Claire stirred awake as her watch’s alarm went off. It was nearly midnight. Despite it being night the moon was so bright one could be fooled into thinking it was day. Kyle Snored hapily in a sleeping bag a few feew away. She went about washing up and heating up her MRE. #17 Maple Sausage. While waiting for the packet to heat up. she made use of the light and wrote a shot entry in her journal.

Yesterday was productive. We covered 28 kilometers, scouted a town and even stumbled upon an abandoned national guard depot. However we are pressing on moving during the night. Tomorrow we should hit our destination. Los Arbol, a small city crucial to the west coast lumber industry till the late 1980’s. Its location on the coastal highway had made it a logistic hostpot for shipping companies since. Dozens of fortune 500 companies had distribution centers set up there in the since defunct real estate.

My hope is that some of those warehouses have been left relatively untouched. Kyle believes the city should be the gold mine we are looking for. We also have a second objective there one of the warehouses is a Government blacksite storing documents about several government contingency plans

Claire would look over at Kyle. He was awake and looking right at her. She would frown and cross out the last part in her journal. Better safe than sorry. “Morning sleepyhead” she would exclaim. He would sit upright and groggily say “Its that time of night already” he would look up at the sky rubbing his eyes a few times then get up, grabbing the trench shovel off his backpack he would say “I’ve got to take care of ‘business’ we head out in 10”. Claire would nod and finish up her journal entry.

Ulterior motives aside. Its refreshing to be out in the field again. I’ve been on that relatively quiet island for so long I afraid I’ve lost my edge. Turns out its as razor sharp as it ever was. Truth be told I miss my time overseas. I knew who to shoot and had the support of the worlds most powerful nation to back me up. Times change…

Claire would close the journal and stuff it inside her backpack. She would begin to don her gear. Vest, boots, belt, comms, gun, backpack check. She would run the checklist in her head. Finally she would pull out a small map and double check the route they had planned. Kyle would walk back out of the woods and begin to get ready as well. After they both checked over their gear they would sit down. Looking up at the sky for a few moments. The night sky was alight with radiant stars and a bright full moon embracing the horizon in a cool glow. The view was truly breathtaking. “Beautiful” Claire would simply remark. Kyle nodded and replied “To think the cosmos knows nothing of our tiny planets struggles”. Claire would snort and mutter “Nerd” before getting up and grabbing her rifle. She would say “Ready to move out boss?”. Kyle would nod shoving off the ground himself, patting his gear to make sure he had everything he would give a thumbs up to Claire “Take point”. Claire gave a thumbs up back and began to move out. The two began the long nights march north to Los Arbol