Radioactive (Hisao) - part 6

The club room is a maze of darkness, lit only by a single beam of light that struggles to make it through the grimy window. It takes a few moments for my eyes to adjust.

The floor is covered with the old beanbag chairs that students would have used in the library proper. In the center of the room, just past the light, a slender figure is slumped into the largest one. The girl sits up as I approach, wiping sleep from her eyes.

“Hi, Hisao.” She says quietly. She looks like she's wincing in pain, but just barely.

“Hey Suzu.” I reply, holding up my pistol to inspect it in the low light. I'm not trying to impress or even threaten her, just making sure it's in working order. Check to make sure it's loaded, click the safety off, right. A long walk, a handful of bodies, and now it just comes to this.

“You know why I'm here?”

“I can guess.” She sits forward, scooting onto a beanbag that rests in the center of the light. Now that I have a good look at her, I can see her skin is deathly pale, almost translucent. Her body has wasted away to nearly nothing, her hair is long and matted, and her eyes are so dark and tired that she looks like she hasn't slept since the day she was born. But I know that's not the case. Even now.

Especially now.

“Suzu!” Miki's shouts are distant and dull, the material of the door and the wall really are that thick. “Suzu, run!”

I take a step back and slam the door shut, pulling over a nearby bookcase to make sure it stays closed. Maybe I'll go through the window, or maybe I'll see if I have enough explosives left to take out the wall. Either way, first things first.

“It's nothing personal, Suzu.” I say quietly, walking back over to her. She watches me blankly, her stare both unassuming and unafraid.

“Shizune wants me out of the way?” She asks softly. I nod.

“You've been digging through everyone's head at night for too long. She's afraid you might know more than you should.”

Suzu bites her lip. She looks like she wants to protest, but is too tired to do so.

“I might, yeah.” She whispers.

Suzu peers at me again. “Please don't tell me that bag is for my head.” She mumbles.

“What?” I grimace. “No. Fuck no, you have such a goddam morbid...”

Stop, stop. I can hear a fist banging on the door now, just one. Taro is probably still down for the count, and Lezard's a useless ass anyway.

“Hisao, listen to me!” Miki's voice is muffled through the door and my makeshift blockade. “You don't have to do this!”

No time for reminiscing. Do what we came here to do.

“The bag is just for my equipment. Shizune isn't that diabolical.”

Suzu smiles dryly. She looks like she could fall asleep again any moment. I don't know if that would make this easier or harder, and fuck, I don't want to find out.

“You might be surprised.” She says quietly, still squinting, the corners of her mouth pulled as if she's suppressing the urge to flinch.

“Yeah, yeah.” I take a step closer, raising my gun. Hold it with both hands, don't miss the girl. Even though she looks so frail that even a body shot would probably do the job.

Now there are more hands beating on the door. More than two people, some sound weak, halfhearted strikes. The cavalry, all rotting and moist. Just another reminder that the sleepyheaded thing in front of me isn't as innocent as she seems either.

My finger is on the trigger. Suzu looks me right in the eyes, frowning slightly.

“She doesn't have it, Hisao.”

“Of course you'd say that.”

She smiles again, a weary, exhausted smile. Deep, dark lines rim her eyes.

“I don't expect you to believe me.”

My hands haven't moved. “How would you even know?”

“Because,” Suzu says. “Shizune has been tossing and turning in her sleep these last few nights, trying to think of what she's going to tell you when you come back and she doesn't have your pill.”

The door behind me begins to bulge and crack, I let out a frustrated snarl as I circle around behind her, still keeping my pistol trained on her head.

“And what, you know where to find it?”

Suzu appears to think it over. “I don't know that.” She says quietly.

“If I let you live, could you find it?”

She pauses again. “I can't promise that.”

“That's what I thought.”

The door bursts open and Miki runs in, flanked by half a dozen mangled, moving corpses. The air fouls immediately.

“Hisao, just, wait. Please.”

“Stay back Miki.” I warn, moving closer and pressing the barrel of my gun to Suzu's head.

“It's okay, Miki.” The girl in the beanbag says, in the same tone she would always use when we woke her up to tell her she had hit something hard on the way down.

The zombies just stand there, their decrepit bodies moving up and down as their punctured lungs struggle to operate. Their empty eyes travel from me to Suzu and back, uncomprehending.

“What about these things, Suzu?” I ask, my tone still hard. “Even if you didn't play with everyone's dreams, these creatures are still your fault.”

I can't see her expression, but her head lowers as she stares at her lap. The zombies begin to shuffle forward, their hands in motion.

“Bad move.” I mutter, grimacing as I look back at my target.

“Wait!” Miki cries. Against my better judgment, I do. I look up.

The shambling corpses are digging through pockets, purses and bags. They're pulling out pills of all shapes and sizes, holding them out as they stagger up to the green haired girl in front of me. Without a word, she slowly cups her hands together as each of the creatures deposits their gift before dragging their damaged legs out the door. In less than a minute, it's just the three of us.

With a careful glance at me, Miki kneels before her best friend, helping her swallow the pills one at a time.

“Tell me what those are.” I mutter, my pulse only just beginning to slow now that I'm not so severely outnumbered.

“Sleeping pills.” Miki says, glaring up at me before returning to her task. “It hurts her to be awake.”

“I was thinking something a little more permanent.” I reply, but the words feel hollow. This is the Miki I used to know, the one that always looked out for her friend with the debilitating sleep disorder. The one who stayed behind to keep her company when she was injured, who never once complained about carrying her around.

“No matter what... Hisao?” Suzu turns her head to look up at me, having finished the last of the pills. She's already fading, Miki cradles her gently as she leans backwards to lay down against the beanbag chair. I still haven't lowered my gun.

“If you make it out of the quarantine zone...” Suzu mumbles, her eyes fluttering open and closed. “...can you please tell my parents that I'm sorry?”

I say nothing for a long moment.

“I can't do that, Suzu.” I reply at last, frowning down at her. “I have my own apologies to make.”

“I know.” She's sinking into the makeshift bedding. Miki stands up, wiping her eyes and knowing that she couldn't stop me now, no matter what I chose to do.

“But Hisao, I don't think she blames you for Emi.” Suzu whispers, already on the way out.

Damn it, god damn it, my hand is shaking, the pistol is bouncing up and down like I'm some amateur.

“She should.” I mutter.

“I saw it, remember? You... you didn't know.”

“It's still my fault.”

With great effort, Suzu opens her eyes to look up at me.

“You have no idea,” she smiles wistfully, “how much I wish I knew what to say to that.”

Miki looks stricken, but something tells me it's not my place to know. I blow out a long breath, okay, think. Just think, what can we do. What are the odds. If I've been working for the Council all this time and they still haven't found it or still won't give it to me, would I really be that worse off telling Shizune to shove it? What about those things, those zombies? Who's to say they won't go berserk and be even more dangerous once the plug is pulled?

“If I let you live, IF I let you live.” I say to the girl below me. “Will you keep an eye out for what I'm looking for?”

Suzu smiles weakly, attempting to raise her hand in a salute but failing miserably at it.

“The next scientist to enter the excluded zone is getting his mind felt the hell up, I promise.”

I almost crack a smile at that. Almost, almost, maybe I will later. After some whiskey, or vodka, or both. After I'm far away from here.

“Alright then.” I say quietly. “Go to sleep.”

She smiles wider, but her eyes are still taking me in wistfully, like there's something she wants to tell me, but she can't.

“See you in my dreams.” She mumbles, and then she's gone. My hand falls to my side, Miki is staring down at the ground now.

A figure limps through the door, we both look up.

“Is she--”

“Don't even fucking start, Lezard.” I motion with my pistol. “Get out.”

He looks from me to Miki, who nods at him. Grumbling under his breath, he stumbles back out of view.

Neither of us say anything for a few long moments.

“The zombies and the dreams are still a problem.” I say.

“We'll move her. We'll get as far away from everyone else as we can.” Miki replies, staring at me desperately.

“The Council might come after me.”

“You can have some of our supplies. We'll always keep a place for you.”

A place? I don't want anything like that. I don't need some shattered wreck to call a home, I just need to stabilize my condition so I won't be a threat to people when I get out of the quarantine zone. I need to get past the military, I need to find Meiko Ibarazaki.

And then I need to tell her that her daughter's death is my fault. Whatever she decides to do with that knowledge is fine by me.

That's what I need. And besides.

“I killed Akio. Taro might not pull through.”

Miki looks as if she had almost forgotten, as if she had wanted to.

“Taro is tougher than he looks. And Akio knew the risks. Stupid fucker, it took forever to find an exosuit that worked well with... with those bones of his.” She sniffs, absentmindedly going to wipe her eyes with her left wrist, but she catches sight of her melted bone. I wouldn't be surprised if it still hurts, if it does, she looks like she's only remembered it now.

“I took that, too.” I say quietly. I'm not going to apologize. They almost killed me. But I would have done the same to them.

Miki grimaces at me, of course she's used to losing an appendage. Her expression softens, though, when she looks back down at a slumbering Suzu.

“But you didn't take her.” She replies gently. I turn to gaze at the girl lying slumped on her back in the web of beanbag chairs, her chest slowly rising and falling. Maybe this trip wasn't for nothing after all. Maybe Suzu is my best bet at finding the means to make it past the military's radiation detectors.

And maybe, if I do somehow manage to get out, I'll have to find her parents, too.

“I'm leaving. The Council will start getting antsy soon.”

“Okay.” Miki says numbly. Hard to thank someone for breaking into your home and then not killing your best friend.

I move towards the door, intent on keeping my pistol out until I know Lezard isn't planning anything shortsighted.

“Hey, Hisao.” Miki calls after me. I turn.

She gives me a pained smile. She just looks weary now, she looks almost as worn out as her charge. I wonder how much of that wild, energetic psycho-bitch act earlier was just that, an act.

Her good hand is clutching her melted mass of a left wrist, but she stares straight at me. “I'm sorry about Emi.” She says.

“Yeah.” Yeah, I'm sorry too. And no matter how nice it might be to stay here and try to relive some of the old days, those days are gone. Just like a lot of things, and a lot of people.

I turn again. “Take care of her.”

“I will.” Miki's tone is tired, exhausted, and still mixed with real, physical pain. She should probably pop a few antirad meds when she gets the chance, too. In fact, hell, they all should. But her words are still determined, her will is resolute. I think she can handle this one. After all, Miki always did remind me of Emi at times.

And there was nothing that girl couldn't do.





"Radioactive" is a song by Imagine Dragons.