by Tristan Vick
She and Kevin had glimpsed one another in passing too. And, perhaps, that was enough. Perhaps that’s what made their love so bittersweet—precisely because it was fleeting, like the cherry tree blossoms.
Looking at Mr. Tamagawa from a distance, Saeko smiled and then politely bowed in appreciation for all he had done for them. For those short few months in his village, away from the insanity of the hungry city, away from the never-ending struggle to stay alive, he had given her enough time to enjoy the last few hours of her spring. It was, perhaps, the best gift anyone had ever given her.
She watched him bow stoically to her in return, full well knowing that she wasn’t coming back with them, and his kindheartedness moved her to tears. She wiped away a tear with her thumb, and then raised her arm and waved goodbye one last time.
Having said her goodbyes, Saeko turned down a different trail and headed down the opposite side of the mountain. It was the path that would take her back to the hungry city. Back to the world she belonged in. The world of the undead. The perfect place for the girl who wouldn’t die.
Arriving at the edge of the sprawling city, its drab gray skyline blending into an equally drab and hoary sky, but for the ominous shadows that brought out the buildings and gave them a chilling depth, Saeko reached down and slid out her sword.
Holding her sword at the ready, the white blade gleamed in the diffused light as though it were a shimmering ray of hope. Behind her cold gaze were eyes that burned with an overwhelming fury. The constrained rage made her even more dangerous, because like everything in this city, she teetered on the edge of darkness. One misstep and she’d forever be swallowed up by it.
Saeko stood on the hillside overlooking the ruins of Tokyo and gazed out at the monochrome cityscape. For the longest time, she watched the dark figures of the undead wonder aimlessly about the streets, like insects trapped in a maze, and a slight smile formed on her lips. Then she uttered those lines she remembered from a time that seemed so long ago, from back when she was still a school girl and Hell hadn’t been unleashed on the world yet. Words which seemed more fitting now than they had been when she’d first read them. “Hell is empty,” she whispered to herself, “and all the devils are here.”
EPILOGUE
Unsavory Vision
The Forest of Whispers, Near Mount Fuji
A veil of mist filled the spaces between the emerald green stalks of towering bamboo and settled onto the mossy ground of the forest like a white blanket. Saeko stood amidst the shady grove in her high school uniform, a pleated navy-blue and green plaid skirt with a white blouse top and a forest green sash tied into a bow at the collar.
Her olive skin bristled with goose bumps all up and down her body as the cold morning air washed over her and caused her tender purplish nipples to stand erect and protrude through the thin white blouse that clung to her with the dampness of the forest’s thick humidity.
Stepping into the sunrays that pierced the leafy canopy above, she let the light warm her and sighed a drawn-out sigh that was two parts relief and one part longing for a lasting tranquility like this one.
The faint leafy fragrance of bamboo lingered in the air and refreshed her. The sound of the nearby babbling brook soothed her. She didn’t know why she was here in the bamboo forest outside Aokigahara where she had spent so much time. She didn’t even recollect how she had come here. Or why. It was all hazy to her.
Suddenly a twig snapped and Saeko’s whole body tensed. She remained perfectly still as she waited for signs of whatever it was that had startled her.
Gradually, from out of the fog came Biters, Walkers, and Fushimon, the nomadic zombies which wandered aimlessly in packs through the wasteland of the cities and the desolate forests—like ravenous wolves—eating anything and everything that had a pulse.
Suddenly she felt a strange sensation, a tightening in her abdomen, and then wetness between her legs. She looked down at her legs and blood streamed down the insides of both of her thighs. Reaching up her skirt, she felt herself. Bringing her fingers back up to her face, she examined the glistening crimson which streamed down them. Saeko covered her mouth with her other hand to stifle a scream.
Before she could begin to make sense of what was happening, she suddenly felt an awful cramp in her abdomen so grippingly painful she felt like hurling her guts out.
Another contraction, and she grunted. She looked up, fearful that the zombies had heard her, but they seemed oblivious, and continued on their way. Then another contraction hit her. This time it hit her so hard she staggered backward into the thick stem of a large bamboo and barely caught herself as she fell into it. With each consecutive contraction, all she wanted to do was curl up on the ground into a tight ball and cry. Instead, she vomited.
Saeko wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, then gathered herself and brushed her blue and green plaid skirt down, ignoring the bloody fingerprints she left on it. That’s when she heard his voice. A voice filled with pain and anguish.
“How could you?”
Saeko spun around to find Kevin Benjamin Russell, the young man who had stolen her heart and then shattered it, standing before her. He was wearing a charcoal gray raincoat and nothing but black clothes underneath. His eyes looked sunken with depression but concealed a rage that wanted to break free. A rage fueled by the fact that Saeko had caused him unimaginable strife.
“How could you take my child away from me?”
Saeko’s eyes flooded with bitter, salty tears. “I didn’t mean for any of that to happen. I didn’t mean for you to …”
“You killed them!” Kevin interrupted. Drawing out a steel sword from under his jacket, which glinted menacingly in the dim light of the forest, he stepped toward her with cold steely eyes that were just as sharp and penetrating as any blade. His ominous look caused her to cautiously back away from him until she felt her back pressed up against the stalk of another bamboo tree. She had no escape.
Kevin scanned her body and his eyes caught on her abdomen. Saeko looked down and suddenly she realized she was pregnant. It didn’t make sense, why hadn’t she noticed anything till now. But it was as obvious as day, she was with child. Looking back up, she noticed Kevin eyeing her unborn child greedily.
“No,” Saeko protested. She raised her hands and reached out to touch Kevin’s cheek, but it was futile. Flinching, she felt the hot blade slice into her abdomen. She looked down to see Kevin pull the sword back out, wipe his blade clean, and then sheath it. Without warning he thrust both hands into her abdomen and she screamed out, “AIEE!!!”
The agony was merciless and her own screaming suddenly became disembodied, as if she was hearing someone else’s voice call out in pain, from a distance. Saeko fought to stay conscious as Kevin tore out a small, blood-soaked, newborn fetus from her womb. Raising her trembling hand, Saeko pleaded, “Wait …”
Kevin ignored her words, took the waling infant in his arms, then turned and walked away.
“Wait,” she whispered again. Distraught, Saeko fell to her knees and landed in the muck of blood and amniotic fluid that pooled around her. Her guts were strewn out before her. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she watched Kevin vanish into the mist with her baby.
Numb from shock, her newborn prematurely torn from her, she gazed vacantly in the direction he had taken her crying infant, but she could no longer hear the child’s screams. They were either too far off or else the babe was already dead.
Suddenly torrents of sorrow and regret came over her, and Saeko sobbed. In the three long years since the Resurrection virus outbreak, it was the first time she’d allowed herself to cry. Three long years she’d refused to shed a single tear, but now it was all it seemed she could do. That’s when she heard a rustling noise just behind her.
Slowly, Saeko turned her head and looked up only to see the burnt corpse of Kana Fujiwara standing over her and staring at her with terrible white eyes. A brownish red crust of dried blood gathered in the corners of her mouth, and her chin was s
tained with crimson goo, as if she had recently fed. Kana hissed, opened her mouth wide and then lunged at Saeko. Saeko threw her hands up and screamed and then everything went black.
Gasping for breath, Saeko sat up in bed. Her heart pounded frantically inside her chest. She was drenched from head to foot in her own sweat and her sheets were soaked through and through. The visions of the nightmare fresh in her mind, Saeko reached down between her legs, slid her hand inside her underwear and touched herself. Inspecting herself, she was relieved to find nothing out of the ordinary, and let out a sigh of relief. Falling back onto her satin pillows she stared up at the ceiling.
“It was just a nightmare,” she reassured herself. Somehow saying it out loud helped.
Saeko Sakaguchi had been having nightmares consistently for nearly three months now. Grabbing a pack of smokes and a lighter from the nightstand next to her bed, she kissed out a cigarette and lit it up. As she puffed out smoke rings which wafted through the warm morning light that filled her room, Saeko reflected on how her life had turned out rather differently than she’d expected. The end of the world had a funny way of interfering with one’s life plans.
After the dreadful incident atop Mount Fuji and her heart-shattering breakup with Kevin, she came back to the city and slaughtered every zombie she could find. Fueled by rage, she fought for days. The days grew into night and nights turned into days, and she kept on slaughtering every zombie in sight. She didn’t eat, she didn’t sleep, all she did was kill. Then kill some more. And still, it wasn’t enough.
Eventually she decided pure rage and raw violence wouldn’t win the war. In the end, she needed to have a plan.
Now, she had one. She’d create an army and lead a resistance to take back the city. And in the three months since she’d left Aokigahara behind, she’d made a lot of progress. She even carved out her own haven in the middle of the city and was already offering sanctuary to those who’d take up her cause.
It was only a matter of time before she’d have enough soldiers to sweep the city clean of the infestation and win back Tokyo, block by block, piece by piece. And that’s exactly what she intended to do.
Saeko walked up to the standing glass windows of her penthouse suite and gazed out at the pink sunrise. Her room was located on the fifty-third floor of what used to be the Ritz-Carlton hotel, the tallest building in Tokyo, but which she’d rechristened The Citadel. She peered out of the windows and looked down at the desolate, sprawling ruins of vast urban wasteland that stretched out below her.
The city was filled with twenty million of the living-dead. The task to take the city back seemed impossible against such odds, but she wasn’t going to give up trying. She’d never give up trying. Taking back Tokyo would be the same as saving all of Japan. Besides, as far as she knew, she was the only one capable of doing it. She was the only one with unique powers—which included immunity to the viral strain and, consequently, the power to resurrect—to shirk death itself.
She took a long drag on her cigarette and then finished it off. Putting it out on the glass window in front of her, she tapped the pack of cigarettes and fetched out a fresh one and lit it up. After a few puffs, she tapped it between her fingers and let ash rain down onto the floor. That’s when she heard the faint noise in the distance. The noise she dreaded. The chopping sound of an approaching helicopter.
“Dammit,” she muttered under her breath. She’d been wrong earlier. All the devils weren’t here. Not yet anyway. But by the sounds of things, he’d be arriving shortly.
THE END
BOOK THREE
TRISTAN VICK
PROLOGUE
AMNESIA
Lake Erie near Bufallo, New York
Rolling onto her back, the woman reached up and touched her sand-speckled cheek. She rubbed the grit between her fingers then let her white arm fall back to the ground. She felt like she had just woken up from a deep sleep and was still waiting for her senses to shake off the last of Morpheus’s spell before getting on with her day.
Suddenly frigid water rushed up around her body, covering her feet, then receded again. The icy water shocked her awake and she sat up. The haze she had been fighting through dissipated and everything came into crystal clear focus.
Looking around, the woman took in the sights of her immediate surroundings. A row of quiet beach houses ran along the entire shoreline. She remembered that the name of this stretch was Crescent Beach, but for some reason when she tried to recall her own name, she couldn’t. She didn’t even know where she’d come from or, for that matter, how she’d come to find herself half naked, lying face down, on this particular beach.
Making her way past the rickety gate of a run-down picket fence, she walked up to the back entrance of the home, opened the screen door, and checked the handle. It was unlocked. Pushing open the door, she peaked inside, then called out, “Hello? Anybody home?”
There was no answer.
After checking through various rooms, she stumbled onto the master bedroom and called again, “Is anyone here?” just out of common courtesy. Not that it mattered, she thought, but one could never be too careful.
A large, well made dresser stood against one wall. Among various objects strewn across the top, there was a photograph of a stout corgie, its bright brown eyes turned up at the camera. Opening some drawers, she found some women’s underwear, a bra, a pair of Levi’s, and a purple t-shirt to complete the ensemble. Luckily, the owner was roughly her size and, shedding her tattered garments, she put the found ones on. To her surprise, the clothes fit near perfectly.
She decided to look for some stationery and a pen and write a thank you note, just in case anyone returned. Stepping out of the bedroom, she went down the hall and came out in the living area; she froze in her tracks. In the middle of the room was the dog from the photo, staring. She cocked her head at the woman curiously
Neither of them knew what to make of the other. She decided to break the ice. “Hey! How’d you get in here?”
The corgi’s ears perked up and she happily wagged her petite, bobbed tail. Turning in a quaint little circle, she barked and then ran toward the kitchen.
The woman trailed her to a side door that led into the garage. There was a doggie-door built into it. The dog barked at her again, as if beckoning her to follow, so she did.
She watched as the yellowish-orange and white corgi briefly looked back at her then quickly turned and darted out of a second doggie door that led to the outside. She followed her, using the larger door. Obviously, she knew exactly where she was going.
“Bark!” The woman looked up and peered through the trees at the end of Maple Lane, gazing out at a lake. There was a boat gently bobbing on the water, and inside it was a cowboy. As she stared at the man, he looked up, caught her eyes and stared back at them. It was the dog’s barking that had caught his attention, but it was she that held it.
The cowboy tipped his hat, held up a couple of fish he had caught as a show of good faith, then started the motor of the small boat and headed toward them.
The woman looked down at the dog and said, “Usually, at a time like this I’d just tell my son not to talk to strangers. But for some reason I have a good feeling about this man. Besides, cowboys are supposed to be the good guys, right? Who knows. He might be able to help us.”
“Bark! Bark! Bark!”
“You’re right. We still have to keep on our toes. A girl and her dog can never be too careful, after all.”
The corgi sat at the woman’s feet and looked up at her with big brown eyes as if the dog was wondering what she was thinking. Unable to resist, the woman crouched down and scratched the corgi behind her ears until her tongue flopped out and began lathering her with wet doggie kisses.
As she patted the animal’s soft side, she reached over and picked up a piece of a broken bottle that was lying on the sand, just in case things took a turn for the worst, and stood up to meet the approaching boat. The cowboy had reached the shore and was busy dragging
his craft up onto the beach. She watched him, casually hiding the bottle behind her back.
“Howdy!” the tall, handsome cowboy said in a heavy, Midwestern accent as he turned toward the woman and her little dog. He took off his cowboy hat and informed them, “My name is Gordon Longstaff.”
“I’m…” suddenly the woman froze, her face reflecting the frustration of her inability to recollect who she was. “I’m afraid I…I can’t remember.”
Gordon put the worn, leather hat back onto his head and turned back toward the boat. This made the woman uneasy; she gripped tightly to the broken bottle.
“That’s alright,” he said, reaching into the boat and rummaging around. “I once caught a case of amnesia after being bucked off a wild mustang I was breaking in. Took a kick to the head. Couldn’t remember my own mother’s name, God bless her soul, let alone my own. Don’t worry though, it’ll pass.”
The woman sighed and let down her guard. A little bit.
Gordon pulled out a fresh catch of a couple of walleye and a smallmouth bass. Holding up the fish by their gills, he said, “I know it ain’t much, but would you care to join me for dinner?”
The corgi barked in excitement at the sight and scent of of fresh fish.
“You hungry lil’ fella?” Gordon said, smiling down at the dog. “Well, alright then. Come along. I have a place up the road from here. It was my brother’s home. But I’m afraid…” Gordon’s voice faded and his face grew stern.
“I’m glad you showed up when you did,” the woman said. “I’m absolutely starving.”
Gordon smiled at her, which caused the crow’s feet around his eyes to show themselves. He was older, maybe in his mid-forties, and the woman, disarmed by his smile, noted that he looked like a young Clint Eastwood. Rugged, yet extremely handsome. His steel-blue eyes were especially fetching, she thought.