"The Lost", Chapter Nine
Title: The Lost
Chapter: 9/10
Fandom: Arashi
Character, Pairing(s): Sakumoto, Ohmiya
Rating: R
Warnings: Graphic violence, language.
Summary: Do you remember me? Lost for so long? Will you be on the other side? Will you forget me?
"Over there," Ai said, with a little wave of the gun still clutched in her hands.
The inside of the 7-11 was sparse, decorated with the remainder of the cases and the coolers against the far wall. It had obviously been raided a dozen times over already- maybe that was why they chose it, to make it a less obvious target. There was glass all over the floor that crunched with each footstep and hissed a bit at Jun's ears. He followed the other four into the corner Ai had been pointing at, waiting; everything hung poised at the edge of the blade sharpened between them. They couldn't trust the others- and the others couldn't trust them. Not yet, anyway.
"One by one," Toma said, hands on his hips. "Down to your underwear. And no funny business."
"What about you?" Nino asked. He sounded annoyed, but not yet to the point of belligerent. He must have realized the same thing Jun did- that it was necessary in order to be safe. Some things had to be done, in order to remain in motion. It wasn't the worst thing they'd had to do in order to survive.
Toma nodded towards the woman, who lowered the gun a bit. "Ai will go into the back room, don't worry."
"I meant about your end of the bargain," Nino said, scowling. "You, too, remember?"
"I know it," Toma replied.
But it was Ohno who hit the real nail on the head, already pulling off his outer layers. "Who is going to check her?"
"Someone has to," Nino said, pointedly, despite the glower that was forming on Toma's features. Ai handed him the gun and moved back through what had once been the aisles of the store to the back room- the manager's office, perhaps, if the half-broken sign by the doorframe was anything to go by. Sho watched her disappear through the portal with a neutral expression.
"One of us," he said, almost gently- maybe he sensed Toma's displeasure with the situation. "Just one of us has to check."
It looked for a moment like Nino was going to say something about not trusting anyone other than himself and Ohno, but his jaw remained shut, and he voiced nothing. Ohno turned, shrugging off his sweatshirt, to meet Jun's gaze.
"Jun," he said.
There was a moment of silence, and Jun nodded. "Okay."
"Fine," Toma snapped. "Fine, whatever, just start stripping. Let's get this over with."
He seemed anxious, like he expected to find something unfortunate in the search- had they done it before, only to find that they were meters away from being infected themselves? How many groups had they encountered- and how many had actually been clean? They had the look of exhaustion, of being out in the thick of things too long. Jun understood that; he felt the same thing in every limb, bone-weary.
Jun went first- it was only fair. He had to go and effectively strip-search a woman he didn't know. It was cold when he tugged his jeans off, and he shivered a bit. Toma was quick, but thorough- he pulled away both of Jun's arms to check the insides of his elbows, and poked at the inner-side of his knees.
"Hits the extremities first," he commented, as if to explain his methods. Jun could have guessed that, from the hands and faces he'd seen- and Kame's leg. The furthest away from the internal organs; he wondered if it made it slower to die, slower to melt away and succumb to the virus overloading the systems it claimed.
After what felt like ages, Toma gave him a nod. "You're clean."
Sho began discarding his clothing as Jun pulled his back on. He had to force himself not to look at the tanned stretch of skin of his stomach, at the definition of Sho's muscles; he didn't have time to get caught up in that now, not with two unknowns in the same building as them. He kept his eyes on the mismatched floor tiles as he re-buttoned his jeans.
"We trust you," Aiba said, quietly, when he started down the aisle towards the back room.
Jun couldn't tell who was showing the most blind trust, honestly- he was walking into the back room alone to face a woman he didn't know was safe, and Toma was standing in the middle of four bodies that could be walking death-traps. Maybe they both had to give and take; maybe that was the nature of it. If they risked nothing, could they really gain enough to get out of the country and into safe ground again?
Ai was seated in a half-ripped office chair when he entered. She rose immediately, fingers tugging at the bottom of her shirt.
"Sorry," Jun said, awkwardly, lingering near the door as she shrugged off her blouse.
"Don't be," she said. She stepped out of her pants, and sort of extended her arms out to him, palms up towards the ceiling. She'd obviously had to do it before- but by the pink in her cheeks, it never really got any easier. Jun tried to stay objective when his eyes roved over the exposed flesh.
Jun swallowed hard when he checked her legs. "Feel like I should have your name."
"Kato," she said, voice cracking only a little. Even in the midst of everything, in the situation spiraling out of everyone's control, he could see what she had been before it- a little shy. Forced into protecting herself, but still clinging to the wisps of timid-ness. Her fingers were still soft and white, hands still manicured. "Kato Ai."
"Matsumoto," Jun introduced himself. "And- thanks. You're fine."
Ai began tugging back on her clothing, still flushed, and Jun averted his eyes; not that it would do any good now, but still, having something normal to fall back on felt more appropriate in the situation than the alternative did.
"I'm sorry for the methods," she said, quietly, as lithe fingers buttoned up her shirt again. "It's just that we've seen a lot of people who weren't what they claimed to be."
Jun's throat felt swollen. "And they were trying to get out of Japan?"
"Mm," she agreed. She pulled hair from the back of her collar, and tucked strands behind her ears. "People want out, even if they know they are dying. But- well, we can't. It's terrible, but we can't take them with."
"They'll spread the infection," Jun said.
"Yes," Ai sighed. "There's no good solution, you know? It's not simple or easy, it's just- how it is."
Jun thought of the family by the train tracks, and the woman from the fire escape. He thought about Kame, and the ones who had gotten out of the safety center, in a world that felt like forever ago. Everything had gotten very gray, lines dissolving; he wasn't sure which way was up, anymore, not really.
"And you and Toma...?"
"We got out," Ai said, startling him.
Jun just stared at her as she pulled on her shoes once more, buckling the straps adorned with dirty, half-tattered bows. "You- got out of Japan? And came back?"
"Mm," she said again. "We wanted to help. We saw what it was, and that hardly anyone else was doing it. And we owed our lives to those that helped us. We wanted to do the same thing."
He felt a swell of gratitude to them- they were putting their lives on the line when they didn't need, when they had already gotten free of the mess. They were trying to help, and if it worked, they owed Toma and Ai everything. Suddenly, having to strip down to be declared free of infection didn't seem so bad.
And the end was in sight, rapidly approaching over the bob of the waves in the ocean that separated them from safety.
"Thank you," Jun said, quietly. For a moment, he wasn't even sure if she heard him. But then she gave him a soft little smile that spoke volumes, and gestured back towards the door.
"Shall we?"
When they were all given the all-clear- which made Jun give a sigh of relief despite the fact that he'd already known they were- Toma and Ai led them back to the apartment across the way from the 7-11, near the one they'd stayed at the night before. They had a small base set up there, with some non-perishable food items and some extra ammunition.
Jun didn't ask where they'd gotten the guns. Given what he knew of their past experiences, he wasn't really sure he wanted to know.
But when Toma handed him a package of crackers, he dove right in. It had been awhile since they'd had much more than bare-bone supplies of their own.
"You're the only ones we've gotten for awhile," Toma explained, taking a sip from a bottle of soda. "We stay here for about a week, see how many we pick up, and then start onward towards the boat."
"Onward?" Aiba asked. "It's not here?"
Toma shook his head, and spilled a bit of the carbonated beverage on his sleeve. He brushed at it with two fingers. "Too much of a security risk."
"It's in Kashima, Ibaraki," Ai added.
"How many- haven't been clean?" Sho asked. He sounded a little quieter than normal- subdued, maybe.
There was a long silence, and then Toma cleared his throat a bit, staring down at the toes of his boots. "A lot."
Jun glanced over at Sho beside him, and Sho let his hand fall down to his side a bit, to the area between their thighs. It was just a brush when their palms touched, but it was enough. It made Jun feel a little better when he looked to the darkness rolling outside the window. Sho's fingers wrapped gently around his and squeezed.
"You're from Tokyo Central?" Ai asked.
"Three of us are," Aiba clarified, pointing at himself, and then Sho and Jun.
Toma nodded. "The University was quicker on isolating those they could. But even then, by the time they did, the government was long gone. They were gone the minute the news got out. So many people just didn't believe it."
"If you didn't have an organization kenneling you, there was no way to understand what was going on," Ai agreed.
Even from his vantage point across the room, Jun could see Nino and Ohno share a significant glance. That much was true- he'd heard it from Ohno himself.
"So," Aiba said, sounding a bit strangled, "how far is the boat?"
"Few days' walk," Toma answered. He shrugged a bit, jacket bunching at the seams. "Not that bad, all things considered."
It was so close. Jun could almost see the light at the end of the tunnel. It was like the coiling that had been so permanent in his stomach was slowly unraveling. He moved his hand to fully entwine his fingers with Sho's- he didn't care anymore. He was going to hold on.
Toma kicked a bit at some of the papers in the middle of the floor- maps, a couple of scribbled coordinates on ripped notebook paper, and what looked to be an old Chinese take-out menu with muddy footprints on it. "We'll leave tomorrow. They'll be expecting us soon."
"What do we do until then?" Ohno asked, almost sounding mournful.
Aiba reached into his bag and produced the tattered deck of cards. "Blackjack?"
"Or," Nino said, reaching for the box without asking, a gleam in his eye, "I could show you some magic tricks."
--
Traveling with people toting guns did a lot to alleviate Jun’s fears. So long as it was light outside, Toma and Ai could take care of most that tried to charge at them. A group of seven was far more intimidating - it would take a real swarm of infected to slow them down now.
Their saviors weren’t terribly forthcoming with information about themselves. She apparently had wealthy friends, connections. They’d gotten out almost immediately. More people had gotten out than they’d originally thought, only to get quarantined when reaching their destinations. Around the world, escaped Japanese were in containment centers awaiting word about their homeland.
“Is there a cure yet?” Sho wondered as they made their way along a deserted highway. They were going to head northwest then cut back northeast into Ibaraki Prefecture. The area around Narita and the airport were just as bad as the rumors had suggested.
Toma and Ai exchanged a look that Jun immediately knew meant no, but she put on a smile. “They’re working on it. At least that’s what we know. We’ve been back here for days. Who knows if they’ve made progress on it? Have to hope for the best.”
Their newest companions were just as cut off as the five of them were now that they were back on Japanese soil. The thought of getting out, though, was enough to keep Jun’s feet moving on the asphalt, walking around abandoned cars and over bodies of people who weren’t as fortunate.
They’d get to Kashima, get to Toma and Ai’s friends and the boat. But what then?
Toma, Ohno, Aiba and Nino were up in front, leaving him and Sho with Ai. She was checking the handgun nervously every few minutes - seeing how many bullets remained in the clip, flipping the safety on and off. He doubted that she or Toma had been marksmen before this had all gone down, but Jun himself had never killed anything larger than a bug before this either.
“Where will the boat take us?” he asked her.
She slid the gun back in the waistband of her pants, although Jun knew she’d be checking it again before too long. “Um, well. Where did you want to go?”
He looked at Sho. He looked just as lost, and Jun swallowed. Neither of them had been out of the country before - he suspected the same of their other three friends. Where the hell would they go? He didn’t know anyone in another country. He didn’t have anything aside from the clothes in his bag. What if they got all the way to Korea or somewhere and got turned away? What about his bank card? Would he even be able to take out money wherever they ended up?
“We didn’t know either,” Ai admitted sadly. “We just…we got out to sea. My friends, Toma, we were just bobbing on the waves. And we just didn’t know what to do.”
“Could go to Hawaii,” Sho mumbled. “Always nice in Hawaii.”
Jun chuckled, watching the sun starting to set over the horizon. “Yeah, we deserve a vacation after this.”
“The hell you guys laughing about back there?” Nino grumbled.
“Hawaii. We’re taking the boat to Hawaii,” Sho said, completely straight-faced.
“Ooh,” Aiba joined in. “We could go surfing.”
“Eat lots of pineapple,” Ohno said.
“Swim. Feel the sand between my toes,” Ai added.
Toma had the rifle perched on his shoulder. It was a bit off-putting when he cracked a big smile and laughed. “Sure, we’ll just relax on the beach until we get the all clear. That’s a great plan.”
It felt good to laugh. Aiba had tears in his eyes he was giggling so much, and Jun tossed an arm around his shoulder and laughed with him. It was going to be dark soon, so they made their way down one of the highway off ramps in search of shelter for the night. Sho walked the long way around a car and tripped over something, making a funny shout as he fell. Nino snorted, and Jun couldn’t help joining Aiba and Toma in a chuckle or two.
But then Sho stayed on the ground, and Jun stopped, pulling his arm away from Aiba to run over. Sho moved to lean his back against the car’s bumper, eyes wide. Toma was around the car first, face falling. Jun knelt down in front of Sho, hands on his shoulders. “What happened? Sho?”
Nino joined Toma. “Found what he tripped over.”
Sho already had tears in his eyes when Aiba came over and gasped. Jun almost didn’t want to peek around the car. Sho tried to grab his hand before he leaned over, but it was too late. It was a young woman, and he followed everyone’s gaze down to the poor woman’s abdomen.
“Pregnant,” Ai whispered, hand covering her mouth.
“She’s…” Aiba told them all, gaze drawn to the woman’s face. “She’s still…”
Then Jun saw it. Saw what had Sho speechless and crying. Her limbs were in various states of decay, but her eyes were open. They were still looking, still searching. What was it like, what could she see? What kind of pain was this? Her mouth was moving, and Jun could hear wheezing, gasping breaths. A pregnant woman, still alive. But dead. Wasn’t that how Nino had described this last part?
Toma and Ai looked at each other, and he simply nodded once. Nino tugged on Aiba’s arm, pulling him back away from the car and followed Ai and Ohno back down the off ramp. Jun rounded the car. “Sho.”
He looked stunned, unable to move, and Jun had crouch down and haul the man to his feet. Tears stung in his eyes as he half-dragged Sho away from the abandoned car. The gunshot echoed, and Sho’s breath hitched noisily with a sob. Jun tightened his grip around him as their ears still rung from Toma’s shot. They made it to a kindergarten building a block from the highway in silence.
--
There was potato chips for dinner. Sho had locked himself in one of the kindergarten classrooms, separate from the others. Aiba had been sitting outside the door for the better part of an hour, trying to get Sho to come out and eat.
He should be in there with him, but what the hell would he say? Aiba got to his feet when Jun approached. “Won’t even talk to me,” Aiba said sadly.
He just nodded. “I’ll stay with him.”
Aiba squeezed his shoulder. “There’s windows in there. They’re not blocked off like the ones where the rest of are. Try and get him to come back where it’s safer, okay?”
He waited for Aiba to disappear into the other classroom before he knocked. “Sho, it’s me.” He got on his tiptoes, trying to peek into the room. Sho was sitting on a rug cross-legged, staring at the wall. There were finger paintings there done by the children who’d once frequented the classroom. Pictures of fruit, flowers. Pictures of the children’s families. He knocked again. “Sho, let me in.”
It was almost fifteen minutes before Sho slowly got to his feet, stumbling over the door almost in a daze. The lock turned, and Jun caught Sho as he pulled the door open. He blinked back tears, sliding the door shut behind him as Sho’s weight tugged them both to the ground in a heap.
Jun could only hold him close as he sobbed, rocking back and forth. “She’s out of her misery. She’s somewhere else now, okay?”
“She was going to have a baby,” Sho was saying between gasping breaths, his voice going to a higher, hitching register. He was babbling, holding Jun so tight he could barely breathe. “They’re always talking about the birth rate in Japan going down, more older people, fewer children. I wrote a paper about it last semester, possible economic impact of…oh god, Jun, I…I stepped on her belly. I tripped over her. I…”
He pressed his lips to Sho’s temple. “You didn’t do anything. She was already gone, okay?”
“What if the baby was still…”
“Sho,” he reprimanded, his voice rather loud in the quiet classroom. “It’s okay. Come on. You need to eat something.”
He snorted. “Not exactly hungry.”
Jun sighed, running his fingers through Sho’s hair. “We’re all sleeping in the other room. Not safe here. They want to get moving when the sun comes up. Will you come with me?”
Sho wiped his nose and sniffed, letting out an annoyed groan as Jun pulled him up. “Hawaii right?”
“Right.” He met Sho’s eyes, seeing something in them he recalled from the night they’d reunited. Surely the same look was mirrored on his own face. They found each other, mouths crashing and noses hitting. Sho was still crying, clinging desperately as they kissed, seeking solace the only way they knew how. He had to break apart before they did something more. There was even less privacy now. “We have to go back.”
Sho caught his breath, closing his eyes and agreeing. “Just a minute.”
Jun waited as Sho went back to the wall of finger paintings. He took out the push pins, letting them fall to the floor as he took down a picture of a child’s bright blue handprint. He watched Sho fold it neatly, slipping it into the back pocket of his jeans. Sho gave him a weak smile as he came back, sliding open the door so they could return to the others.
--
It got harder as they got closer to Kashima- he got antsy, felt like they could move faster even with the blisters that dotted the back of his heels from his water-logged sneakers. They were all exhausted and he didn't want to push them, but he wanted to move faster. He wanted to get there sooner. The sun was breaking over the darkness and he wanted out; he wanted the safety of the waves and the firm sides of a boat.
"You mentioned a cure," Ohno said, as they continued after several days of moving in the late afternoon breeze that was hot against Jun's face. "But to have a cure, they have to know why it started, right?"
"It was a vaccine," Toma replied. He tapped the barrel of the gun against his shoulder, like he was beating out the rhythm to a song.
And ahead of them, a few paces in front, Nino scoffed and kicked at a scraggly weed growing out from between the pebble-strewn railway. "It's always a vaccine."
"What kind of vaccine?" Aiba asked, just as Jun said, "What do you mean it's always a vaccine?"
There was a silence, and Nino kicked again at the ground, sending a spray of tiny rocks flying up into the air. He shoved his hands in his pockets and turned around with a cheery skip to his step, a smirk gracing his features. He hopped backwards on the balls of his feet.
"Oh, come on," he said, as if it should have been painfully obvious. "It's always something like that- that's how humans work. We try to fix something, and we end up doing way more harm than good. Just like I Am Legend."
Toma looked wary; Jun felt the same way. He didn't like the gnawing sensation in his stomach that Nino's words were creating.
"I don't get it." Aiba frowned.
"In the movie, it was cancer," Nino explained, in a sing-song voice. He pulled one hand from his pockets and raised his finger up towards the sky, as if he were pointing out constellations during a star-viewing session. "They tried to cure cancer, and killed everyone with what they created instead."
There was another long stretch of quiet, with the breeze blowing through the long-stemmed weeds at either side. Near the coast, the air was salty and clean.
"So what was it a vaccine for?" Ohno finally asked.
"Alzheimer's," Ai answered. She looked rattled- she wrapped her arms around herself and squeezed, and Toma put his arm across her shoulders to pull her in a bit. "We think that's why it's centered so much on memory. Why it targets the brain first."
It was like biological warfare gone horribly, horribly wrong.
Sho was shaking again, and Jun reached over to tangle his fingers with the other man's. Nino was still walking backwards, step by step, frowning a bit in concentration. "But why the other symptoms? Why the rotting flesh?"
Toma shook his head. "Dunno. Heard that the virus is eating the living cells from the inside out, and that's why the memory goes, too."
"Stop," Sho said, suddenly. "Please- just stop."
All six sets of eyes snapped to look at him, but Sho wasn't focused on anything but the ground. His fingers closed tightly around Jun's hand, hungrily- needy. He wasn't okay; he still wasn't okay from the experience with the body, and Jun couldn't entirely blame him for that. It was enough to shake anyone up.
"But don't you want to know-" Ohno started, and Sho interrupted him with an empathic, "No."
Nino regarded him coolly- but not unkindly.
"Okay," the shorter man said, after a long moment. "Fine. Let's just keep walking."
Maybe Nino was too tired to snap, too tired to fight. Maybe underneath all the sarcasm and cheek grins, he really didn't want to know anymore about the virus they were running from, either.
They moved in silence for a long time. Over the side of the hills, Jun could occasionally see the spray of water against cliff rocks- the spray of ocean waves beating against the coast. It was calming and grounding all at the same time. He'd missed the ocean. He couldn't remember the last time he went surfing. And there had always been something peaceful about the waves, no matter how hard they broke against the surf.
They encountered a small beach-town just as the sun started to dip under the horizon, and the sky began to go dark. Ai's hand went back to the handgun, and Toma kept his rifle pointed forward, but it wasn't until halfway through the town, when the street lights flickered on through a hazy fog, that they saw any signs of movement.
It was quick- just a blur at the edge of Jun's vision. He spun a little, but lost it behind a building.
"There's one," Ohno murmured, under his breath. Toma stopped and aimed the rifle to the corner it had disappeared behind, and then there was another flash behind Jun. He turned, and then there was another- and another.
Four? No, five. Another, there, in the corner of the light spilling onto the concrete.
He kept turning, making a circle, and his breath caught in his throat. They were unconsciously starting to move in, forming a tighter pack, and he could hear the wheezing gasps from the others like they were coming from his own throat. Maybe they were.
Another flash, to his left, this one slower.
"Fuck," Toma hissed. The finger poised over the trigger to the rifle was trembling. The outline of a hunched form against the horizon, black with the sun at its back.
"What is this?" Aiba whispered. His elbow was digging into Jun's ribs. "They're everywhere-"
Ai let out a shaky gasp when there was a cackle near one of the ransacked buildings. It echoed a little through the structure, and into the night air.
They really were everywhere. Jun could see them on all sides of his vision, everywhere he looked- some were stumbling out from behind the corners of the buildings lining the street, only to surge back behind another and disappear from sight again. None of them stayed out long enough to solidify in Jun's vision.
They were making sure they couldn't be shot at with accuracy.
They were coordinated.
"Walked into the middle of a fucking hive," Toma rasped. He no longer sounded confident and sure of himself- he sounded just like them, just as scared shitless as the rest of them were, huddled around each other.
Jun kept waiting for one of them to attack- one of them had to lunge, right? There was a reason they were being encircled and trapped like prey- they were dinner.
Toma jammed the butt of his rifle against his shoulder, closing one eye and aiming. The barrels were lined up down the street, towards the direction they needed to continue moving in. "When I shoot," he said, very low, "we move. Run, and just keep moving."
There was an incredibly long moment when Jun forgot to breathe, and then the shots from the rifle rang out through the air. His legs moved without volition, propelling him forward; the others around him did the same, dashing forward with everything they still had left in their energy reserves.
And around them, the figures did the same- with rattling howls.
"Go!" Jun couldn't be sure who uttered it- maybe it wasn't even one of them. Maybe it was one of the creatures following them. But one jumped out almost in front of him with blackened skin and a mouth full of blood-stained teeth, and he dove to one side to avoid it. He narrowly avoided the rake of its fingernails and managed to land at least one hit to the stomach, but the action forced him to the side of a building, rounding some trash cans.
He knocked into them noisily, sending the metal flying, and kept moving. It was an alley- he couldn't see the others, but he could still hear them, and he knew what direction he had to go. He just kept moving.
A figure barreled out in front of him, knocking him over. He rolled and kicked at the back of its knee, shattering what was left of the kneecap. It went down with a howl. Jun didn't know if it could feel much pain, but it definitely wouldn't be running after him anymore with the shin hanging limply off the thigh like that.
He pushed himself up onto his feet once more, taking off again.
"Shoot it!" he could hear Nino hollering from the other side of the building he was running next to. Then there were three gunshots in quick succession; the rounds sounded like they came from Ai's handgun rather than Toma's rifle. There were two distinct shrieks of gurgled pain.
And then, over the din and screaming, "Jun?!"
Sho- he could hear Sho. Jun wanted to bang his hands on the bricks to alert them that he was still moving, still okay, but to do so would alert more to his presence. He just had to get out of the alley he was running through, and he could see the end and the yellow street light beyond it.
A creature appeared at the end of the corridor, blocking the light. Jun had a split second to react and threw himself to his right, to the other building- there was a door there. His shoulder ached when he slammed into it, but the wood splintered open and he stumbled inside whatever the structure had once been, nearly tripping over a chair that had rolled in front of the entrance.
There was another one inside, and Jun could hear it's mangled breathing. He tightened his grip on his metal pole and swung with all his might as it leapt for him. His arms reverberated from the contact.
It wasn't enough to kill, but it was enough to knock the thing down, leaving him an opening.
"-you," the Infected he had just hit wheezed from the ground, and the shock of hearing it speaking knocked the wind from Jun's lungs. "Fuck you!"
It lunged again, and he flew backwards, dropping his pole. Weaponless, he stumbled further into the building he'd fallen into. There weren't any lights on, but there windows, and he could see the outlines of machinery as he ran through it by the filtered orange of the street lamps. It was a car shop- a mechanic's garage. There were still cars up on jacks, meters from the ground, like no one had come to claim the vehicles again.
The thing screamed, mostly un-intelligible, and Jun darted around one of the cars. He needed something to fight with.
He ended up banging his shin on a metal shelving unit. Cursing, he stumbled as the pang shot up his leg- it gave the creature behind him an opportunity to catch up.
Jun grabbed for a wrench, and threw it. He caught the Infected in the head, between it eyes- it fell backwards like it had been shot, collapsing in a heap on the floor. And just when Jun tried to catch his breath again, there were hands darting out from underneath the car he was trembling behind.
Fingers grabbed for his shoelaces. He managed to sidestep them, but his heart was in his throat, and he couldn't see straight from terror in his veins. He kicked instinctively at the jack holding the back of the car up.
Either he had more strength than he knew, or the vehicle had been precariously balanced in the first place; it gave a heaving screech, metal shrieking against metal, and then the jack in the front crumbled when the one in the back clattered out across the floor, and the entirety of the car lurched to one side, falling on the Infected still crying to claw at Jun's ankles.
The creature quieted almost immediately, falling still, and the blood pooled faster than Jun had ever seen it. He tried to get over the growing puddle, but his shoelaces were unhooked, and he tumbled forward, knees hitting the ground with a splash. He managed to catch himself on the tool cabinet, and breathed a long, shaky sigh of relief when his body teetered and stayed upright.
He'd managed to keep his hands from falling in the blood.
His jeans were soaked when he righted himself, but his palms were clean; he wiped them on his shirt anyway. His shin was throbbing from impact with the damn corner, and outside, he could hear gunshots- distinctly from Toma's rifle. They were still close enough for him to hear their voices.
He stumbled back out into the warm night air, and nearly ran into Aiba, who grasped at his wrists with tight fingers immediately. "Jun, Jun, come on, come on, we have to get out-"
He was mostly just babbling, but Jun had never agreed with anymore more- he wanted out. He'd take the openness of the rail line rather than the maze of buildings. There were too many places for the Infected to hide in town.
"Jun, hurry, hurry," Aiba kept gasping, pulling Jun forward, and Jun allowed the other man to tug him down the street.
They ran until they couldn’t. His side ached, and finally Ohno called out. “Stop, stop. I can’t run any more!”
It was dark. Jun had no idea where they were, and he was sweating more than he probably ever had. He felt disgusting. “Shit,” Toma muttered, looking around. They’d been moving so quickly away from the last town that the careful progress they’d made earlier had been forgotten.
“We’re lost?” Sho asked.
“No,” Ai said almost immediately. “We’re not. We’re just…”
“Gonna take too long to get to Kashima.” Toma pulled a fading map from the pocket of his jacket. The seven of them huddled under a flickering street lamp as Toma held the map open. There were parts crossed out, just like Nino’s Tokyo map had been. But nearly everything between their current location and Kashima was crossed out. “Boat’s going to leave in two days, with or without us. We can’t afford to fall behind.”
“But we need to clean up,” Aiba complained, holding the one part of his shirt that hadn’t been covered in blood. “This can’t be safe. We can’t keep moving at night like this.”
“And sleep,” Nino grumbled. “I need a nap.”
“Sure, take a nap,” Toma fired back. “And when there’s no boat because they think we’ve all been torn apart, then what?”
Nino quieted down, shrugging out of his bloody jacket and tossing it aside. They’d had to drop their bags ages ago - it was slowing them down. They had no clothes. “Look,” Jun said, leaning against the light pole and still desperate to catch his breath. “We’re gross, all of us. I get that we have to keep moving but…”
“We go through the night,” Ai said decisively. “The boat is more important than anything. And besides, it’s already late. I don’t want to go into a building and get ambushed. We’ll stop tomorrow, get changed.”
They had to bow to the wishes of the people with guns. The people who knew the way to the boat. Nino yawned. “Fine. Which way?”
Their reflexes were bound to be slower. But what choice did they have? They needed to be on that boat. Sho gave his hand a squeeze before moving on ahead after Toma. At least they weren’t running now. They continued off into the darkened streets, and his jeans were getting stiffer and more uncomfortable as the blood started to dry.
--
By late morning they’d found their way back to the rail line that took them into Kashima. They were like the walking dead themselves. Toma had gone through a few energy drinks he still had in his backpack, but the rest hadn’t been as fortunate. Then again, Toma was toting the big gun - he didn’t need to fall asleep standing up.
They were only a few kilometers from the city’s industrial district where Ai had said the boat was stashed. There’d been no laughter, no howling since they’d moved into the city limits. There was a department store just past one of the railway crossings. Water, fresh clothes…
“And furniture!” Aiba shouted. “I’m going to find a reclining chair.”
“Fuck chairs,” Nino said, rolling his eyes. “I call the best mattress they’ve got out for sale.”
They walked over broken glass to enter the store. Nino went off to find his bed while Toma kept watch at the entrance. Ai, Ohno and Sho went off in search of water in the store cafeteria while he and Aiba went to pick out clothes for everyone. Things had been picked through, and clothes were strewn every which way. People probably imagined the world was ending - they figured it was time to take what they wanted before someone else did.
The electronics section was completely bare as he pushed a shopping cart through to the men’s clothing area. Aiba scampered around, full of an energy Jun knew he himself could never possess. He was exhausted and just leaned against the cart, still thinking about the mechanic’s place and the car falling. He had to focus - had to think about getting on that boat. Aiba gave him a little pat on the head before dumping a heap of clean clothes into the cart.
“You look like crap.”
“Thanks.”
He eyed the things Aiba had tossed into the cart. Nothing too hideous - just t-shirts and new jeans. He grabbed a belt as they pushed back to the furniture area since there was no way Aiba had checked all the labels. Nino was already spread out, limbs sprawling across a nice looking mattress. He’d stripped down to his underwear, leaving his filthy clothes on the floor beside the bed and was already snoring.
“Guess he really was tired,” Aiba said with a smile when they approached. “Water, yes!”
Sho had his arms full with water while Ai and Ohno carried bottled juice and candy. “Just stuff to rot our teeth,” Sho said quietly, “but the sugar should keep us going.”
“We’ll stay until mid-afternoon,” Ai told them. “Then we walk again until it’s dark. If we can meet our people by tomorrow afternoon, we can start making preparations.” She found her way to the mattress next to Nino and flopped down casually. It was nice to have a moment to rest and relax, although she kept the handgun at her side, reminding them that there was no such thing as safe any longer.
“Sounds good,” Jun replied, grabbing a t-shirt and jeans from the cart. He gave Sho a weak smile and took a couple bottles from him. “Be right back.”
Nobody else seemed to have the urge to change yet, but he seemed to be the most disgusting right then anyhow. He shoved his way to the men’s room around the corner. It stunk - he didn’t even need to step into the room to know there were bodies inside. He swallowed down the bile rising in his throat and left.
He had to settle for a dressing room at the other end of the floor. The water would pool all over the floor, but it wasn’t the worst thing that had made a mess in the department store, all things considered. He pulled the t-shirt over his head with a sigh, hearing his neck and arms pop. It would be good to get a nap after this.
The jeans were nearly stuck to him, and he had to tug at the bottom of his one leg. The denim was completely stuck. A rush of pain shot up from his shin as he yanked at the material, tossing the jeans angrily against the dressing room wall.
“Shit,” he hissed, remembering the contact his shin had made at the mechanic’s shop. He’d probably have a nice purple bruise waiting. He opened the first bottle of water and dumped half of it over his head. It was warm from sitting in an abandoned store for a month, but he didn’t care. He rubbed his face, ran his fingers through his hair. Maybe the damn boat would have a real shower?
He poured the water over each limb, little flakes of dried blood scrubbing off as he ran his hands up and down his arm. The floor was growing slick with the water, and he was probably just going to slip and land on his ass. He sat down with a heavy groan, opening the second bottle and pouring some on his right leg, then his left.
The blood that had soaked through his jeans had left red stains over his legs. He ran his hands up and down, watching it disappear. His shin was still tender, so he couldn’t scrub as hard. The blood flaked and vanished until he hit a sore spot. “Son of a…” He’d hit his leg harder than he’d even thought. They’d been so consumed with hurrying away that the pain was only really catching up now.
“Come off,” he grumbled to himself as the injury throbbed. He added more water, but his finger stopped as he reached it.
The bruising and blood stains and his own ignorance had hidden it until now. There was a gouge in his shin, no more than a few centimeters across, and the blood that was coming off with the water was fresh. He pressed his finger against the wound, hand trembling. It was bright when he brought his hand away - it was his own blood.
And he’d landed in the infected one’s after he’d hurt his shin, hadn’t he? Hadn’t he? All he could do was stare at his leg, at the tiny bit of skin that was marred, dark hair matted and damp from the water he’d been pouring. Maybe they were mistaken, he thought frantically as he covered the wound with his hand, shutting his eyes tight to avoid the sight of it.
Maybe infection traveled a different way. Surely it hadn’t been enough to get him. No, his mind was screaming now. You walked around for hours, bleeding, with blood of an infected soaking into your jeans. He pulled his hand away. Still red.
He dropped the water bottle, plastic hitting linoleum and it spilled on his boxers, spraying onto the fresh clothes he’d brought in with him. “No,” he whispered. “No no no, please.” He scooted backwards until he hit the dressing room wall, rattling the filthy mirror. His mouth felt dry, and he couldn’t breathe. “No.”
The blood was trickling down his leg - his life was draining out wasn’t it? The boat. They’d reach the boat in another day, wouldn’t they? Toma and Ai’s friends, they’d want to inspect him, right? He stared at the filthy t-shirt he’d discarded, pulling it to him with a muffled sob.
There were specks in his vision as his tears hit the lenses of his glasses, leaving spots. He tore at the shirt, feeling a ringing in his ears as he ripped the material. He was going to forget. He was going to get angry. His skin was going to disintegrate. People were going to trip over him and take pity but keep moving.
“No!” he sputtered, working the soft shirt material around his leg, tying it tight. There was already red seeping through. “Damn it damn it damn it.” He stumbled to his feet, grabbing the clothes Aiba had picked out. He yanked at the tags, pulling the jeans on. The belt he’d brought lay forgotten as he used his teeth to get the tag off of the new t-shirt.
He pulled it over his head, nearly knocking his glasses off his nose in his haste. He picked up the discarded jeans, tugging his tiny planner from the rear pocket. Jun pulled it open, eyes scanning dates, randomly jotted notes.
“You can’t forget,” he told himself, trying to get his panic attack under control as his wet fingers flipped pages. “You can’t ever forget.” What was he going to tell them? What was he going to tell Sho?
He shoved the planner into his pocket and used the water he hadn’t spilt to clean his hands, drying them on his new jeans. His wound wasn’t bleeding through. But what did it matter? He tossed the old jeans and shirt in the corner of the room, sliding back into his sneakers.
Jun pulled the door open and nearly stumbled back.
“Hey, took long enough,” Aiba said cheerfully, hand poised to pull the door open himself. “Bathroom’s definitely off limits huh? I’ll change in here too.”
He could barely get a word out, so all he did was nod as he shoved his way around Aiba, who continued into the dressing room. Jun cleaned his glasses on his new shirt, hoping he didn’t look too puffy. There was no time to think about it now - he needed to rest. When he woke up, he could think of what the hell to do.
He made his way back. Ohno was gone, probably off to maintain watch with Toma. Ai and Nino were still fast asleep, and he found Sho curled up on one of the couches. He knelt down, feeling his eyes start to water again. “Damn it,” he whispered. He couldn’t touch him - he could never touch him, not now.
Jun got to his feet, finding another couch. Under the denim on his leg, his wound was probably still bleeding, a constant reminder. He shut his eyes, feeling the planner underneath him in his pocket.
He had to fight it. He had to remember. He had to try remembering everything.
Chapter: 9/10
Fandom: Arashi
Character, Pairing(s): Sakumoto, Ohmiya
Rating: R
Warnings: Graphic violence, language.
Summary: Do you remember me? Lost for so long? Will you be on the other side? Will you forget me?
"Over there," Ai said, with a little wave of the gun still clutched in her hands.
The inside of the 7-11 was sparse, decorated with the remainder of the cases and the coolers against the far wall. It had obviously been raided a dozen times over already- maybe that was why they chose it, to make it a less obvious target. There was glass all over the floor that crunched with each footstep and hissed a bit at Jun's ears. He followed the other four into the corner Ai had been pointing at, waiting; everything hung poised at the edge of the blade sharpened between them. They couldn't trust the others- and the others couldn't trust them. Not yet, anyway.
"One by one," Toma said, hands on his hips. "Down to your underwear. And no funny business."
"What about you?" Nino asked. He sounded annoyed, but not yet to the point of belligerent. He must have realized the same thing Jun did- that it was necessary in order to be safe. Some things had to be done, in order to remain in motion. It wasn't the worst thing they'd had to do in order to survive.
Toma nodded towards the woman, who lowered the gun a bit. "Ai will go into the back room, don't worry."
"I meant about your end of the bargain," Nino said, scowling. "You, too, remember?"
"I know it," Toma replied.
But it was Ohno who hit the real nail on the head, already pulling off his outer layers. "Who is going to check her?"
"Someone has to," Nino said, pointedly, despite the glower that was forming on Toma's features. Ai handed him the gun and moved back through what had once been the aisles of the store to the back room- the manager's office, perhaps, if the half-broken sign by the doorframe was anything to go by. Sho watched her disappear through the portal with a neutral expression.
"One of us," he said, almost gently- maybe he sensed Toma's displeasure with the situation. "Just one of us has to check."
It looked for a moment like Nino was going to say something about not trusting anyone other than himself and Ohno, but his jaw remained shut, and he voiced nothing. Ohno turned, shrugging off his sweatshirt, to meet Jun's gaze.
"Jun," he said.
There was a moment of silence, and Jun nodded. "Okay."
"Fine," Toma snapped. "Fine, whatever, just start stripping. Let's get this over with."
He seemed anxious, like he expected to find something unfortunate in the search- had they done it before, only to find that they were meters away from being infected themselves? How many groups had they encountered- and how many had actually been clean? They had the look of exhaustion, of being out in the thick of things too long. Jun understood that; he felt the same thing in every limb, bone-weary.
Jun went first- it was only fair. He had to go and effectively strip-search a woman he didn't know. It was cold when he tugged his jeans off, and he shivered a bit. Toma was quick, but thorough- he pulled away both of Jun's arms to check the insides of his elbows, and poked at the inner-side of his knees.
"Hits the extremities first," he commented, as if to explain his methods. Jun could have guessed that, from the hands and faces he'd seen- and Kame's leg. The furthest away from the internal organs; he wondered if it made it slower to die, slower to melt away and succumb to the virus overloading the systems it claimed.
After what felt like ages, Toma gave him a nod. "You're clean."
Sho began discarding his clothing as Jun pulled his back on. He had to force himself not to look at the tanned stretch of skin of his stomach, at the definition of Sho's muscles; he didn't have time to get caught up in that now, not with two unknowns in the same building as them. He kept his eyes on the mismatched floor tiles as he re-buttoned his jeans.
"We trust you," Aiba said, quietly, when he started down the aisle towards the back room.
Jun couldn't tell who was showing the most blind trust, honestly- he was walking into the back room alone to face a woman he didn't know was safe, and Toma was standing in the middle of four bodies that could be walking death-traps. Maybe they both had to give and take; maybe that was the nature of it. If they risked nothing, could they really gain enough to get out of the country and into safe ground again?
Ai was seated in a half-ripped office chair when he entered. She rose immediately, fingers tugging at the bottom of her shirt.
"Sorry," Jun said, awkwardly, lingering near the door as she shrugged off her blouse.
"Don't be," she said. She stepped out of her pants, and sort of extended her arms out to him, palms up towards the ceiling. She'd obviously had to do it before- but by the pink in her cheeks, it never really got any easier. Jun tried to stay objective when his eyes roved over the exposed flesh.
Jun swallowed hard when he checked her legs. "Feel like I should have your name."
"Kato," she said, voice cracking only a little. Even in the midst of everything, in the situation spiraling out of everyone's control, he could see what she had been before it- a little shy. Forced into protecting herself, but still clinging to the wisps of timid-ness. Her fingers were still soft and white, hands still manicured. "Kato Ai."
"Matsumoto," Jun introduced himself. "And- thanks. You're fine."
Ai began tugging back on her clothing, still flushed, and Jun averted his eyes; not that it would do any good now, but still, having something normal to fall back on felt more appropriate in the situation than the alternative did.
"I'm sorry for the methods," she said, quietly, as lithe fingers buttoned up her shirt again. "It's just that we've seen a lot of people who weren't what they claimed to be."
Jun's throat felt swollen. "And they were trying to get out of Japan?"
"Mm," she agreed. She pulled hair from the back of her collar, and tucked strands behind her ears. "People want out, even if they know they are dying. But- well, we can't. It's terrible, but we can't take them with."
"They'll spread the infection," Jun said.
"Yes," Ai sighed. "There's no good solution, you know? It's not simple or easy, it's just- how it is."
Jun thought of the family by the train tracks, and the woman from the fire escape. He thought about Kame, and the ones who had gotten out of the safety center, in a world that felt like forever ago. Everything had gotten very gray, lines dissolving; he wasn't sure which way was up, anymore, not really.
"And you and Toma...?"
"We got out," Ai said, startling him.
Jun just stared at her as she pulled on her shoes once more, buckling the straps adorned with dirty, half-tattered bows. "You- got out of Japan? And came back?"
"Mm," she said again. "We wanted to help. We saw what it was, and that hardly anyone else was doing it. And we owed our lives to those that helped us. We wanted to do the same thing."
He felt a swell of gratitude to them- they were putting their lives on the line when they didn't need, when they had already gotten free of the mess. They were trying to help, and if it worked, they owed Toma and Ai everything. Suddenly, having to strip down to be declared free of infection didn't seem so bad.
And the end was in sight, rapidly approaching over the bob of the waves in the ocean that separated them from safety.
"Thank you," Jun said, quietly. For a moment, he wasn't even sure if she heard him. But then she gave him a soft little smile that spoke volumes, and gestured back towards the door.
"Shall we?"
When they were all given the all-clear- which made Jun give a sigh of relief despite the fact that he'd already known they were- Toma and Ai led them back to the apartment across the way from the 7-11, near the one they'd stayed at the night before. They had a small base set up there, with some non-perishable food items and some extra ammunition.
Jun didn't ask where they'd gotten the guns. Given what he knew of their past experiences, he wasn't really sure he wanted to know.
But when Toma handed him a package of crackers, he dove right in. It had been awhile since they'd had much more than bare-bone supplies of their own.
"You're the only ones we've gotten for awhile," Toma explained, taking a sip from a bottle of soda. "We stay here for about a week, see how many we pick up, and then start onward towards the boat."
"Onward?" Aiba asked. "It's not here?"
Toma shook his head, and spilled a bit of the carbonated beverage on his sleeve. He brushed at it with two fingers. "Too much of a security risk."
"It's in Kashima, Ibaraki," Ai added.
"How many- haven't been clean?" Sho asked. He sounded a little quieter than normal- subdued, maybe.
There was a long silence, and then Toma cleared his throat a bit, staring down at the toes of his boots. "A lot."
Jun glanced over at Sho beside him, and Sho let his hand fall down to his side a bit, to the area between their thighs. It was just a brush when their palms touched, but it was enough. It made Jun feel a little better when he looked to the darkness rolling outside the window. Sho's fingers wrapped gently around his and squeezed.
"You're from Tokyo Central?" Ai asked.
"Three of us are," Aiba clarified, pointing at himself, and then Sho and Jun.
Toma nodded. "The University was quicker on isolating those they could. But even then, by the time they did, the government was long gone. They were gone the minute the news got out. So many people just didn't believe it."
"If you didn't have an organization kenneling you, there was no way to understand what was going on," Ai agreed.
Even from his vantage point across the room, Jun could see Nino and Ohno share a significant glance. That much was true- he'd heard it from Ohno himself.
"So," Aiba said, sounding a bit strangled, "how far is the boat?"
"Few days' walk," Toma answered. He shrugged a bit, jacket bunching at the seams. "Not that bad, all things considered."
It was so close. Jun could almost see the light at the end of the tunnel. It was like the coiling that had been so permanent in his stomach was slowly unraveling. He moved his hand to fully entwine his fingers with Sho's- he didn't care anymore. He was going to hold on.
Toma kicked a bit at some of the papers in the middle of the floor- maps, a couple of scribbled coordinates on ripped notebook paper, and what looked to be an old Chinese take-out menu with muddy footprints on it. "We'll leave tomorrow. They'll be expecting us soon."
"What do we do until then?" Ohno asked, almost sounding mournful.
Aiba reached into his bag and produced the tattered deck of cards. "Blackjack?"
"Or," Nino said, reaching for the box without asking, a gleam in his eye, "I could show you some magic tricks."
--
Traveling with people toting guns did a lot to alleviate Jun’s fears. So long as it was light outside, Toma and Ai could take care of most that tried to charge at them. A group of seven was far more intimidating - it would take a real swarm of infected to slow them down now.
Their saviors weren’t terribly forthcoming with information about themselves. She apparently had wealthy friends, connections. They’d gotten out almost immediately. More people had gotten out than they’d originally thought, only to get quarantined when reaching their destinations. Around the world, escaped Japanese were in containment centers awaiting word about their homeland.
“Is there a cure yet?” Sho wondered as they made their way along a deserted highway. They were going to head northwest then cut back northeast into Ibaraki Prefecture. The area around Narita and the airport were just as bad as the rumors had suggested.
Toma and Ai exchanged a look that Jun immediately knew meant no, but she put on a smile. “They’re working on it. At least that’s what we know. We’ve been back here for days. Who knows if they’ve made progress on it? Have to hope for the best.”
Their newest companions were just as cut off as the five of them were now that they were back on Japanese soil. The thought of getting out, though, was enough to keep Jun’s feet moving on the asphalt, walking around abandoned cars and over bodies of people who weren’t as fortunate.
They’d get to Kashima, get to Toma and Ai’s friends and the boat. But what then?
Toma, Ohno, Aiba and Nino were up in front, leaving him and Sho with Ai. She was checking the handgun nervously every few minutes - seeing how many bullets remained in the clip, flipping the safety on and off. He doubted that she or Toma had been marksmen before this had all gone down, but Jun himself had never killed anything larger than a bug before this either.
“Where will the boat take us?” he asked her.
She slid the gun back in the waistband of her pants, although Jun knew she’d be checking it again before too long. “Um, well. Where did you want to go?”
He looked at Sho. He looked just as lost, and Jun swallowed. Neither of them had been out of the country before - he suspected the same of their other three friends. Where the hell would they go? He didn’t know anyone in another country. He didn’t have anything aside from the clothes in his bag. What if they got all the way to Korea or somewhere and got turned away? What about his bank card? Would he even be able to take out money wherever they ended up?
“We didn’t know either,” Ai admitted sadly. “We just…we got out to sea. My friends, Toma, we were just bobbing on the waves. And we just didn’t know what to do.”
“Could go to Hawaii,” Sho mumbled. “Always nice in Hawaii.”
Jun chuckled, watching the sun starting to set over the horizon. “Yeah, we deserve a vacation after this.”
“The hell you guys laughing about back there?” Nino grumbled.
“Hawaii. We’re taking the boat to Hawaii,” Sho said, completely straight-faced.
“Ooh,” Aiba joined in. “We could go surfing.”
“Eat lots of pineapple,” Ohno said.
“Swim. Feel the sand between my toes,” Ai added.
Toma had the rifle perched on his shoulder. It was a bit off-putting when he cracked a big smile and laughed. “Sure, we’ll just relax on the beach until we get the all clear. That’s a great plan.”
It felt good to laugh. Aiba had tears in his eyes he was giggling so much, and Jun tossed an arm around his shoulder and laughed with him. It was going to be dark soon, so they made their way down one of the highway off ramps in search of shelter for the night. Sho walked the long way around a car and tripped over something, making a funny shout as he fell. Nino snorted, and Jun couldn’t help joining Aiba and Toma in a chuckle or two.
But then Sho stayed on the ground, and Jun stopped, pulling his arm away from Aiba to run over. Sho moved to lean his back against the car’s bumper, eyes wide. Toma was around the car first, face falling. Jun knelt down in front of Sho, hands on his shoulders. “What happened? Sho?”
Nino joined Toma. “Found what he tripped over.”
Sho already had tears in his eyes when Aiba came over and gasped. Jun almost didn’t want to peek around the car. Sho tried to grab his hand before he leaned over, but it was too late. It was a young woman, and he followed everyone’s gaze down to the poor woman’s abdomen.
“Pregnant,” Ai whispered, hand covering her mouth.
“She’s…” Aiba told them all, gaze drawn to the woman’s face. “She’s still…”
Then Jun saw it. Saw what had Sho speechless and crying. Her limbs were in various states of decay, but her eyes were open. They were still looking, still searching. What was it like, what could she see? What kind of pain was this? Her mouth was moving, and Jun could hear wheezing, gasping breaths. A pregnant woman, still alive. But dead. Wasn’t that how Nino had described this last part?
Toma and Ai looked at each other, and he simply nodded once. Nino tugged on Aiba’s arm, pulling him back away from the car and followed Ai and Ohno back down the off ramp. Jun rounded the car. “Sho.”
He looked stunned, unable to move, and Jun had crouch down and haul the man to his feet. Tears stung in his eyes as he half-dragged Sho away from the abandoned car. The gunshot echoed, and Sho’s breath hitched noisily with a sob. Jun tightened his grip around him as their ears still rung from Toma’s shot. They made it to a kindergarten building a block from the highway in silence.
--
There was potato chips for dinner. Sho had locked himself in one of the kindergarten classrooms, separate from the others. Aiba had been sitting outside the door for the better part of an hour, trying to get Sho to come out and eat.
He should be in there with him, but what the hell would he say? Aiba got to his feet when Jun approached. “Won’t even talk to me,” Aiba said sadly.
He just nodded. “I’ll stay with him.”
Aiba squeezed his shoulder. “There’s windows in there. They’re not blocked off like the ones where the rest of are. Try and get him to come back where it’s safer, okay?”
He waited for Aiba to disappear into the other classroom before he knocked. “Sho, it’s me.” He got on his tiptoes, trying to peek into the room. Sho was sitting on a rug cross-legged, staring at the wall. There were finger paintings there done by the children who’d once frequented the classroom. Pictures of fruit, flowers. Pictures of the children’s families. He knocked again. “Sho, let me in.”
It was almost fifteen minutes before Sho slowly got to his feet, stumbling over the door almost in a daze. The lock turned, and Jun caught Sho as he pulled the door open. He blinked back tears, sliding the door shut behind him as Sho’s weight tugged them both to the ground in a heap.
Jun could only hold him close as he sobbed, rocking back and forth. “She’s out of her misery. She’s somewhere else now, okay?”
“She was going to have a baby,” Sho was saying between gasping breaths, his voice going to a higher, hitching register. He was babbling, holding Jun so tight he could barely breathe. “They’re always talking about the birth rate in Japan going down, more older people, fewer children. I wrote a paper about it last semester, possible economic impact of…oh god, Jun, I…I stepped on her belly. I tripped over her. I…”
He pressed his lips to Sho’s temple. “You didn’t do anything. She was already gone, okay?”
“What if the baby was still…”
“Sho,” he reprimanded, his voice rather loud in the quiet classroom. “It’s okay. Come on. You need to eat something.”
He snorted. “Not exactly hungry.”
Jun sighed, running his fingers through Sho’s hair. “We’re all sleeping in the other room. Not safe here. They want to get moving when the sun comes up. Will you come with me?”
Sho wiped his nose and sniffed, letting out an annoyed groan as Jun pulled him up. “Hawaii right?”
“Right.” He met Sho’s eyes, seeing something in them he recalled from the night they’d reunited. Surely the same look was mirrored on his own face. They found each other, mouths crashing and noses hitting. Sho was still crying, clinging desperately as they kissed, seeking solace the only way they knew how. He had to break apart before they did something more. There was even less privacy now. “We have to go back.”
Sho caught his breath, closing his eyes and agreeing. “Just a minute.”
Jun waited as Sho went back to the wall of finger paintings. He took out the push pins, letting them fall to the floor as he took down a picture of a child’s bright blue handprint. He watched Sho fold it neatly, slipping it into the back pocket of his jeans. Sho gave him a weak smile as he came back, sliding open the door so they could return to the others.
--
It got harder as they got closer to Kashima- he got antsy, felt like they could move faster even with the blisters that dotted the back of his heels from his water-logged sneakers. They were all exhausted and he didn't want to push them, but he wanted to move faster. He wanted to get there sooner. The sun was breaking over the darkness and he wanted out; he wanted the safety of the waves and the firm sides of a boat.
"You mentioned a cure," Ohno said, as they continued after several days of moving in the late afternoon breeze that was hot against Jun's face. "But to have a cure, they have to know why it started, right?"
"It was a vaccine," Toma replied. He tapped the barrel of the gun against his shoulder, like he was beating out the rhythm to a song.
And ahead of them, a few paces in front, Nino scoffed and kicked at a scraggly weed growing out from between the pebble-strewn railway. "It's always a vaccine."
"What kind of vaccine?" Aiba asked, just as Jun said, "What do you mean it's always a vaccine?"
There was a silence, and Nino kicked again at the ground, sending a spray of tiny rocks flying up into the air. He shoved his hands in his pockets and turned around with a cheery skip to his step, a smirk gracing his features. He hopped backwards on the balls of his feet.
"Oh, come on," he said, as if it should have been painfully obvious. "It's always something like that- that's how humans work. We try to fix something, and we end up doing way more harm than good. Just like I Am Legend."
Toma looked wary; Jun felt the same way. He didn't like the gnawing sensation in his stomach that Nino's words were creating.
"I don't get it." Aiba frowned.
"In the movie, it was cancer," Nino explained, in a sing-song voice. He pulled one hand from his pockets and raised his finger up towards the sky, as if he were pointing out constellations during a star-viewing session. "They tried to cure cancer, and killed everyone with what they created instead."
There was another long stretch of quiet, with the breeze blowing through the long-stemmed weeds at either side. Near the coast, the air was salty and clean.
"So what was it a vaccine for?" Ohno finally asked.
"Alzheimer's," Ai answered. She looked rattled- she wrapped her arms around herself and squeezed, and Toma put his arm across her shoulders to pull her in a bit. "We think that's why it's centered so much on memory. Why it targets the brain first."
It was like biological warfare gone horribly, horribly wrong.
Sho was shaking again, and Jun reached over to tangle his fingers with the other man's. Nino was still walking backwards, step by step, frowning a bit in concentration. "But why the other symptoms? Why the rotting flesh?"
Toma shook his head. "Dunno. Heard that the virus is eating the living cells from the inside out, and that's why the memory goes, too."
"Stop," Sho said, suddenly. "Please- just stop."
All six sets of eyes snapped to look at him, but Sho wasn't focused on anything but the ground. His fingers closed tightly around Jun's hand, hungrily- needy. He wasn't okay; he still wasn't okay from the experience with the body, and Jun couldn't entirely blame him for that. It was enough to shake anyone up.
"But don't you want to know-" Ohno started, and Sho interrupted him with an empathic, "No."
Nino regarded him coolly- but not unkindly.
"Okay," the shorter man said, after a long moment. "Fine. Let's just keep walking."
Maybe Nino was too tired to snap, too tired to fight. Maybe underneath all the sarcasm and cheek grins, he really didn't want to know anymore about the virus they were running from, either.
They moved in silence for a long time. Over the side of the hills, Jun could occasionally see the spray of water against cliff rocks- the spray of ocean waves beating against the coast. It was calming and grounding all at the same time. He'd missed the ocean. He couldn't remember the last time he went surfing. And there had always been something peaceful about the waves, no matter how hard they broke against the surf.
They encountered a small beach-town just as the sun started to dip under the horizon, and the sky began to go dark. Ai's hand went back to the handgun, and Toma kept his rifle pointed forward, but it wasn't until halfway through the town, when the street lights flickered on through a hazy fog, that they saw any signs of movement.
It was quick- just a blur at the edge of Jun's vision. He spun a little, but lost it behind a building.
"There's one," Ohno murmured, under his breath. Toma stopped and aimed the rifle to the corner it had disappeared behind, and then there was another flash behind Jun. He turned, and then there was another- and another.
Four? No, five. Another, there, in the corner of the light spilling onto the concrete.
He kept turning, making a circle, and his breath caught in his throat. They were unconsciously starting to move in, forming a tighter pack, and he could hear the wheezing gasps from the others like they were coming from his own throat. Maybe they were.
Another flash, to his left, this one slower.
"Fuck," Toma hissed. The finger poised over the trigger to the rifle was trembling. The outline of a hunched form against the horizon, black with the sun at its back.
"What is this?" Aiba whispered. His elbow was digging into Jun's ribs. "They're everywhere-"
Ai let out a shaky gasp when there was a cackle near one of the ransacked buildings. It echoed a little through the structure, and into the night air.
They really were everywhere. Jun could see them on all sides of his vision, everywhere he looked- some were stumbling out from behind the corners of the buildings lining the street, only to surge back behind another and disappear from sight again. None of them stayed out long enough to solidify in Jun's vision.
They were making sure they couldn't be shot at with accuracy.
They were coordinated.
"Walked into the middle of a fucking hive," Toma rasped. He no longer sounded confident and sure of himself- he sounded just like them, just as scared shitless as the rest of them were, huddled around each other.
Jun kept waiting for one of them to attack- one of them had to lunge, right? There was a reason they were being encircled and trapped like prey- they were dinner.
Toma jammed the butt of his rifle against his shoulder, closing one eye and aiming. The barrels were lined up down the street, towards the direction they needed to continue moving in. "When I shoot," he said, very low, "we move. Run, and just keep moving."
There was an incredibly long moment when Jun forgot to breathe, and then the shots from the rifle rang out through the air. His legs moved without volition, propelling him forward; the others around him did the same, dashing forward with everything they still had left in their energy reserves.
And around them, the figures did the same- with rattling howls.
"Go!" Jun couldn't be sure who uttered it- maybe it wasn't even one of them. Maybe it was one of the creatures following them. But one jumped out almost in front of him with blackened skin and a mouth full of blood-stained teeth, and he dove to one side to avoid it. He narrowly avoided the rake of its fingernails and managed to land at least one hit to the stomach, but the action forced him to the side of a building, rounding some trash cans.
He knocked into them noisily, sending the metal flying, and kept moving. It was an alley- he couldn't see the others, but he could still hear them, and he knew what direction he had to go. He just kept moving.
A figure barreled out in front of him, knocking him over. He rolled and kicked at the back of its knee, shattering what was left of the kneecap. It went down with a howl. Jun didn't know if it could feel much pain, but it definitely wouldn't be running after him anymore with the shin hanging limply off the thigh like that.
He pushed himself up onto his feet once more, taking off again.
"Shoot it!" he could hear Nino hollering from the other side of the building he was running next to. Then there were three gunshots in quick succession; the rounds sounded like they came from Ai's handgun rather than Toma's rifle. There were two distinct shrieks of gurgled pain.
And then, over the din and screaming, "Jun?!"
Sho- he could hear Sho. Jun wanted to bang his hands on the bricks to alert them that he was still moving, still okay, but to do so would alert more to his presence. He just had to get out of the alley he was running through, and he could see the end and the yellow street light beyond it.
A creature appeared at the end of the corridor, blocking the light. Jun had a split second to react and threw himself to his right, to the other building- there was a door there. His shoulder ached when he slammed into it, but the wood splintered open and he stumbled inside whatever the structure had once been, nearly tripping over a chair that had rolled in front of the entrance.
There was another one inside, and Jun could hear it's mangled breathing. He tightened his grip on his metal pole and swung with all his might as it leapt for him. His arms reverberated from the contact.
It wasn't enough to kill, but it was enough to knock the thing down, leaving him an opening.
"-you," the Infected he had just hit wheezed from the ground, and the shock of hearing it speaking knocked the wind from Jun's lungs. "Fuck you!"
It lunged again, and he flew backwards, dropping his pole. Weaponless, he stumbled further into the building he'd fallen into. There weren't any lights on, but there windows, and he could see the outlines of machinery as he ran through it by the filtered orange of the street lamps. It was a car shop- a mechanic's garage. There were still cars up on jacks, meters from the ground, like no one had come to claim the vehicles again.
The thing screamed, mostly un-intelligible, and Jun darted around one of the cars. He needed something to fight with.
He ended up banging his shin on a metal shelving unit. Cursing, he stumbled as the pang shot up his leg- it gave the creature behind him an opportunity to catch up.
Jun grabbed for a wrench, and threw it. He caught the Infected in the head, between it eyes- it fell backwards like it had been shot, collapsing in a heap on the floor. And just when Jun tried to catch his breath again, there were hands darting out from underneath the car he was trembling behind.
Fingers grabbed for his shoelaces. He managed to sidestep them, but his heart was in his throat, and he couldn't see straight from terror in his veins. He kicked instinctively at the jack holding the back of the car up.
Either he had more strength than he knew, or the vehicle had been precariously balanced in the first place; it gave a heaving screech, metal shrieking against metal, and then the jack in the front crumbled when the one in the back clattered out across the floor, and the entirety of the car lurched to one side, falling on the Infected still crying to claw at Jun's ankles.
The creature quieted almost immediately, falling still, and the blood pooled faster than Jun had ever seen it. He tried to get over the growing puddle, but his shoelaces were unhooked, and he tumbled forward, knees hitting the ground with a splash. He managed to catch himself on the tool cabinet, and breathed a long, shaky sigh of relief when his body teetered and stayed upright.
He'd managed to keep his hands from falling in the blood.
His jeans were soaked when he righted himself, but his palms were clean; he wiped them on his shirt anyway. His shin was throbbing from impact with the damn corner, and outside, he could hear gunshots- distinctly from Toma's rifle. They were still close enough for him to hear their voices.
He stumbled back out into the warm night air, and nearly ran into Aiba, who grasped at his wrists with tight fingers immediately. "Jun, Jun, come on, come on, we have to get out-"
He was mostly just babbling, but Jun had never agreed with anymore more- he wanted out. He'd take the openness of the rail line rather than the maze of buildings. There were too many places for the Infected to hide in town.
"Jun, hurry, hurry," Aiba kept gasping, pulling Jun forward, and Jun allowed the other man to tug him down the street.
They ran until they couldn’t. His side ached, and finally Ohno called out. “Stop, stop. I can’t run any more!”
It was dark. Jun had no idea where they were, and he was sweating more than he probably ever had. He felt disgusting. “Shit,” Toma muttered, looking around. They’d been moving so quickly away from the last town that the careful progress they’d made earlier had been forgotten.
“We’re lost?” Sho asked.
“No,” Ai said almost immediately. “We’re not. We’re just…”
“Gonna take too long to get to Kashima.” Toma pulled a fading map from the pocket of his jacket. The seven of them huddled under a flickering street lamp as Toma held the map open. There were parts crossed out, just like Nino’s Tokyo map had been. But nearly everything between their current location and Kashima was crossed out. “Boat’s going to leave in two days, with or without us. We can’t afford to fall behind.”
“But we need to clean up,” Aiba complained, holding the one part of his shirt that hadn’t been covered in blood. “This can’t be safe. We can’t keep moving at night like this.”
“And sleep,” Nino grumbled. “I need a nap.”
“Sure, take a nap,” Toma fired back. “And when there’s no boat because they think we’ve all been torn apart, then what?”
Nino quieted down, shrugging out of his bloody jacket and tossing it aside. They’d had to drop their bags ages ago - it was slowing them down. They had no clothes. “Look,” Jun said, leaning against the light pole and still desperate to catch his breath. “We’re gross, all of us. I get that we have to keep moving but…”
“We go through the night,” Ai said decisively. “The boat is more important than anything. And besides, it’s already late. I don’t want to go into a building and get ambushed. We’ll stop tomorrow, get changed.”
They had to bow to the wishes of the people with guns. The people who knew the way to the boat. Nino yawned. “Fine. Which way?”
Their reflexes were bound to be slower. But what choice did they have? They needed to be on that boat. Sho gave his hand a squeeze before moving on ahead after Toma. At least they weren’t running now. They continued off into the darkened streets, and his jeans were getting stiffer and more uncomfortable as the blood started to dry.
--
By late morning they’d found their way back to the rail line that took them into Kashima. They were like the walking dead themselves. Toma had gone through a few energy drinks he still had in his backpack, but the rest hadn’t been as fortunate. Then again, Toma was toting the big gun - he didn’t need to fall asleep standing up.
They were only a few kilometers from the city’s industrial district where Ai had said the boat was stashed. There’d been no laughter, no howling since they’d moved into the city limits. There was a department store just past one of the railway crossings. Water, fresh clothes…
“And furniture!” Aiba shouted. “I’m going to find a reclining chair.”
“Fuck chairs,” Nino said, rolling his eyes. “I call the best mattress they’ve got out for sale.”
They walked over broken glass to enter the store. Nino went off to find his bed while Toma kept watch at the entrance. Ai, Ohno and Sho went off in search of water in the store cafeteria while he and Aiba went to pick out clothes for everyone. Things had been picked through, and clothes were strewn every which way. People probably imagined the world was ending - they figured it was time to take what they wanted before someone else did.
The electronics section was completely bare as he pushed a shopping cart through to the men’s clothing area. Aiba scampered around, full of an energy Jun knew he himself could never possess. He was exhausted and just leaned against the cart, still thinking about the mechanic’s place and the car falling. He had to focus - had to think about getting on that boat. Aiba gave him a little pat on the head before dumping a heap of clean clothes into the cart.
“You look like crap.”
“Thanks.”
He eyed the things Aiba had tossed into the cart. Nothing too hideous - just t-shirts and new jeans. He grabbed a belt as they pushed back to the furniture area since there was no way Aiba had checked all the labels. Nino was already spread out, limbs sprawling across a nice looking mattress. He’d stripped down to his underwear, leaving his filthy clothes on the floor beside the bed and was already snoring.
“Guess he really was tired,” Aiba said with a smile when they approached. “Water, yes!”
Sho had his arms full with water while Ai and Ohno carried bottled juice and candy. “Just stuff to rot our teeth,” Sho said quietly, “but the sugar should keep us going.”
“We’ll stay until mid-afternoon,” Ai told them. “Then we walk again until it’s dark. If we can meet our people by tomorrow afternoon, we can start making preparations.” She found her way to the mattress next to Nino and flopped down casually. It was nice to have a moment to rest and relax, although she kept the handgun at her side, reminding them that there was no such thing as safe any longer.
“Sounds good,” Jun replied, grabbing a t-shirt and jeans from the cart. He gave Sho a weak smile and took a couple bottles from him. “Be right back.”
Nobody else seemed to have the urge to change yet, but he seemed to be the most disgusting right then anyhow. He shoved his way to the men’s room around the corner. It stunk - he didn’t even need to step into the room to know there were bodies inside. He swallowed down the bile rising in his throat and left.
He had to settle for a dressing room at the other end of the floor. The water would pool all over the floor, but it wasn’t the worst thing that had made a mess in the department store, all things considered. He pulled the t-shirt over his head with a sigh, hearing his neck and arms pop. It would be good to get a nap after this.
The jeans were nearly stuck to him, and he had to tug at the bottom of his one leg. The denim was completely stuck. A rush of pain shot up from his shin as he yanked at the material, tossing the jeans angrily against the dressing room wall.
“Shit,” he hissed, remembering the contact his shin had made at the mechanic’s shop. He’d probably have a nice purple bruise waiting. He opened the first bottle of water and dumped half of it over his head. It was warm from sitting in an abandoned store for a month, but he didn’t care. He rubbed his face, ran his fingers through his hair. Maybe the damn boat would have a real shower?
He poured the water over each limb, little flakes of dried blood scrubbing off as he ran his hands up and down his arm. The floor was growing slick with the water, and he was probably just going to slip and land on his ass. He sat down with a heavy groan, opening the second bottle and pouring some on his right leg, then his left.
The blood that had soaked through his jeans had left red stains over his legs. He ran his hands up and down, watching it disappear. His shin was still tender, so he couldn’t scrub as hard. The blood flaked and vanished until he hit a sore spot. “Son of a…” He’d hit his leg harder than he’d even thought. They’d been so consumed with hurrying away that the pain was only really catching up now.
“Come off,” he grumbled to himself as the injury throbbed. He added more water, but his finger stopped as he reached it.
The bruising and blood stains and his own ignorance had hidden it until now. There was a gouge in his shin, no more than a few centimeters across, and the blood that was coming off with the water was fresh. He pressed his finger against the wound, hand trembling. It was bright when he brought his hand away - it was his own blood.
And he’d landed in the infected one’s after he’d hurt his shin, hadn’t he? Hadn’t he? All he could do was stare at his leg, at the tiny bit of skin that was marred, dark hair matted and damp from the water he’d been pouring. Maybe they were mistaken, he thought frantically as he covered the wound with his hand, shutting his eyes tight to avoid the sight of it.
Maybe infection traveled a different way. Surely it hadn’t been enough to get him. No, his mind was screaming now. You walked around for hours, bleeding, with blood of an infected soaking into your jeans. He pulled his hand away. Still red.
He dropped the water bottle, plastic hitting linoleum and it spilled on his boxers, spraying onto the fresh clothes he’d brought in with him. “No,” he whispered. “No no no, please.” He scooted backwards until he hit the dressing room wall, rattling the filthy mirror. His mouth felt dry, and he couldn’t breathe. “No.”
The blood was trickling down his leg - his life was draining out wasn’t it? The boat. They’d reach the boat in another day, wouldn’t they? Toma and Ai’s friends, they’d want to inspect him, right? He stared at the filthy t-shirt he’d discarded, pulling it to him with a muffled sob.
There were specks in his vision as his tears hit the lenses of his glasses, leaving spots. He tore at the shirt, feeling a ringing in his ears as he ripped the material. He was going to forget. He was going to get angry. His skin was going to disintegrate. People were going to trip over him and take pity but keep moving.
“No!” he sputtered, working the soft shirt material around his leg, tying it tight. There was already red seeping through. “Damn it damn it damn it.” He stumbled to his feet, grabbing the clothes Aiba had picked out. He yanked at the tags, pulling the jeans on. The belt he’d brought lay forgotten as he used his teeth to get the tag off of the new t-shirt.
He pulled it over his head, nearly knocking his glasses off his nose in his haste. He picked up the discarded jeans, tugging his tiny planner from the rear pocket. Jun pulled it open, eyes scanning dates, randomly jotted notes.
“You can’t forget,” he told himself, trying to get his panic attack under control as his wet fingers flipped pages. “You can’t ever forget.” What was he going to tell them? What was he going to tell Sho?
He shoved the planner into his pocket and used the water he hadn’t spilt to clean his hands, drying them on his new jeans. His wound wasn’t bleeding through. But what did it matter? He tossed the old jeans and shirt in the corner of the room, sliding back into his sneakers.
Jun pulled the door open and nearly stumbled back.
“Hey, took long enough,” Aiba said cheerfully, hand poised to pull the door open himself. “Bathroom’s definitely off limits huh? I’ll change in here too.”
He could barely get a word out, so all he did was nod as he shoved his way around Aiba, who continued into the dressing room. Jun cleaned his glasses on his new shirt, hoping he didn’t look too puffy. There was no time to think about it now - he needed to rest. When he woke up, he could think of what the hell to do.
He made his way back. Ohno was gone, probably off to maintain watch with Toma. Ai and Nino were still fast asleep, and he found Sho curled up on one of the couches. He knelt down, feeling his eyes start to water again. “Damn it,” he whispered. He couldn’t touch him - he could never touch him, not now.
Jun got to his feet, finding another couch. Under the denim on his leg, his wound was probably still bleeding, a constant reminder. He shut his eyes, feeling the planner underneath him in his pocket.
He had to fight it. He had to remember. He had to try remembering everything.