Journey Into The Aftermath |✔

Chapter four: The Cover Up

I took another bite into my meal and cleaned off my knife on the fur of the bear we finally took down. We relit the grill with as much salvaged coal as possible and dry wood that had died with the cool season as we cooked the slain monster over it.

With the knife, I was able to cut it down into reasonable chunks and Noah retrieved some seasoning and spices from the village.

This bear was surprisingly easy to cook and he tasted downright delicious. It tasted very sweet and tangy probably because he was eating a lot of fruits and berries before our encounter and for that perfect tenderization, I slow-roasted the bear with the seasonings.

We left the head of the bear out in the middle of the village so people would know that the caves are now safe and maybe they could use it in their breakfast soup or something.

Noah complained about how long it took but it was well worth the wait and he knew it too the way he devoured it. After the three-hour long meal that we both enjoyed immensely, Noah hung the skin on a rock to dry out.

He said that he had always wanted one of those real animal fur coats from an animal he himself killed. There was plenty of string at the village and he had a basic understanding of how to sow from having to make his own clothes from caveman devices in his tiny little house.

He walked back inside the cave and sat next to me on the floor by the wall as I was taking my last bite trying to stuff myself before I could fall asleep. He plopped down beside me and groaned as he leaned back on the wall.

"Why the hell would you go after--"

"I was not about to be the cause of an entire village being slaughtered after you people and the bear clearly lived in peace for like how long now?" I shot at him. "The bear attack was my fault and I needed to correct that and that's the end of it."

He gave me a dubious look. "You should have let me help."

I crossed my arms, not really expecting that. "It was none of your business."

A victorious smirk crossed his face and his nose wrinkled in that cute way when he's about to say something he may get slapped for. "Is that seriously what you're going with? --cough--pathetic--cough--"

Case and point. He also has a habit of calling people out on their crap when they were wrong and they both knew. He pretended to clear his throat. "Sorry, my throat's been messing with me since morning."

"Whatever, why would you hole up out here in this jungle of a state?" I asked him, thinking of all the hell I went through to find him and get here. "Rapid water levels almost consumed this state completely, thus making you, a bitch to find."

He slouched even further. "I needed to get away from New York and I was staying with a friend a couple of miles here when the eind dagen hit."

I gave him a curious stare.

"It's Dutch for 'the end of days.'" he told me. "That's what these people have been calling it ever since the Dutch claimed to have predicted it first and blah. You know, before the world lost all power."

He looked up at the ceiling of the cave and seemed to follow the dancing shadows of the flames jet back and forth. "My friend and I," he sighed. "We hiked and hiked through the dense forests that seemed to have come out of nowhere and after about a year and a half we stumbled upon this place; long before the bear."

"What happened to him." I probed, knowing he was purposely excluding that detail.

"Well, he died from falling into a nasty snake pit a few yards out that way." He pointed beyond the village. "and he screamed and screamed but no one could go in and save him so after who knows how many bites, the screams stopped."