There’s Fear in Letting Go

Left, right… clear. The door closed behind us, with just the crack in the door and the little gap between the window and the wooden boards they had used to cover it, illuminating our work station. The hazmats were working, the rot could only bond to organic matter, meaning things like pvc and plastics were the perfect barrier. Even when it tried to sputter out into the air, our respirators made quick work of it, it soon dissipated into the outside air.

We threw it onto the table in the centre of the room, still asleep luckily. Funny, I didn't even know they could sleep…

“Hajime, little help here?”

“Oh, yeah sorry”

“We don’t have much time. We can’t tie it down, so if it wakes up you’ve got to put it down, got it?”

Kana nodded, she aimed her rifle at its skull.

*-*-*

The first one went well. It took us about 10 minutes to gather some samples before it started moving again, it was ended with a blade through the back of the head. In this world, incubation was no longer an option, so we needed to gather a lot more tissue. It was slow work, boring work, and that’s a recipe for mess ups and death. So, to ease the tension, we got onto our stories, our journeys since the fallout. Alex learned much about his new club members. About my urban excursion, and the fall of the safe zone in Kawasaki. It was his turn to speak his struggles.

This scientist slash doctor turned monster surgeon weaved his words as he weaved his scalpel, cautiously and with a feeling of pain and regret hidden under his breath.

“I had just got transferred from Oxford. There was a pathology lab in Ueno that I got access to alongside a few of my colleagues. We were so excited to travel, go and see the lab, see a shrine or two and just enjoy the city. We had also been told that Doctor Koziol would be in Japan.

Turns out I caught something on the day of his seminar, I stayed behind as my colleagues, my friends… my wife…” he paused, finding it difficult to finish his explanation.

“They were there…” Hajime remembered going back there, back when he was trying to stop it from happening in vain…

Alex nodded sullenly.

“I slept for about an hour or two, woke up to screaming. When I went to investigate, I could see them, murdering and devouring. It was like a… like a”

“Fucked up nightmare.” Kana casually interrupted. He didn’t really respond, knowing we knew it was correct.

“There were probably a hundred like me in that hotel, running for the hills away from the scene.

When my legs gave in, I looked back… the hundred had fallen to a handful… there were kids there.

After that, the remaining survivors carried on walking. Walking, and walking, you’d be forgiven for thinking we were the dead ones. On and on we went. There were occasional rot attacks, and a fight here and there. But eventually we found this place.

Junichi’s father, Masaru and his men kept us safe. He was a good man, built us a camp and thick walls to surround us. He’d have survived long after all of us if…”

“If?” Kana asked.

“His wife was pregnant with their second child. We were scavenging the city at the time, but when he heard she was struggling, he rushed back. He almost died on the way back but he soldiered on still… Some say Love is the death of peace of mind.

When he finally returned back, he was without a wife or child… both passed in the labour. It was a dark day.

He was different from the hero we knew from then on, he was brooding, quick to temper and rash. He would leave the safe zone on his own for hours on end. He would refuse to eat and stay locked in his office, not even seeing his son.

Before long, they found him in the corner, with a picture from their honeymoon.”

Hajime recalled the words he spoke of Junichi, wincing like he had aimed them at himself.

“He’s not a bad kid, Junichi. He’s hurt people and I don’t want to think about the ones thrown out to face their fears alone… but, he’s just a kid trying to be someone he’s not, his father.”

“Then why is he so against a cure? Wouldn’t the man that risked everything to keep strangers safe be for the research?” Kana asked.

“I think he’s scared. Scared to survive it all and realise he’s alone.”

There went another, Hajime jabbed at its nape with the dagger harshly, “There’s a lot of that going around lately.”

Alex could see the family that never was, and how much Junichi wanted to be his father yet fell so short… “A man cannot cast a shadow he does not possess.”

*-*-*

3 hours and 4 more subjects to gather from later, along with a little bit of testing, it was time to head back to the safe zone. It wasn’t enough, if we wanted to find a cure within a timely fashion we would need a lot more samples, but just carrying that much back would give Junichi a heart attack… we were struggling carrying what we had anyway. It just meant that this wouldn’t be our only journey past the walls for danger.

Similarly to the hours working on cell stealing, this walk back was a ball ache. Conversation was a good remedy last time at least.

“When did Oran come into this?” The words just slipped out suddenly. I had been curious about the ones they called the spears and their leader Oran, this was a good chance to try and figure them out.

“Oran? He’s a soldier. If I’m remembering the story right, he was on the frontlines of the Korean war. Could have gone quite far up the ranks if he wasn’t such a loose cannon. He’s only ever told three people his past, each tell different stories. One says he killed one of his friends by accident, one says it was on purpose. The other, he keeps his mouth shut. His troops were being stationed in Japan after the bomb threat a few years back, but that never came of course.”

“How did they end up at the camp?” Kana asked, also seeming to be intrigued.

“They were there before we were. Masaru paid them well enough, put walls between them and the walkers and kept them fed in exchange for a security detail. It worked, but they’ve gotten more cruel recently, they throw people out for nothing and kill those that question them, Junichi ignores it. I think Oran’s using the kid, he’s putting ideas in his head and manipulating him.”

“Oh? He didn’t seem smart enough though, you sure you aren’t just overthinking it?”

“He’s not an idiot. Oran knows that getting on Junichi’s good side is beneficial. See, Oran had an issue with orders from Masaru, a lot of us assumed the same would be the case for his days in the army. He loves power, and the freedom it brings.”

*-*-*

It was just after we’d grabbed the samples that we heard something, something we had been hearing for a while. It was a constant thing that almost had a beat, but now, now that we were nearing the base, it became irregular, in fact, it seemed to be a lot more frequent now.

“Don’t you think there’s more gunshots than before?”

“Hmmm… now that you mention it, they have been going on for a while. I guess we underestimated the amount in the area?”

“Yeah, makes sense…”

I don’t think either of us really thought anything of it, but we all shared the voice in the back of our heads, telling us. “The end is here.”

The smoke was visible once we passed the clearing, little did we know it was a sign of the end. It’s hand laid on the wall, pulsating and decaying. But instead of trying to break through like the walkers, it simply stood there. But the wall was breaking down, it wasn’t being demolished… it was being melted.

They watched as the white they were so accustomed to turned to the nauseating green of the outside world, and the glow of their eyes, staring deep into their souls.

Junichi stood at his window, staring down at the scene, his whiskey tumbler at his feet leaving broken glass and a stain on the carpet.

Those things, they just waited, like they were under orders. But soon enough it lifted its cursed head, frothing at the mouth it spoke one word.

“E…N…D”.

The locust descended on the people, and the onlookers could only see one thing amongst the carnage.

“Hell hath come…”

*-*-*

They rushed in, much like a wake of vultures descending on a comatose impala, forced to watch its doom coming without the strength to do anything. Is it frustrating? Maybe more haunting. At some point in our lives we became so foolish, we believed that the world owed us something. Money, intelligence, a sex life, hell even just a talent, or something to differentiate ourselves from those that we live with. But we were wrong. The only thing in life you are owed is a death, and the reaper brings it gift wrapped with blood soaked wings.

They brought our deaths with the gaze of a crazed lion that hadn’t eaten in months, finally eyeing its next course. The wall falling, it was something these people knew could happen, maybe some knew it WOULD. But it didn’t change their reaction, completely paralysed, rooted to the spot.

This was it, the day you can prepare for, but will never truly be ready for. The day the world rips away all your assumptions of being owed, the day you realise none of it mattered… Judgement Day befell the strong, the weak. Before it’s presence we were all as fucked as the other.

How could they have gotten in though? The walls were concrete, there’s no way they could just break through. It’s too high to jump over, obviously, but there’s also guards watching the perimeter 24/7 on a rota. If there was even a small chance the rot decided to try and climb, or even push each other up, the soldiers would have no issue popping off their heads…

So what happened? Did we just miss something? No, it was impossible. But maybe Oran was right, maybe putting so much trust in the safety we had was stupid, nothing lasts forever and there’s just not enough info on our enemy to know their limitations. It didn’t matter how much we tried to work out how it happened, all we could do is solve the problem.

Kana slipped through the opening first, baseball sliding in and firing at the one she passed. The next fell when she got to her feet, she fired the next round point blank. The third swung at her but she ducked and fired the last round.

We were clear for now but there were still many in the compound and even more turning.

The wings were ablaze, man woman and child scrambled, looking for a way out, looking for a way to survive as the wave of certain death inched closer and closer.

…a scream in the distance…

The mutant held his head in its palm, lifting his heavy body off the floor with a single arm. His screams went from terrifying to blood curdling when it started burning through his skull. Everything not bone or skull just melted away, even his hair set a light, like some strange Ghost Rider.

All I could do, all any of us could do, was watch. This thing was more than any of us could comprehend. But it made sense, the walkers were consuming trillions of cells everyday. To think that not one of the cells they make would mutate after so long is illogical, but even so, we were struggling so hard with just the base walkers… now we had this fucker…