The city didn't sleep.
It brooded.
Its skeleton creaked in the wind. Shadows twisted behind boarded windows. Time had worn the bones of the world thin — and something inside still moved.
Ava walked ahead, rifle raised.
Sierra followed at her flank, boots crunching through frost-bitten leaves and shattered glass. Their breath steamed faintly in the morning chill.
Neither of them had spoken since the gate closed behind them.
Not until the road forked and the silence became something heavier.
"How'd you end up with Zane?" Sierra asked suddenly.
Ava didn't look back. "Why?"
Sierra shrugged. "You don't talk about before. Just curious—did you guys just show up one day, or did Zane save you too?"
Ava kept walking, boots crunching gravel underfoot.
"I found him in an alley behind a laundromat. Dumbass kicked a pipe during a stealth crawl and brought a clicker down on us."
Sierra raised an eyebrow. "And you didn't leave him?"
"He panicked. Froze up." Ava's voice was even. "I dragged him out, shot the thing before it tore us both apart."
"Charming first impression," Sierra said.
"He said I saved him. I told him he made the mess—I just cleaned it up."
Sierra smirked.
Ava paused, then added, "But he didn't whine. Didn't break down. When I asked if he still thought he could survive out here, he said 'more than ever.'"
Sierra gave her a look. "And that earned your trust?"
Ava shrugged. "Earned a pistol. One mag. He knew not to waste it."
"He's sometimes green. Clumsy. But there's something in him," she said. "Like the world hasn't stomped it out yet."
Sierra was quiet for a moment. "That's rare."
"Yeah," Ava murmured. "I'm not sure if it's strength or a liability. But I gave him a shot."
They passed a crumbling sign, half-swallowed by moss: Highway 4 South – Tunnel Access 0.5mi
The lullaby echoed in both their minds:
Not infected. Not survivors.
Just a Voice.
Tunnel Mouth — Perimeter
The tunnel's entrance loomed from the brush — its concrete arch blackened with soot, choked with vines. Old Firefly tags clung in fragments to the wall, half-scratched away but not forgotten.
Ava crouched low near the embankment. Sierra moved past her — and froze.
There, tucked into a hollow in the stone, half-swallowed by roots and dirt:
A shrine.
A child's jacket, folded carefully. A melted candle. Small things, arranged with care — or desperation.
Above it, pinned with a rusted blade, a torn scrap of map fluttered in the wind.
Ava plucked it down. Red ink traced a jagged route through the city — through broken quarantine zones and crumbling outskirts.
At the end: a circle.
And beneath it, a name — scrawled in dried blood:
"She's still out there. —E."
Sierra stared. "Do you think that's…"
Ava didn't answer. She folded the map, slipped it into her jacket—
Then the first shot rang out.
Sierra hit the ground as the bullet whistled overhead. Ava was already rolling behind a crumbled support pillar, rifle up.
Three scavengers burst from the treeline — not infected, but wild in their own way. Faces wrapped in grease-stained scarves. Leather armor stitched from tires and tarp. One carried a sawed-off shotgun. Another had a fire axe dark with old blood.
Ava dropped the lead one — a clean shot to the throat. He gargled and collapsed against a root.
The others flanked. Fast. Desperate.
Sierra ducked left, glass shattering around her as she fired back. The one with the axe roared — rushed through her cover — and they slammed together, tumbling down the slope near the shrine.
Her weapon skittered out of reach.
She landed hard, boots slipping in the mud. The man stood over her, weapon raised — then froze.
He stared at her wrist.
A faded Firefly tattoo. Curled like smoke across her skin.
"I know you," he said, voice hoarse. "Fuck — you were with them. Salt Lake base. Sierra?"
Sierra didn't move.
"I was there," he continued, stepping back. "I was in logistics. I left before it burned. I didn't tell anyone. I swear—"
She stepped toward him.
"You don't have to—" he started.
"I know," she said.
Then she drew her sidearm and put a bullet between his eyes.
No hesitation.
Ava arrived seconds later. She looked at the body, then at Sierra — the blood splattered on her face, the smoke still curling from her pistol.
"You okay?" Ava asked.
Sierra wiped the barrel on her sleeve, keeping her eyes on the ground.
"Yeah," she said. "Just saw him reach for something and got lucky."
Her voice was steady. Too steady.
Ava watched her for a beat longer, then nodded.
They didn't speak again until they were well beyond the tunnel.
Safehouse — Hours Later
Zane stood over the table, the torn map laid out under the System's flickering overlay. Ghost-zones, collapse routes, the perimeter of the southern jungle — it all tried to fit into place.
The map didn't give answers.
But it gave a direction.
South.
Where no one returned from.
Ava leaned on the table beside him.
Sierra stood near the far wall, cleaning her weapon with practiced calm.
Zane said, "What do you think?"
Ava's voice was steady. "It's recent. Someone made that shrine for her. Which means they believe she's still alive."
[Quest Progress: "The Unfinished Path" – 34%]
[Thread Unlocked: "The Red Circle"]
[Item Acquired: Torn Map Fragment (1/3)]
[System Notice: Survivor Territory Expanded]
Next Objective: Establish Outpost South of Ruin City (Optional)
Later — Outer Wall
The sky bled red into the forest.
Zane sat on the barricade, watching smoke drift above the tree line, distant and thin.
Lily stepped up beside him, the wind tugging at the ends of her faded militia scarf.
"You're still thinking about her," she said.
Zane didn't answer right away. His eyes stayed fixed on the horizon—where the dead trees met the smoke-stained sky.
"You never told us why you're so fixated on her," Lily added, quieter now.
"I don't know," he said, and this time, he meant it. "Sometimes it feels like I do. Like I have a reason. Other times… it's just noise in my head."
She looked at him, brows drawn. "Noise?"
He nodded faintly. "Flashes. Voices. Memories I don't remember making. Like pieces of someone else's life got stuck in mine."
Lily was silent, unsure if it was metaphor or madness.
"I see her in them, sometimes," he said. "Or hear her. And I just know—I have to find her."
Lily tilted her head, considering. "Then maybe it's not about her. Maybe you're trying to make something right."
Zane didn't respond. Didn't tell her about the other things he sometimes saw. The blood. The screams. The shadow of someone with his face doing things he doesn't want to understand.
He just watched her walk away, her words lingering like ash in the wind.
And far to the south, past the blackened forest, the song stirred again.