v16c01

Kino and Hermes are riding in a meadow along a coastline. They chat for a while, Kino notes how she likes seeing the ocean and how she used to think she'd never get to see it. Hermes notes that that's the case for most people and they go on a tangent about how everyone is hikkikomoris clammed up inside their countries. More banter ensues as Kino mentions that the country is meant to be nice and peaceful, Hermes complains how that's no fun and it means Kino won't be shooting anything. They get off topic again, segment ends with Kino being pretty psyched to get in the country.

A guy yells at Kino that she can't enter the country. As they'd gotten closer they'd discovered a ring of trucks and tents set up in a blockade all around the outside country, and lots of policemen and soldiers patrolling the place. A policeman guides Kino and Hermes into a command tent, where exposition ensures.

All these policemen and soldiers are troops from the several other countries in the region. An epidemic struck this country with typical zombie fare symptoms, reanimation after death and infection spreading via biting. Citizens from the country fled to the neighbouring countries 5 days ago, which is how the neighbours found out. The country's population is about 2000, with 112 confirmed escapees and no confirmed survivors in hiding. None of the neighbouring countries like each other very much but they've decided to work together to stop the infection from spreading.
Kino concedes that there's nothing she can do and is about to leave, when the command tent guys stop her and ask if she can fire a rifle, then if she can shoot people, then if she can shoot things shaped like people.

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Next day. Kino joins up with the zombie extermination effort and is lent a military-grade sniper rifle for the job. She gets up on top of the country's walls that morning with the other snipers (and spotters), where she watches the sunrise come over the ocean. She remarks that the country is beautiful.

Kino sets up to snipe alongside her spotter, a policeman in his forties. They exchange some pretty good banter as the signal goes out to begin operations. Coincident with the sunrise, hordes of zombies come out of the buildings throughout the country to shamble about. Kino is told by her spotter that the only way to kill them is to get a headshot, but her spotter goes on to voice his doubts. The infected potentially could still be curable, or might just be in some bizarre fever dream rather than actually being dead, and he's concerned about the morality of killing them as if they were pests.

Someone fires the first shot, which blows off the head of a zombie standing near a belltower in the country's central park. Other zombies seem to take notice of their felled companion and go over towards him. Kino's spotter wonders if they're concerned about him, and if that implies that they're sentient, and if so, that they probably shouldn't be sniping them like this.

The zombies instead graphically devour the felled zombie and Kino's spotter almost pukes. Other snipers start firing in earnest at the zombies. Kino's spotter makes a 180 and yells at her to start killing them.

Afternoon. Kino's down from the walls for her lunch break where she meets up with Hermes. All the snipers, including Kino, are pretty frazzled about the dirty work they've been doing. She talks with Hermes about how it's physically exhausting on her trigger finger and body due to the recoil, which segways into Kino saying that it's still nicer than Master's training because she's at least not getting shot.

Kino tells Hermes about what's been going on at the front lines and is about to drop the bombshell of the zombies eating each other on him, when he just guesses it himself. Kino goes on to say that she heard the disease didn't start as an epidemic like this, but as a handful of cases that were being dealt with normally in a hospital. Hermes notes that the quarantine efforts the neighbouring countries have been doing are working, so it's strange that the disease got out of control here.

Kino tells him that apparently what happened is that a doctor's lover was infected, and after he saw her reanimate from death, he proclaimed it wasn't a disease and set her and the other patients free, after which the disease spread. Lunch beak ends and Kino goes back onto the walls.

Sniping continues as routine into the afternoon, with an estimated 1500 kills secured across all the snipers--300 remaining. The call goes out to cease operations for the day and someone shoots the bell in the belltower. Everyone joins in and unloads the rest of their ammunition at the bell, and a funeral knell rings over the country.

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Next day. The weather today has been alternating between clear and overcast. Kino and the other snipers go up onto the walls, and manage to secure 50 kills before they're called to stop operations, in the afternoon. Sniping has been so effective that it's now inefficient and it's difficult to find and exposed zombies for sniping. Kino is called into the command tent and asked to be part of a special unit that will enter the country and eliminate the rest of the zombies at close range. The weather is cloudy.

Kino goes back to her tent and Hermes where she gears up. She's been lent a shotgun for this, equipped with a flashlight. Hermes realises that she's been helping out because she just really wants to get inside the country, which she doesn't disagree with.

Kino joins up with the special unit. It's Kino, a muscular army officer in his 40s, a policeman in his 30s, and an enthusiastic soldier in his 20s. They're all from different countries, generations, and backgrounds.

Meanwhile Hermes chats loudly to himself about how if the plan fails, that'll be four more losses, and idly wonders what new plan everyone will come up with then. A passerby soldier scolds him for being so callous when Kino's meant to be his partner. After some antagonistic back and forth it comes out that everyone's been ordered not to speak with Hermes because he's not a human, Hermes mocks the soldier for failing to follow orders, soldier starts to leave.

Hermes notes that the country didn't do anything to stop the infection in advance. The soldier picks up his implication and says that Hermes is saying that the infection was a purposeful thing, intended as a superweapon with which this country would make immortal soldiers to destroy the neighbouring countries. The soldier rejects the idea and asserts that nobody from any country would allow the people to turn into monsters, because despite differences, all the countries agree in the value of dying well.

Back with Kino. Team Kino enters the country proper and Kino pauses for a second to note how pretty the place is. The four start going through the houses, looking for survivors, but everywhere they find is empty.

They eventually get a house with zombies inside, which Team Kino promptly kill. They then hear a slurping sound and wonder what it is. The policeman locates the source of the noise by squatting down and illuminating the area with his flashlight, and the officer, Kino, and the soldier in turn do the same. The source of the noise is five babies, which are lapping up the remains of the dead zombies.

The soldier unloads on the babies and graphically kills them. He then rails on the rest of the team for not killing them earlier, obviously shaken. The policeman thinks he needs to cool down and is getting irked with him, the officer tells Kino to keep an eye on the soldier.

They continue doing this until they clear the 35th house. They take a break at an intersection where the officer asserts that their current killcount of 57 is good enough and they're going back. The policeman finds they still have two bulk stores of ammo left, which prompts the soldier to insist that they keep going. The policeman says he's too tired to keep going, and the soldier relents. The sun comes out.

Hordes of zombies start streaming out from houses, blocking all four exits from the intersection, and slowly approaching Team Kino. Army officer radios command and requests sniper support. Sniper support comes immediately and the soldier rails on them for being premature and interrupting them while they're still planning. Policeman criticises the soldier for his badly-timed fit.

Kino starts distributing ammunition to everyone. Soldier is getting unnerved and yells for them to just ram through the zombies and get back to the walls. No one else agrees with him because the zombie mobs are too thick, and running through them will remove their sniper support. The officer instead proposes a simple plan where they all take one street from the intersection, and fire at the zombies, which are naturally wired to approach the four (and consequently enter shooting range), while walking backwards.

The soldier is unsettled with the plan but the officer tries to bring back morale by proposing that they all go drinking afterwards. This cheers the policeman up. Kino declines the drink and requests something sweet instead. They start the plan.

A few pages go on of Kino murdering zombies, either by sniping two of them at a time with a shotgun or by walking up to them with the shotgun held under her arm and blowing their heads off from close-range. Onlookers from atop the walls watch how quickly Kino's designated shooting street is getting cleared of zombies. There are eventually so few left that Kino decides to let the snipers handle the rest, as she notices that one of her teammates is faltering, and she dashes off to help. It's the soldier.

The soldier's shotgun has jammed and he's reduced to batting the zombies away. He cries in panic as the zombies get closer, when one of them gets close enough to touch his cheek. He drops his gun in a euphoric fit as he smiles, giving up. The zombie moves in to bite him.

Kino tugs him back and out of range in the nick of time and graphically kills the zombie by batting it away with the shotgun and finishing it off with Cannon. She then kicks the wailing soldier so that he goes quiet and unconsious and steals his ammo, and goes back to killing the zombies.

The policeman, officer, and Kino soon finish cleaning up. The officer commends Kino for her good work. She says she's exhausted and wants to have something sweet.

Evening. Kino, the officer, and the policeman get called into the command tent upon their return. The command tent guys commend them for their excellent work under pressure and offer them rewards. Policeman requests a vacation. Kino requests supplies for her journey.

The officer drags Kino and the policeman along to go see the soldier, who's been hospitalised in the medical tent. He's still and silent, with hollow eyes. The officer congratulates him for the win, which is shared between the four of them, and so also the soldier. The soldier denies that it was a win, and that it was actually a defeat for mankind and good people. Officer reassures him by bringing up how great their teamwork was and how he'd remember it for his entire life. Soldier says that he'll never tell anyone about what happened, not in his entire life, and pulls his blanket over his head.

Cut to Kino and Hermes driving away from the country along the seaside. Hermes confirms with Kino that the soldier got touched by one of the zombies. Hermes seems to have a hypothesis about what's happened. He says that the entire story about the illness was a fabrication. Instead, the zombies had surpassed being human.

Kino cuts his engine. Hermes goes on to say that those who get bitten evolve into a higher lifeform, where they eternally savour a rich, fulfilling, and brilliant inner world, as if they were in heaven, forever. Kino doesn't get it but decides to listen before asking questions. Hermes goes on to say that the bitten are overcome with brilliant emotion and work to remove people's discomforts by inviting them into this higher state of being, via biting.

They don't have to eat because they photosynthesize their energy, which makes them immortal, short of having their heads blown off. Further, they can assimilate any of their felled companions by eating them. Even a tiny scrap would secure a connection and allow the dead zombie to continue existing in that internal heaven, while assimilated inside the other.

The zombies would have spread out from that country and eventually taken over the world. Once that happened, humanity would have evolved into a race of truly happy beings.

Kino points out that Hermes' idea is all speculation and is just as likely to be a fabrication as the 'sickness' story. Hermes concedes that it is. Hermes also notes that the zombies can transmit the brilliance of the internal world they feel to others via skin contact, though only for a moment, which facilitates biting. Rather, people would be glad to be bitten under those circumstances.

Kino asks whether she would be able to ride a motorrad if she were like that. Hermes says of course not. Satisfied, Kino starts Hermes' engine and drives off.