𝕯𝖊𝖆𝖉𝖘𝖍𝖔𝖙

See No Evil

The blood moon's light barely broke through the thin veil of clouds as the car roared down the empty highway, it's engine's hum the only sound slicing through the eerie silence. Emma's knuckles were white against the steering wheel as she drove with precision, her eyes focused ahead. She hadn't spoken much since they left the city. Not since Gian.

In the passenger seat, Nathan stared out the window, his gaze distant, the rolling forests and abandoned towns slipping past like a forgotten dream. Every once in a while, his lips moved as though he were reciting something under his breath—maybe Gian's name, maybe something else.

In the back seat, Kaylin sat wedged between Julian and Russell, her leather jacket bunched awkwardly around her neck, her bag heavy on her lap. The hollow feeling Gian's death left gnawed at all of them. They had escaped, yes—but at what cost?

Gian was dead. Kaylin hadn't been able to shake the weight of his absence since the moment they left the mall. He had been more than a fighter. He was.. well.. it was confusing, to say the least. He was definitely her best friend, but.. stuff was always tense. Like, the 'weird' tense.

But now, with nothing but the open road in front of them, the group was forced to confront the emptiness his loss left behind. But today was about something different—reclaiming pieces of their past.

After the chaos of the last few days, they needed to gather supplies and personal belongings, things left behind when they'd fled for their lives. Their destination: upstate New York, where their homes—Julian's, Kaylin's, and Emma's—waited.

There were only fragments of their old lives scattered there, things they had abandoned in the rush to survive. But they needed those fragments now. Maybe having them would ground them, help them remember who they were before the world ended.

The car fell into silence again, broken only by the occasional grunt from Russell as he adjusted his seatbelt or Julian softly tapping the window. It wasn't an uncomfortable silence, though—it was the kind that grew between people who had already shared every word they had.

As they drove deeper into the countryside, the landscapes shifted, growing more rural. Fields stretched out on either side, untamed grass swaying in the wind like specters of a forgotten past. Time felt slower here.

The remains of the modern world were still present, but fading, overtaken by nature, and the group felt it—the odd quiet after weeks of relentless survival, the weight of Gian's absence still heavy in the car.

Finally, Emma cleared her throat, her voice raspy from disuse. "Julian's house is up first. We'll be there in about ten minutes." Julian nodded but didn't speak. He hadn't said much about his home since they decided to go back, and no one pressed him.

They all understood the tension of returning to places that once held the simplicity of normal life. For Julian, the weight of it all was different. His house wasn't just bricks and mortar—it was where his family had lived, where memories of laughter and light still echoed in the halls.

But the people who made it a home were long gone. He was going back to a shell of what it had once been. Emma's eyes flicked to the rearview mirror, catching a glimpse of Kaylin, who stared blankly ahead, her expression unreadable.

They were all feeling it, the heavy gravity of what had happened—Gian's death, the raid, the fractured group trying to find their way through a world that was collapsing around them. She swallowed and focused back on the road, a knot tightening in her stomach.

STOP #1: JULIAN'S HOUSE

The house loomed in the distance as they approached, nestled in a secluded part of the woods. It looked almost untouched, like the chaos of the world hadn't quite reached it yet.

Vines crawled up the side of the house, their tendrils wrapping around windows like nature was slowly reclaiming what was once human territory. The driveway was cracked, weeds pushing through the concrete, and the air was still—too still.