Reek, page 18
“Look forward, not back. It's what my dad used to tell me.”
“He a cameraman too?”
“Reporter, actually. Just like you.” She swiveled in her chair, fixing on him. Okada realized it was the first time she had made eye contact with him.
“Really? Okada, right?”
“Yeah. He filmed during the sarin attacks.”
“Oh, then?”
He laughed. “Nice. Then?”
“Oh, sorry. I didn't mean to-”
“It's OK. It was a long time ago.” The cult sarin attacks on Tokyo commuter trains had rocked the nation in 1995. It was still a significant reason why trashcans were not found in abundance in public areas today. Okada doubted that Yui would have been out of kindergarten when it went down.
She threw her hands up, “This is exactly what I'm talking about. You, your father. This is all a normal day for you, right?” He was about to say otherwise but noticed she wasn't stopping. “Me? It's my first big production. Being the weather girl for a local late night station is as far as I had made it. Watch out everyone, here she comes.”
“So that's how Kojima found you. Anno and I were taking bet...uh, wondering about that.”
“He asked me because I was cheap. All the pretty, famous reporters were out of his budget.”
Okada let a small silence fall. A flash lit the room, painting everything in white. She flinched, frowning at him. “Why did you take a photo?”
“Here,” Okada said, turning the still camera in his palm. “The person in this photo looks pretty enough to me.” The viewscreen showed a picture of Yui, flattened by the flash.
“Stop it,” she said, hitting him lightly. He felt a thrill as she gave a small–but real–smile. He stood up, emotions running the show.
“C'mon. Stand up. Let me take some pictures. You'll look great.”
“No, no thanks. I don't think we-”
“Trust me, it'll be fun.” He didn't know what was happening. His heart was beating fast, legs a little shaky.
“Okada, no. Shouldn't we be filming?”
“Kojima won't know. You're pretty. Let me show you.” She shook her head, but the smile remained on her lips. “Tell you what, I'll let you delete any photos you don't like, how's that?”
Yui laughed, still shaking her head. “You're serious?”
“Stand up,” he said, seizing his chance. He had never done anything like this and it felt great. He moved over to her, hand wrapping lightly around her arm. So soft, he thought as he pulled her up. She laughed as he moved back, shooting rapidly.
“Really?”
“Yeah, yeah. Do your thing. OK, use the chair, kind of lean on it like you are thinking.”
She did as he instructed, resting her butt on the back of the chair. Flash, flash. Once she saw that he was serious, she started to move around the room, resting against a wall, looking at the camera, looking away. Okada smiled, pushing the button on the camera so hard the soft bottom of his finger hurt. The flash was too harsh, but he could adjust it in Photoshop. Add some color, maybe a filter or two. She could visit his place, go over the photos with him, sit next to him; the light smell of her perfume reaching him.
“Okada, watch out!” He jumped, the worry in her voice at once scaring him and thrilling him to no end. “Be careful, you almost fell in.” She grabbed his shoulder, pulling him close. The hole in the floor had been right there. One step back and he would have fallen in, crashing to the ground and breaking his neck. Oddly, that didn't matter right now. He was pressed in close to Yui. He could feel the slightest trace of her breasts against his arm. He swallowed, her hair lightly tickling his collarbone. She smelled fantastic, even out here, a few nights into filming.
“T-thanks,” he said, trying to get some moisture back into his mouth. “That would have been nasty.”
“I guess you take your work seriously,” she said, that smile back on her face. He had no idea what it meant, but he loved it, wanting to stand by the hole again just to have her pull him back. He knew he was grinning, he felt he might never stop. A woman, pretty as all hell was smiling at him. It had been a long time coming. “Okada?”
“Hmm?”
“You going to show me those photos?”
For a moment, he had no idea what she was talking about, camera all but forgotten. “Oh, y-yes, of course.” He fumbled with the device, his hands clammy. Flashes flooded the floor as he pressed the wrong button. Their feet looked as though they were standing in the snow.
“Now I see why Kojima hired you too,” she replied.
He pushed the correct button, bringing up a series of small pictures. “OK, let's start from the beginning.”
He rotated the camera dial anticlockwise, cycling through the photos. If there was one thing he wanted people to understand about him; to have it etched in their minds, it was that he knew cameras. He had at least half a dozen still cameras at his apartment, as well as some of the finest film and digital video cameras on the market. The Arriflex 535 B was his most cherished; his baby complete with her own cloth to wipe away fingerprints. His hands were made for holding cameras, for shuffling through images at a breakneck pace. His eyes were sharp; able to pick out problematic photos or video issues at speeds which alarmed Anno and the rest of his colleagues. It was a thing of pride with him.
Something was wrong with the photos. He knew it from the moment his thumb scrolled away at the camera dial. His nature would have been to take the camera away, quickly flick through and delete the mistakes, the errors. Show off only the best, make it seem as though everything he took was golden. But Yui was standing next to him. Again, the briefest of grazes against his arm. He'd promised to let her see.
I'm sure she'll understand, he thought. Guy can't hit a home run every time.
The screen whirled to the first photo, the one where she was sitting, unaware. He swallowed again–why it was so hard to swallow, he didn't know–and held the camera up, the small, bright screen illuminating their faces. To his delight Yui took the left side of the camera in her hand, their fingers touching. “Definitely delete that one,” she said, paying no attention to their fingers; shaky, nervous Yui a distant memory. “Next.”
He did as requested, flicking forward. She laughed, her photo doppelganger's face twisted in confusion. “That was when-”
“You were asking me to get up. Delete, thank you.”
He flicked forward until finding the first true photo. The photo was taken from a great angle, showing off her legs as she rested against a chair. “See?” He said, happy with himself. “You look great, like Audrey Hepburn.”
“Who's that?”
“Wait, you don't know who Audrey Hepburn is? Are you serious?” He felt his elation dip somewhat. A person unaware of Audrey was someone he would never speak with. A complete idiot.
“No,” she said, her brow scrunched up, “who is that?” She pointed at the screen. Okada saw that her finger was shaking, the tip of her fingernail tapping the glass lightly. Tip-tip-tip. He looked beyond the Yui in the picture, following her finger.
There, in the background, was a face. Okada pushed on a button; the image zooming in. It was a face, no doubt. It was staring at Yui.
“Oh, shit,” he said, fear tingling along his back. He rotated the dial, moving to the next image. Yui was posed, looking at the camera.
The face had moved forward.
Yui let out a small groan. Okada flicked ahead. Another image. The face, now attached to a small body, was closer to her, the Yui in the picture, oblivious. His thumb moved again, another image sliding into view. In this picture, Yui was smiling. The thing was now close enough to touch her.
“No, no no no,” Yui said. Her whole body was shaking. Okada's too. The dial turned again. Yui was looking away from the camera, a dramatic shot.
The thing looked straight down the lens. It had no jaw, no flesh from the nose down. Bald, with eyes that lit up in the camera flash. Okada rotated again, and again. It came closer with each image. Heading for them. Yui grabbed Okada. She held on tight, her breath hot against his chest. He flicked through to the last photo; a shot of their feet. The screen was shaking wildly, his hands convulsing in fear, the camera almost slipping from his fingers. There was Yui's feet, and his, all white. Next to his sneakers was another pair of feet. Riddled with boils and missing most of its toes, the feet were touching against his. Terror stabbed into his chest.
“Make it stop,” Yui said, her voice muffled against his chest. Despite the fear that had smothered him, his dick grew hard from her proximity.
“M-maybe it's gone?” he said, as much to himself as to her. With a hand that refused to stay still, he flicked the camera back to its filming state. The screen flared white, then grew dark, small traces of lantern light appeared at the edges of the frame, heavy grain saturating the image. With his eyes closed, Okada snapped off a series of pictures, the flash a chestnut color through his eyelids.
“Make it stop, make it stop!”
He clicked back to review the images. He didn't want to look. Couldn't bring himself to open his eyes. “I can't look,” he said, “I can't!”
Yui gripped him tighter, her face pushing his T-shirt up as she looked at the camera for him; a courage in her that he knew he didn't have. He felt in that instant as though he had failed not only her but men everywhere. He didn't care, as long as he didn't have to look. His thumb pressed against the dial. Click-click. There was no sound, nothing. Just the hot breath against his chest from Yui's mouth. Click-click.
She screamed. A sound so terrifying, Okada opened his eyes from the panic, looking at the image. The face was there, reaching out for the camera, gnarled fingers smudging against the lens.
Okada shrieked, turning on the spot. His nose flared, reacting to the stench before his eyes adjusted to the darkness. The thing stood in front of him, something thick and gelatinous spewing out from where the mouth should have been. Cold hands tore at his body. Somewhere, far away, Yui wailed.
So very far away.
11:25:44:01
Mai drew breath, sitting up with such force that she rolled off the bed and onto the floor. She was alive. She was whole. Her cheek felt as though it was on fire, searing with an agony that brought tears to her eyes. Her arms throbbed; pain wrestling her ability to move. Even her knee screamed out for attention.
She lay on the floor, a poorly thatched roof for a view. A lone lantern and her iPhone the only companions, the light more than enough for the small space she found herself in. The place stank of age and mistreatment. A hut. She was in one of the huts, separate from the main building. From the holes in the roof and walls, Mai could see that night had fallen.
A thought came, panic suffocating her: Have they escaped the island and left me here? She started to hyperventilate; not enough air, not enough. They left me. They left me! She tried to bring her legs up, to push them under her, but one of her knees refused to respond. Her arms also fought back, aching with a pain so fierce it sapped the will from her. Something on the edge of her memory flew past, distracting her from the panic that threatened to overtake her. A fire? In the building? Something important tried to shake itself free from the cloud of her mind, a word. Starting with C. Mai gave up when her cheek did the job of reminding her that she was lucky to be alive. The lantern, her phone. Someone had left them for her. As she shuffled on her butt, trying to sit up, it all came back.
The ghost with no legs. Jin grabbing her, fighting it. Stopping it somehow. There had been yelling, then her memory skipped to someone putting her in the hut. Jin again. But she had no clue where he was now or how long she had been out for. He had said the ghosts would be coming for her. The hut couldn't be any safer than the main building.
They could be behind her now, reaching out.
Mai whipped her head around, sure in the moment she would see a ghost; horrible face smiling at her with horrible teeth about to finish the job. Her eyes picked the wrong moment to play tricks; the shadow over there, a head. Knots in the wood, eyes. A scream flew out sof her, ripping away, stealing her energy. She collapsed to the floor, arms up to ward off a predator that existed only in her mind. Like a pair of children that had tripped over and grazed their hands, her arms, knee, and cheek ached in unison; her whole body talking at once, crying out in agony. She had never felt so weak. So finished. Not even the accident measured up, that awful moment all those years ago had nothing on this. She had been mauled, inside and outside. Nothing would feel better than to sleep, to give in, though deep inside, the one remaining part left unscathed spoke up, warning her to stay awake. Telling her if she closed her eyes now it would be the end. No more tweets, no more lunchtime specials, no more golden sundowns from her balcony. No more Mai; the island claiming yet another soul.
Would it really matter? she thought. Can't I just sleep?
She had read the articles; climbers succumbing to the elements, crawling into a ball as the wind and cold took them. She could see how peaceful that moment would be, how pleasant a death was being offered. No pain. No ghost tearing you apart. Death at its most compassionate, everything but a kiss to send you on your way. Just close one eye, and the other would follow. Nothing more to worry about. Nothing more to feel guilty over. Just sleep.
I'm a survivor, her mind pushed out, yet the word couldn't reach her lips. I made it through the accident. Made it through Mom's stares. Even a ghost couldn't put me down. I'm awake, I'm alive. Now get up. Move!
Still the words did not come out, the only result a mere twitch of her finger. She blinked, faster and faster, willing the movement to keep her here, keep her now. It was getting darker in her mind, the lights going out.
What was it all for then? The shit I've gone through, all the crap sent my way? It's not fair that it all ends here. Wake up.
Her lips moved, a slight gesture at best.
I want to get up, OK? I want to get out of this hut. I want to get off this island.
A grunt from her throat, her lips moving.
I'm not done, no. I want to survive. So get up, get up NOW!
With more pain than she thought existed, her hands slid forward, pushing up, her body rising. A weight in the center of her abdomen yearned to return to the floor, fighting against her with a tempting force. She faltered, halfway to a sitting position. The temptation grew, her strength draining, something trickling down the cuts in her arms. Mai shook her mind, forcing her head to do the same. She pushed because the alternative was not an option. Mai managed to get her legs under her, a headache announcing itself and driving in deep. The room wavered but slowly regained focus. Mai saw that the bed she had fallen from was not fit to bear the name. A carved frame with planks of wood sat in front of her, one leg collapsed against a wall. A jacket–Jin's–lay crumpled at the head of the frame. In the flickering light, she peered at her arms. It looked as though he had cleaned the wounds, with a sloppy attempt at bandaging for the kicker. Her battle with the floor had opened up the cuts; small lines of red ran down to her palms. It didn't look infected, all things considered.
Ghost rabies, maybe? The cuts itched, the sensation a crazy kind of pleasure compared to the pain she felt elsewhere. “Thank you, Jin.” She had a feeling the sentence was long overdue but was happy to say it. When she met again, she would say it to his face.
It was silent in the hut and beyond, no birds, no sounds of the ancient structures settling against the wind. Quiet. Mai shivered, her senses returning. With some trial and error, she tugged on Jin's jacket. A riceball–wrapped, thankfully–plopped to the ground. Her hunger returned with a vengeance. As she moved towards the door, her vision blurred once more. How much blood have I lost? Peeling off the clear wrapping, Mai hooked a finger around the door, her mouth salivating as she bit into the salty rice. She would owe Jin a lot once she found him.
If he's still here, Sis. If he didn't leave you for the ghosts to finish off.
The voice remained. Something about the ghost attack had led Mai to believe her sister was done with her, the voice no longer occupying space in her thoughts.
“H-he's here. He's got to be.” The more she repeated it, the stronger the thought took weight. It was difficult to stand, her knee felt dead but the riceball was doing the trick. Her exhaustion was receding slightly, the bleeding in her arms had almost stopped. If she was going to make a move, it would have to be now. There would be no second chance. Sliding the phone into her pocket and grabbing the lantern with her other hand, Mai wobbled out into the night.
Into the dark.
11:42:36:18
Jin and Mai were out of the picture. Gone.
He would have to write them out of the film. The girl was easy, a simple graphic or subtitle sufficing but Jin would require some post-production trickery, his part thus far too substantial. A title card showing the man had lost his mind or filming a scathing interview with Sato were viable options. Change things up in the final edit, some slow motion here, a few glances there. Make him out to be batshit. This would have been fine, tolerable. The production could continue, his vision unaffected. But now the rest were leaving him. Anno was AWOL. Okada and Yui had not returned. Sato had been sent to look for them but that had been almost an hour ago.
The place wasn't that big, how could it take so long? Are they all together, planning against me?
Kojima sat alone in the kitchen, thinking it all through; assembling a picture from the scattered puzzle. He couldn't have predicted the ghosts would be so violent, nothing he had read online indicated anything of the sort. They weren't meant to do it this way. Spirits did not eat people; even in death there was order.
It will be fine, he told himself, unaware that the most obvious thing had eluded him. The voice which whispered in his mind was foreign; totally unlike his own. Things are being taken care of.
For the last day or so, he had felt assured, unbeatable. It was unnerving, completely unlike him. Filming was a battle against the clock, a constant sensation of feeling ill to the point of collapse; moment upon moment reminding you of how much footage there was still left to shoot, how behind you were, how expensive everything was costing. How utterly alone you were; unaccompanied in the throng of a film crew. On one film he had been diagnosed with stomach ulcers and not a single person had asked if he was alright. He had not been eating right, no one does on a film set. Worst pain he had ever experienced, it was a coin toss as to what was worse, the vomiting of blood or the ghastly stench of his shit but that was the movie life. Director goes down, the money counters start to worry, look at the project. Suggest trimming the budget, maybe bring in a cheaper director to 'oversee' things. Over his dead body. He had stayed the course, fought it out and won, though no one was the wiser. Another story to throw out when an interview took place–less and less these days, that would soon change–but on this island with almost all of his crew missing he was alone, no matter how you looked at it.
“He a cameraman too?”
“Reporter, actually. Just like you.” She swiveled in her chair, fixing on him. Okada realized it was the first time she had made eye contact with him.
“Really? Okada, right?”
“Yeah. He filmed during the sarin attacks.”
“Oh, then?”
He laughed. “Nice. Then?”
“Oh, sorry. I didn't mean to-”
“It's OK. It was a long time ago.” The cult sarin attacks on Tokyo commuter trains had rocked the nation in 1995. It was still a significant reason why trashcans were not found in abundance in public areas today. Okada doubted that Yui would have been out of kindergarten when it went down.
She threw her hands up, “This is exactly what I'm talking about. You, your father. This is all a normal day for you, right?” He was about to say otherwise but noticed she wasn't stopping. “Me? It's my first big production. Being the weather girl for a local late night station is as far as I had made it. Watch out everyone, here she comes.”
“So that's how Kojima found you. Anno and I were taking bet...uh, wondering about that.”
“He asked me because I was cheap. All the pretty, famous reporters were out of his budget.”
Okada let a small silence fall. A flash lit the room, painting everything in white. She flinched, frowning at him. “Why did you take a photo?”
“Here,” Okada said, turning the still camera in his palm. “The person in this photo looks pretty enough to me.” The viewscreen showed a picture of Yui, flattened by the flash.
“Stop it,” she said, hitting him lightly. He felt a thrill as she gave a small–but real–smile. He stood up, emotions running the show.
“C'mon. Stand up. Let me take some pictures. You'll look great.”
“No, no thanks. I don't think we-”
“Trust me, it'll be fun.” He didn't know what was happening. His heart was beating fast, legs a little shaky.
“Okada, no. Shouldn't we be filming?”
“Kojima won't know. You're pretty. Let me show you.” She shook her head, but the smile remained on her lips. “Tell you what, I'll let you delete any photos you don't like, how's that?”
Yui laughed, still shaking her head. “You're serious?”
“Stand up,” he said, seizing his chance. He had never done anything like this and it felt great. He moved over to her, hand wrapping lightly around her arm. So soft, he thought as he pulled her up. She laughed as he moved back, shooting rapidly.
“Really?”
“Yeah, yeah. Do your thing. OK, use the chair, kind of lean on it like you are thinking.”
She did as he instructed, resting her butt on the back of the chair. Flash, flash. Once she saw that he was serious, she started to move around the room, resting against a wall, looking at the camera, looking away. Okada smiled, pushing the button on the camera so hard the soft bottom of his finger hurt. The flash was too harsh, but he could adjust it in Photoshop. Add some color, maybe a filter or two. She could visit his place, go over the photos with him, sit next to him; the light smell of her perfume reaching him.
“Okada, watch out!” He jumped, the worry in her voice at once scaring him and thrilling him to no end. “Be careful, you almost fell in.” She grabbed his shoulder, pulling him close. The hole in the floor had been right there. One step back and he would have fallen in, crashing to the ground and breaking his neck. Oddly, that didn't matter right now. He was pressed in close to Yui. He could feel the slightest trace of her breasts against his arm. He swallowed, her hair lightly tickling his collarbone. She smelled fantastic, even out here, a few nights into filming.
“T-thanks,” he said, trying to get some moisture back into his mouth. “That would have been nasty.”
“I guess you take your work seriously,” she said, that smile back on her face. He had no idea what it meant, but he loved it, wanting to stand by the hole again just to have her pull him back. He knew he was grinning, he felt he might never stop. A woman, pretty as all hell was smiling at him. It had been a long time coming. “Okada?”
“Hmm?”
“You going to show me those photos?”
For a moment, he had no idea what she was talking about, camera all but forgotten. “Oh, y-yes, of course.” He fumbled with the device, his hands clammy. Flashes flooded the floor as he pressed the wrong button. Their feet looked as though they were standing in the snow.
“Now I see why Kojima hired you too,” she replied.
He pushed the correct button, bringing up a series of small pictures. “OK, let's start from the beginning.”
He rotated the camera dial anticlockwise, cycling through the photos. If there was one thing he wanted people to understand about him; to have it etched in their minds, it was that he knew cameras. He had at least half a dozen still cameras at his apartment, as well as some of the finest film and digital video cameras on the market. The Arriflex 535 B was his most cherished; his baby complete with her own cloth to wipe away fingerprints. His hands were made for holding cameras, for shuffling through images at a breakneck pace. His eyes were sharp; able to pick out problematic photos or video issues at speeds which alarmed Anno and the rest of his colleagues. It was a thing of pride with him.
Something was wrong with the photos. He knew it from the moment his thumb scrolled away at the camera dial. His nature would have been to take the camera away, quickly flick through and delete the mistakes, the errors. Show off only the best, make it seem as though everything he took was golden. But Yui was standing next to him. Again, the briefest of grazes against his arm. He'd promised to let her see.
I'm sure she'll understand, he thought. Guy can't hit a home run every time.
The screen whirled to the first photo, the one where she was sitting, unaware. He swallowed again–why it was so hard to swallow, he didn't know–and held the camera up, the small, bright screen illuminating their faces. To his delight Yui took the left side of the camera in her hand, their fingers touching. “Definitely delete that one,” she said, paying no attention to their fingers; shaky, nervous Yui a distant memory. “Next.”
He did as requested, flicking forward. She laughed, her photo doppelganger's face twisted in confusion. “That was when-”
“You were asking me to get up. Delete, thank you.”
He flicked forward until finding the first true photo. The photo was taken from a great angle, showing off her legs as she rested against a chair. “See?” He said, happy with himself. “You look great, like Audrey Hepburn.”
“Who's that?”
“Wait, you don't know who Audrey Hepburn is? Are you serious?” He felt his elation dip somewhat. A person unaware of Audrey was someone he would never speak with. A complete idiot.
“No,” she said, her brow scrunched up, “who is that?” She pointed at the screen. Okada saw that her finger was shaking, the tip of her fingernail tapping the glass lightly. Tip-tip-tip. He looked beyond the Yui in the picture, following her finger.
There, in the background, was a face. Okada pushed on a button; the image zooming in. It was a face, no doubt. It was staring at Yui.
“Oh, shit,” he said, fear tingling along his back. He rotated the dial, moving to the next image. Yui was posed, looking at the camera.
The face had moved forward.
Yui let out a small groan. Okada flicked ahead. Another image. The face, now attached to a small body, was closer to her, the Yui in the picture, oblivious. His thumb moved again, another image sliding into view. In this picture, Yui was smiling. The thing was now close enough to touch her.
“No, no no no,” Yui said. Her whole body was shaking. Okada's too. The dial turned again. Yui was looking away from the camera, a dramatic shot.
The thing looked straight down the lens. It had no jaw, no flesh from the nose down. Bald, with eyes that lit up in the camera flash. Okada rotated again, and again. It came closer with each image. Heading for them. Yui grabbed Okada. She held on tight, her breath hot against his chest. He flicked through to the last photo; a shot of their feet. The screen was shaking wildly, his hands convulsing in fear, the camera almost slipping from his fingers. There was Yui's feet, and his, all white. Next to his sneakers was another pair of feet. Riddled with boils and missing most of its toes, the feet were touching against his. Terror stabbed into his chest.
“Make it stop,” Yui said, her voice muffled against his chest. Despite the fear that had smothered him, his dick grew hard from her proximity.
“M-maybe it's gone?” he said, as much to himself as to her. With a hand that refused to stay still, he flicked the camera back to its filming state. The screen flared white, then grew dark, small traces of lantern light appeared at the edges of the frame, heavy grain saturating the image. With his eyes closed, Okada snapped off a series of pictures, the flash a chestnut color through his eyelids.
“Make it stop, make it stop!”
He clicked back to review the images. He didn't want to look. Couldn't bring himself to open his eyes. “I can't look,” he said, “I can't!”
Yui gripped him tighter, her face pushing his T-shirt up as she looked at the camera for him; a courage in her that he knew he didn't have. He felt in that instant as though he had failed not only her but men everywhere. He didn't care, as long as he didn't have to look. His thumb pressed against the dial. Click-click. There was no sound, nothing. Just the hot breath against his chest from Yui's mouth. Click-click.
She screamed. A sound so terrifying, Okada opened his eyes from the panic, looking at the image. The face was there, reaching out for the camera, gnarled fingers smudging against the lens.
Okada shrieked, turning on the spot. His nose flared, reacting to the stench before his eyes adjusted to the darkness. The thing stood in front of him, something thick and gelatinous spewing out from where the mouth should have been. Cold hands tore at his body. Somewhere, far away, Yui wailed.
So very far away.
11:25:44:01
Mai drew breath, sitting up with such force that she rolled off the bed and onto the floor. She was alive. She was whole. Her cheek felt as though it was on fire, searing with an agony that brought tears to her eyes. Her arms throbbed; pain wrestling her ability to move. Even her knee screamed out for attention.
She lay on the floor, a poorly thatched roof for a view. A lone lantern and her iPhone the only companions, the light more than enough for the small space she found herself in. The place stank of age and mistreatment. A hut. She was in one of the huts, separate from the main building. From the holes in the roof and walls, Mai could see that night had fallen.
A thought came, panic suffocating her: Have they escaped the island and left me here? She started to hyperventilate; not enough air, not enough. They left me. They left me! She tried to bring her legs up, to push them under her, but one of her knees refused to respond. Her arms also fought back, aching with a pain so fierce it sapped the will from her. Something on the edge of her memory flew past, distracting her from the panic that threatened to overtake her. A fire? In the building? Something important tried to shake itself free from the cloud of her mind, a word. Starting with C. Mai gave up when her cheek did the job of reminding her that she was lucky to be alive. The lantern, her phone. Someone had left them for her. As she shuffled on her butt, trying to sit up, it all came back.
The ghost with no legs. Jin grabbing her, fighting it. Stopping it somehow. There had been yelling, then her memory skipped to someone putting her in the hut. Jin again. But she had no clue where he was now or how long she had been out for. He had said the ghosts would be coming for her. The hut couldn't be any safer than the main building.
They could be behind her now, reaching out.
Mai whipped her head around, sure in the moment she would see a ghost; horrible face smiling at her with horrible teeth about to finish the job. Her eyes picked the wrong moment to play tricks; the shadow over there, a head. Knots in the wood, eyes. A scream flew out sof her, ripping away, stealing her energy. She collapsed to the floor, arms up to ward off a predator that existed only in her mind. Like a pair of children that had tripped over and grazed their hands, her arms, knee, and cheek ached in unison; her whole body talking at once, crying out in agony. She had never felt so weak. So finished. Not even the accident measured up, that awful moment all those years ago had nothing on this. She had been mauled, inside and outside. Nothing would feel better than to sleep, to give in, though deep inside, the one remaining part left unscathed spoke up, warning her to stay awake. Telling her if she closed her eyes now it would be the end. No more tweets, no more lunchtime specials, no more golden sundowns from her balcony. No more Mai; the island claiming yet another soul.
Would it really matter? she thought. Can't I just sleep?
She had read the articles; climbers succumbing to the elements, crawling into a ball as the wind and cold took them. She could see how peaceful that moment would be, how pleasant a death was being offered. No pain. No ghost tearing you apart. Death at its most compassionate, everything but a kiss to send you on your way. Just close one eye, and the other would follow. Nothing more to worry about. Nothing more to feel guilty over. Just sleep.
I'm a survivor, her mind pushed out, yet the word couldn't reach her lips. I made it through the accident. Made it through Mom's stares. Even a ghost couldn't put me down. I'm awake, I'm alive. Now get up. Move!
Still the words did not come out, the only result a mere twitch of her finger. She blinked, faster and faster, willing the movement to keep her here, keep her now. It was getting darker in her mind, the lights going out.
What was it all for then? The shit I've gone through, all the crap sent my way? It's not fair that it all ends here. Wake up.
Her lips moved, a slight gesture at best.
I want to get up, OK? I want to get out of this hut. I want to get off this island.
A grunt from her throat, her lips moving.
I'm not done, no. I want to survive. So get up, get up NOW!
With more pain than she thought existed, her hands slid forward, pushing up, her body rising. A weight in the center of her abdomen yearned to return to the floor, fighting against her with a tempting force. She faltered, halfway to a sitting position. The temptation grew, her strength draining, something trickling down the cuts in her arms. Mai shook her mind, forcing her head to do the same. She pushed because the alternative was not an option. Mai managed to get her legs under her, a headache announcing itself and driving in deep. The room wavered but slowly regained focus. Mai saw that the bed she had fallen from was not fit to bear the name. A carved frame with planks of wood sat in front of her, one leg collapsed against a wall. A jacket–Jin's–lay crumpled at the head of the frame. In the flickering light, she peered at her arms. It looked as though he had cleaned the wounds, with a sloppy attempt at bandaging for the kicker. Her battle with the floor had opened up the cuts; small lines of red ran down to her palms. It didn't look infected, all things considered.
Ghost rabies, maybe? The cuts itched, the sensation a crazy kind of pleasure compared to the pain she felt elsewhere. “Thank you, Jin.” She had a feeling the sentence was long overdue but was happy to say it. When she met again, she would say it to his face.
It was silent in the hut and beyond, no birds, no sounds of the ancient structures settling against the wind. Quiet. Mai shivered, her senses returning. With some trial and error, she tugged on Jin's jacket. A riceball–wrapped, thankfully–plopped to the ground. Her hunger returned with a vengeance. As she moved towards the door, her vision blurred once more. How much blood have I lost? Peeling off the clear wrapping, Mai hooked a finger around the door, her mouth salivating as she bit into the salty rice. She would owe Jin a lot once she found him.
If he's still here, Sis. If he didn't leave you for the ghosts to finish off.
The voice remained. Something about the ghost attack had led Mai to believe her sister was done with her, the voice no longer occupying space in her thoughts.
“H-he's here. He's got to be.” The more she repeated it, the stronger the thought took weight. It was difficult to stand, her knee felt dead but the riceball was doing the trick. Her exhaustion was receding slightly, the bleeding in her arms had almost stopped. If she was going to make a move, it would have to be now. There would be no second chance. Sliding the phone into her pocket and grabbing the lantern with her other hand, Mai wobbled out into the night.
Into the dark.
11:42:36:18
Jin and Mai were out of the picture. Gone.
He would have to write them out of the film. The girl was easy, a simple graphic or subtitle sufficing but Jin would require some post-production trickery, his part thus far too substantial. A title card showing the man had lost his mind or filming a scathing interview with Sato were viable options. Change things up in the final edit, some slow motion here, a few glances there. Make him out to be batshit. This would have been fine, tolerable. The production could continue, his vision unaffected. But now the rest were leaving him. Anno was AWOL. Okada and Yui had not returned. Sato had been sent to look for them but that had been almost an hour ago.
The place wasn't that big, how could it take so long? Are they all together, planning against me?
Kojima sat alone in the kitchen, thinking it all through; assembling a picture from the scattered puzzle. He couldn't have predicted the ghosts would be so violent, nothing he had read online indicated anything of the sort. They weren't meant to do it this way. Spirits did not eat people; even in death there was order.
It will be fine, he told himself, unaware that the most obvious thing had eluded him. The voice which whispered in his mind was foreign; totally unlike his own. Things are being taken care of.
For the last day or so, he had felt assured, unbeatable. It was unnerving, completely unlike him. Filming was a battle against the clock, a constant sensation of feeling ill to the point of collapse; moment upon moment reminding you of how much footage there was still left to shoot, how behind you were, how expensive everything was costing. How utterly alone you were; unaccompanied in the throng of a film crew. On one film he had been diagnosed with stomach ulcers and not a single person had asked if he was alright. He had not been eating right, no one does on a film set. Worst pain he had ever experienced, it was a coin toss as to what was worse, the vomiting of blood or the ghastly stench of his shit but that was the movie life. Director goes down, the money counters start to worry, look at the project. Suggest trimming the budget, maybe bring in a cheaper director to 'oversee' things. Over his dead body. He had stayed the course, fought it out and won, though no one was the wiser. Another story to throw out when an interview took place–less and less these days, that would soon change–but on this island with almost all of his crew missing he was alone, no matter how you looked at it.
