Chapter 29: Eat. Drink. Then sleep. I'll take the first watch.
The forest air, sharp and laden with the scent of damp earth and pine, felt like a physical shock. Nate was a different man out here. The brief, unsettling vulnerability he'd shown in the cabin was gone, locked away as securely as the door behind them. His posture was rigid, his head on a constant, fluid swivel, his eyes endlessly scanning the shadows between the trees. The M4 was in his hands, a cold, hard extension of his will.
He moved north with a ground-eating pace that was neither a walk nor a run, a predator's lope designed for silence and efficiency. He didn't speak. He communicated with sharp, precise gestures, a flat hand held low for stop, a pointed finger for direction, a clenched fist for danger.
Skylar followed, her own bow held ready, her movements a conscious, clumsy echo of his. She remembered the feel of his hands on her, the shocking intimacy of the night before, but the man in front of her now showed no trace of it. He was pure function. And she had learned enough, through harsh lessons and slapping water, to understand that her survival depended on mirroring that function. She bit back questions, swallowed complaints about the punishing pace, and focused on placing her feet where he placed his, on moving with the minimal noise possible.
They had been moving for two hours when Nate froze, his body going preternaturally still. His fist shot up. Skylar stopped instantly, her breath catching in her throat. He pointed, a slow, deliberate motion towards a thicket of mountain laurel ahead and to their right.
She saw it then. Movement. A lurching, shuffling gait. Then another. Three Rippers, their clothes hanging in rotten tatters, moving parallel to their path through the dense undergrowth. They were close. Too close.
Nate didn't wait. He changed their course in an instant, angling sharply left and down into a shallow, rocky creek bed. The sound of their footsteps was masked by the gentle gurgle of the water. He moved faster now, not running, but with a frantic urgency, using the creek's course as a natural highway, putting distance between them and the threat. It was a close call, a reminder that death was never more than a misplaced footstep away.
An hour later, a guttural moan from a ridge above them sent them diving into a dense patch of ferns, pressing themselves into the earth, their hearts hammering against the forest floor. They lay there for what felt like an eternity, the sound of shambling footsteps passing just yards above them, the stench of decay carried on the wind. Another close call.
As the sun began to bleed out of the sky, painting the woods in long, deep shadows, Nate's vigilance intensified. He finally led them off the game trails and up a steep, scree-strewn slope. It was a brutal climb, but it led to what he was looking for: a narrow ledge tucked beneath an overhang of rock. It was a defensive position. Their backs were to the cliff, and they had a commanding, if limited, view of the slope below. It was secluded, but the open area in front meant anything approaching would be seen, or heard long before it reached them.
He didn't speak until they were both on the ledge, their chests heaving from the climb. "This is it.We don't move until dawn."
He dropped his pack and got to work with a quiet, furious efficiency that was more intimidating than any words. He used his knife to cut low-hanging branches from the pines clinging to the cliffside, weaving them into a crude screen at the edge of the ledge to break up their silhouettes. He cleared a small, contained area of all dry leaves and twigs, scraping down to bare earth.
Only when the last sliver of sun had vanished and the world was plunged into a deep, velvety blue did he finally relent. He gathered a tiny pile of bone-dry tinder and twigs in the cleared pit.
"Turn around," he commanded, his voice a low whisper. Skylar obeyed, facing the rock wall. She heard the strike of a match, a brief, sharp hiss, and smelled the first tendrils of smoke. When he told her to turn back, a fire no larger than his cupped hands was flickering, its light swallowed by the rock face above and the screen in front. It was a fire for warmth and water purification, not comfort.
He handed her a strip of jerky and a canteen. "Eat. Drink. Then sleep. I'll take the first watch." He positioned himself at the edge of the ledge,his back against the rock, the M4 across his knees. He became a part of the darkness, his eyes two chips of flint reflecting the tiny, dying fire, watching the black void below for any sign of movement. The man who had held her was gone, replaced by the sentinel. The journey had truly begun.
The silence stretched, thick and suffocating. The tiny fire had died to embers, and the only sounds were the endless chorus of crickets and the occasional, unnerving rustle in the darkness below. Skylar shifted, the hard rock digging into her back. The memory of his warmth in the cabin felt a million miles away.
"Does it ever bother you?" she whispered into the dark, her voice too loud.
Nate didn't move. "What?"
"The quiet. Not talking for hours. Days, even."
"No."
She waited, hoping for more. Nothing came. The silence pressed in again, heavier than before.
"It's just… unnerving," she tried again, a minute later. "It makes me feel like I'm going crazy."
"Talking gets you killed," he replied, his tone flat and final. "Crazy is better than dead."
She hugged her knees, frustration bubbling up. "You could just say something. Anything. Just to know you're still… human in there."
He let out a short, sharp breath. A sigh of profound annoyance. "I'm human. Now be quiet."
But she couldn't. The need to break the oppressive stillness was a physical ache. "What about…"
"Enough," he cut her off, his voice a low growl. He finally turned his head a fraction, though his eyes remained locked on the wilderness. "Fine. You win. What do you want to talk about?" His attention was clearly still ninety percent on the perimeter, his body tense and ready.
The sudden capitulation threw her. "I… I don't know. Your life. Before all this."
"Not much to say," he said, his gaze scanning a distant thicket. "Grew up in Namibia."
"Where?"
"Country on the south-west coast of Africa. You've probably never heard of it, so don't bother asking." The statement wasn't arrogant, just matter-of-fact. "When I was six, my folks moved to the states. They died when I was ten. Got passed around orphanages 'til sixth grade. Dropped out. Went on my own. Been working ever since."
"Doing what?" she pressed, intrigued despite herself.
"Various things. Gangs and things," he said, the words deliberately vague, closing a door. "The day the outbreak happened, I was working. Fixing the entertainment center for this annoying rich brat and his slutty girlfriend at the Palisades Manor Presidential Suite." He let out a dry, humorless chuckle. "Since that day, I went alone. Traveling. Running. Getting things. Had a car for a while. Just to live on the move, thinking back an RV would have been better."
The air left Skylar's lungs. The pieces, scattered across months of survival and days of tense coexistence, slammed together with the force of a physical blow.
"Wait," she breathed, her voice trembling. "The Palisades Manor… Presidential Suite… Pierce and I were in that suite the day the outbreak happened." Her eyes widened in the dark, staring at his profile. "You… you were that janitor who took off."
He didn't turn. He didn't need to. She could feel his smirk in the darkness.
"You've known all this time," she whispered, horror and humiliation washing over her. "And you never thought to mention it? 'Hey, we were together that day the world ended'?"
His head tilted slightly. "It didn't come up."
The casual dismissal was a slap. All the times she'd talked about that day, about the "janitor," the condescending story she'd told him in the woods… He had known. He had listened, saying nothing, letting her prattle on, seeing right through the fragile persona she clung to.
"You were so caught up in your little world, looking down on me, you didn't even recognize I was the same person," he stated, not with anger, but with a cold, clinical finality. He turned his head just enough to meet her stunned gaze for a split second, a grim, knowing smile on his lips before he turned back to his lookout. "Like I said… we all lived in the same world."
Suddenly, Skylar didn't want to know any more about his life. The truth was a pit opening up beneath her, revealing a depth of his perception, and her own blindness that was far more terrifying than any Ripper in the woods. She pulled her knees tighter to her chest, wrapping her arms around them, and fell into a silence far deeper and more profound than any he had ever imposed.
[A/N: If you liked the book then dn't forget to leave a like and commen. Drop a power stone, it helps . If you're interested in this story you can now read 25 chapters ahead available on patreon.com/jacobperalta ]