Act 3 Scene 9 「ゾンビの時間」[Zonbi-no Jikan] 'Zombie Time'

Gin panted. His wounded knee and ribs were making it difficult to keep going, but he had no choice. The military squad, probably run by the CIA by their use of English, had crashed his meeting with the boss. He and his wife had been black-bagged and whisked away. Vodka was… behind. Lost. There'd been a lot of blood. He hoped he wouldn't forget Vodka's face like the others.

Someone, perhaps many, had betrayed the organization. Betrayal was unforgivable. He had his last orders from the boss. Find the leak. Then he'd kill it. Or them. Whichever.

An old car, one easy to break in to. Smooth, like it'd been in his wretched youth. How long ago had that been? He'd stopped counting years when he couldn't count the bodies anymore. That didn't matter. He had to get to the lab.

He took off his hat and tucked his long hair under his coat. The disguise wasn't as good as what Vermouth could cook up, but that smug bitch could go fuck herself. Or he could. Had she been rounded up too? Nah, she was too slippery, like a cockroach.

They swarmed around him, doing their best impressions of worry and fear, begging for news.

"Listen up, everyone. There are a few people here who have betrayed us all." They all visibly flinched. "I'm going to talk to each of you, one by one, and the betrayers are going to die horrifically. The Faithful will get to work clearing this place out to move to our new location. Got it?"

They got jitterier, looking at eachother with wide eyes.

"Shouldn't we be working on packing up, and worry about moles later?" asked one of the medical staff, a woman he knew. That statement was suspicious. Her brain-matter showered the people around her, and her face vanished from his memory.

That should solve the problem of stupid questions.

Conan slowly awakened. His head was fuzzy. A sharp pain, and a loud noise exploded on Conan's face. Pain sharpened his senses, and he was dragged with a scream to full consciousness. A black fedora. A long scar on the left cheek. Cruel pale eyes, watching his every movement. Breath that stank of cigarettes being chain smoked. He was face to face with the man who'd tried to kill him two years ago. "Gin," he whispered.

A crooked smile, half triumph, half wrath twisted his lips. "I never would have believed it, until I confirmed it myself. Today, that was all you, wasn't it?"

Conan didn't answer, but glared his captor straight back. It was all he could do.

"Bourbon was right to want to recruit you. Pity I'll have to kill you." He stepped back, favoring his right leg. They were in a lab. Complex, expensive equipment was all around, in various states of being packed up. He grabbed a sheet hung over a particularly large box, and yanked. It wasn't a box, but a clear, thick glass tube, full of water, and a sleeping Areku. "I know you've met Ambrosia. Have you met Okiagari?"

Who, or what was that? It sounded like the word for "self-righting" or "self-rising".

Seeing the confusion on Conan's face, his grin became all triumph and anticipation. "His full name is Okiagari Shitai." Rising corpse.

Zombie.

His eyes widened in horror. Areku spoke English, of course he'd use an English word. Areku's voice echoed in his memory. 'Zombie Time is particularly violent, so run away as fast as you can if you ever see it.' Gin snatched him up. He tried to struggle, but the zipties on his wrists and ankles were too tight and too strong for him to wriggle out of, at least not in the few seconds it took for Gin to drag him to a heavy iron grate in the floor, open it, and throw him in.

He landed on something soft. Moans and cries echoed in the small, concrete room. There were other people here. He'd landed on one of them. They were already cold to the touch. He rolled off the corpse and squirmed his way from the opening. The floor was cold, wet concrete. He tried not to think about what was he was crawling through. Above, he heard water sloshing. The cries of terror from the vague shapes around him told him his worst fear was about to come true. He, and all of the people here with him, were about to die.

"Hey Gin!" he screamed. "At least I got to watch a teenage girl kick your ass!"

Someone wrapped their arms around him, and squeezed him tight. "Face death without fear, without regret. Rob him of our screams, boy." It was a woman's voice. He clung to the stranger he was about to die with in the dark.

The light dimmed. He could see the silhouette of Areku's feet dangling into the pit. They slowly lowered, until he was almost in. Gin must have been hanging him by the neck. The feet suddenly thrashed, and gagging and coughing echoed down to them. "Don't..." Areku's weak voice moaned. A bright flash of light at the trapdoor and an ear shattering explosion in the small concrete space answered him. Areku's limp body dropped.

Okiagari landed on its feet, on top of the corpse under the opening.

Conan pushed his face into the woman's chest, so he couldn't see. It wouldn't make much difference. At least he'd feel a little safer in his last moments. The woman stroked his head and gently rocked him back and forth. Maybe she had children somewhere. They were probably being held hostage. That's how these people work. His thoughts churned in wrath and sadness. Wishing was useless here. He bit his tongue, and waited. 'Face death without fear, without regret.'

It was oddly quiet. Some of the people who were still able to use their legs tried to run, to stay as far as possible from Okiagari. No one wasted breath on screaming. No one was going to give Gin their scream. At least he took a large part of the organization down with him, he thought bitterly. He peeked up, at the opening. Cigarette ash, still glowing, fell down from above. Then the woman was ripped from his grasp, and he fell into the deepening pool of blood. He heard her gasp, and he was showered with her arterial spray. He regretted, for the first time in his life, knowing so much about the processes involved in human death. Her falling body soaked him in a wave of other people's blood.

Then it was silent. Had Conan – no… Shinichi? He… I… – died? He hadn't noticed if he had. There was pain. His wrists and ankles ached from the restraints. There were sounds too. A soft swishh-tap, swishh-tap echoed in the room. Not dead yet. Was he the only one?

Strong hand lifted him up gently by the armpits. He braced himself for his end.

A voice spoke in his ear. It was Areku's, but it sounded like Conan through a voice changer, because his own word choices, his own idiolect were being whispered to him.

"Long time, no see Shaman. You've come to us small this time."

He cautiously opened his eyes. It was Areku's shaved-bald head, but it was covered in blood. The expression on his face was blank. The eyes were wrong too. Areku had dark, almost black eyes, these were green and reflected the little light in the room back, like a cat's.

Okiagari set him down on his feet, and snapped his restraints as though they'd been made of taffy. Then it touched Conan's face gently, crouching down to look into Conan's eyes. "No memory. No power either. This one is only half. We'll have to wait for a stronger one. None of them are as strong as she was." Its knees dropped to the floor, and it sat on its ankles. "You think he's a fool, but the boy likes you. Take care of him."

"Who…?"

"You call him Areku. He's the human." It tapped the side of its head, the other hand still holding Conan. "He's trying to scream right now. I'll take his memories later."

"Can he hear me?"

"Yes." The word tickled his hair. "But, he won't remember."

Seeing it once was bad enough, but feeling it through one's own body must be torture. How many times Areku had awoken in a room full of corpses and not known how they'd gotten there?

"I beat them," Conan said at last. "All that's left is one angry old man and a handful of scientists he could bully into staying with him. It's not going to last. You'll be safe from them soon."

Gin's scornful laugh echoed from above. "Lucky brat." The iron grill slammed shut.

Okiagari's hands were warm. Conan couldn't hear breath nor a pulse. The only movement was his own trembling. Adrenaline was still saturating his body.

"The big humans are dangerous," it whispered. "You were big once. When you made us like this, you were big, Shaman."

"Mr. Okiagari, I don't understand," Conan said back, his voice being shaken by his body. "My name is Conan Edogawa."

It paused, as though considering this. "You feel like Shaman. But you're too small to be Shaman. You must be half of her, and don't have her power. Maybe the next time I meet you, you will have it, and you could separate us again. You should remember that: become strong and separate us."

It sank down on its hip, and pulled Conan with it. Okiagari wrapped its arms around him, squeezing him close, squishing him into the remains of Areku's chest. Okiagari had stuffed a variety of human organs into the hole the buck-shot had made. Conan retched at the realization, and tried to squirm free.

"Stop being slippery," it scolded. "You should sleep and remember me."

He opened his mouth to protest, but he heard Areku's heart start to thump in his chest. Hot blood gushed over Conan. The chilly concrete had been making him numb. The liquid spread over him like a thick blanket on a cold winter's day. It was soft. And warm. And he was very tired.

Author's Note

This was my favorite chapter to write.

Not much of an author's note today, because I'm selling garb and fantasy-prints at the local Ren Faire! I'll do my best to not get too sunburned...

また来週！ (See you next week!)
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