Scenes from an Unholy War by Hideyuki Kikuchi

seemed to glow. Gil suddenly felt as if they were going to swallow him. Before he could fight it, he was falling into the depths of the darkness. Something came into view—and the instant he realized what it was, he cried out.
    It’d been a dream. He trembled as his two comrades in arms stood watching him. A black-gloved hand was covering his mouth. The darkness remained still.
    “Did you see?” D asked. His voice fell from high above. Gil didn’t bother looking up. For all eternity, he wouldn’t know what the Hunter was asking. But someone had loomed before him, oh, so black and oh, so high, challenging the heavens.
    Gil mumbled something.
    The black-gloved hand came away from his mouth.
    “Not a thing,” Gil repeated. “I didn’t see . . . anything . . .”
    As if nothing had happened, D said, “You have four and a half minutes to get it done. We’ll meet back here in five minutes.” The figure in black spun around, but none of the other three noticed that his left hand was missing from the wrist down.
    —
    The house was filled with the stench of blood. It had seeped into the very cores of the roof beams, the logs of the walls, and the floorboards, rotting them, and even if the house were razed, the area would retain a cloying smell that would keep any living creatures from drawing closer. Until this evening, it hadn’t been that way. The former residents had been very good about getting rid of the smell, which posed the greatest threat to their self-control. But at present, the floor was covered with blood-red plastic. Bags of plasma for medical procedures, each containing 100 cc, were spread across the floor. However, that wasn’t the source of the stench.
    The fluid of over a hundred of those bags had been emptied into his body, and the blood now clung to his flesh and bones and organs. When he opened his eyes, it began to slosh, and when he got up out of bed, it eddied wildly in him.
    “He’s coming,” the leader said, barely able to squeeze those two words from a body that felt as dirty and heavy as mud. “He’s coming. Yes, here he comes!”
    A sword gleamed in either hand.
    “Oh, come! Please, come to me! You’re the one who can kill me. Zeke, Bayon, Kronos—are you all set? Are you ready to sing the songs of death? Better think of some words to beg for your lives. This time, we’ll be up against a formidable foe!” He bellowed like a wild beast, whipped up by a dark desire even he couldn’t fully comprehend.
    A black glint zipped to the wall. Striking the logs, it laid waste to the caulking between the thick trunks and shot through. After zipping along the ground for another twenty yards, it stabbed into something, and the instant it did, a low groan came from beneath it as something crept along, black and spiderlike. The ammo dump shielded by vinyl and reinforced plastic lay just ahead of those five painfully struggling “legs.”
    —
    II
    —
    The missiles were mounted on a steel truck. The five men didn’t move a muscle as they scanned their surroundings. It was easy enough to approach them. D’s feet didn’t make a sound, and his body melded with the darkness. On a night when even the stars weren’t out, he could stand right in front of a person without them even knowing it. Avoiding the watch fire, the Hunter glided toward the man guarding the rear of the truck. His gait wavered unexpectedly as vertigo suddenly assailed him. The bats’ venom hadn’t left him yet. Dropping down on one knee, he put an arm out to brace his upper body as it doubled over, but his hand was missing.
    These sounds didn’t escape the guard. “Who goes there?” he shouted as loudly as he could, turning the flashlight he wore on his hip in their direction.
    Even though he lay in the beam of light, D didn’t respond immediately. This time the venom was having a particularly strong effect on him.
    In response to the man’s shout, the other guards came running with their firearms or longswords drawn.