"Happy birthday, Erin."
The voice came muffled, like a background noise, distorted even. Erin's eyes fluttered as they opened slowly, taking in the scenery before her.
'Wh–' she thought as she glanced around frantically. She was in her home, standing on the floorboard. On the other side, at the dining table, was a seven-year-old Erin. Her face was void of emotions, making her unreadable. A cake sat in front of her, and she just stared at it like it was whispering life's secret. Her parents sat across from her, wide smiles stretched on their faces, the kind that seemed practiced and rehearsed.
Erin was in her own head. Her body was still back at the wasteland, being cared for by Jayden, who never left her side for a second.
"Why did you leave me?" little Erin asked. Her voice was soft, but it carried a heavy weight. For the first time, her eyes left the cake and landed on her parents.
"Erin, what has your aunt told you about asking questions you shouldn't ask?"
Their smiles faltered for a millisecond, but they quickly recovered. They had both been at this for seven years. By now, they were good at maintaining their smiles.
'This is a memory… what happened? What is happening' she thought as she snapped out of her daze.
Erin took a step forward, but it was a struggle. Every movement felt heavy, as though something was pulling her down, trying to keep her in place. She glanced back at her parents, still wearing that same smile. The same smile she saw once a year, for sixteen years.
Liquid began to gather in her eyes as the thought struck her. She never had an answer for why she was abandoned. All she had ever wanted was closure.
"Why?" Erin muttered, her voice shaky. But they couldn't hear her. She wasn't an essence in her own head. She was there, yet at the same time, she wasn't.
Her eyes welled with tears until her vision blurred. She exhaled sharply, and with a single blink, the tears escaped, sliding down her face and hitting the floor. That's when something strange happened.
The teardrops began to bubble, as though heated from beneath the floorboards. Erin quickly wiped the remaining tears from her eyes, trying to make sense of what she was seeing. This wasn't part of the memory. This was something else.
Familiar events began to manifest. The sky darkened, and within seconds, another color bled through, red.
"No…" Erin whispered. She knew this. She'd seen it before. She knew what came next. And then it came.
The ground split apart, revealing lava-like liquid seeping up from below. The heat was overwhelming her, but she didn't flinch. She peered inside and could have sworn she saw Liam.
Looking back at the table, the memory carried on as though nothing had changed, unaffected by the chaos unfolding. From one perspective, it looked like a normal family celebrating their daughter's seventh birthday. But that couldn't be further from the truth.
Without another thought, Erin stepped into the cracked floor, the molten liquid consuming her whole…
–
For the first time since their arrival, silence was the only thing that lingered. The wind was calm, no shifting gravel, no distant growls. Just silence.
The others stood in place, although Jayden sat next to Erin, checking her pulse every now and then. They were all still processing what they had just witnessed. It wasn't something any of them could comprehend. Things like this, they had only ever seen in movies or read about in books. And now, they were living it.
The purple dust that covered the wasteland seemed almost still in the air, hanging like smoke after an explosion. The cracked monoliths still towered over them. But the same couldn't be said for the rest of the bunkers. Erin's unnatural burst of power and vapourised what was left of most of them. There were now jagged boulders and the skeletons of long-dead ruins looming around them, half-buried beneath fractured grounds. Somehow, Erin had accidentally pulled them from underneath the ground and up to the surface.
Above, the three suns shed strange light across the barren landscape, washing everything in shades of pale gold and violet. It was starting to set.
Still in shock, the others waited in silence, for nothing in particular. They had only just begun to accept that they were no longer on Earth, a truth that was unexplainable, impossible, and now Erin's body glowed with an otherworldly light. Liam felt bitter at the destruction before him. He had hoped to find a few supplies inside these bunkers, flashlights, maybe food. Something that could give them an edge for a while. But now, it was all gone. Destroyed by Erin.
Liam, being the "smart one," had immediately advised Jayden to keep away from Erin's unconscious body. Of course, Jayden didn't listen. Eira didn't know what to do. She wasn't going to side with Liam, he'd been nothing less than an asshole to her since they got here, but Erin's display of unnatural power had shaken her more than she wanted to admit.
"I'm telling you, Jayden." Liam's voice cut sharply across the silence. He stood a few meters away from Erin with his arms crossed and his jaw clenched. "You don't know what kind of virus she's picked up here. She could be dangerous. Actually scratch that, she is dangerous."
Jayden shot him a glare, one that told him to shut it.
"Hey, Monroe," Jayden finally said, softer, trying to ground himself. "We need wood, or anything that could hold a fire. Something to keep her warm when the suns dip. She won't last the night without it."
Eira's face twitched at her name, her lips parting as if to answer, but Liam's voice came in sharp again, dripping with venom.
"Fuck. No. Did her ability fry your brain or did you just forget what happened last time, Mr. I-want-to-get-us-all-killed?"
"If she doesn't wake up before nightfall, she's going to freeze to death," Jayden snapped back, his voice carrying across the wasteland, bouncing off the wreckage of a half buried bunker.
"You gotta be kidding me," Liam scoffed.
"I'm sorry, Jay… but he's right." Eira's voice was barely above a whisper when she spoke, brittle and cracking like she'd been holding back tears for hours.
"She's going to die! Are you listening to me, goddammit?!" Jayden roared. His voice echoed again through the valley of broken stone and carried far into the empty distance where nothing but silence answered back.
His chest heaved, his eyes blazed almost blood-red with frustration. He turned to Liam one last time, searching for a shred of sympathy, but found nothing. Liam was a lost cause.
"Look, I don't want her to die, she has a chance of surviving the night" Liam argued, making sure his tone was harsh enough. "But you know what she can't survive? Those damn things. We can't fight them off again—"
"We fought them off last time, we can do it again," Jayden cut him off as he clenched his fists
"Last time we got lucky. There were what, ten of them? What are you gonna do if a hundred come? Or a thousand?" Liam's voice cracked as his anger was laced with fear. He kicked a jagged stone across the dust.
"Fine. I'll get it myself."
Jayden stood for the first time since Erin had collapsed. He dusted himself off, adjusting his torn sleeves. Every part of him screamed to stay by her side, but if no one else would act, then he would. He wasn't going to let her die, not here, not like this.
But just as he took his first step, Erin's body jerked violently. Her eyes snapped open, glowing faintly for an instant before fading back to their natural dark shade. Liam stumbled a step backward. His face turned pale immediately, as if questioning whether this was still Erin… or something else wearing her skin.
Erin groaned, pressing her hands to her face as if trying to block out the burning light above. She squinted, rubbing her eyes until her vision cleared. Her gaze landed on Jayden first. She blinked, confusion settling heavy across her expression. Then she turned her eyes to Liam. To Eira, then back again to Jayden.
Her lips parted, her voice cracked and raw.
"Who… are you people?"
She didn't remember them at all.