to push Mishima off of him but the smaller boy clung tightly, not letting him move. “Can’t you see you’re the bad guy in all of this?” He elbowed the boy in the face to make him let go.
Mishima clung tightly, his nose bleeding and a bruise beginning to swell under his eye. “If that’s what it takes to show people the truth, then I’ll be the bad guy! I’ll show the world what a hero he really is!”
Ann managed to free herself from his grasp and ran to the desk, only to be tripped by Mishima before she could reach it. As she fell, Ann hit her head on the side of the desk and slammed onto the floor. She laid there, motionless, and for a solid 10 seconds no one said anything. The two boys watched as blood began to pool on the floor around her head.
“TAKAMAKI!”
“ANN!”
Both of the boys cried out at once in concern for their friend. Ryuji took the opportunity to push out of Mishima’s weakened grasp. He ran to his friend’s side and saw her eyes closed and a large gash running down her forehead, bleeding profusely onto the floor.
“Ann, holy shit! Ann! Answer me! Ann!” Ryuji’s voice cracked as tears began to blur his vision.
Mishima knelt on the floor in silence, his eyes wide in shock. “I...I...I didn’t mean to...I just...I just wanted to stop her...Is she?”
Ryuji turned to Mishima, tears running down his cheeks and a furious expression in his eyes as he put pressure against the head wound. “What are you doing!? Get some bandages! Call an ambulance! DO SOMETHING FOR GOD’S SAKE!”
Mishima tried to stand up, but his legs gave out, shaking in fear. “I...I just wanted to help.” Was all he could say as he tried to pick himself up but failed again. “I just…”
“You son of a bitch!” Ryuji stood up, walking back over to Mishima and grabbing his shirt collar and lifting him up to his feet. “You want to help? HELP HER! HELP ANN!”
Mishima ran out of the room and into the kitchen, searching the drawers for a first-aid kit. His mother who was baking cookies while listening to her headphones turned to him.
“Hey honey what’s going on? I thought I heard yelling. Is that blood on you? What are you kids doing in there?” Her line of questions became increasingly more concerned.
“First-aid *huff* where?” He said, out of breath.
His mother looked at her son’s bruised and bleeding face with shock and concern. “Wha? Honey, what’s going on?”
“Mom I...There’s no time. First-aid kit, where!?”
“Second drawer down.”
Mishima grabbed the kit and ran back to his room, slamming the door shut behind him. When he arrived in the room he saw Ryuji furiously smashing the various computer towers on and around the desk. All of the work Mishima had put in, all of the long hours and sleepless nights he’d spent hunched over his desk in an attempt to help Tokyo’s greatest hero and do something productive with his life for once. All of it was being smashed apart by this blond idiot who didn’t understand a thing.
“STOP! Stop it right now!” He yelled, dropping the kit and pulling Ryuji back.
“NO! I won’t let you hurt anyone else!” Ryuji yelled as he turned and attempted to punch Mishima.
The smaller boy saw this blow coming however, and leaned out of the punch. Using this opportunity, Mishima hit Ryuji where he was weak, his bad leg, the one Kamoshida had broken last year. Kicking the leg as hard as he could, a snapping noise echoed in the room, followed closely by Ryuji’s cry of pain as he fell to the floor, unable to pick himself back up.
Mishima looked over his two friends lying on his bedroom floor, the shock of the situation leaving him frozen for a moment. What had he done? He’d just hurt two of the only people in the world who he could call friends.
He really was the bad guy wasn’t he?
He looked down at his shirt, blood running down the white fabric, both his and Ann’s from when Ryuji grabbed him earlier. Suddenly he heard a noise from his computer, looking over, he saw that despite Ryuji’s destruction of the computers, some were still running. The battle in Shibuya still displayed on the monitor, though the remaining illusions were either flickering or dispelled entirely.
Remembering his reason behind doing this in the first place, Mishima’s gaze hardened and his will was reinvigorated. He locked the door to his room and took his place back at his desk. He was going to see this through to the end, no matter what came after.
“For once in my life, I’m going to make myself useful. Even if it means I have to be the villain.”