Ring: Carrier - part 1

By Koch

Based on characters created by Suzuki Kouji.

This story follows Ring 0, the timeframe is mid-summer, 1982. It is 16 years after Sadako was thrown in the well by Ikuma and eight years before the events in Ring.

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-Part 1-

         Tiny chunks of gravel were chewed up and spat out from the wheels of the battered white pickup as it noisily made its way down the narrow track. Behind the wheel sat Kakizawa Kenji, peering intently at the track from behind his round-rimmed glasses, an unnaturally stern expression set on his thin face. Next to him in the passenger seat sat his daughter Akiko, a pretty eight year old girl. She was still dressed in her school uniform with her long jet-black hair tied tightly back. Kakizawa was halfway to taking her to school when Takashi had contacted him on the old CB radio.

         Yamamoto Akira, his colleague and childhood friend, was dead.

         The message kept echoing through Kakizawa's mind as he loomed ever closer to his destination. Takashi's normally calm, level voice raised in pitch to a panicky shriek.

         "Yamamoto's dead! I can't believe it, it's like his heart just stopped! I mean, is that possible? That a healthy, 35 year old man should have a fatal heart attack?! And his FACE..!" Takashi was well known to the team as having an extremely level head and for him to be -this- rattled, even at seeing a dead body, just didn't sit right.

         The pickup emerged into the clearing. Kakizawa slowed down and started to look among the newly-erected cabins for Takashi. He eventually spotted him standing with Mishima next to the old well. He stopped the truck and turned to Akiko.

         "Wait here," he said before swinging open the driver's door and stepping out. There hadn't been any rainfall in weeks and the ground under his feet felt unnaturally dry as he slowly walked over to where the two men were standing.

         Trying to delay the inevitable. The sight of his friend's corpse.

         Mishima turned and spotted him before he had even made half the distance between his truck and the well. "Shit!" Mishima exclaimed loudly. Something resembling fear or excitement shined in the big man's eyes. "I've never seen anything like THIS!"

         Kakizawa continued walking past Mishima. The two of them had never seen eye to eye. Mishima wasn't happy with his pay and he was pretty vocal about it. However, he seemed not to show much interest in working elsewhere and his large frame was well suited to heavy labour and so Kakizawa kept him around.

         Takashi had heard Mishima's outburst and turned his head around. Kakizawa met his gaze for an instant before his peripheral vision spotted the legs, oddly twisted amongst the pale, sun-bleached grass surrounding the well. Somewhere, echoing in his pounding head he heard Takashi say, "You had better prepare yourself."

         But it was too late. He was already looking at the body, his eyes roaming up the familiar leather boots, the pale

jeans caked in years of oil and dirt, the front darkened as Yamamoto's bowels had deserted him in his last moments. The white T-shirt, the red lettered slogan long since lost to repeated washings. His gaze slowed down by a fraction

of a second as it passed over Yamamoto's pale neck, until it eventually stopped on his face.

         A shot of liquid ice engulfed Kakizawa's entire body. The face was recognisable as his old friend but he had never seen such an expression on any living creature! Yamamoto's face was drained of all colour and looked damp under the eyes which had completely rolled back into the sockets, leaving little more than white orbs cris-crossed with tiny red veins. His mouth gaped open in an expression of complete terror, his discoloured tongue lay uncomfortably in his mouth like a purple sponge.

         Kakizawa stared, unable to tear his eyes away until he felt an arm on his shoulder. He slowly turned to face Takashi, his face ashen.

          "I contacted the local hospital right after I spoke to you. They're sending an ambulance, should be here any minute."

         Kakizawa forced the words out of his dry throat. "What happened to him?"

         "I dunno," came the reply. "I came up here this morning and found him like...this. It looks like he was setting the charges to demolish that old well when...." Takashi shrugged and let the sentence trail away.

         Kakizawa turned again and for the first time properly looked at the well. Its opening sealed, the chunk out of the side exposing nothing but an unending blackness below. The charges were indeed set up and good to go.

         "Why was he here alone? He shouldn't be handling charges on his own." Kakizawa knew how pointless-sounding his words were but anything was preferable to the resounding silence that was clinging to the air.

         "I guess he must've got here early to try and save us some wo...." Takashi's sentence was cut in half by a wailing siren; the ambulance had arrived.

         The ambulance stopped a few yards behind Kakizawa's pickup. The driver and passenger side doors were flung open and two medics stepped out. One rushed toward the back of the ambulance for a stretcher while the other one started to jog towards the men by the well. Kakizawa walked away from the well, meeting the medic half-way.

         "So what do we have here?" the medic's professional, flat tone seeming oddly appropriate. Kakizawa pointed soundlessly towards the well. The medic looked at him, shrugged and continued on. The other medic, visibly younger than the first, ran straight past, stretcher tucked under one arm. Kakizawa clearly overhead the first medic as he came within sight of the body, his professional tone now gone.

         "What the HELL?!"

         Kakizawa was intently watching the medics when Mishima spoke up.

         "So, what the hell do you think caused that? My grandfather died of a heart attack and his face damn well didn't look like that!" The medics were now coming back carrying the stretcher between them. After the body was loaded into the back of the ambulance the older medic stepped out to speak to Kakizawa.

         "Well, it doesn't -look- like a homicide to me but I expect the police will want to speak to you. At best guess I'd say it was an electric shock but from what I couldn't tell you. However, off the record and if I didn't know better...I'd say it looks like he was scared to death!"

         After the ambulance had driven away Kakizawa spoke to his men. The fear had pretty much burned itself out and his voice was now almost back to its usual steadiness.

         "Well, we can't work today. I'll expect the police will want to look around before we start tampering with the site. I'll phone Tachihara and tell him we're gonna be off for the next couple of days. You guys go home and I'll callyou tomorrow."

         Mishima nodded once and turned away. Takashi stayed where he was.

         "Are you sure?"

         "Yes, it's fine I just wish..." he was stopped mid-sentence by a thin voice, almost a whisper.

         "I know why he died."

         Kakizawa turned. It was Akiko's voice. She had exited the pickup and was now leaning against the well, her back to the two men.

         "I know why he died," she repeated. Kakizawa remembered the charges.

         "Hey! Come away from there! Thought I told you to wait in the truck." The girl remained still.

         "He shouldn't have tried to blow up the well. She's not ready." Kakizawa approached his daughter ready to pull her away, forcibly if he had to. She turned to face him.

         "She can't come out yet, she's not ready."

         Takashi's voice came from behind Kakizawa's left shoulder. "Who's not ready?"

         Akiko's gaze remained steadily on Kakizawa as she spoke.

         "The girl with the long hair."

                                           ***

         Akiko made her way silently through the woods. The whole place had changed since last time she was here. Gone were the cabins her daddy had built, replaced by thin trees which stretched themselves high into the air. The early morning sunlight filtered through the treetops, cascading its misty light to the ground below. One featurestill remained however: the well.

         Akiko steadily made her way towards it. It looked different now. One chunk was still missing out of the side, but now the top was open. Akiko peered inside but could make out nothing from the crawling blackness which saturated the inside of the well. She looked up at a house. Strangely drawn to it she began to walk.

         The house was a complete ruin, a mess of split wood and shattered glass. Cobwebs clung to nearly every spare inch of rotted timber. A cockroach scuttled out from under a table as Akiko made her way through the kitchen. She stopped at the foot of a staircase. A wave of fear and nausea washed over her. A metallic keening sound came from upstairs like a rusty blade scraping across sheet iron. A voice?

         Akiko was suddenly hit with a compulsion to find out what was making that noise. Despite her fear, Akiko swallowed hard and started to climb the staircase.

         The staircase moaned and creaked ominously, as if it was about to give way any second. Akiko slowly climbed her way to the top, determined. As she neared her destination she spotted a doorway. The crossbeam had collapsed and was now split in two pieces at the foot of the doorway. The whole thing was covered in cobwebs, which she now brushed aside to allow her access to the room inside.

         Her fear and anticipation hit fever pitch as the metallic scraping returned, this time louder and faster as if something was telling her to hurry up. She looked around for its source, and that was when she spotted the door. It was small, about the same height as Akiko and was made of metal. The metal had completely rusted and was now a dull brown where once it had probably been a dull grey. It had obviously once been sealed but now the lock was broken, the padlock lying

on the floor.

         Trembling, Akiko pushed the heavy door open to the sound of a piercing, metal shriek. Inside the room was dark, the only source of light coming from a barred window high above Akiko's head, its beam shining down on an old television set.

The TV was unplugged, its screen lifeless. Akiko looked around the room until she spied the bed in the darkest corner of the room. It was a hospital-style bed complete with restraints. Most disturbingly, in the centre of the bed was the imprint of a child, which had obviously lain, imprisoned on this bed for many years to create such an indentation.

         As she stared, a metallic grinding sound replaced the noises she heard earlier as a small figure, forming itself

from the darkness, slowly came into existence on the bed. It was a small child, smaller even than Akiko. Its slender ankles and wrists tightly bound by the bed's restraints. The child wore a white nightdress, much like Akiko's but her face was invisible, cloaked behind a mass of greasy hair.

         As the child began to struggle against her restraints, the TV barked into life.

         Akiko spun around, terrified. The TV was showing nothing but a blue orb of howling static, but a girl now stood next to it. She looked like an older version of the girl tied to the bed, although her dress was soaked and clung to her gaunt frame. Her hands hung awkwardly by her sides, her shoulders seemed snapped out of alignment, forcing the figure to stoop. Its face was also hidden beneath its hair, but as Akiko continued to stare, paralysed by fear, the figure started to raise its head. The lank mass of hair parting strand by strand to reveal the face beneath.

                                          ***

         Kakizawa sat cross-legged on the floor staring drunkenly at the TV screen. It was showing some stupid quiz show, but as it was 1:30 in the morning and he was working his way through a bottle of whisky, Kakizawa wasn't paying much

attention. It was three days ago since the well incident and he had not slept since. It wasn't just Akiko's constant nightmares. He felt...wrong somehow, an uneasy feeling which chewed at his gut telling him things were not as they should be.

         The police investigation was over. They had picked the place apart and could find no evidence of any suspicious circumstances surrounding Yamamoto's death.

         Construction was due to start again tomorrow. He wasn't looking forward to it, in fact he wished he hadn't taken the job. Although at the time there was no way of telling things were going to turn out this way. Business had been pretty slow lately and such a big job was certainly welcome. They had even had to hire an extra man to ensure the job was completed on time. Tachihara... Kakizawa remembered their recent phone conversation, why did he ask so many questions? He had wanted to know every single grisly detail! Was he some sort of sicko? He had been like this when they had first driven him to the site too, wandering around looking at every square inch of that ruined house. Still, he had pulled his weight pretty well since the project started. He always seemed distracted though...

         Kakizawa was separated from his thoughts by a piercing scream that suddenly rang out from across the hall,snapping him into sobriety. After the initial wash of panic passed over him, he set down his whisky bottle and made his way across the hall. This had been happening every night since that damn well incident! He wished he had never taken Akiko along.

         He slid open the screen door to reveal Akiko sat bolt upright in bed. She slowly turned to look at him, eyes peering through a cascade of jet-black hair. A thin whisper pulled itself from her throat.

         "We're all going to die."

                                          ***

         The headlights cut through the darkness as Tachihara's jeep approached the well, stopping mere inches from it. Tachihara felt a wave of anxiety and anticipation chill his entire body as he cut the ignition. Finally he was going to get some answers! He had been so disappointed when he had found nothing in that burnt wreckage of a house. Sure the police hadn't found anything either, but his sister and all those others couldn't have just disappeared! Something strange had happened here, and somehow, the well was the answer to it. He grabbed the torch from the passenger seat and climbed out of the 4x4.

         Tachihara put all his weight behind the stone cover sealing the well and pushed. He was a strong man and the stone made a reluctant grinding noise as it was pushed away, opening the well. Tachihara peered inside shining the torch, its beam failing to penetrate the crawling gloom.

         Tachihara went back to the 4x4, it had a winch attached to the front bumper for pulling farm vehicles clear of muddy fields. He took hold of the hook and pulled the rope free. He made his way back to the well and lowered the hook over the side, slowly feeding the rope down into the darkness below. When the winch had lowered all its rope into the well, Tachihara grabbed a pair of gloves from the 4x4 and taking a firm hold of the rope, lowered himself over the side.

         The rocks jutted out and were relatively dry so Tachihara had little difficulty navigating his descent. The well was deep though, as the water came in sight Tachihara looked up to see the opening a great distance above his head. A stone ring framing the night sky above.

         He entered the water with a splash, its cold darkness claiming his body from the chest down. His hands began to grope blindly in the depths. Kakizawa's daughter had said something about a girl being down here? Maybe it was just a child's thoughtless chatter but maybe, just maybe she might've meant Etsuko! Maybe her body was down here. It had been his mother's dying wish that he bring his sister home so that they could be buried together. Hope turned to despair as his hands trawled yet again through the water still finding nothing.

         Defeated, Tachihara leaned back against the unyielding rock. Recovering his strength before the long climb out to the surface. As he stared, dejectedly into the water he saw a patch where bubbles were rising to the surface. Cautiously, he made his way towards it. As he drew closer the bubbles rose more rapidly and he could hear a rusty scraping noise. Inch by inch he moved his hand closer to the disturbance. He paused, only for a second.

         A pale hand shot up from the murky depths and clamped in to Tachihara's arm with such burning ferocity that it felt like a million white-hot needles were piercing his skin.

         A blood-curdling scream ripped its way out of Tachihara's lungs, out through the opening of the well and into the uncaring night sky.

-End of part one-