Part 3

Two days passed. Gouji devoted all his efforts into the care of his wife and daughter, but he knew from the beginning that it wouldn't be enough. The faces of his charges grew increasingly pale, and their skin hung limply on meatless limbs. He did his best to keep the other four oblivious, even as it pained him. The children worked diligently on the tasks he assigned, and after each completion asked how their kin were faring. Their innocent faces, so full of hope, tore through his heart, so that as soon as they'd moved to their next task he retreated to privacy and cried.

Late that morning Gouji went to check on his wife and daughter. He felt it as soon as he entered the room: death, decay, as if walking into a fresh grave. The air was stale and cold. Silence would have been fitting for such a scene, but instead the man was treated to an even more horrifying sound--hoarse, weak breath. Marimo had moved into the corner of the small room, still wrapped in her blankets, her eyes closed and head bowed. Shiiho was huddled like one of Akami's small dolls in her lap.

Gouji approached slowly. "Marimo," he coaxed, kneeling in front of her. He touched her face, then pulled his hand back--her skin was frighteningly cold. "Marimo, can you hear me?"

Slowly, she opened her eyes, but they were vacant and red with tears. "My baby," she whispered, tightening her embrace around the silent body she held. "She was...my first daughter." Her tears fell over her pale cheeks. "But she won't be lonely for very long."

Gouji took his wife and daughter into his arms, holding them tightly to him as they wept.

"Sister Akami! Sister Akami!"

"What is it, Shinta?" Akami called from the kitchen. She was just preparing the afternoon meal, exhausted from her work in the last several days. She dried her hands when Shinta burst inside.

"It's Ma-chan," the young boy declared breathlessly. His eyes were wide with fear. "She just threw up."

Both children ran to the stables, where Kyouji had been attending to the animals with Matsuriko, to find their brother cleaning the child's face. She looked a bit pale but otherwise not unlike her normal self. Kyouji was speaking to her softly. When the two entered, he gazed up at them with eyes that were dark. "She's sick," he told them, lifting Matsuriko into his arms. His voice was so calm that it frightened them. "I'm going to take her to Father. Both of you will have to finish preparing the food, all right? I'll finish here." Without so much as another glance he carried the youngest Himura out of the stables and crossed the yard.

Gouji was near the entrance of the farm, speaking to a man: Sagakura Norihide. He was dressed in his yukata, which was stained with dirt. His dark eyes were hollow and cold. Kyouji approached slowly, trying to make out what the two adults were saying.

"I've sent her away." Nori's voice gave the young man a chill--it was as if he were an animated corpse, relaying a tale that didn't apply to him. "All my sons are dead, Gouji, and I'm ill. It...won't be long now. But there's something I need to tell you."

Gouji nodded. It was then that his son noticed the disarray of his garments, and the similarity in the men's eyes. "Go ahead."

Nori sank to his knees, as if his weight had become too great for them to support any longer. The ridges of his spine could be seen even through the material of his yukata. "It's all our fault," he said, the words like a sob, his shoulders trembling. "My wife was the first to fall ill--she developed the disease before any of us. And...she prepared our food, for the picnic that day."

Though Gouji did not react, his son could not help himself. "What?" he demanded, setting his little sister down. "It...it was you?"

"We didn't know," the man wailed, and his voice was quivering and vaporous, already a ghost. "If we'd known...but it's too late. It's our fault your wife and daughter..."

"What!? Father, what is he--" Kyouji turned on his parent, ready to demand an explanation. His heart twisted and plummeted into his gut when he saw the pain in Gouji's face. "Father...what is it?" His vice rose shrilly. "What happened to Mother and Shiiho?"

Gouji stared straight ahead, refusing to meet the disbelieving gaze. "They're dead," he said quietly. "Not long ago. I just finished burying them."

"That's...that's a lie." Kyouji's sight became blurred, and he wiped the tears away quickly; as if their absence could dull the painful truth. "Father...it has to be a lie! They can't be dead! They were just...only a day ago...."

The man looked to his son, preparing to speak. But just then his knees buckled, and he dropped to the earth, exhausted with illness. Kyouji could only stare, horrified, as he retched. "No...." the boy whispered, shaking his head in fierce denial. His eyes danced from his father, to the withered Sagakura Nori, to his young sister, smiling innocently at them all. Her face was only a bit pale--nothing compared to the ivory tones of the men, and softly curious. She did not understand what was happening to her, or what she would become.

"I'm sorry...." Nori bowed until his forehead touched the dusty earth. "I'm sorry...I'm sorry...."

Shinta was awoken roughly by a hand on his shoulder, shaking him. He sat up, rubbing at sleep-crusted eyes, exhausted and soul-weary. "Who is it?" he asked, finally clearing his sight.

"It's Akami." His older sister was watching him very carefully, as if searching for some indication in his face that would tell his destiny. Her eyes were red and swollen from crying. "Come on, Shinta. We're leaving."

"Where are we going?" Shinta climbed out of his futon and changed quickly, noting that Kyouji and Matsuriko weren't in the room. "Where is everyone?"

"Outside. Be quick--we have to go."

They entered the yard to find Akami's friend Miyo, and her brother Oyuki waiting with Kyouji and Matsuriko. Miyo was holding the youngest of them, also tearstained. The faces on the two boys were colorless, and empty. Each was holding a lit torch.

"What's going on?" Shinta asked anxiously. Something had happened; he could feel the remnants of it in the air. It prickled his skin with goosebumps.

"Father died last night," Akami told him quietly, suppressing the falling of fresh tears. "And Ayumi-san, Miyo-chan's mother. We're the only ones left, so we're gong away. We don't want others to get infected."

Shinta nodded. The news of his father's end did not affect him as seriously as it could have; somehow, he'd already known. The limp, white skin had told him, as had the cold, well-like eyes. He found that his eyes held no more tears to shed, no more grief.

Kyouji and Oyuki stepped forward with their torches, touching them to the wooden walls. They caught quickly; like the tongues of hungry beasts their fire glided along the rough surface of the wood, stretching and expanding. Shinta watched, a bit mystified by the flames. They rose higher, engulfing the small house as they belched their black clouds like the cloaks of death. Then Akami took him by the hand, turning her back on their home. A moment later the other children followed, down the path that led them through the grove of cherry trees.

Akami seated herself on the steps, allowing her gaze to mingle with the fading light of another lonely day. Her eyes would not dry. She scrubbed at them, slapped them, ground them, but could not get the tears to stop. She watched the back of her brother Shinta as he left down the path to town, his rusty hair bouncing. He was hurrying to fetch fresh clothing for her and the two boys--Miyo had passed away earlier that morning. Two days the five remaining children had been living in the smallest room of the Yamashita household, as the Sagakura and Himura residences had been burned with the disease that had destroyed them. Two days--ten days since the cherry grove picnic--and Shinta had still not developed any signs of the illness. While Akami found herself becoming weaker, she saw him with more spirit then ever. He refused to let their enemy win.

"He doesn't...understand," Kyouji said in a hoarse whisper behind her. He was lying on the floor, covered in a thick blanket, as walking or even sitting had become too difficult a task for him. "He'll…survive, but we...."

Next to her brother, Matsuriko was playing with Akami's dolls. "No, he doesn't," Akami said, envying her sister's blissful ignorance. "Someday, he will. But for now...." She choked on her emotions, allowing a sob to grace her lips. Then she composed herself, and in a softer tone said, "He'll be taken care of. My little Shinta...he will live."

Though Shinta had intended on returning to the house just after completing his errand, the shop owner--a family friend--insisted that he spend the night due to the late hour. Reluctantly, he agreed. The comfort of the futon was greatly appreciated after the relative poverty he had become accustomed to. In the morning he was well fed and given fresh clothing, compliments of the townsfolk. He was just about to set out with the supplies he'd gathered when the shop-owner's husband pulled him aside. His eyes, not unlike the stern eyes of his father, were filled with sympathy. They told him the news before it was spoken. Quietly, the boy cried into his hands.

"I'm sorry, son. I just came back from the Yamashita house--they're all dead."

Shinta did not see the bodies. The townspeople kept him away for fear of him being infected, and burned the Yamashita house. Shinta was put into the care of the shop-owners. They treated him kindly with food, shelter, clothing, and sympathy. Everything they could think of to do for him, they did with open and willing hearts.

Shinta regretted not being able to express his gratitude towards them. He drifted about the town specter-like. Some whispered to each other that he was searching for his family, others speculating that he'd simply lost his mind in grief. Truthfully, Shinta didn't know what drove him. He walked the streets, flittering about the people as if their presence would prove that he too was alive. He was still a part of this empty world, a world without his family. The pain began to fade with time--slowly at first, and then more easily. It was simpler that way, to forget. If he moved quickly enough, and surrounded himself with enough people, it was almost as if his parents and siblings were there with him, and were only lost in the crowd.

It was late one night that Shinta left the town and journeyed, one last time, up the hill to the cherry tree grove that sat overlooking where his home lay in ashes. He sat among the twisted, gnarled roots--to him, they were the arms of his mother. He did not stay there long, as the memories rose like shrieking gusts of wind against him. But for some time he allowed the scene to drift through his mind, and then to drift out. For there was nothing left in the orchard: not the laughter of children, or the ohagi baked for a picnic, or the barrel of cherry blossoms. All of the delicate pink flowers were gone now, deep within the earth, where they would remain.

Shinta climbed to his feet. Slowly, and without a word, he departed.

*End

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