We Have Fallen.

Chapter Four.

I woke before dawn, like I usually do.

I watered my garden, I ate a piece of dried meat, I fed Syha, I went about my daily chores. I did these things every day, I knew my schedule like the back of my hand. Probably because I've done it for the past decade. Syha knew my schedule. She did her rounds around the house. We fell into sync and worked together like gears in a watch.

I miss watches.

***

I noticed things. I noticed the broken branch by the rotten wood pile. I noticed a patch of wet ground by the garden. 

How did the garden live? How did it not shrivel up and die in the hot sun while I was gone? 

I try not to wonder about these things. 

 I try not to think that infected have been through my home.

"It isn't your home." I corrected, trying to make it true. Once you get attached... You fail. You lose your heart. The thing you love gets taken away from you faster then you can say goodbye. And I've made the mistake of loving my cabin. I've made the mistake of loving my wolf. 

And now I'm gonna pay.

***

At what I'm guessing to be three o'clock I head out to hunt. Syha knows this too. She can sense everything. 

We're going to hunt turkey when I hear something. I crouch to the ground, knife in hand. I hear rustling in the leaves, but it doesn't sound like animal.

Syha creeps to my side, ears back, eyes of a hunter.

"-wolf." I hear someone whisper. Everything goes off in my mind, panic, fear, hopelessness. Syha stands up, perks her ears up, and walks into the bushes.

"Sy!" I whisper harshly, before I bolt up the hill to my cabin.

***

I bolt all the doors closed. I cover all of the windows with extra curtain. I put out the fire. 

I am a machine.

I am a good machine.

I am a scared machine. 

***

After an hour or so of waiting with three guns by the door I hear Syha outside. I don't let her in for another twenty minutes out of sheer terror. 

I let her in, and she just casually sits on the floor.

"What the Hell were you doing, Sy! There's probably infected just outside the door! I have to leave. I have to leave here. Oh, my cabin, my sweet cabin. You're gonna get us killed, Syha!" I accuse. I'm pacing back and fourth, panicking. Why did this have to happen? Why did we have to get caught?

I will have to leave my cabin.

I will have to leave my home.

My wonderful, mostly peaceful piece of Heaven I have on this planet.

"Why did you do this, Sy?" I say, packing up food and water. She whimpers and puts her nose to the sky, and then to the ground.

"I don't know what that frigging means, Syha!" I say, trying to keep my voice low as possible.

She starts clawing at the door.

I taught her to never do that.

"Shut the Hell up, wolf!" I growl. She whimpers again. 

Then I hear it.

Everything goes quite.

My mind is racing at a thousand miles per hour.

A knock.

A simple, soft, knock.

I'm gonna die.

Hey. I hope you enjoyed my fourth chapter of We Have Fallen. Please vote and comment if you did. Please point out any mistakes in the writing, I'm a bit new to this. I can't wait to hear your feedback.

-Dani-