What Remains (Book 1): The Outbreak

by Barrett, Tyler

  Kenji decided that they should take a quick break and eat a small snack to keep them feeling at their best. They sat on the stairs in the stairwell, eating a can of soup they had found while scavenging. They tried to keep quite afraid of alerting any more Yokai that could be lurking around the building. He grabbed the backpack and put it back on signaling Nobuto that it was time to continue onward.

  The next floor all the doors were locked, although it looked like someone had tried to break into one of the apartments and failed. Kenji began to wonder if they would find anyone else alive in the building, seeing as they had already cleared three floors and found no one alive. He was surprised to find the man that was infected this high up in the building, along with the others the day before. It was hard to tell how long they had been in the building roaming around.

  They searched all the floors, up to the fourteenth floor, finding only a few unlocked with anything of value. They decided to go back to Kenji’s apartment to check on her and unload the supplies they had. Walking up the stairs were starting to make Kenji’s leg muscles burn from over usage. It had been some time since he had taken the stairs up to his apartment, preferring the quickness of the elevator.

  A few minutes later they were breathing heavily, but they had made it to Kenji’s apartment. They walked in and found Kiyomi waiting in the living room wearing a worried face, but it evaporated once she saw them walk in. She jumped up from the couch and ran over to hug Kenji. They took off their backpacks and sat down taking a break.

  Kenji wondered how long it would take to search the rest of the building. It was already past two O’clock in the afternoon. They had only searched about ten apartments altogether, leaving many of them untouched. Not only that they still had about thirteen floors that were still unchecked. The evidence the chaos out on the streets had leaked into the building was more predominate the further they went down each floor.

  After taking an hour-long break, they decided to go at it again, however, this time, she joined them. Kenji was glad that Kiyomi decided to join them because he didn’t want to worry about leaving her alone in the apartment. It wasn’t that he didn’t think that she couldn’t handle herself it was that he didn’t want her to face anything without him. Kiyomi still looked nervous but tried to put on a strong face.

  They tried to pace themselves going down the stairs, not wanting to make too much noise, which echoed down through the stairwell. They reached the thirteenth floor after a few minutes, opening the door onto the floor. It was the most horrific thing they had seen yet. Blood covered most of the walls, including the floor. All but two apartment doors were open, each one a gaping portal to possible danger.

  They cautiously walked down the hall and whispered about what they should do. The best plan they could think of was to call out and see if anyone, or anything, would answer. They needed to clear the building as best as they could of the Yokai, and why to stop and leave this floor alone. Kenji told them both to back up a bit towards the stairwell door just in case they needed to make a quick getaway.

  Kenji also told them to watch the two apartment doors that were the closest to the stairwell door; he didn’t want to get cut off from them if a fight ensued. He readied himself, and after Nobuto and her gave him a nod, he called out.

  “Hello? Is there anyone here?” Kenji called. The sound echoed in the hallway. A few moments of silence followed his call, with no answer.

  Kenji started to feel more relaxed, but then he heard the familiar shuffle that indicated that at least one Yokai was headed in his direction. Sure enough, a man in his twenties stumbled out into the hallway near where the elevator was. He turned towards Kenji and the others, letting out their terrible hissing groan. The man shuffled towards Kenji, who let the man get close enough to swing at his head.

  Kenji swung his sword yet again, missing the man’s head and ended up getting his sword stuck in his shoulder. Kenji quickly yanked, and at the same time kicked the man back, releasing the katana. He tried again and, this time, met his mark, decapitating the man. Luckily, Kenji didn’t seem to swing the sword hard enough to do any damage to it with his missed hit. As the body fell to the ground, he heard more shuffling. He looked back up to see three more Yokai erupt from an apartment down the hall.

  He took a few steps back; he hadn’t planned on taking three Yokai on at the same time. Nobuto rushed forward and stopped right behind Kenji. Kenji looked back at the teen. Nobuto looked ready to fight alongside him, willing to help. Kenji told the teen that he was going to push the first one down and go for the second, and it was his job to kill the first one. Nobuto kept to himself, not answering, but gave a quick nod.

  Kenji rushed forward grabbing the first one, which was a younger woman and shoved her to the ground. He quickly turned his focus on the second one, an older man, and swung his sword. The katana connected right below the base of the man’s skull severing his brain stem. Nobuto was hard at work on the first one, which he ended after two quick heavy blows.

  The third one grabbed Kenji, who was still trying to get his bearings from the swing at the second one. The third one with unseeingly strong grip shoved Kenji up against the wall, trying to take a bite out of him. Nobuto swung towards the third one, a middle-aged man, and hit it hard enough in the head to make it lose its grip on Kenji.

  The middle-aged man dropped to the ground where Kenji plunged his blade into its eye socket. It the heat of the battle, Kiyomi had taken down one that came from one of the apartments next to her. She had seen it and bashed its head in with the bat she wielded. He looked over at her, and she at him.

  Kiyomi tried to wear a smile weakly, but it faltered. He knew the feeling; he felt it every time he killed one of the Yokai. It was an odd feeling, one that is not easy to relate until you have felt it yourself. It was the feeling of being glad to be still alive but understanding that you had to end a life for you to remain alive.

  The moment was interrupted by a door in one of the apartments opening. A small voice called out, “Are you still there?”

  Kenji and the other two ran to the apartment that the voice had originated. A woman about twenty poked her head out from the bathroom of the apartment. She jumped back when she first saw them closing the door with a slam.

  Kenji said as calm as possible, “It’s ok, we aren’t going to hurt you. We aren’t infected. You can come out and talk to us.”

  The door opened a crack at first, and then enough for the young woman to poke her head out again. She looked them all over, deciding whether to come out or close the door again. She opened the door and stepped out. “Have any of you been bitten?” she asked.

  They all shook their heads and showed what little skin they had to show. It eased the woman a bit, but she still looked worried. She looked around the apartment as if searching for something. She ran into the bedroom and searched the closet. When she found nothing, well, at least, nothing to her, she ran back to the group.

  “Have any of you seen a woman not much older than me around here? She should have been on this floor?” she asked nervously.

  They all shook their heads while she looked distraught. She pushed past them and went out into the hall. She screamed and ran over to the young woman they had just killed. She fell next to the body and began to cry. She picked up the woman who lay on the floor, calling a name. She had known this person and only a few minutes before they had bashed her head in. Kenji started to feel guilty; all the Yokai he had killed at one time were people.

  Kenji tried to stay distant, emotionally, from that hard truth. It made it easier, but now that he was facing what he had done he felt sick to his stomach. He had taken part in killing a loved one of a living person. He had just assumed that these people were now different; not human. However, it stared him right in the face, and he felt like a deranged psychopath.

  It hit him hard watching the woman they had just saved from the Yokai, holding her dead relative. He didn’t know what to say if there even was a right thing to say, so he
just kept to himself. Nobuto looked around making sure that the noise the woman was creating wasn’t spawning new Yokai to kill. Kiyomi walked over and put a reassuring hand on the woman’s shoulder.

  The young woman held the body crying, calling out a name that was indecipherable. She was distraught and had every right to be. She had lost a loved one while holding onto the hope that they would see each other again. It took them several minutes before they hauled to woman away from the body.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  The woman’s name was Ren. Once she had gathered herself, she told them how she ended up in the bathroom of an apartment that wasn’t hers. More importantly, she explained whose body was lying in the hallway outside. Her story started out much like the others, but with one difference, she didn’t try to stay put and decided to leave the city.

  It all began with her sister and herself, who lived together several blocks away. They had waited a few days but soon ran out of food and major supplies. They decided it would be best to leave and try to find a place with some food and water. They both left their apartment and made their way to the store, but never arrived. Shortly after they left their building a Yokai came towards them, and neither one had a weapon, but by luck, a passing man held off the creature while they escaped.

  Like so many others before they went to the military checkpoint, hoping to find some help and protection. Too many people swarmed the already overworked and understaffed soldiers. The checkpoint they came upon was one of the less busy ones, but they still were under a lot of pressure. Each civilian was put in a line to be checked, where they were sent into a tent to undergo a medical search to make sure they weren’t infected.

  They waited in line, while several people before them were checked in a tent and then released. The entire time several soldiers were shooting down Yokai that approached the checkpoint. About three people ahead of the sisters in line, a man was called forward into the tent. Quickly the man that had just entered barged out of the tent waving a gun that he had forcefully taken from the medical examiner.

  Several soldiers ordered him to drop the weapon, but instead, he shot two soldiers, before being gunned down himself. At that point, the officer in charge demanded that all the civilians present were required to strip and prove that they weren’t infected. Several people began to get upset and started to argue with the officer. The officer who was upset about losing his men fired into the crowd murdering several civilians.

  His soldiers detained him, but in the commotion of the shootings, several infected made it into the checkpoint. They began to overwhelm the small force and attacking several trapped civilians. Several soldiers rounded up the few surviving people and ordered them to move. The sisters followed the four soldiers that led them down the street, where they saw another group of Yokai heading from the opposite direction.

  The soldiers ushered everyone into this building and told the civilians to find anything they could to block the doors at the front. They grabbed anything thing they could find, tables and chairs mainly, and tried to block the doors. It seemed to work, but no one noticed the stairwell door was open, and all the noise attracted them to the group. The Yokai came from the stairwell, cutting off several civilians from the rest of the group.

  The ones that were cut off were attacked and didn’t have much of a chance to fight back. The others ran to the other stairwell, hoping to escape them on the upper floors. One soldier was taken down trying to hold off the Yokai before they could go after the rest of the group. His sacrifice was the only reason that they made it through the door and up the stairs.

  Everyone ran for their lives hoping to escape the Yokai that were in the lobby. There were only about eight people left that made it through to the stairs. Their group wasn’t worried about sticking together, especially since most people didn’t know each other, victims of circumstance. Some decided to make their escape earlier than others ducking into floors closer to the ground floor.

  The sisters both decided to keep going; try and put as much distance as they could. One of the three soldiers left stopped on a landing and started to fire his gun. The last two soldiers stuck with the sisters until around the ninth floor, they stopped and started to shoot at the Yokai that were making their way. The sisters kept going until they made it to the thirteenth floor and went in. They found that there were already two Yokai at the other end of the hallway.

  Ren’s sister grabbed her hand, and they made our way into one of the apartments that were open, slamming the door closed, but couldn’t get it to latch. The Yokai started to hit the door, trying to force their way in. The sister held the door while Ren went and grabbed a chair to try and hold the door. They tried to block the door, but it still didn’t hold. Ren’s sister told her to hide, and she would be right behind her.

  Ren ran to the bathroom and locked the door. Ren heard the apartment door open, she heard a crash, and then a scream. Ren was too scared to move, understanding that the Yokai were right outside the bathroom door. Luckily, for her, the Yokai weren’t smart enough to find her, and she was safe as long as she didn’t make any noise. That’s what mainly attracts them is sound, so she kept quiet, and they never found her. Ren didn’t even try to leave until she heard all the noise Kenji and the others were making.

  Her story was compelling for Kenji to hear, the temperance Ren showed was beyond belief. She had spent several days in the bathroom with no food or water, unable to move. Three Yokai were shambling about the apartment she was hiding in, her sister who was infected included. Kenji didn’t want to think of the things the woman had run through her mind when she was trapped.

  He still felt terrible about killing her sister but knew that in taking her sister’s life, he had saved hers. He thought it best not to bring it up and inflict more pain on the woman’s already fragile state. They offered her some food and water, which she gladly accepted. Kiyomi decided to take her back to Kenji’s apartment and have her rest there. Nobuto and Kenji decided that they needed to see if they could find any of the other civilians of the group alive. If their luck improved hopefully, they could find some of the soldiers’ alive or worst case, their weapons.

  It looked like they were going to have to carefully search the rest of the floor since they now knew that they most likely held Yokai. They wasted no time in setting out to search the remaining floors, deeming it an important task. They gathered their gear and headed back to the stairs.

  Chapter 21

  The group

  Kenji and Nobuto opened the door to the twelfth floor, slowly keeping their noise to a minimal. The twelfth floor looked normal compared to the floor above. They checked each door, finding them all locked. They decided that it would be easier to find any of the survivors if they knocked on each apartment door. Knocking would be an easier way to alert any other people, than calling out. They didn’t want to put themselves in a situation like last time facing too many opponents, and barely making it out alive.

  No one answered on this floor, and there wasn’t even as much as a noise. An eerie silence hung about the floor, indicating no life. So, they moved to the next floor. They stopped on the stairwell before the landing to the eleventh floor. The door had been caved in, crushed by enough force and weight to make it break.

  Kenji motioned to Nobuto to slow down and pointed at the door. Nobuto leaned in closer to Kenji and whispered, “Do you think that was the Yokai or people?”

  Kenji shrugged, “I don’t know, but, either way, we need to watch out. I don’t want to walk into a group again.”

  They slowly approached the landing and got as close as they could to the door without looking in. Kenji poked his head around the corner, where several Yokai wandered about in the hallway. He quickly pulled back, looking at Nobuto.

  “There are at least five that I could see in the hallway. I couldn’t tell if any of the apartments were open or not. It doesn’t look good.”

  Nobuto pushed around Kenji, “Let me have a look… Damn, you were right, there are at l
east five. What are we going to do? There is no way we can take on five at once. Even then, what if more show up?”

  Kenji thought about it, and the teen was right. It would be certain death if they tried to face all five at once, and the hallway didn’t give much room for two people to fight next to each other. The stairwell was another option, but again it would be too dangerous. That’s when it hit him. He had his plan; he told Nobuto what to do and got ready. Nobuto smiled, and said, “On it!”

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  Kenji took a deep breath, calming himself, trying to muster all his focus. He couldn’t have any mess ups this time. His plan called for precise timing and good teamwork. He prayed that the teen could hold up his end of the plan. Kenji didn’t feel like dying today. He counted down, and four minutes had passed. It was time.

  Kenji rush around the corner, entering the hallway and screamed at the Yokai, “COME ON! COME GET ME!”

  The first, and closest, Yokai turned and quickly began to make his way towards Kenji. The others followed the first one, shambling forwards. Kenji walked slowly, making his way to the Yokai. He readied the katana and swung at the first one. His aim was true as the steel decapitated the Yokai. Kenji readied for the next one, taking a step back for the next swing.

  Nobuto entered from the other end of the hallway, as planned. He stealthily came up behind the last Yokai and swung at its head, sending it flying to the ground. He gave it another quick bash before moving to the next one. The next Yokai had begun to turn around towards Nobuto, hearing the commotion of the fight. He sent another swing of his pipe at the creature, taking it down as well.

  Kenji was at work on his second Yokai, hitting it in the neck but only partially decapitating it. The Yokai still twitched, until he pulled his sword out, severing the spinal cord. The last one that was still up and moving had moved in closer than Kenji realized. The Yokai grabbed him and pushed him to the ground, but Kenji was ready for it. He rolled with the force of the push and used the momentum to gain the upper hand.