The Road To Anywhere

Being on the road was a dangerous place to be,but she had to make it. She had to. Hali didn’t really remember when exactly the world fell to absolute chaos. She was only a baby when the Others came to their planet. There was many losses from their world as many tried to bring some sort of peace between the humanity and their greatest intergalactic enemies that hovered a larger population of some cities.

Now 22 years later, things were still the same. The Others were winning and were just starting to claim small parts of the earth to do god knows what. That wasn’t even the bad part of it all. There was Others capturing the remaining humans and began to use their bodies as to gain trust from the remaining survivors.

The process would then repeated it self until the end of humanity.

Hali sighed as she took a few minutes to relax on the sideways log. She took inventory of her belongings. “2 pistols, 32 bullets, 3 water bottles, 4 granola bars, 1 bag of crabapples, my pocket knife…Crap, I’m runnin’ low..” Hali muttered to herself as she then pulled out the bag of fruit and bottle of water. Taking the occasional sip of water and carefully eating a handful of fruit without the seeds, Hali took the time to rest and fill her body with nutrients. Her mind began to wonder as she remembered the day the Other came to her home in the camp. Her mind remembered the screams of her father telling her to run and of her mother screaming at her to save them. The mere memories of her parents aches her heart. She clutched her chest as a few tears dropped down her cheek. A sound of a branch breaking soon caught her attention. She immediately got up and pointed her gun in that direction. “Get your ass out here now, or I swear to god I will attract the Others hear and leave you for dead” she yelled as she was on her guard.

Slowly, a man began to slowly wonder out from behind the tree with his machine gun out. Hali squint her eyes as she opened her eyes in surprised. “Nathan?!” She yelled as she lowered her gun. Hali recognized Nathan from the last camp she stayed with about a few weeks ago with her parents. She remained on her guard, so she lowered the gun only a tiny bit. Nathan was glad to see Hali. It was a while since he seen anyone. But he hid the terrible truth from Hali. A truth that could instantly get him killed if Hali was to ever know about the truth. The heart-wrenching truth that lead to her parents’ downfall. Setting the gun to the side, Nathan set the gun carefully against the side of a tree before he slowly stepped away from the gun.

Hali watched him carefully as she lowered her gun. She studied him carefully before she put her gun away slowly. “How have you been? Since the attack?” Nathan asked softly as he watched her. Hali looked caked with dirt and germs. Of course, he didn’t look any better. Hali sighed as she settled down back onto the log. “I been…okay?” She spoke in a questionable tone, unsure of how to explain it. She felt the familiar grief,but she felt relief. Relief that her parents was free from danger, starvation, and other humans that threatened their very own life.

Hali looked at him as she then asked”What about you? How are you holding up?”. Shuffling his feet, Nathan sighed as he looked at the ground. He shrugged as he spoke “I been okay..Well, I’m trying to be okay.”. He walked closer to the woman carefully as he stayed cautious of the woman next to him. Hali studied him carefully once more before seeing the darkened veins that was hidden from plain view.