Anomaly: Deep Warehouse #3
Soccer balls, ping-pong balls, bowling balls, basketballs, and all sorts of other "balls" came flying toward Section Chief Lee.
Dodging them as best he could with his stiff, aching body from years of service, Section Chief Lee entertained a horrifying thought. What if those charging balls had once been humans?
Emergency Support Team 4's Q was dead. And along with K, who had left the recording, the entire Team 4—and likely Anomaly Investigation Team 1 as well—had perished. So the absurd notion that all those balls scattered throughout the warehouse were human corpses was probably untrue.
Instead... they were likely anomalous entities. "Maybe these balls are mimicking the humans they killed."
Like a swarm of insects moving as one. Mere toys of humanity clumsily imitating people. But was it just the balls? What about those cones or vests trapped over there?
Section Chief Lee barely dodged another incoming bowling ball and hurriedly retraced his steps. Evading the barrage of balls, he recalled the words spoken by the "ball human" that had mimicked Q just moments ago.
"Even those two short flights of stairs nearly made me tumble down... Dozens of steps stretching out, with no handrail. A small space, yet so dark I could barely find the entrance."
A ball struck his head. Every ball attacking him now targeted his head without fail. Combining the ball human's words with his current predicament, Section Chief Lee gasped out hoarsely.
"The trait of this space... is exaggeration of phenomena?"
Two stairs turning into dozens of treacherous ones. An interior too dark to find the entrance expanding into a vast complex of dozens of storage warehouses. The balls his friends had thrown multiplying into dozens of hostile varieties aiming for his head.
He had found a clue. But that didn't mean Section Chief Lee was safe now. Even if he escaped the warehouse immediately, he'd be bedridden in a hospital for a while. And the reason lay in one phrase from the ball human.
"And this thick air... thinking about it, it's pretty dangerous too. Probably crawling with all sorts of dust and germs..."
"This is why I keep telling them to send proper support to field teams."
His respirator was already infected with unknown germs. Too late to cover it with his sleeve now. And the other members of Team 3 were in the same boat.
Thud! Rumble... Bang!
"Ease up a bit, damn it. Whew. Did they hear the shot at least?"
The space was so cavernously empty above that gunfire echoed easily. The other team members would surely hear it and recall their orders based on their own judgment.
'The missing ones... I'll have to leave them to the follow-up team.'
Just as the encroaching balls were becoming overwhelming...
Screech...
An old equipment storage locker creaked open, and someone called out to him.
"Mister...!"
"...!!"
Without a moment's hesitation, Section Chief Lee dove toward the locker upon hearing that voice.
"Hah... hah..."
"..."
"..."
"Whew... As expected, the lockers are affected too. This one's huge inside."
"..."
"..."
"So, you're both sixth graders at XX Elementary, right?"
"...! Y-yes, sir!"
"Y-yes, we are, sniff, we are...!"
The two boys nodded vigorously at Section Chief Lee's words. They must have been hiding in this locker to escape the chaos outside.
'Did Anomaly Investigation Team 1 and Emergency Support Team 4 not think of the lockers? Or... did the assault start before they could?'
"Did you come to rescue us...?"
"Yeah. But weren't there three missing kids? Where's the other one?"
"...We don't know."
"We got separated midway..."
The two boys grimaced, on the verge of tears, perhaps from guilt over not knowing their friend's fate. Section Chief Lee, who usually got complaints from his wife and daughter about being too curt, tried his best to comfort them.
"That kid might be hiding in some locker somewhere in here too. So relax."
"O-okay..."
"So, when can we get out...?"
"First, I need to ask a few things."
Section Chief Lee posed several questions to the boys: any traits of the space they'd discovered, sightings of Anomaly Investigation Team 1 or Emergency Support Team 4, details on the missing one, and so on.
"We saw some people... but we're not sure if they were real people..."
"They were there from the moment you first entered?"
"Yes..."
"Hmm."
They were probably "ball humans" or something similar. More precisely, human-like but not from our Earth or world. The Deep Warehouse had only appeared three days ago, and the first missing persons were these elementary kids right in front of him. Whoever the boys had seen upon entering... wasn't human from our Earth, at least.
'No need to overthink it.'
His goal now was simply to escape with these two boys. Team member survival and rescuing the remaining kid were largely off the table, so no need to worry about whatever human-like things they'd spotted.
"The other one was a girl, right?"
"Huh? Yes."
"Any distinguishing features?"
"Features... um... she was just... normal."
"Besides when you entered the warehouse, tell me everything you noticed about her as a classmate before that."
"Um, well... kinda haughty? Doesn't play well with us boys..."
"She was bullied."
"Bullied?"
"Hey...! If you say that...!"
"Why not...? The mister told us to say!"
"But what if we tell the teacher!!"
"Calm down. This stays between us. And do you boys want to save her if we can?"
"Huh? Yes! Of course!"
"Then tell me. Uncle here's... like a detective. Might spot a useful clue."
"Um..."
The two boys exchanged glances and began spilling details about the girl. In short, she was obedient to parents and teachers but didn't play well with classmates. Especially since she tried so hard—almost deliberately—to impress the teachers, she got bullied a lot by the other girls.
"She even carried her textbook during music or art class, so the kids hated that."
"Music and art? What's that got to do with anything?"
"Oh, you don't know, mister? Music, art, PE—we hardly ever use the textbooks even if we have them."
"Um, what's it called? Pretending to look studious or something?"
"...I get it. Did she carry her book even when running errands with you guys?"
"Book? Oh, the PE textbook, yeah."
"Up until you separated?"
"Huh? Yeah... Wait, no?"
"Last question. What errand did your PE teacher send you three on? Why send three kids who weren't even close?"
"Uh, well... what was it...?"
"Definitely... go into the warehouse and... offer ourselves as sacrifice... expand the space..."
"Stop."
Thwack.
As their eyes glazed over and speech slurred, Section Chief Lee swiftly struck the napes of the two boys' necks. They collapsed limply, unconscious.
"What a headache."
Where to even start? For one, this Deep Warehouse wasn't a simple anomalous space. It was more like a composite of multiple anomalies. Two prime suspects: the missing elementary student and the PE teacher. They weren't necessarily the direct culprits, but they were undoubtedly the primary cause or closely connected.
And that primary cause could be a person, a space, a phenomenon, or an object. Anomalies were like that.
"...Can't drag these two around."
Better to leave them in this undiscovered locker. He remembered every path to get here anyway. So... time to change objectives. Rendezvous with the team.
Screech. Clunk.
Section Chief Lee burst out. And soon, countless balls began rolling toward him.
I was out in the lobby reading a book for the first time in ages. Well, practically the first time ever. Because right now, inside, a full-scale war was raging.
To be precise, it was something I'd permitted. The books had enjoyed their war games so much before that I'd set aside time for everyone to play together.
Hmm, if anything, it felt like having free time during PE class in the middle of regular lessons. So now, inside, three factions were waging a massive war across dozens of bookshelves as the battlefield. The leaders of those factions were, naturally, Swamp Zone, Earth Religion Studies 1, and Universe Door Darkness.
Library operations were on hold anyway, with no recent visitors besides those from the Anomaly Management Bureau.
"Or maybe it's because people these days don't read books anymore..."
Who knows. Come to think of it, I was curious about that Anomaly Management Bureau group too. They seemed familiar with the White Mother monster from before, so they must be accustomed to this mysterious world.
'Grandmother... probably not on the same side. Right.'
Compared to Grandmother... those three were too human. Simple curiosity made me want to meet them again and ask about the bureau, but since they'd broken rules before, I didn't want to risk it. The Recipe Book had developed near-trauma from it, freaking out and rampaging over nearby books at the mere sensation of dripping water.
"Maybe I need to give it more care."
Muttering that, I jotted in my ever-present ancient tome: How to resolve a book's PTSD??
Then, suddenly, a knock-knock echoed from the library entrance.
"...Huh? A knock?"
First time seeing that. What was it? All previous patrons (just one team, really) had appeared naturally.
"Hmm..."
The knocks came at steady intervals. They planned to keep going until I responded, it seemed. I glanced toward the stacks, but everyone was too engrossed in their war games.
'...Might as well check it out. If they know I'm leaving, it'll be chaos and exhausting.'
Someday I'd venture outside confidently; this could be practice. Clutching my ancient tome and pen, I slowly opened the library door.
Screeech...
And in the next instant, I stood in the middle of a railingless staircase shrouded in darkness. No library door behind me.
"Huh...?"
And at the end of those stairs... balls? Cones? A vast, dim warehouse-like space stretched out.