It Emerges

Kneeled over a body was a man biting the corpse's torso. Realising that his neck had healed, he held his head and snapped it back into place. Then continued feeding.

The body was jiggling every time the voracious man pulled flesh off the body. Six officers were standing in a semi-circle surrounding the man. They were shocked silent.

"MPD! You're under arrest! Put your f***ing hands up!"

The man turned around stringing along an intestine in his mouth. He dropped it seeing fresh prey.

Everyone looked at his mouth in horror. The body on the ground was wearing their uniform. Officer Mochi had his guts pulled out and sprawled over his stomach area and touching the ground. This was dishonouring the dead.

They had watched their colleague's carcass being picked apart. Thinking how he was going to be at their funerals and explain to their families, officer Denji with eyes showing whites yelled:

"Get the f*ck on the ground now you sick f***"

The man instead of obeying stood up and approached them.

"I'll f***ing shoot you I will!"

The bloodied and raggedy man took another step, yet this was what Denji wanted.

*Bang*

A bullet went through the killer's chest. A bloodstain pooled on his shirt. Yet, the man didn't seem hurt.

"Rawwwrgh!"

It came charging at them, the six fired simultaneously without stopping.

He fell but they kept shooting until they emptied their guns.

Surprisingly, the man was still twitching and trying to get up.

"Oi! He's not staying down!"

"Reload!"

The Japanese police use a 5-round double-action revolver called the New Mambu M60. While 60-70% of the police officers in the US use guns with higher ammo capacity such as the Glock 22.

Since Japan has extremely strict gun laws and lower gun violence, there wasn't a need for the police to possess much firepower. However, they would be at a disadvantage when the worst-case scenario happens.

When they are outgunned.

They all panicked and took out their revolver cylinders and refilled the chambers with an HKS model speed loader.

*Thud*

Seeing that there wasn't a need to anymore, they felt their chest relax a bit. The cannibal finally died out from blood loss.

***

They've appeared since the morning.

Small metal capsules that could fit into a closed fist. They were long thin cylinders with hemispheres for ends. Essentially, the shape of medicinal pills.

No one knows who distributed them or what's their purpose. Some believed that it was a hoax or a new marketing strategy, but seeing the property damage, others believed that a faulty cargo plane dropped items from the cargo hold.

No one had seen the inside of it yet or has been able to open it.

The group of students invited Hikaru to one of their father's workshop in the garage to cut it open.

"Oh? I got Kendo practice afterschool. Sorry guys."

"No, no, you go do your thing. We'll send you a pic when we open it. Then, see you later!"

"Ah, see you later."

***

High above in a tree houses a nest of eggs and a bird sleeping on top of her eggs.

Peck

Peck

Crack.

A little chick pushes out a slip of eggshell and calls out to her mother. The mother wakes up to the chirping. Elated, the mother bird helps break the rest of the shell so she could see her chick.

Crack.

Chirp.

Another chick is hatched. Soon most of the eggs begin cracking. The mother bird is thrown into the busiest pace of her life as she goes around helping all her chicks out.

Frantic but ecstatic, the mother bird flies away in search of food. It's early in the morning. As the saying goes, the early bird gets the worm.

Soon after the mother leaves, an uncracked egg which appears to be darker than the others begin cracking. This egg had a crème white shell just like the others but what seems to be a dark shadow from within the egg absorbs all the light around it, making it seem darkened.

Crick

Crick

It sounded like the chick in this egg was crushing bone, causing the egg to violently jolt.

Crick

Crick

Snap

...

Slick...

Squelch

What came from this egg wasn't a chick but what seemed to be a living grey slime.

It raised a portion of its body like a giraffe's neck to survey its environment. It didn't need to point its extension around because it didn't have eyes. It had photoreceptors on its entire body, giving it a 360-degree view.

The slime's 'head' drooped and then dropped to the floor of the nest and stretches towards another egg. This motion pulls the rest of its body out of the shell, making it lazily plop down.

The slime tumbles its upper body forward and pulls itself over. The slime effectively rolls until it hits the base of an eggshell. It raises its head and snakes into the opening in the eggshell.

Chirp

Chirp

Chirp

Crrrrk!

...

"Chip"

The chick made one last weak chirp.

Wrapped around the chick's neck is the slime. The throat had been crushed. The slime pulls in the rest of its body to devour the dead chick.

CHIRP

CHIRP

CHIRP

The chicks were no longer crying out for food but help because a predator had arrived.

The slime comes out bigger than before and rolls towards the nearest chick calling for help.

It becomes a little quieter with one less chick. The cries of the few remaining chicks turn into a lonely cry in space, where no sound can escape.

***

Hikaru walks home on a street alone or he thought he was.

A girl walks behind him looking anxious as she remembers what she said last night brazenly to Chiho, her best friend.

"I'm going to confess my undying love!"

Her cheeks blushed.

Hikaru stops walking and stands there.

Suddenly he turned around, Aimi hid behind a cafe chalkboard sign.

She peeks and when their eyes made contact, she hid again.

'He saw me!'

When she peeked again, she saw that he was giving a truly magnificent smile. He seemed happy to see her. She blushed behind the sign.

'Could it be that... He knows my feelings and wants me to follow him?'

This was the happiest moment in her life.

***

'Someone's following me.'

Sure enough, when he turned around, he saw a girl panic and duck behind a sign. He could still see the top of her head.

It was just another stalker from his school.

'She thinks I can't see her from behind the sign? How stupid.'

Feeling bored today, she gave him an idea.

A big grin spread across his face.