you are my home - leslie withers x reader

chapter eighteen - separated

you and leslie were walking for quite some time now and you couldn't bear it anymore. leslie didn't say a word the entire time, which wasn't really unusual of him, but you felt awful. you were overthinking everything and felt completely overwhelmed by your thoughts. this was a big problem of you, but right now you couldn't do anything about it. leslie was different than everyone you'd met before but you also knew that he was suffering a lot and probably wouldn't be able to live a normal life outside of the mental hospital sometime in the near future. hell, you didn't even know if he felt the same and what would happen to you, maybe all of you won't even survive this. the best thing was to not get close to leslie and just find sebastian and the others so you could get out of here.
you flinched when you suddenly heard a voice behind you, as you were completely lost in your thoughts.
"y-y/n... are you... mad?" leslie asked.
you sighed. "no, i'm not mad leslie," you said without any emotion, "let's just find the others."
you really had no idea where they could be. maybe they found shelter in one of the buildings? you weren't sure if it was a good idea to go inside one of them again, but you didn't know what else to do.
"y-y/n..."
"leslie, i don't-" you turned around and froze. leslie stood there with a beautiful flower in his hands. where did he even get it?
"you seem m-mad... i think y-you're sup...posed to gift f-flowers as an... apology."

you just stood there with your mouth open. it wasn't even because of the flower. well, maybe a little... but mostly because that was the first time you heard leslie say a complete sentence, almost without any interruption. you felt your throat tighten and were tearing up.

leslie saw you and panicked. he shook his head and started to have issues talking again.
"mad...mad...mad..." he repeated the word over and over, "i'm s-sorry..."
"no leslie, i'm-" you weren't able to finish your sentence. both of you cried out in agony as you fell to the ground. the high-pitched noise was back again and it felt like your eardrums were pierced by the sound. you curled up and put your hands over your ears in an attempt to  quiet the sound, but it didn't work. if you had to endure this any longer, you'd go mad. suddenly, the noise stopped. it took a while for you to get used to the normal sounds again. you slowly got up and looked around. something was wrong. you were at a different place, not in the city anymore, and...
leslie...
where is he?
your heart dropped. just a few seconds ago he was right beside you. you got sick to your stomach. this isn't true, he can't just disappear?
"leslie!"
you started screaming and turned in every direction.
"leslie, where are you?"
this was just a bad dream. you would probably wake up any moment, right? you just didn't get enough sleep and now your body was taking revenge. it had to be like that.

but you didn't wake up. this wasn't a bad dream. he was gone.
"leslie..." you felt a tear running down your cheek. he didn't do anything wrong, life only treated him bad and all he wanted was someone he could trust, someone who gave him comfort and where he didn't have to be afraid of doing something wrong.
and in your last moments together you treated him like an object without feelings just because you were afraid of your own.

in the distance, you could see a single building.
"is that a... church?" you said while you squinted your eyes. it surely looked like one.
"maybe leslie went there. he must be so afraid..."
you've never been so determined before in your life. you would find leslie, even if it would take forever. you started to make your way towards the church. once you arrived, a bad feeling overcame you. you debated if you should open the big wooden gate or not. but leslie may be here and could need help. you couldn't let him down, so you pushed against it with all your strength. you entered the churchyard and looked around. it seemed abandoned, weeds grew everywhere. you walked over to another gate when you heard something behind you. it was a group of people but they looked kind of... dead? you started to panic and ran to another part of the churchyard but they chased after you. you thought about running to the entrance of the church but you probably wouldn't make it. they had you cornered.

sebastian landed on his back in a puddle of dirty water. he groaned and got up.
"alone again...?" he mumbled to himself.
the others were nowhere in sight and he had no idea where he was.
it was dark but his lantern provided enough light for him to see.
guess i have to do this on my own...
he knew that this was ruvik's work. ruvik wanted to separate everyone so he could get to leslie easier. sebastian couldn't let that happen, that would probably be the death of all of you. he could see some traps hidden on the ground and managed to disable them.
but then a six legged girl appeared out of nowhere. sebastian started to shoot her but it didn't seem to bother her even one bit. he tried to run away, the doors were behind a weird barrier.
"what the...?"
he turned around and saw the girl already crawling towards him. he saw his last chance to survive in shooting the oil barrel next to her. it exploded and instantly set her on fire. she started screaming in agony and ran away in an attempt to put out the flames that enveloped her body. it worked and she looked even more furious than before. it was a long and exhausting fight, but in the end sebastian managed to kill her. this way, the barrier that sealed the door broke and sebastian could leave the deadly room.

next, he saw ruvik walking towards a circle of bathtubs that were connected to a machine in the middle of the room. he was ready to fight him when he noticed that it wasn't really ruvik. it was more of a see-through silhouette. this must be another one of ruvik's memories...
there was a young man laying in one of the bathtubs, it was leslie.
ruvik walked towards a switch. "there can be no mistake. this one is... compatible." then he pulled the switch. leslie started twitching and screaming because he couldn't bear the pain.
then, the memory ended.
ruvik cannot get leslie... if this happens, it's the end for all of us.
he climbed over some wooden boxes and jumped over a destroyed brick wall. the way led him to some steel stairs that appeared to be leading out of this wicked place.
he climbed them up and was greeted by a beautiful sunrise. in the distance, he saw a building that looked like an old church or cathedral. he started to make his way towards it. when he arrived, he pushed open a big wooden gate. behind it, someone was laying in the grass. it was joseph. sebastian ran towards him and helped him up.
"are you all right?" he asked.
"my head wouldn't stop buzzing... it felt like it was about to crack open," joseph said.
sebastian nodded, "you seen kidman?"
but joseph shook his head, "no... next thing i knew i was here. i must've blacked out or... maybe i turned again."
suddenly, the gate behind them started to move. haunted were banging against it, trying to open it.
sebastian turned to joseph and helped him walk.
"in there, now."

accepting that you were about to die made you think about leslie. you wished you could turn back time so that you could tell him how much he really meant to you and that it wasn't his fault you behaved like that. that you would do everything you can to give him comfort and make him laugh. to tell him that you loved him since you looked through that window and your eyes met for the first time.

the monsters came closer. they sounded like wild animals that were about to tear apart their prey. you closed your eyes and curled up against the wall. one of them was about to rip his teeth into you when you heard shots being fired. the monster got hit and fell forward, right onto you. you felt blood splashing in your face and let out a scream. a few seconds later all of them were dead. you thought you heard footsteps coming towards you but you didn't look up. you couldn't, your fear paralyzed you.
"y/n...?"
the voice was muffled, everything you could hear was a ringing sound in your ear.
"y/n... we're... you're okay..."
someone touched you and you started screaming, kicking, everything that would get them away from you. but they wrapped their arms around you while someone else grabbed your legs so you couldn't kick them.
"y/n, it's me, sebastian. you're safe now."