In Extremis

“I’ve done terrible things to survive. I don’t know if survival turned me into this, or if I’ve always been this way.”

The Young Woman stared out into the endless forest. The heat from the fire she created was providing ample warmth, but what she just scribbled into her notebook sent a chill down her spine. She opened up a heart-shaped locket dangling from her neck. She looked into the bright green eyes of her father, lovingly looking right back at her. She barely recognized the sheepish young girl standing next to him in the photo.

She also looked peaceful, a feeling The Young Woman hadn’t felt in a very long time.

The life The Young Woman now lived was anything but peaceful. It took several days of trekking through thick foliage to find this spot on the edge of nowhere. The Young Woman couldn’t even remember the last time she saw a human face, but that was likely “for the best”, she thought. It was a good day if The Young Woman saw no one at all. “How did it get this way?” The Young Woman thought to herself.

“The dread never stops”, The Young Woman thought. Even now, The Young Woman wasn’t alone in her thoughts without the fear of something, or someone, always lurking in the woods.

Perhaps it was the last time she encountered a real human face that stirred up such lingering uneasiness. It was days, or weeks, or months ago. Time no longer operated in a linear fashion, as moments bled together like water washing over leaves. The Young Woman was scavenging for food on an empty forest trail when she heard footsteps. She could tell this person was adept at hunting.

The footsteps were not loud or frantic, but hushed and organized. It took years of practice to separate the unique sounds of a trained hunter to the sounds of an unskilled survivalist, as her father taught her when she was a child.

She did not make any sudden movements, as that would alert the hunter right away. She could tell this hunter was no animal, or at least no animal she had ever encountered before.The footsteps became quieter the moment she had been identified.

The Young Woman shut her eyes, picturing this hunter. She had trained her senses to eliminate all other sounds and visuals. She gripped her knife tight, tensely wrapping her fingers around the handle. For a couple of strained moments, it was completely silent. As close to peaceful as she had experienced in a very long time.

Then, the hunter made their first, and last mistake: they charged for her. Within seconds, that modicum of peace had vanished, like smoke evaporating into thin air. The Young Woman raised the knife, opened her eyes, and threw the knife as fast and as hard as she could. She heard the knife pierce the body of the hunter, who screamed an agonizing wail. She started running toward the scream.

“This is a man”, she thought. As she fastly approached the hunter, she noticed he was going for his own weapon, a homemade machete made out of Oak tree bark.

The second after that thought had popped into her head, she had pounced on the hunter, taking out her knife from the man’s chest and plunging it into his chest again, and again, and again. She did not waste energy, as there could have been others lurking not far away. She deliberately stabbed the man in vital organs, which she had also learned from her father. It was swift, like how she would imagine a golden eagle would attack their prey.

The man was dead in moments. The Young Woman quietly surveyed the area. She noticed only two footsteps for quite some time, the hunter’s tracks signaling he operated alone, as most did in these woods. As the sun went down, she walked to the pond to clean off the man’s blood.

There was no time to mourn. She had to move, to find another camping spot. Another hunter would study her tracks, and find her. As she cleaned the man’s blood from her face and hands, she walked back to her camping spot, packed up, and continued on her journey.

“There is never any time to rest”, she thought. This life does not afford peace, only survival.

It was the first time she had met a man since her father, and like her father the man suffered a similar fate.

The Young Woman thought back to her father as she searched for a new camping spot. She touched the heart-shaped locket around her neck, remembering simpler times. She remembered the way her father would smile, and how it always reassured her. When she was feeling despondent, he would dress her up in bright yellow clothes and take her to her favorite ice cream parlor.

Yellow was her favorite color. She could barely picture it now. All the color in the world seemed to have been vaporized when the fires burned everything to ash. “The climate is changing, and soon so will everything else”, he told her right before everything got worse. She had no idea at the time how true his words would become.

As the clouds permanently covered the skies, the smoke filled the air. Then, it filled people’s lungs. It tainted them, corroding society’s ability to speak. After a while, everyone lost the ability to communicate as they did before. “It’s the world’s way of punishing us”, The Young Woman’s father explained to her as a child, one of the last things he ever said to her. “We’ve ruined her to survive, and now everyone will suffer.”

The Young Woman stoked the fire at her new campsite as she brushed the thought away, like breaking apart a charred piece of wood. She didn’t want to think of her father, or what he made her do. She looked down at her notebook, back to her original thought. “I’ve done terrible things to survive.” The idea couldn’t escape her head now. It had latched on, like a tick drilling into her skin.

She couldn’t just pluck the idea out of her head. Like a tick, she would need to burn the idea out.

She got lost in the flames. She thought back to that day. She didn’t remember how old she was. Maybe nine, or ten. It didn’t matter. As she saw the embers floating away from the fire, The Young Woman remembered the day she ran away from her father. The look of love in his eyes was gone, replaced with a crazed hunger. They hadn’t eaten in days. She was already feeling weak. He started chasing after her.

At first, it seemed like a fun game of tag, but as he advanced on her, she slowly realized this wasn’t a game. This was real.

The Young Woman’s father pounced on her, like she pounced on the hunter. She was only a child. Even though her father was weaker, he was still strong, his arms thicker than tires. He had a shard of glass in his hand, the same piece of glass he would use to open up cans of beans he found in derelict cars off the ground. She had never felt more fear in her life. Then, fear turned into something else, something worse. She went deep into herself, like she was trained to do.

She closed her eyes, removing every other visual and sound. She focused on her father, on his labored breathing, his frenetic body movements, and his loud screams. As he swung for her throat with the glass shard, she knew exactly where to attack. After all, it is what her father trained her to do. She bit hard. Blood instantly started flowing from his neck.

It splashed onto her face, blocking her vision like smoke obstructing the sun. She didn’t need her eyes. She operated on instinct, now. The instinct to survive. Then, a quaint noise brought her back to reality. She wasn’t alone.

“Dammit”, she thought to herself. “This is what I get for becoming distracted”. She immediately went for her knife. The sun had gone down, making it impossible to rely on her eyesight anymore. She didn’t need her eyesight. She closed her eyes, picturing the new hunter. She heard footsteps, but they were quieter than the other hunter. They were quicker, too, less organized. The breathing sounded more like panting. “This hunter is scared”, the Young Woman thought.

The footsteps were getting closer. She gripped her knife tightly. Beads of sweat rolled down her forehead, the heat from the campfire radiating profusely. She opened her eyes, slowly raising her knife, and in one quick movement turned to face her hunter. She was prepared to lunge, but before she could she made out the outline of this hunter. It wasn’t a man, like before.

It was a child. A small child, no older than age nine or ten.

The color left The Young Woman’s face. She was dumbstruck. She had never seen a child this age before. So many questions filled her head, but as she was trained to do, she focused on the moment at hand. She leaned over and cut a piece of meat from the carcass that was roasting in her campfire. She did not divert her eyes from this child at all.

She offered the meat to the child. She saw the child had a long, slender wooden spear, either as a walking cane, or a weapon. The child was hesitant to accept the offering. “This child is smart”, the Young Woman thought. He came across as if this had been a trap he had nearly fallen into times before. The Young Woman continued to offer the piece to the child, gently leaning toward and nodding. The child took the meat, eating it within seconds.

“This child is also starving”, thought the Young Woman. She had wondered when was the last time he had eaten a proper meal. She nodded for him to sit next to her. The child, wooden spear still firmly in the attack position, hesitantly walked around her. The child refused to take his eyes off the Young Woman, even after the offering. The Young Woman patted the ground next to her. She went and cut off an even bigger chunk of carcass, offering it to the child.

He contemplated for a long moment, and then grabbed the meat out of her hands. He slowly sat down next to The Young Woman, devouring the meat like someone who hadn’t eaten in weeks. Then, instinct once again took over. The Young Woman’s hands started shaking, the knife still firmly in her grasp. She looked down, trying to make it stop. “No. Don’t do this”, the Young Woman thought to herself.

The child started to notice the Young Woman shaking. He slowly moved for his spear. The Young Woman, hands still shaking, looked over and noticed the child was wearing… yellow.

It was faded, covered in dirt, but still absolutely distinguishable as bright, cheerful yellow. The Young Woman looked down at the heart-shaped locket around her neck.

She looked at the image of her father, smiling lovingly at his daughter. She looked at the little girl, who was so beautiful, so happy, and so peaceful. Tears streamed down the Young Woman’s cheeks. She then flipped the knife and handed it to the child. He looked at her quizzically, still not sure if this was a trick or not. The Young Woman nodded. He took the knife, and cut deeper into the carcass.

They sat there by the fire, and for the first time in what felt like forever, The Young Woman felt... peaceful. She picked up her notebook and scribbled the following words, as she watched the child eat, feeling safe.

“I am not my past.”