"Naomi? Naomi, answer me!"
I sobbed into the phone as I begged my daughter to answer. She was late coming back from school, and now she wasn't answering me even after picking up the phone. This wasn't like her!
"I'm you're mom, Naomi! Please, say something!"
I can't believe that I was already brought so low that I'd state the obvious, hoping for any response. When I finally got my response, I felt like a knife had been driven into my heart.
The only thing I heard from my daughter… was a horrified scream cut off by the phone being hung up.
Naomi!…
I immediately dialed the emergency number and told the police that my daughter was missing, and that she sounded like she was in danger the last time she picked up her phone. They asked me for so many little details, but I told them everything they asked. That scream… if anything happened to Naomi, I'd be all alone…
It… was all in vain.
Days passed. There was no sign of my daughter anywhere. The news reported that a number of her classmates and a teacher were also missing. There was no sign of what might have happened to them. No indication they were even alive.
The police spent the next week asking me questions about my Naomi, trying to figure out what to do to find her and the others. Even after the police had left for the day, I'd wrack my brain trying to think of some reason Naomi might have gone missing.
A week after that, and the police called off the investigation. There was simply no trail to follow, they said. They'd leave up the missing person reports, but they'd do nothing else to help.
I was alone.
I stayed home from work after that. Some days I couldn't even force myself out of bed to eat. When I finally took the time to listen to my answering machine and check my email I found messages asking why I'd been skipping work. But I couldn't reply… I could barely do more than stare at my keyboard and wonder what I would even say.
I think it was almost three weeks after Naomi didn't come home from school that I started seeing strange things.
It started with a young boy, probably around grade school age, appearing suddenly at the end of the hallway when I went to make myself meals in the kitchen. He looked transparent… as if he weren't really there. And he had horrible wounds across his stomach that made it difficult for me to keep my food down when I remembered his appearance.
Next, a little girl of about the same age started showing up in Naomi's seat at the dinner table. Or I think it was a girl… her head and tongue were missing and she made a low gurgling sound before fading away.
Then came another girl, a bit older but still young enough to be a grade schooler, started appearing in Naomi's room when I came to look for some clue as to why she left me. The girl played with Naomi's toys as if she were real, but looked just as transparent as the other two. One time I glanced at her and realized one of her eyes had been gouged out.
I realized I was going insane.
That night, as I prepared for bed, I wondered if that would be so bad. If I went insane, I wouldn't have to feel so alone… I could pretend I didn't still feel a void where Naoyuki and Naomi should have been.
As I slept, I began to dream… or, I thought it was a dream at first. But it was too real to be just a dream… I felt like I was actually experiencing something. I was in a dark tunnel, like some sort of bomb shelter. I could barely see around me, but I made out a teenage girl sitting down next to a pillar.
I realized I could move of my own will, so I inched closer to the girl. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I began to recognize the messy hair and dirty face of the girl.
"Naomi!…"
I ran toward her and knelt next to her. This was definitely Naomi!
"Naomi, thank god I finally found you!" I reached out to touch her, but felt as if I shouldn't and reflexively pulled back. "I've been so worried about you!"
Naomi didn't respond. I realized there were tears in her eyes.
"Naomi, what happened to you?…"
Footsteps echoed down the tunnel from the direction I had come. Naomi quickly dried her tears and stood up, holding what looked like a scrap of paper in her hand.
Around a turn in the tunnel came another girl, one of the other students from Naomi's class if I remember correctly. Her face was dirty too, and there were tearstains down her cheeks.
They were both silent for a moment. The other girl looked in my direction but didn't seem to see me.
"Ms. Yui…" the other girl began. "…is dead."
Naomi choked back a sob. "Ms. Yui…"
There was another silence. I tried to move forward, but suddenly I felt rooted to the spot. I couldn't even open my mouth to speak…
"Nakashima?…" The girl looked at my Naomi with a strange gaze. "Where did you get that paper doll scrap? Is it… Mochida's?"
Naomi shook her head slowly. "No. Satoshi still has his own. This is Yuka's." Naomi's chest rose and fell despite her attempts to avoid sobbing. "Poor girl… She didn't make it, either…"
What were they talking about? First, the girl says that their teacher is dead, now some other girl is dead too? What the hell happened to them?…
The other girl hummed to herself. "So that means there are two between the both of you." She glanced over at Naomi with an eerie grin on her face. "Sorry to ask, but… can I have that one?"
Naomi clenched her free hand into a fist. "You're a real jackass, you know that?"
The other girl moved close to Naomi, a frightening look in her eye. "Actually, I'm only asking because I ended up losing mine… SO GIVE IT HERE!"
Naomi and I only realized too late that the other girl had a large rock that she had been holding behind her back. I tried to scream for Naomi to get out of the way, but the other girl swung too quickly and my mouth wouldn't open.
The rock hit Naomi right in the forehead, knocking her to the ground. I felt fear and horror start to worm into my body at the sight of my precious Naomi bleeding on the ground of some abandoned bomb shelter. But that wasn't the end of the torture… that was only the beginning.
The other girl picked up the rock again and started bashing Naomi with it, over and over again. I tried desperately to scream for her to stop, to leave my Naomi alone. But nothing I could do would let me move or stop the girl in any way.
I felt like I'd fall to my knees, too weak from the pain of seeing my daughter's head bashed in to stand. But whatever kept me from moving kept from from falling too. I couldn't even turn away. I had to watch as my Naomi's skull was caved in, one bludgeon at a time.
When the girl finally stopped, I could barely recognize my daughter's face. Only her lower head escaped the other girl's wrath… and my Naomi was… smiling?!
I finally fell to my knees, and screamed out with all the breath I could muster. The scene around me turned black, and I was alone in a void. I didn't stop screaming. I could move now, but the memory of my daughter being murdered had been etched onto my soul. I couldn't look into the blackness without seeing that horrible smile she wore as she died.
"Ahahahahahahaha!"
I spun around at the sudden sound of a young girl giggling. Naomi?… No… it sounded different… like from a younger child…
"You're funny, lady!"
I looked down to see a young girl in an old-fashioned red dress. She looked no older than eight, yet her skin was as white as a corpse.
"I thought it was funny how she smiled when she knew she was going to die, but the look on your face was even better!" The girl imitated my horrified expression and scream. I started to choke on my tears.
"Why is this happening?"
The girl looped some of her long, stringy hair on a finger before responding. "Eh, because I decided things were getting boring."
I shook my head in disbelief. "You do this… just to pass the time?"
The girl giggled. "And because it's fun! I mean, did you SEE how that girl's cranial fluids leaked out of her head? It reminds me of a story my mom told me once, only funnier!"
I sobbed and lowered my head. This wasn't happening. My Naomi… couldn't be dead. Not like this. Not to some psychopathic child…
"Actually…" the girl tapped her cheek in thought. "We don't have enough adults around here. I suppose we have the writer, the cameraman, and the teacher now. But I'd like another mom here too."
I pulled at my hair. How could Naomi have died like this?… What did I do wrong?…
"Yeah, I like that idea." I heard the girl walking closer to me, the space around us becoming solid again. It looked a bit like an infirmary. But I wasn't paying much attention anymore.
Naomi was innocent… she didn't deser—
A sharp pain shot through my throat, ending my thought. I felt something move in close to my ear, and heard the little girl speak the words "Welcome to Heavenly Host Elementary… Mrs. Nakashima."
I couldn't breathe through whatever was stuck through my throat, and I felt myself bleeding and suffocating to death. I knew I was going to die…
I felt a small hand on my chest push me backwards, and I fell onto my back. As I spasmed reflexively in my final moments…
…I looked up to see…
…standing next to the girl in red…
…the smiling face of my daughter staring back at me.