The Afterward

Prologue

I'm not revealing the POV yet.

I think they sent out search parties yesterday. I don't know. There's a whole group of animals screaming their heads off about their injuries and screaming for help, but I can't see them. Perks of being stuck in a big pile of rubble a few meters under the surface; you avoid all that blood and gore and noise.

I think they're gone now. The search party is always like this--they miss everything until it's too late. The other two that were with me have already died now from the cold. Or the shrapnel. The explosion that put me down here went off just after the infection ended. Not much is left down here. 

In other words, I'm dead for sure.

I sort of don't want them to find me, mostly because everything hurts. If I got pulled out now, I'm sure I'll break another three bones along the way, and I can't risk that. I can move my arms, but not my legs, and even if I do, there's always the wonderful chance of dislodging a rock by accident and dropping over 20 tons of rock and concrete on myself.

Oh, crap. There's footsteps. 

But they're not above me, treading on the rock, but below me, like there's a tunnel which I've landed on. I feel wind on my back, so maybe I'm stuck suspended awkwardly above it. Then, a big boom sounds and I fall onto nice, hard, rough dirt. The rock stays put, stuck in place, except for a few pebbles and a few small rocks which I fall on. 

"EEEAARGH!" It hurts a lot. I roll around, completely useless, while I scream from the spinal pain. I've broken my leg (which doesn't seem to be fixable), my arm and now the back, too?!

There's a shadow standing over me and looking down at me. They're very tall, but the feeble light coming from a suspended lantern isn't enough to help me see their face. Without saying anything, they lift me up by the arm and hoist me over their shoulder. I can't even muster enough energy to fight back, and I flail uselessly as they walk off with me.

"Hey! Stop!" I try banging on their shoulder, and that works. They sit me down and crouch down to face me. It's still too dark to see them. I start my interrogation with, "Who are you?"

"You can call me Willow," she says, and lifts up a lantern so I can see her. She's got a serious look on her snout, and her shoulder is terribly bandaged. So that's why she put me down. I look around, trying to see whether we're alone down here. Yep. She's by herself, in a tunnel, definitely not suspicious.

A boom reverberates somewhere down the tunnel and Willow perks up, ears twitching. She grabs me again and shushes me before I can fully open my mouth.

"Shh. They're here."

"Who's here?"

She nodded toward a growing shadow in the tunnel. "Them." and then she shoves us behind a large rock. That sends a quick sharp pain up my leg and I have to grit my teeth. "Ow." Marching can be heard as we sit there, silent, for a few minutes. Then when it ebbs away, we're left as we were; two animals stuck alone in a tunnel, except I'm slightly more rattled and puzzled than before. Willow sniffs and bends down with her arms out. She wants to pick me up again, and I try to awkwardly climb up and we head off in silence. Later, I ask her what she's doing there. She responds with this:

"I got separated from a friend. From a few friends, actually. Found that tunnel and just... kept on going. I guess. You're... not going to report me, are you?" I shake my head, confused. "I moved here a few weeks ago, got met with this." And I point to the place around us. The tunnel eventually becomes wider and cleaner, and then it ends with blinding light. No shielding of eyes could stop us from spending a few seconds blind. 

I'm the first to look around. The landscape is barren; just grass, trees, and rocks. We've come into a forest.

Except... this isn't a forest. I can tell from the thick plume of smoke rising from a few trees away from us.

It's on fire?

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Credits:

Piggy & Piggy Book 2 by Minitoon

Story by Soo0shi (Aka TrenchcoatsAndTuxedos)