Shoot House Two was a walled compound with a wide front gate on the south side and a back gate on the north side. A large two-story cinderblock building represented a small office and storage building in the middle. This building’s rectangular floorplan was longest between the front and back gates. There were no doors anywhere inside or glass in any windows. Sheds and garages ran along the inside of the wall of the compound. A scattering of beat-up old cars provided cover in some of the open spaces. The red team would enter via the back, while the blue team entered through the front. The first scenario required capturing a flag positioned in one of four central rooms on the second floor of the office building, and the team to return the flag to their gate would win. They could also win by eliminating the other team, and any hit to the body killed the participant.

  The girls chose Ayako to be the squad leader of the blue team and Karen to be the leader of the red team. Members of the teams were selected at random by drawing straws with either a blue or red end. Squeals of joy erupted when friends found themselves on the same team, and sighs of disappointment filled the air when they discovered they weren't. With fifteen girls, the red team ended up with a slight advantage. Chiyo ended up on Karen’s team, while Sarah was on Ayako’s. Blue or red colour panels were issued for their fatigues, depending on the team, and each team leader was given a map of the compound.

  “We’re going to win,” Karen confidently stated to Ayako. “You might have gotten the top score this morning, but we have the advantage this time.”

  Ayako locked eyes with her. “Do your worst, but blue is best. Right, girls!”

  A chorus of cheers went up behind her.

  “Red won’t be beat!” Karen’s girls cheered at that.

  The two teams then faced each other and bowed. “Let’s have a good match,” they spoke in unison before leading their teams to their respective gates.

  Ayako gathered her team around her at the front gate, laying the map on the ground so all of them could see.

  “This compound is more or less symmetrical, so neither force has a particular advantage out of the gate. Whoever gets to the flag first will have an advantage, but finding the right room and getting it out will be hard, as the other team will be right on them. Based on my experience from the other times I’ve run through this compound, it usually turns into a firefight right around the flag. It is fun, but it is pretty frantic. Does anyone have fresh ideas?”

  Sarah spoke first. “Knowing Karen, I’ll bet she’ll charge right in. She did this last year and thinks speed is the key.”

  “You’re probably right.” Ayako agreed with Sarah’s assessment of her best friend. “Speed is essential, especially as we need to check six different rooms.” She pointed to the twelve interconnected rooms in the middle of the building on the second floor. The innermost six had little flag icons on them. “This cluster of rooms has multiple entrances and exits, and it takes a bit of time to go through them and find the flag. It’s faster to split into two squads to cover ground from both sides so you don’t find the flag in the last room you look in. ”

  “That makes sense,” Sarah said. “Two search squads are faster, but it doesn’t give us much leeway for tactics as everyone ends up in the middle.”

  “You’re right. We would use both the left and right main staircases in the front atrium and converge on the centre from two sides. If they follow the same strategy, they would take the two stairwells in the back and do the same. We have a slightly more direct path to the middle, but getting out is harder for us as the atrium is more open. They actually have a better exit route out the back, too, if they get the flag first.”

  Airi had been studying the map. “Then we split into a capture and a cover squad?”

  “Good thinking, Airi.” Ayako smiled.

  Airi beamed with the compliment.

  “That’s what I was thinking,” Ayako said. “However, the two sides have often ended up in a big firefight in the middle anyway, and we’re short one person. So let’s try something different. We can split into three elements; two to attack and one to take the flag. I want to put a three-person squad on the left and right hallways around the middle rooms, and only a single person searches the middle rooms. This way, the three-person squads can attack and advance down the hall and prevent the other side from getting in.”

  “Isn’t that a little risky? What if the searcher has to fight? They could be outnumbered?” Sarah asked.

  “Yeah,” Ayako admitted, “it is a risk. The searcher has to be fast and ready to fight. Airi is the fastest runner from what I’ve seen, but there are only four girls here that have been in the building before.” Ayako looked at Sarah. “There’s you, Nami, Hikaru, and me. One of us should probably do the searching.”

  “I don’t really want to search,” Hikaru told Ayako. “It probably should be you, as you are the best at shooting, in any case.”

  Nami shook her head. “I’d rather support too.”

  “I agree.” Sarah nodded. “We are short a person, and this is a good way to go. We all know you should be the searcher.”

  Ayako looked at her teammates. “Do we go with this plan?”

  Nods all around affirmed her plan.

  “I thank everyone for their trust in me.” Ayako kept a straight face, trying not to show any anxiety. “It’s decided then. Let's get organized into squads.”

  *****

  A loud horn sounded to start the battle. Ayako led the girls in a run from the front gate to the building. She dodged around a couple of rusty cars in the front courtyard, their windows long gone, and burst into the atrium through the opening where big double doors would normally be. Airi overtook her, being the fastest runner. Both of them dashed by the big reception desk and up the right-side stairs with Sarah and another girl right behind them. The other squad went up the stairs on the left side.

  Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.

  They breathed hard when they reached the second floor. Airi turned the first corner, leading the way for the girls. She ran down the hallway until she reached the first intersection, where she shouldered her rifle, ready to shoot. Ayako dashed left at the intersection towards the set of interior rooms housing the flag. Airi then continued forward down the right hall leading to the rear of the building. Sarah took position behind her and on the other side of the hall while the third girl covered from the corner. The two dashed further down the hallway before the first girls from the other team appeared ahead of them. They ducked into doorways as the girl behind them gave cover fire. Paint bullets flew down the hallway in both directions. Using the doorways as cover, Airi and Sarah began firing back, driving the other girls back behind cover.

  Ayako ran into the first room and located the entrance to one of the interior rooms. The sound of gunfire had broken out in both hallways between her squads and the other team. She knew her time was limited now before running into someone. The first interior room lay empty, and she passed through it to the second room. Rapid gunfire sounded loudly off to her right, indicating a fierce battle occurring there. Ayako stayed focused on her search and entered the next room with her rifle ready.

  “Airi’s down,” she heard Sarah shout. “Two reds down on our side.” More gunfire erupted from the right hallway following this.

  A rapid exchange of gunfire sounded on her left. Another one of her girls shouted, “Two broke through!”

  The third room was also empty. Ayako had a choice of two rooms to check next, one ahead to the rear of the building and one to the left. She chose the one closest to the left side, knowing that the opposition was close by.

  Ayako entered the fourth room and saw the bright orange flag hanging from the ceiling in the center. She expertly covered the far door while advancing to the flag. A girl wearing a red colour panel burst into the room through the far door. She saw Ayako and swung her rifle to shoot. Ayako fired twice as the other girl got off a single shot that cleanly missed her. The other girl dropped with two yellow paint hits to her chest. Ayako grabbed the flag and tucked it into the straps of her web gear. She then spun around to exit the same way she came in when Karen appeared in that doorway.

  Both girls dodged and snapped several shots off at the same time. The shots went wide. Ayako kept up a steady fire as she backed out of the room through the door where she had shot the other girl. Karen stayed behind cover and fired back some poorly aimed rounds.

  Karen shouted out, “Ayako has the flag and is going left. All girls attack!”

  Gunfire doubled as both sides tried to converge on the central rooms. Ayako fired one last shot and ran out of the room. She would have to get to the left hallway and then head back out to the front. In the next room, she dashed for the far door while keeping her rifle ready to aim forward or backward. Karen would be right behind her, and she would have to take a chance in the next room.

  “Going left!” Ayako called out.

  The next room stood clear, and Ayako could see the left hall through the far doorway. Pausing at the doorway, she fired off two shots at the doorway behind her, just in time to cause Karen to back off to cover.

  “Cover fire!” Ayako then partially pivoted out into the left hallway. She saw Chiyo, on the other team, firing from the far corner down the hallway, then fired multiple shots at her. Chiyo returned fire, barely missing her. Hikaru and another one of the girls from Ayako’s team put out a flurry of gunfire to briefly pin Chiyo down. Sorry, Chiyo, Ayako thought when she managed to shoot Chiyo once in the arm, killing her.

  “More cover! Karen’s right behind me!” Ayako ran towards her teammates as they fired off another flurry of rounds.

  Karen popped out of the same doorway from which Ayako had come. Shots just missed Ayako, who dove for cover behind the corner at the end of the hallway. Fire from another of Ayako’s teammates drove Karen back behind cover. A moment later, Karen fired back; the same girl cried out when she was struck in the shoulder. Ayako noted that only one girl remained from her team, guarding the corner with two down.

  “Hold them off; I’m going to take the flag back.” Hikaru, the last squad mate, nodded in confirmation. Ayako fired a half dozen shots in support before she ran towards the stairs. She took the stairs down two at a time.

  Another flurry of shots sounded close behind her, and she heard Karen shout, “After her! She’s getting away.”

  Ayako made it down the stairs and ran for the reception desk to take cover behind it. She aimed at the top of the stairs to see Karen and the other girl from her team appear. She fired at Karen, who dropped and fired back. The other girl shifted to the side to put down more fire on her at a different angle. Ayako was pinned from above.

  Sarah came to the rescue from the right hallway to fire at Karen from the top of the right stairs. She hit Karen twice before the other girl shot her in the chest. Ayako stood up and shot the last girl in the side. She quickly panned for more targets before the horn sounded twice to indicate the battle was over.

  Ayako sighed in relief. That had been a very close battle.

  Yuriko’s voice came over the loudspeakers. “Blue wins by eliminating the red team. Everyone assemble out in front of the building.”

  The girls got up from where they had been shot and gathered outside in front of the building where Yuriko and Sergeant Wilson met them.

  “That was a good battle, girls,” Yuriko began. “I saw some good teamwork and tactics going on but also recklessness. For the first years, I hope you know how easy it is to get shot now. I’ve been shot twice myself, so even the pros can get very dead in real life. Everyone needs to use their cover well, and while this is fun practice, take it seriously and learn from today. That’s all for now. We’ll do a more extensive debrief later. Let's set up for the next round. Remember, it is capture the flag again, but then the last two exercises for the day will be fifteen-minute elimination battles.”

  The two teams then teased each other before they separated for their starting positions. Karen let Ayako know that they would definitely win this time.

  In the second capture the flag battle, blue started from the rear, and the red team won. They did an all-out attack on one side and wiped out the blue team's flank. Ayako had been overwhelmed in that battle but took out two reds. In the team elimination battles, blue and red each won one battle. These battles raged around the building and inside it, with the last battle won by blue killing more red before the time ran out. After this, the girls wound down the day by changing back into their civilian clothes.

  *****

  Back on the bus, the girls were both tired and animated at the same time. They were all sharing war stories from the day’s training. Everyone looked forward to the club dinner at a Hiroshima okonomiyaki restaurant before heading back to Odewara. It was a common dining affair where groups of diners each had their own steel grill built into the center of the table. They would grill up pancakes made of batter, yakisoba noodles, shredded cabbage, green onions, egg, meat, and tempura pieces and top it with okonomiyaki sauce. Everyone liked this meal, but not everyone flipped the savoury pancakes well. When word got out that Ayako was good at it, tables were putting dibs on her to do their flipping, too, only to have Karen put down first dibs since she sat at their table with Chiyo and Sarah.

  Yuriko knew it had been a good session today. It had been busy and fulfilling to watch the girls applying what they had learned in action. It had taken her mind off the creature that was killing in Odewara for a while, but she knew the joint IMA and National Police investigation was on top of it.