"Next station… Hanasakura Station. We will be arriving at the station shortly. Please be ready to disembark. "
The feminine voice over the intercom crackled, almost completely buried under ringing static and the rhythmic rattling of the train wheels. The underground train felt like a coffin going continuously over and over and over on the metal rails.
Ren sat tucked away alone by the corner away from all human interactions. The car was almost empty safe for a few handful of people who sat closer to the doors probably in a hurry to get off as quickly as possible at the next station.
This wasn't his first time on a train but he had his backpack held tight against his chest like a kindergartener, his eyes not leaving the sight of the windows.
Just only turned fifteen last month but he looked tired in every sense almost like someone had taken away everything that made him a kid and left an empty shell behind.
The tunnels outside were a mix of darkness and then occasional light but all it did was make it harder for him to tell if the world was moving, or if he was being dragged forward by some mysterious force.
Fresh start, he told himself for the hundredth time. New school. New life. Leave it all behind.
But his hands wouldn't stop shaking.
Ren shoved them back into his jacket pockets, fingers immediately finding the folded paper inside. Bloodstained. Three weeks old. Still there.
Always there.
The edges were soft now, worn from constant handling. The soothing sound of it between his fingers had become his nervous habit, something to help me convince himself that he wasn't going insane. That it had really happened.
The train breezed through another curve, and Ren closed his eyes, trying to steady his breathing.
He breathed in slowly in through the nose and slowly out through the mouth. The way the hospital therapist had taught him during that single, useless session his mother had insisted on.
"Post-traumatic stress," the woman had said clinically, as if slapping a label on it would make it better. "It's normal after what you witnessed. Give it time."
Time. Three weeks. Twenty-one days since his entire world had shattered.
The automated announcement crackled again overhead: "Next stop: Hanasakura Station. Hanasakura Station, next."
The train began to slow down from the high speed it was moving earlier, the brakes scraping heavily against the metal. Through the window, he could see the platform approaching ahead countless bright advertisements, a few waiting passengers, sunlight streaming down from the street level above.
Almost there.
But then the train sped down into another tunnel.
And then like it always did when everything went dark his mind dragged him back into his darkness.
His complete and utter darkness.
And suddenly Ren found himself not on the train anymore.
No. Not again. Please not again.
Three Weeks Ago,
Somewhere in Tokyo,
10:47 PM. 21/03/2005.
Ren had been studying hard for his entrance exams, spread out at the low table in their small apartment's living room. He was attempting to get into this prestigious high class highschool but he knew he had to study hard to do thag.
His Math textbook was wide open, his notes and jottings all scattered everywhere like a madman's workshop.
He had the house all to himself. His mother was working the night shift at the hospital—as usual. His stepfather had taken Ayame to visit her grandparents for the week.
The apartment was quiet except for the hum of the refrigerator and the distant sound of traffic from the street below.
Ren had been working through a particularly frustrating algebra problem for more than an hour when he heard it:
The sound of footsteps in the hallway outside.
Slow. Uneven. Heavy.
He thought it was maybe their drunk neighbours again. Well they had a lot of them could've been any of them.
But then the doorknob rattled open.
Ren looked up, pen still in hand. "Mom? You're home early.. " The door opening cutting him short in his speech.
Kaito stumbled through, and Ren's words died in his throat.
Kaito, his brother was twenty-one years old, strong, smiling, always smiling but he wasn't now.
Kaito had one hand pressed against the side of his neck, the other gripping the doorframe like it was the only thing keeping him upright.
His white jacket with the faded dragon embroidery on the back was soaked full with blood. The blood ran down his left arm in rivers, dripping onto the wooden floor in thick droplets. His face was pale, his lips colourless, but his eyes burned with something desperate.
"Kaito!" The textbook fell from Ren's lap as he scrambled to his feet.
Kaito managed to take a step forward before he almost fell to his feet. He steadied himself on the kitchen counter leaving a red handprint on the white surface.
"Ren..." His voice was wet, gurgling. He coughed, and blood sprayed from his lips. "Listen... to me..."
Ren's body wouldn't just move at all. His brain screams at him repeatedly to do something, call someone, get help, just move but he just sat there, pencil still in hand, watching his brother bleed.
It was as if his legs had been welded to the floor and wouldn't let go. This wasn't real. This was a nightmare. It had to be.
Ren's feet finally obeyed him at long last and he crashed to his knees beside his brother, hands hovering trying to cover the wounds.
There were so many, knife slashes across his torso, a deep puncture on the side of his neck that was pumping blood with each heartbeat.
"What happened? Who did this? I'll call.. "
"No time." Kaito's hand shot out, gripping Ren's wrist with surprising strength. His fingers were sticky with blood.
"I don't have much time." Kaito coughed, and blood spattered on the floor. "You need to... you need to find..."
He fumbled inside his jacket with his other hand, movements jerky and desperate. When his hand emerged, it clutched a piece of white paper now stained red with blood.
"Take it." Kaito pressed the paper into Ren's palm, closing his little brother's fingers around it. "Find... Hasegawa..."
"Kaito, please, just hold on.. "
"At Sakura High." Another cough, more blood. Kaito's eyes were starting to roll back. "He will... understand. Tell him... the dragons... they're not... "
His eyes closed and he lost consciousness and his grip on Ren's wrist wasnt there anymore.
"KAITO!" Ren screamed.
He grabbed his brother's shoulders, shaking him. "Wake up! Don't you dare.. "
"No no no, stay awake, please.. " Ren's voice cracked, tears running from his eyes. "Mom! MOM!"
The apartment door was still open. A neighbor who had heard all the commotion and screaming appeared in the hallway, phone already to her ear.
"Ambulance! We need an ambulance!"
"Help is on the way. Can you feel a pulse?" She said sitting beside him.
It was Mrs Sano, the only not drunk neighbour they hadm
Ren pressed shaking fingers against Kaito's neck. There faint, but it was there. "Yes! But it's weak, please they should hurry.. "
"Keep pressure on the wounds. Don't let him move. The ambulance will be there in three minutes. "
Three minutes.
Three minutes felt like three hours.
Ren held his brother, blood pooling around them both, and repeated the same words over and over like a prayer.
"Don't die. Don't die. Don't die."