Houses of Ice - II

[celestos]

Chapter II

Death was wet.

The first thought stirred in the darkness, and shifted another with it as it went. Something was wet, and it was dark. Something else was there, and it it was wet on her - on her skin. It was a taste she remembered; not sweet but not bitter, the cold of it a little painful, but not as much as the tangle of rope coiling inside her belly, terribly empty. Something prodded gently on the edge of her lip, and the intensity grew. As did another feeling, at the back of her head, but that was another sensation, one that made her think of a hand.

Her body gave a shiver, and she felt the coldness trickling from her lip to her chin.

Water.

Her eyes would not open - could not, could not open yet, but her lip could move, and she could still feel whatever touched her. The coolness that was touching her lips was something solid, ridges zigzagging up and down on the surface she felt on her lip. Plastic? A bottle?

A little of the water went the wrong way, and she found herself coughing. Water splashed back up from her throat, the warmer taste of it as it came down so unpleasant she had to shake her head and try not to shudder too much. The hand below her was aware. She felt it move down, then across, until what felt like an arm was holding her, shoulder to shoulder where the hand had settled upon her, the feeling of breaths a little hot on her skin.

Breathing. Who - me? Somebody else? One of them?

Yes, Rei thought, flopping into the arm in defeat. It’s going to eat me.

What it looked like, she could not tell with her eyes shut. There was only the breaths, and the scent of that breath that she could not quite pick up on, and the firm, gently-shuddering hand on her shoulder. Her lower half still lay on the floor. It was cold.

Pinpricks of light stabbed into her eyes.

No. I don’t want to wake up. I don’t want to see it…

Whatever small gap there had been between her eyelids, the light had come in and started to pry them open, and had she the strength, Rei knew she would have punched out that light. She was going to sleep - sleep forever, just like the voice in her head had made her wonder the morning before, or that very morning, or some morning she could not put a date to. Time did not feel real. She could not open her eyes. She could hear breaths, but not the tick of a clock.

“Shit. I think she’s…”

She had misheard. A voice had sounded out through the air, but it could not have been a voice. Voices were human. She was about to be eaten. She wanted to die. She wanted to wreck the pale yellow light that had beamed in between the mess of her eyelashes, that fought to open her eyes, but she did not want to, all at the same time - she did not want to think, or to see it, to see what she knew was a monster with human hands, breathing in front of her -

“She’s awake. Guys, come here… no, wait…”

I’m still alive .

Struggling through the light piercing her eyes, she forced them to open. Her vision wobbled. Particles diffused and came together again. In her eyes was a fuzz. Only slowly was it beginning to clear. Her head ached, but she could still turn it. Spots and clusters of light became a bright window. There were lights on the ceiling, hanging down, looming, as though the cables would snap any moment.

Instinct told her to move, but her body did not. Above, they were still.

The warmest thing, up against her, was the phantom hand and the figure she began to make out in the mess of her vision. It turned back to face her, and Rei made out the face of a boy, older than her, mouth just open with surprise and concern. Parts of his hair - a muddy-brown mess - fell past his chin.

The hand at her back trembled with him, and she recognised it as his.

“Hey.” His lips moved. Rei recognised his to be the voice she had been hearing. “Hey. Sorry about that. Are you OK?”

For a second, he hesitated, and chimed back before Rei could say anything. “Well, I know that’s not the best question to be asking right now, but… are you hurt anywhere?”

Rei’s throat ached; not as horribly as she realised her empty stomach was aching, but she could barely speak all the same. Her back felt stiff, her fingers numb. Her head was filled with screaming and echoes.

She shook her head.

“…No,” she managed to croak.

“Well, we’re here if you need anything,” the boy said, turning around. “Hey, guys? She’s definitely awake.”

It was hard for Rei to move her head and look up. Her neck felt too stiff, her head that bit too heavy, even with the boy holding her up. His chest, clad in a coat and dark sweater, was in the way of whatever he had been looking towards, but she did not need to turn, or to stand up. Almost immediately, she heard footsteps beating the ground. The fast beats of a run turned into slow, careful steps.

Two more strangers kneeled down on one side of the boy. Rei turned to face them.

“Is she hurt?” One of the two - a blonde girl with a long, trailing ponytail - leaned in a little, an outstretched hand hovering around Rei’s leg, and the side of her that still lay on the ground.

“She says she’s fine.”

“Did you check her?”

“No,” the boy shook his head. “I’m not touching her.”

“I - I know, but what if there’s a bite?” The second stranger chimed in with a shiver. A quivering hand played with a sky-coloured lock of hair, lost in the thick mess of the waterfall that spilled out from under a red beanie hat.

Another girl, Rei thought.

“If there’s a bite she’d have reacted already,” the blonde girl said. Her hand came to rest on her companion’s shoulder. “I don’t think it got her. There’s no blood. There was only one of them, anyway.”

Rei thought back to the sight of the face and the warp of its neck. She gave a shudder.

The boy holding her clearly noticed. The arm holding her moved down, slowly but carefully, until she met something soft on the ground. She shivered at the feeling, turning immediately. What was below her was only thick fabric; some kind of hoodie, she realised, rolled up in a lump, and not what she had first feared.

It could have been, she thought, deep in the back of her head. It could have been something worse…

“Rest up,” the blonde girl said. “And don’t worry about any of us. We’re not going to touch you if you don’t want to be touched.”

“But what if they got her? What if she got bitten?”

“Shou, it’s all right,” the girl hushed. “She’s safe.”

Her hand patted down on Shou’s shoulder again, and the pale-haired girl gave a sigh, only-half convinced as she shuffled back slightly, head down and eyes wide, yet unwilling to meet Rei’s gaze.

Rei said nothing.

The voice of the brown-haired boy interrupted her thoughts. “Still,” he said with a sigh, turning to the girl with the ponytail, “you’re better at this kind of thing. You mind checking her over if she’s OK?”

The blonde girl turned back to Rei, letting Shou go. She gave a nod, and he turned back to look down at Rei, who had leaned back on the lump that was the hoodie on the cold of the ground.

“Sorry,” the boy said. “Shou kind of gets anxious sometimes. It’s fine. Don’t worry about him.”

Him? So he’s… not a girl?

Rei turned back to the smaller… boy, she realised, seeing him turn away, one hand still tugging at the tips of his hair. If it had been her vision, or something about him, then she had not realised. Cringing, she felt her face flush with embarrassment.

“We brought you in here,” he continued. “You fainted outside. I don’t know if you feel kind of rough. If you are, then it’s all right. Rest up. We’ll look after you. What’s your name?”

“…Rei,” she mumbled.

“All right,” the blonde girl said back. “We’ll stay with you. I’m Asuka. That’s Shou - sorry about him - and that’s Judai.”

The boy with the mess of brown hair looked up upon hearing his name, as if expecting something. Glancing around, it did not take him long to look back at her.

Rei gave a sigh.

She had names, but not much sense of the place. As odd as it felt to be as she was, resting on a cold, stony floor and on top of a rolled-up hoodie, still in her old clothes with her wallet pressing down in the same pocket - they didn’t steal it, she realised - she did not know if she wanted the help. It was too cold - and as she looked around the room, she no longer wondered why. The room she was in looked like some sort of grey-shaded storage room. Metal and stone surrounded her on all sides. The slit-windows above were small, but still let in white strips of light that cut up the floor into chunks.

She tried to speak out again, but her throat had forgotten the sounds. They came out hoarse and half-broken. “Where… are we?”

“Near where we found you. The store. This is the back,” Asuka said.

She could remember it, suddenly. She had never been in the back of the convenience store, but what was on her mind was the horror of what she had put herself into the moment she decided to run from her house. She saw the flash of the street in her eyes; the vending machine, broken glass on the ground and bottles of water tumbled out all over the street…

Her stomach groaned. Asuka’s eyes widened.

“I… I’m OK,” she lied.

“When’s the last time you ate?”

It took her a few moments to think. “Three… days?”

Three days before she had run had been the day of the last bowl of ramen. A week before that had been the last of hers and Marty’s hidden snacks, buried under her bed. Those days, she remembered, she had thought of drowning herself in her parents’ terrible coffee, both to dull out the terrible feeling of hunger she had felt in the night and the little voice in the back of her head, telling her to give up, and to find some place to herself, and to die.

Asuka shook her head, a look of something like guilt flashing into her eyes. “Oh, God. Don’t worry. We’ll get you something.”

Part of Rei was screaming at her, telling her to say no - that she could not inconvenience these strangers. and that only earlier that day she had decided to die, and that it was no use holding it off. The dead were already everywhere, taking over, inside and out. It would be less of a struggle to join them, the little voice said. At some point, there would be no hunger.

At worst - I will be, but then, it won’t really be me, because I won’t be human…

“Is there… anything?”

Her voice came as a croak. Even with the little beckoning voice deep inside, she could not stop herself speaking her mind, or whatever the emptiness in her stomach was now demanding.

“We’ve got enough. This place was stocked up,” Asuka said with a sigh. “I’ll stay with her. Shou, Judai, can you two go get something for her? Is there anything you want? Rei?”

“Um… no… I don’t mind…”

“All right. You two get her something. Fish? You all right with that kind of thing? Biscuits?”

“Yes. That’s… yes, please.”

“Got it,” Judai nodded, standing up and waiting for Shou to follow. Rei turned to one side, watching Shou sling a small bag over his shoulder, before following Judai out of the room. The wide door flew open and closed, and the two boys were gone, footsteps ringing out through the ground, but growing quieter as they drew away, out of the safety of the grey room.

As soon as their sounds had quietened, Asuka stood up.

For a moment, Rei felt her heart beat that little bit faster. Was she going to leave her? Had something happened? Was there some kind of noise that had tipped Asuka off that she had not heard, either half-deaf or half-dead from hunger, and most likely hallucinating?

The grim feeling lingered as she watched Asuka walk over to one of the corners, then reach down. Something small and dark had been left there - but what it was, Rei could not see, not clearly; not with the bad light and the tired ache behind her eyes, beginning to pound again like a heartbeat in the back of her skull.

Her eyes squeezed shut, teeth gritted through the pain of an oncoming headache. All of her - empty, full, in-between, dead and alive - felt weak and hollow.

There’s food here, she reminded herself. They said they’d get me something… anything. I don’t want to die…

For once, it felt stranger to think that than think of oncoming death.

By the time she opened her eyes, Asuka was by her side once again. There was a black bag on her shoulder, the same size as her school bag, and she put it down with a soft thump, before coming down to her knees herself. Reaching down and unzipping it, Asuka dug around, before carefully taking out a small roll of bandages.

“Here,” she said. “Are you sure you aren’t wounded?”

Rei shook her head. It was still aching. “No.”

“Headache?”

How Asuka had been able to tell - from the look on her face, or something else, Rei did not know, and it startled her a little. The sight of something silvery in her hands made her heart leap, fearing the worst - until she looked closer, past the haze of her vision, and saw that it was nothing more than the packaging for what looked to be some kind of tablets or pills.

“You can take one if you want,” she offered. “I’ve got water in here.”

Her point was proven as she put down a small bottle next to her. Rei reached for it, and the tablets in Asuka’s hand, almost driven by instinct. It was not a lie, she realised, reading the packaging. Painkillers.

Her hands would not stay still. Her throat needed the comfort, and her head an ounce of sanity. As much as Judai had tried to give her water when she was half-conscious, it had not been much, and her tongue was already dry and uncomfortable. Her hands, though they were weak, managed to reach for it and unscrew the cap, before she held it aloft, freezing in place.

Rei gulped. “Is this safe?”

It felt a little odd, to be doubting bottled water when she had become used to drinking from a tap for the past twenty-seven days, not knowing if anything lurked in the pipes - but the bottle was already half-empty, and who had drank from it, she was not certain.

“It’s safe, don’t worry. I’ll drink first if you’re not convinced.”

“No, it’s all right. Th-thank you.”

She did not have time to wait any longer. Rei popped out one of the pills and swallowed it down. Never had she been more thankful for what had to be clean and safe water, and how cool and pleasant it felt on her tongue. Her stomach complained; it was still empty, but for the moments when only the water was enough to make her feel that little bit calmer, Rei let herself relax.

It was still cold. She was in an unfamiliar place - or a familiar one, she recalled, thinking back to wandering the aisles of the same convenience store, only weeks ago - and the people she had met were no more than strangers. She had been alone, empty-bellied, with blood behind the door and family lost in her memories, and at the very least, now, she had something. That something - a bottle of water, the promise of food - was not much, but it was light to her in the dull grey tones of the room, bright as a promise in Asuka’s eyes as she watched, her own expression that little bit calmer.

She did not realise she had drained the bottle until nothing was left.

“Sorry,” she shirked away, putting it down. “I - I mean…”

Asuka shook her head, picking up the now-empty bottle and screwing its lid back on. “It’s all right. You were in a pretty bad state. If you need any more, we can get some.”

“I don’t know,” Rei admitted. “Can you?”

“We can. We’ve got the whole place to ourselves.”

Rei’s eyes widened. “Do you three live here?”

“No. We only stopped by,” Asuka sighed, putting the empty bottle out to one side, closing her bag. “We’ve been moving around. To see if anyone else is out there.”

Rei understood, swallowing down the fear in her stomach. She had stopped looking out of the window a week ago. The weeks before then had been empty - terribly empty, save for lumbering shadows peering out from behind the houses, that she had seen in her nightmares. Nobody in her phone had picked up. The signal had died halfway through the first week.

Nobody left messages. Her internet had gone out shortly after.

“We didn’t expect to find you. It was just us three for a while. How did…” Her gaze drifted up, then back down, back to look straight at Rei’s dry, weary eyes. “How did you survive?”

Rei held her tongue for a moment, trying to put words together. “I… I stayed. I stayed at my house. I just left today. I was going to go back.”

“Were you alone in the house?”

“…No. Not really,” she confessed, shaking her head. “There were my parents. And my step-brother.”

“And… did you head outside on your own?”

“Yes.”

“Are the rest of your family still there? At your house?”

“Yes.”

Asuka stopped. For a few moments, her gaze shifted, up and down and away from Rei, before coming back. Slowly, she leaned in, and when she spoke up, her voice had dulled down into a whisper.

“Rei.” She paused, breathing in. “Did they…?”

She did not need to finish the sentence. Rei understood, and she braced herself, shivering as a feeling of cold shocked its way down her spine.

Silently, she gave a nod.

“Oh, God…”

“Hey, we’re back!”

Rei had no time to say anything else before she and Asuka were interrupted. Judai and Shou were back, and no different than before, she realised with a sigh. Neither one was limping or bleeding. Shou’s hat was still perched on his head. The same bag was still on one shoulder, something bright held tight in his arms.

“That’s good,” Asuka breathed out a sigh of relief. “No sign of anything out there?”

“No. All clear, door’s locked,” Judai replied. “Brought some snacks. Here,” he said, tossing a small packet at Rei. It landed on the floor with a crinkle, and Rei scrambled for it, instincts unstoppable. “Thought you’d like some of those pastries. We’ve got other stuff, if you want…”

The thought of eating blocked everything else out around her.

Her hands would not stay steady as they reached for the packet, tearing it open. Her teeth sank into the pastry, not caring that she was tasting foil amongst butter and fluff. It was not fresh, and it would not be hot, like the pastries she had snacked on with Marty on the way home from school. but it was food, and her stomach demanded it. Eyes shut with desperation, she devoured the treat like a starved animal, not caring how many flakes ended up on her lap, or if her chin would end up covered in chocolate.

A small, weak smile came to her lips. She could not begin to describe her relief.

“If you’re still hungry, we have other stuff,” Judai said. “I mean, it’s nothing special, but there’s fish, and snacks, and pretty much anything else in a can.”

Rei tried to reply between bites. “If… if that’s fine…”

“Of course it is. You last ate three days ago. That’s rough, especially for someone like…” Asuka hesitated for a second, before realising that she had not asked her everything. “Hold on. Rei, how old are you?”

The pastry was gone now, flakes and crumbs the only remainders, spilled like sawdust down the red of Rei’s hoodie. She looked up, seeing a small tin in Asuka’s hands - and further up, a pair of concerned eyes, looking straight back, awaiting an answer.

“I’m thirteen,” she mumbled.

There was a pause. Rei saw Asuka’s eyes widen for a moment, as she looked left and right, and swallowed what had to be some kind of fear hiding deep in her gut. “Oh, God,” she said, shaking her head as she touched her forehead with her palm.

“What’s wrong?” Rei asked.

“Nothing,” Asuka said, shaking her head. “It’s just… it’s rough. And… and you’re just a child.”

“I’m not."

“Compared to us, you are. And if… if what any of us has gone through has been… and you… oh, my God…”

“Why? How old are you?”

Rei hoped that Asuka would not shout at her for asking. She already looked shaken. Her stepmother had told her once to never ask a lady her age, with a sly look in her eyes. She could hear that voice still; faint, but echoing, in the back of her head, so far back it had almost left from her memories, just like her birth mother herself. Her father she knew far more, and far better; and time had passed, and she had grown to care for her stepmother, and Marty, the boy who had come into the house and with whom she had spent time with…

No, she thought, pushing aside the thoughts and the voices. They’re gone, they’re finished, they -

They’re hurting, I know they are…

“Rei?”

Asuka’s voice penetrated through the haze of her memories. Rei shook her head. “I’m fine,” she lied through her teeth. “But… how old are you?”

Asuka sighed. “Seventeen.”

“I - I’m eighteen,” Shou mumbled, peering at her from just behind Judai. “He’s eighteen as well.”

Even though she had expected the numbers, hearing it said out loud still left Rei startled. They were older than her - all of them, even Shou, who she had pinpointed to be around her age after finding out he was male. She thought of questioning him, but decided not to. If he did not look his age, he could at least act it, and the way Judai and Asuka seemed to look at him was not the way they were now looking at her. It was hard to describe what she saw in their eyes.

I’m thirteen, she thought, lifting her shoulders . I’m not a child, not really, am I?

“I’m not a child, though,” she said, a little louder.

She looked straight on, waiting for protest. It never came. All she saw was Asuka biting her lip and anxiously looking down, chest heaving with the heaviness of a sigh.

“Still,” Asuka breathed out, pushing the mess of her fringe, damp with sweat and most likely other things she did not want to think about. “Still, Rei. You’re… you’re not exactly a grown-up.”

“I know.”

“I… I just… I just can’t believe this. Everything.”

“Can’t believe what?” Rei already knew the answer, and it was not her age. She swallowed down the familiar taste in her throat that told her that if she thought any more of the past, she would throw up.

Marty’s old smile flashed once in her vision.

“That you’re thirteen. And you’ve stayed alive. And that… everything’s happened…”

Rei did not have time to get out of the way before she was pulled into a hug. She did not try to fight, in fact; her body refused to; she was still aching in places, and her stomach was not yet full. More than anything, the hug that enclosed her was warm. Asuka’s hands, a little larger and thinner than hers, caressed her shoulders.

It took a few moments to realise that Asuka was sniffing.

She spoke with a shake, clearly fighting to stop tears. Her hands felt desperate. She clung to her as if clinging to life itself, and not the body of a girl far weaker, smaller and stranger than her.

“I know it’s not much, but you’re a child in our eyes,” she whispered. Rei pulled back for an instant and saw the damp in her eyes. “We’ll look after you. I promise. OK?”

Rei did not know if she could accept it. By their side, the two boys had come to kneel and shuffled closer. Shou was about to lean in to lend a hand, but backed off, seeing the faint movement of Asuka shaking her head.

“It’s all right. I’m sorry.” Asuka said, and Shou edged back. She turned back to Rei, and softly whispered, fingers unwrapping themselves from her shoulders. “I know. I know it’s not much. We don’t have a lot, and… we’re not really adults ourselves, but… we’ll try. We’ve come so far, Rei. We’ll stay with you. We’ll be all right.”

This time, she really was crying. Her hands came back to her side.

She thought back to the groaning, and the ominous sounds she had heard through the gap between the floor and living room door, and almost fell down again.

“Rei?”

It was Shou that responded first this time, seeing her falter. He reached out, quickly grabbing her shoulder, and it was only then that Rei realised just how small he was; for a boy of eighteen, it was odd that he was only a finger’s width taller than her.

“Rei? What’s wrong?” He panicked for a moment, before turning to Judai. “Judai, do you have the rest of the snacks?”

“I’m all right,” Rei said. She shook her head, knowing she was telling a lie.

“I’m sorry. If you’re still not feeling well, then stay down. We’ll bring you whatever you need, just don’t make yourself worse. Stay with us…”

It was not the emptiness of the past three days; not really. She would feel better if she ate something else, but all it would fill was the empty, dead feeling in her belly. What hurt more - more than anything, was terrible memories, ones that Rei felt coming back. They were her thoughts - the ones she had slept with and tried to push aside when she forced herself out of bed - but ones that would not cease. They were doubts, little doubts, but powerful ones.

She could see her parents again - but she heard their groans and wails, too, and she had glimpsed red through the keyhole. She had seen the yarn tied around the door handle and the hook shake. The door had not been still. There had been movement.

They were hurting, Rei knew. Marty was dead, and her parents were hurting - and that same little voice in her head was talking to her, telling her to go back, and to at least get what she needed if she was to go with the three she had met.

She had to say goodbye.

“No.”

…but they’re in pain.

They’re in pain.

“I want to go back.”

Her head drooped down as she stood. She did not see eyes widen, nor did she see shivers, but she felt them - she knew they were there, just like she felt her own at the mention.

“Rei?” Shou gasped. “What do you mean? Go back where? Asuka?”

The older girl took the reins. “Go back? Do you mean, go back home?”

“…Yes. My parents are there.”

They’re in pain. They’re hurting. They killed Marty, and I let him die. I can’t see him again. They’re in pain. They’re in pain…

“Wait, she has parents? Someone else is alive?” Judai exclaimed.

Immediately, Asuka shook her head, and her arms, shushing both of the others immediately.

“No. She had them at home,” she said. When his expression did not change, she raised her voice. “You know, you know what happened!”

She said it far louder, almost snapping into a scream. Rei winced, no longer thinking of Asuka, but of home, of her parents. The harm had already been done. It was too late. The visions were back in her head, dancing and dancing.

The realisation came slowly. When it finally did, she heard Judai’s voice turn into a mumble, and as she looked back up for a second, she saw him with his forehead in one hand, shaking his head as he realised.

“Oh. Oh, God. Shit…”

“Judai - “

“Rei, God. We’re so sorry,” he insisted, and Rei almost felt sorry for him. He had not meant to, she knew - he did not seem like a bad kind of person, and he had sheltered her, and he had not known the truth, and what Asuka had meant. It was too late for him to hold back. She was already thinking, and the thoughts would not stop plaguing her head.

“They’re hurting,” she repeated. “I know. Please. They are.”

“Rei?” Shou chimed in, the same alarmed look in his eyes.

It was too far to stop. She could not stop the words on her mind spilling out from her lips, even if it hurt with each little thing that she said. “They’re hurting. They’re not human, but… they’re hurting. I know they’re hurting. I have to go back.”

“Hurting?”

“They… they did things,” she spat, shaking her head. “To Marty.”

“Marty?”

“He thought he could help them… It was my fault, he died because of me. My parents. And, I… I messed up… they…”

Her throat was freezing up. The words felt harder and harder to say, until she was almost choking on them, and her feelings. Her vision blurred and refocused through the fluid mess of a teardrop. If fell. The salt water stung her cheek, dipping into her pores and running through like a shock - like crying was hurting, not just her chest and mouth but all of her, all at once, like fire and electricity, and something else too terrible, too much to bear.

She did not jerk out of Asuka’s reach when the older girl grabbed her and hugged her, so tightly she knew fighting was useless. Her head fell onto her shoulder, not noticing if tears got onto her coat. Asuka did not shrug her off. Her hand - still sleek, still firm even through her own shaking, dipped back into her tangle of hair.

“Oh my God. Oh, come here…” Asuka murmured into her locks, gentle hand carding through. Rei felt her chest seize as she wept. She could feel the weight of Judai and Shou’s stares on the back of her head, and it only made her face burn hotter and wilder. The little voice in her head grew that little bit louder.

Why didn’t I die?

Speaking came only with coughing, only with spitting. “I just… they’re my parents… I can’t… I can’t leave them, I can’t. I want to go back…”

Why she wanted to, so badly it was making her cry, not even she understood. It was something coming deep from within: something as much a part of her as her skin and hair and the blood in her veins. In the back of her mind, her father was picking her up, and she was five years old again, laughing at the feel of his tickling hands. Her stepmother’s dresses were as light as the perfume she wore, and her hands were gentle and kind, to both her and Marty, even after she had found their secret stash of chocolate under her bed, and shook her head at the sight.

Marty - timid, shy, smiling Marty - was dead. His voice still rang in Rei’s ears.

She did not expect Judai to speak up. When he did, his voice was no more stable than hers. His gaze was unstable; switching between her, Asuka as she looked back, and Shou by their side, eyes wide and uncertain with the same kind of terror.

“Rei, listen,” he hesitated, clearing his throat. “If you want, we could go back. With you. If it helps.”

Go back? Yes. I want to go back, Rei thought in desperation. “Please. Let me go.”

“We’ll go with you. Asuka?”

Asuka gave a nod, turning back as her hands loosened around Rei’s trembling body.

Rei shook her head. “I want to see them. I don’t want them… I don’t want to…”

“We’ll come with you. Do you want us to?”

“…Yes.”

She did not mind. If they came home with her, they would take her back in their line of sight. She would not be alone. She would come home, and find a place to rest there; but she would be safe, and not alone, just for a few minutes before they would leave her alone. She would come home and tidy her room. Then, Rei decided - she was going to die.

That’s good. Please. No more, the little voice said. Rei went along with it. What she had lost would not come back. There was no use. She could not stay here, or there, or anywhere else. If she had struggled so badly just to get food, and almost died out on the streets, all alone, then such was the sign. She needed to die. There was no point in fighting.

“Is it far?” Judai asked, leaning in.

“N-no,” she whimpered. “Five minutes.”

“All right. We’ll come with you. You eat something else first, if you want. We’ll head out then, OK?”

Her stomach was not yet full, not with only the pastry. But I’m going to die, she said to herself. What use would it be?

She shook her head. “I’m not hungry.”

If Judai caught onto the lie, then he did not notice. “Well, if you’re sure,” he said, sighing and heaving himself up. “You guys, you going to be long?”

“Not long,” Asuka replied. “Shou? You want to go get the thing?”

Before Rei could ask what the thing meant, Shou had already nodded and started to run. Hair leaping like a small river under his hat, he ran over to one of the corners of the grey room, and with a dreadful scraping noise on the ground, picked something up - something Rei had not noticed in the room at the start. It was only when he brought it over, heaving a little, that she made out the shape of an old, fairly worn shovel, silver faded to grey and dappled with rust on the edges.

Her eyes widened a score, Shou saw the sight in her eyes. “Just in case,” he said, trying to look less at Rei and more at Asuka, next to her, as her hands unwound from Rei’s body and the older girl heaved herself up with a grunt. Her hand reached out to help Rei stand up herself, and she took it. She took a breath in, and heaved.

Slowly, reluctantly against the weakness of her own body, Rei followed Asuka up. Pushing herself off the ground with one hand - properly, for the first time since she had collapsed against the bus shelter, she gritted her teeth against her exhaustion, and everything else: against the little voice that would not shut up in the back of her mind, against the fear she had felt, and felt still. She fought, and she had to fight, against all that she thought of as she opened her eyes to wake up, against the sickness that she had grown used to feeling for the past twenty-seven days of walking down the stairs in her house.

By the time she was up and steady, back on her feet, Judai had already slung his bag over his shoulder. Shou followed suit, his own small bag on his back. The shovel was almost too large in his grasp.

“Judai?” Asuka prompted, taking the medicine bag for herself. “Everything clear out?”

The boy was already by the door. Easing it open as he had when he and Shou had gone to get food, he peered out. His head turned, left and right.

“Yeah.”

“Lead on?”

He took the lead, as Asuka had commanded. Shou held the door open as Asuka went through, and then Rei, somewhat nervously. There was only a little more light in the store, she saw as she followed Judai out of the back and into the aisles.

The smell of rot assaulted her nostrils. Wincing, she went on, trying not to look past the aisles or the cartons and bottles tossed and thrown about on all sides. Whatever had once been fresh was now long gone. Glimpsing more of what she had tasted, her stomach longed for another one of the foil-wrapped pastries.

Maybe some ramen - no, she shook her head, focusing on the door and the brighter light of outside that was ahead. She had no time.

Asuka ran a few steps ahead, and before Rei could ask why, she stopped by the door. It did not open. Switched off, she realised - and then, she saw Asuka’s hands messing with some sort of device by the side, or what had to be the lock.

The doors opened after a few seconds. Wind blew in from outside. Rei took a breath in.

The air of autumn was cold; far cooler than she had remembered, but her memories of running out of the house had grown fuzzy at best. She did not want to think about it. What had happened that morning, or the day before, or three days in the past, she could not tell, and she did not want to.

My parents are waiting.

That was the thought pushing her on, even as Judai told her to stop while the other two in the group caught up, and they clustered together. Asuka took the back, and Shou took the side. Carefully, they stopped by each lamp-post and wall, peering out and over. The coast was clear, but something about it, each time they checked, was unnerving. It was the fear, and the wind as it blew, that left Rei shivering, even in the thick layers of her shirt and oversized hoodie. The sound of the shovel - maybe a little too heavy for Shou, but probably too heavy for her if she was to carry it - made her jump as it hit metal or asphalt every few moments, gritting her teeth with each shock of anxiety.

“Which way?” Judai would ask her, every few minutes. She would point it out, without saying much back.

The streets and the roads were ones that she knew - but their emptiness, the cold and the grey, was somehow spine-chilling. She did not feel safe. She was surrounded - by three others, all older, one with a shovel heavy enough to probably kill - but the silence was also around her, cloaking and dead. The sky was white. The ground behind and in front was a hard, stony grey, as were all of the clouds.

“That way,” she said, a little louder, on the last turn before they came to the vending machine, as battered as it had been the last time Rei had run past it. Bottles still lay on the ground.

Rei’s stomach twisted and turned at the sights around her. They were familiar sights. She did not want to remember. She did not want to think. There was nothing to live for.

I’m going home, aren’t I?

“Home.”

It was the only word she could say as they stopped at the house she had pointed at. Her hand was stiff from the pointing, and the muscles ached as she put it down.

“This one?”

“Yes. This one.”

There was an awkward silence. Nobody knew what to say. Rei thought of asking the others to leave: she could be alone now, if she just opened the door and went back inside.

Judai took a few steps ahead. His head turned, as if scanning the area, and she heard him breathe in, taking in the smells of the air. It did not smell like blood.

“Keys,” Judai mumbled.

Shou turned around, but Rei had not heard. She stared, for a moment, eyes wanting to shut and legs on the edge of surrender. Asuka prompted again, and she snapped out of the trance. “Rei? Do you have the keys?”

“Yes,” she hesitated. One hand crept into her pocket, and she pulled them out with a jangle, but she stopped as she realised. “Wait. I didn’t lock the door… I don’t think…”

It was hard enough to remember anything beyond the time she had woken up in the grey room with the others around her. Her belly had been empty, and she had been exhausted - tired out and probably crazy from the things she had experienced, and not being able to sleep. Her headache had started to ease after taking Asuka’s painkillers, but was not yet completely gone. Something still ached.

She stepped ahead, hands ready to open the door - but did not expect a strong, steady arm to stop her.

“We’ll go in first,” Judai said. “You said your parents are there, right?”

“Y-yes,” Rei nodded. “In the living room. I locked it.”

“You locked them in there?”

“Yes.”

“Phew. Good thing they can’t work locks out. You mind?”

Rei understood, and handed over the keys. There was something unpleasant about losing the cool metal touch in her hands. The jangle they gave was almost sorrowful.

She heard Judai take a breath in as he pushed down the door handle. What followed was silence. There was a pause. Nobody - none of the four, not even Judai, hand stuck to the door handle with sweat - moved a muscle. Rei heard him breathing, deeper and louder.

She hated the silence.

“…I think we’re fine,” Judai finally said. His voice was much quieter than it had been. He looked back over his shoulder, and Rei glimpsed the odd flash of fear in the rich dark of his eyes.

“Sure?” Shou whispered. By Rei’s side, Asuka braced herself for the worst.

“…I think.”

Carefully, Judai stepped into the house. He did not take off his shoes. Rei thought of her stepmother, shaking her head - but remembered, she would not be shaking her head now. Her stepmother was locked in the living room, along with Rei’s father, and whatever was left of him, of the person she had let die -

No, she swallowed. Please. I don’t want to remember. Please, Marty…

In silence, she followed the others.

The corridor was no different from how it had been. It was still eerily quiet. Coats still hung by the side of the door, each one on its own separate hook. On the other side hung her family’s keys. Her own peg was empty, but even looking at it made her wish she had her keys back. Her hands longed to keep hold of them, or of something else that she did not have, and not quite thinking, she grabbed onto Asuka’s coat.

The girl jerked, turning around. Rei could feel her heart race for a moment, before she saw her clinging, and let out a sigh.

“Rei, you scared me…”

“Sorry,” she mouthed. She did not dare speak. Her eyes were back on the door, where her mother’s knitting yarn had been tangled around the door handle and the hook on the wall.

It shook for an instant, along with a faint bang from the other side of the door.

“Shit…”

She heard Judai curse. Her feet told her to step back, and she did, reflexes firing and tugging Asuka along.

“They’re… still alive…”

Rei gave a faint nod. “I know.”

It did not feel right to call them ‘alive’; not in the state she had seen them in, just for a moment. They were no more than another monster of the kind she had seen roaming outside. They were not human, not anymore, and she knew that. The voices on the television, the radio - everything, everything had told her they were human, but some part of her did not think humans could eat other humans, or look at her with dead eyes and reach, nails and hands cracking and smothered with blood.

They’re hurting. They’re hurting.

They’re human.

They’re not.

They’re human.

They’re not.

They’re…

“Rei?”

She did not realise she had started to gasp until Asuka’s hand reached out for her. There was concern in her voice.

“They’re… they’re suffering,” Rei said, out loud this time. “I don’t know. I don’t know.”

“What don’t you know?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know if they’re human…”

Asuka took a breath in, her hand coming to rest on Rei’s shoulder. Gently, she pushed her away, back towards the door, while her free hand made some kind of gesture to Shou. The boy in the hat only gave a small nod. Leaning in, she saw him whisper something to Judai. She did not hear what it was.

She heard Judai put his bag down. The clatter of the shovel followed, as Shou laid it to rest by the wall.

“…Rei. I… I’m sorry,” Asuka said. Her voice cracked halfway through. Words were coming, but what she wanted to say was still on her tongue, frozen and bitter like pepper and ice. Rei could feel the sick feeling she had felt so many times rise in the back of her throat. She swallowed it down. She had to stay sane, she thought, and forced the thought down as she looked up, trying to meet Asuka’s gaze.

Her eyes were starting to water.

“I’m sorry.”

“They’re hurting, aren’t they?”

“Listen.” Asuka’s voice quietened. She dipped her head down, almost coming to whisper into Rei’s ear. “We… we don’t break into houses. We can’t. It’s dangerous. But if you want, we can… we can end things.”

“What do you mean?”

“…We can stop them being in pain. If it helps.”

“But you can’t bring them back. You can’t stop the - “

Rei’s eyes widened. No , she thought, realising. No. They don’t mean -

She looked past, and in Judai’s hands, she saw the silver thread of the edge of a knife. The yarn on the door handle fell to the ground. Shou picked it up and pocketed it, at the same time digging in to Judai’s now-open bag.

Asuka’s hand rested still on Rei’s shoulder. Her voice was serious now; not quite stern, but far heavier, not so much with strictness as it was with grief and slight terror. “Rei, I know. I know. We can’t bring them back. But if you think they’re suffering, then… then it might be better to end things.”

“…I know,” Rei said back, looking down. “I know.”

“Rei, I’m really sorry about this.” Asuka said, biting her lip. She turned back. “Judai, can you and Shou deal with this? I’ll stay with her.”

Her eyes were between shock and anger - but they were pleading, desperately pleading.

“…Yeah,” Judai replied, after a moment of silence. The knife in his hand was clutched tighter. “We’ll be all right.”

He turned around, and Shou followed. Asuka took a step back.

Her hands reached out, taking hold of Rei’s shoulders. Eyes met eyes. “Now might not be the best time to say this, but… it’s best that you come with us after all of this. We’ll deal with things. Being alone right now just isn’t safe.”

“But…”

“I’m sorry,” she said. Her eyes turned to glass for an instant. Rei understood. “Any other time, I would have said that if you didn’t want to come with us, then you wouldn’t have to.”

Asuka’s hand rested in place, just pressing down. It was pleasant, strangely so, as much as something Rei could describe in that instant with watering eyes,visions of blood playing like broken records in all parts of her head. It played on, she winced, hearing the same terrible sounds, and the same absolute silence.

Rei quivered, shuddering in her grip. As if she had read her mind, one of Asuka’s hands lifted itself from her shoulder, and nestled gently in her hair.

“Any other time. But it’s just not safe,” she repeated.

Not safe. Not safe.

In the corner of her eye, she saw Judai unwrap a shirt from his bag. Kitchen-knife silver shone in the sun. In silence, Shou gave a nod.

I know. I know. I don’t want to. I don’t want them to - but at least, that way, they won’t suffer. They can’t go back…

This time, the tears fell.

They were bitter and salty, and stung, far more than the ache in her belly. Her whole body jerked into Asuka’s hold, shivering and heaving in the midst of harsh sobs. She could not stay steady like this. Her eyes shut, blacking out past the tears. Every part of her ached, from her back, remembering the cold glass of the bus shelter and the rough of the asphalt, to her chest, heaving with broken, rough breaths.

“I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

She knew what it meant.

“I’m sorry, Rei. They can’t be brought back.”

“I know,” she mumbled. “I know… but they’re suffering…”

“We’ll be quick. I promise.”

“I don’t want them to suffer.”

“That’s why,” Asuka explained, voice turning down into a whisper again, deathly-gentle. “That’s why  we’re going to do this. They won’t have to suffer. Not any more.”

Rei leaned over to look. In Shou’s hands was something dark, something she knew he had taken out of the bag, wrapped in what looked like a black towel.

She saw him unwrap it. In the black fuzz was sharp silver.

Rei felt acid in the back of her mouth, and she swallowed, turning around, until all that she saw was Asuka and the dark of her clothes obstructing her field of view.

Warm hands reached out. They pulled her in, and the same, long-fingered hands nestled their way into her hair, pale against the long, inky-dark trails, thin with filth and as limp as rags on a scarecrow. Asuka’s touch felt odd on her scalp, but Rei could not stop herself leaning in, resting her head on the top of the older girl’s chest, her own trembling hands reaching to clutch at Asuka’s sweater for comfort.

She gritted her teeth and held on. Any moment. Any - any, she knew, hearing the sounds of the door’s lock click, and the jangle of keys. She heard Judai breathe in, Shou just behind him; the smaller boy’s breaths anything but calm, yet forcing themselves to be steady.

“…you back me up, all right? Take the other one…”

“This one?”

“Yeah. Be careful. She said there were two of them in there…”

Two of them. It’ll be over soon, won’t it?

She was in safer arms; but they were not the arms that she wanted. Never again would she feel the arms of her parents. Marty was dead. Her mother and father would not come back. She wanted to die, and she still thought of death still as her hands grasped at the sweater, like a small baby tugging at its mother’s finger. Warm drops ran into the fabric, out of control.

Asuka leaned in. Rei shut her eyes. Her teeth gritted. She tried to think of something else, something different than what was around her, but the thoughts would not come.

Silence. The door handle turned with a click -

“Shou, now, behind me!”

- then came the moaning, sounds that grew louder as a terrible gap formed between the doorframe and the edge, widening, slowly then sudden. Rei let out a wail. She buried herself in Asuka’s chest, and tried to cover her other ear with her shoulders, but it was useless. Unable to stop, even with the sweater being there, thick and ready to muffle, she cried.

The cries racked through her chest, first soft, and then growing harsher, knives digging into the parched state of her throat. There was nothing more to say. She had nothing to say, and had the strength only to cry. Worse than a child, and worse than a monster, she wished for the ground to swallow her up. It hurt - all of her did, no matter how much she tried to fight it. She had not died. The angels had not come.

She was in hell.

Crying out hurt her throat, but none of it helped. She did not want to, but she still heard everything through the howling: footsteps and something sliding in - then out, then in - then heavy breathing, overtaken by the pain deep inside, more so than the howls almost tearing through her throat - then silence, then nothing.

Nothing, she thought, barely able to breathe.

It’s over.

There’s nothing.