Highschool of the Dead: Fanfiction Darkpenn

Chapter 0.9: Saeko and the long goodbey

Saeko and the Long Goodbye

What really matters is what we take with us, and what we leave behind, and what we keep in the secret places of our heart.

[Author's Note: This story takes place when the group is staying at the Takagi family mansion; specifically, within the time period of Episode 11. It relates to images that appear in the credit sequence.]

In a secluded corner of the garden of the mansion, Saeko removed the sword that Saya's father had given her from its sheath and examined it closely. It was truly beautiful. She tried a series of practice moves with it. It felt as if it belonged in her hand, or perhaps her hand belonged to the blade. She returned it to its scabbard.

She looked up at the sky. Clouds were gathering: rain was on the way.

"Hello, Saeko," said a voice. Saya. "Not doing the kimono thing anymore?"

"Please thank your mother for the loan of it," said Saeko. "But it is not appropriate for what I have in mind. I am planning an excursion. To my apartment. It is not far from here. I have told Takashi I would be going."

"I'll have some of the staff drive you."

"Thank you, but I would prefer to go on my own. I will not be gone for long."

Saya nodded. "Sure, I get that," she said. They went to the gate and Saya directed the guards to allow Saeko to pass through.

Saeko walked through the empty streets, carrying the Hokusawa blade. She wondered why she was going to the apartment. There was not really anything there that was important to her. There was a cabinet full of meaningless trophies. Some clothes: also meaningless. Not much else.

Perhaps it's a matter of bidding farewell to the past, she thought. A way of accepting that everything you thought you were, everything you thought you knew, was built on sand.

She turned into the street where she had lived; the building with her apartment was at the end. She stopped.

"Well, that's one way of saying it," she said to herself.

The building was no longer there. It was just a burned-out frame and a pile of smoking ashes.

"Don't move, girlie," said a voice from behind her. She felt the barrel of a pistol on the back of her neck.

She had heard that voice before. She had heard those words.

She remembered. It had been night.

"Drop the sword," said the man.

She wondered if she could move quickly enough. But the gun was pressed against her skin, and it was very likely that the man holding it knew how to use it.

She put the sword down.

"Now put your hands behind you," he said. "And don't think that I care whether you're alive or dead when I get you down on your back."

She did so. He bound her wrists with a plastic tie. He pushed her into an alley that ran off the street.

"Turn around," he said.

She did, to face him.

"You're a pretty one," he said.

"As you have already told me," she said.

"What, we've met before?"

Saeko said nothing.

"What's your name, girlie?"

"You would be afraid to hear it," said Saeko.

He peered into her face.

"You," he said at last.