Zero Story

•2• Remember, Breath

A screech split through the busy night, a siren that the residents of New York had been praying would never come.
A siren, the alarm to the city and all it's residents that a nuke was on its way towards them and people had to get to cover.
The only issue with the alarm, was people had never wanted it to happen, so they never prepared. There was no cover from a nuke, nothing to hide in, no underground bunkers. Not that many people knew about anyways.
Reikonshoumetsu's family had been one of the few who thought it better to be safe than sorry, and as hysteria erupted along the city, Reikon felt calm and collected.
She hadn't taken the alarm seriously however, her mind bitterly reminded her.
Just as she had reached the bunker, the bomb hit and her mother had shoved her in the hole and plunged her in darkness.
She remembered clearly the pain of falling down the 10ft hole, of how she had put her feet against one end and her back on the other to slow her decent. It had worked, however it left her back worse for ware.
•••
Reikon poked the body that shared the bunker with her, a pain gripping her heart as she recognized her little sister.
"Oh, Liz don't.. Don't be dead..." She whimpered, and quickly flipped her sibling over on her back.
The small ten year old was dead, and a gruesome sight meet her older sister.
The body had begun to decay, the bits of clothing her sister wore were tattered and ripped while thousands of puncture wounds from cobble stone pelted the small body and had ripped at the flesh.
As she slipped her hands under the body to hold her sister closer, her fingers met a sticky, cold substance that had pooled under the body. A shiver slipped through Reikon..
"W-what the hell happened to you Liz..." She asked, as tears streamed down her cheeks.
A gas-mask was rested crookedly on the child's face, and Reikon removed it, placing it aside as she studied the face of her sister. Unlike the rest of the body, the parts of her face that had been under the mask were fine and still.
Reikon ran her fingertips over the skin of her sisters face, it felt soft, smooth, and cold to the touch.
After she lifted her hands from her sisters face, she noticed a few crimson liquid streaks where she had touched, causing Reikon to glance at her hands.
Blood had painted her palms and fingers dark with her sisters blood, and as she looked, the less she believed that her sister was really gone.
She bowed her head, laying it on her sisters chest while rivers began to spring from her eyes, her sister was dead..
.. The soft sound of a pained breath suddenly reached Reikons ears, and she sat up again, looking at the body that lay before her.
"Oh, Liz thank god..." Reikon said, as her sister began to stir, first opening her eyes then looking right at her.
Before Reikon had a chance to register what was going on, her sister reached up as if to touch her face, but quickly grabbed ahold of her shirt and yanked her down harshly, while using her other hand on the back of her sisters head to pull her closer.
Reikon screamed as she felt teeth on her shoulder, her sister was biting her. In defense, Reikon reeled back and grabbed the mask that had once been on her dear sisters face.
With the mask in hand, she hit her sister upside the head with it, and as she let go, she kicked her in the head and scrambled to her feet.
Without much hesitation or questioning, Reikon slipped the mask onto her head, made sure it was in place, and then quickly backed up to the ladder and scurried up it, leaving her demented sister to crawl after her.