FRAGILE PEACE

"Dad!"

Takumi’s voice cracked as he threw himself toward his father’s limp body, the sickly blue glow of the mushrooms casting eerie shadows over his pale skin. His hands trembled as he fumbled with the oxygen tank, securing the mask over Todo’s face, praying it wasn’t too late. The muffled wheeze of air flowing into the mask gave him hope—his father was still breathing.

Haruto’s voice broke through the haze. “Is he okay?” His words came out warped and distant through the thick filter of his gas mask.

Takumi exhaled sharply. “Yeah… for now.” He pressed his fingers against Todo’s wrist. A pulse. Weak, but there.

Haruto shifted uneasily. “We need to get out of here. I feel sick just standing near these things.”

Takumi followed his friend’s gaze. The mushrooms—they were still growing. Thick veins pulsed beneath their fleshy caps, expanding in slow, rhythmic bursts. A faint blue mist seeped from them, swirling in the air like it had a life of its own. The scent was metallic, wrong. Like rotting flesh and burnt ozone.

Takumi clenched his jaw. “Help me lift him.”

Haruto nodded, and together they hoisted Todo up, each gripping an arm over their shoulders. The man groaned faintly but remained limp. His body was heavier than before, dead weight from exhaustion and whatever sickness had overtaken him.

They trudged forward, every step crunching over brittle, fungus-coated ground. The undergrowth had been swallowed by the infestation, patches of blue spreading like wounds in the earth. Takumi’s breath was shallow. He tried not to think about how much oxygen was left in their tanks.

Then, they reached the road—and everything changed.

Takumi stopped dead in his tracks. His stomach lurched.

Bodies.

Scattered among the wreckage of abandoned cars, human corpses lay twisted and broken, their faces frozen in silent screams. Mushrooms had burst through their skin—out of their mouths, their empty eye sockets, their chests split open as if something had crawled out from within. The streetlights flickered weakly, bathing the carnage in erratic flashes.

Takumi turned away and gagged.

Haruto stared in stunned horror. “Oh… my God.”

Haruto clenched his stomach, nausea tightening his throat. “Tell me this is a nightmare. Please.”

Silence.

Takumi’s breathing was uneven. Then, barely a whisper—“D… did I do this?”

“What?" Haruto’s voice wavered. “No. It’s not your fault. This… this might have just happened out of nowhere, you know?” But even as he said it, his hands were shaking.

Takumi forced a smile. A brittle, empty thing. “Yeah… maybe.” He shoved the thought deep into the back of his mind and locked it away. Not now. Not here. If he let himself break, he wasn’t sure if he could ever put himself back together.

Todo stirred, coughing weakly. His body trembled in their hold. “Takumi… Haruto…”

Takumi’s grip tightened. “Dad, don’t talk. Save your strength.”

Todo let out a weak chuckle. “I don’t… have much of that left.” His voice was hoarse, strained. “But you two… you have to keep going. No matter what you’ve seen. No matter what’s ahead.”

Takumi swallowed hard. “We’re going to fix this.”

Todo’s breath rattled in his chest. “Fix it… or survive it. Either way, don’t stop moving.”

The words settled deep in Takumi’s bones, heavier than the corpse-littered road behind them.

They walked.

Through the ruins of a town they once knew. Past shattered buildings, empty homes, and storefronts taken over by the creeping blue infestation.

For a brief moment, they talked—not about the horror around them, but about what used to be.

“Remember the mountain trails?” Haruto asked quietly. “The ones behind my parents’ house?”

Takumi nodded, his voice soft. “Yeah… We used to race up them like idiots.”

Haruto let out a quiet laugh. “Your mom always yelled at us for coming back covered in cuts and bruises.”

Takumi smiled. A real one, this time. “We never listened.”

Haruto chuckled, then hesitated. “…Hey, remember when I got rejected by my crush in high school?”

Takumi snorted. “Which time?”

“The worst one, idiot.”

Takumi smirked. “Ohhh, right. That was brutal.”

Haruto groaned, shaking his head. “Dude, I swear, I thought she liked me. I even rehearsed the confession for days. Then she hit me with the ‘You’re like a brother to me’ line. I swear, I died inside.”

Takumi laughed, the sound almost foreign in the middle of all this horror. “And then we went to your room, blasted music, played video games, and called her every insult we could think of.”

“Yeah… and then she somehow found out.” Haruto covered his face. “The next day at school, I walked in, and everyone was already laughing. She told everyone I cried.”

Takumi burst out laughing. “You did cry!”

“So did you, bastard!”

They both laughed, the sound bittersweet. For a moment, it felt like they were back in Haruto’s room, controllers in hand, pretending their world wasn’t crumbling around them.

But reality loomed.

The laughter faded, replaced by the quiet weight of what they had lost.

As the sky turned a sickly shade of orange, they found shelter—a large building with an indoor swimming pool. The glass walls were cracked but intact, its doors still standing. More importantly, there were no mushrooms inside.

Relief crashed over Takumi like a wave. “We stay here until nightfall,” he said. “We can’t risk being seen.”

They dragged Todo inside, laying him gently onto the cold tile floor. He barely moved.

Takumi shut the doors behind them. The silence felt heavier now. The only sound was their own breathing through the gas masks.

They sat. Exhausted. Hollowed out by the day.

“Haruto.”

Haruto looked up.

Takumi’s voice was quiet. “Do you ever think about what it means… to carry something you never meant to?”

Haruto hesitated. “…Yeah.”

“Something you didn’t ask for. Something you didn’t want. But it follows you anyway.”

Haruto exhaled, rubbing a hand over his mask. “I try not to.”

Takumi let out a humorless chuckle. “Yeah… same.”

They didn’t say anything more. Some things didn’t have answers.

Some burdens weren’t meant to be put down.

Their exhaustion swallowed them whole.

One by one, they fell asleep.

The last thing Takumi saw before his eyes closed was the soft glow of the sunrise bleeding through the cracks in the glass. A quiet, fragile moment of peace.

Before the nightmare continued.