WELL: Chapter 3

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He was just about to sink his teeth into a chunk of meat when the dream fell apart and he woke. The fact that he’d dreamed of food—and had woken up right before eating—made him grind his teeth in frustration. Swallowing the saliva that had pooled in his mouth sent a sharp ache twisting through his stomach.

He’d been dulling the hunger with wine, but since the day before yesterday, even drinking made him feel sick. The only other thing he’d managed to consume in the past two days was rainwater, gathered during the occasional downpours.

Once he was awake, the hunger gnawed at him too deeply to ignore, and sleep wouldn’t return. He checked the time. 5:35 a.m. He’d only been asleep for about an hour—and it had been shallow. He raked a hand through his hair and lay down again.

He already knew there was no food in the cellar. He’d torn the whole place apart. Still, his restless brain began counting. Today was October 18th—eight full days. It had been eight days since he’d eaten anything solid. Each day it became harder to move, harder to speak. His strength was clearly draining away, and part of him feared that if he fell asleep again, he might not wake up.

If he was going to die... he wanted to eat something first. Anything. Even just a piece of chocolate. He saw something small, pebble-like, rolling across the floor. He picked it up and brought it to his nose. It smelled sweet.

It was a cork. He knew it. But still—desperate—he bit into it. The rough texture and lingering scent of wine made his tongue curl, but he forced himself to chew and swallow.

Within five minutes, he threw it back up.

He gagged violently, retching again and again. The sound must’ve woken Shinobu, who sat up beside him and gently rubbed his back. “Ryou-chan, are you okay?” he asked.

The bile burned Ryousuke’s throat, and tears welled in his eyes.

“I’m hungry...”

He grabbed Shinobu by the front of his shirt and shook him roughly.

“I said I’m hungry. Starving! Do something about it!”

Since returning four days ago—beaten after his first search for food—Shinobu hadn’t gone out again. He spent every day in the basement, sipping wine. When it rained, he placed empty bottles outside to catch water.

“I’m gonna die.”

Ryousuke said it like a threat—and he could feel Shinobu trembling.

“I’m gonna die. I am gonna die. I’m so hungry, I can’t take it anymore. I’m seriously gonna die. I can’t… I can’t...”

The more Ryousuke repeated the word “die,” the more real it became, and the more it terrified him. Maybe not today—but tomorrow, or the day after, he really might die.

“I wanna eat something before I die. Just something... anything...”

He had never, not once, begged his servant with a voice this desperate.

“I want to eat, Shinobu…”

Shinobu exhaled deeply, and as if to comfort him, slowly reached out and stroked Ryousuke’s head.

“Ryou-chan… it’s okay. You can eat me.”

He lifted his cutter shirt all the way up and held out his arm. Ryousuke stared at it—at the makeshift ration now offered to him in the dark, a limp rod of flesh thrust out before his eyes.

“If I can’t walk anymore, that’d be bad, right? So… leave the legs for last, okay? But you can eat my arms.”

Technically, yes—it was flesh. Just like chicken or pork. But eating a human being... it wasn’t something allowed. It would tear something down—ethics, maybe, or the invisible framework that made a person human.

But then again—what did it matter? If he died, there’d be nothing left. Being human only had value while alive. Once you died, all that remained were bones.

Hands shaking, Ryousuke grabbed Shinobu’s wrist. As he brought it close to his nose, he smelled sweat. He pressed his lips against the skin, testing the feel. A little above the elbow, on the inner side, it was soft. When he licked it, Shinobu flinched.

The soft skin tasted of salt and sand. But no matter how tender it was, it didn’t feel like food. Still, Ryousuke licked it again—and again—and then opened his mouth wide.

“Ah—!”

Shinobu cried out. His body tensed. The skin had a surprising elasticity, pushing back against Ryousuke’s teeth. He bore down harder, his molars pressing in slowly. The moment the taste of blood spread across his tongue, nausea surged up and Ryousuke snapped back to himself.

He scrambled away, spitting the metallic saliva onto the floor over and over again. No matter how hungry he was, he couldn’t eat human flesh. He wasn’t a lion. He wasn’t a tiger.

“Ryou-chan… I really don’t mind,” Shinobu whispered.

That broke him.

“Like hell I’m worried about you! I don’t want to eat people, no matter what. I’d rather die than do that. I just want to eat something normal! Being with you is making me lose my goddamn mind. Who the hell just offers themselves like that? Even if you say it, how the hell am I supposed to actually do it, you dumbass!”

Crying made him tired. Yelling made him tired. But this pathetic, tangled emotion—grief, frustration, despair—had only one place to go: the only other person here.

“This is all your fault, you know. You didn’t stock up on food, and that’s why we’re like this. If you’d just grabbed a few cans of something before those underground freaks staked out their territory, none of this would’ve happened.”

“I’m sorry, Ryou-chan…”

Ryousuke slammed his fists against the wall like a madman.

“It’s your fault. If I hadn’t messed up my leg, I would’ve handled this just fine! I’d have brought back food, a blanket, something to keep us warm. Why’d I have to be the one who got hurt, huh?! Why not you?! If it’d been me—”

His useless, injured ankle burned with resentment. With rage.

“If I die, Shinobu—it’s your fault.”

He pointed a trembling finger at his face.

“I’m sorry, Ryou-chan… I… I—”

As Shinobu stumbled closer in a tearful blur, Ryousuke lashed out with his left foot and kicked him. Shinobu fell backward with a thud.

“Don’t come near me. If you really feel bad—then prove it. Crawl if you have to. But go find us something to eat.”

Ryousuke screamed, cried, raged—until even that exhausted him. Just before dawn, he collapsed and lay there, limp. Shinobu didn’t come near. He hadn’t been told to.

Hunger, irritation, and cold came in waves, one after the other. At six a.m., the beep of the hour echoed softly, and Ryousuke sensed Shinobu stand. He heard the sound of slow footsteps climbing the stairs, the creak of the door opening in silence. For a moment, the deep blue of pre-dawn slipped into the basement. Then Shinobu stepped out, the door closed, and all that remained was the faint whisper of sand tumbling down the stairs.

The idea that he might have been abandoned didn’t strike him until three hours later. It started with a simple question: Where the hell did he go? Shinobu had been afraid to leave ever since he came back beaten. Would someone like that really go out again just to look for food?

So why had he left?

Because Ryousuke had screamed like a lunatic, demanding to be fed? Maybe he’d finally had enough. Maybe he’d gone off somewhere, alone, without saying a word.

When that possibility hit him, a chill ran down his spine.

I can’t do anything on my own.

If no one came to help, if he was left alone with a bum ankle, this basement would become his coffin. He’d die here, staring at the darkness overhead. Even if he screamed, the only voice he’d hear would be his own, echoing off the walls and driving him mad.

Unable to stand the dark, Ryousuke dragged himself up the stairs. The moment he opened the hatch, blinding sunlight pierced his eyes like blades.

“Shinobu! Shinobu!”

He crawled outside, shouting his name—but there was nothing. The desk and chair Shinobu had used as landmarks had toppled over. Ryousuke frantically propped them back up. There was only the blinding sun, the wind that sometimes howled across the silence, and the endless, pure white sand.

He sat down in a daze, staring at the blank horizon. But the heat was unbearable, and eventually, he returned to the basement.

The sunlight pouring through the open door shifted gradually with time. When even the orange glow vanished and the scent of night crept in, Ryousuke climbed the stairs again to close the door.

There was no moon that night. The sky was pitch black, scattered with an unbelievable number of stars—and the sight brought tears to his eyes.

His stomach ached, but somehow he didn’t care anymore. There was something far more desperate in him now. Sitting in the dark with his knees pulled up to his chest, he checked the watch over and over again.

If Shinobu came back, he’d have to apologize. For lashing out. For everything. He had to—because without Shinobu, he couldn’t do anything. But… would Shinobu even come back?

Lying down, Ryousuke forced his eyes shut. He knew that sleeping was better than sitting there, anxiously waiting. He tried to escape into a dream—but his body wouldn’t allow it. Hunger gnawed at him relentlessly, as if mocking his attempt.

The cramping pain in his belly. The overwhelming dread that maybe, just maybe, he’d been left behind. That no one was coming back. There couldn’t be a worse kind of misery than this.

Why did I even survive? he thought. If I’d just stayed above ground instead of going to that basement shop that day... maybe I could’ve died easily. Without knowing a thing.

As dawn arrived with a sharper chill than ever, Ryousuke was finally starting to drift off when he heard it—a creak. The door opened with a long groan. He shot upright and stared at the ceiling.

A black shadow descended the stairs, step by slow step. It knelt down before him.

“…Ryou-chan. You’re awake.”

It was Shinobu’s voice.

Ryousuke was flooded with relief. He hadn’t been abandoned. The warmth of that realization brought tears streaming down his cheeks—but Shinobu didn’t notice. Ryousuke grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled him close. The cold fabric smelled like Shinobu. Without saying a word, he wrapped his arms tightly around his back.

The feel of another human being—it overwhelmed him with joy. Shinobu hugged him back just as tightly, pressing his nose against Ryousuke’s shoulder. Clinging to each other like they were falling into a ravine, they both felt it—an ache that had no name, and a closeness too raw to deny.

“Ryou-chan, help me…”

Shinobu’s fingertips were trembling—quivering in small, tight spasms like he was freezing.

“Help me, Ryou-chan… my hands won’t stop shaking. They’ve been like this… all this time…”

Ryousuke took Shinobu’s frozen fingers in both his own. But his hands were just as cold, so he guided them up to the warmth of his neck instead. Shinobu’s shaking gradually began to subside, soaking up the heat from Ryousuke’s skin. He thought he felt a bit more pressure in that grip, and when he lifted his gaze, a chilled cheek brushed against his own.

The rough stubble scraped his skin—he grimaced—but before he could react, dry lips grazed his own lips.

“Ryou-chan… Ryou-chan…”

Shinobu repeated his name in a trembling, tearful voice.

“If it’s for you, I could die. If it’s to protect you, I could do anything. I mean it… really…”

Hearing that brought him relief. He hadn’t been abandoned after all. Shinobu would always be his servant—he’d stay by his side until the very end. He’d take on Ryousuke’s final loneliness too, he was sure of it.

They clung to each other, carried away by fear and solitude. But when the digital beep of the clock marked the hour, Ryousuke snapped back to himself. Embarrassment surged through him, and he pushed Shinobu away. But Shinobu refused to let go.

“Ah—right…”

Shinobu fumbled around in the dark and suddenly offered Ryousuke a rustling plastic bag.

“Here, Ryou-chan. Eat this.”

He pressed the bag against his face. It smelled like bread. Ryousuke tore it open and bit down, desperate. Soft bread, sweet cream—the smell alone made his mouth flood with saliva. He chewed like a madman.

“Does it taste good?”

Ryousuke didn’t nod or answer—he just swallowed. In seconds, the single roll had disappeared into his stomach.

“Tomorrow, I’ll try going somewhere else. I’ll make sure you have something to eat, Ryou-chan.”

Shinobu had gone out and returned with food—a small but undeniable success. Yesterday’s fear vanished like a lie. Though his stomach still wasn’t full and his heart not fully settled, something inside him unclenched. Leaning against Shinobu, Ryousuke fell straight into sleep.

When he woke, Shinobu was still there. Even when Ryousuke shifted away, feeling cramped from being held from behind, Shinobu followed. When his bangs were touched—when his dirty, unwashed hair was played with—he batted the hand away, annoyed. But Shinobu didn’t give up easily.

On any other day, he would’ve yelled at him. But not today—not after yesterday. Somehow, whether intentionally or not, Shinobu had managed to carve his presence deeply, unshakably into his master.

“Hey. Open the door.”

He said it less to get light and more in the hope that Shinobu would step away.

Obediently, Shinobu went to open it. When he returned, he noticed Ryousuke sitting with his back to the wall and looked at him with a faint, lonely expression.

When sunlight hit Shinobu’s face, Ryousuke flinched. His cheeks were hollow, his eye sockets sunken. Of course—Ryousuke hadn’t eaten, but that meant Shinobu hadn’t either. And compared to Ryousuke, who’d barely moved because of his injury, Shinobu had been out there using up his strength. Somehow, that obvious truth had never occurred to him.

The world outside was bright, but even that light felt distant, like it belonged to someone else. Shinobu’s gaunt frame sat down beside him, pressed close. He slid down against the wall, then leaned his head gently onto Ryousuke’s knee.

“I’m really glad I’m with you, Ryou-chan. Because you’re hurt, I keep thinking I have to stay strong…”

He appreciated the sentiment—but Shinobu himself was clearly weakening. In a state like this, how much longer could he rely on him? Ryousuke just wanted rescue to come. Soon. Before Shinobu could no longer move. Before he died.

“Did you see anything out there?”

The head resting on his lap shifted slightly.

“A helicopter or anything? Something that looked like it might be coming to help?”

Without even needing to think, Shinobu replied.

“I didn’t see anything. Nothing at all.”

Is it because we’re hiding underground that they can’t find us? But there was no way they could wait for help under that merciless midday sun. The chair and table outside should serve as some kind of marker. Maybe help wasn’t refusing to come—but simply couldn’t. Maybe the area had been contaminated, quarantined. Radiation, for example. Maybe no one was allowed to enter.

…But all of that was guesswork. The truth was, he didn’t know a thing. Ryousuke let out a deep breath.

“Ryou-chan… I haven’t even seen birds.”

He wasn’t sure why Shinobu said it. But he didn’t ask. He just nodded and said, “Yeah.”

That afternoon, a downpour hit like a tropical squall. It only lasted about ten minutes, but despite the pounding of the rain, Shinobu had fallen asleep, still lying across Ryousuke’s lap. Maybe he hadn’t slept all night.

Lulled by his steady breathing, Ryousuke was just starting to doze off himself when—he heard it. A voice. From outside the door.

He held his breath.

Then came the sound of footsteps, heavy, clanging against the metal door above. Ryousuke pressed a hand to his trembling throat and shouted as loud as he could:

“Hey! Down here!”

The footsteps stopped cold.

“We’re in the basement! Please help us! I’m injured—I can’t walk!”

Shinobu shot up, grabbing Ryousuke’s arm tightly as he kept yelling.

“No, Ryou-chan. Don’t.”

He didn’t understand why he was being stopped.

“What do you mean, don’t? There’s someone out there! Someone came to rescue us! Open the door—if we don’t, they might leave!”

“We don’t know that they’re here to help. You don’t know this, but… there are a lot of bad people out there.”

Ryousuke punched the face that kept making excuses.

“If you won’t go, I will!”

He forgot all about his injured ankle as he dragged himself across the floor and up the stairs. In his mind, there were clean beds, real meals, and a return to a life where his dignity remained intact.

With hope and expectation swelling in his chest, Ryousuke flung the door open.

“Found someone down here.”

A voice fell on him—flat, unimpressed.

But what stood before him weren’t rescue workers or any adult come to help. Just three boys, around his own age, staring at him with cold, indifferent eyes. There was no sympathy, no friendliness. The sight of them drained all his hope and filled his chest with dread.

One wore casual clothes. The other two were in the uniform of a nearby all-boys school—an infamous one, known for its low academic standards and problem students.

“What’s this place? You alone?” the boy in street clothes asked, leaning forward. His brown hair caught the sun and shone gold.

Don’t judge people by appearances, Ryousuke reminded himself.

“This is my house’s basement. There’s one more person inside.”

“A girl?”

The question was crude and unfiltered.

“No… it’s a guy. Same age. We’re childhood friends—”

“So no girl, huh? Lame. What’s in there? Food?”

The boy cut him off, uninterested in answers—he was just here to ask what he wanted.

“There’s no food. But it used to be a wine cellar, so there’s wine…”

“Booze, huh?”

The short-haired one in uniform licked his lips.

“Lucky. Guess it was worth coming all the way out here,” muttered the other guy in a school uniform—the one with the nose piercing—shrugging casually. When his eyes met Ryousuke’s, he clicked his tongue.

“You’re in the way.”

Without warning, Ryousuke was kicked square in the face. His fingers lost their grip on the doorframe.

“Uwaaahhh!!”

He toppled backward, tumbling down the stairs, landing with a hard slam onto the basement floor, his right leg twisted underneath him. “Gyaaah!” he screamed.

The swelling in that leg had only just started to go down. It had still hurt to put weight on it, but he’d begun to believe that maybe, just maybe, he’d be able to walk again soon. Now all that progress had been undone—and then some. The pain in his right ankle surged worse than ever as he writhed on the ground, clutching it, crying out.

“Ryou-chan! Ryou-chan!”

Shinobu came running. Ryousuke clung to his servant as the harsh, discordant clatter of three pairs of feet echoed across the metal stairs.

“Ugh, it stinks in here. Smells like a goddamn toilet,” the pierced guy muttered, glancing around. The thick iron pipe in his hand was terrifying. These guys had the kind of minds that let them kick a stranger in the face without blinking. There was no telling what they’d do. Only now did Ryousuke begin to understand why Shinobu had been so hesitant to open the door.

One of the boys—the short-haired one—grabbed a bottle of wine from the shelf. When he realized it was corked, he immediately hurled it against the wall. The bottle shattered, and the sharp tang of wine filled the room. Ryousuke trembled.

The pierced guy stood before him, crouched low, and jabbed the pipe against his shoulder.

“This place is ours now. Get out.”

“Get out…?”

If he lost even this place, he’d have nowhere left. He wasn’t resisting—he was simply overwhelmed by the despair of what came next. But even that seemed to displease the pierced boy, who raised the pipe high and brought it down across Ryousuke’s back.

“GYAAAH!”

Ryousuke curled in on himself, and Shinobu immediately threw his body over him.

“Don’t you dare hurt Ryou-chan!”

Bash! Bash!—the sound of blows filled the room. But Ryousuke couldn’t feel them—only the way Shinobu’s body jolted with each hit. Shinobu didn’t make a sound, even as he was beaten. Ryousuke trembled underneath him, unable to do anything but pray it would stop. It didn’t.

“Don’t kill them here,” came a lazy voice. The boy in street clothes was drinking wine straight from the bottle, chuckling.

“It’d be a pain to deal with. Toss them out while they can still walk.”

“Yeah, good point.”

The pierced boy seemed satisfied and finally stopped.

“Get the hell out.”

Shinobu stirred sluggishly, drawing a heavy breath. As he turned his back to Ryousuke, preparing to carry him out again, Ryousuke caught a glimpse—and gasped. Shinobu’s shirt had been ripped open. His back was swollen, bloodied, and grotesquely bruised.

“Ryou-chan… hurry…”

Urged by that whisper, Ryousuke cautiously clung to his servant’s back. Shinobu groaned softly and, with Ryousuke on his back, slowly climbed the stairs.

He didn’t look back.

He just walked straight ahead, leaving the basement behind. But he hadn’t made it more than a few dozen meters before his knees gave out, and Ryousuke was thrown into the sand.

“S…sorry… Ryou-cha…”

Shinobu pressed a hand to his mouth. His back curled in, and with a choking sound, he vomited a stream of dark red blood onto the pale sand. The vivid crimson soaked in immediately, staining the ground. Ryousuke stared in stunned silence.

Shinobu wiped his blood-smeared face with his palm, then turned his battered back toward his master once again.

“…Are you okay?” Ryousuke asked.

Shinobu, still facing away, gave a quiet “yeah” in reply. So Ryousuke, hesitating, wrapped his arms around those battered shoulders again. With his master on his back, Shinobu started walking once more, slow and unsteady.

The burning heat. The weight of despair.

What they’d lost was far too great, and it weighed heavily on Ryousuke with bitter regret. Shinobu had tried to stop him. If only he’d listened, maybe they wouldn’t have lost their only shelter.

No—it wasn’t his fault. It was those three bastards who’d barged in. There was no reason they should’ve been kicked around, beaten with iron pipes like that. Violence didn’t care about dignity. The only reason they’d stopped hitting him was because they didn’t want anyone dying there. To them, Ryousuke and Shinobu were no more than pests—vermin to be cleared out.

Shinobu walked for nearly an hour, stumbling over the sand again and again. Every time, Ryousuke was thrown from his back. On the fifth fall, Shinobu didn’t get back up right away like before.

“Shinobu. Hey, Shinobu…”

No reply. Ryousuke panicked, shaking him, slapping his cheek until at last Shinobu’s eyes cracked open.

“…Tired,” he murmured, barely audible, then shut his eyes again.

The wind picked up, stronger than before, and Shinobu’s unmoving body began to be swallowed by drifting sand.

“If we stay here, we’ll die…”

Ryousuke tried desperately to get him up, but Shinobu’s sunken eyes just fluttered weakly, never fully opening.

“I can’t do it anymore. My head’s all fuzzy, and I can’t move…”

Eyes closed, Shinobu continued in a rasping voice:

“So Ryou-chan… you should go on without me. There’s gotta be people ahead…”

He broke off into a fit of dry coughing, each one scraping his lungs.

“What the hell are you talking about? I’m not leaving you!”

Ryousuke snapped—but the thought had already crept into the back of his mind. Leaving Shinobu behind. If he went alone, maybe he’d make it… maybe he could be saved.

A gust of wind ripped across the desert, forcing his eyes shut against the sand. When he opened them again, just two or three meters ahead, he saw a shadow.

He squinted. And the moment he realized what it was, his breath tore loose in a cracked scream.

“Uhh… uwaaaAAAAAAAH!”

A head half-buried in sand. Skin leathery and brown with desiccation. The sour stench of rot carried by the wind. It was the first corpse Ryousuke had ever seen.

“Shinobu, Shinobu! There's—someone's—dead! Someone died, right there!”

Shinobu opened his bleary eyes to glance at it.

“Yeah.”

“Yeah?! What the hell—”

“I’ve seen a lot of them. All kinds. I guess I’m gonna end up like that too.”

Suddenly Ryousuke was consumed by fear. Dying out here in the desert wasn’t just a theoretical risk—it was real, lying right beside them. Death wasn’t some far-off threat; it was already creeping in. And it had already reached out for Shinobu.

A cold sweat slid down his back.

“I don’t want to die in a place like this!”

He clutched his head. He felt like he was losing his mind. The corpse sat there, and he couldn’t look away. Couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe.

“I’ve got a busted leg, damn it! I can’t go anywhere without you! Are you saying I should just die here too?!”

“…Sorry…”

Shinobu looked on the verge of tears—but even with how fragile he was, there wasn’t enough water left in him to cry. Shinobu was going to die. And if he did—who would bring Ryousuke food? Who would carry him on their back?

Ryousuke’s fate was tethered to Shinobu’s. He wanted to scream until his throat tore open, but no sound would come.

“I’m not scared of dying,” Shinobu whispered.

“But… if I die, I can’t be with Ryou-chan anymore. I don’t want that. And… I’ll probably go to hell…”

He’d just told him to go on alone—and yet Shinobu clung to his master's hand.

Still holding that hand, Ryousuke pushed himself onto his knees and stared into the distance. The white sand stung his eyes. The horizon stretched endlessly, impossibly far. Even if there was a place out there where people still lived, reaching it would mean crawling for what could be hours… or longer. And even if he did get there by today, what if the people were like those three guys from before? Going would be no different than walking into his own execution.

There was a voice whispering to him: Forget the fight. Just give up. Let it all go. And the moment he let that idea take root, the suffocating fear of death that had haunted him began to quietly, almost gently, fade.

He curled up beside Shinobu.

His childhood friend, hand still entwined with his, didn’t move—not even a twitch.

The west wind blew softly, carrying grains of sand that began to bury their feet. It felt like slowly sinking into a sand pit, like being swallowed whole by the desert—and Ryousuke let it happen. He let himself feel it.

And he cried.

Just a little.

But the tears were swallowed by the sand and dried away almost instantly, as if they had never existed at all.

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