Betaread by DemonicWhispers!

Remains

Chapter 2. Streets Ran Red

-several months later-

Flevance was falling apart.

Where once stood the glorified White City, now there was only a fading ghost town, mere remains of the highly sought miraculous land. Streets that once were full of laughter and joy now remained mostly empty and desolate. Shops were closed, glass shards of their shattered windows covering the ground. Statues had been broken, fountains stopped, and flowers – stomped on or uprooted and probably eaten.

It was getting worse every minute, Leon thought as he trudged through the dying city.

The crime was at its highest possible and no one seemed to give a damn about it. No one was left to give a damn about it. The royal family fled their own country weeks ago, leaving their subjects to their own devices.

Food was almost gone. What few farms Flevance had around on the outskirts were not enough to feed everyone and they had been plundered weeks ago. With a strict quarantine over the country's borders, there was no way to get more food. They were left to starve.

The teen still couldn't forget the crestfallen faces of his parents when they told him that they couldn't get a cake for his thirteenth birthday two weeks ago. Like he cared about that; he was just happy to spend his last birthday with his family before they all perished from hunger. Or riotous crowds. Or lack of medicine. Or amber lead. Whichever claimed them first.

People were irritated, angry, tired, hungry, sick, and in pain, their spirits as broken as the city around them. Leon heard doctors talking that they didn't know what to do with corpses anymore – all morgues were full, cemeteries didn't have space anymore, and the crematorium was overloaded.

Madness. That's what it was.

The boy spotted a group of rough looking guys ahead and ducked into the nearest alley. He wouldn't even be here at this late hour if Kian wouldn't have contacted him about wanting to meet.

He found his best friend on the roof of the abandoned kindergarten. As he sat down next to him, the older teen offered him a cigarette. "Ooh, you still have some," Leon said in surprise.

"Saved it for a special occasion," Kian replied with a crooked grin. Before the raven could ask, he spoke again, "My dad thinks that he found a way to get us out of this shithole. We're leaving in a few days."

Leon whipped his head at his friend and stared at him with wide eyes. "Are you serious? They slaughter everyone who tries to cross the border! You said so yourself."

"Yeah," the older boy agreed. "We're gonna die anyway, right? And maybe we'll succeed, who knows. Not that it would make any difference, but…" He ruffled his hair with a frustrated groan. "They are my family, you know. My parents, my sisters, and my brother."

The younger boy's shoulders slumped, fight leaving him right away. This wasn't an argument he could win against. "Yeah," he conceded, fully understanding his devotion.

Kian laughed. "We're so screwed for being born as big brothers, eh?" he joked, causing his friend to crack a smirk. "Oh, by the way," he suddenly said, pushing his hand inside his jacket and pulling out his mysterious notebook. "I'm a bit late, but happy birthday."

Leon stared at the offered item before tentatively taking it, curiosity settling on his features.

"Sorry to disappoint you but there are no poems in there," Kian informed cheerily.

"Eeeh? So, what is it?" the raven asked as he flipped the notebook open.

"A story," the other teen answered, his brown eyes drifting to gaze somewhere beyond the patch of the forest, beyond Flevance and its borders, beyond their misery and all the deaths. "A story about a boy who wanted to live free."

"Hmmm," Leon hummed in reply, reading a few sentences. Then he snapped it shut and stuffed into his pocket. "Thanks."

Kian slowly stood up and stretched. He dropped a finished cigarette on the roof and ground it with his boot. "I guess this is a goodbye then."

"You talk like we're gonna die soon."

They both burst into laughter. Death had become a normal thing in Flevance, an everyday occurrence. What else were they supposed to joke about?

The two friends climbed down the broken roof into the kindergarten's kitchen area, chatting about this and that, cherishing their last moments together. Kian was the first one to walk out into the corridor, Leon falling a few steps behind as he stopped to extinguish his smoke into the wall next to the door.

They didn't see them coming, didn't hear their footsteps or their hushed voices. They felt safe here, the thought to be on guard never crossed their minds.

The only thing they heard was a sharp echo of a gunshot.

Startled, Leon turned towards the sound, only to meet the splatter of blood, and his eyes instinctively shut. Time seemed to slow down to a snail's pace, but his heart sped up, reaching a frightening speed in an instant, as he rubbed a sleeve across his face. Then he dared to open his eyes and look.

His best friend's name got strangled somewhere along his throat the moment he saw him.

Kian's head was suddenly not as whole as it should have been – a deep dent gaping at its left side, his eye completely gone. With a small smile of surprise still curved on his lips, he just stood there. As if nothing had happened.

More shots resounded across the building. Kian's body jerked from the force and finally fell.

Leon caught it. His knees gave way, and they both collapsed on the floor.

Someone was yelling. Approaching heavy footsteps rang off the walls.

The teen barely registered all that, because there was unnatural redness spreading across his arms and chest, seeping into his clothes. All he could feel was warm and slick liquid on his hands and on his face. All he could focus on was the red mixed with white covering him and the limp, lifeless body of his best friend.

Suddenly, there was an urge to run, to escape, to hide.

He had to get away. He couldn't stay here.

Blinded by raw fear and driven by a primal instinct to flee, Leon scrambled from under Kian. His foot slipped on the puddle of blood and he almost went back down. But he did not stop.

Several bullets embedded themselves into the wooden carcass of the caved in roof that the boys used to climb up.

"Kill all the infected! Leave no survivors!"

Leon skidded to a stop at the edge of the roof.

The backyard of the kindergarten was crawling with unfamiliar armed soldiers, their faces hidden under gas masks, weapons at their sides.

The boy immediately jumped down, avoiding another barrage of bullets by a hair's breadth. His shoulder hit the ground and a cry of pain pushed its way through his constricted throat. Yet, he was on his feet and running in the next second.

Chased by bullets, Leon dived into the forest. After several minutes of stumbling across the shadows, he burst out of it on the other side and stopped short with his breath hitching at the sight in front of him.

Flevance was burning.

The entire city burned in a sea of ghastly red, yellow and orange. Unfettered flames devoured everything in their path hungrily, licking and lapping at the houses, twisting and swaying in a dance without rhythm. Tendrils of smoke billowed into the night sky as if trying to escape the blazing inferno below.

A twig snapped behind him, jolting the young boy out of his shocked stupor, and he bolted without a glance back.

The city was in chaos. Terrified people were running everywhere, trying to save themselves and their loved ones. Screams and wails echoed into the night. Soldiers with gas masks, armed with rifles and flamethrowers, marched through the streets, killing, slaughtering, and burning everything in their way without exception.

Leon had just walked past this area around an hour ago. Nothing had been out of place.

However, he had neither time nor the proper state of mind to ponder on how it was possible for these murderers to appear here so unexpectedly. Dodging another group, that was busy laughing loudly at the burning people in front of them and mocking their screams, he rushed forward through the streets, streets that were drowned in insanity and blood.

There were no soldiers yet in the part of Flevance where the hospital was located. With his mind still in shambles, panic pumping through his veins, Leon didn't dare to stop even for a quick break to catch his breath. The gates of the hospital were closed, a bunch of civilians crowding it, so he had to use an emergency entry – climb the tree that grew beside the fence at the back and jump inside the hospital's territory.

As Leon sprinted through the hospital's corridors, someone tried to stop him. He didn't – couldn't – wasn't in his right mind to recognize the person, all he saw were those scary soldiers laughing, shooting, burning everything around them…

Leon leapt to the side like a spooked animal, escaping the hands that wanted to grab him, but his legs got tangled or maybe he slipped – the boy wasn't even sure anymore – and he slammed into the hard wall. Momentarily stunned, he lost his balance and stumbled, falling on his knees. He was back on his feet the next instant, continuing his mad dash towards the office of his parents, towards his family – towards safety.

He burst into the room the moment his father yelled into the Den Den Mushi's receiver, "It's not contagious! Why doesn't the Government report that?!" and he just stopped, completely frozen, barely able to suck in the air, his mind scrambling to make sense of this new, cruel world around him.

"Oh my god, Leon!" Naomi shouted. In a flash, she was right in front of her eldest son, her warm hands cupping his bloody cheeks. "Leon! Leon, honey, look at me." When there was no reaction, she brushed his wet bangs out of his eyes and repeated calmly, "Leon, listen to my voice and breath. In and out, in and out." She cleaned some of the blood and grime from his pale face with the sleeve of her blouse as she repeated the instructions over and over.

The boy's wide, panicked eyes finally focused on her and his erratic breathing started to even out.

"That's it, baby, you're doing fine. You'll get through this. Your dad and I are here for you."

As his panic began to subside, Leon's previously stretched thin nerves uncoiled, the whole traumatic experience flooded his mind, and tears sprung into his eyes.

North came from behind his wife and put a comforting hand on his son's shoulder. "Leon, are you hurt? Where is this blood coming from?"

"W-What..?" the boy stuttered out, glancing down at his hoodie, and his breathing sped up again. "Th-this– Kian's… He went first and– We didn't hear them… The bullet just– I-It went through here," a trembling hand covered his left eye, "and-and-and his eye– his eye was suddenly gone… I-I r-ran…" At this point, Leon was already openly sobbing.

Naomi pulled her child into a tight embrace, her hand stroking the back of his head soothingly.

Leon fisted his hands into her blouse. "I left him, mom. I just ran…. What if– What if he was still alive? I just left him…"

"You did nothing wrong, Leon," Naomi said softly. "Injuries like that can't be healed, so you did nothing wrong. Nothing wrong at all." She planted a loving kiss on his temple, a stray tear sliding down her cheek. "I'm so sorry, honey, so sorry."

North patted his son's head, sighing in relief that he at least came back safe.

The boy fell apart in his mother's arms, letting all that terror out. He may have been mature for his age, but in the end, he was only a thirteen year old child. Seeing such things that would leave adults traumatized would certainly scar him for life. The worst was that there was no time left to properly help him with this kind of experience. What they were about to ask him to do, might be too hard for him to handle in his current condition, but they had no other choice left.

"Naomi…" North said quietly.

His wife caught on the urgent undertone. Leon was slowly calming down. Though it still wasn't enough, but despite all her motherly and doctor's instincts screaming at her not to do it just yet, give her kid more time, they were quickly running out of it. "Leon." She pushed him gently away and looked directly into his golden eyes – just like his father's. "Leon, we want to ask you to do something very important," she spoke in a kind voice, wiping tears from his grime smeared cheeks. "Can you hear us out?"

The boy sniffled. Then inhaled and exhaled, composing himself as much as possible. "…Yeah."

Naomi stroked his hair, unable to believe the blessing of having such a smart and strong-willed son. She brushed a hand across her eyes, getting rid of unshed tears, schooling her features to remain of modest concern rather than heart-wrenching grief. "Your father managed to contact an old friend outside Flevance. He agreed to help to get you three out of here. There is a safe passage through the borders… Leon, you have to take care of your brother and sister."

Leon stared at her in absolute disbelief. His gaze flicked up at his father. "What? Have you both gone insane?!" he shouted. "They're slaughtering people at the border!" His parents said nothing, their loving eyes full of sadness. He gritted his teeth. "What's the point of us running away if we die anyway?! If not from bullets or fire, then from this poison in our bodies!"

"Oh, honey." Naomi's palm was cupping his cheek again, her thumb gently moving back and forth, and while Leon was angry, he couldn't force himself to swat her warm hand away. "How long have you known?"

The teen shifted from one foot to another and looked down, suddenly feeling guilty. "…Maybe a year."

North shook his head with another sigh. There was no time for reprimands. "Leon, listen," he said as his hand squeezed the boy's shoulder, getting his attention. "Once on the other side, go to my brother to Ononola Island. He was helping us examine amber lead and search for a way to remove it from a person's body. If anybody can help, he can."

Leon blinked. "Your brother? That psycho?"

His father's lips twitched up against his will.

A gunshot echoed from somewhere within the hospital.

Leon flinched at the sound, the gory image of Kian's head crawling into the forefront of his mind again with its missing eye and blood and blown up brains and–

"Leon."

His mother's sharp voice startled him back into reality. She looked extremely worried. The teen's eyes passed her and fixated on his father who pushed a cabinet slightly to the side, revealing a niche behind it.

Naomi took the boy's hand and tugged him to follow. They stopped next to the open up hole in the wall and she looked straight her eldest in the eyes again. "Whatever happens, Leon, live," she said, kissing his forehead and then shoving him inside.

There was just enough space for him and maybe another adult person or two more kids. Leon had no idea about something like this existing in the office in the first place.

The screech of the cabinet being dragged alarmed him. He turned around just in time to take a glimpse of his father's face before it disappeared as the cabinet stood back in place, but not before he heard his parting words, "We love you, son."

"W-What– Wait!" Leon screamed, throwing himself at the back of the cabinet and pounding it a few times. "Mom! Dad!"

The sound of a door being broken on the other side caused him to stop. He could hear a bunch of unfamiliar voices shouting and his parents pleading them to stop because the amber lead poisoning wasn't contagious and could be healed and–

They never let them finish.

Leon recoiled from the entrance violently when the shooting started. With his heart hammering inside his chest, he backed off until he hit the corner. Putting his arms over his ears in a vain attempt to block the sounds, he slid down and curled in on himself, choking out a sob.

Leon stayed like that even after everything went quiet. Until a sudden wail of unimaginable grief snapped him out of it. He knew that voice, would have recognized it anywhere. "Law…" he whispered. After another moment, he jumped to his feet.

Sounds of shots pierced the air on the other side, and the boy's heart seemed to cease beating.

"Don't let him get away! Kill him!"

Leon drew a sharp breath, rammed his shoulder at the cabinet, and pushed. "Come on…" he forced out through clenched teeth, pouring all his strength into this. Just how goddamn heavy this thing was?!

After several minutes of pushing, it seemed to move an inch, something crashing on the other side. Leon hooked his fingers around the edge and pulled, then tried to push again. It took a significant amount of time to make a gap wide enough for him to squeeze through. When he was finally free, his eyes instinctively searched the room.

His parents were there, lying next to each other, his father's arm around his mother protectively, a big, crimson puddle still spreading around on the floor.

Leon shut his eyes, curling his fingers into tight fists, and turned around. The air was permeated with a raw, acrid, heavy, and festering scent, like a slaughterhouse. His stomach flipped, feeling queasy.

Considering himself steady enough, Leon opened his eyes, but never looked in the direction of his parents again. They were dead and no prayers would bring them back. His top priority right now was Law and Lami.

Leon didn't see Law's body in the office, so all he could do was hope that his little brother managed to escape. Lami, on the other hand, could barely move.

When Leon exited the office, he was hit with hot, suffocating air.

The boy's chest grew tight. The hospital was on fire.

Not wasting any precious time, he sprinted across the corridor, shielding his head with his arms from the occasional flames. But the fire was spreading, devouring the inner wooden structure of the building faster and faster. Leon had to stop as a coughing fit assaulted him on the stairs to the next floor.

The corridor leading towards his sister's room was already engulfed by flames, licking at the walls and climbing up to the ceiling. Leon's heart sunk. He coughed again, feeling dizzy. After covering his nose and mouth with his forearm, he looked around, his mind whirling.

There was no time to find a better solution. With a curse, Leon clenched his teeth, and just ran straight through the burning tunnel that was once a hospital's corridor.

The door to Lami's room was open, and Leon burst in, wheezing and coughing. He needed to get out of here fast, but he was not going anywhere without his baby sister. Wildly looking around, he couldn't see her. Flames were everywhere: on walls, on the wardrobe, on the bed, on the curtains…

But no Lami.

Something combusted from the heat on the room next door and the wall exploded, the blast sending the slightly disoriented teen into the burning curtains, through the window, and into the tree that grew outside.

Leon wasn't quite able to grab the tree branch to avoid falling down. He landed, hard solid ground meeting his back with a shocking force. The burning curtain got wrapped around his right arm, setting it on fire. With a hiss, he shook the material off and patted the leftover flames.

Dazed, Leon stood on shaky legs. He staggered as the world swayed dangerously and wobbled away from the burning hospital, along the fence towards the gate, without any destination in mind.

Now that the adrenaline was gradually leaving his system, the exhaustion, the steadily growing pain from all the burns and bruises, the devastating despair and hopelessness threatened to drown him. Yet, he felt numb and detached from the situation, as if he was just a passerby watching this horror movie happening to some stranger.

The teen was slowly making his way out of the fenced area when he first heard and then saw a small kneeling figure in front of the open gate. Leon halted for half a second, his eyes widening in surprise and disbelief. With a miraculous burst of energy, he crossed the distance that separated them, collapsed next to his wailing little brother, and pulled him into his arms with tears in his eyes – just crushed Law against his chest, an overwhelming sense of relief washing his whole being.

Law was alive.

God, he still had his brother.

Law seemed startled by a sudden presence, stiffening in the unexpected embrace. Soon, he recognized who it was and relaxed. "O-Oniisan…" he sobbed out, his little hands fisting into Leon's hoodie as he continued crying into his brother's chest.

"Law," Leon called out softly after a few long minutes, "what happened to Lami?"

"Wardrobe… in her room… I didn't know where you are… I thought–" the boy hiccupped, "that she'd be safe…"

Wardrobe in Lami's room… Leon's heart skipped a beat and his arms around his little brother tightened.

The wardrobe was definitely on fire.

Lami was gone.

But he still had his little brother.

Approaching heavy footsteps and muffled voices reached Leon's ears and his head snapped towards it.

Shit.

Law was in no condition to walk yet, and he had no strength to carry him.

An idea popped into his head and he immediately pressed them both to the ground, shielding his brother with his own body. "Shhhh," he soothed. "They're returning. Play dead, Law."

The warning worked. Law pushed his head into the crook of his neck and, while Leon could still feel the ever-growing wetness, the little guy was doing a fantastic job of lowering the volume into quiet sniffling. With the roaring inferno right next to them, no one could hear it.

They lay like that – just two more corpses amongst the sea of them – when two soldiers rounded the corner and started to check the dead people around them, the cheerfulness in their voices making Leon's blood boil.

Looters. Damn scavengers, that's what they were.

They moved even closer, inspecting every dead body, and the boys felt panic creeping in. Law was not even crying anymore, just holding onto his big brother with his eyes shut tight, waiting for the inevitable.

One guy whistled in appreciation, lifting something up from the woman he had just ransacked. "These people are loaded!" he exclaimed.

The second soldier cackled, adjusting his rifle, and crouched down to the man, lying right next to the two boys. He instantly jumped to his feet again, fumbling with his weapon in a hurry.

The brothers forgot how to breathe.

The man pulled a trigger.

"The hell are you doing, dumbass?!" his companion bellowed.

"Son of a bitch!" the soldier cursed, lowering his weapon and adjusting his gasmask. "I thought he moved. Hahahaha! That scared me! You never can be sure with these white monsters."

"Idiot! Almost scared me to death!"

"Sorry, sorry."

Shots resounded somewhere nearby, and both men looked at that direction. After a terse debate, they begrudgingly trotted away, leaving the dead for themselves again.

Leon let air rush out of his lungs and it came out as a mirthless laughter that quickly died under the urgency of the situation. He pushed himself up.

They needed to get out of the streets. Right now.

"Law, can you stand?" he asked, struggling to do exactly that himself. The burn on his arm pulsated in an excruciating pain under the strain of the slightest movement, and his expression was twisted into a grimace as he endured.

Law nodded mutely. After standing up, he promptly latched onto his big brother's hoodie as if afraid that he would disappear into thin air and he'd be left completely alone.

Like that, the two brothers proceeded to move towards their old home.

The nightmare wasn't finished yet, but Leon and Law got lucky. There was a big scuffle not far from their route – it seemed that people of Flevance were putting quite a fight over there – and it consequently drew all the enemy forces to that place. They reached their house after over an hour of careful trudging through streets awash with blood and the dead and going around the obstacles on fire.

Leon was barely keeping himself vertical. The last few hundred meters he leaned heavily on his little brother, only half aware of it. His head was pounding, his arm felt like it was on fire again, and his back and shoulder ached. He toppled onto the couch in their living room, his body refusing to move any longer.

"Leon," Law called, gently shaking the teen. He got even more anxious when all he got was a jumbled murmur. "Oniisan, you need to dress your burns." This time no reply came at all. He waited a bit longer. "Oniisan?" With dread pooling in his gut, the boy pressed his trembling fingers to Leon's neck – just how his father taught him – and held his breath.

There was a pulse.

He still had his big brother.

Law straightened up, his features hardened with resolve. It was his turn to help him.

Next Chapter. River of the Dead