Further Investigation

Sorry about not posting for a while. Been laying low for the most part.

I snooped around a bit and dug up what I could find. The town's called Moore. Moore, Oregon. The name didn't click at first, but I think I passed through here when I was first heading into Redwood. Whole place looks vaguely familiar. To be honest, I was getting pretty paranoid by that point, so I spent a few days holed up in a cheap motel out on the outskirts. Old habits die hard, I suppose.

My phone dying finally dragged my out of my self-imposed isolation, but only as far as a corner store on the road into town. After Redwood, I was uneasy about going inside, but the guy behind the counter didn't seem off or weird at all. Thank god for that. I still had some cash in my wallet, so I bought a charger and some snacks to get me through the week. Credit card wasn't worth shit; I couldn't get into my account or check anything. Whole thing was scrubbed.

Asked the guy if he knew anything about Redwood Falls, and he just shrugged. He couldn't have been much older than me. Mid twenties, scrawny. Yellow trucker cap with the words "Praxis International". That part was definitely weird. I pressed him about it, and he just said that as far as he knew, it was just some backwater town that everyone thought was run by a cult. Said he thought it was bullshit.

I sighed, took my stuff and went for the door. Just before I got outside, though, I had a thought. I asked him if he'd seen a woman recently. Kind of goth-looking, hoodie, that sort of thing.

He said he had. Said she'd come through about two days before, bought a small army's worth of snacks and water, then left. The clerk thought it was weird that she didn't have a car, what with being a decent way's walk from the highway. He didn't know what direction she was going, but I think I can guess.

If she's still alive, she probably came through here either looking for shelter, or trying to find me.

It sounds egotistical, I know, but it's a possibility.

I'm back at the hotel now, living off two slim jims and a gatorade. Checked the news again; nothing on Redwood. There was a bit about a military exercise in the Pacific Northwest, but not much else.

Wait.

Thought I heard someone walking around outside my door. Looked out the peephole but didn't see anything. Grabbed my gun and opened the door, but still nothing. Just as I'm about to go back inside, though, I look up and a pair of helicopters fly past. It was hard to see details in the dark, but they looked military. No markings, though. They passed over the town, then broke off in separate directions.

I feel like that's a bad sign.

Aftermath

Managed to hitch a ride back to a different town. Didn't catch the name on the way in, but they've got a cheap hotel, and I'm short on cash, so it'll have to do for now. All I've got left at this point is a gun, a wallet and a phone. The latter is actually the least useful, to be honest. Whoever took us days ago had the sense to wipe everything I'd saved. Pictures, notes, everything. Whatever backups of my data that I had were with me when they caught us.

So, I guess I'm just fucked in that regard. Typical.

I've been checking the news to see if anything about Redwood has come up, and there's nothing. Like the place just dropped off the face of the Earth. I can't say that surprised me, but I would've expected something, anything. You'd think someone would have noticed fucking bombs being dropped on an American town. Hell, it looks like even my blog got seized for a little while.

They didn't delete the posts, so that's something. Seems odd, considering how thorough they've been so far.

I'm going to try and get some sleep, then ask around this place and see if anyone knows about what happened. If Deb's alive, maybe she passed through through here.

I doubt it, but it's worth a shot.

Resurrection

I'm not dead.

At least, I think I'm not. It's hard to tell. I don't really know what to think anymore. Deb is gone. Everyone's gone.

I woke up in a ditch in the middle of the woods a few hours ago. They left my phone. I thought maybe they'd just forgotten it, but when I found it, the password was disabled and all my data had been scrubbed. Pictures, video, anything I'd taken in Redwood was gone. At first, I couldn't remember anything that had happened. It was like my brain was blocking it out, like on some subconscious level, I didn't want to remember. They left my clothes, at the least. I suppose if they had any real interest in killing me, they would've dumped me in the woods naked. Took my gun, though. I guess if I run into a bear, I'm pretty fucked.

These are definitely the woods around Redwood. Same kind of trees, same landscape. I know I'm near Redwood for sure, though. Everything out here reeks of burnt meat. It's deathly silent; no helicopters, no fighters, nothing. Just me and the sounds of my breathing.

I didn't have a compass, so I started heading towards the smell. Only lead I had at the time, unfortunately. It didn't take long to figure out where it was coming from. There was a ravine, about five miles or so from where I started from. The smell was overpowering. I hadn't eaten anything for at least a day or so, but even still, I puked my guts up.

The ravine was full of bodies. Burnt human bodies. I recognized some of them. People from the town, mostly. No gunshot wounds, no bullet casings. They burned them all alive. The smell of gasoline was still in the air when I arrived. It couldn't have been more than a few hours since this happened. If Deb was in there, I couldn't see her. I hope she's alright.

Took another few hours to find the road. Signs leading out of Redwood and back towards the highway. Sticking near the trees in case patrols come through. There's smoke rising from where Redwood Falls used to be. I'm not really keen on going back and seeing if anyone made it out.

The road seems to go on for miles. No food, no water. Getting cold. I keep expecting to see figures in the woods, like before, but there's nothing. No eyes on the back of my neck, no uneasiness, nothing. For the first time in weeks, I actually feel truly alone.

I don't know if I like it.

Coming up near the highway on ramp now. I'll see if I can get a ride back to civilization.

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Still Running

I'm starting to think this is going to be my last entry.

Not, like, last as in on this blog. Last ever.

We've been walking out of the town for hours now and haven't seen anyone. It's getting cold out now too. The wind's kicked up and I can smell the town burning a few miles behind. It's an unmistakable smell. Ash has been falling like snow for the last hour now. Deb started crying. Can't say I blame her.

I understand, now, why the Church hadn't killed me. This blog, this whole thing was meant to be a message. I think they wanted me to come here, to tell people about them. Virgil wanted the truth to get out just as much as they did, I suppose. Maybe people will get word around because of this.

Sun's started coming up over the horizon.

We stopped at a gas station a mile or so back. Looked normal. Not off or strange like the town. Thought there might be people inside, since there were lights on.

There weren't. Not living people, at least.

Everyone was dead. Gunshot wounds. Normal folks, just a tourist and two old folks that seemed like they manned the shop. We grabbed what we needed and ran.

Normal people. They just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, I guess.

Helicopters keep buzzing overhead. We duck into cover when they show up, but odds are they already know where we are.

I wanted to go home at first, but I'm just so tired. I'm done with it all. I just want to get this over with and go home. If they're going to kill me, then so be it. I might be able to take a few of them with me when I-

oh fuck

there's a checkpoint up ahead. they can see us.

oh shit oh shit oh shit theyre coming what the fuck where is deb

please god im sorry dont

On the Run

It's been more than an hour. Still running. I've heard things behind us. Gunfire, shouts, screams. The soldiers are everywhere. Everyone is dead. They shoot them and burn the bodies. Like it was nothing.

Deb was shaken. Alive, but definitely in shock. I can't say I blame her. She's been crying since we got back up to the surface. Took some time, though. The tunnels were like a maze, like wandering the guts of some long dead corpse. For all I know, I was. The Town is- was- alive.

Everything on the surface is burning.

I've read stories about white phosphorus, even seen photos on the web, but I never imagined I'd be standing in the middle of it. The wind burned my lungs and scalded my eyes. We walked for miles, blind, through the storm of white hot air.

All throughout the streets, there are burned bodies. Some human but most not quite. Amalgamations of bits and pieces of people, sure, but not people. The town's monsters. It's immune system. The soldiers were still around, and every so often we'd hear another round of gunfire. Didn't take us long to figure out what they were doing.

They were rounding up anyone still alive in the town by the city hall; the only structure not burnt out or collapsed. It was hard to tell who was part of the Church and who wasn't. We ducked behind a corner-store that had mostly fizzled out and watched. The soldiers wore these hulking suits, like gorillas. Most were blackened by the smoke and soot, but it seemed like they weren't even affected. The masks they wore looked like a cross between a gas mask and a medieval knight's helmet. I could see tubing running up and down the suits, leading back to hefty backpacks they lugged around. Their guns were connected too. Big guns, like machine guns. We stayed low when I saw that.

With little ceremony, they put another round of people up against the wall and cut them down. Then another while the bodies were carted off and dumped into a crater in the street. Christ, I didn't think about it at the time, but it seemed like the crater was almost full.

We ducked out towards the motel. It took some time without a car. Not that it mattered, though. The motel was gone, blown away like god himself had just taken a vacuum to it. Both our cars along with it. We were both too tired to even be angry about that anymore. We just sighed, collected what we could, and started down the road out of town.

I'm not sure if this will even get out to anyone. For all I know, the fuckers are blocking my signal. Or tracing it. There've been a few patrols come through since we left, but we finally hit an intersection.

Seems like burning the town to the ground got rid of that bullshit road magic they pulled on us.

At least that's one good thing.

We're going to keep walking. With any luck, someone might pick us up. It's a long shot, but at this point all I can really do is hope now.

I made sure to save two bullets just in case.

Still Alive

The fuckers bombed us. Those fuckers dropped a goddamned bomb down here. The Initiative or the Government or whatever the fuck. Phosphorus. It had to be White Phosphorus. I've seen pictures of what that stuff does. 

The whole place was on fire. The freaks were dying left and right and I was hiding in a hole like a coward. My friends were dead, and I was probably going to join them. I was going to die here, in this fucking eldritch mineshaft shithole. I was about to put the gun to my head when something went flying past. It was Virgil. He hit a ridge of burning meat and fell, shotgun in hand to the ground. I got off my ass and ran to him. 

Just as I heard something slide down behind me. 

It was Whitewall, of course. Still burning. Shrieking like a cornered animal, he looked like something straight out of a kid's fever nightmares. This spasming mass of bones and teeth and skin. He was flailing and screaming just about every obscenity I'd ever heard, and some that I hadn't. Virgil and I started shooting, and Whitewall shot right back. One of his arms, with a few bits of flesh left over, flung out like a knife and impaled Virgil on the wall. I kept shooting. Whitewall closed in. He had the worst smile on his face. A halfway melted head, I could see the inside of his skull as he reached out for me. 

Something hit him from behind and he stopped, one bony finger just inches from my face. He whipped around and we both saw that the suits were lowering themselves into the chamber from above. Bulky forms in gun-metal gray armored suits, carrying machine-guns and flamethrowers. They went to work on the remaining freaks, and Whitewall turned to me. His voice seemed to crackle alongside the fire as he spoke.

"This isn't over" he said. "Even if we fall, another Church will just take our place. You've accomplished nothing." 

I wasn't sure what to say. My mind just kind of drew a blank, like the horror of it all had just knocked any sense out of me. All I could think to say was "Fuck you." He laughed. 

"You think they're going to save you, don't you?"

As if on cue, one of the suits shot off a rocket in our direction. It skimmed the ridge above us and struck the wall. As it did, a whole squad of the suits came around the corner of the ridge I'd been hiding behind. Up close, they didn't look like anything I'd ever seen. Heavy suits that looked like they were made out of kevlar or maybe even metal, guns bigger than my arm, and masks that looked like they'd be more at home in a lion taming show. They opened fire the minute they saw us. Whitewall tore at them, and they opened up with flamethrowers. 

I took my chance. Virgil was stuck to the wall fast, though the stomach. We both knew what that meant. He didn't say anything, just shook his head when I tried to wrench him loose. He pointed off in the distance. Deb was waving towards us, screaming that we needed to run. Virgil shoved me off of him, kicked the shotgun over to me and told me to go. 

I ran, again. Feeling a little less like a coward and a lot more like a bastard.