Still Smoke

Ryeki sat on the floor across from Jin, and asked, "Who are you?"

"I told you already."

"No no no. WHO are you?"

Jin grinned with cunning arrogance, "I see. You wanna get down straight to it. But before I answer your questions, mind answering mine?"

"Shoot."

"You were bitten, but instead of turning into a full on zombie, you're half zombie?"

"Yeah. It's weird honestly."

"What does it feel like?"

"Like I wanna kill something."

"And how long does it last?"

"All night."

"How strong are you without the zombie form?"

"Pretty damn strong to be honest. I killed some zombie spider woman."

"WAIT?! YOU DID?! That might be the same one that Yuuma and Xiayou couldn't beat."

"Who in the hell are they?"

"Members of the Horde, we're a survival group."

"What are you all? Some kind of mercenary?"

"Haha, we may look like it, but no. We bash the brains of zombies, we have scholars and smart nerdy ass people who are looking into this entire apocalypse, even going so far as to try and mimic the past doctors work and research to create a cure, but it's no use."

"A cure?! Maybe with that cure.."

'Maybe with it, I can fix this zombie side of me. But do I really want it gone? The overwhelming power I have with it is insane. I mean, without it, I'm pretty strong with my base abilities.'

Jin put his hand on Rykei's shoulder, grinning, "I know what you want. You probably want to get rid of that zombie side of yours, right? Want Seven to fully believe you're her lover that she cries over EVERY SINGLE night?"

"You'reeeee definitely a stalker."

"Just an observer. I always know what I'm doing. I never had a bad or wrong intuition."

Rykei thought, 'Off the bat, this guy is cocky, prideful. With a hint of confidence. And something about him is cunning and secretive. I should keep going along with this.'

Rykei asked, "About this doctor you mentioned, he made a cure?"

"Doctor Sato. He did make a cure, then ran off. And even our scholars have no luck following his old research, which leads me and my father to think he replaced them with gibberish ones."

"How come?"

"We never tracked the way he made them, he probably used something unfamiliar."

"Ah. And you think if I join your little gang then I can help with this entire situation?"

"You're very observant, like me. You're only half right." Jin started walking around the room with his hands on his back, continuing, "You're a danger to us all. Still a dirty zombie on the inside, human on the outside. Having you around is a risk, but me and my father considered letting you with us. You'll work for us, but you'll always be watched until we feel you don't need to be watched anymore."

"Watched? I don't need a babysitter."

"If not, they'll banish you. You'll be away from your lover Seven. And don't think you can take her with you out there in danger, this is the best place for you both."

"Tch. Shit. Guess I have no choice then do I?"

"You do. Either yes or no."

"Okay. Okay then."

'Guess I really don't have a choice. I need to work on thinking more. I can't just refuse and take Seven away from here where she eats, sleeps, and keeps warm. Where would I actually take her? At first I was going to decline, because I don't want to be someone's lap dog or slave, but I begged God to let me see Seven again, and here she is, I don't wanna make this worse on her. She doesn't trust me enough already, and she doesn't  even think I'm Rykei, which I am. While I'm here, I'll do what it takes for her. And maybe get that cure so I can be fixed. Do I want to be fixed? If I had the opportunity to control my zombie form, would I keep it then? Yes. No question. Maybe if I can work on that while I'm here, then that'll be a good thing. I don't know yet. What If I can't control it? I don't want to waste any time.'

Rykei stood up, saying, "I'll join."

Jin smiled, "Excellent, zombie. Now you have to follow me now."

"Whereeee are we going?"

"To kill you."

"What?!"

"Haha, I'm kidding. Just kidding. All jokes. The head leader, the Director, wants to see you."

"HOW MANY LEADERS ARE THERE?!"

"Me, My father, Seven, and Renn. But theres ranks. My father is first, I'm second, Seven is third, and Renn is fourth."

"How did Seven manage to become a leader?"

"We had to decide fairly. So once we all awakened with superpowers or whatever, we fought, and the last ones standing after a few minutes got to lead the Horde. Seven can create tattoos on her body, and pull weapons out of them, in which those weapons are insanity overpowered."

"She's amazing.."

"She is, isn't she?"

"Mhm. Yes she is."

"I know."

"Me too. I know more than you do."

"Haha! You're pretty competitive, just like my old man. Anyway, you'll be a part of the Alpha team. Which Seven leads. It consists of Seven, Kaido, Yuuma, Hel, Cupid, and Xiayou."

"YES!" Rykei celebrated.

'Being on the same team as Seven, oh this is perfect. Time to show how badass I am.'

(5 minutes later)

"Stop throwing shit at me! This is a waste of food!"

Members of the Horde were sitting in a large school cafeteria, but instead of them eating their food, they were launching it at each other.

Kaido exclaimed, "Sit down! All of you! All of you are acting like you have rabies! This is a waste of food!"

Cupid was throwing apples at Yuuma, laughing, "HAHA! Take this! Take that! And Kaidoooo! This food is spoiled and ROTTEN anyway!"

"Don't go throwing tainted food at people! The zombie infection could get on them!"

"It won't! It only works if someone eatsssss it!"

"But—."

At that moment, Renn walked beside Kaido, saying, "I highly advise you to calm down before you obtain high blood pressure. Plus, these people are fairly young, let them smile for a chance."

"Who are you to talk? You're like 11."

"13."

"Same thing."

"Kaido."

"Fine, fine. I'll calm down, but if one of them turns into a zombie."

"We'll deal with it."

The food from Cupid bashed against Yuuma, and she ran towards Cupid, saying, "I'm gonna squash you like a bug."

Hel, dodging food as he wrote in his journal, wrote:

'A food fight. They are fighting each other with food. Only because someone got hit first. Also, most members are fairly young, and immature, but powerful. Giving them a time to smile in this fucked up world…is worth it. And thy food is already tainted with a zombie infection. My love, save me from thy malevolence!'

Suddenly, walking into the cafeteria, was Xiayou. He had a black headband over his head, black hair in two twin buns, a metal body with metal hands, baggy camo pants, and dark red eyes. He walked in, holding a head of a zombie sphinx. 

The Horde members around said:

"No way!"

"He caught a zombie sphinx?"

"He finally found it after hunting it all night?!"

"It's head is huge!"

"Another weird zombie creation added to my list."

"I feel like these zombies are getting generated from a computer, these are so random."

Xiayou dropped the head of the zombie Sphinx on the floor, making the entire cafeteria go quiet.

Kaido said to Xiayou, "So you're back."

Xiayou bowed over and over, "I-Im sorry I took so long! I got held up by t-those zombie assassins! They w-were everywhere! But I brutally slaughtered them! I should've had this t-task done in under an hour ago! Please f-forgive me!"

Cupid ran towards Xiayou, putting her arms around his shoulder, "Relaaaax, hehe. Take a chill pill, guy. Orrrr take a bunch of them to save us from you!"

In fear, Xiayou screeched, "Cupid?!" He ran away, hiding behind Hel.

Kaido sighed, "You're back, that's all that matters. Most importantly, that head is needed for the other doctors, it could aid in their creation of a cure."

Cupid asked, "Hmmm. Can I see it? Can I hold it!"

Kaido scoffed, "No! You can't!"

"Whyyy?"

"Because you're not stable enough to be trusted with anything besides killing zombies and following orders."

Yuuma said to Xiayou, "Tch. I could've beaten that sphinx In under a minute!"

Xiayou responded, "T-That thing was strong! And it k-kept spitting out baby zombie sphinxes! And zombie assassins kept t-trying to attack me!"

"Wimmmmp. Let's have a duel! Seems you've gotten stronger!"

Kaido scoffed, "Yuuma! Haven't you got your ass kicked enough today?!"

"Damn you! Wanna-be leader."

"I am more mature than most of you, and because of that, I'm highly favored by the Director and other leaders."

Hel commented, "Hmph. Everyone art thou leaders when thy time to survive is unyielding…"

Everyone in the cafeteria exclaimed, "WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?!"

Xiayou raised his hand softly, "I-I think he means we're all leaders."

They commented:

"Ohhh ohhh.."

"I mean he could've just led with that."

Floating in the air, sitting on top of moving black vines, was Renn, and he was eating chips, commenting, "I'm the only good leader. All of you stand no choice."

Everyone bashed their words at him:

"You little brat!"

"Get down from there and show us what you're made of against all of us!"

"You're like 5!"

Renn scoffed, "I'm 22!"

"You JUST SAID YOU WERE 13 earlier!"

"Shush!"

Kaido yelled to everyone else, "DON'T YELL AT YOUR SUPERIORS!"

…

Seven was sitting on a rooftop, staring out in the distance with her arms folded. Her eyes were watery, thinking about Rykei. 

'That can't be him. I've seen hundreds of people get bit, maybe even a thousand. They immediately turned into zombies. That's not him…that's not him! It can't be! What's holding me back from believing it? Because of the reasoning behind the zombie bites. He acts like Rykei, sounds like him, knows me, even smells like him. I hate this. Stuck between the crossroads of believing and not-believing. I'll watch him. There's one trait about Rykei that I've only really noticed from the dates we went on. If he displays that trait, then I'll know it's him.'

…

Rykei followed Jin, they were outside in a courtyard, and they saw Yamato surrounded by dead zombie bodies.

Jin said, "Father. Why are there zombies in the courtyard?"

Yamato grinned, "Huh? Oh, yeah. I let them in. I was getting bored waiting so long."

"That's reckless!"

"So? It's not like we can't just send them to zombie hell or something. What took you so long anyway?"

"I had some things to discuss with our new member."

"Oh? So he decided to join even before meeting me?"

Rykei thought, 'He has a katana, like me. So this is the father and son duo? They look too much alike, but their personalities are far different from each other. Jin is the cunning son, and this old man seems like some jokester, or a nonchalant guy who fears nothing. Awesomeeee.'

Yamato walked towards them both, holding his hand out to shake Rykei's hand.

Rykei immediately pulled his katana out of his own chest and slashed at Yamato's face.

Jin yelled, "Father!"

Yamato blocked the attack with the butt of his katana.

'He blocked it?!' Rykei thought.

Yamato chuckled, "Haha. You're interesting. So you saw right through my handshake."

"Your palm was pointed towards the katana on your hip, and you didn't take your eyes off of me, even while you were talking to your son. Yeah, I can kinda see certain things."

"I applaud you for it. Most people can't see through it. They always get caught off guard. I think you'll fit in quite well."

Yamato slightly pushed Rykei back, and Rykei went flying, sliding back with force. He began to grit his teeth, thinking, 'Shit! He barely pushed me and I went flying!'

Yamato walked up to Jin, saying, "He's good."

"I know."

Yamato said, "You'd make a fine addition, zombie brat. Jin informed me that you turn into a zombie at night and human in the daytime. Do you feel bloodlust right now?"

"Only a small bit. Like 2%. B-But trust me! I'm not thinking of killing anyone!"

"Interesting. What's your goal?"

"My goal…hm. I wanna get cured, have Seven know I'm the real Rykei, and maybe turn things back to the way they were."

"That's honorable. Everyone here has a dream; a goal they want to accomplish. As for me, I want to cure my wife. She's deep down in that zombie form of hers, and no matter what I'll do what it takes to save her. Jin keeps shit to himself so I don't know what he really wants." Yamato began to light up and smoke another cigarette. "Seven too. She keeps things to herself, barely talks to anyone, not even the girls who die to be her friends, and the men who constantly want to bang her. As you stick with us, you'll notice what every person wants, their goals, dreams. Just know you're not In this alone, brat."

"I-I needed to hear that, honestly. Thanks."

'Guess he's not so bad.'

"Gross. Enough with the nice stuff. I save all my nice stuff for my wife. Are you trying to take all the niceness away from her?" Yamato asked maliciously.

Rykei backed away, "N-No! No! I'm not! Promise!"

"Good." Yamato grinned, puffing his cigarette. "Jin, fill him in on the lore."

Jin said to Rykei, "As you probably know already, this area, this city, Yokohama, is infested with zombie assassins. They're everywhere. We set up a small camp here yesterday, looking for Doctor Sato. We've been tracking his steps, searching every inch of this city, looting, etc. Our first area of interest was that mall you were in, which was crawling with hostiles. And we've picked up 3 more locations that could hold the doctor."

"How are you all tracking him?"

Shink!

Shink!

Rykei and Yamato turned to Yamato, and Yamato was letting zombies into the courtyard, then killing them.

Jin sighed, "Tch. That geezer."

Yamato said, "Got bored."

Rykei asked, "Is he always this outgoing?"

"He and mother are the same. It's nasty. Anyway, we've been going to locations with the most zombie activity, because Dr. Sato always attracted zombies for some odd reason. So once we've cleared out the major areas and buildings, we'll move to the next city."

"Soooo I have to help go and clear those areas?"

"Technically, yes."

"Great, great, awesome. Something bothers me though."

"What?"

"I gotta say, I'm surprised you guys built such a strong survivor army thing in only 3 days."

'That's strange in itself, honestly.'

"Mhm.It is surprising."

Yamato walked back over to them, swinging his katana around. 

"Now that we've got the lore out of the way, I gotta see if you're truly one of us, Rykei."

Rykei thought, 'Shit. I already know what's gonna happen. He's gonna try and beat the brains out of me. I gotta get ready for it. He had a katana like me, I haven't fought anyone sword to sword yet. Which direction will he feint and attack from? Will it be a feint though? He's strong, but how fast is he? He was able to react pretty fast to my strike earlier, I have to stay focused! I have to—!'

—Yamato's voice cut through the busy hum of the survivors' camp nestled amidst the abandoned monoliths of Yokohama. Rykei, swiping a grimy sleeve across his forehead, looked up to catch the end of his orders, his expression already souring.

"Rykei, I need those fuel canisters moved to the north end. And after that, check the water purifiers!" commanded Yamato, pointing towards a stack of heavy-looking metal canisters glittering under the merciless sun.

"I'm not some butler!"

"This is practice, Rykei! Practice!"

Rykei groaned, the sound a mix of genuine annoyance and comedic resignation. "Seriously, old man? Does it look like I've got 'fuel mover' tattooed on my forehead?" Rykei shoved a canister, feigning exasperation.

"Mmm. Now that you mention it, I see it!"

"Tch! I wanna kill zombies."

Yamato chuckled, shaking his head, the corners of his eyes crinkling in amusement. "It's about following orders, Rykei. Keeps the place running and your muscles flexing," he shot back, tapping his temple knowingly. "I'm thinking of making our new stronghold here. It's got a nice source of things around us."

Grumbling under his breath, Rykei tackled the water purifiers next, his hands fumbling with the intricate filters. Each component seemed to mock him, slipping and sliding as if alive. "Oh, come on, you blasted things, work with me here!" he hissed, his frustration providing a backdrop for the day's labor.

"Watch out, they might just hiss back," Yamato called out from a distance, his laughter trailing after his words, soft but clear.

"Ohohoho so funny!" Rykei mocked.

'Seriously?! I'm cleaning?! Is this some sort of joke? Exams or something?'

Watching from a distance were Seven, Hel, Kaido, Cupid, Xaiyou, and Yuuma.

Cupid smiled, "He's doing chores!"

Hel commented, "He's obedient."

Kaido spouted, "Serves that zombie right."

Xiayou spoke nervously, "I-Is that the zombie man? I h-heard he was strong!"

Cupid grinned, "He is strong! If Seven wasn't in the way, I'd make him my husband…hehe."

Seven looked at Cupid, saying, "No one touches him."

"Oooh scary!"

Yuuma scoffed, "Hmph. Can't let any of you softening him up before I fight to the death with him. I blew his brains out and he recovered in an instant. I love it!"

Seven said to Yuuma, "You don't touch him either."

Xiayou asked Seven, "A-Are you jealous..?"

"Never."

Yuuma said, "Your only challenge will be Ares. If your long time friend Ares gets a hold of Rykei, she'll make him hers easily."

"No she won't. And she's not my friend. I have known her since we were children."

The day waned, and Rykei's chores landscaped a bizarre montage of odd jobsâ€"anything to keep the camp's heart beating. Scavenging parts from derelict buildings, repairing barricades, it seemed never-ending. Every task was interspersed with his sharp-tongued commentary and Yamato's amused counter-shots.

The sun began to dip low when Rykei approached the cage of Yamato's zombie wife, Aoi. The others kept their distance, a mixture of respect and fear coloring their avoidance. Rykei, taking a deep breath, stepped closer to the cage where Yamato's wife, Aoi, growled and snapped her jaws menacingly.

'Oh man…. So this…'

Yamato said, "Jin didn't want to come in, he hates seeing his mother like this. I don't blame him."

"This is your wife."

"Yes it is."

"She's…beautiful?" Rykei grinned nervously.

Yamato got in Rykei's face, smiling maliciously, "You mean that?"

"Y-Yes!"

"Good. I'm showing you this because she's in the same predicament as you. I know deep down she's screaming to be saved. You are too, I can tell. Once she's healed, you'll be healed."

"I hope so. I think. I just want things back to the way they were."

"Don't we all? Like I mentioned before, I'd give anything to turn things back to normal. A world full of strange zombies, raiders, bandits, shit like that. 

Behind the door, Jin leaned against the wall, folding his arms.

'Guess he's your new son, huh, father? Taking some stranger in there to see mom. What is he thinking? If I would've known I would be so easily replaced, I wouldn't have saved this brat.'

Rykei said to Yamato, "Wait."

"Hm?"

Rykei got closer to Aoi, and Aoi stopped snarling and screaming.

"She stopped?!" Yamato gasped.

The others in the room gasped, saying the same thing as well.

Rykei kneeled in front of her, waving his hand slowly in front of the cage. Aoi mirrored the same movements, slowly.

'She's mimicking my movements, like the zombie assassins from the mall. If I had to take a guess, these intelligent zombies still have a hint of human in them. If that's the case, she's not fully consumed by that zombie madness. She's calm around me.'m

Yamato smiled with happiness, happy to see her not rampaging. He kissed the calm demeanor of Aoi.

Rykei stood up, and said, "She's not fully consumed by a zombie, but only around 1% of her is left. If she was able to do that, then she has some brain left. The other zombies are brainless and stupid, and will bite anything that moves."

"You think so?!"

"Yes. Well it's a hypothesis, but the zombie assassins are intelligent as well. Maybe those bastards aren't fully consumed by zombies either, leaving a small percentage of their brain within them."

"I-I have to let the scientists and scholars know this!"

"Don't tell them I said it!"

"I will! Also, I have a mission for you."

"What is it?"