Empty Handed

The soft silvery glow of the moonlight drapes over Lyra's small figure. Her figure a contrast against the shadowy landscape composed of myriads' kinds of debris. Her head still tucked in her knees as she fell asleep not too long ago.

Timmy in a corner finishes giving first aid to his injuries. He looks towards Lyra only to see her desolate image highlighted by the ethereal light of the moon. He could help but sigh as he recalls the day's events. He then rummages around for something to cover Lyra. He finds a fleece blanket in one of Lyra's backpack. Timmy as quietly as possible limps towards Lyra and drapes the fleece blanket on her. Soon after he drapes the blanket, he looks for a place where he could lean back and also provides a good view of their surroundings. He finds one and silently takes the role of night watch that night.

Lyra wakes up just a few hours past midnight as usual. Feeling stiff all over she carefully stretches. She notices a blanket draped over her. She looks around and sees Timmy seriously watching their surrounding. Timmy senses a gaze on him looks around and finds Lyra awake.

"Since your awake, Mind taking over? I would like to catch a few hours of sleep myself." Timmy asks Lyra. Lyra nods and makes her way towards him. Timmy seeing Lyra coming looks for a good spot to rest. When he finds one he instantly goes to sleep.

When Timmy falls asleep, Lyra checks their surroundings then starts her mourning practice. She makes more than a few mistakes when practicing. She just couldn't clear her thoughts and focus on the moves. Noticing that her frustration from yesterday still hasn't abated and keeps on getting on her way in practicing, Lyra stops practicing and decided to find a new thing to concentrate on.

Lyra sees the night sky begins to brighten so she decides to concentrate on cooking to clear her mind. When Lyra puts all her skill and focuses on making a grand feast for breakfast that morning. She uses all the high-quality ingredients from her baggage. She even uses some of the rare spices she has been saving for a long time. Although she has a limited option on how to cook the variety of meat and veggies; she was still able to bring forth a mouth-watering smell from a simple looking creamy chicken and mushroom soup as well as grilled well-seasoned skewers of asparagus, salmon, and pork ribs.

The enticing and hunger-inducing smell of delicious food spreads far and wide inside and outside the area where Lyra and Timmy are staying. The smell attracting unwanted attention. Lyra unaware of the danger still cooks with diligence.

The smell of the delicious food attracted some scavengers near the area where both Lyra and Timmy are staying. The scarceness of resources especially food is one of the major causes of conflict in the country. So it's only natural to fight over food.

Lyra noticing the sudden stillness of the surrounding instinctively sense danger and quickly wakes Timmy up. Timmy still half asleep struggles to fully grasp the situation making him slow in reacting. Lyra had to once again drag him to a place where it's easy to hide and defend. After that, she quickly conceals the bonfire she used to cook the food trying to look at the surroundings as naturally as possible. Then she too patiently and calmly waits while putting her guard up. Not long after she finishes up concealing their presence she sees a lot of rough and savage-looking individuals appear.

Some of the individuals sniff the air and kneels to examine the ground. One, in particular, puts his hand on top of the place where Lyra buried the remains of the bonfire.

"Hmm. The sand is still warm. Whoever who was cooking is still close by."

"Now, gentlemen the question would be is that, will it be finder's keepers or are you guys willing to share with everybody here?"

"You must be joking! Who shares?"

"I'll fight for it!"

"I want it and its mine! and only mine!"

Lyra making her presence as weak as possible silently observes. She's looking for an opportunity to get away with only a little to no confrontation. She didn't want to fight since they still have to travel quite a lot before they reach the safe area near the train station. She didn't want to waste too much time since Timmy's broken leg needs medical attention as soon as possible even with the first aid he applied to it. Besides looking at a large number of people gathered it would take more than her best to fend them off all without considering assisting Timmy. But since she has to assist Timmy as well then her chances to fend off while escaping with Timmy is slim.

After a while of observing Lyra notices the rising tension between them. The arguments between the gathered people become more and more aggressive. Lyra hopes that they would start to start fighting each other soon. It would be easier for both her and Timmy to slip away without being detected.

"I don't care about your family! All I care about is me!"

"The food is mine!"

"No it's mine!"

"Back off! You, wimps, are nothing compare to me so I definitely deserve getting that food than any of you!"

The tension breaks and with everyone there gathered to rob Lyra's food losses any sense of civility with each other starts a blood boiling fight. Lyra without missing the chance grabs Timmy and quickly wears her backpacks. Timmy who's been silent presses his lips tightly suppressing his urge to scream from the pain as Lyra roughly assists him as he limps quickly. Timmy with cold sweat dripping down his face can barely concentrate on keeping himself conscious and his mouth tightly shut. Suddenly a thin wire covered with sand unexpectedly trips Timmy. Timmy couldn't help but yelp and even brag Lyra down with him. Lyra caught off guard by Timmy's sudden trip was unable to balance herself quickly enough and falls. Timmy's fall created a loud noise combined with his scream attracted everyone's attention to them. Luckily Timmy and Lyra were able to get quite far away from everyone else.

"What's that noise!" Almost everyone who wanted to get Lyra's food shouted.

Then, everyone stops fighting and rushes over towards Lyra and Timmy. Lyra instantly gets up and scans. With a second scan of the area, Lyra finds a niche good enough to hide one person. She quickly drags and pushes Timmy into the niche. She made the 'zip it gesture' to shut Timmy who's about to complain about Lyra's rough handling. Securing Timmy, she heads out to do her best to fight off their pursuers. She calms herself and readies herself to kill this time. This time she has to try to kill and not only cripple her enemies. The consequences of letting them live might cost her life and Timmy's. She couldn't take that chance when she hasn't even retrieved her uncle's corpse yet.

She readies her knife and makes sure her gun is easily accessible. She has to take the initiative to attack first while she still has the element of surprise by her side. Stealthily she crouches behind a boulder hiding her presence as best as she could. She then waits for the pursuers to pass by. When finally the last of her pursuers pass by, starting from behind the pursuers she launches insanely quick and accurate thrust and stabs to their vital points. Almost half of them immediately lose their lives due to Lyra's sudden deadly attack. Although those that have lost their lives many of them aren't experts in combat. Even so, Lyra didn't have the luxury to contemplate their combat skills since she's fighting to live.

When the initial shock of Lyra's attack fades the expert within the group already readies well plan counter for Lyra. Lyra simultaneously uses both her knife and a handgun to attack. Whenever she has to fight close-quarter she uses her knife while wielding her gun effectively to counter and maim her enemies from afar.

A standstill happens when there were only five remainings, Lyra full of bruises and cuts tries to maintain her calm while trying to even out her breathing. Full-grown men against a ten-year-old. It looks like the outcome is obvious but to those who are fighting knows that unless the fight is over the outcome is never predictable. Even though Lyra is outnumbered she stays vigilant and keeps herself ready to attack at any time. Sweat and blood drip down Lyra's arms.

Suddenly all five men attack Lyra at the same time. Lyra expecting their action quickly drops down disrupting the momentum of their attack. And then Lyra picks up some sand and throws the sand into their eyes as they try to refocus their attack towards Lyra. Taking advantage of the momentary blindness of her enemies, Lyra goes behind one of the men then kicks the back of his knees making him kneel making it easy for Lyra to slit his throat. Using the man as a shield, Lyra precisely shoots the rest of the men in their knees. Swiftly, goes behind each of the remaining men and slit their throat or shoot their head if they're too tall for her to reach.

Exhausted and bloody, Lyra makes her way shakily to the niche where Timmy is hiding. With great effort, she walks while cradling her trembling left arm. It can't be helped that her left arm almost broke from all the recoil it receives from the handgun. When Lyra finally reaches the niche she sees Timmy fast asleep. She can't help but roll her eyes. She nudges Timmy awake with her foot. Timmy rubbing his eyes looks and sees Lyra glaring at him.

"WHAT? You have no idea how painful my leg was! I had to either scream or sleep off the pain!"

Lyra just looks at him and gestures for him to get ready. Only taking a moment to tend to her worst injury, Lyra and Timmy head out to continue their journey back to the safe zone.

After the bloody incident, Lyra and Timmy didn't encounter any life threatening incidents anymore. Lyra learns her lesson and only prepares jerkies and pickled veggies for their meals. Even though Lyra acts as if nothing happened after her first kill, every night she would wake up screaming and vomiting most of her dinner. Timmy clueless on how to help Lyra only watches and offers tea after Lyra stops vomiting. Lyra would always accept the tea with shaky hands gulps it down quickly. As they get closer and closer to the safe zone Lyra becomes calmer making her nights a little bit better.

When they finally reach the safe zone near the train station, they quickly went to a medical facility. Lyra refuses to get herself examine and only let the medics examine and treat Timmy. Timmy's leg injury seems to have gotten worst which means a lot of resources are needed to treat it. Meaning the treatment would be a hefty sum. Lyra without batting an eye pays for both Timmy's full medical treatment, medicine, and accommodation. Timmy overwhelmed by Lyra's kindness wanted to thank her but she was already about to head to the train station to purchase a ticket. Timmy desperately limps after her shouting her name. Unfortunately, Lyra for whatever reason didn't look back at Timmy. Seeing Lyra's ever-growing small figure he shouted

"I'M SORRY! Lyra, I'm sorry! and Thank you!" For a moment Timmy sees Lyra stopping only to quickly disappear afterward.

Lyra heads towards the train station. She buys a ticket, lucky for her, the train arrives that day. She still has about half an hour before the train arrives. She looks around the station and sees the all too familiar bench with bullet holes. Without thinking, she finds herself walking towards it. Then coming to her senses she stares at the bench, she sits. Recalling Timmy's words, Lyra couldn't help but think of another person saying those same words to her. She closes her eyes recalling her uncle's voice saying the same words "Lyra, I'm sorry and thank you."

She opens her eyes and stares at her empty hands.

"How naive. Thinking I'm strong enough to face any challenge to bring you back, Uncle. I wasn't even strong enough to get a glimpse of you." tears drips on Lyra's open empty hands.