Don't Call Me Dead

9. Backpackers' Rest

My feet land on the moss next to the dark puddle. I reach down to brush the leaves off the object that's drawn my attention, but, of course, my fingers can't even touch them. The limitations of being a – well, whatever it is that I am.

But I don't need to remove the leaves to see what's underneath.

It's a hand.

It sticks out of the water, its fingers spread as if trying to grab something. Rotten leaves stick to the back of the hand, and there's a spider web between the thumb and the index finger. The hand is so decomposed the bones protrude in some places.

I stare at it, feeling numb. Is this Gia? Or is it...me?

I reach out again. A part of me is half-expecting for the dead fingers to twist and grab my wrist, but nothing happens, of course. I can grab nothing, and nothing can grab me. Surely not some decomposed hand.

Its wrist is wider than mine. Its fingers are longer. Its palm is wider, too, even though most of its tissues are gone.

It's a man's hand.

I straighten up. Surprisingly, I feel relief. Finding a dead body is not a good thing, but people do disappear in swamps. It's a dangerous place, and yet every now and then backpackers challenge it.

Someone has died here, but at least it wasn't me.

I start moving again, slowly now, looking around. In another hundred of feet, something else draws my attention. A grey object under a tree. I move closer and find a tennis shoe, partly covered by dirt and rotten leaves. It had been white once, but it's dirty grey now. The size seems rather small, like something I or Gia would wear. But neither of us wore tennis shoes then we came here, I'm sure of that. We had our waterproof gear on.

To my right, I find something else. An object that seemed like a boulder from a distance, on a close inspection looks suspiciously like someone's back, clad in rags that have once been a checked shirt. A back of a person lying with his—or her—face down. I can see no feet or hands or head, but if seems like the dirt and the leaves are covering them, with only the back partly visible.

I start moving again, my eyes noticing more suspicious objects along the way. A rag that looks like it's been torn off someone's clothes. A corner of a laminated map. A hairbrush sticking out of the moss. A pale shape under the water—a scull or the reflection of the moon? But the moon is fading, and my surroundings grow more visible as the morning grows nearer.

What is this place? Some kind of a backpackers' cemetery in the middle of nowhere? When all these people disappeared, how come that search parties have never found them? Was this place too deep into the swamps to be discovered?

I keep moving. I already have a lot to tell Jack, but that's not what I came here for. I want to know what's happened to me.

Suddenly, the trees end. I stand on the edge of a small clearing. It's relatively dry here, and the ground gets higher until it culminates in a grass-covered hill in the middle of the clearing.

The hill with a door.

The moss-covered, heavy wooden door is closed, but as I come closer, I notice a window to the right from it. There's no glass or shutters in it, only a round hole in the side of the hill. I could look though it and see what's inside. Hell, I could go right through the door and get my answers. Yet I hesitate. Do I really want those answers? Will I be able to handle them?

I clench my fists. I've come all this way. I must know.

I approach the window and look inside.

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