My Amaranth

Summary: “The sound I never wanted to hear rang in the air….”

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Jin sat in corner of the room with Xiaoyu, who was trembling. She was huddled inside his jacket, clinging to him like to a lifeline. He held his phone to his ear, waiting the person to answer. When he finally heard the click and the familiar voice answering him, Jin was relieved. He risked putting the speaker on.

“Hello?”

“Lars.”

“Jin. Are you all right?”

“I’m fine. You and Hwoarang all right?”

“I haven’t seen him in hours, but he’s there. I can hear him through the radio. He still doesn’t know how to shut up.”

Kazama let out a sigh of relief, followed by a small giggle from the girl he had hidden beneath his jacket. He shifted a little on the concrete floor of the basement. The abandoned building was rather remote, and nobody would even guess someone was there.

“How’re things going there?” he asked, holding the phone at an arm’s length, as the sounds of guns and aircrafts drew nearer at the other end.

“You can hear, busy. Shit, that was close!”

Steve winced when he heard the sound of a shot hitting the stone wall all the way to the other side of the room over the phone.

“They are retreating. I think they are working on orders.”

“Retreating?”

A loud boom was heard from the other end, and then the line went dead.

The silence was heavy. Had their friend faced his fate already?

***
The Korean Frontline
***

Team Hawk was thrown backwards by the wave of hot air and rubble. They saw the building go down as if in slow motion. Hwoarang attempted to run to the place where the building once stood, only to be yanked back down by his former Tae Kwon Do instructor and now commander, Baek.

“Don’t get yourself killed so rashly, boy.”

“But Lars just went there!”

Baek watched the worried amber eyes of his student. He shook his head, keeping a tight grip of the muscled arm.

“He can look after himself. Now, back to your position. This is not a playground. Running now, even to help your friend, will get you to court martial.”

Hwoarang hung his head. He was back in South Korea and back in the army he hated. But after seeing what damage the North Korea and Russia had inflicted, he decided to return. They weren’t aware of the current happenings outside of the ruins of Seoul.

“Over there! They’re from the Tekken Force!” one of the Korean soldiers yelled, making Baek and Hwoarang’s heads snap in the pointed direction. Two men were dragging themselves towards them; one had his leg torn off, and the other one seemed to be in better shape, but his legs were crushed. They would both die from shock; that much was clear.

“Where’s your officer? Alexandersson?”

“We-we didn’t see him… but a minute be-before the bomb went off….”

Hwoarang glanced at Baek, who was scanning the grounds. It was silent except for the aircrafts of North Korea, which were flying away.

“Run, but keep your head low.”

That was all the encouragement Blood Talon needed. He dashed towards the collapsed building, looking for even a glimpse of black and red armor or sand-colored hair, but he found nothing.

“Lars! Lars, are you here? Lars!” he ranted while digging into the piles of rubble. He had help from a few Tekken Force soldiers and a few Koreans. Every minute that passed, as he was searching, he felt hopelessness take over his heart bit by bit. If Lars was down there somewhere, he should be found quickly, or all the hope would be lost.

“This sucks…,” he muttered, as they finally quit digging and searching. The Swedish man was nowhere to be found. Baek came up to the five men.

“China reported that they have unleashed an attack on North Korea. The North Koreans needed all the forces to defend themselves. They are retreating from here. They claim they won’t attack us again.”

The redhead sank down on the pile of crushed cement. Silent tears rolled down his cheeks. The last attack had probably claimed his friend. He remembered the first night when Lars had been in Korea, helping out Team Hawk with his own Tekken Force troop. He had told that on their way to Russia, the Americans had bombed other countries as well, preventing any help from being given to Russia. Copenhagen in Denmark, Helsinki in Finland and Stockholm in his home country were in ruins. The Copenhagen bombing had claimed one of his friends, Leo, on her holiday. He had been talking on the phone with her when the planes flew right above the city and dropped bombs down. One of them had been a new biological bomb. That inhuman weapon was something even worse the other wars with the battle gas.

And these countries had nothing to do with the Third World War.

And now Lars himself had perished in the raid. Hwoarang flicked his cell phone open and, with trembling fingers, unlocked it to see if it still worked. Only few cell phones worked now that even some of the satellites had been shot down. Hwoarang felt lucky. He knew that probably in the whole of South Korea, he and Lars were the only ones with working phones.

“Jin?” He heard his love’s worried voice talk a mile a minute. “Jin, listen to me. They are retreating from South Korea. We are safe.”

There was a moment of silence between them.

“Jin… I’m afraid Lars has died. We haven’t found him. We looked for quite along time. I better quit now….”

He tried not to break down in front of everyone.

“I love you, too…,” he whispered before closing his phone.

**
Tokyo, Japan
**

Jin was torn. He was happy that his love was safe, but he felt like crying his heart out for his friend. The ever-so-polite, open-hearted Swede had come to Japan when he was still young. Jin had chosen him in his gang after seeing the enormous potential and determination of the pale boy. When his intelligence had been revealed to them all, Heihachi Mishima, Jin’s grandfather, had appointed him to lead his own Tekken Force group.

Lars was always a few steps ahead of everyone. His realization that the enemy was slowly retreating had been a display of his intelligence. Another one had been the coup d’état and the detailed plan he had mastered in the past.

“Lars is likely to be dead. Hwoarang said he was right next to the building when the bomb brought it down. They searched everywhere.”

Jin watched his companions. Nina’s eyes remained cold; only a brief flicker of sadness passed in them over her comrade. Steve stared ahead, a hand pressed over his mouth as if preventing anything from coming out. Xiaoyu, still tucked away under his arm, was quiet. Too quiet to Jin’s liking. Suddenly, she burst into tears, sobbing against Jin’s chest; Chinese words forced their way out.

Kazama patted her back, holding her tightly. He knew Xiaoyu had had a crush on Lars for ages now, but it seemed to be a serious case now as she kept crying her heart out. Nina walked up to the door, letting out a sigh.

“Help her up. We have to move again. Asuka Kazama lives nearby.”

Steve reached for the Chinese girl, who suddenly launched herself at him. They sneaked their way out of the basement and onto the streets.

Eerie silence engulfed the city of Tokyo. The once bustling metropolis was now a mere ghost town. Signs of the sushi bars hung from their holdings, glass panel windows were broken and hotels and shopping centers were deserted. It was all fitting for the Yakuza.

It was as if the underworld was ruling.