I do not own Highschool of the Dead, nor do I own Harry Potter, both are the respective properties of those who created, drew and published them. This story and all listed Original characters are mine, please do not copy or redistribute without my permission. With that said – please enjoy the story and share your thoughts and opinions with me.
Summary: A holiday to Japan soon turns into a nightmare for Harry when the world ends. Language difficulties, racism, unfamiliarity and lack of trust, not to mention THEM. Its fly and live or fall and... become the enemy.
EPISODE TWO – Amongst the Dead
By Araceil
Breakfast was a speedy and chaotic affair that morning.
The main-road was somewhat populated by the Things – he needed to think of a better word than Things or Zombies – and the backstreets were actually choked. Harry felt it safer to stick to the main road and be as quiet as possible since these things were blind from what he could tell. None of the ones in the shop windows had even reacted when he walked past – and hadn't that given him a heart attack when he finally noticed them.
In all, the only problems he had were inside the shop when he had to shut the Cashier into one of the freezers and get his breakfast, lunch and dinner into the bag. He felt bad about stealing so he emptied his wallet on the counter and quickly made his escape before anything took exception to him being there.
He had always been particularly stealthy, years of stealing food at the Dursleys and then sneaking around at school to avoid the worst of the delinquents had strangely prepared him for this. He stalked through the streets of Tokonosu towards where he hoped the river was, he was quiet and he managed to make it ten minutes down the road before his foot hit a metal street cover and clanged audibly – it didn't echo, it didn't go far, but the creature closest to him jerked around and moaned. Loudly.
The gig was up.
Harry cursed under his breath and bolted, using the pipe he occasionally shoved one or two out of the way as he ran but it was getting more and more difficult to avoid them, the things from the back-streets were being drawn out by the hissing and moaning mob that was trailing behind him as he ran. Up ahead was an overturned freight-truck, Harry didn't know what was inside it but the crumpled car in front of it provided the perfect leg up as he jumped up and then pulled himself onto the overturned vehicle – safely out of reach from the ravenous horde behind him. God damn, there had to be a solid hundred, maybe two hundred of the little bastards swarming down the road towards him.
He sighed and got his breakfast out, he wasn't going to be able to move for a while. Best he stay quiet. Perhaps they would come to the conclusion that he had escaped after a while.
He hadn't been at all very picky when he'd been grabbing food, but he found that while he didn't really like the pancakes filled with the sweet-bean curd, he could still eat them without needing to waste most of his water to get rid of the taste. The majority of his bag was filled with canned goods, bottled water and a few stimulant bottles – plus vitamins and minerals from the tiny little pharmacy section at the back of the shop, he'd also grabbed a few roles of bandages, some disinfectant and a small general first-aid box, and a notebook and pen. Just in case. He'd wrapped Dudley's clothes around them to prevent rattling and sloshing, it seemed to have worked so far. Now, if only those noisy buggers down below would stop clamouring he could probably sleep those hours he missed from this morning.
A car crashing further up the street broke whatever tranquillity he was able to gain.
Harry jerked upright and stared at the flaming wreck several hundred metres up the road, already it was being swarmed by the Things, completely uncaring as to whether they caught fire or not, which they did. He hoped to all hell that the people inside died when the car crashed. Getting eaten alive wasn't the way he ever wanted to go, he hoped someone would be kind enough to kill him first.
On the bright side though, the impact into the building set up an almost unholy racket that drew all of the things toward it, leaving his way entirely clear.
Cautiously, Harry climbed down from his safe perch, stepping back awkwardly as one of the things shuffled past him with a gargling hiss of interest. Fairly soon they were all igniting next to the car, Harry grimaced and pulled the collar of his shirt over his nose as the smell began to get to him – he could see why Fire Fighters would swear off pork, the rumours were true. Hefting his pole, Harry took a deep breath and tightened the straps on his bag, time to go he decided as he made his way down one of the side streets, flattening himself to the wall as one of the Things moved past towards the crash-site.
Definitely drawn by sound, that was fortunate, if they had increased senses like sight or smell then he could only assume they would all be royally fucked because if just one of them saw you then you would get swarmed by all the others when they kicked off the alarm.
The further into the back streets the less crowded and choked it became, there was a lot more evidence of human activity though – bullet holes in the walls, broken windows from the shop-fronts, a pair of ripped and bloody lady's underwear which made Harry freeze in incomprehension for all of ten seconds before anger, hot and thick, burned through his veins. Gritting his teeth, he carried on, just because he saw something that... It might not have been rape, he was letting his imagination run away with himself, for all he knew, someone may have just used the first piece of clothing in a bag to mop up a wound or something. He kept walking, being careful of his feet and not to make any undue noise as he crept behind swaying figures stood listlessly in the middle of the street.
He took his time, what would have taken half an hour probably took him two hours, there was a lot of broken glass strewn over the pavements and it was difficult to manoeuvre his way through the clumped corpses. When he occasionally did some across an honest to go inanimate corpse it was somehow more horrifying than its reanimated companions. Usually because the body had been severely savaged barely seconds after it had fallen. Apparently the Things would continue to feast until the corpse had lost warmth, or they were distracted by other, livelier prey.
He encountered his second survivor of the morning at that point.
They were roughly of the same age, he was still wearing a school-uniform and wielding a large metal baseball bat – causing quite a lot of commotion and steadily drawing the shambling corpses ever nearer. But he was alive and despite his apparent stupidity or lack of observational skills, Harry wasn't one to leave someone to die unless he was certain there was no chance of rescuing them – like the woman earlier that morning, he tried to help her but the second those Things got their teeth into her, even she knew it was a lost cause.
"Oi!" Harry called to the kid, gesturing, making a few of the ones nearer to him jerk around with hissing moans. The kid looked around in surprise, probably at having run across another survivor, it was roughly mid-morning and all Harry had seen were those Things, car accidents and blood-streaks. He didn't know the word for 'This way', at least, he wasn't certain about it. He just kept gesturing for the other teenager to follow him while saying, "Hayaku, hayaku." one of the few Japanese words that he knew would be helpful in this situation. The moment Petunia had learned that it meant faster, or hurry up, it became her new favourite thing to bark at him.
Harry jabbed one of the Things out of the way as he ran forward, grabbing the kid by the shoulder and pulling him back, repeating himself until the kid turned away from the Things and actually did as he was told. The two of them ran pell-mell through the back streets, the other teenager quickly following Harry's example of just shoving the things aside and not stopping to crack their skulls open, thankfully he also kept his mouth shut as they finally hit the main road.
Harry sighed in relief and placed his finger to his lips to tell the other boy to be quiet, he looked confused so Harry did his best to explain through crude puppetry. Some things could never be misinterpreted. He pointed to the nearest one of the Things, shuffling listlessly down the street before pointing to his own eyes and shaking his head, the other teenager's face lit up in sudden realisation as he nodded rapidly. Well, perhaps not as stupid as Harry had first anticipated. He smiled and nodded happily before taking a deep breath and looking at the other teenager in askance, was he ready for this?
The Japanese boy nodded firmly, his dark eyes intense as he gripped his metal bat in preparation.
They could exchange names and niceties when they got somewhere safe and less likely to kill them if they spoke or made a sound out of turn.
Sasaki Mamoru honestly didn't know how to react. His whole world had just fallen to pieces in the span of two hours – he had only just barely managed to escape the school after getting ditched by his so called bestfriend Hideaki who practically shoved him into a crowd of those Freaks so he could escape with those sluts he called classmates. Everything had just gone so horribly wrong so quickly, too quickly, it still hadn't sunk in to be completely honest. One minute he was sat in lessons, contemplating how to glue the teacher to his fucking chair and shove that chalk stick up his nostrils without getting expelled, then an announcement came over the speakers about how some dangerous individuals had broken into the school and that everyone had to stay in their classrooms and follow the Teach's orders.
It hadn't even been five minutes after the announcement ended that the doors were busted in by a gang of those Freaks, they grabbed Masaki as she was sat closest to the door and then all hell broke out as she started screaming with those things biting and clawing at her. Like everyone else in the class he bolted, but unlike those suckers, he made for the fencing behind the Gym where it was pretty easy to use the trees at the back there to climb over the chain-link fence.
He had been laughing, all of them had, Hideaki and those girls had come with them along with Naoki from Class 2E, an old smoking buddy of theirs. They raided the gym and gathered weapons before doing the business and skipping out. But the outside wasn't any safer than the inside. The second their feet touched the ground, those Freaks were after them. He knew now that it was because they were laughing and making such a noise but at the time they assumed the Freaks had been waiting for them.
Hideaki blamed him for leading them straight to Them and roughly kicked him in the gut, shoving him towards the things before he grabbed the blonde bitch Hana and dragged her off. They were laughing as they left him to be eaten alive and it tasted bitter when he realised that Hideaki, that fucker he once called a bestfriend, ditched him for a chance to fuck some sweet, sweet vagina. Too bad that everyone and their fucking dogs had boned Hana so he wasn't going to have very much fun fucking the slut, it'd be like throwing a hotdog down a fucking hallway when you compared his tiny cock to how fucking loose her cunt was. Maybe it was the bitterness talking but he said they deserved each other, and he hoped they got eaten while they were busy having their lame and unsatisfying sex.
He'd managed to escape, he had stumbled across the street and nearly got hit by some jackass in a bus as he ran down the back streets, he had to get home, he had to check on his family. They weren't too far from the river, they lived pretty well in a small family home not far from the Onbetsu Bridge, not much of a walk but it had taken him almost two hours to get a third of the way there.
Currently, he had pulled the foreign kid who'd saved his bacon into a familiar convenience store, they had hit on a pocket of survivors but everyone was going insane, shooting and killing any one of those things and the kid nearly got shot despite being clearly alive. And that kind of pissed Mamoru off in all honesty.
Having worked at this convenience store a few summers back, he still remembered the keycode to get into the back rooms and easily tugged the smaller male along behind him. The two of them retreated into the storage rooms while the pursuing psychos tore the place apart shouting, the High-schooler placed a hand on the kid's head and gestured at him to be quiet as he tried to listen in on what they were saying. He completely missed the irritated scowl on the older male's face as he was treated like a fucking kid.
Damnit, no use, the door was too thick for him to hear anything useful, though if he had to put money on it, he would say that they shot at the younger kid because he was foreign. Heck, he was guilty of a little Tourist Baiting before now, Super Soakers in summer filled with icy cold water, stalking the fatties and getting them in the most embarrassing of locations. Great fun. But trying to kill a kid with a shotgun just for that? Not cool.
Especially not when said kid was a better person than half the fuckers he knew at school.
Who apparently had kleptomania. Mamoru spluttered in shock as he saw the kid tearing open various boxes, unloading several things into his backpack, "Hey, you can't do that!" he squawked in an undertone, "You have to pay for those!" he hissed, rushing over to try and stop him.
The kid glared at him and slapped his hand, preventing him from removing the stuff he had already put into his bag. "Stop," the kid growled at him before rummaging around for a few other things, Mamoru stared at him and then looked into his little bag, somewhat startled by what he saw. All this stuff was high-energy and long term preservable, not to mention the first-aid box and vitamins, all the clothes in there were massively oversized and rather threadbare – much like the clothes he was wearing right now – but he certainly had a lot of water in there, plus some stimulant shots that were usually popular around exam time.
This kid... was acting as if this was going to be a long-term thing.
Mamoru's stomach sank to his feet as he sat down heavily on the hard linoleum floor, they had no evidence that it wouldn't, the fact that it spread so quickly meant that it was next to impossible to contain and thus control... who's to say that the whole of Japan hadn't been inflicted with those Freaks? What about other countries?
"Lunch." Mamoru jerked as a packet of salmon onigiri landed in his lap, he looked up at the kid who was sat opposite him, already stuffing his mouth with another ongiri, a bottle of water in his hand stretched out towards the High-schooler. "Eat. Lunch," the boy told him in broken and stumbling Japanese.
He managed to smile, "Thanks," he said, accepting the water bottle and cracking it open, "I'm Mamoru, you?" he asked.
The kid frowned at him and dug into his bag, Mamoru watched curiously until he produced a little book that very nearly had him snorting water through his nose as he tried to suppress his laughter. A little Japanese Phrasebook, that was surprisingly cute, just how old was this kid? There was no way he was older than fifteen, especially as a foreigner, they were all freakishly tall and this kid barely hit his shoulders.
"My name is Harry," the boy read out falteringly, "Nice to meet you."
Mamoru snickered as he sipped his water, "Nice to meet you, Hari-san. How old are you?" he asked, breaking into his Onigiri. At least with the delay between replies they could comfortably eat their lunches.
"I am seventeen-years-old." The Japanese high-schooler promptly choked on his Onigiri, much to Harry's satisfaction. "How old are you?" he asked, and it wasn't Mamoru's imagination that Harry's voice had become sweeter upon asking the question. His cheeks flushed embarrassedly, holy crap, he had mistaken a dude older than him for just some Gaki.
"Uh, sixteen. Sixteen-years-old," he admitted, still rather embarrassed that he had made such a huge social blunder, Hari-senpai didn't seem to mind though as he dug into his Onigiri and one of the bottles of fizzy-pop from behind them. "Where are you going anyway?" Mamoru finally managed to ask, embarrassment subsided, the older male certainly seemed to have a destination in mind judging by how purposefully he had been moving through the streets earlier, the fact that it had been in the same direction as Mamoru was somewhat relieving as he didn't like the idea of splitting up and going it alone. That was dangerous, not to mention a little depressing and lonely.
"Onbetsu Bridge," Hari-senpai answered after consulting his little book for a few minutes or so, finally getting the gist of what the other boy was asking, "Shintoko School police-san go to said." He completely butchered the sentence structure but Mamoru understood, someone from the Police told him to cross the Onbetsu Bridge and get to Shintoko Elementary School. But whatever for? "Where are you?" he asked, peering over the edge of his little book as he absently nibbled away at a Sweet-bean bun.
"Home. I need to check on my family," he admitted, rubbing the back of his head and telling himself that the nauseous feeling in his stomach was just from the smell of his clothes.
"Family?" Harry asked, not understanding the word before frowning and checking his book and nodding in understanding, "Family. Okay. We go," he agreed firmly as he licked the last crumbs of his lunch from his fingertips.
Mamoru stared at him in surprise, that easily? He had just decided to join him, help him and his family, just like that? Drop of a hat? Even Hideaki would have whined and bitched before help- no, as evidenced earlier, Hideaki would probably use them along with him to keep himself alive. No one else would have helped. He wasn't the smartest guy, or the best looking guy either, he was gruff and crude and he swore entirely too much and he had bleached his hair blond. No girls would talk to him unless it was to get a cigarette off him or have him beat someone up on their behalf, he had a girlfriend once or twice, but only when he had a job they could sponge cash from. Though there had been one girl, one girl who had been decent, she had been kind and good and all the things he wasn't, she was a proper girl and not one of those slags. But he'd screwed it up, got drunk, got violent, she ran off crying and he never heard from her again, after all, she attended a different school and the few times he did try to go and see her, her rather scary girlfriends would gang up on him and make him leave.
Even his friends ditched him in the end and then along comes some scrawny foreign guy who looks like a Gaki but is actually a Senpai and without a single moment's hesitation, agrees to help him without his even having to ask for it.
"Thank you."
The vast number of humans that flocked to the Onbetsu Bridge was staggering, Mamoru made sure to keep Hari-senpai close to hand, while no one was paying attention right now, too determined to escape those Freaks, but he could tell that there would be discontent later. People would be pointing the finger at the first convenient scapegoat, be it Yakuza, Delinquents or Foreigners. And considering the fact that Yakuza and Delinquents were still Japanese, Mamoru was betting that everyone would jump on the 'Let's all hate America' train. Which meant a mob mentality and more danger for them, he was fairly sure he would be seen as a Traitor for taking his diminutive friend's side.
"Let's go," Hari-senpai hissed, grabbing him by the arm and jerking his head towards a young woman who was choking and spitting blood, a very obvious bite mark wrapped in a scarf around her forearm.
Mamoru nodded and quietly lead the other male down some familiar back-allies, they would need to climb the wall next to the Gas Station but it would take them out into his street about eight houses down. Apprehension squeezed his insides as he made his way through the familiar allies, remembering when he sprayed that graffiti outside the Ramen place, man, the owner had been so pissed that he actually came out swinging a hot oiled wok.
Behind his new friend, Harry frowned, picking up on his wool-gathering, this area must be close to his home.
Pursing his lips, the seventeen-year-old sped up a little until he was level with the blond male, if they ran into someone he knew, Harry doubted he would have it in him to strike without hesitation. That could mean Mamoru's death.
Distantly, they could hear shouting from the Onbetsu River, people being told that the bridges were blocked off and vehicles were only allowed to pass on the Onbetsu Bridge, anyone caught attempting to cross the other bridges would be harshly dealt with. The rapport of distant guns echoed through the streets along with the screaming and crying of women and children, men swearing and the sound of car horns and the low static hiss of those Things moaning as they chased their noisy prey.
Thankfully, they didn't encounter anyone that Mamoru was familiar with until they reached his house. It was a nice traditional looking place with a washing line out the front, the clothes smelling faintly of rice milk and green tea fabric softener. It was quiet, safe looking with large thick walls and a sturdy iron gate.
The blond teenager looked around warily as one of the curtains rustled from the open second floor window, silently, he closed the gate behind him and locked it into place as Harry shrugged his bag off and quietly set it on the grass.
"I go," the green eyed teenager told him, pushing him back towards the gate when he took a step forward, "I go," he repeated quietly, making Mamoru choke at the implication before he nodded.
Harry nodded and stepped back, readying his pole before he pushed open the front door, it having been slightly ajar which sent alarm bells off in his mind. He hoped that they weren't in the front entrance, Mamoru didn't need to see that. The hallway was empty, and he couldn't see any tell-tale blood streaks or splatters anywhere. Nudging the door shut behind him, just in case anything jumped out at him, he slowly made his way through the bottom floor. Moving on soundless feet – heedless to the act that he should have taken his shoes off in the entrance way as he cleared the living room, dining room, kitchen and bathroom.
That left upstairs.
What he found... was grim.
Husband and wife in the bedroom, both of them having turned, the wife obviously having been bitten first as her wound was wrapped, both of them turned towards him with gasping mouths. Gritting his teeth, Harry lunged forward, jumping and smashing the pole down on the Wife's head – cracking it open like an egg. Twisting around, under the grasping arms of the Husband, he smashed it around his head with every ounce of force he could muster, crushing it against the wall, leaving a large blood splatter as he jerked and went still.
Panting slightly, Harry stared at the bodies silently before he set aside his pole and pulled their bodies to the other side of the bed, out of sight of the doorway. He put them side by side and covered them with the duvet from the bed.
It felt kind of wrong to just leave them there, he knew he could half expect Mamoru to either refuse to see them or spend hours just staring at their corpses. Either way, he felt like he had to say something, anything really, to reassure whatever piece of themselves still existed, or had existed. He picked up his pole and went to the door, pausing slightly as the feeling refused to let him leave without saying something. But what could he say to a pair of dead parents? Sorry for killing you, don't worry, I'll keep your son alive as long as I can? Rather inadequate in his opinion.
So, in the end, he kept his mouth shut and continued to check the rest of the house, nearly getting killed in the process as he opened the upstairs bathroom and had a child lunge for him, bloody teeth gnashing to try and claim a chunk of flesh. Mamoru's kid sister! Shit!
Putting his parents out of their misery was one thing, but she couldn't have been any older than eight!
Kicking the child away, he stared at her with conflicting feelings before stepping back, luring her back into the Husband and Wife's bedroom. Once inside he lifted the pipe above his head, "Sorry," he whispered and smashed it down onto her head, watching her drop like a puppet with its strings cut. He was equally careful about moving her as he had been with her parents, peeling away the duvet and setting her tiny body between them and, regardless of how morbid it may have been, he moved the arms of the Parents to rest over her, as if in a hug.
Sitting back he sighed, anything he had to say was inappropriate, he had quite literally just cracked their skulls open. In the end, he recovered them with the duvet and made his way out. Firmly closing the bedroom door behind him before heading downstairs to give Mamoru the all clear.
He didn't say anything, and he didn't ask after his family when Harry opened the door again.
Dark eyes took in the blood streaking the pole and splattered across his friend's clothes and closed his eyes, Harry kept quiet, feeling almost ashamed of himself in the painful silence as his friend tried to pull himself together. Eventually, he took a deep breath and opened his eyes, forcing a smile to his lips.
"C'mon, we're both covered in blood. Let's grab a bath and get some dinner, there's a lot of left-overs in the fridge," he suggested, breezing past the smaller teenager who didn't understand a single word but followed quietly none the less, closing the door behind him.
Right, I'm going by the Manga Timeline so by the time that Harry and Mamoru reach his house, Komuro and his group have just met up outside Tokonosu Castle and are preparing to head to Rika's house. I know in the anime it had various events take place at night – such as Rei's near rape by that guy with the braces, but in the manga that takes place in the afternoon of Z-day. As of right now, its approaching night time of Z-day.
Hope you guys are enjoying this so far, I know we haven't had Komuro and his guys in there yet but like I said, I'm trying to keep this a little original so Komuro and his gang will show up but I'd like to play with Mamoru and Harry for a while. They're interesting characters in my mind, both with their own codes of conduct and oddly enough chivalry. Both of which will be demonstrated later.
((Yes, Mamoru is supposed to be something of a Yankii/Delinquent. I think it would rub a few people's fur the wrong way, such as Rei and Saya, to have him in the group.))
A past reviewer suggested an alteration in the pairings. Now, in all honesty, the idea never crossed my mind. I just didn't like Takashi/Rei so the next viable pairing was Takashi/Saeko. But a helpful reviewer - you know who you are - asked why I didn't just make it Takashi/Harry. I will be honest and say this never crossed my mind. So. The decision is up to you guys. I've written about five Chapters of this story already, they're sat on my harddrive as I type this and I won't be writing anymore until the fifth Chapter is posted. At which point this Poll will be closed.
Which would you prefer, pairing wise?
Takashi/Saeko
Takashi/Harry
Mamoru/Harry
Harry/Rei