Last Attempt

Rin and her brother, Ikuto, had spent almost 24 years together in an apartment in San Diego before heading back to Japan, a place where ghost stories were not uncommon. Seeing their chance, they began to write about fictional encounters with the paranormal. They had always wanted to see a ghost, but since the day they were born, the dead have neither communicated with them nor made their presence known.

They had traveled from Hokkaido to Chiba, staying at centennial inns that have withstood aging or camping in a forest where many apparitions have been sighted. They seek ghosts everywhere but they can't seem to catch a single one and it was either because the dead hated them or that they have a really flawed sixth sense. But their luck was strong and even if the day was disappointing for the siblings, they still ended up writing a really good book.

Some of their books have been serialized as mangas [Comic books] while the rest seemed too marvelous for movies that producers are having a hard time making a good script out of one without ruining it's intricate plot. The siblings were pretty much satisfied with their lives, going as far as maintaining an almost-incestuous relationship with each other.

Rin stared at a wine glass which gleamed yellow against the light as her brother entered the living room with two bottles of vodka in his hands. They had successfully finished a book that entailed another one of their midnight trips. This one was quite different from the rest considering that they had chosen a very fitting place for an escapade -- Aoyama Reien, one of Tokyo's largest cemeteries. A proof-reader claimed their manuscript earlier, and by tomorrow, there was a high chance of seeing the book's name on the best-seller's list.

Rin had finished pouring the wine in her glass just as Ikuto began drinking his portion.

"We stayed in Aoyama Reien for 25 hours and saw nothing. Not even a mosquito," Rin muttered using flawless English.

"Either way, the proof-reader was impressed," Ikuto retorted in the same language."She kept ranting about what a privilege it was to be working for us two. It was--"

"Mendokusai," Rin spat the word out to finish her brother's sentence. "Bothersome. That woman wastes most of her time talking. She's probably drooling over the manuscript right now."

Ikuto didn't continue the discussion. He was silent for a moment, as if he was trying to discern something. His eyes moved from one side of the room to the other, like an eagle waiting for its prey.
"I thought I heard someone whispering in my ear," He said in Japanese.

"Must've been your imagination," Rin remarked, standing up groggily with a glass in her hand. "You're almost drunk."

Ikuto shook his head. "No, Rin. It was too real. It sounded like--"

At that instant, an eerie reverberation erupted from the door to the left. It was followed by an ear-screeching bang and a few scratches -- as if someone was clawing at the door. Ikuto, being sensitive to and angered by the noise, stood up and dragged himself across the room to relieve himself.

He swung the door open, readying his throat for the profanities that would flow through it once he caught sight of the person causing the racket. He stopped dead, looking down on the floor.

The outside of their apartment was flooded with blood, and in front of Ikuto was the mercilessly-twisted body of their proof-reader. The woman's face was recognizable beneath the blood, but the rest of her was not. Her wrists were broken. Her spine was bent in the most inhumane way. The lower part of her legs were nearly torn off her knees and her neck... Her neck had been completely skinned off, revealing nothing but red bones. Her eyes were focused on him, as if he was the person who had put her in that state.

Ikuto turned around, only to find a girl no older than 13 feeding off Rin's limbs. His sister was already gone. Her eyes were open, but her pupils had rolled behind her eyelids, showing nothing but white. He held his breathe, fearing what it felt like to be dead.

It was then the little girl took notice of him and she smiled, flesh and blood hanging off her lips. Then slowly, she walked towards him -- hands flexing with hunger and excitement. Ikuto's mind darted back to Aoyama cemetery... to the tombstone that he had demolished in an attempt to anger the spirit of whoever it belonged to...

He tried to remember the name that was neatly etched on the stone... but he couldn't.