Chapter 35 - Chapter 33: A Story of Only Having Orange Juice
The few minutes to the village office were extremely awkward. Sitting with the youth in the bed of the swaying truck, the silence was very painful for me. Is there anyone who enjoys being with someone who doesn't think well of them?
When the truck finally arrived at the village office and I met Kaburagi-san, who was waiting for me in the parking lot, I felt relieved that I was finally being released. After thanking the glaring youth and the man in the driver's seat who probably knew nothing, I followed Kaburagi-san into the village office building.
"Why the meeting with Yamato-san today?"
"There are just a few things I want to ask."
"I see."
It might have been my imagination, but Kaburagi-san's attitude seemed curt. Perhaps he also didn't have good feelings toward me like the youth, but I tried not to mind it.
The two of us proceeded down the deserted, dimly lit corridor. Eventually, the wooden door of the Village Head's office, which I had visited over a week ago, came into view. When Kaburagi-san knocked, the voice of Yamato-san, who serves as the acting village head, echoed from beyond the thick door, "Enter."
"Hey, it's been a while. What kind of business brings you here today?"
The smile Yamato-san showed me seemed no different from when we first met, but I felt something was different. I can't put it into words well, but somehow the atmosphere is different.
"There are just various things I want to ask. Is it okay if I ask a few questions?"
"Yeah, it's fine. Oh, do you want something to drink? Though we only have orange juice."
"Excuse me, I'll have some."
Yamato-san spoke into what seemed to be an intercom microphone, "Bring some juice," and then urged me to sit on the sofa lined up in front of the desk. As told, I sat down, and my body sank into the soft sofa.
There was a knock on the door, and the woman who had been at the reception entered the room, carrying a glass filled with orange juice on a tray. Yamato-san received the juice from her and placed it on the table in front of me.
"Here, you probably haven't had a cold juice in a long time, right?"
Certainly, I had hardly been able to drink cold beverages until I came to this village. Even after coming to this village, what I had been drinking was cold groundwater, and I hadn't had a single drop of cold juice since the outbreak.
It's because refrigerators became unusable since the infrastructure died.
The water stored in the water tanks of apartments and such had become lukewarm from being hit by sunlight, and I made sure to boil river water before drinking it. No matter how cold it was, it was because I didn't know what was upstream. Even if it looked transparent and beautiful, a corpse might have been soaking in the water upstream. Considering the fear of infectious diseases and such, drinking cold water had become almost impossible.
Touching the glass, it was cold, and my hand got wet from condensation. When I timidly took a sip, a sweet and sour taste immediately spread in my mouth. I had many opportunities to drink juice or soft drinks themselves from plastic bottles, cans, or bottles, but as I thought, cold juice was exceptional. I felt like it had a bit of a strange taste, but at least three months had passed since its manufacture. It would be boorish to complain.
"So, what are the things you want to ask?"
Yamato-san placed the tray on the desk, which also looked expensive, and sat on the sofa in front of me across the table. At his waist, a handgun was still hanging in its holster.
"It might be a question that makes the people of this village uncomfortable, but is it okay if I ask?"
"It's fine, it must be hard living with anxiety."
"Then I'll ask. Why do you not want us to go outside the house grounds?"
To that question, Yamato-san answered with his usual calm manner.
"Because we don't want you to go out carelessly and have the infected sniff out the existence of this village——————but that won't satisfy you, will it?"
"Yeah. The house we are staying in is quite far from the village boundary. Unless an infected has already entered the village, it's unlikely we'd be found. Despite that, we aren't even allowed to take a walk, and if we step out even once, the village guard people immediately come rushing."
It's as if they are watching us——————no, they are actually watching us. Otherwise, there's no way the guard would arrive so quickly.
When I threw that doubt at him, Yamato-san crossed his arms and suddenly confessed, "I'm sorry, but we were watching you."
"I'm sorry, but there are many residents who can't trust outsiders. In fact, several times, refugees who came before acted as they pleased and caused friction with the residents. Because of that, for people who come from outside, we've established a period to watch and judge whether they are safe. That's why we couldn't let you go outside carelessly; I'm sorry for keeping it quiet."
According to what Yamato-san said, a group of young people who had evacuated to this village before began doing whatever they wanted as soon as they knew this was a safe place, and in the end, they had to be kicked out by brandishing guns. Yamato-san and the others were wary that we might be that kind of people, too.
The reason that youth told me to get out was also likely because he was wary that we would follow in the footsteps of those young people who were kicked out after doing whatever they wanted. If such a thing had happened, it wouldn't be strange for people to harbor wariness toward outsiders.
"If you had taken actions that suggested you didn't care about the rules, we would have ended up kicking you out of the village. But well, you lived while observing the established rules. It was our mistake to let you build up stress by not being able to go out. I'm sorry."
"No, if that's the case, then it's fine... Then, can I ask the next question?"
"Yeah, go ahead."
"Why are you not trying to make us work? In this day and age, it's unthinkable to provide food and housing for free. I expected labor to be asked for in return, and in fact, I was anticipating it. Why are you letting us stay in a NEET state? Do you really have enough hands?"
Yamato-san's answer was the same as before. It was that the risk of letting us, whom they couldn't completely trust, go outside was greater than the results obtained from labor. It would be unbearable if we did whatever we wanted while outside for labor. Rather than that, they keep us confined in the house and see if we are safe people. They just prioritized that.
"To tell the truth, we don't have enough hands. But if you were to wander outside, it would be even more inefficient to allocate hands for monitoring and searching for you. Instead, if we keep you confined in the house, the personnel for monitoring can be kept to a minimum."
"As I thought, you can't trust people you've just met..."
"To be honest, yes. In fact, when the police were still functioning, information was coming in that riots were occurring in various places. In such a chaotic time, there are many people who mistakenly think that law and order have vanished and start running wild. In fact, that kind of people have come to this village several times."
Even so, the reason Yamato-san and the others continue to accept refugees must be because they are a group that tries to believe in humans even in such a situation. Thinking that, I felt ashamed deep down for having doubted them until now. If the people of this village didn't want to be involved in trouble, they just wouldn't have to put up the sign for the shelter. If they did that, no one would notice the existence of this village, and the people of Osawa Village could live in peace.
The refugees who were said to have left the village were likely mostly those "people who were doing whatever they wanted." Otherwise, they wouldn't think of leaving such a safe village. They must have wanted to act according to their own desires rather than maintaining a peaceful life by following the rules, and so they left this village.
The sound like the howl of an infected that I heard while in the bath must have just been the sound of the wind sounding like that. Or maybe an infected had really come near the village. Either way, there is nothing for me to be anxious about.
"...I'm sorry, for asking various things."
"No, it's fine. It's important for us to remove people's anxieties, too. More than that, could I ask one thing from my side as well?"
A question for me? What could it be? Basic information like where we came from was all told on the day we came to this village. What is he trying to ask now?
After glancing at his wristwatch, Yamato-san opened his mouth.
"Do you think the infected have their old emotions and memories?"
As soon as Yamato-san said that, I couldn't help but doubt his sanity.
"Eh? No, I don't really understand the meaning of the question."
"Whether those 'former' humans we call infected have their emotions and memories as they were before. What do you think?"
"There's no way they have them."
I answered immediately.
The infected are existences whose reason has been blown away by the virus, and who act only according to appetite and combat instinct. If they see a human, they kill and eat them; there is not a shred of humanity there. The limiters in their brains have also come off and their sense of pain is dull, so although they will eventually bleed to death, they will crawl on the ground and chase you even if their lower body is severed. Those things are no different from beasts in human form.
I didn't understand the intent of the question, why Yamato-san would ask such a thing that is obvious to anyone. Has he never seen an infected? No, in the time from when he fled from the police station where he worked to here, he must have seen the disastrous scenes of the city many times. If you see the remains of people cruelly eaten alive by the infected even once, you wouldn't even think of such a thing.
"Those things only look like humans on the outside, but on the inside, they are beasts without a shred of reason. If they had memories or emotions, why would they attack us? If they were the same humans, they shouldn't think of attacking, right?"
"I wonder about that. Maybe they are losing to the urge to eat humans while trying to remain human. Their attacking us might also be because they want us to save them from their pain. Deep in their hearts, they might be seeking help from us."
"So what if they are? It doesn't change the fact that those things attack us."
Even though I was moved by his generosity until just now, Yamato-san rapidly began to seem like a trivial person. People who say these kinds of things were common before or immediately after the infection spread in Japan.
When the government issued a notice to the police and JSDF that it was okay to shoot the infected if the infection spread in Japan, human rights groups protested, claiming "the infected are also human," and surrounded groups of armed police and JSDF officers to obstruct their activities. Even when the infected appeared in Japan, it was people with such thoughts who detained the infected who had lost their reason, claiming there was a prospect of treatment, and forcibly took them to hospitals, spreading the infection.
"Even if those things had emotions or memories, I can't possibly think so. Where is the reason in those things that drool blood while groaning 'aa-uu' and sprinting at full speed?"
"Then, are you saying that no human-like parts remain in them at all?"
"Of course."
Yamato-san let out a sigh as if to say he was disappointed and said while looking at his wristwatch.
"Then, when your own family becomes infected, wouldn't you think you want to help them? Or would you kill them without hesitation?"
"The latter. Killing them at that point is rather a mercy."
Taking another sip of the juice, I answer.
Well, my mother has already been sent to the other world by my hand, though. Yamato-san, who doesn't know that, looked at me as if he couldn't believe it.
"...I see, it seems your thinking and mine are different."
"I think it would be scary in its own way if there were people with exactly the same thinking."
"Haha, no doubt. Even so, it's a pity; since you seem like an honest person, I thought you would take our side."
Take our side? What is Yamato-san talking about?
At that moment, I noticed I was being assaulted by an intense sleepiness. Even though my head was clear and my thoughts were distinct until just now, my eyelids are incredibly heavy. Since I slept a full 8 hours last night, it shouldn't be due to lack of sleep.
I tried to shake my head to dispel the sleepiness, but my body wouldn't listen either. As soon as I tried to stand up and stretch, I staggered and collapsed onto the sofa. The glass containing the orange juice slipped from my hand, fell to the floor, and shattered into pieces.
In my swaying vision, Yamato-san was looking at his wristwatch again. Why has he been checking the time so many times since a while ago?
Strength left my entire body, and my body, losing to gravity, fell onto the sofa. In my sideways vision, Yamato-san was looking at me with eyes of pity.
Why does he not try to help me, who suddenly collapsed, and why is he not worried?
At that moment, the shards of the broken glass cup and the orange juice splattered on the floor entered my eyes.
Could it be...?
Before my poorly functioning brain could reach a conclusion, I lost to the sleepiness and closed my eyelids.
I look forward to your opinions and impressions.