Chapter Text
It was a beautiful sight before him. His younger brother carving a figure out of a piece of wood, sitting on the floor next to the couch where he lay, still ill. Concentrated, he bit his lips, trying to make everything look exactly the way he wanted. He didn't know Hanzo was awake. He had wanted to sit nearby to make sure he was sleeping well and not alone, but he was so focused on his task, he hadn't noticed the movement under the covers.
“What are you making there?”
His voice startles him despite his soft tone.
Genji looks at him, still surprised, but then smiles. There's relief in his eyes before he shows him the sculpture in progress. Hanzo can see the outline of long ears and the curve of an animal's fine snout in the wood.
“A rabbit.”
He could imagine who asked him to make a rabbit. Smiling, he asked:
“Have you already met Miss Song, huh?”
Genji nodded excitedly, “She came here a few hours ago to see you, but you were sleeping…”
The windows are covered with wooden shutters and the fire has not been fed recently; it is probably at night. Hanzo sleeps too much. He has a really painful and hard time sitting on the comfortable sofa, symptoms of his poor health. He does not feel, actually, he feels weaker than yesterday… Why is he feeling that bad? What did he do in his whole life so wrong to deserve this sickness?
His bones crack like cookies when he is trying to stretch his body. It was a really comfortable sofa, but it was built to be lying there for days. Also, he felt really… sensitive, like he could cry and gimp really easy. But maybe it was just his imagination… Or the mix of his pain and his stress. Did not sound like a stupid idea, he could not go hunting for several days and he could not even go home to sell whatever he could find in Shimada’s house and value something. Genji would never accept him to sell anything they have, but if someday -or even today- they need the money, it was the best option… At least until Hanzo could go to the forest.
His eyelids feel heavy and yawned softly against his arm, his body slowly and delicately lying down again on the couch, under the warm, comfortable sheets. The sound of his brother working on the figure of a wooden rabbit was the best sound to sleep right now… He felt tired like he had no time to rest for a long, very long time.
“Hana asked me to tell you…”
Not even Genji’s voice was able to stop him from falling asleep again. He was almost asleep when he was starting to talk and could not take all the messages before being brought to the dream land. Or maybe ‘no-dream’ land. It was all dark and calm, and he was happy with that. After all this time with nightmares, running and escaping even when he was lying down and wake up breathing heavy and nervous, no dreaming was practically a paradise for Hanzo
Peace, silence, total darkness. Right now it was the only thing he needed. And loved to get them finally.
“Who would have thought that my most talented offspring would go bankrupt so quickly?”
But there was something that never remained silent.
(...)
The sun was really bright when Genji was out for a walk and looking for some wood the next morning. Kids were playing and throwing snowballs at each other in the marketplace, running between the stands where the adults were selling and buying things; Genji cannot help but laugh, watching them.
The youngest Shimada smiled when a girl rounded him, followed by another girl who was trying to catch her, running and laughing. This place was so happy… All this seemed so unreal to him... A village so happy and alive, was near a forest with terrifying things that seemed to come from the mind of a disturbed person.
What the hell were those things even? Onis? No, they didn't look like them. Ghosts? No, he was sure he felt that blow that someone gave him, it still hurt when he remembered it. Were maybe zombies? His feet stopped suddenly.
He had heard the stories which run through this town like air; but he never thought this would be real. Like his brother...
Wait a minute.
If it took him less than an hour to meet two of those beings, his brother had done it too. They talked about him, he had heard about him. The one who captured him did so because of the bow that Genji had. Hanzo’s bow, not his.
“What troubles are you in, Hanzo?...” His whisper was not answered, not even heard by anyone. Laughs were too loud.
However, even if they heard him, he wasn't sure he wanted an answer.
While cutting down a tree so that its wood could be used for firewood for the Amari fireplace -and a piece for carving-, the Japanese man heard quickly steps near him. ‘One person’, he thought, hearing the steps. I wish I had paid more attention to the teachings received at the Shimada Empire. Hanzo would have deduced more than a number of people based on the steps. ‘What is looking for?...’
That person seemed worried and in a hurry because of the fast steps. The snow crunched, crying underfoot, like chunks of ice on a frozen lake threatening to break.
And then, that person found him.
“Genji!” It was Miss Amari. Fareeha. She looks really worried, nervous when Genji stops to cut the tree on the floor and pays attention to her. And Genji knows something is wrong -really wrong- because this woman is not easy to impress…
“What happened? Is your mother okay?”
She denied, her forehead covered in a film of sweat despite the cold weather. She had been looking for him and had put real effort into it. The matter was important, and if it wasn't her mother who had problems…
‘It cannot be…’
“It 's Hanzo. You have to-”
so no
Genji didn't let her finish. The axe fell hard on the snowy ground as he rushed back into the village and ran towards the Amari house. Old lady Amari was near Hanzo, who was awake, lying on the couch, looking really dizzy like he had turned like a spinning top for hours. Bending down on the floor, the younger Shimada went to the only person he loved, the only person he considered his family; Hanzo’s hand is a little bigger than his when he took it, and his temperature is hotter than Genji expected.
“He is burning…” he whispered, trying to not disturb his brother -it happened though, he grunted softly, his eyes closed hard. Hanzo was too weak and sensitive right now. Why? Why is his brother that bad?
Genji did not realize that Ana was talking to him until he felt her gentle hand on his shoulder, his body jumping in fright.
“Genji, I need your help,” her voice was so warm, calm. If he could not see her worry expression, he could think she was having a normal, boring day. “I sent Fareeha to find Miss Angela to help your brother, but she lives far away and it will take time…, I need you to bring a bucket of water and towels and help me cool your brother down, okay?”
The youngest nodded and ran out the house. There was still water in the house, he had brought two buckets at Ana's request yesterday. However, Genji thought one full of cold water was more useful than a half one with a little yesterday's water.
The village well was on the path to go to the Abernathy farm. It was old, despite being well maintained; Made of grey stone and had a black tiled roof now covered in snow and ice and with a large basin where to put water for the horses, donkeys, dogs and mules of passing merchants. There was also a wooden sign, with a snowflake symbol, with a dense cover of ice, but Genji did not know what that meant.
He was in a hurry and the trip seemed endless, so he decided to sprint what was left of the way; practically threw the bucket into the water, almost broke the crank when lifting the bucket tied to the wicker rope and as the water passed from the bucket tied to the rope he carried with him, many drops fell to the snowy ground. But got some cool water!
Hanzo only used it so they had water to shower or clean the house, and if they needed to drink they got the water from a river -He first strained it with a funnel with a small hole in the tip and then boiled it- so Genji had never tried until they were at Amari’s house. And the water was nice! Quite sweet and clean, almost magic.
“I wish water was magical.” He muttered and then tripped over his own feet, almost falling to the ground with the bucket of water. He hadn't brought any more buckets, if this tin one broke, he would have to figure out a way to carry water with his hands. “... or better not.”
“It seems like your human is not okay, ¿Huh?”
Huges, large shadows were projected under the several trees of the forest. Behind the nude woods, mixing with the darkness, nobody would notice the presence of two no-humans, unless you knew they were there. But they could see and hear everything…
“Is it because of you?”
She laughed like he had told a joke, her red heart shaped lips forming a big smile when she looked at him. “Why would I make that human get sick?”
He could not help but be surprised, a lot. Her calm expression did not change anything, as cold as the weather she brings every fall and winter.
“You hurt me,” It did not look like that, “if I wanted to kill him, I would not give him a simple, stupid flu…”
“I don’t think he has a simple, stupid flu.”
The wind suddenly was strong, blowing and whispering a warning that only the forest could understand, bringing snowflakes with it. An ancient language nor even the undeads knew was saying to cut it up; it was remembering him what was his place. Her face, with a gentle smile, was hiding her true thoughts and emotions; but the weather could not lie. And weather or woman, they were the same thing. The snow, the cold winter, the cruel feelin' being frozen alive and unable to move.
And that was the greatest fear of an undead, even though the lady in front of him was closer to being an ally than an enemy.
“... What did you say?”
“Sometimes I forget how fragile human health is.” he murmured as an apology.
“And life itself… Human don't last long; they get sick, get old, starve, go mad. If you control the cause of every tear, complaint, and tantrum, you will lose the track of the time of your no-life in vain, Jesse.” Her breath is cold like the wind she blew before, "If it his time to die, he will, if not, you are losing your time." The same wind that breaks her figure, takes away her color, until it tears away everything that seemed human in her. A pile of snow remains, a snowman without eyes nor smile. No one would say that there was a woman there, next to the undead; but Jesse feels her in the wind, in the air, in the snow.