Hetalia oneshots

angst warning! iceland x Hong Kong

Cold, dark sea
Wrapping its arms around me,
Pulling me down into the deep—
All eyes on me.

"Shit."

Though Leon is the affected one—the wound on his neck throbs harder with every beat of his heart—Lukas is the one to say it.

Emil swivels around, his shoes squeaking on the hospital's linoleum floor. Leon doesn't realize the extent of his injury until Emil meets his eyes and turns as white as his hair.

The two brothers stare at him. None of the three of them can breathe.

"That bad?" quips Leon.

Leon's family would have left town if Yao had known the severity of things, but because he didn't, he barricaded them in the house instead. The outbreak felt so far away until it reached their suburb, and for the first few days, everyone treated it like a bad flu. Stay home, disinfect everything, let no one in, it'll all be over soon.

At first Leon treated it like a snow day. He stayed in his room, played video games, and pretended the occasional shrieks outside his window were from the Pokémon he'd collected. He didn't do his homework, reasoning that he'd wake up early and do it the first day his high school called its students back.

One day without school became two. Then three. The meals Yao cooked because smaller, his smile tighter. Yong Soo and Mei looked out the window more frequently, muttering to each other. Kiku absorbed himself in digital manga. When Leon got a chance to look over his shoulder, he saw nothing but stories of the undead.

Since the third day, Yao slept by their largest downstairs window with a bat. Someone broke through it between the fourth and fifth days. The next day, Yao shut and locked the door to that room and insisted that only he was allowed downstairs now. For the rest of the day he wrapped and re-wrapped his arm in bandages which seemed constantly bloody, and he looked increasingly paler and spoke less. When Yong Soo and Mei tried to change his bandages for him before they went to bed, Yao bit at their fingers and sat still at the top of the stairs. Neither Kiku nor Leon could convince him to take his usual post downstairs, so they all went to bed concerned but not nervous. Yao was unwell, but protecting them. They were fine.

Between the fifth and sixth days without school, in the coldest hours of the night, Leon woke to thumping at his door.

Wham.

Wham.

Wham.

Slow, steady, as if someone were using a battering ram. A very tall battering ram. Which stepped backward and thrust itself forward.

Then Leon heard the moaning.

Before he realized he was doing it, he was opening the window beside his bed. He popped the screen out expertly and slipped, barefoot, onto the small roof sheltering the garage. Two or three people meandered down the street, lurching in unrelated directions. Leon ignored them and slid across the inclined roof until he approached the window beside his.

Mei and Yong Soo had fallen asleep with the shades open.

Leon peered inside.

Mei lay in her bed, convulsing in her sleep as if possessed by a demon. Her right middle finger, the one Yao had bitten, no longer bled, but her entire right arm glowed grey and coarse in the streetlight. Grey streaks already radiated across her shoulder and disappeared into her nightgown, and were settling into her cheek.