They drove on, over hilly roads, passing through another village what felt like every five minutes. Each was invariably the same; completely abandoned, the roads overrun with thick overgrowth, houses with paper walls that had long since rotted away, replaced with bushes, vines, and flowers. It probably looked beautiful in the summer, but winter had caused it to be mostly devoid of greenery. Everything was covered in snow, even the overgrowth; it just looked overwhelmingly dead. The one exception was the most striking sight they saw was a Shinto temple, with a huge evergreen tree growing through the roof.
"It's nature reclaiming what we took," Sachiko said in amazement as Alanna slowed down, staring at the temple.
"Yeah," Alanna agreed, pausing. "The whole world's going to look like this, isn't it? I mean, not soon... but even if it takes another ten thousand years, it's just going to return to this, isn't it? Nature takes over after our brief stay of changing the environment."
"Wow," Sachiko said. "Our brief stay. Yeah, it is."
They kept driving on.
They passed by a sign that announced, entirely in Chinese characters, that Tokyo was just 50 km away; mere minutes, even over the ancient, long since overgrown road. They'd barely even seen the sign, it was obscured by a large tree. Almost there, Alanna thought.
Two minutes later, there was an explosion, and their car flipped over.
The two women were flipped upside down, crashing into the roof of the car just seconds after the roof of the car crashed into the ground. Alanna started to pull herself up, figuring out what had just happened. As soon as she'd realized that they'd flipped over, she looked over, making sure that Sachiko was okay.
"Sachiko?" she asked, seeing that Sachiko's door had come open; she was laying halfway out it. "Sachiko, are you okay?"
There was no response. Immediately, the worst assumption came to Alanna's mind, and she scrambled over to her to check, praying that it wasn't true.
"Sachiko?! Sachiko, come on, wake up!" Alanna cried, putting her hand on Sachiko's heart. "Come on, Sachiko! Sachiko!"
There was no heartbeat. Alanna stared, starting to cry. Come on, what do I do? Focus! Focus! She's dying! she thought frantically, trying to think straight. CPR. I know CPR, dammit, I have to revive her.
Alanna wiped her face dry, and leaned over, tilting Sachiko's head right and pressing her lips against hers, breathing out. And again. Then she pulled her head up, scrambling to get into position to start chest convulsions, pounding on Sachiko's limp body. Come on! Come on! she thought, wiping tears off again. And then she started with the breathing again, alternating between that and chest compressions at the right frequency.
She stared at poor Sachiko, looking truly innocent, truly helpless, her body bloody and twisted as Alanna tried desperately to revive her. At last, the rational part of her kicked in; and she realized, she was dead. That was it. She was gone.
And then, glancing over her shoulder, she realized why.
Standing just fifty metres away, was a soldier in full armour, holding a huge black tube in his one hand. Smoke was billowing from it, and it all came together instantly. He'd shot at their car with an RPG, and killed Sachiko. And now that fucking bastard's just standing there, she thought.
She opened her own door, bringing herself to her feet as adrenaline rushed through her body. She stared at the soldier; he looked confused and frightened, but she didn't see that at all. All she saw was the man who had killed Sachiko. She headed towards him.
"Stop! Stop!" he shouted frantically in a thick accent, repeating the few words of English that he knew. "You can't be here!"
Alanna did not stop; she ran, immediately feeling an incredible surge of pain through her right leg, not letting it stop her a bit. She sprinted at him as fast as she could, faster than she'd ever ran in her life. Forty metres.
He stared at her, almost petrified with fear. Thirty metres.
Alanna kept glaring at him, imagining how she was going to beat him as soon as she got over there. She'd never so much as been in a fist fight in her life, didn't know any sort of martial art, and hadn't ever punched anyone out of anger since she was in third grade. He wondered if he could shoot at her with the rocket launcher in his hand; no, she was too close. Twenty metres.
He instead reached for his sidearm, letting the RPG launcher drop to the ground, falling into the snow. He pulled the pistol out of its holster, raising it to her. Ten metres.
He leveled the gun, aiming at her, and pulled the trigger, a bright flash of light firing from it. No distance. Alanna wasn't sure if he'd even gotten her or not; she slammed her whole weight against the soldier, knocking him into the ground, landing on top of him.
She swung her fist, punching the terrified soldier in the face. Suddenly she realized that her whole arm was in pain. She tried to hit him with the other, but couldn't even lift her left arm; she swung again with the right, and again, and again, and again, adrenaline numbing the pain as she punched him with her broken arm.
At last, she stopped, staring down at the bloody, terrified soldier, coming to her senses. She wasn't sure if he was still alive or not, but even as the adrenaline rush wore off, she didn't care. She slowly brought herself to her feet, realizing that her leg was incredible pain.
After saying her final goodbye, she limped off to Tokyo, using the RPG launcher as a crutch; she had a broken arm, an injured leg, and a chunk of her shoulder had been zatted off entirely. But her car had been damaged beyond all repair by the rocket, and night was coming. If she didn't get to shelter by sunset, she probably would die of exposure, she thought.
Half an hour after she'd left, the soldier crawled away to the outpost that he'd come from.