Episode 3: Mother “He” was wandering through a world of deep, thick fog. “He” didn’t know who “he” was, and no voice told him, either. Nor did “he” know where “he” was supposed to be going. “He” just moved on instinct, like a wild animal, tracking his food. Ba-dum, ba-dum…The pulsing stones housing amber light were his food supply, and they made his body bigger and stronger. Each time “he” absorbed a stone, someone’s screams echoed in his head. The voices accumulating inside him were always just more pained screams and moans for help; “he” couldn’t find a voice that would lead him out of the fog. “He” was still walking in the fog, searching for that voice. A little while ago, “he” had heard one lone voice calling him. Had that been his name? “He” groped through his hazy consciousness for the memory: What name had the voice used? Jude— When that voice penetrated his mind, for just a split second, something burst in his head. A white yard blanketed in gunpowder smoke. A half-ruined gray building. A half-collapsed wall of blocks. A chin-up bar crushed out of shape. A tiny smoldering sand pit. A young redheaded boy crouching, back hunched, piling up rocks in one corner of the schoolyard. And another boy watching him work. And then “him,” watching them from afar. A fragment of memory flickered back to life. “He” had never expected to encounter those boys again as his comrades when they’d grown up. His conscience tormented him. First he’d taken the young children’s lives, and now he was about to make the boys who’d survived and grown do the same things he’d done. In his heart, “he” vowed to be their honorable and devoted superior. That wouldn’t erase his sins, of course. It was the sentence “he” imposed on himself for crimes too great to ever atone for, even if “he” spent his whole eternal life trying. Ksssshhhhhhhh… In some corner of his consciousness, there was a low sound like a machine gauge going past the red zone. “He” detected an energy mass resonating with his heart, one even bigger than his heart, which was already greatly swollen. If “he” took that into himself, “he” would grow more, and gain knowledge, and maybe he could get out of this fog. Slowly, “he” started walking. “He” pushed through the slight feeling of repulsion that happened when like poles of two magnets were brought together, dragging along the lump of cables and pipes and carrion that his body had become as “he” made his way toward the mass of energy hovering at the edge of his consciousness. One step. Another step. Whoever got in his way he slayed, and ate, and made into his own flesh. At that time, “he” had no concept of his own ugliness. “He” was unaware that his body had become as horribly ugly and misshapen as his name. His was the name of the criminal who betrayed the Messiah. The name of one who carried a lifelong burden of sin. “How are you feeling, Lord Sigri?” he asked the Elder who’d just awoken on the cot next to him. Sigri blinked vaguely a few times and then squinted sternly up at him for a while before his expression finally relaxed. Julius supposed he couldn’t see very well without the glasses he usually wore. “Julius, eh? Where are we?” “The Security Forces’ crisis headquarters. I think my father will be back here soon, too.” Julius carefully kept his tone calm, wary of startling the injured man. He didn’t know how much that was worth, though, since the bustle of foot traffic in the hallway outside created a never-ending muffled din. It would be easy enough for the older man to figure out from the atmosphere that the situation wasn’t good. “What about my daughter and…him?” Sigri hesitated midway through the question, apparently not sure how to refer to the Undying. Julius ended up hesitating a little, too (he himself had never referred to him as anything but “that guy” or “you”), before he answered. “They went to look for one of their friends. The woman who was staying at your house, I believe.” “Friends…I see…” Sigri echoed slowly, as if savoring the taste of the words in his mouth. “They’re my daughter’s friends, aren’t they? So my daughter has something wonderful, then, something I don’t have…” he muttered to himself. Julius thought he heard pride in his voice. “…Lord Sigri,” Julius said slowly after a moment’s hesitation. Sigri looked up quizzically. “Rumor has it you repeated my father’s message word for word during the uproar in the cathedral.” He’d heard the reports. People said Father Sigri, the Eleventh Elder on the Council of Elders and the highest-ranking priest in the Preaching Department, had taken leave of his senses, called a normal believer names, and shouted abuse at the Council of Elders. There was a pause, and then Sigri let out a dry laugh. “Ahaha. That felt good.” Julius couldn’t help laughing with him. They looked at each other, laughing oddly cheerfully together. “Julius, sir. Your father’s come back,” reported a soldier who appeared in the doorway. The confused riot outside the room had calmed down some, replaced by a mild sense of relief and the comfortable focused tension that came from trust. The father Julius respected gave his men that kind of high morale. The Elder in charge of the Security Forces was already gone, a victim of the recent string of Elder deaths, and in the discord among the Church leaders a successor hadn’t been named yet, which meant that for all practical purposes his father currently bore right of command over the whole army. Julius’s father appeared through the narrow doorway of the little room they were using as a makeshift infirmary clanging with the weapons of war, carrying a rifle and saber and decked out in full-body armor plating under the officer’s greatcoat he wore. The pure-white greatcoat that was the emblem of the Church Soldiers was filthy with scorch marks from torches and black coal-tar-like fluid. Julius could see his exhaustion as he wiped sweat from his forehead with his glove, but when he looked at Julius and Sigri he gave them his usual bright, cheerful smile. “Sigri. Glad you’re all right.” “I wouldn’t exactly say ‘all right,’” Sigri said sardonically, sitting up in bed with a protective hand on his right shoulder. Julius helped him. “If you’ve got one head and four limbs all still attached, you’re plenty all right,” his father said, laughing him off unsympathetically. At that, Sigri gave a little burst of laughter himself. “Can’t argue with that.” Then, in a melancholy voice, he murmured, “…I suppose there were a lot of deaths.” The mood of the room grew heavier at that. “What’s the situation?” “As you can see, it’s not good,” Julius’s father answered sourly as he set down his weapons. “We’ve finished evacuating the people who were left on the streets, but apparently there’s a group still stranded in the cathedral. I sent a rescue team.” “And the monsters?” “They just keep on coming,” he spat, and then suddenly fixed a glare on Sigri. “You know where those things came from, don’t you, Sigri?” he demanded with a harshness that rode the line between question and condemnation. Julius’s father didn’t give people that truly sharp look very often. If Sigri had been one of his subordinates, he probably would’ve gone pale as a ghost and frozen stiff on the spot. Sigri, however, accepted it with a serious face and without turning his eyes away. “…Certain of the Elders were attempting to manufacture Undyings. Those things are the defective products.” “Ma—” Julius blurted, on the verge of interrupting the adults’ conversation, but the charged mood around them proved too much for him, and he fell silent. Manufacture Undyings?! His father had evidently guessed this already. He didn’t look particularly surprised, and his glare didn’t soften. “You didn’t take part, I assume?” his father pressed. Meeting his gaze head-on, Sigri shook his head. “I didn’t take part, no. But…” “But you stood by and watched, is what you’re saying.” “…Yes.” As soon as the word was out of Sigri’s mouth, his father’s fist shot past right in front of Julius’s eyes and slammed square into the Elder’s bony jaw. Sigri’s body slammed hard into the wall next to the cot. “D-dad!” Julius rushed between them and tried to help Sigri up, but Sigri waved off his hand. “It’s fine.” He sat up on his own, wiping blood from the corner of his mouth. “Good thing I wasn’t wearing my glasses. You would’ve broken them,” he accused, which wasn’t exactly what most people would consider the appropriate response. His father replied with equal breeziness. “Lucky for you, I guess.” He was shaking his fist out lightly. The only one upset here was Julius. Those two were completely unruffled. “It’s been a long time since I took one of your punches. Since Setsuri, I think.” “Well, it wouldn’t do to deck an Elder. I hit extra hard to make up for all the times I’ve had to hold back.” “I am still an Elder, you know…” Sigri replied, hunching his shoulders. “Well, if you ask me, the Elders can all eat shit.” Julius’s father dismissed him flatly, looking strangely proud of himself. “Reporting in, sir!” cried one of the soldiers, dashing into the room. All eyes turned to him. Looking a little intimidated, he bowed and gave his report. “We have word that a walking energy mass of unknown origin has broken into the energy tower and destroyed portions of it in the process. Energy supply in those portions is coming to a halt.” “The energy tower?” As they all exchanged wary looks, the light illuminating the room abruptly went out. Julius’s field of vision was blanketed in darkness, and he could just barely make out the shadowy outlines of the people in the room with him. With the uneasy feeling that he’d been suddenly tossed into a void, he looked around apprehensively. It was the middle of the night by now; fighting back against the monsters without light would be fatal. “Scrape together all the lights you can find! Torches, lanterns, anything!” His father’s reassuringly powerful voice sent the other soldiers running out of the room to follow their orders. He didn’t show any signs of agitation even now. Julius heard sounds of commotion from all the groups of soldiers outside. Somewhere off in the distance, the howling of a beast echoed. “Julius, you stay put. Take care of Sigri for me.” “Dad—” His father took up his weapons and dashed out of the room. Julius watched him go, unable to stop him, and then groped his way quickly to the window. In the flickering torchlight at the base of the tower he could make out soldiers running to and fro along the walls. A shiver ran all the way down his spine at the sight of the scene outside. Their headquarters tower was completely surrounded by a pack of monsters. Body after slack, rotting body shimmered in the light of the orange torch flames. Stooped forward and swaying slowly left and right, step by step they closed in on the tower. That day, the last and longest in the capital’s history, wasn’t over yet. And while Julius doubted any divine miracle had ever occurred before in this city of God on the graveyard, that day would be remembered for the advent of a true miracle… Kieli sat beside Beatrix’s pitiful remains one more time, looking down at her and combing through her hair with her fingers, that hair that was so beautiful even cut short. Beatrix… Kieli began to speak silently to her. I didn’t let go of his hand. And I never will, either, no matter what. Because you told me what to do, Beatrix. Thank you… Kieli stroked her cheek one last time and then laid Harvey’s coat over her. They’d found what appeared to be a little painting storeroom nearby, and they’d carried Beatrix’s body inside. Lots of canvases of religious paintings stood propped against the walls, not framed yet. The smell of oil paint permeating the room calmed her somehow. It was just like the smell in Sigri’s house…in the house where she was born. …Maybe it was the slow but steady passage of time doing it, but she realized that somewhere along the way she’d almost begun to accept that fact without even thinking about it. She didn’t know how to feel about that. “Are we leaving Beatrix here?” Kieli asked, turning to face Harvey where he waited by the wall near the door. He nodded. “Yeah. We still have things to do…” Nonetheless, Harvey stayed slumped on the floor holding one hand to his chest and looking as if it still hurt a little just to talk. Kieli was pretty sure moving would be a lot more of a trial. But in his mind’s eye, it wasn’t this place Harvey was seeing. He was looking somewhere else. The direction Jude had walked off in. Even if he couldn’t physically see the departing back of the man who was at once his old friend and his enemy, he was still fixing his sight on it all the way from here. Kieli thought that really, Harvey had probably already forgiven Jude. The Jude in Harvey’s world was a cobbler who lived a quiet life watching over the gravestones in his yard, and a criminal tormented by regret, and the boy who was that world itself hadn’t blamed Jude at all. There was no way Harvey actually wanted to raise a hand to his old friend, to turn on one of his own. He was bottling up his own feelings, though, and preparing to settle things with Jude. Not to take his revenge, but to free an old friend trapped in a life of guilt. And Kieli…Kieli hadn’t thought she’d forgiven her father yet. But she realized that as time went on, her feeling of instinctive rejection was starting to fade. Had she already forgiven him, deep down, and her mind was just being stubborn about it now? Had Kieli managed to forgive her father, just like Harvey’d forgiven Jude? She couldn’t really figure out how she felt. She thought she’d like to talk with that man. He’d traveled with her mother, Setsuri; he might know. Know how her mother had felt about her father, Sigri, and whether she hadn’t hated him anymore… She’d been lost in thought, staring at the floor, but now Kieli steeled herself and raised her face. “Harvey, you’re still in pain, right? I’ll go get you some water.” It came out sounding sharp, almost as though she was picking a fight, and Harvey gave her a funny look. “Nah, I don’t need any. Let’s get moving.” “It’s okay. A little while ago I found a water fountain nearby, so I’ll go straight there and come straight back. You rest until then.” Harvey was moving to stand up. She put her hands on his shoulders and pressed him a little forcefully back down to sitting. He tried to resist, but it was plain that his body wouldn’t do what he told it to, and in the end he plopped back down. Kieli squatted in front of him and drew the braid of golden hair and the copper-colored stone that had come apart out of her skirt pocket. She pressed them into Harvey’s hands and said, “Listen, I want you to fix the lucky charm Beatrix gave me. And while you’re doing that, I’ll get some water. Okay?” Kieli knew she was pretty much trying to railroad him into this. She waited on pins and needles for his response. “…Okay,” Harvey agreed. Although he was frowning, that was still a lot easier than she’d anticipated. She could laugh with relief. “Okay, I’ll be right back. Hang on to the Corporal, too.” Kieli took the radio from around her neck and handed it to him as she left the storeroom. She looked left and right down the colonnade outside to make sure there were no failures wandering around and then gave Harvey a little wave as she shut the heavy door of the storeroom and left him behind. She began making her way through the silent colonnade alone, careful not to walk too loudly. I’m sorry Harvey, Corporal…In her heart, she gave them a bow and an apology. Kieli thought she might be able to touch that man’s heart, just like she’d been able to touch Harvey’s inner world. If they could talk inside his heart, then maybe she could bring his heart back. That way they could avoid a situation in which Harvey would have to settle the score with Jude, the old friend he cared about a lot. She didn’t want Harvey to do something like that, not if there was any way around it. Because he was the kind of person who always got hurt himself whenever he hurt someone else. And…Kieli also wanted to ask that man who must’ve known her mother so well a few questions. Had my mother forgiven my father? Is it okay if…I forgive my father…? He lifted the little stone and the unraveling braid of golden strands to eye level with his left hand. “…How does she expect me to fix this thing one-handed?” he muttered to himself, eyes narrowed, and stuck it in his pocket. Leaning back on one of the paintings propped against the wall, he looked over to where Beatrix’s body was lying just beyond his field of vision. Resting in front of a big, finely detailed religious painting like that, she might as well be part of a painting of a beautiful angel herself. Fzzsh…bzzzzzzz… The radio prodded him with a stream of faint static. He murmured back without moving his gaze from the angel in the painting, “I know, Corporal. Does that girl think she can fool my instincts?” Sheesh, how many years does she think I’ve known her? Using that obvious excuse to go running off alone—it was plain as day what she was thinking. “Stupid idiot. You don’t get to take my last job away…” he grumbled, standing up. His body hurt all over and he was a little unsteady, but he got to his feet by bracing himself against the painting with his hand. He took one last glance at the body still so soft even in death that if he didn’t know better he might believe she was only sleeping, and then he let his eyes fall shut and said his farewell. “Sorry, Bea. This is good-bye.” “He” ate a giant energy source and took it into himself. His body grew even bigger. But his mind didn’t grow at all: If anything, his consciousness only spread out even thinner, and “he” didn’t get any closer to the answer “he” sought. “He” looked around for more energy, but “he” couldn’t sense any energy bigger than himself anymore. His enlarged body was too heavy for him to walk now. With each step “he” took, all the things he’d fused with wailed and moaned in pain. The cables sticking to his body got yanked whenever they caught against something. Each time “he” felt a pain as though he was being ripped apart. With each step dead flesh came loose from his body and plop, plopped down in rotting clumps. “He” kept right on going, though, searching for his next source of energy. To maintain this giant body, “he” thought, would take an even larger energy source. Why do I need to get bigger, though? A thought suddenly struck him: What had “he” been looking for? Yes: I wanted to remember. Remember who I am, why I exist. What was that scrap of memory that burst in me? Who was that boy? Whose voice was it calling me then? That’s right…I have to make amends to that boy. That’s why I still exist. Am I still not powerful enough to beg that boy for forgiveness? How big do I have to get before I’m strong enough? His entire bloated body hurt like hell. But, “he” thought, he still had to get bigger to make amends for his sins. Much, much bigger. Unable to understand that the act of doing so would increase his sins, “he” kept on walking. The colonnade was a mess of half-eaten failure corpses. Kieli carefully avoided touching them as she walked, feeling sick. They did make it easy to trace the path that “he” had taken, though. All the lights had gone out a little while ago, so the colonnade was dim, but the clouds had thinned enough to let in just a little moonlight. The horrible corpses were even more sickening in its bluish glow. Suppressing her nausea, Kieli nervously made her way down the path “he” had traveled. Eventually she found herself in a claustrophobic passageway where pipes of all sizes twisted and turned along the walls so thickly that she couldn’t see through them to the stone. Maybe she was near the energy tower now. Was it really okay for her to have come alone? Had she been reckless? She already regretted it, but she forced the thoughts out of her mind. Slither… Kieli felt something warm and clammy grab her ankle. Too stunned to jump back right away, she turned her neck with stiff, jerky movements to look down. The half-eaten failure with its hand around her ankle lifted its head up to look at her almost pleadingly. Its body was half-eaten, was nothing more than a horrible lump of meat now. She could see a tiny shard of its core still buried in its flesh. Coal-tar-like blood sluggishly tried to regenerate it, but it was decomposing too fast. Pieces of its body rotted off as she watched. It was such a grotesque and pitiful sight that Kieli thought it might’ve been better off not surviving in this in-between state at all. Unable to do anything else, Kieli desperately yanked her foot free and ran away. Should she have taken out that last fragment and put it out of its misery? But she was too scared even for that. As she ran, she was seized by a terrible vision of every single corpse around her starting to move, reaching their hands out to her for help. Their painful gurgles of grief wouldn’t get out of her head. Forcibly banishing them from her thoughts, Kieli ran. In her peripheral vision, she caught sight of a giant shape lurching heavily in the shadow of the pipes. She slowed her steps, startled, and peered down the passageway. There he is…! “He” appeared from out of the shadows of the pipes, bloated so much bigger than the first time she’d seen him that there was almost no comparison. And he had changed in other ways, too: he was so much more monster than man now that she could barely recognize him as a person-shape that walked on two legs. Even as Kieli unthinkingly took a step back, she mentally shook herself. No, you’re the one who came looking for him, so you could talk! So try saying something to him! “U-um…” The monster tilted its head and gurgled questioningly. That got Kieli’s hopes up. He’d reacted as if he could hear her, so maybe he could understand her— Owooonn…! With a bellow, the monster launched its body of carrion and scrap metal at her. Kieli instinctively jumped aside, and the monster’s fist hit the pipes on the wall behind her. A few of them crushed out of shape and spat white steam. She’d messed up. She shouldn’t have dodged. Next time you can’t dodge, she instructed herself, gulping. To do that, she had to lose consciousness, so of course she’d come here prepared to take at least one hit. Kieli stood still and gazed at the monster head-on while it prepared for its next attack, waiting for that girl to appear. She was pretty sure that the ghost girl who’d drawn out her spirit body for her when she’d gone to sleep next to Harvey would show up again here. It was a gamble, but she felt strangely certain about it. And then she should be able to touch that man’s world, just like she’d been able to touch Harvey’s inner world. She should be able to touch his world. No, you can’t touch his world… She finally heard the voice of the girl she’d been waiting for. Kieli couldn’t see her, but she sensed she was nearby. Still steadily watching the monster’s movements, Kieli asked in her mind, Why not? His mind isn’t just his anymore. It’s a bunch of different consciousnesses mixed together. It’d be tough to separate out just his own consciousness and touch only that. What should I do, then? You can’t do anything…All you can do is end his life for him. He can’t ever go back to what he used to be. But—isn’t there some way? Can’t I talk to him somehow? I’m sorry, but no… As the girl’s presence faded away with those despairing words, the monster charged again. Kieli gazed at it head-on as it attacked, unable to completely give up hope. Is it really too late to talk to you…? Just as the monster’s hand was about to connect with her face, she suddenly felt herself floating up into the air. The monster’s swipe missed her and slammed into the pipes again. Kieli witnessed this as her body flew in an easy arc through the air and then got deposited back down again a little ways away. She looked up with her mouth hanging open. “You idiot!” an angry voice shouted at her without preamble. Harvey looked seriously pissed. Still bewildered, Kieli asked, “Wh-what are you doing here…?” “What’s wrong with you?! You’re the most reckless…” Harvey trailed off and just opened and closed his mouth a few times as though he couldn’t even find the words to keep yelling at her. He was really, truly angry. Kieli knew full well that when Harvey stopped talking, it meant he was really angry. The monster yanked its hand out from where it’d gotten stuck between two pipes and slowly turned to face them again. “I’m chewing you out later, believe me,” Harvey told her, which sounded like a message from the radio around his neck, and then he raised the saber in his left hand and turned from Kieli to the monster. “I’m sorry for you, Jude…All messed up like that, long dead but you still can’t really die…” Owooo…nn…! The monster gave a howl that sounded distinctly like a sob. To Kieli, it seemed as if Harvey was crying as they faced off, too. Crying on the inside. “Come here. I’ll end this for you.” The monster charged with thundering footsteps that shook the ground. Holding his saber low, Harvey stared straight at his opponent and didn’t move. In the next second, it looked to Kieli as though their bodies collided and sort of mingled together. The tip of Harvey’s saber was thrust into the center of Jude’s body, but at the same time Jude’s arm had pierced straight through Harvey’s side and out his back again. Kieli let out a hoarse scream.
Chapter 122
23 min read