Volume 1 - Chapter 40

  Haru, Kid Wonder

  I didn't pass out, which surprised me. Still, I felt like I would lose consciousness at any given second.

  Genta was banging on the door, still verbally tossing his insidious taunts.

  "Let me into the house, man! I'm tired of playing this foolish game with you pathetic little weaklings!"

  Aiko had her hands over her ears. The back of my head was cradled in her sitting lap, and I looked up at her bruises and her bandaged scars.

  Mio still cried helpless in the corner nearest the kitchen, but I didn't really care why.

  I thought of Haru and wondered where he could be. I turned my head in both directions, looking for the boy. I couldn't see him from where I was, lying on the floor next to the unlit irori firepit.

  "Shut it up with the crying!" I yelled. "Damnit, Mio!"

  It was the wrong thing to say but the petite woman had ruined any friendly qualities I once liked about her. Now she was an annoyance at the end of my life.

  "Hachiro…" Aiko said quietly.

  I calmed myself once again, hyper-focusing on the beautiful woman that spoke to me. We hadn't known each other long, but it was long enough for us to truly know one another.

  "Hachiro… Mio is crying because of Haru."

  I wondered what she meant. I struggled to sit up, fresh blood trickling from my nostrils, caused by Genta's relentless aura. I wondered how much blood I had left. I wondered why I still lived.

  Aiko's hand gently pressed against my shoulder, urging me to stay down. She seemed weak and tired, and I understood why. Aiko had used up every reserve of energy she had.

  But I couldn't give up. Not this time. I had to see why Mio was crying, and whatever Haru was doing to cause her such endless grief.

  Haru stood on the opposite side of the room, his small frame barely visible against the walls.

  His eyes were locked onto Mio. She held Chiemi's pistol in her trembling hands. The weapon seemed foreign in her delicate grip, as if she had never held one before.

  Tears streamed down her red face. She'd been crying nonstop ever since I told her she was stupid for kissing me, and ever since she'd run off.

  Between them, suspended in mid-air, was a bizarre sight that defied explanation. A swirling cloud of objects floated, seemingly held there by an unseen force.

  Knives, tools, and other random items spun in a chaotic dance, their sharp edges glinting in the dim light. It was like someone had reached into my mind and pulled out a scene from a fantasy novel, placing a magical ability before my eyes.

  I struggled to comprehend what I was seeing. My brain felt sluggish, weighed down by the loss of blood and the constant barrage of Genta's sickening aura.

  My vision blurred again, and I felt my consciousness slipping away. Yet, I couldn't tear my gaze away from the surreal spectacle.

  My eyes drifted back to Haru, the young boy who had been rescued by Genta. Little did we ever suspect that he too had been turned into one of the hybrid-zombies.

  This must be his power, I figured. The boy was able to move inanimate objects. It felt so otherworldly and unrealistic, and I fought against every truth before my very eyes. I must have gone delirious.

  But Haru's expression was intense, focused on Mio and the weapon she held. How was this possible? How could a child possess such power? The questions swirled in my mind, and I couldn't find the answers.

  We'd encountered Dempei, a man who could run faster than anyone in the history of man's existence. We'd encountered Genta, who could bring us to our knees with a relentless sickening aura, and who commanded an army of the undead. And now there was a boy who could move objects with his mind.

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  This second life sucked…

  Blood continued to drip from my nose, adding to Aiko's bloodstains on the tatami mat beneath me. I wondered how much more I could lose before I finally succumbed to darkness.

  My body felt weak, limbs heavy and unresponsive. Yet, I fought to stay aware, to witness the impossible scene unfolding before me.

  "Haru," Aiko said, "Please don't… Please don't kill her…"

  The little boy's face didn't move and his eyes never flinched. His full focus remained on Mio, concentration maximized on his floating arsenal of household items.

  "Haru," I added, "Don't! No matter how annoying she is! You're a good kid. I know it. You don't want to be like this. You don't want to be a killer, do you?"

  The floating mass of objects shifted, rotating slowly in the opposite direction. Mio let out a terrified scream, her grip on the pistol tightening.

  The weapon shook in her hands, barrel pointing wildly at the boy. I could see the fear in her eyes, the desperation to protect herself from the unknown.

  But what was Haru doing? Was he controlling the objects, or was it Genta's influence? The questions raced through my mind, each one more confusing than the last.

  I turned back to the front door when Genta slammed against it once again. His zombie friends had never stopped trying to bump and shove their stupid bodies through, but I'd become lost in Haru's supernatural threat.

  "Kill her, Haru!" Genta demanded. "And then let me in!"

  "No!" Aiko yelled. "Don't kill her!"

  Against better judgment, I tried pushing myself up. I didn't like Mio, but I couldn't let her die like this. I had to do something to get through to Haru, to explain to him he didn't need to be like Genta.

  But my body refused to cooperate, leaving me helpless on the floor.

  "Don't do this…" I begged. "Don't help Genta, please…"

  Haru turned slowly towards me. His face had a blank expression, eyes cold and distant. This was the same kid that had willingly come with us back at the apartment building, only now he had a calculating smirk on his little face.

  "I'm not doing this for Genta," Haru clarified. "I'm doing this for me. It's not real, Hachiro, don't you understand? Don't any of you understand?"

  "No, I don't!" I said quickly.

  Genta's laughter outside distracted me. The scratching and clawing and thumping of his undead friends against the house distracted me.

  I looked towards the door, and to the noise of their constant barrage. Then it all went quiet.

  Genta and his zombies went silent as the locks clicked louder than any sound I'd ever heard in my life. I saw the lock on the knob turn, followed by the deadbolt.

  Haru flung his arms forward like he was throwing two underhanded items at once. All the floating knives and tools blurred forward into Mio in an instant, impaling her body full of metal and wood.

  At the same instant, just before her death, Mio's trembling hands pulled the trigger on the pistol. Aiko and I both jerked, startled by the pop.

  Her gunshot was the second loudest sound I'd ever heard in my life, and then I heard the gun fall to the floor.

  Mio's body went limp, pinned to the corner of the room by dozens of random objects Haru had mind-controlled at will. Her head lilted, last breath finally drowning away.

  Haru fell to the floor, blood gushing from a gunshot wound to the chest. His eyes finally blinked up at the ceiling as he bled out quickly and stopped breathing.

  I couldn't believe what I'd just witnessed. Mio and Haru had killed each other in a tense duel. She'd killed a nine year old boy.

  His words repeated in my head as I struggled to comprehend, to make sense of what I'd just seen. None of it made any sense.

  "It's not real, Hachiro, don't you understand? Don't any of you understand?"

  I shook my head, mind incapable of realizing what he meant. Everything felt unreal, but it was completely real.

  The front door opened.

  I flipped myself over, my body screaming in protest as I moved.

  Genta stood in the entrance, a smirk on his face that quickly turned into a frown when he saw Haru's lifeless body on the floor.

  "What a shame!" Genta said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "You call me a monster, but you killed a nine year old boy?"

  My mind took in everything in slow motion, like a movie trying to dramatize the most important scene.

  I saw the blood pooling around Haru's body and the knives and tools still impaled in Mio's lifeless form.

  I saw the pain and exhaustion etched on Aiko's face as she slumped over to the floor, blood dripping from her nose.

  I wished I could take all her pain and suffering away. I wished I could protect her from the horrors of this world.

  But I was powerless, lying on the floor with my own injuries.

  Genta stepped further into the room so that he stood above us.

  His eyes scanned the carnage before settling on Aiko. He approached her slowly, a twisted smile spreading across his face.

  "You're looking a little worse for wear, baseball star!" he said, reaching out a hand to touch her cheek.

  Aiko flinched at his touch, eyes narrowing in anger. But she was too weak to fight back, her body trembling with an effort to stay conscious.

  I watched in helpless rage as Genta continued taunting her, his words cutting deeper than any knife.

  I wanted to scream, to lash out, to do something to stop him. But I couldn't even lift my head off the floor. Genta was too powerful and we were too weak.

  My vision blurred again, and I felt myself slipping away for the last time. I didn't want to leave Aiko alone with this monster, but I couldn't hold on any longer.

  I heard Genta talking but he seemed to be a thousand kilometers away. "Don't worry, my dear. I'll take good care of you."

  I drifted away but saw one last blurry thing before my death. Genta kneeled down so that he was looking directly at me. The knife he held touched my neck, its blade cutting deep.

  "You are pathetic and weak, Hachiro. You always were, and you always will be, man."

  Everything went black when I died.