Hitori Nojima: Death Stranding: The Official Novelization, Volume Two

Around the same time that the dead started to return from the Beach, some people began to be born with the ability to sense the world of the dead, and some people emerged with the transcendental ability to use the Beach to move through physical space. There were even those who were forced back to this world when they died—who, in effect, were immortal. They were called repatriates. A theory was even floated that suggested using the Beach to create a pathway for a network. The Beach evolved into a physical concept. It may not have existed in this dimension, but it existed in a state that could be utilized in the physical world.

“You’ll be drifting off soon. Just a little longer.” The surgeon’s voice already sounded very far away.

Then Heartman was floating above his body, looking at it lying there with its chest clamped open. What was going on? Was he having a near-death experience? The EKG wasn’t showing anything out of the ordinary. His other vital signs all read normal. Was he dreaming? Even though he had been anesthetized?

The doctors continued to move calmly and efficiently. They looked like engineers fixing a soft biological machine.

It had been a few years since the problem with his heart was first detected. Since he found out that his heart had been stopping in his sleep. He had no idea. He was asleep! His wife suspected it was sleep apnea, but Heartman didn’t really care. It wasn’t like he was going to die, and besides, he didn’t have time to be going and seeing doctors back then. He put aside his wife’s concerns and threw himself into his work. He had been scouted by Bridges and he was busy grappling with all his data on mass extinctions.

It was around that time when he began to have the same dream over and over again. He knew what they were. They were dreams of extinction. Everyone with DOOMS had them. At the time, he had no idea that he had that condition. He knew he was a genius, but not this. He didn’t even believe in the Beach. He had assumed Bridges was simply after his intelligence, but it seemed they had detected his DOOMS, too. Bridget even told him as much herself.

After the Death Stranding, people were rushing to figure out what had happened. It was completely unprecedented. They didn’t even have a name for it.

Eventually, the annihilation events came to be known as voidouts. The monsters that came from the other side were named BTs, and they came from the world of the dead via “the Beach.” The phenomenon itself was named the Death Stranding. Naming all these elements was the first step toward objective study and discussion.

The first Death Stranding wasn’t a voidout between the living and the dead, but a voidout between colliding matter and antimatter. Eventually, the theory mutated. It was us. Our dead became the BTs. It was the BTs that were responsible for the voidout. But why was it only humans that became BTs? Because the only ones who could perceive death and an afterlife were human beings. It was our astounding human consciousness that had detected the Beach and summoned the BTs forth. The tragedy of extinction was switched into the glory of being the chosen ones. It was elitism on a global scale. Only the ones who could overcome such a tragedy could go forth to the promised land. It was pure arrogance.

That’s why Heartman hadn’t believed in the Beach. Mankind was still intent on continuing to climb the stairs of evolution, when in fact we had already reached the landing long ago. New existences were already beginning to catch up with us from the other side. And if BTs were one of them, then we would just have to step down from that pedestal. Heartman hadn’t accepted Bridges’ invitation in order to save mankind or rebuild America. He just wanted to prove his theory.

He had immersed himself in data about mass extinctions to prove the universal truth of extinction. The whole reason that he joined Bridges was to discover the few records of extinction that still remained. He had come here together with his wife, who was also a member of Bridges, and his infant daughter. They were the only ones who had joined the expedition as a family. They were lavished with attention and admiration as a symbol of connections. But Heartman’s dreams of extinction and his heart defect became more and more severe.

Heartman knew that the reason he had these dreams of extinction was because of his heart defect. They were just nightmares that reflected how unwell he was. That’s why he underwent the surgery. To prove he was right. There weren’t any operating theaters in the colony he was based at for his research, so he was transferred to an ICU in Mountain Knot City.

The surgery itself went well. For a few days after the surgery, he would have to rely on an artificial heart, but that was all part of the plan. His wife and daughter were relieved and asked if he would be home soon. He said yes.

Heartman and his family lived in a satellite city outside of Mountain Knot City. A place where a voidout-based terror attack would later snuff out the lives of his wife and daughter after they returned home.

Heartman understood what had happened in his core, it didn’t matter whether people believed it or not. He had been asleep right up until the explosion. Then, as if still in a dream, two flashes of light burst before his eyes, one after the other. They were so intense that he couldn’t perceive any other color in the world. He could feel the hospital room vibrating and the thunderous rumble of its foundations shaking. When color did eventually return, the hospital room lights were still out.

It must have been a blackout. Heartman was all alone in his room and there didn’t seem to be a soul out in the hall, either. Heartman tried to call for help, but nothing came out. His chest was tight and he couldn’t breathe. All he could feel was a sharp pain like a knife had been plunged into his heart. He tried frantically pressing the emergency button, but it was no use because the system was down.

The artificial heart had stopped working, and once more he found himself floating, looking down at a body close to death in the dark.

When he tried to sit up he found himself on the Beach.

It was a sandy beach. The waves were lapping at the shore. But it was also strewn with the stranded carcasses of whales, dolphins, and other sea-dwelling creatures that Heartman didn’t recognize. It was just how the people who had near-death experiences described. It seemed so incredibly realistic. He couldn’t believe that he could dream something so vividly. His stomach lurched. If he could see the Beach this vividly, then it couldn’t be some subjective concept in his imagination, it must actually exist. But to accept that fact, Heartman would have to let go of everything he had always believed in.

He suddenly noticed several lines of footsteps leading toward the sea. Yet he still tried to write them off as manifestations of his own imagination. That was also why he saw people walking in the very same direction when he gazed in the direction in which the footsteps led. It had been his own head that produced these figures.

They were the ka s of the people who had died in the voidout. He didn’t know any of them, he just saw hundreds of backs silently heading away from him toward the ocean. If he had known them, they would have been more than blank behinds. They would have been the backs of someone with a name.

Heartman stood up and looked across the crowd of people. Someone was stumbling toward the sea to the side of him. She was a small old lady. Heartman had never seen her before, he didn’t know her name, nor did he know her face. The woman looked up at him, but her eyes were unfocused, and Heartman doubted whether she could even see him at all.