Kimura by R.G. Honda

Author:R.G. Honda [R.G. Honda]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: R.G. Honda
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 21

Down

The treadplates clanged mercilessly as Naoko descended the steps zigzagging down across the width of the warehouse. Sizeable gaps separated each mismatched panel, promising more than a few broken bones to any who slipped through the thirty-three–foot gap created between the stairs and the bloody hexagons below.

Naoko traced the rusted railing with her damp palm as she went. The chipped paint skittered off of the iron as she slowly adjusted to the rolling blue light that both illuminated and obscured her surroundings. The stench intensified with every step. By the last five, it was burning at her eyes and throat. Akari muttered disgust a few yards behind, producing a shuffle of leather as she pulled her collar up about her nose to lessen the blow. Naoko stopped as her boot sole finally met the red floor tiling. The putrefaction swarmed to an absolute climax. The droves of mattresses appeared to joggle along with the light, casting shadows across the bloody web of hexagons in a dizzying flicker film. A moment later, the sweeping illumination made Naoko aware of the array of small buckets accompanying each mattress. She cast her glance over the one closest.

A yellow liquid stood stagnant within, the blue light generous enough upon her closer inspection to reveal the shadow of something solid also dwelling within the bucket’s murky depths.

Naoko gagged – the world had rotted away. Its wet flesh slopped off in generous rolls and piled in the most fitting place it could conceive: a graveyard within a warehouse. But, not one of death. There was no rest for the residents gifted to each mattress. All that existed in this world was a constant cycle of labour and malodor, day in and day out. This was the afterlife, and it festered.

‘God, Naoko. It reeks down here. How the hell do they get them into workplaces unnoticed if they keep them in conditions like this?’

Naoko shifted her nose from the crook of her inner-elbow, careful to avoid tipping the fetid bedpans as she walked down the aisle created between the third and fourth row. ‘I suppose that’s your answer.’

Akari’s line of sight followed the corner to which Naoko’s hand motioned. A collection of faded orange buckets were lined by a green wall of ceramic. The tiles were staggered, odd gaps made up their borders, and an obvious differentiation in colour could be seen throughout. Someone had evidently paid dearly for poor initial craftsmanship over the years with the cost of multiple replacements.

A broken rectangle of steel guard rails, seemingly bolted down from back when the factory was still active, extended from the wall, creating a segregated zone of roughly three-hundred square feet. An assortment of filthy t-shirts clung damply to the railings, their initially vibrant colours washed out and their logos, predominantly Nike and Fila, faded.

Two thick hose pipes, both the same gaudy orange as the buckets, snaked across the floor. They weaved around one another and settled in a clumsy heap of tubes and sponges against the railings.

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