Parasite Eve Sephirotto Part 31

Not a moment later, Anzai was gone. Tos.h.i.+aki immediately heard a loud thud behind him.

He had no time to react when something fell onto his head. He cried out and bent over.

There was another thud. Trembling with fear, he turned around.

Anzai was hunched over on the floor, blood flowing down his temples. White powder was falling onto his body. Tos.h.i.+aki saw a hairline crack running up along the wall, almost to the ceiling. It took a few seconds for him to realize that the split had been caused by the impact of Anzai's body against it.

Anzai groaned faintly, unable to get up.

Something moved in the corner of Tos.h.i.+aki's eye. He looked up to see Yos.h.i.+zumi, who was making a dash for the alarm switch on the wall.

But Eve read his movements. Just as Yos.h.i.+zumi was reaching for the alarm, she opened her mouth wide and bellowed.

Yos.h.i.+zumi screamed. His arms twisted back, his body turned around once, and he fell head first to the floor with a hard crack.

Eve smiled, clearly taking pleasure in his pain. His body lifted.

She had complete control over him. Yos.h.i.+zumi began spinning in mid-air. He cried out.

Eve's eyes sparkled as she flung him from wall to wall. After a while, his clothing was stained with blood. When she saw that he was limp, Eve suspended him from his feet, then let him drop suddenly like a marionette cut from its strings. Just before Yos.h.i.+zumi's head hit the floor, Eve stopped his fall and lifted him up again, toying with him like this over and over.

"Stop!" Tos.h.i.+aki yelled in spite of himself.

Eve swayed around and looked at him.

He swallowed and froze. There was a heavy thump as Yos.h.i.+zumi fell at last, but Tos.h.i.+aki could not even turn in his direction.

Eve grinned.

Tos.h.i.+aki heard voices coming from everywhere in the room.

Panting voices. And not just one or two, but many, growing larger like a chorus.

He was terrified.

It was Kiyomi's moaning. Something only he should have known. A sweet song that soared without end, it had slumbered deep in Tos.h.i.+aki's ears. His wife's moaning, responding sensitively to his lovemaking...his wife's moaning, echoing now in a frenzy of vocal activity.

He looked across the room. Someone spoke in Kiyomi's voice. Her figure flowed into his mind like a deluge. Every one of her expressions, every gesture, bearing down upon him in raging waves. Kiyomi smiling, Kiyomi frowning, Kiyomi crying, Kiyomi calm, and Kiyomi held in his arms... Tens, hundreds, thousands of Kiyomis spilled into his brain.

His eyes were captured by these visions.

The dissected corpse on the floor opened his mouth, crying with pleasure in Kiyomi's voice.

The dead men in the green operating gowns were all moaning with their eyes wide open.

Tos.h.i.+aki began to lose his mind. The moaning was giving him the illusion that he was embracing Kiyomi. When she moaned ah ah he sucked on her nipples when she purred with her mouth closed he ran his tongue over her ribs and back when she seemed to wail he stimulated her down there when she alternated between aaa and haa he entered her hugged her tight kissed her many times thrust hard saw her limbs in disarray saw her expression and it overlapped with the white corpse spilling its intestines when had it stood up the ones in surgical robes too walking towards him he was embracing Kiyomi the moaning came from corpses then Kiyomi was a corpse dead but moaning made love to why what am I making love to what this cold sensation what is this intestines wrapped around my arms is it Kiyomi's am I doing a corpse inserting into brain-dead Kiyomi's body Kiyomi's moaning is getting louder she likes it Kiyomi is Kiyomi is Kiyomi is Kiyomi is "STOP-STOP-STOP-STOP-STOP-STOP-STOPPPPPPP!!".

The voices ceased.

The corpses fell to the floor, glistened, and dissolved instantly with only a faint, damp sound. Not a single flame to be seen. Eve 1's evocation of fire paled in comparison.

Anzai was clinging to Mariko on the autopsy table and shouting madly. Her eyes were open, but she was completely unresponsive to her father's cries.

Eve was giving Anzai a cold stare.

Don't.

Tos.h.i.+aki raised his voice.

Too late. Still looking at Anzai, Eve tilted her head. One of Anzai's legs shot up unnaturally towards the ceiling. She was going to hurl him against the wall again.

Even when his entire lower body was in the air, Anzai refused to let go of his daughter.

Eve frowned.

He was immediately jerked away. His body grazed Tos.h.i.+aki's cheek as it flew past into the wall with a crash. He did not fall to the floor. Instead, he was stuck spread-eagled with his face pressed against the wall. His eyes were shut tightly and he winced from the pressure.

Without warning, this unseen power gripped Tos.h.i.+aki as well, pressing him against the wall before he even had the time to struggle. It was so strong, he could not even lift a finger.

His cheeks squeezed together, nearly touching each other. He couldn't even blink his eyes.

Stop.

Stop it now. He could not voice these thoughts. He was unable to move his tongue.

Eve's figure was reflected in his eyes. It walked slowly towards the two of them, glancing down at the blubbering ma.s.s that was Eve 1, who smiled murkily in response. Eve beamed at her dying mother, then turned back towards Anzai and Tos.h.i.+aki.

It's coming! Tos.h.i.+aki screamed a silent scream. The pressure became stronger and stronger. His bowels twisted painfully. His skull creaked. His throat was crushed shut and he couldn't breathe. He felt like sparks were flying from his body. Simply killing them was probably too easy for her. The surgeons' corpses had disappeared from sight in but a moment's time. Eve was just toying with them now, like a predator making sport of its prey, like a child pulling the legs off an insect. He couldn't forgive his powerlessness before her.

He couldn't forgive himself that all he could really do now was beg for his life.

His consciousness grew dim. Vision clouded with red as blood vessels ruptured behind his eyes. Something popped in his body with a dull sound and a hot substance flowed out from it. But Tos.h.i.+aki continued to yell at Eve in his heart, to yell at her to stop.

"Daddy..."

Tos.h.i.+aki was startled to hear a voice. It entered his ears as an unintelligible grunt, but transformed into j.a.panese in his head. Eve had called him "daddy." He felt faint. He saw her with the corner of his eye.

It had a horrendous grin on her face.

His whole body cried out. He couldn't believe what he had seen. Blood vessels burst everywhere in his body and his bones cracked. Eve's smile burned into him. He could not close his eyelids, no matter how much he tried; he could not yell, to dispel that horrid impression. It was a grin that could only be called horrendous. He couldn't bear it anymore.

He did not want to live, with such a grin imprinted on his mind. Just hurry up and kill me, Tos.h.i.+aki prayed. Crush me!

At that moment, Eve grimaced.

24.

Tos.h.i.+aki's body fell to the floor, followed soon after by Anzai.

What's going on? He could not make sense of it. Why did it stop?

Eve appeared to be in pain, tearing at her face with a look of anguish. Flesh fell from her in pieces.

Tos.h.i.+aki strained his eyes as Eve changed form yet again. Her entire body rippled. Her waist's curves straightened out, and her b.r.e.a.s.t.s flattened while her chest heaved out. Her shoulders broadened. The facial structure also changed. She wailed loudly. But the voice, too, was transformed.

What the h.e.l.l is going on?

What had been a woman was now clearly becoming a man.

Something protruded from between its legs. At first the size of a finger, it began to swell and rise menacingly, pulsing all the while. The gentle curves faded as muscles stretched out in their place. Abdominals bulged out, and muscles swelled up above the shoulders. The neck grew thicker and the facial features sharpened. Sideburns extended like a lion's mane. A goatee and beard sprouted on the face. The creature's back heaved up like a mound of steel. Then, it put both hands onto the floor and a.s.sumed a beast-like posture on all fours. Every part of it embodied strength. A shout of indignation emanated from this new body as it struck the floor.

And then, it howled.

Thunderous waves rattled Tos.h.i.+aki's ruptured organs, nearly tearing him apart. There was another enormous sound and the room went pitch dark. The electricity had been cut. An alarm sounded from somewhere.

Tos.h.i.+aki coughed up the blood rising in his throat. Ruptures along his skin oozed plasma. The inside of his head burned.

Something popped in his eyes, after which he saw only red and black dots. A swarm of countless points ran wildly in his vision like a sand storm. He could hear the creature, but could not guess what it was doing. He heard concrete split ting open as chunks of wall fell onto him.

Yos.h.i.+zumi let out a scream, but Tos.h.i.+aki could do nothing more than remain where he was.

He then felt himself rise into the air. Something hit him repeatedly. In the stomach, shoulders, head, and chest. He was soon numb to the pain. While he knew he was being thrown against the walls, he had no will to fight it. He could only wonder why Eve had turned into a man. Mitochondria were definitely female. What did this mean? Was this another evolutionary step? And if so...

It all became clear to him now.

It can't be.

But there was no other explanation. Intellectually, it was questionable, but the intuition of every fiber of his being told him otherwise.

As if in answer to his thoughts, the creature yelled in agony.

There was an explosion. Tos.h.i.+aki fell to the floor. The alarm blared in his ears.

But an even more deafening sound threatened to drown it out. It was as Tos.h.i.+aki had suspected. Eve's voice was changing back into a woman's.

He heard what sounded like wriggling flesh in between the alarm intervals. Eve was reliving her violent regeneration and birth. Her pulse shook the air. A woman's voice arose above a man's yell, as if to silence it. The man's voice cut off the woman's with the ferocity of a jet exhaust. Male and Female were waging battle against one another in the same life form, a balance of power being pulled back and forth between them. Just when the female's expression was about to appear, the male formed its own figure over it. When the female cut out a womb in the body, the male buried it and extended its distinguis.h.i.+ng organ in retalia-tion. The female twisted the p.e.n.i.s back into the body as b.r.e.a.s.t.s arose in defiance. Tos.h.i.+aki's intuition had been correct. Though he couldn't see it, he could tell that the new life form was devolving into a mess internally.

Someone or something jumped into Tos.h.i.+aki's mind. The voice was faint, as when phone fines got crossed. Tos.h.i.+aki realized right away that it was mitochondria, the ones that had parasitized Eve 1. That monster had been melting on the floor, trying to welcome her extinction, but was now dismayed at her daughter's transformation. The mitochondria were making one last desperate attempt at signaling the host cells to propagate again. The mother longed to control this disaster that was supposed to have been her perfection. But the host cells were damaged beyond repair. The mitochondria's sorrowful cry echoed in Tos.h.i.+aki's body. This cannot be, this cannot be!

His head filled with a brilliant flash. That which until now had caught in a corner of his mind, refusing to be drawn out, now revealed its dazzling self. It was just as he thought... The mitochondria in Eve 1 had overlooked one important thing. They did not give sufficient consideration to it because they were female. His sperm was obviously necessary to create new life, but Eve 1 had only thought of male genes as tools for reproduction. The mitochondria had failed to notice that their "daughter" was made up not only of themselves, but also of male mitochondria.

Eve l's mitochondria's final scream rang in Tos.h.i.+aki's ears, trailing off into silence. He felt her death indirectly. Outer and inner membranes collapsed, spilling DNA from inside.

They were then torn apart by enzymes. All electrical transmissions diffused and died out.

Receptors dissolved into useless peptides before losing life completely. Consciousness ceased. Cells burst, returning to mere fats, amino acids, and sugars. Eve 1 was no longer a life form, but simply a heap of decaying organic matter.

Eve 1's child screamed in s.e.xually dimorphous anguish.

The ceiling began to crumble as Eve erupted with pure power. I need to get out of here, thought Tos.h.i.+aki. But his body would not move.

He heard people's voices, footsteps drawing near. Short gasps of shock and horror followed. A light hit his face.

Help had arrived at last.

He let out an exclamation of joy, but it did not take form in sound. He tried to move a little, but could not quite gather enough strength.

At that moment, a tidal wave of heat exploded around them.

Screams and frantic footsteps.

Tos.h.i.+aki panicked, fearing for those who had come to their aid.

A blast of magma-like air pierced his body. Something heavy smashed into his waist.

He lost all feeling in his legs. Distant screams: "Oh my...!"

"What is that?"

"It's alive!"

He heard only s.n.a.t.c.hes of speech, followed by the sound of flesh being torn from the bones, damp explosions, and truncated screams. While Eve was trying to keep Tos.h.i.+aki under control, she was simultaneously venting out her power and destroying everything around them.

This could not go on. No one would ever make it out alive. He had to calm Eve somehow. There was no reason to let anyone else be sacrificed. He felt something hot swelling up from the very core of his being. He would stop this thing. He had to kill it. Even if...

"I order you to stop!" thought Tos.h.i.+aki, with all the fury he could muster.

He sensed Eve's momentary hesitation. He screamed with more force.

"Come here! Look at me, me! I am your father! Come here!"

Eve whined, turning her attentions to him. The blazing wind lost its intensity.

"I know all about you. I know why you are the way you are. Come to me. Let me hold you."

Eve's movements weakened. She looked around in confusion for her mother. But Eve 1 was already dead. Tos.h.i.+aki spoke to her with sympathy.

"Your body is breaking apart now. It hurts, doesn't it? I understand. Come here. Let your father hold you. I will share your pain. You can make all the children you want. But what about parents? You can't create them. And your mother is dead. I am the only parent you have left. Share your suffering with me. Think only of me. Over here. I am here. Now come!"

The heat died down completely.

Silence fell. The alarm faded away as Tos.h.i.+aki's ears grew deaf to it. The ceiling stopped crumbling as well, as if the concrete fragments falling from above had ceased in mid-air. A silence that could not even be called silence.