Demon City Shinjuku: The Complete Edition by Hideyuki Kikuchi Page B

heels—the same as before—and the way she stumbled and tripped down the road strewn with chunks of concrete and boulders, painted an all too precarious picture.
    Nevertheless, she managed not to fall and arrived at the Yotsuya Sanchome intersection, the result of not only good luck but sharp senses and reflexes. The same skills that made her captain of her high school Aikido team. She came to a halt in the middle of the intersection.
    â€œGo straight and I’ll end up in Shinjuku’s old High Street. If I turn right, I’ll cross Akebono Bridge to the Defense Agency. Left, I’ll end up at Shinanomachi station and Keio Hospital. If I were the bad guys, I’d probably go straight.”
    Before setting out, she’d at least taken the time to make quick use of the autosuggestion machine that Kyoya hadn’t, and flashed her memory with a detailed geographical map of Shinjuku.
    â€œAll right then,” she said to herself. “I’ll keep on going in this direction.”
    Two or three steps later, she stopped. She sensed something around her. Several things. Her eyes scanned the darkness to her left and right. Crimson points of light—eyes. And not just two or three pairs. The low growls revealed the rapacious nature of these carnivorous beasts.
    Not man-eating leeches or giant rats. That left two-headed dogs, and put her in a very tight spot. When it came to dangerous animals, Demon City had its share of completely unique species. Rumor had it that specimens released from a joint public-private gene research laboratory during the Devil Quake had been further mutated by the magical miasmas.
    Among these creatures—that would attack anything that moved—the two-headed dogs reached a good six feet in length and would take on a North American grizzly bear. From the prey’s perspective, an attack by one was not different than by two, making more than one quadruple the trouble.
    Shinjuku Ward was surrounded by a fissure hundreds of feet deep and twenty yards wide that effectively kept the beasts penned up inside. One “good” side effect of the Devil Quake. Traffic between Shinjuku and the outside wards was controlled through a series of large gates in Yotsuya, Tsurumakicho in Waseda, and Yonchome in West Shinjuku. The gates were open twenty-four seven, as were the numerous watch towers equipped with a full array of electronic monitoring equipment and particle cannon emplacements, turning Shinjuku into the world’s most vigilantly guarded zoo.
    The encroaching circle slowly tightened around Sayaka, trembling with the pleasurable promise of the kill and appetites sated. The growls ceased, perhaps due to that heightened sense of anticipation. The wild, feral smell struck Sayaka’s nostrils.
    One pounced on her from the right. As she expected, a two-headed dog. The twin sets of fangs gnashed at her throat.
    But Sayaka’s throat was no longer there. However prim and privileged she appeared from the outside, she dodged the attack with an unexpected quickness, focusing a paralyzing ray as the dog landed. The big frame toppled over.
    Sayaka took off before the second one completed its leap.
    Her memory proved true, and the road sloped down toward the entrance to the Sanchome station on the Tokyo Metro Marunouchi line. The roof had fallen in but the steel shutters were up. The thinking was, rather than staving off a concentrated assault from the street, it was safer to fall back and ambush invaders from within.
    Dogs came at her from both sides. She hit them with the paralyzer. They fell unconscious, blocking the road.
    Sayaka leapt like a trout scaling a fish ladder, vaulted over the big canine torsos, and tumbled head-first through the entranceway. She hit the stairs, somersaulted, and stuck the landing. The rush of air lifted up her dress, revealing her well-formed legs and thighs. She hastily pressed it down again.
    The move backfired. Raising dreadful howls, a