Page 31 of What Remains

Behind them, Seth muttered into the radio, “The world went to shit. Fast.”

Jay gave a humorless snort. “Didn’t take long once people started dying.”

No one argued with that.

Around noon, they crested a hill.

Below them, the valley was a graveyard of cars—hundreds of them, tangled in a frozen, silent stampede. Jay swore under his breath, his knuckles tighteded on the steering wheel. Cara stared, her map forgotten in her lap, trying not to imagine the panic, the screams, the final moments that had died here. It wasn’t just a roadblock; it was a tombstone for an entire town.

“No way through that,” Jay said, his voice flat.

Cara studied the map, then the terrain. “There’s an access road to the west. It looks clear…ish.”

“I can push through some debris if it comes to it,” Seth offered over the radio. “Beast is built for exactly that.”

They rerouted.

The access road carried them past a strip mall—windows shattered, metal shutters hanging open at broken angles, a grocery store sign dangling from its last bolt. Slumped against a brick wall, a body had decomposed to little more than sunken flesh and bone beneath torn clothing. Nature had already begun stitching moss into the fabric.

Cara spoke in a near whisper. “The forest is taking everything back.”

Jay shifted his grip on the wheel. “Maybe that’s for the best.”

Halfway through the afternoon, they passed a collapsed fence that marked a former petting zoo. A few scrawny goats, their coats matted and ribs showing, watched them pass before scattering back into the overgrown pasture. A lone, shaggy pony stared from the treeline, wild-eyed, then bolted at the engine’s growl. It wasn’t a triumphant return to nature, but it was life, tenacious and stubborn, hanging on in the ruins.

Unexpected proof that the world hadn’t died completely.

Seth whistled low over the radio. “Think we should grab Addy a goat? Might as well start her a whole damn farm while we’re at it.”

Cara snorted, surprising even herself with the sound. “She would name every single one of them.”

Jay shook his head, but couldn’t hide the smile pulling at his mouth. “Honestly? Not a bad idea. If one of those little guys is still hanging around on our way back…” He shrugged. “We’ll bring her one.”

“Addy would lose her mind,” Seth said over the radio, his voice softer than usual. “Probably try to herd it into the cabin.”

The image drew a shared, quiet smile from all of them.

Cara rolled her window down a crack, the spring air, a welcome change. She watched a deer lift its head from a ditch as they passed, its body thin but its eyes alert—a survivor, just like them.

“The world is healing,” she said, almost to herself, “but still wrong somehow.”

Jay glanced over at her, his fingers loose on the steering wheel. “Guess we’re the invasive species now.”

They drove until the sky began to bruise with evening colors—deep purples simmering at the edges of dusk, orange bleeding away along the horizon as shadows stretched long across the cracked highway. The ruins of old farmhouses and collapsed barns rolled past in a slow, haunting panorama.

Seth’s voice crackled through the handheld radio. “See anything for shelter?”

Jay lifted the radio, scanning the landscape ahead. Slightly off the road, the silhouette of a steeple jutted above a grove of wind-gnarled trees.

“Church up ahead,” he answered, his eyes narrowing. “Looks abandoned. Part of the roof looks collapsed, but the walls are still standing. Looks like there’s a lot in the back that might give us cover from the road.”

Cara leaned forward, squinting. “A collapsed roof means easy access for anything or anyone. And those trees are awfully close.”

“It’s that or we sleep in the vehicles,” Jay said.

Seth’s voice came through again, lower this time. “Copy that. I’ll hang back until you clear it. I say we sleep in the vehicles makes it easier to quickly leave if trouble pulls up.”

They pulled off the road, tires crunching over gravel and weeds. The church loomed larger as they approached, its front cross long fallen and half-buried in the dead grass at its base. Jay navigated the building’s side, weaving around broken fencing and scattered debris until they reached a slope of land entirely shielded from the road. Perfect cover.