The Differents | ✓

T H I R T Y - S I X

By the time the light was starting to grey and somewhere above the rainclouds, the sun was beginning to set, we had walked all day. We stopped a few times to eat and rest, but the rain discouraged us from staying put for very long. I hadn't dried off since the previous night and was positive the skin on my fingers couldn't get any more wrinkled. Walking around soaking wet for twenty-four hours is not very fun.

I looked down at my boots as I walked. A few centimetres of water sloshed around at the bottom, but I couldn't be bothered anymore to stop and empty them.

Sniper tapped my arm lightly, fumbling for my hand but distracted by something ahead. "Look," he said, pointing.

A long way down the road, an object stood out from the rest of the surroundings. It looked like some sort of structure, or at least something that wasn't endless trees and forest. As we got closer, it became more distinguished, and revealed itself to be a building. It was a squat little thing with a slanted roof and multiple windows, most of which were either broken or had a layer of green muck covering them. The building, although not very tall, had multiple different parts to it and extended far back into a flat piece of land that had been hollowed out of the forest. The walls had long since been taken over by the plants, but minus a chunk where the bricks had caved in, the building was fairly intact.

Sniper put a hand on his gun as we stopped in front of it. "Should we go in?"

I eyed the building. It looked like a deserted house, its inhabitants long gone, most likely taking with them the majority of the building's furnishings too. Still, I thought. It wouldn't hurt to take a look at the first building I had ever seen since the Core.

"Sure," I replied. "Why don't we."

I stepped off the road and onto the gravelly ground the building rested on. There was a large empty space in front of the building, where we stood, that puzzled me. It looked large enough to hold lots of people, but maybe they put other things here? Transportation, if it existed?

We climbed the short flight of stairs leading up to the battered-looking door. Sniper tried the handle while I wiped the mould off a sign I had accidentally stepped on.

The Journey's End Inn and Pub, it read. I had no idea what an inn or pub was, but it sounded like the building was not someone's house.

Sniper grunted in frustration and rammed his shoulder into the door. It broke clean off its hinges and fell inside the first room with a loud bang.

"Well, any hope we had of making a quiet entry just died," I said, looking at the door lying flat on the ground, rain starting to make the wooden surface slick.

He rubbed his shoulder. "Handle wouldn't move."

Stepping inside, we were met with the sight of a building which had been neglected for years. The forest had taken over most of the outside of the building, and had started to creep in through the broken windows and in the section where the wall had caved in, and whatever coating had once covered the walls was now long gone, leaving only the house's wooden skeleton behind. The old, battered floorboards creaked as we walked, leading us from room to room. There were multiple rooms that we went through, but the majority of them contained piles of splintered wood and other broken things strewn across the floor.

One room we walked into contained a very strange-looking contraption though. The room looked like a storage room or at least somewhere you wouldn't sleep. There were more piles of wood against the floor and I managed to retrieve a very battered cupboard door from one of them. Sniper suggested that the room might have been a kitchen or pantry, if people had those back then.

As for the contraption, it looked like a very old version of an oven. Made of rusting metal that protested loudly when I tried to open it, it reminded me of the sleek, shiny ones the Core had in their kitchens. The buttons and knobs running along it didn't work -- or at least didn't do anything when I tried to use them -- but I made sure to put everything back the way it was anyway.

We moved on. The first floor of the building contained little of interest and seemed to have been used for its kitchen and living areas. Sniper remembered that as we were exploring, he had walked by a staircase and went to go find it. I took a quick look out the back door (which wasn't really a back door anymore since there was no door), and noticed a big, grassy area that I guessed would have been used for enjoying the summer days outside. I still wasn't sure what an inn or pub was, but the house looked big enough to accommodate at least everyone in my hallway at the Core, probably more.

I went back inside and found Sniper looking thoughtfully at a flight of old stairs. They didn't look very sturdy and a few of them had broken, but it looked like the only way to the second floor.

"Should we try them?" I asked. "I don't think there's any other way up there."

"I don't know. The stairs look so battered and we have no idea how strong they are. There's probably not much up there anyways considering this place is in the middle of nowhere and is already in such a bad state."

I shrugged and looked around. We were in what looked like the living room, judging by the half-crumbled pile of bricks against a wall which vaguely resembled a fireplace. "What if there's something up there?"

"Like what?" Sniper replied. "I'm pretty sure if someone had left something here that could help us they'd leave it down here. This just looks like an old abandoned building to me. Probably a place for travellers to relax on their way to the city."

"Yeah, you're right." I sighed and leaned my arms against the stair railing. Its supports cracked and part of the railing toppled over, falling through a hole in the stairs. I looked at it bitterly. "I guess I was just hoping we would find something here, you know? And now that I think of it, I don't know why. Life is not some made up story, and the likelihood is that if we find an abandoned building from before the virus, it will probably be just that -- an abandoned building from before the virus."

"Still. It's cool that it's even still here," Sniper said, trying to lift my spirits. "I mean, you don't just see a piece of history lying around like this every day, do you?"

"I guess not," I replied. "Wanna eat something and dry off and then keep going?"

We did, and by the time we were no longer trailing drops of water behind us as we walked and puddles were no longer forming where we sat, we were ready to go. The rain had slowed down a bit and had turned to a weak drizzle, and I was thankful that my jacket, now only damp on the inside, was waterproof. At least I could wear it and not feel completely soaked, although it would take actual heat to dry us off completely.

We walked for several hours more, passing more and more things as we got significantly closer to our destination. First, it was a strange looking building with no walls that offered gas. I had no idea what anyone would need that for, and the adjoining shop offered no answers or salvageable supplies. Next, we passed another building with the title of an inn, although this one was a lot smaller than the first. The next few buildings we passed all varied in height and structure and all looked completely useless and battered, but one thing was for sure: we were getting closer.

I don't know exactly when we realized we had entered Old Victoria, as it was very gradual. It wasn't like the Core, surrounded by a very distinct barrier. It kind of just happened. First, there was one building. Then two. Then five. And before we knew it, we were surrounded by buildings on all sides, more than I had ever seen in my life.

I don't think I had actually registered that we had made it until Sniper had pointed it out. "We're here," he had said, sounding baffled.

We stood there for a bit, looking at the buildings. After I had had to run his statement through my head a few times, I turned to him and asked a question that's weight hadn't dawned on me until that moment.

"Now what?"

*****

A/N: heyy! it's been awhile since I've put one of these at the end of a chapter. I just wanted to say thank you to those of you still reading this. regardless of if you interact with it or not, I appreciate you. thanks for staying with me and for keeping up with Arthemis' story. There are about five chapters left of this book, which will probably take us into late February to early March if I keep updating once a week. For now, don't forget to vote! It won't kill you :)