Countd0wn

Chapter 3: Signs of Life

It was a week after I had encountered the wolf, and had been forced to use my powers a second time. Ivy and I were a few miles away from the main road that connected the forest to the rest of civilization. Seattle had a ton of forests, and Dad had practically raised me on that fact by taking me hunting as soon as I was old enough. It was weird and scary for me at first, but it was how I learned to shoot and track wildlife. In short, we wouldn't have survived this long if it wasn't for him.

We had been in this forest for so long, I'd almost forgotten what civilization looked like. Although I was pretty sure it wasn't exactly like I remembered it, especially with those things running around. But, the forest was the best place to hide. It had plenty of cover, animals to provide food, wood and trees for shelter, and a river for a natural water source. Those things didn't seem smart enough to be able to track us or follow our trail, so, we stayed quietly.

But, unfortunately, this place couldn't last us for long. Soon, the food started to come less and less. I was finding little to no animals anymore, and my traps weren't picking up anything. If I ever did come across an animal, it was most likely infected. The wave, or whatever it was, appeared to have affected them too. I killed them, obviously, but I wasn't going close to their meat.

So, we had to come up with another solution, one that I didn't like the idea of. The forest wasn't that far away from our suburb, which had a store that was full of food and supplies. The first time we went out, we got sleeping bags, gallons of water, and food. I had also managed to find my Dad's hunting jacket in his locker at the sportsman's shop. I had cried a bit at finding it, but kept it, to almost honour his memory in a way.

Ivy was excited to be able to finally go home, but I had to hide her eyes from the more gory parts of humanity that had been left over. I hated that she had to go through this. She was only 8 years old. No one, especially someone that young, should have to see anything as bad as this. But she's eventually going to get used to this. I thought to myself one day, which made my heart run cold.

We went every few months, getting as many supplies as we could, and managed to outrun the creatures almost every single time. I say almost, meaning one time, in which we barely managed to escape. We were heading into the grocery store, and I thought I heard shuffling in the back rows. I told Ivy to stay by the entrance, and if I wasn't back in 5 minutes, to run. I walked as silently as I could, and had turned a corner to see one of the things feeding on a store clerk, who had been long dead. It seemed to be too focused on eating to notice me, and I didn't want to waste my bullets or attract attention. Instead, I grabbed what I could, and got Ivy out as fast as I could.

That had been over 6 months ago, and was the only time that we had encountered one of those things together, except for the times when it happens to me when I'm alone, which I don't talk to Ivy about. If I did, she would never let me leave again, which would be bad for both of us. Now, we were heading back into town for our latest expedition for materials.

We were just about a mile from the road, when we decided to take a small detour. The river had overflown it's banks, thanks to the melting snow, so we moved a bit to the right around it in order to get to our normal path, and came upon a small clearing. As I brushed the branches aside, I could see several items that appeared to be from a campsite.

There was the metal poles left over from a tent, whose tarp had been ripped and shredded to pieces, and I could see that one side of it was stained with blood. There was also a campfire that had been stomped on and extinguished, with a cooking rotisserie bent and snapped. There were coolers and small backpacks that had been left open, with flies around them trying to pick up what was left of whatever food might have been inside.

Ivy was looking away and holding me, and whispered to me. "Wren? Are there any bad things there?" I sighed, then shook my head. "It's ok Vee. You can look."

Ivy turned around, and stared at the remains of the campsite with wide eyes. I kept holding her, until she whispered to me again. "I would like to go now..." I nodded, and took her hand again, and lead her away from the campsite. I had no idea who lived there, or what could've caused that. Maybe a mutated bear? Or just a human? It was getting harder to tell which was more animalistic now...

After a while, we finally made it to the road, and saw what we saw every time. A regular highway with a cracked black pavement and barrier around the edges, along with several crashed and abandoned cars spread everywhere. We stayed off the road, but walked right next to it, knowing that there could be anything lurking in the middle of the large pileup.

A couple of times, once we were walking towards the city, I thought I saw something move behind me. Whenever I was looking in the trees or at the road, I would see something twitch in the corner of my eye, or turn to see something just move behind a tree or a car at the last second. Every time, I would turn and aim my rifle at whatever it was. Ivy would get behind me, scared, but nothing would appear. It was probably just some kind of bird, but I couldn't shake off the feeling that we were being watched.

As night fell, we both set up camp for the evening, knowing that we would be arriving in town the next day. We were both in our sleeping bags, and the stars were out. I enjoyed this the most about living out in the forest. Nights like this were calm and peaceful, and could almost make you forget about what was happening everywhere else in the world. Almost.