They moved quickly.
Caleb stuck close to Jalen, who led the group with swift, silent urgency. Hana followed right behind Caleb, clutching a long branch she'd broken off one of the glowing trees. It pulsed with faint amber light, a strange, soothing rhythm that made Caleb wonder if the trees were alive in a way more conscious than any on Earth.
The moss gave way to broken, uneven terrain—slick roots, jutting stones, and sudden dips that caught ankles and knees. Alya took up the rear, helping the injured along. Somewhere behind them, the girl with ribbons stumbled. The older woman with her caught her just in time.
"Keep moving," Jalen said. "We need shelter before nightfall."
"But isn't it already night?" Hana asked.
Jalen didn't answer.
The world around them shifted subtly as they passed deeper into the woods. The light changed—not darker, but different. The mist began to glow faintly blue. The trees grew wider, their trunks splitting at odd angles, creating twisted arches and hollow spaces.
They found a grove—less open than the clearing, half-sheltered by the hanging roots of a massive tree. Vines looped from branch to branch like natural curtains. It wasn't safe. Nowhere felt safe. But it was the best they could do.
"We'll stay here," Jalen said.
"Should we light a fire?" someone asked.
Alya shook her head. "We don't know what that would draw."
The group began to settle in. People gathered what supplies they could—fallen leaves, bark, branches that shimmered slightly. No one wanted to sleep. Caleb didn't blame them. He wouldn't either.
He found a spot near the edge of the grove and sat down next to Hana.
"Think it'll come back?" she asked.
He looked toward the mist. "I don't know what 'it' even was."
They both fell silent.
Then came the stories.
It began with a soft voice from across the grove—an older woman with gray hair, wrapped in a coat far too thin. "I saw a man in the sky," she said. "Before I woke up here. Just before. He was standing on a bridge, arms out, and then… gone. Like something reached down and plucked him out."
Others began to speak up, one by one.
A man with a limp recounted being on a subway platform when the lights flickered and the tunnel ahead rippled like water.
A nurse described how her hospital flatlined. Every machine, every patient. Then silence. Then this.
Caleb listened, arms around his knees, as the survivors painted a tapestry of the end—fragmented, surreal. It was like a thousand different disasters had struck in the same breath, and only a few had been spared… or taken.
He glanced toward Jalen, who stood near the edge of the grove, scanning the trees.
"You didn't say what you saw," Caleb said, getting up and walking over.
Jalen was quiet a moment. Then: "I was driving home. Long stretch of highway. Rain. I blinked, and the road just… ended. Like I'd driven off the world."
"And then?"
"I woke up here."
Caleb looked out at the forest, where the blue mist moved like breath. "You think we're dead?"
"No," Jalen said. "We're not that lucky."
The air changed again.
Not colder. Just... heavier.
Something in the moss nearby hissed, a long exhale like escaping gas. People froze.
A low moan echoed through the trees. Distant. Then closer.
Everyone went silent.
Hana gripped Caleb's arm. "It's here."
"No," whispered Alya. "It's not the same thing."
The sound was different—less animal, more... human.
"Someone's out there," said the man with the limp.
Then a figure staggered out of the mist.
A man. Shirtless, barefoot, his skin pale and wet-looking, eyes wide with terror.
"It's him," someone said. "The guy who ran off."
He collapsed at the edge of the grove, gasping. Alya rushed to him.
"What happened?" she asked, checking his pulse.
He stared at her with bloodshot eyes. "It got inside me," he whispered. "It touched me. I saw its face."
"Shhh," Alya said, "you're safe now."
He shook his head violently. "No. No. I'm not. I'm not me anymore."
Then he started convulsing.
Alya cried out, trying to hold him down. His body writhed, mouth frothing, veins darkening under his skin. His fingernails blackened.
Someone screamed.
Caleb reached for Hana, pulled her back as the man began to thrash violently. Alya tried to hold him—but then he stopped.
Still.
Silent.
For three full seconds, no one breathed.
Then his eyes opened.
And they weren't human.
They were pitch black. No whites. No iris. Just void.
He opened his mouth—and hissed.
Jalen moved first.
He surged forward and brought a thick branch down hard on the man's head. Once. Twice. Three times.
The thing inside the man shrieked like metal scraping metal—then fell still, blood pooling beneath it. Black blood.
No one spoke.
Jalen dropped the branch and stepped back, breathing hard.
"What was that?" someone whispered.
Alya was trembling. "I think he was... infected."
"By what?"
Caleb looked down at the body. "By this place."
They buried him under the moss.
No one wanted to touch the body, so they used long branches to move it. They covered him as best they could.
Then they sat.
No fire.
No light.
Just each other and the slow, creeping realization that whatever had happened… it was only beginning.
Later, as the group began to drift into uneasy rest, Caleb sat with Jalen again, watching the forest.
"There's something wrong with the air," Caleb said. "It feels thick. Like it's watching."
Jalen nodded. "There's something hunting out there. But this forest… it's not passive either. It's not just nature. It reacts. It hides things."
Caleb glanced toward the glowing trees. "Do you think we're in some kind of... pocket? A trap?"
Jalen gave a dry chuckle. "Does it matter?"
"I guess not."
Jalen looked at him. "You're calm. That's good. Don't lose it."
Caleb wanted to say he wasn't calm. That he was barely keeping it together. But he just nodded.
Nearby, Hana stirred in her sleep. She mumbled something. Caleb walked over, sat beside her, and kept watch.
The forest sang a low, droning note all night. Not music. Not wind.
But something like breath.