Volume 4 – Chapter 16: Shadows Stretch Longer

Date: September 22

Last 9 Days.

The mist that morning blurred the view of the world into a watercolour of gray and white.

Visibility was perhaps a few meters in front. Every branch looked like a claw reaching down to grab them.

They stepped carefully, tapering tension in every step.

"Stay close," Kaito ordered quietly, with his hand instinctively on the hilt of his knife, his words cutting through the fog like a line binding everyone together.

Even Kanna, usually so daring, kept near the middle of the group.

None wanted to be the first one swallowed by the mist.

Around noon, they began to move faster as the fog - or what was left of it - began to be enough to make their way through.

A deserted town — if such could be called any longer — loomed.

The houses sagged from years of neglect, windows shattered, doors hung precariously from their hinges.

Signs swung idly in the hard breeze, the messages barely legible ghosts of warnings.

KEEP OUT. Oh, a fine coward! Turn on your heel and go home safe ; this entire area's unsafe.

Rika breathed, giving a reassuring squeeze to Kaito's hand.

They carefully split up to scavenge supplies: food, medicine, anything still usable.

Kaito and Rika advanced slowly through a crumbling convenience store, shelves already mostly looted and standing sometimes on empty.

Suddenly, Rika froze.

There was a photo taped behind the cracked counter — water damage notwithstanding, it was still intact.

A family: two parents, a little girl, a dog.

Someone's whole world, now an abandoned place just like everything else.

Rika reached out and gently peeled the photo away, handling it like a sacred object.

"Do you think... They made it?" Rika asked softly.

Kaito hesitated for a moment before he finally answered her.

"I think... they fought for as long as they could. Just like we are."

That, he felt, was perhaps his one truly honest answer.

Stars came out that night, camping outside the ruined town, for the first time in weeks.

No clouds, no smoke.

Just a vast, open sky hung over them like a promise and a threat.

Reika rested her head on Kaito's shoulder. Kanna sat on a little distance from them, looking at the stars, with a hand on her curled-up knees.

There was once again no need to fill the silence.

They all knew what lay ahead.

They all knew how little time remained.

But tonight — just tonight — they let themselves wish there was still beauty somewhere.