Chapter 59: Whispers from the Ashes
Ruined Tokyo.
Ever since escaping that hellish shelter, they had been trekking through the massive, skeletal remains of the city like headless flies, searching for the faintest glimmer of survival. Finally, as night fell, they found an abandoned subway platform.
The darkness here was thick, seeping into every corner of the station. The air was foul and cold. A few faltering emergency lights cast a dismal glow, barely pushing back the pitch-black darkness while stretching the exhausted, fearful shadows on everyone's faces.
The group huddled on the cold concrete floor. Some twenty or thirty survivors pressed together, drawing a negligible amount of warmth from each other.
Low sobs.
The weak coughs of the sick and starving.
The embarrassing rumble of empty stomachs.
The last piece of compressed biscuit had been divided and eaten. The last drops of murky drinking water were gone. Panic was a noose around each person's neck, tightening with every passing moment.
Conan still leaned against the body, long since gone cold. Ran's body was his only barrier between him and this collapsing world. His eyes were half-open, staring emptily into the depths of the dark tunnel, as if some answer was hidden there. Or perhaps, it was simply because there was nothing there at all.
The numbness in his body grew heavier, insulating him from the hunger and the cold, and from the act of thinking itself.
Dr. Agasa held Ayumi and Genta tightly. The children, weakened by constant terror and malnutrition, barely had the strength left to cry. The doctor looked worriedly at Ai Haibara nearby. The girl's condition was even worse than before. She was curled into a ball. The successive deaths of people she knew, of her comrades, had pushed her into an almost complete state of self-isolation. She barely responded to anyone, save for a slight reaction when her sister called her name. The silver Soul Gem on her chest now held only the faintest glimmer of light.
Akemi Miyano stayed by her side, her face pale, her eyes filled with worry for her sister and a sense of powerlessness against the future.
The whispers were more frequent now, more blatant. They rustled in the darkness, a currency of fear, resentment, and twisted speculation.
"…The water… it's all gone… the food, too…"
"…At this rate… how many more days can we last?"
"…That news broadcast… that last part… you all heard it, right?"
"…It's all their fault… If they hadn't brought those monsters here…"
"…So many of us died… our homes are gone… whose fault is all this?"
"Who else could it be… It's them! Those 'Magical Girls'!"
"Yeah! Don't they have magic… making some water should be easy… I bet they just want us to die of thirst!"
The voices were kept low, but their venomous aim was crystal clear.
"…That one with the brown hair… look at her stone… it's almost out… Is she going to turn into…?" a middle-aged woman's gaze darted toward Haibara. Her eyes were filled with fear, and a hint of jealousy. "She'd rather die than make us a little water… damn her…"
"Stop talking… they did save us, after all…"
"What's wrong with saying it… they're the ones who caused all this… saving us… shouldn't they have?"
"…And that little brat… holding a corpse… holding something that's already turned into a monster… he's like a cursed doll… stay away from him, he's bad luck…"
Conan's strange behavior had also become an object of their fear and revulsion.
In another corner of the crowd, the old woman who had lost her son and daughter-in-law was still clutching the dirty cloth doll. Her eyes were no longer empty or merely sad. They now glowed like two red-hot coals in the dark, shining with a paranoid, venomous light. She no longer mumbled the names of her lost family; she was completely silent. But every so often, her gaze would sweep with extreme slowness over the "witches" and their allies, as if she were assessing them. Her grief had not lessened with time. Instead, it was like water in a sealed pot, heating up, the pressure silently building, about to destroy everything as it searched for a release.
Suddenly, the sound of stumbling footsteps broke the heavy silence. A young woman, feverish and disoriented, got up to relieve herself in a corner and tripped. Her body fell uncontrollably, crashing into the curled-up form of Ai Haibara.
"Oof…" Haibara grunted.
"Ai-chan!" both Akemi and the doctor cried out, rushing to check on her.
The young woman who had fallen was terrified, apologizing profusely. "I'm sorry… I'm so sorry… I didn't mean to…"
Just then, a sinister voice rose from the crowd. "Hmph, can't watch where you're going. If you cause a problem for that one, we'll all pay the price…"
The speaker was a bitter-faced man who had lost his wife in the shelter. His malicious words were like poisoned needles, pricking at everyone present. The young woman went pale with fear and didn't dare say another word. Akemi looked up, her eyes flashing with anger at the man. Her lips moved, but in the end, she said nothing. She knew that arguing was pointless and would only make things worse. Having been granted a new life, Akemi wanted to face this cruel world with kindness. They are weak, she thought. They are just scared. They need to be protected.
But what chilled her to the bone was the reaction of the other survivors. While no one echoed the man's sentiment, almost no one defended the young woman, either. No one even came to see if Haibara was alright. They just watched in silence.
The night deepened. From one corner, a pained cough was followed by the weak groan of an old man. He seemed gravely ill, struggling to breathe, his body twitching. His family had died in the disaster. He was now alone, on the verge of death. Yet, aside from a few indifferent or annoyed glances, no one moved to help.
"So noisy…"
"He's not going to last much longer anyway. Better if it ends quickly…"
Only Akemi, after a moment of internal struggle, found the last small piece of fever medicine in her nearly empty first-aid kit and made to go to the man.
"Don't go, Akemi-san," Dr. Agasa stopped her, his voice tired and hoarse. "It's no use… and besides…"
Akemi looked at the suffering man, then at the cold, apathetic faces around her. Her hand fell limply to her side. The last traces of warmth and compassion between people seemed to have been frozen solid in this endless darkness and despair.
The ice was covered in cracks. It would only take one more gentle step, one insignificant breeze, for it to shatter completely, dragging everyone down into the frigid abyss.
Conan buried his face in the cold hollow of Ran's neck. The familiar, faint scent of orchid was long gone, replaced by the coldness of death. He didn't know how much longer he could maintain this numbness.
Perhaps… it wouldn't have to be for much longer.
…
The night grew deeper.
On the platform, only the sound of uneasy, ragged breathing remained. Everyone's nerves were stretched taut. They listened for the slightest sound in the darkness, and they watched… every "companion" who only pretended to sleep.
No one knew what tomorrow would bring. Or rather, they had a sinking feeling that tomorrow might not come at all.
The string called "humanity" had been stretched to its absolute limit.
It was only a matter of time before it snapped. And when it did, everyone would be dragged into an inescapable, bloody carnival.