"I'll explain later. Hurry!"

But the guard was angry. He grabbed Anzai's sleeve to separate the two.

"Now hold on. What are you talking about? This is..."

Toshiaki struck the guard with full force. The sudden blow made him stagger. In that moment of opportunity, Toshiaki pulled Anzai by the arm.

"Where's her room?"

"Go right."

Toshiaki broke into a run, and Anzai ran ahead to lead the way.

"Stop, both of you!" echoed the guard's shouts from behind, but they pressed on, heedless.

"What happened? What did you do to Mariko?"

"There was a parasite in my wife's cells."

"A parasite? Bacteria you mean? Has Mariko been infected with something?"

"Something like that. But that's not all. It's much worse. I've been keeping my wife's cells. They're extremely virulent."

Anzai was confused, especially by the last bit, but he had no trouble believing that Mariko's kidney was abnormal. He remembered the way her abdomen had appeared to leap unnaturally the day before.

"It has special abilities. It can set things on fire. It can also change shape at will. And it's coming to this hospital."

"Coming here?"

"Through the sewage pipes."

"So that's what it was!" Anzai cried.

"You know about it?"

"I heard it outside near the side entrance not too long before you showed up. It sounded huge."

"Then what? Where did it go?"

"Disappeared into this hospital."

"What?!"

Anzai turned a corner, ram up a flight of steps and continued to Mariko's ward.

Toshiaki didn't speak another word. The younger man's silence told of the gravity of the situation, conveying a painful tension regarding something unfathomable coming after Mariko. Anzai ran as fast as he could, badly out of breath though he was. He heard multiple footsteps behind them. Perhaps the guard had called for backup.

16.

Yoshizumi was speechless.

It had spewed forth from the drain and stuck to the wall, then wiggled and fallen to the floor. It looked like pink sludge. What was left in the sink spilled over the edge. The two united on the tile. Then, with an unpleasant gurgle, it started to rise.

The two nurses were on their knees, crying and holding each other. Mariko didn't budge. She did not even cry out for help. Only, her body was trembling, and she was swaying slightly to and fro. The shock had completely paralyzed her.

The gelatinous thing rose up even higher. Yoshizumi stepped back on shaking legs. He could barely stand. The thing climbed up before him like a waterfall in reverse. The foul-smelling liquid gushing sporadically out of the drain bathed it so that it gleamed as it took form. Something hit Yoshizumi's shin. He lost balance and fell back onto Mariko's bed. His fingers touched her leg.

The column's shape became increasingly complex as it grew. Its center narrowed and tentacle-like appendages separated from either side. Yoshizumi stared in disbelief. A person was forming right in front of his eyes. A woman's body. The tentacles each separated into five fingers. Arms appeared behind them and shoulders above the chest. A small navel took shape in the middle of the column and nestled in a concave stomach that could have been carved with a spatula. Two hemispheres of flesh bulged out above it, while the section below gained a plumpness and hundreds of thin, compound folds worked themselves into perfection. Flesh above the shoulders narrowed into a throat. The circular blob that was its head rippled, creating a nose, mouth, ears, cheeks, jaw, forehead, and eyes. Yoshizumi was shaking his head in denial. He recognized the figure, the face of this woman. "Recognize"

wasn't the word. He remembered her very well. This was Mariko's donor. The woman he had cut open with his own hands, whose kidney he himself had extracted. She could not possibly be alive. He just kept shaking his head in denial.

Whatever this thing was, it had taken on her exact likeness. Her eyes popped open and looked down at Yoshizumi and Mariko.

With a smile, she addressed Yoshizumi.

"Move."

He couldn't if he wanted to. He was swallowed in her gaze. Hers were the eyes of a predator, and Yoshizumi sensed that her prey was Mariko.

"I said, Move..

Without warning, one of the nurses huddled in the corner of the room let out a bizarre whimper and stood up. Yoshizumi was released from his paralysis. He turned towards the nurse. Tears and saliva were streaming freely down a crumpled face. Flailing her arms weirdly, she started running for the door.

The creature glared at her.

Just as Yoshizumi called out, flames rose up from the nurse.

A moment later, she was engulfed in them, and her body was visibly getting charred.

Her tied-back hair curled and shrank. But the flames refused to recede and instead shot up to the ceiling, sending a stifling blast of hot air through the room. Even as Yoshizumi guarded his face with both arms, he could not shut his eyes. The nurse's violent cries of agony filled his ears. Her teeth enamel were melting away in her mouth, which was twisted wide open, a sight that burned itself into his retina. She staggered, trying to pat out the flames with her arms, but the blaze was too overpowering as it roared like a rocket engine. Her white coat fell scattering in pieces onto the floor only to shrivel up and evaporate in a matter of seconds.

The strong stench of binning flesh stang Yoshizumi's nose. The nurse no longer looked human; she was melting in the raging inferno. Her flesh had turned jelly-like and was dripping from her skeleton. Those bones, too, eventually shrank and crumpled. A thunderous ringing ripped through the air; the fire alarm had gone off. What was left of the nurse turned into muck amidst the piercing bell. Overwhelmed by the noise and heat, Yoshizumi just sat there on the bed like a simpleton.

The flames disappeared, leaving only the skull-shaking alarm to continue in their wake.

Strangely enough, there were no scorch marks on the linoleum or walls. Nothing had been altered by the heat. Yoshizumi stared in wonder. The only indications of the nurse's existence were a gelatinous ma.s.s and her right leg, left unharmed from the knee down. It just lay there like merchandise some store clerk had forgotten to put away. Its skin was smooth and the stocking intact and it wore a slipper. Staring at it, all Yoshizumi could do was to keep all common sense from crumbling away.

The other nurse was trailing saliva from her mouth and tearing furiously at her face with both hands. Her eyes lacked all focus. A liquid seeping out from her inner thighs dirtied the floor. She had let loose her bladder.

The thing that looked like the donor turned slowly to her with a scornful smile.

"Stop."

Yoshizumi had managed only a raspy command that he himself found quite pathetic.

He could hardly hear himself above the fire alarm.

"Please. Stop this."

The creature ignored him, glaring at the nurse until she, too, burst into flame.

Not wanting a repeat performance of what he had just witnessed, Yoshizumi looked away.

The same scorching wind blew through the room. The nurse's screams enveloped his body with an intensity that rivaled the alarm. He closed his eyes and covered his ears, but could not block the din of tempestuous flames or the horrendous screams escaping through the nurse's clenched teeth.

But soon, her voice went silent. Yoshizumi turned towards her timidly, and groaned when he saw the thing.

As expected, there was a jello-like pile in the nurse's place; only, this time, an arm had been spared from the elbow down. The faint pink manicure was left unscathed and the skin was as beautiful as white china.

Yoshizumi suddenly remembered a strange forensics article he'd read as an intern, about spontaneous combustion. This not altogether rare phenomenon was usually discovered by a neighbor who, upon noticing the smell of smoke, went next door to discover a most unpleasant scene. There was usually only a sticky ma.s.s in place of the body and often a foot or other body part that was left unharmed. Neither the clothing or the couch the victim had been sitting in would bear any sign of damage. In none of these cases was there ever any evidence, such as a turned-on stove, matches, or gasoline to suggest a suicide. The circ.u.mstances pointed to the fact that the body in question had been subjected to heat comparable to a blast furnace. It required a temperature of nearly 3,000 F to turn bone to ash. How could such a high temperature be created? And how could one human alone be selectively made to burn?

Yoshizumi wondered if this was what he had just witnessed. Was that spontaneous combustion? Does this humanoid creature actually possess the ability to make us go up in flames?

"Out of my way," she said. He looked up in surprise.

It was approaching him with a ghostly smile. No. It was trying to get to Mariko.

"Get out of my way!"

"No," answered Yoshizumi, shaking his head.

"I don't want to kill you, so step away quietly."

"I can't allow this... She's my patient."

"Your patient? Hmph. If that's true, then so am I."

"What?"

"I really am grateful to you, doctor. You looked after this girl for me. But that's where your service ends. Leave now if you want to live."

He was silent.

She walked over to Yoshizumi, who instinctively bent over the bed to protect Mariko.

Her eyes were open, but her body was rigid. Perhaps she'd fainted at the outset of it all. So much the better. It meant she'd been spared the ordeal of witnessing the nurses' fate.

The creature laid a hand on Yoshizumi. He shook it off, but was grabbed again. He cried out from its unexpected strength as it pulled him forcibly away from the bed.

He hit the wall. An intense pain spread across his forehead. Blood flowed into his eyes.

"Stop!" he shouted, his head throbbing with pain. The alarm was still going. He felt like it would never stop.

The creature crawled onto the bed and straddled Mariko, and started stripping off her sheets and nightgown. Yoshizumi saw Mariko's painfully naked skin.

"Stop..."

Yoshizumi stood up dizzily and brought his hands down upon her back with as much strength as he could muster. His arms sunk into her slimy, sticky body. The creature continued tearing off Mariko's clothing and paid no attention to him. But Yoshizumi kept shouting for her to stop.

"Enough!" said the creature, turning her head around and silencing him with a penetrating glare.

Her pupils contracted.

Yoshizumi's arms instantaneously burst into flames.

17.

Toshiaki placed his hand on the k.n.o.b, but cried out from the heat and pulled it back.

Scorching waves billowed out from the other side of the door. The guards were only a few dozen feet behind them. The fire alarm continued to echo throughout the entire building and many of the patients were running out into the hallway to see what the commotion was about.

Toshiaki looked to Anzai with a nod. He pulled his sleeve over his hand and opened the door into Mariko's room.

A suffocating heat burst out from inside. Toshiaki covered his face with his arms.

Anzai shouted his daughter's name.

A man was screaming with his arms raised; they were burning. He was flapping his arms as if that would put out the fire. Anzai grabbed Toshiaki from behind, struggling to get in. He kept on calling out his daughter's name. A young girl lay face up, half-naked, on the bed. Standing next to her was Eve 1, in the guise of Kiyomi.

"You!"Toshiaki snarled.

But Eve l's movements were quick. She grabbed the girl, then looked at Toshiaki with a huge grin.

"Stop, let the child go!"

Eve 1 turned and jumped through the gla.s.s.

Toshiaki shouted after her and ran to the broken window. He leaned out and looked down.

It was dark. He could see almost nothing. Then he barely saw a large shadow move. He followed it desperately with his eyes, but there was not enough light outside, and the glow from their window hardly reached the ground. In the blink of an eye, he lost sight of her. But she seemed to have been going not away from the hospital, but back into it.

"Help me! Put me out!" yelled the white-clad doctor. Just then, the guards arrived, standing outside the door in disbelief. Toshiaki took the sheets from the bed and wrapped them around the doctor's shoulders. With Anzai's help, he patted all around to snuff out the fire.

Once the flames were fully extinguished, the doctor crouched down in relief. Toshiaki shook the doctor's shoulders to snap him out of it. And then, he remembered. He had seen this doctor before. He was the man who had performed Kiyomi's kidney extraction. His name was Yoshizumi. Undoubtedly, he had also performed the kidney transplant on that girl Mariko.

"Can someone please tell me...what the h.e.l.l is going on?" said one of the guards shakily, as he entered the room. He was middle-aged and slightly overweight, with a large frame and tense face. Toshiaki had a feeling he was the one in charge.