Chapter 17: The Climb

My feet stopped in its tracks as a thought crossed my mind. This is a waste of time. Fuck what this crazy bitch has going on and fuck Takashi for wanting to help her. The time spent fighting could have been time spent making progress. The soles of my shoes parted from the carpeted surface of the hallway, back into the blood puddles in the elevator. Dead stench reacquainted itself with my nose with my arm being the only protection, barely masking the scent. The button that resided above the hill of others on the panel lit up when pressed by my freehand.

Kiyoko's gaze wasn't hard to notice. She could be burning holes at me from a mile away and I would still feel it. Through her glare, she looked like she wasn't surprised. But she watched me instead of taking some sort of action to stop me. After a split second, the elevator doors closed, separating us, and the interior shook as the elevator lifted me up.

It was the longest elevator ride so far, even if it passed for only roughly thirty seconds. My arm was not a good barrier against the strong smell of blood and rotting flesh entrapped in this cramped space. Every inhale activated my gag reflexes that threatened my stomach to empty its contents.

Holding back the undeniable urge to vomit, I took cover at one side of the corner of the metal doors as best I could beside the corpses. The chance Jurno was expecting me outweighed the priority to minimize my intake of the smell of corpses.

With a familiar ding emitting from a disembodied speaker. I rushed out before the doors separated completely. The stench was a great motivator for me to get my ass out there, but at the same time, I knew that the elevator would be my grave if Jurno's plan was to gun me down right there. I had to get out of there quickly to have any chance of not adding to the corpses.

What waited for me outside wasn't Jurno, or his lackeys, not even a zombie. In fact, there was nothing. For some reason, the electricity barely coursed through this hallway. In front of me was a narrow, dimly lit hallway that stretched forward around a hundred meters. The end of the hallway was marked by a brown door, a light shining brighter illuminating the door as if it were a light at the end of a long tunnel.

Totally not creepy at all. Nothing really beats that sight of first seeing Kiyoko though. That was much creepier.

Cautiously, I crept forward to the door at the end. Softly placing my heel to toe on the ground and trying to maintain a smooth, swift space. I prepared the knife I relinquished from Kiyoko, ready to deal with an ambush or trap of some kind. If I did get jumped, it would make for a shitty situation with the shifty lighting. But so far, I've been doing good. I just need to be more careful when getting into more scrapes because flexibility, at this point, became almost impossible without reinjuring myself. My body is in the process of repairing itself and I can feel the burn of its labor. Each movement around my upper body just intensified that burning sensation. I couldn't let it deter me now, I haven't come this far just to die.

A silhouette of a body that laid on the floor came to my view about four feet away, the light above flickering at an irritatingly rapid rate. I wasn't about to try to discern the corpse over the seizure-inducing light show, and I nearly stepped over before my eye caught something. From the rapid flashes, I spotted a familiar tint of red-colored hair. It felt like my heart got stuck in my throat. It can't be true. This motionless body can't be Yasumi. But sure enough, as I got to my knees to study closer, and forcing my eyes to adjust to the glittering light, I discerned the features of my best friend.

His face was drenched in blood with cuts over his cheeks and eye. His left eye was worse and where most of the source of blood came from. Crimson oozed from his puffed up and bruised eyelid. I picked up Yasumi's motionless body, sitting him up gently.

"Yasumi," I whispered, stopping myself from crying out and revealing that I was practically outside Jurno's door. "C'mon man," I urged softly, shaking him as an attempt to bring him back to life. Yasumi didn't stir.

Tears welled up in my eyes and I choked back a sob as I pulled Yasumi's body close in an embrace, masking every cry into his shoulder. A new sensation of grief I have never experienced took hold of me. My body shook with each masked sob, my head throbbed, and my chest burned as I held my dead best friend in my arms. I was too late.

"Fuck… Fuck!" I screamed into his shoulder; the sound muffled so no one could hear. "I'm so sorry," I said, "I never wanted to leave them. I was scared of losing you and Shizuka. Please, don't hate me."

Opening my eyes revealed a distorted hallway through the tears that lingered. Blinking them away, I looked over my shoulder to find more of my fears coming true. The elevator was moving, and it was heading up. The numbers above the metal doors lit brightly, counting upwards from ten.

It was time for me to move, but my feet couldn't bring themselves to do so. It's wrong, leaving Yasumi to rest in a shitty, dark, and filthy hallway. He deserved more than this to be his final resting place. Much more. With my feet finding new motivation, I moved around to grab Yasumi under his arms to start dragging him towards the end of the hallway. Two steps in, I noticed Yasumi's hand lost grip of something. On the floor nearby, I snatched it up and recognized the feeling from its weight. It was Yasumi's revolver. One of them, anyway.

16...17… I had to haul ass now. Pocketing the revolver, I dashed to Yasumi and hurriedly dragged him. My calves ached and burned as I dragged him, falling backward onto the floor as my legs gave out on me. I looked up.

18… Forcing my sorry ass up, my legs continued trudging backward until I finally felt my back press up against the brown door at the end.

19… My breathing became so raspy I thought I was tasting blood with each breath. I dug my hand into my pocket, yanking out the keycard, and quickly swiping it through the card slot. A beep, a green light blinking near the slot, and a clicking sound, the door was unlocked.

20... Pulling the handle and swinging the door open, I shoved myself and Yasumi inside, pulling my knife out at the ready. The immediate area was clear. I heard the faint ding of the elevator from across the hall and I hurried to close the door. The door closed shut as the elevator doors opened. Using both the doorknob lock and the bot lock, I felt we were at least safe from whatever hunter was out there.

My back pressed against the door, my jelly legs finally resting as I slowly slid down, sitting with my legs out. Yasumi laid in front of me where I left him. Catching my breath, I watched Yasumi's body, spacing out for a moment.

Yasumi was always a goofball. Everything was a joke for him because he never really gave a shit. I enjoyed that about him. He always smiled even when the situation seemed grim. But he was more than that, he always listened to me whenever I had troubles, helped me whenever I needed, or didn't deserve it. Dealing with my dumb ass for the four years I've known him.

Shifting where I'm at, I found the reason why I was so uncomfortable where I sat. Reaching behind me I pulled Yasumi's revolver from my pocket. The pristine steel shined in the better lighting of the room. Releasing the cylinder out I sighed, disappointed when only finding one unused bullet. Yasumi must've fought these bastards to the bitter end. He was always stubborn like that.

That was when I realized the light was much better in this room! Closing the revolver cylinder, I looked back at Yasumi's body once more without phasing out this time, focusing. Tears found their way to escape my eyes once more when I noticed the rise and fall of Yasumi's chest.

My sore calves gave out on me when I tried standing up, making me end up on my knees. So, I crawled over to Yasumi's side, placing a hand on his shoulder and patting it.

"Yasumi!" I called him again, watching him respond by turning his head and opening his uninjured eye. His emerald iris looked at me, eye half-lidded with blood staining the white surrounding his iris.

"Riida?" Yasumi said his voice a low rasp as he barely said my name. His eye moved, scanning me in a daze. "Ah, my head!" He held the side of his head, the side his injured eye was. Yasumi pulled his hand back to look at his now bloody palm.

"Oh... das not good," Yasumi said, pitching his voice up a bit as he usually did when he joked around. It succeeded in me releasing a breathy chuckle.

"Hang on man, you'll be okay," I said, laying Yasumi gently back on the ground. Making sure he was comfortable, I carefully stood up this time and made my way to search for some type of bandage.

The size of a deluxe suite in a fancy hotel didn't occur to me until I tried searching the place over. Unlike the normal rooms that are empty or left unkempt due to some evacuation, this suite was kept to standard. Furniture was dusted and not thrown to the side. The dining table and kitchen were clean and free of litter. Cabinets were filled with spices and dish plates along with utensils. I walked Yasumi to the living space, carefully setting him down on the leather couch that was free from any tears and smelled new. Hell, there was even a potted plant that sat on a table in front of the couch, which faces a sixty-inch flat screen T.V. Knowing this place seemed to be immaculate, I went to search the medicine cabinet in a bathroom adjacent to the kitchen. What do you know, I found a box with new, clean gauze inside. "Are all the rooms up here like this?" I wondered.

Closing the medicine cabinet had the mirror face me. I looked horrible. Stray cuts and bruises covered my face. The space around my bloodshot eyes looked sunken as if I hadn't slept for weeks. The red shirt I wore was torn at the collar, and I could see the distinct shade of dark red around my chest where my wound resided.

Turning the faucet, and being pleasantly surprised by the working water pipes, I washed the dirt and blood off my hands as best I could. The clear, warm water flowed through my hands, coloring the white sink in red and brown. It stung the cuts on my knuckles and forearms, but it was important that I'm sanitized before I help Yasumi. God knows I dirtied my hands plenty in the hotel. From what I could tell so far it seemed Yasumi suffered from a bad concussion and a worse eye with a probably severed cornea. Before I left the clean bathroom, I didn't forget to grab the bottle of ibuprofen that sat in the medicine cabinet and slammed the cabinet shut as I exited.

Yasumi sat low on the couch and stared into the black void of the T.V. Taking my place beside him, I dropped the gauze box and ibuprofen bottle on the table. His face brightened up and he leaned forward to snatch the painkillers. With a pop, he downed the bottle greedily, not letting any tablet fall to the side with his head up and bottle in the air. He tossed the bottle to the side when he finished, sighing in relief and sinking back on the couch. I sat there, staring at him in shock and waiting for some explanation for what just happened.

"Jesus Christ, man," I said, grabbing the gauze from the table," You just downed that like some addict."

"You haven't had your face nearly beaten to a pulp," Yasumi said, "You'd do the same, trust me."

"Do you even need this?" I waved the gauze in my hand.

Yasumi grinned, "Prolly not."

"My ass. C'mere." We both shared a moment of laughter before I got to work on dressing Yasumi's head. Most of the gauze wrapped over his eye and the rest covered the top of his head.

"I tried to see out of my eye while you were searching, but… Yeah." Yasumi said, "So I'm a cyclops now I guess."

"What the hell happened to you and Shizuka?" I asked, leaning forward from my seat.

"We escaped to try and find you," He said. "They cornered us and, well, I protected him." Yasumi pointed at his bandaged eye.

"So, he escaped?" I said, sitting up as my hopes rose.

"I don't know," Yasumi's eye looked downward and I deflated. "He's prolly still looking for your ass."

"Oh… well, Yasumi," I placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder, "Thank you."

"Don't thank me yet," Yasumi patted his own hand on mine and I released his shoulder, "Still need to find the sneakster."

The uncomfortable poking on my rear reminded me I still owned one of Yasumi's property. I offered it to him, now relishing on the comfy couch cushion. He silently accepted the weapon back, opening the cylinder to face the same disappointment I did earlier, audibly voicing it by cursing at himself.

"The pills taking effect?" I asked, eager to search for the next lead to finding Shizuka.

"Almost, just give me a bit more," Yasumi said, pressing his hand on his bandaged head. "Hey, what happened to you? You look like shit too."

Starting from when I first came to, I summarized everything that happened and Yasumi listened quietly until I mentioned my encounter with Saeko and Takashi.

"They're okay?" Yasumi peaked up, "So the others are okay too?"

"Yeah," I nodded, grinning, "They're fine. Alice was the one who asked them to find and bring us back."

"Alice," Yasumi said, turning his head away so I wouldn't notice the tears building in his eye, "Thank God."

"Riida, I…" Yasumi started, and I knew where he was going.

"It was wrong. I know. They're our family now and what I did was something family doesn't do to each other. I just… y'know." I said.

"You didn't want to lose Shizuka and me," Yasumi said. "I heard your voice when I was coming to. I talked to Shizuki about it as well before we escaped. He understands your reason, and I do too." It was Yasumi's turn to awkwardly place his hand on my shoulder. "I'm sorry for giving you a hard time. Y'know, before we got jumped."

"Hey, it's alright. Takashi and I got into a scuffle about it too," I said, sighing. Just thinking about what happened on the ground floor exhausts me, "It's worked out with him and Saeko, I think."

"If they start giving you a hard time, I got your back. Always will." Yasumi released my shoulder, pounding it lightly with a fist.

Continuing where I left off, I told Yasumi about the fight when Takashi, Saeko, and I were cornered in the hallway. Also told him the whole debacle with Kiyoko, which all he had to say about her was, "Creepy."

"Now, I'm here," I finished, slapping both my hands on my knees to exaggerate the end of my tale.

"You gonna be alright? With your chest and all. You took a lot of abuse these past couple hours," Yasumi said.

"We need to push through if we're gonna find Shizuka," I said.

"I know that. I'm going to continue to give everything," Yasumi stood up on his own. Those thousand painkillers worked like magic if it hadn't destroyed his kidneys by now. "There's gonna be more shit flying at us after we get Shizuka."

"That's a lovely image," I jeered, getting an "ew," from Yasumi. Nevertheless, he was right. There's more of these hunters than I can count, we'd have to rally with Takashi and Saeko here or outside of this hotel. That's if we can make it out. Then we'd have to make our way back to Takagi's estate, avoid zombies or more hunters-

I stopped myself and stood up with Yasumi. Finding Shizuka's elusive ass comes first, I'll deal with the rest as they come. That's how I've been surviving so far. One thing at a time.

"So," Yasumi started, "where do we start?"

It was faint but my ears picked up the sound of white noise. Yasumi must have noticed too since both of our heads turned to the direction the noise emitted from. It fell silent as we set our eyes on a closed door. Without a word, Yasumi and I made our way to the door, knife, and revolver at the ready.

The next room was a stark contrast to the rest of the suite. Trash and unfinished food were scattered across the floor and on the desk on the corner of the room. The smell of rotten food filled our noses, earning a hearty complaint from Yasumi. Other than the mess and smell, the desk was what caught my eyes because there was a radio. It looked military; the box tinged in green with two dials below a scale in the middle with a speaker just above the scale. The standing microphone in front told me that it was a communications radio.

"Weird," I said, "None of the guys I've seen carried any walkie talkies." It would've been the first thing I'd take from them if it were the case.

"They carry them. Shizuka and I saw them use them before," Yasumi said, covering his nose with his hand. I hope we can handle the elevator.

The desk drawers were all pulled out, leaving the surface of the desk itself the only place to search. Other than the radio, which would have me dead if I tried to carry it, and the scraps of food, which smelled worse up close, there were papers scattered on the surface of the desk. Yasumi and I got to inspecting, hoping to find any clues to Shizuka's whereabouts. AS savage as these people are, they at least try to keep account of everything. Papers document inventory, supplies (collected and stolen), and reports. We focused on finding any reports through the disorganized mess.

We eventually got to finding reports about the three of us. "Apprehended three kids. Jurno wants them held for now," One note said. "Separate one from them. Escaped, probably tracking the two captives." Another said. I skimmed through the next pages, stopping at one note that stood out amongst them, "We have one of their daughters. They should be coming soon, and we can finally settle this."

My thoughts turned to Kiyoko first. Were they talking about her? They must be, she was the only female I encountered here who looked captured. Who were they expecting? Did they already come and go before all this? Yasumi and I shared the same confused look before a loud static shriek jolted us to attention.

"Found one of those three brats on the roof!" A voice of a man announced hurriedly. Yasumi and I locked eyes once more. It must be Shizuka up there.

"Secure the perimeter. Guard the lifts. No one goes down there until we catch him!" A frustrated voice commanded.

"The roof," I said, turning to walk out of the room.

"They're guarding the elevator," Yasumi said, following suit, "We'll be gunned down before we can reach him."

"Fortunately for us, there's more than one way up," I said, stopping at the glass sliding door that led to the suite balcony. Yasumi grinned at me, "Glad to see you're still insane."

"I take everything back! You're a psychopath!" Yasumi exclaimed as I heaved him up to hold onto a less slippery crevice he won't almost kill himself with.

"Keep it down!" I said, reestablishing my grip on my own crevice. "They'll hear us!"

"We're not even close to the top!" Yasumi said, looking upward. Cranking my neck back, I looked up too. We barely made any progress. Although we started climbing from the twentieth floor, the edge of the top seemed miles away.

"Just keep climbing!" I said, continuing my ascension. The heavy wind seemed to intensify the more we kept climbing. My fingertips had gone numb, my chest was now so cold I shivered whenever I stopped climbing. If it seemed like miles to get to the top, looking down just made me nauseous. On the bottom, I saw a slow-moving crowd joining up to the entrance of the hotel. They looked as small as ants, but the size of the horde grew to a point where it was hard to miss from a birds-eye view.

"It's gonna be hard to get out of here once we get Shizuka," I commented, staring down at the zombie hoard.

"Maybe we can just jump buildings. You've done it before," Yasumi said with some difficulty as he climbed up.

"I fell six stories!" I said.

"Into a room filled with naked, hot girls taking baths together!"

"I could've died!" I said before losing a grip on one of the ledges I reached for, leaving me with one hand keeping me from plummeting to my death. Cursing to myself, my hand found its place and I achingly pulled myself upward.

The rest of the climb was spent in silence, mostly because Yasumi and I were feeling fatigued rather than voluntarily ending our bickering. My arms ached with each pull-up, sweat was dripping from my chin. We were at least fifty meters away from the top now, and the more I climbed, the more my muscles threatened to give out on me. Out of all the ways I could go out, falling wasn't one I thought too fondly of. Among other things. Nevertheless, Yasumi and I made it to the top, pushing each other up over the ledge as quickly as we could.

We moved behind some nearby generator to catch our breaths, congratulating each other by patting our backs.

"For the record, we all almost died falling more than six stories," Yasumi said, always wanting the last word in every banter. I let him have it this time, tiredly waving my hand in dismissal and he responded with tired laughter.

A loud gunshot rang through the air and Yasumi and I scrambled in our cover.

"Did we get made?" Yasumi whispered. Just as confused, I shrugged in response. Slowly, I peeked out just enough to see what lies beyond our cover. My eyes widened and I took a gasp in, a bead of sweat dripping from my brow.

This hotel was undergoing an extension. Abandoned construction tools laid on the ground, beams were built high to give a foundation of the additional floors and the rooms that were going to be inside. High elevated construction walkways were still suspended in the air by metal cables. Where the hanging walkways hung, there was a hunter with a gun aiming down at someone. A suspending walkway hung above all the others, where Jurno stood, looking down at a figure.

Shizuka stood in the open, his gun pointed at the sky with smoke blowing from the barrel.

Authors Notes:

Hello everyone. Apologizing for a late update each chapter is becoming quite the tedious cycle, but one I can only blame myself for. For those still reading this, thank you from the bottom of my heart. I won't be making any empty promises anymore about deadlines, we all know how I am about consistent updates. But I do plan on finishing this story, and it's happening soon I assure you. I've been busy, joined the military in fact. Coupled with that and all the COVID 19 thing going on, I'm sure all our plans have been ruined one way or another. During basic, I was writing this chapter in my off time. Now that I now have access to a computer, I was able to make a final draft and here we are. Amidst all the chaos going on today, I hope this chapter and the following ones make you happy, because I know I'm happy to have finally updated this again.

Stay safe.

-Tenkura