Asylum (Chapter 28)
Title: Asylum - Chapter 28
Characters: Kato Shigeaki, OC, Tegoshi Yuya, Masuda Takahisa, Koyama Keichiro, Yamashita Tomohisa, Horikita Maki, Ryo Nishikido, Fujigaya Taisuke, Kimura Takuya, Gackt.
Rating: G13
Disclaimer: I own the story ONLY
Summary: Welcome to hell…
At first all that can be seen is darkness, all that can be heard is a slight wind. Tegoshi had landed, somehow, under Fujigaya, one arm against a cold slimy rock floor. Two seconds after falling in, Tegoshi's air supply was cut; a hand was around his neck and easily lifted him up.
"What do you think you are doing, you little worm?"
Tegoshi had no air to answer, not that the question wasn’t rhetorical and actually required an explanation.
"What do you think you will accomplish with this?"
This time, an actual answer was required since the pressure on his windpipe eased off just enough for him to talk.
"The gatekeeper..."
Fujigaya laughed. "Ah, so you think that if you piss me off enough I will make you bleed and human blood in the demon realm will alert the keeper. Well, boy, I don't need to make you bleed to kill you, or bring you pain."
One hand squeezed harder while the other one grabbed Tegoshi's left arm and twisted it between his body and the wall. And right then there was a loud ratcheting sound, like stone impacting on steel and the earth move, making Fujigaya lose his footing and release Tegoshi.
He took a deep wheezing breath and then another as his vision blurred and everything around him shook as if in an earthquake. For some reason, Tegoshi thought that the last time he had felt an earthquake he had still been with his mother, not long before he had been taken away. His mother had blamed the earthquake on him, but he couldn't remember why.
"What the hell did you do?" His mother asked. No, it wasn't his mother. It was Fujigaya talking. Tegoshi squeezed his eyes shut and took another breath before looking up to Fujigaya with a shit-eating grin. He lifted his right hand, showing his palm, which was bleeding where he had cut it against a sharp edge of the wall.
"Human blood brings the gatekeeper forth. Nothing says one of you suckers has to draw it."
Tegoshi didn't wait to see the reaction his comment caused; he turned around looking for the gate. It was not as easy to see on this side, but he noticed a disturbance in the air and ran to it, hoping that it had not been a trick of the dim lights or lack of oxygen in his brain. Another shock wave and he fell. He heard a blood curling scream and he guessed that whatever the gatekeeper was had gotten to the suzerain in Fujigaya, but Tegoshi didn't turn around to watch. The sounds were enough and the creature making them was not Fujigaya. He was dead, Tegoshi had felt him trying to take over, probably as a way of letting him know that only the suzerain was occupying the body.
Setting his thoughts aside, he tried to stand up, but he kept slipping on the wet floor and then there was a hand on his forearm.
Shige was not sure what was going on. Too many things were happening at once. One second he was talking to the bodies of Maki and Fujigaya, the next he was in the middle of a hurricane, or at least that was how it felt like. And now he was helping G get up on weak legs and in a second the other man was running towards Maki and from the corner of his eye he saw Tegoshi doing the same, but running towards Fujigaya and then he was gone, swallowed up by the rip in the middle of the room. Something flew and it took a moment for Shige to realize what it was. G's body had flown across the room hit the wall with the sickening sound of bones breaking and fell on the floor like a rag doll.
Shige didn't know if the man was dead but he had no time to check. White shadows were circling the room. There were seven in total and they were wailing like banshees with strident high pitched shrills that pierced your ears and went straight to Shige's brain.
Erica was looking around, wide eyed covering her ears with her fists. Shige supposed it wasn't doing much good. Then the noise just stopped. Things kept moving in the whirlwind but there was just no noise but a faint static noise.
The suzerain took form. They were the same as in the dream they had had and different. More terrible. More indescribable. They were surrounding them. And out of the corner of his eyes he saw... someone. However, when he tried to focus on it the image was already gone.
He had no idea what to do. His body as frozen as his brain. They were locked up, surrounded, no way out and he wasn't surprised. They had gone in blind with no real plan; or if there was one, they were not in on it. Well, not nobody. Tegoshi had looked like he had had a purpose. And he hadn't come out. Shige looked at the light rip in front of them and took a deep breath. He didn't ran towards it like Tegoshi had. He had always been much more conscientious than that.
Kimura sensei was up now, although he didn't look exactly his best, with a pale complexion and blood caked on the side of his head. Next to him were Erica, Yamashita and Koyama. They were all facing Maki and the other entities were looking at them, still unmoving. Shige couldn't hear what they were saying but Maki was showing emotions now: anger.
He decided he didn't care what was going on there as long as nobody was paying attention to him, or to what he was doing. As Shige got closer to the rip in the air, he felt a pull and a push alternatively like a current. He felt someone behind him. Masuda.
“That... thing is pulsing... it's like drawing me in and shoving me away...” The other man said.
“Yes. And the closer we get the worse it is.”
“But we have to... we can't leave him there.”
Shige merely shook his head. It was all going to hell, but he could at least do this.
Bolted almost to the center of the room, to the right of what Shige assumed was some kind of portal to nowhere good, given their luck, was a sturdy metal hospital bed. Shige didn't even want to think why a bed would be bolted to the floor on what had once been a conference room. He looked sideways, the others were still busy, there was no sign of physical confrontation, but one didn't seem to be far away. Yamashita probably knew what he was planning. The man nodded slightly. He hated Yamashita's abilities but it had its uses.
The beings, the suzerain, were still, but now started to squeal. Shige took a deep breath.
“Ok, we have to go in and get him out of... wherever he is,” Shige started. “But, we have no idea what's on the other side and that thing seems to suck in everything that gets close...”
“I'll go, I...”
Shige interrupted the doctor. “No, I will and you are going to hang on to me so we make sure that I don't get sucked in... or fall into.”
“I want to...”
“Yes, yes, I know,” Shige said impatiently. “You want to rescue him and all, but honestly, you look buffer and stronger than me, and we don't have time to argue so grab on to that bed and then me.”
Masuda nodded and did as he was told and Shige went in.
He was watching everything and if he had still been alive he would have been red with rage. He had been preparing for decades, had given his life and waited in the afterlife and now they were failing. He didn't care if the Suzerain were sent back to the underworld, but he needed their power if he was going to come back as an immortal creature.
The beings were unmoved, still, surrounding the group. They could not physically touch them, that was part of the contract that they could not breach. ‘It was all over’, the spirit that had once been called Katori by his parents, thought. His grandsons knew how to vanish the creatures; why else would that little brat have ran into the other world. He was summoning the gatekeeper, which was not exactly a herculean effort once you knew how to do it.
He looked about the room. The suzerain generals began to howl. After the earthquake they probably knew that they had been defeated by a group of human children. Katori could also see other, lesser suzerain gathering, inexorably drawn by the gate. Most were powerful, some were mere infants in suzerain terms.
There was also one of his descendants on the floor; he was mortally wounded but still alive. He was one of the promised ones, not that it mattered now, by the look of things. The offspring of his other son was conscious and diverting the attention away from the two young men by the gate.
He had to think of something else if he was going to come back to the world of the living.
The two young men accomplished their task, Katori noticed. They brought the younger one back, wide eyed and shaking from fear and shock, but otherwise unharmed; and then came a roar and the whole building convulsed, its foundations rattling, walls peeling in the vibration.
The gatekeeper was here; the suzerain moaned and wailed but any outcry was for naught, the beings were wrenched from this reality into their own until none was left. Well, not quite none, Katori realized with a smile.
~~~~~~
Shige went into the source of light in a much more consciously way than Tegoshi had and the shock was not diminished by it. It was hell, as he had read in novels, no less but so much more. However, he could not ponder on it for more than a second, Tegoshi was running blindingly towards him, stumbling as he went. Shige managed to catch his roommate and wrench him backwards making them both fall on Masuda in a tangle of limbs.
Tegoshi scrambled to his feet first pulling Masuda and then Shige up before another tremble shook them. Tegoshi opened his mouth; “run!” He screamed and Shige was disinclined to argue but he wasn’t sure where to run to. The opening at their back, the suzerain in front of them, they were practically surrounded.
Shige turned around in time to see the gate, still giving off the unearthly glow, stretch letting a creature into the room. The creature seemed to be twenty meters tall, even if it made no sense since surely the ceiling was not that high. It seemed to dwarf the room and still fit and it was nothing Shige could have imagined. It was beautiful in a terrible way. The skin looked made out of molten lava and stone, moving, forming sinewy muscle. Looking up, its face moved in heavy ropes around a slim face with big slanted eyes devoid of any color except pitch black, there was no nose but a row of orifices leading to a mouth filled with sharp shark-like teeth.
Shige’s throat hurt and he realized he had been screaming, his own cry mixing with those of the others in the room. After that, Shige was not sure what happened.
The Suzerain got caught in what could only be described as a hurricane. There were painful howls and the earthquake was back bringing them all to their knees.
Maki was directly in front of them, her face showing fear. Complete and utter Terror. The other Suzerain had been sucked into the portal in the middle of the room, the creature that had come out of it, turned its attention to the one Suzerain remaining in the human vessel.
Maki cowered attempting to run. A pointless action. The guardian reached for her, grasping at her throat, but instead of latching in the flesh the hand went through it and yanked. Maki’s body collapse as the creature that had inhibited was violently removed, kicking and thrashing. The guardian lifted the Suzerain until they were face to face. The guardian’s mouth elongated. Shige could see slimy saliva dripping from the sharp teeth before the Suzerain was gobbled up. Then, without so much as a look behind, the Guardian left as he had come.
Once again, everything was still, the portal still pulsing, glowing mutely, but nothing else.
Yamashita ran to Maki’s unmoving body. “Maki?” He called shaking her gingerly. Shige moved closer. Her face was eerily pale, looking more like a wax statue than a person. Still moving slowly, Shige reached out to touch the body’s slim wrist to look for a pulse but as soon as his fingertips were on her skin he knew there would be no pulse to find. She was cold. Not as if she had been out in a winter night but as if blood no longer ran under the pale skin. She was dead and probably had technically been dead for some time now.
No one said anything until Shige felt something that tugged at his insides without moving him physically. And the whirlwind, sucking everything around them, started again. The floor started to shake, not enough to make them fall but the walls were starting to crack visibly. The few objects left in the room swirled around them. ‘We have to get out of here’, Shige thought. As he turned around to say this to the rest, he never saw the mid-sized brick coming straight to the side of his head.
Erika saw Shige drop to the floor and lay there. She dropped next to him and saw that he was profusely bleeding from the side of his head, it looked bad but he was breathing and Erika knew head injuries tended to bleed a lot. There was no time to check on much more. Now the bricks were coming out of the walls and she wasn’t sure if the ceiling would hold or for how long.
“We have to go. Now.” Erika turned to look at Kimura sensei. He was standing up from where he had been crouching next to G. He looked tired and grim and Erika didn’t have to ask anything. She looked around.
“Where is Koyama?” She asked. Everybody shook their head.
“Maybe he’s already out…” Kimura started to say.
“He wouldn’t leave us here!” Tegoshi interrupted from the floor where he sat grabbing his ankle.
“We have to go regardless. This place is collapsing and we don’t have much time.” Nobody disagreed. Nobody could, really.
Kimura moved to the door avoiding the growing amount of bricks in the air. “I’ll go first and see if… those things are still out there, but you better be right behind me if you want to get out of here.” He shouted as a sibilant sound, barely audible before, increased.
Tegoshi was standing up with the help of Masuda, who was helping him climb on his back. Tegoshi was not putting any weight on his left bare foot, which already looked swollen to twice its size. He must have hurt it at some point.
Shige was still lying there, breathing but not moving. It was clear that she wouldn’t be able to carry him; not far anyway.
“Yamashita-kun,” she called but the man didn’t answer. He was on the floor, next to Maki’s body, his back bent towards her.
Erika got closer. “Yamashita,” she tried again and put a hand on his shoulder. With a quick flick of the wrist, Yamashita slapped her hand away but otherwise ignored her. “Please, we have to leave…”
Yamashita shook his head closing his eyes.
“Please,” she insisted, his eyes filling with tears now. “I need your help. I can’t carry him alone. Please.”
At that Yamashita finally looked at her and then behind, seeing Shige on the floor. He looked around and he seemed to realize, just now, what was happening around him. He opened his eyes wide and nodded. He looked at the body next to him one last time and closed his mouth tightly, so that it was only a white thin line. He moved to where Shige was and Erika helped him get the unconscious man on his back as a piece of one of the walls collapsed.
Erika crossed the door followed by Yamashita carrying Shige. Kimura sensei came running with Koyama in tow.
“I think I found a way out but everything is falling apart, and the suzerain may be gone but those other… people are still around,” he said before anybody could say anything. “This way.”
Nobody argued they just followed the man through winding halls that collapsed almost as soon as they left them. They finally made it to the newer part of the building and here it was no better. The automatic doors opened and closed on their own and the lights flickered. But worst of all, the former patients turned to zombies, Erika thought for lack of a better word, were back.
“Zombie is as good a word as any,” Yamashita murmured next to her, already sounding breathless.
They were coming from every side, almost every door.
“Go that way. You know the way out, don’t you?” Erika nodded and she supposed the others did the same. “Good. Go.”
“But, you…”
“I’ll follow, go.”
They went just as the zombie-like creatures burst inside. Erika now noticed that Kimura had a sort of cane, like the ones the orderlies guarding the maximum security cells had and Koyama had one just like it. He was right behind her but when she crossed the door Koyama closed it staying on the other side with Kimura.
Erika looked at Koyama, bewildered. “What are you doing?”
“Just go, it’s fine,” he said from the other side of the glass window and blocked the door.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“It’s the way it’s supposed to be, trust me. If I can I’ll follow you.” There was a scream and Koyama turned around. “Go! Now!”
Erika could see bits and pieces of Koyama and Kimura fighting those things. She tried to open the door but it was stuck. Everything was falling down around them and the walls would not exist for much longer.
“Eri..” She heard Tegoshi’s voice. She turned around to look at the others, they were all beyond scared and Tegoshi’s eyes were filled with unshed tears. They all knew they had to keep going or die there, but none of them liked it.
There was a strong quake that almost made them fall and they heard the unmistakable noise of brick on brick and they started to move again, Erika on the lead.
Koyama had made up his mind but it was still difficult to see them leave. Not because they were leaving him, he knew they didn’t have much choice, but because for years they had been an intrinsic part of his life, a life that was now coming to an end. He had no hope of surviving, nor did he want to. He had been living on borrowed time, or that was how he felt.
The zombie things were coming and they seemed to be more now, probably they were trying to get out as well. They would not succeed. He jumped in to help Kimura sensei. They fought knowing that they were clearly outnumbered but winning had never been the plan; they were just stalling, giving the others a better chance to escape.
There was a quake but they kept fending the things off, splitting open their heads with any weapon at their disposal. There was another quake, bigger this time. Kimura fell and immediately one of the creatures grabbed him by the head and yanked, twisting the neck. Koyama turned around, unable to watch. He ran back the way they had come and when the earth moved again he fell. He turned on his back expecting the same fate as Kimura. The things were coming close, looking not quite human but still keeping a whisper of what they used to be, he even thought he could recognize some of them. Funny the things that come to mind when you are about to die. Koyama’s train of thought was cut by an even stronger quake that made the ceiling and the wall crumble on themselves burying the creatures along with him and then no light, no noise.
He was being crushed, he couldn’t breathe but after a second it didn’t matter and he felt lighter. He heard a voice and followed. There was one last bit of breath his mouth opened. “Lin.” His heart beat stopped… 1 second… 3 seconds… 6… and the dead heart slowly, faintly started pumping again.
The walls cracked and bricks flew into the portal which was becoming smaller but stronger at the same time. No living creature would be left. There were only two faint heartbeats that kept going against all odds. Four set of lungs barely sucking what little air they could from beneath the rumbles of what was once an imposing building.
Ryo parked where he had been told. It was dark already and he had no idea how long he would have to wait but he hoped it wouldn’t be too long. He had a clear view of the institution and he felt like he hadn’t been there in decades not merely a couple of weeks.
He turned his head around and looked at the passenger seat of his car which was occupied by a thick brown envelope. He had been instructed to find a shady guy by the name of Tanaka and retrieve the envelope. He looked inside; there were IDs and passports with last names Ryo didn’t know but faces he recognized very well. There were also bank accounts information. He stopped looking. He knew enough and he didn't want to know anymore.
With shaking hands he took out a pack of cigarettes and lit one up. He focused on the slight burn on his throat and lungs instead of the eerie sensation he had and the wind that felt like no wind he had ever experienced before. He tried to convince himself that the hair at the back of his neck was not standing up in goosebumps.
He was half way through the pack when he felt the ground move. Earthquakes were not rare in Japan, although less frequent in that area and it didn’t seem like a big one so he didn’t worry until he saw the building in front of him all but implode. It fell on itself giving him the idea of a slayed giant. He walked a few steps forward and he saw figures coming up the hill towards him; they were climbing painstakingly and as they got closer he recognized them and he hurried to help them.
They made it to the side of the car and turned around to see the ruins that were left. Just ramble and dust. Nothing more.
After two hours, or maybe two minutes, who knew, who cared, they were all in Ryo’s car driving somewhere; none of them knew where at the moment. They were free, in a matter of speaking, but they could only hope that it was all over and take comfort that everything they had lost was somehow worth it. Even though it probably wasn’t, even though it might never be really over and they might never be entirely free.