Troubling situations
Helltanz's notes: As we approach chapter 10 I feel it necessary to state that this first arc is mainly to introduce the first changes in the first week of the zombie apocalypse. The descisions of different people will come under scrutiny, and obviously different groups will be encountered once 'arc 2' starts for example the Yakuza might show up, other student survivors, maybe tourists, or something along those lines.
Either way with the Takagi Estate surviving, and as implied by other events, things are changing. I will say I'm sticking reasonably close to canon for the moment. By and large though thats changing because of changes in events. The mall for example will play out different. If anyone notes any glaring plot errors feel free to point them out.
-scene break-
There hadn't been much time to talk to the people who were holed up in the mall. Not before we got the warning of the threat of imminent zombie attack. It did keep me from having to get into a lengthy conversation, which we really didn't have 'time' for, because we did have a fair amount of things to do including looking for supplies at other locations. Ishi had radioed in Zed on approach, and we heard Kohta's first shot a minute later. It was only a handful that were an immediate threat if we dallied, but that was plenty both as an excuse to leave now, and a real reason to leave. Kohta could kill them all quickly, but there were already more coming. We'd need to be gone by the point that the rest of the horde started this way.
I grabbed the radio. It hadn't been made official but with Hirano's prodding, and exposure to the Takagi organization, and me we were starting to develop a paramilitary layout. "Saeko you heard that, make sure you have the bags lets move." I turned to the survivors who'd been held up inside the mall, "Well you'll want to reset your barricades, and I honestly advise you to choke the extra stairs up just in case." Both of those were pretty common sense, but every little bit helped I supposed. After that they'd probably want to get one of the upper floors and stay there.
I really wanted to tell them how to better improve their readiness, but these people didn't really seem that capable of getting organized for that kind of thing. From what information we had exchanged there had been an older cop who'd gone for back up, and she'd been in charge. Now that she was gone these people weren't really doing anything but going through the last instructions, and what seemed like a good idea. As for the clothes well as long as the girls had changes of clothes we could get clothes for the guys later. The girls could change when we got some breathing room. Right now we were going to bail, and that was the priority.
I had broken my own rule to come talk to these people, I'd insisted everyone walked with a partner when they went somewhere. I needed to get back. I started walking.
"Where are you going?" Shimada asked, "Where you going to go?" He kind of made a gesture to the barricades on the entrances to the shopping center.
I shrugged. "We've got another stop to make," The truth was... they weren't my obligation, even if we should be trying to help them, we did have other things to do. At the same time though they'd only be so long they could stay here without support. "You said the police should know where you are right? Just man the barricades, you'll be fine, hold out." I swallowed, "If you're still alive when we come back, if you've kept yourselves alive well..." Mr Takagi said he'd be prepared for whatever his plan ended up being in a few days, "We'll take you with us, but for right now I've, we're still searching for someone you're safer here." I lifted the radio, "Kohta?"
The shots had stopped, "Ah its all clear, yep all balls in play sunk. There is a bigger horde coming though" He announced. He was probably reloading the magazine he'd been shooting already. Still if that was all of them that was good, we could go ahead and get loaded.
I took one of the bags as Saeko and Takashi got up to us, "Look we'll being coming back through you can come back with us, in the mean time," I slid my handset across the ground, "If you need to get in contact with us," We'd agreed... that was to say Hirano, Saeko, and the rest of the group, and I that we didn't have the resources to save everyone. I told them that it should only be used in emergencies, and that its battery should be conserved.
This radio though was going to be more than a psychological lifeline than anything. If they did get into a mess chances were we wouldn't be able to get there fast enough unless they were somewhere defensible. From the perspective of the supplies this place could supply it was a good place, but if its defenses were breached it would probably fall pretty quickly.
There was also a part of me that was a little doubtful that the police would be coming. Even though we were going back to the police station it was for supplies. It'd been abandoned, in the best case scenario, by the time we'd gotten there on the first day. That didn't leave me with a whole lot of hope, and we'd left because it'd been like that. We were really only going back because it was the best place to start looking, and might have supplies worth gathering.
That was the truth, but with so many zombies trying to make sure as many humans as possible survived was critical. Even if we couldn't keep them with us trying to keep them alive by giving them something to clutch hold of, something to hope for. If these people could keep alive then maybe we could get one of the cars here working, maybe even a bus and drive to the Takagi's on our way. Really if we could get something like a van or a truck it'd be ideal because then we could bring supplies back in bulk with us to the Takagi Estate.
When we'd been plotting out where to go Hirano had brought up the shotgun ammo situation, and about the guns we hadn't had to use yet. I'd come packed for in the event I needed to arm other people, and that was what we were doing. Ishi toting the FAL around was good because it was in 308, and we had plenty of that. I'd brought a folding Sig rifle in 223, and had a fair amount of ammo for that, not to the ridiculous extent as 308 and 9mm, as well as a Ruger 10/22, and 22 caliber target pistol. With the benefit of hindsight I knew I should have considered bringing another 7.62 caliber rifle, or carbine when packing, and brought along M4,but there was no point regretting now... well I'd added those notes to my 'hypothetical scenario' notes.
Hirano had pointed that there was a gun store we should consider hitting. If we were lucky and it hadn't been looted it'd would probably have twelve gauge ammo, and possibly 22... maybe even. It was also apparently near a castle, which might be worth trying to use as a place to hole up in if we needed somewhere to spend the night.
Kohta had also pointed out that there was a chance that the sporting goods been looted already. Of course he'd brought it up because we could drive there. We'd been inordinately fortunate about Shizuka's friend's guns, especially given their caliber. The other options for ammo, realistically, was the police station, which we'd agreed to to begin with. If we were lucky the police station would have shotgun ammo.
We exited the entrance we came in. I got the impression that there were other survivors, somebody had to be handling the cooking, especially considering the power wasn't working. Still it was a little disconcerting. The traffic cop was the first cop we'd actually seen in person. Certainly there had been some on the bridge that first night. Even with all the noise of the city we'd heard the gunshots but that had just been from a distance. This junior cop was the only one we'd seen, which was not likely a good sign for people who were depending on the police to save them.
That first day we'd seen Japanese SDF helicopters but hardly any police. It did kind of make sense. We'd pretty much left the school, stopped to argue, picked a spot to actually split, and then left for our seperate ways, and then from there we'd gone on to go to Shizuka's friend's house. It had been there that we'd stayed the rest of the day. Of course it hadn't made sense for the police station to be quite so empty, but there hadn't been any zombies milling about either so it could have been they were all out. Still we should have stripped it when we got there, as it was we should have gone in all together and searched it.
I looked around. This place, the exterior, was pretty well secured. They could maybe move some the cars around to shore it up, but we didn't have time for that. If these people could keep it together until we got back we could probably get them to the Takagi estate. We finished loading the bags of clothes into the Humvee's rear compartment. They probably weren't totally ideal for what was coming but they were better than having the girls stick to running around in mini skirts... or hoping the Takagi's had extras of those silly black track suits they were all parading about in. Of course the Takagi's probably did in fact have extras... but those outfits probably weren't ideal for a number of reasons.
I knocked on the passenger's side front window, and Hirano clambered up the seat and stuck his head out the top of the Humvee, "Whats up?"
"I gave the survivors inside a radio, hopefully they're going to be smart about it and turn it off until they need it." I stated, taking a minute to look back at the mall. That was probably the first piece of equipment that they'd seen worked since the EMP. "either way stick to the vehicle radios if you need to talk, I don't really know much about the people in there."
He nodded, and Takashi jumped into the conversation, "Thats right, and there is a cop with them right, that could be trouble for us." Yeah, that was the truth because this was Japan, and we had enough equipment to knock over some small country. "She could really cause a problem for us." He reiterated again.
I shrugged, "Just keep in contact via the vehicle radio." I told them again walking back towards the ASLAV, where Ishi was already waving from the top of the turret. Shizuka pulled away from the front of the shopping center and was already nearly to the road by the time I got back to the ASLAV.
Her crazy driving was pretty scary. I wondered if she was intentionally running over the zombie corpses that Hirano had shot while we'd been inside grabbing the clothes from the store. She'd probably hit a lot more as we were driving away, because there were a lot zombies that had been attracted by Hirano's shooting.
"We're settled back here." Saeko called from the back. We'd stored all the gathered clothes in the humvee, but since it was all clear and we weren't having to run there was no point in her not getting directly back in the ASLAV. Ishi yawned as he sat back on the bench.
I looked back as the engine rumbled, "Alright, Ishi you might want to try and nap." We still had no idea how we were going to this thing with the police station, and what not. I put the ASLAV in motion and got about sixty feet behind the humvee, which was waiting in the middle of an intersection with Hirano popped up on top looking around with his binoculars so he could take a look around.
Well we were gonna have to come back here eventually. First though we needed to hit the police station, and then see about going by Rei's house. We also needed to see about eating lunch. That might have seemed a bit of a trivial concern, but everyone needed to keep their strength up.
I hear Ishi adjusting some of the stuff in the back, and trying to get comfortable, and then Saya spoke up, "Are we going to take those people back to my papa's?"
"All things considered it'd probably be the best for everyone." At the same time though I could see why Saya in particular would be wary about bringing extra people, even if we were bringing food and water back to the estate.
The situation at the Takagi estate had been deteriorating, and despite what Rei had implied, it had nothing to do with Shidou showing up. The ultra nationalists were fine, they had an established chain of command to help them cope, but the normal people weren't so lucky. Like they had said they were just 'normal Japanese citizens'. Saya had been sent to deal with that first hand. The civilian survivors weren't coping well with the situation.
She probably crossed her arms, "there not doing well as it is and its been less than a day," Since the EMP she meant. If these people were exposed to some of the more odious elements who were causing trouble at the Takagi estate well it could just exacerbate the problem. The problem was I didn't see any where else where these people had a chance for lasting anywhere past short term.
-scene break-
I looked around... tch this place was still fucking empty and creepy as mess. I knew we were someways away from Tokyo. Enough that the city could avoid being dominated by the Tokyo megapolis skyline. It meant also buildings could have space between them. For the most part I'd been running off local town maps of where things were... like 7/11s and what not. They'd have patrol maps inside, probably even menus from their favorites, maybe addresses of their homes. If cops were surviving Takagi would want to know where they would fall back to. I know if I was in his shoes I would. Souichiro needed more guns, and people who could use them in this country that meant the SDF, or armed police.
I wondered if the other police stations in the city, presumably there was one to the west, were like this. It also looked pretty much in the exact same condition, or appeared to be, as when we'd left that first day. It didn't really bode well for trying to find Rei's dad. Takashi had let her use his cell phone to try and call him on the first day, but the reception had been bad enough that he hadn't been able to hear him.
That did tell us he'd at least been alive when we'd been at the school, and Rei was clinging to that fact. There was no telling how she'd react if we found him dead... or worse, especially with how she'd reacted to Hisashi being turned into a Zombie. Takashi had recounted that occurrence to me last night.
"Hey Hirano?"
He turned his head when I called out, "ah yeah?"
"When we get in here look for a map I want to know where all the other police stations, facilities or whatever are in town." In the best case scenario we could get weapons here, and you never knew what you could find in evidence lock up. Given the size of Tokunosu there was probably a warehouse for confiscated goods, and a dedicated SWAT building somewhere in town, plus whatever other police stations which might be worth checking out. With at least 150,000, maybe 200k+, people in the near vicinity.
Takashi looked up, "There is another station across the river, but..." That meant going back across the river. That wasn't an issue, but bridge situation from the first night came to mind. There was no telling what was going on.
The girls were changing like they had when we bugged out from Shizuka's girlfriend's house so here we were waiting. Ishi was still taking a nap, so I was on overwatch on top of the ASLAV. It made sense though, Ishi taking a nap right now that was. He probably hadn't had a good night sleep since this whole thing started. Even at the Takagi's there still had been a lot of stress to deal with so we were all pretty bushed.
We'd found out something interesting that the thermal signature of a human and a zombie was in fact different. That was interesting. It'd be useful for spotting them far off, or during the night. Of course most people who were surviving were probably holed up in some building somewhere were you couldn't see them clearly.
Hirano waved from his spot on top of the Humvee to get my attention, "There isn't a lot of movement, but you've got suppressed rounds right, and suppressor for your EBR right." He was right. The group of zombies wasn't a lot, but at the same time better not let them get to close.
I nodded my head, and gestured to the interior of the ASLAV. "I'll get it, keep watch," I had removed the 'wind talker' quick detach suppressor on day one and been using standard PMC 308 rounds when I had had to shoot because I didn't have a comparative lot of the subsonic rounds, or match grade bullets to spare, seeing as I had to weigh 45 and 223 caliber boxes in while packing.
Hirano nodded in acknowledgement, "Hey Takashi keep an eye peeled,"
"Yeah, yeah I am," He responded from the pavement his shotgun slung over his shoulder, with another pair of binoculars in his hands. It wasn't like we'd seen much driving up once we'd gotten through the horde drawn by the noise near the mall. We'd also opened the police station door and propped it open. So far nothing had come out but that didn't mean shit so there was still the very real chance of Zed being in there... or maybe even survivors. If there were survivors they probably would have tried to make contact.
I took the effort to try and be quiet. The ASLAV interior was still pretty crowded with spare ammo and my five duffle bags, plus other stuff, including food we took from the gas station. In fact it was pretty uncomfortable it was a wonder Ishi could nap back here... Saya, understandably, complained enough about it being so crowded.
I pulled my shooting bag up with me as I went back up top. Hirano had the right idea really. I knew for a fact that Tokunosu was not Tokyo sized, but that didn't mean much. In this kind of mess you didn't need for the city to have that many, as Tokyo, people for there to be problems. As it was there were plenty of zombies to go around. We'd seen more than a few massive hordes from a distance. The ones that had gotten through the Takagi baricade when it had been down by our experience had been fairly large. If we could whack this small group quietly well it'd buy us some time. If we did see a bigger group we could run away. That was the advantage of motorized transport after all. That was the basic idea for our plan to survive until we could find something better.
"I'm seeing at least three, probably more," Hirano said, "I'd say load a full magazine just in case," I nodded, the truth was without a reinforced shooting position any group of zombies over thirty or so was a bit much for us to deal with on this cluttered street. There was the wreck down the road, and the trees, and the parked cars, and that bus stop to take into consideration when shooting. We could in theory deal with more if we had extra space between them and us, but the best solution while on the road was just to run away. Trying to stand and fight risked getting bogged down and from there overrun.
I looked through the scope and considered my options, Hirano was right. I could really only see three of them, but there might be more. I let half the breath I was holding out and pulled the trigger there was a softened thump against my shoulder. The very manageable recoil of the M14 and the satisfaction of a downed zed. Hirano flashed a thumbs up, as Takashi kept watch on the flank as Kohta looked ahead of where I was aiming.
By the time girls finished we were done as well. I'd already unscrewed the suppressor, and taken the rounds out, replacing them with the regular velocity 308 rounds I had been using, the rounds we had in abundance. Takashi cleared his throat, and handed me the binoculars, "Look at that." He gestured down the street pointing down the way. I took a minute to find what he was looking at, "He was with us wasn't he?" It certainly looked like a Fujimi school uniform, and there was a mass of dead zombie corpses around it. It meant he'd probably been a part of a group, which was too much of an oddity to be coincidence.
"So how do we look?" Rei asked Takashi.
Alright well since they were back it was kind of time to poke through the police station. I handed my binoculars over and gestured over towards the dead bodies. I thought back to that first day. When we'd been escaping it'd been chaotic, a bunch of students had piled on to the bus. I hadn't really paid much attention to them, because of all the chaos, and just trying to avoid the zombies, but he was right. It had been on that day we'd come here. Shidou, and I hadn't really waited for anyone to decide. I'd told everyone who wanted to come with me to do so now. The rest had presumably agreed to Shidou's leadership of the bus.
Rei had come along because she wasn't going to stick with Shidou, and Takashi had come with us for her sake. I could only presume Shizuka and Ishi came because of what Saeko and I had done at the clinic. Hirano wasn't going to pass up being around this kind of hardware to deal with some high school teacher, and Saya had come for similar if more common sense reasons.
They'd know their own classmate. There could have been a dozen explanations as to why he was here, but the underlying one was he hadn't kept traveling with Shidou and the rest on the bus. There was also the fact of the zombie corpses meaning there had been other people with them. I hadn't checked in to see who all had been with Shidou. I hadn't really seen a point, because I'd assumed they'd all have been there with him. We didn't know what had happened but I could piece together that the people who hadn't come with us must have divided into at least two more groups.
I looked back to the police station. Then looked back to the girls, and finally I looked at the ASLAV we needed to be ready to bug out. If we weren't able to make it back Mr. Takagi if we could secure this place though it'd probably be a good one to hold tight in.
I voiced this idea to Hirano, and the others. The relative height of the building meant if we could get on the roof we could have a good position to look out for zombies. The fact that the building came with an enclosing security fence around it was another plus. We'd just need to lure out any zombies that were in the building.
"Hey Kohta," I held up my iPad that had been crammed inside the ASLAV since we had all escaped the school, "Lets all go stand by the entrance," I slid the iPad across the floor and under one of the cushioned benches. The music would be loud enough inside the building, but the speakers wouldn't project the sound outside the building... and if the Zombies did come that was why Komuro was on look out after all.
We had determined out objective clearing out Higashi station, and by securing it attaining a fall back position and hopefully ammo and guns. Even if we couldn't secure the building we'd be able to escape, because we had radios, and could keep in contact. We'd just have to minimize the use of our guns, and possibly resort to melee.
Well we'd see how many zombies took the bait first. "Do you have a count on subsonic bullets you have?" Kohta asked me while we looked around the police lobby. "I mean using them in combination with the crossbow and well Busujima-sempai would let us keep the noise down."
This was really one of those we needed better planning for. Right now though we were just winging this, and we were going to have to stop doing that before it got us into trouble were we had to do something drastic to survive. "Its all in the ASLAV," I told him, "with my MP5's suppressor." This was one of those points where instinctively conserving ammo tended to mess you up. This was also a fact of I didn't tend to have to work with surpressed weapons regularly. I had brought the ammo just in case, but I couldn't get to it quickly now that we'd started the music.
"Well it was worth a shot." there was a groaning and we turned to face the hall way. Well here we go again... much as I disliked the idea of Saeko and Rei being melee fighters it was a lot quieter way for dealing with two zombies. At least Takashi was outside guarding the rear, and Shizuka was ready to drive in the event of trouble. If we absolutely had to bug out, well we'd just need to get on top of the vehicles and enter from there.
"Another one is coming down the stairs." Saeko announced quietly as she peaked around further inside, and I looked at the two zombies she and Rei had just killed. Definitely not cops, not these two. In 'style' civilian clothes, early twenties age wise, no those people had been looking for help.
"They probably came looking for help after he got bit." The zombie coming down the stairs though was apparently some cop Rei knew. We backed up further as quietly as we could, and Saya hefted the crossbow up. She'd left the luger in the ASLAV, because it would just be loud, and she hadn't even shot it so far. We should have taken the time to practice on it when we'd been at the Takagi estate, but it had slipped all our minds I supposed.
I needed to wake Ishi up another gun and a pair of eyes outside couldn't hurt. It wasn't exactly the best option, but a little bit of sleep was better than none. I'd probably make coffee in a little while when we got a little bit of breathing room. It'd probably be good to eat lunch first though. I adjusted my HK as walked backwards. We were going to have to forward and go through the building, to do anything less without good reason would mean all of this had been a waste of time that could have been spent on other things.
From the response to the music there didn't even seem to be that many zombies, and we'd already found one extra gun, and some medical supplies. "What should we do?" Hirano asked as the track stopped playing.
"Guess we go outside and get ready to search the old fashioned way..." We probably need to define a better plan than just try and lure any zombies out first. Waking Ishi up, and digging out subsonic ammo from the bag would probably be a good thing. We'd need to avoiding troubling situations like this as much as possible. Too many people were going to be zombies in the next week for us to get caught where we could get trapped in.
Time Stamp: ~1 PM Japanese Standard Time, Z-day +4
-scene break-
