The Eden Projects (EDITING)

Chapter 20. Frenzy.

Kasper stuffed his pack back up as best he could, checked his weapon, and joined Zak in the field. He seemed hesitant. Death was a thing that happened to other people, and for a while they had felt invincible. Now it was all too real. "Ready?" If it happened to Archer, who then was next? Death never hit once. It had a habit of fanning out. Death had a blast radius.

"Let's go." Zak nodded, scanning their surroundings before clipping the chest strap on his bag.

Woods were less menacing in the daylight.

The colors were fading from emerald greens to richer tones of yellow and red. The sounds of creaking trunks and rustling branches made the forest less of an unknowable thing. It was alive, it breathed. So they had things in common. It was all so different. But still. He could smell it. This is going to be hard. It was the ultimate test. I just have to stay clear of Zak.

Kasper had become increasingly aware of the space Zak required. It wasn't much but it was enough to make him wary of overstepping. He knew just how fragile a human was and after the trap, he knew exactly what it took for one to die. "Once they're dead, we'll take as much as we can food-wise." He didn't want to be the one to make all the decisions, but he knew Zak wasn't in any state to bark orders. So he would have to. "If they've got em' we'll grab the bullets too. All of em'."

The trap wasn't far from where their barn was, though their dead sprint the night before made it feel like miles when walking. All he had to do was follow the blood, the smell, and soon enough they were squeezing between cars, hiding their packs in the brush, and walking past the bodies that were reduced to unrecognizable piles of mush and fragmented bone. Faces all but skinned. Cores emptied out like clay urns. He stared at the trampled sauce that could have been the bent neck man. "They work fast." Kasper's mouth watered.

"There was a lot of them."

"Do you think they'll come back?"

He walked the sidelines, looking for any sign that one of the cars had been moved. "The Flickers?"

"The people."

"Maybe."

"Maybe?"

"Maybe."

Nothing had changed, except for the missing generator and battery. Of course they would.

"What's the plan?" Zak pulled his curly hair back into the smallest of tails.

"Well... we follow the tracks and make our move. They came from behind us, but I think our best bet would be to head up. Towards the tower."

"Sounds good, let's just get out of here." Zak's shoulders where high against his ears. He rubbed his arms nervously.

Stepping past the dampened plots of crushed viscera and grass both Zak and Kasper did their best not to look. Kasper felt an ominous chill trickle down his spine. "That's not happening to us man." He waited for Zak's reply.

He wasn't exactly leader-like but he could try to sound reassuring.

"Hey, that's not gonna be us." Something unnatural tainted his words. Is that a lie? No matter how much he wanted to believe it, how much he wanted Zak to trust his judgment, he knew his own words weren't sound. What he wanted was an unviable outcome.

"You can't know that."

Peace was never an option.

The path eventually wove them back up onto the road and they found the rubber burn where tires had met the pavement spinning. The displaced dirt pulled left towards that small city. He shifted his pack. Standing in the open lane. "We're doing this right?" He checked his gun.