He felt a fresh wave of agony rush over the fingers Hanko had torn off, phantom pains that stabbed through his brain. He clung to the sensation, forced himself to stay put. He clamped his jaw over his left hand and bit down hard, calling on all his strength as he clamped his teeth over the glove, over his missing fingers. Then he bit down on the roof of his hand, tearing a chunk away. Come on you fucking bastard! Fuminari screamed.
He felt something at the base of his feet, a coldness that spread up his calves to his knees, growing in temperature as it rose. The feeling transmitted up his thighs and buttocks, entering his colon to permeate his insides like a burning coal rammed through his anus. It flamed around him and he felt something like molten iron settle in his stomach. It blistered outwards as his cells began to pop, exploding from this central point. He let out a thunderous howl. The muscles around his thick neck rippled and his veins pulsed grotesquely. His mouth stretched into a pathetic grin, like a wounded animal; a cramped expression. Fuminari was completely unaware of the way his mouth had frozen.
The counter crashed down, revealing the demonic monster again. Fuminari grabbed the back of one of the fallen chairs in both hands and raised it over his head. He charged the small distance between them, roaring as he channelled every last ounce of his power into the attack. He moved with vicious speed, perfect timing. Nothing could avoid him. He was going in directly, aiming for a full-body blow. It would connect somewhere, regardless of how the beast dodged. If it blocked, it would smash into the beast’s hands or legs. Fuminari brought the chair down in a diagonal arc, putting his whole weight behind it. There was an explosive collision. It was like hitting a concrete wall. The chair smashed into pieces, scattering to ricochet off the walls and floor like a storm had hit them…
…then Hanko was just standing there, blood flowing down its forehead. Fuminari was facing him, holding the remains of the frame in his hands. They were two meters apart. Fuminari could hardly remember what had just happened—his conscious mind struggled to catch up with the speed of their bodies.
Between his bringing the chair down and the shards hitting the floor, there had been a period of furious attack and defense. Fuminari saw fragments of it—Hanko’s fist, coming towards his face. He did not remember how he had blocked. Then his left leg, flying towards Hanko’s side. The same leg, rebounding and burning with hot pain, torn flesh. Hanko’s claws coming down, perhaps blocked with the chair. He seemed to remember leaping backwards.
But now was not the time for details. The broken table was at Hanko’s feet, partially attached at one end. Hanko’s right foot slipped under it—the beast volleyed it towards Fuminari. It spun into the air, only just hanging together. Then the two halves broke in mid-flight, even as they hurtled towards him. Fuminari parried the first part off to the left with his right foot. It flew towards the window, greater in size than the hole created by Ishibashi and Biku. It crashed noisily through—the same noise that had distracted Biku outside.
The second half of the table angled so that it came towards him, but flat. Fuminari’s leg was still in the air from deflecting the first half, there had been no time in between. Hanko was blocked from sight, momentarily concealed by the table. Fuminari brought up his thick left arm and smashed his elbow through the heavy table. It split again, revealing Hanko behind it. The beast was coming in fast, jaws gleaming.
3
As Biku stepped back he felt something under his right heel—the part of table Fuminari had booted through the window, two legs still attached.
Just then he saw Enoh framed against the night sky, coming in from above.
“Kyaa!”
Enoh’s shout ripped through the dark, followed by the sound of snapping wood. Biku had gathered up the broken table and used it to block the attack. It split in two in his hands. Enoh had kicked off the board, flipping twice in the air before coming to land on the grass. Then, as their gazes locked over the newly-formed distance between them, the remaining fragments of window sprayed outwards, exploding loudly to their side. Fuminari and Hanko tumbled out onto the ground between them, their bodies entangled. They sprang apart as soon as they landed, each vaulting to their feet. Fuminari landed at Biku’s side, Hanko at Enoh’s.
Fuminari’s sturdy chest heaved as he sucked in, then released air. He had used up huge reserves of energy. Hanko’s lungs were working too, causing his chest to ripple gently. The thin light coming through the window made them appear to float in the dark.
Enoh was smiling, hardly able to conceal the fun he was having. There was something in the smile that was reminiscent of Hosuke Kumon’s, but with a more sinister edge to it. Hanko’s expression was mostly devoid of emotion. Biku’s crimson lips were smiling faintly, in a manner not dissimilar to Enoh. It was the smile of a Buddha, chilling in its own way, enough to make skin crawl. For Biku it was inbuilt, the same as no expression at all. Perfectly natural for someone unable to feel pain. Only Fuminari brandished his teeth, biting into his lips.
“Ah, Fuminari,” Enoh said.
“Old man!” Fuminari grunted, grinding his teeth together.
“Indeed I am. And here to kill you,” Enoh said.
“That’s not gonna happen. Not until I’ve ripped Hanko to pieces.”
“Hoo. And why is that?”
“Shut up. I’ll take you out first if needs be.”
Enoh cackled in response.
“Where’s Renobo?” Biku asked.
“Still in there, unconscious,” Fuminari growled.
“Ishibashi managed to escape.”
“Huh.” Fuminari was glaring at Hanko and Enoh, hardly showing interest in Biku’s words. He would leave no openings during their conversation.
“I had tied him up, of course…”
“…but let’s see, we’ve been brawling long enough for him to crawl back into the house, find a knife to cut the ropes.”
“Most likely.”
The distance between the two groups was lessening even as they spoke. Enoh and Hanko were edging forwards.
“The woman is still in there.”
Biku moved sideways as he spoke, edging for the window. Enoh shadowed the movement but Biku had moved first, he was ahead. He threw one of the boards at Enoh. Enoh knocked it away, but it slowed him. Biku threw the remaining board onto the glass-covered grass and jumped, landing on it with one foot. Then he pulled off an incredible dive, springing up to slip cleanly into the room beyond, through the hole in the window left by the huge shapes of Fuminari and Hanko.
“Damn it!”
Enoh followed in from behind, but Biku already had a shard of glass over Renobo’s throat.
“Are we done?” he asked coolly.
The pain of the glass against her throat brought Renobo around.
“Fuck!”
She seemed to grasp the situation immediately, her slanted eyes widening as she groaned. The glass cutting against the skin of her throat, causing a trickle of bright-red blood to flow down her white neck. Enoh stopped, glaring at Biku with renewed force.
“Well then. It would appear she is important to you after all. I had expected you to come at me without consideration for her. That being said, this is probably why you’re here in the first place—protection duty.”
“…”
“If I’d known that I would have done this sooner.”
He pulled Renobo to her feet, pushing the shard against her throat as he brought his arm forwards. Slicing sideways would leave her with comparatively little damage, but it would cut deep if pushed inwards by someone with the right skills.
“The front entrance, if you would.”
Biku paced slowly forwards, keeping Enoh ahead. A couple of Shinmeikai thugs lay in the corridor outside the entrance, unconscious from when Biku and Fuminari had broken in, knocked out before they could make a sound.
Together, they left the building. Across the darkness, the clashing figures of Fuminari and Hanko were playing out a violent battle to the death.
“
Fuminari! I’ve got her,” Biku said. The man showed no signs of stopping.
“Hanko, that’s enough!” Enoh called out. Hanko, likewise, was lost in the fight.
Neither could afford to let their guard down for a moment. To answer would be to die. Enoh pounded across the grass and leapt into the air, keeping speed as he kicked out for Fuminari’s head. Fuminari blocked, separating from Hanko as he did. Hanko chased, trying to close the gap as Fuminari pulled away, but Enoh landed between them.
“Enough.” The old man stood his ground.
The two monsters faced each other, both with their skin torn. Fuminari was covered in gashes, his clothes had become rags that hung loose over his gigantic form.
“There is no stopping!” Fuminari’s voice was a hellish roar. He kicked heavily, attempting to mow the two bodies down. His leg found only air. They had scattered, one to either side.
“Fuminari. We’ve got what we came for. I can’t do anymore to help, but I won’t stop you if you want to take them on alone,” Biku declared, his voice sober.
Fuminari swallowed a bestial howl. Even he was unsure of his chances, taking on the two of them. Biku walked up to his side, holding the glass tight against Renobo’s throat. They stood, silhouetted before the light coming from the window.
“Now then,” Biku started. “You two should leave. Or, maybe it would be fun to have you escort us out.”
Just as Biku was finishing speaking, there was a noise behind them. Glass, crackling under something heavy as it clambered over the fragments still embedded in the window frame. Fuminari roared, pivoting abruptly around. Biku remained still, unwilling to take his eyes off the two in front of him, even for an instant.
A black, human-shaped form leapt from the window, aiming for Biku, something metallic glinting dully above its head. The tip of Fuminari’s left foot came hurtling upwards, tracing a wide arc through the dark before smacking firmly into the shadow’s face. The form crumpled and fell forwards. Fuminari lost balance—the tip of his foot was embedded in the man’s face.
He stepped forwards as the man tumbled back onto the ground, only barely maintaining his balance as his weight shifted to the man’s face. The man was Akio Ishibashi. He had a knife in one hand. He had crept back into the residence and solicited a knife from the kitchen, it had probably taken until now to sever the rope that tied his hands behind him.
Fuminari’s foot had ripped through the man’s nose and smashed into his chin, knocking out teeth as it sunk ankle-deep into the lower-half of the man’s face. Ishibashi’s eyes had popped from their sockets. They hung from hollow pits, held up by white nerve fibers. One was on the grass.
Biku stepped slowly backwards, Renobo in tow, until the object under Fuminari’s foot came into view. He saw Ishibashi’s body, pinned under Fuminari’s boot and writhing in a strange rhythm, rolling and wriggling like an experiment in dance. His arms and legs convulsed, thrashing up before hitting the ground again as his torso bent. His death throes had taken control of his entire body. It was grotesque to watch, all the more because of the comedy of the movements. He looked like a kid playing games. The knife in Ishibashi’s right hand slapped against Fuminari’s right shin. Fuminari’s eyes were stretched wide, glaring down.
“Sorry, but he’s already dead. I’m gonna help him on his way,” Fuminari said, his voice heavy.
He shifted his entire 145 kilograms of weight over the heel of his right foot, then pressed. There was a sharp crack as his foot punched even further into Ishibashi’s caved-in face, snapping already-fractured bone and instantly putting an end to the man’s convulsions. Ishibashi’s legs stiffened, going through a final set of exaggerated movements before finally going limp. The twitching sensation of life disappeared from under Fuminari’s foot.
He pulled slowly away. Ishibashi’s face was over twice its previous length, lower-jaw dislodged and upper-jaw partially broken. As Fuminari’s foot came free blood rushed out like muddy water. He saw white outlines of broken teeth mixed in with the gunk, obvious against the dimly-lit black of the blood.
The dark liquid collecting in Ishibashi’s mouth gurgled up, suddenly forming an oversized red bubble. The man had seemed dead, but he had just spewed up some air still held in his lungs. Ishibashi got to his feet. Then he pitched forwards, howling as he thrashed the kitchen knife in one hand, striking random directions as he ran three or so nonsensical meters. Then he stiffened like a pole and collapsed. It was an incredible sight. The man had been possessed of a tremendous life force. Now, finally, he was still. A perfect silence descended. Nobody could speak.
A single voice broke the silence. It was Renobo. “Fuminari…Fuminari, Fuminari you cunt,” she groaned in a low, stuffy voice. “You killed him. You killed Akio. You went and fucking killed him.” She began to struggle like she was possessed, stamping and shaking her head. Her long black hair hit the sides of her neck, ends slapping noisily against her and Biku’s cheeks. Enoh and Hanko watched on in silence. Only Renobo’s voice continued to echo around them.
“Kill them! Enoh! Hanko! Kill them both!” The words came in a blood-curdling shriek. Tears flowed from her eyes. They were blood red. She looked like a beautiful yaksha, weeping as her white body tossed in the night air. She bawled, howling for murder.
Biku’s flat expression was an abnormal contrast behind her.
“Alas we cannot, Mistress Renobo,” Enoh said. “It would be different, of course, if we had such orders from Master Kurogosho.” He was trying to calm her.
She let out a senseless wail. Blood ran from her eyes and over her pale cheeks, down her throat, forming crimson threads that came together in interlacing veins. Each time she whipped her head they would veer to the side, painting a red net below her eyes. Enoh was moving away, although his legs showed no signs of movement. Hanko moved with him.
“Mistress Renobo, their target is Kukai. You will be safe as long as Kukai is with us. There is no need to endure any discomfort. They will want to learn Kukai’s location. Tell them. Don’t let them torture you for it.” Enoh continued to slide away as he spoke. Darkness intruded, gradually thickening between the two parties. There was the sound of them leaping the wall, already concealed in darkness. Then silence, permeated only by the rustling of the surrounding trees.
“Hanko..,” Fuminari said, half moaning. He pulled the glove from his left hand and squeezed it into a three-fingered fist, thrusting it forwards. “Hanko..,” he repeated the beast’s name. He no longer knew what he felt for the creature, whether it was love or hate—he just knew he could kill it. That the reason no longer mattered. An arid sense of purpose settled in his stomach, heavier than ever—he had to kill Hanko. Renobo was staring at the fist, incredulous.
“Now I see, of course,” she muttered. “You’re him, him from that time.” Her lips pulled tight and arched upwards. “One night two years ago, someone stumbled onto our ritual. That was you. It was your fingers that Hanko ate,” She looked away to glance at Ishibashi’s corpse on the grass. The man’s body seemed buoyant, pale against the darkness and the windswept grass.
Twenty-one
Crazed Nightmares: A Covert Insertion
1
A bizarre object appeared in front of Hosuke Kumon; it was swollen, red, huge.
Like a house, but one from a nightmare, assembled from the pulped entrails of thousands of people. It was the size of a mountain. The surface rippled with peristaltic motion, shifting endlessly from one shape to another.
Hosuke Kumon stood inside Geshin’s mind, perched on the threshold of the man’s surface consciousness. His standing there was only metaphor—there are no concepts of up or down in the mind, only measures of depth. Comparisons may be made where deeper is framed as down, areas nearer the surface as up, but such conveniences only approximate the truth. Hosuke was formless. A Diver can take on any shape in the mind, the only limitation is the level of detail the Diver can picture in his mind. But forcing a shape requires effort; it is always easier to adopt a natural s
tate.
When a person is attacked the natural response may be to run. In that moment—regardless of their form until that point—they become defined by the movement of their legs.
The Diver might take the form of a dog, yet without an understanding of the relevant mechanics the Diver would immediately stumble. A-grade Divers need to take whatever form the situation demands while maintaining perfect control at all times.
Even after the Diver became a dog, he would not necessarily be recognized as such by a second Diver, whose mental state would influence their perception of the shape. The rule applies for anything witnessed within the mind—where one Diver might see a mountain, another may see something completely unrelated. The object Hosuke saw before him now was the result of a negotiation between Geshin’s consciousness and his own mind. The slightest fluctuation in Geshin’s mindstate could cause the object to transform into a monster, replacing its current form as a towering, intestinal structure. By maintaining an amorphous form, Hosuke was allowing himself to observe Geshin’s mind as objectively as possible. The technique allows two A-grade Divers to perceive any given object in more or less the same way.
The mindscape that Hosuke saw now was nothing like that during his dive into Tamura. Tamura’s mind had been missing, as though consumed by something. Only fragments of the man’s surface consciousness had remained, interspersed with packs of grotesque creatures; black, maggoty things, invaders that were foreign to his mind—hungry manifestations of appetite. They had been scattered through the barren chamber of his mind like fragments of a demonic soul, flocking around the remaining scraps of his consciousness and consuming everything in their path, chewing even on bone.
The Psyche Diver Trilogy: Demon Hunters Page 39
