June 28, 2023
Dear Journal,
We found bones today.
The morning started slow, the forest wrapped in a mist that clung to our clothes and made every breath feel damp. We broke camp before the sun had fully cleared the trees. Marcus looked tired—he said he'd heard something in the night, a branch snapping too cleanly to be wind, but when he got up to check, nothing was there.
It didn't matter. Whether it was an animal, one of them, or something worse, we were already too used to sleeping with one eye open.
The ravine path led us deeper into unfamiliar territory. Our map was less useful now; the terrain had changed over the years—erosion, overgrowth, old logging roads reclaimed by the wild. But Naomi kept us oriented. If the ranger station still existed, it had to be near a water source, and the trickle of runoff we'd been following suggested we were on the right path.
That's when we reached the riverbed.
It was dry—completely, hopelessly dry. Cracked soil stretched where water once ran, and on either side, jagged rocks jutted like broken teeth. We followed it cautiously, watching for signs of movement, until we found the bones.
At first, we thought it was an animal. Maybe a deer. But then Marcus spotted the boot.
Half-buried beneath a mound of dried mud, a leather boot stuck out like an accusation. We uncovered it slowly, gently. Then came the jeans, the torn fabric clinging to sun-bleached bone. A pelvis. A ribcage. The skull, when we reached it, was shattered—blunt force trauma. Maybe a fall. Maybe something worse.
Around the corpse were scattered supplies—an empty backpack, a rusted canteen, a flare gun with no flares. Whoever this was, they'd been here for months, at least. Maybe since the first wave of infection. Maybe longer.
Nora turned away and vomited. Naomi knelt beside the remains, searching silently through the debris.
She found a notebook. Half-destroyed by water, most of the pages illegible. But one survived.
A name: Elias Corman.
A line: "Station's gone. No one's left. Heading south."
And a date: July 10, 2023.
Marcus muttered, "So he made it to the station." His voice was thin, the words fragile in the still air.
Naomi stood and stared down the length of the riverbed. "Then we're close."
I wanted to believe that. I really did. But something about that skeleton stuck with me—the way it was curled in on itself, like it hadn't just fallen there, but waited. For what, I don't know. Help? Rescue?
Or death?
We moved on.
The day grew hotter as the clouds cleared, and by mid-afternoon, the mist was gone. We walked in silence for hours. The only sounds were our footsteps, the occasional rustle of squirrels, and the hum of distant flies. No birds. No deer. The deeper we moved into the woods, the more I realized how empty everything felt.
And that's when we heard it.
A shot.
Just one.
Far off, muffled by the trees, but unmistakable.
We froze. Marcus raised his hand, signaling us to drop low. We listened. Waited.
Nothing followed.
No shouts. No more shots. Just that one, lonely report echoing across the trees like a question we couldn't answer.
We debated what to do. Naomi wanted to scout ahead. Marcus argued we stay put and wait for nightfall. Nora just clutched the baby to her chest and stared at the trees.
In the end, we compromised—move cautiously, stay hidden, detour if needed.
But that single gunshot stayed with us the rest of the day. Like a reminder: we're not alone out here. Whether that's good or bad is still unclear.
By the time dusk rolled in, we were exhausted. We found a grove of fallen trees near a cliffside and made camp there. No fire. Again. We're all starting to miss warmth, but it's not worth the risk.
While the others rested, I climbed the rocks to get a view. From up there, I could see the ridge stretching to the north, trees blending into one another like a sea of green shadows. And just on the horizon, nearly lost in the haze, I saw it.
A structure.
Small. Square. Probably half-collapsed.
But definitely man-made.
I climbed down carefully, adrenaline pushing back the fatigue.
"We're close," I told them. "I saw something—maybe a building, maybe the station."
Naomi's eyes lit up—not quite hope, but something close.
Tomorrow, we head that way.
We're running low on food again. The baby's fever came back tonight, and Nora's trying not to panic, but I can see it in her face. She's scared. We all are.
We need shelter. We need supplies. We need a damn break.
Maybe tomorrow will be the day.
Until then, I'll hold onto the image of that distant roofline. It might be a ruin, or a trap, or already taken. But it's something.
And right now, something is more than we've had in weeks.
Yours in exhaustion and flickering hope,
J.K.