CAFE AU LAIT

“Lan, Jings, lan!” shouted Nakamura, in his signature Japlish.

So, it had boiled down to this. The final battle of flesh and blood. Nakamura had no choice, although the choices were clearly his to make.

Those eyes, those angry eyes stabbed Nakamura. His hands were trembling. He knew the day would come. And he would never forgive himself for doing this. But he had to.

The body that carried those eyes ran towards Jings. The room shook. Nakamura protruded towards the body and pushed it away. “Don’t make me do this! You hear me?!” he said. The body, which was much larger and stronger than Nakamura let out a loud roar and threw him to the floor. That broke his left leg.

It picked Nakamura up and threw him even further away. He landed against a pair of terracotta warriors. Their spears penetrated his chest and punctured his lungs. Breathing became difficult.

“Geto buru karla botaru. Fwadster!” Nakamura told Jings, pointing at the glowing, grenade-like device, placed on the shelf, hidden behind a figurine. A Maiko holding an umbrella. With no eyes.

Gasping.

Dying.

Those eyes got angrier now. It turned to the helpless Nakamura. With just a soft blow, Nakamura flew to another corner of the living room. Jings rushed towards that broken boyfriend of hers.

Nakamura had the grenade-like device in his hand now.

He didn’t want push the button. He shook his head and said something in Japanese. But the body marched forward and eventually charged Nakamura.

A perfect throw. It exploded right in front of the eyes. No fireworks. Nor was there a tremor. Just a burst of glowing, blue-coloured liquid. The body fell to the floor. It let out a painful cry. The liquid adhered to the skin, propagated to the other parts of the body and eventually covered it completely. Blue turned red and the body was now shaking violently. As if corroding, the body shrunk with every painful scream, emitting an unbearable, ammoniac stench. It got warmer, gradually. As if temperature adversely proportinated the decay. Jings watched in disgust as the body transformed into a pool of emerald-coloured semisolid fluid.

Slurpee.

She turned to check on Nakamura. He was not breathing.

Slurpee.

Pengyi arrived. With the news.