July 9, 2026
Previous: Endling I - Leaving the Bunker
Back before the war, I had a habit of overpacking. I would take a weekend trip to New York or Toronto or Nashville, somewhere plenty civilized enough to have a corner store where anything I forgot to bring could be found, and for some reason I'd take four changes of clothes, extra socks, two phone chargers (just in case one stopped working!), my wallet, passport, two books, a pair of shoes (even though I was wearing a pair already), headphones, earbuds, pencils, toiletries, laptop, pencils, ibuprofen, and my shaving kit. All for a three day stay at a decent hotel. It became a running gag with my friends.
Nobody's laughing now, though. My rucksack, which is half again as tall as I am, is filled to the brim with supplies of an entirely different nature. Mostly food, and an extra change of cold weather gear.
I spent the last month in the bunker getting used to carrying around a heavy pack. I had recurring nightmares of finally leaving the bunker only to freeze to death a few miles south, crushed under the weight of my own bag. So I would hump it from the common area to the cistern and back a few times a day, loaded up. My thighs are statuesque now.
Once I was confident I couldn't cram anything else in there, I took one final tour of the bunker. All the living quarters, to say goodbye to the memories of the people I survived here with. The kitchens where we'd eat meals and snack and pretend the world wasn't ended for a half hour at a time. The gym that we stopped using six months after we got here. The Rec, with the couple hundred DVDs, of which only three were ever watched (A Knight's Tale, Goodfellas, and Mission: Impossible 3.) I actually went for a swim in the cistern. The last swim of humankind. Then I got all my gear on, went to the entrance of the bunker, laid down on the concrete floor, and cried myself to sleep.
What am I doing? What is the point? I could live here for a few more years, assuming the big C doesn't get me. With a reasonable quality of life, all things considered. Two hundred DVDs that I haven't watched yet. I could drag those out, make it a Friday night thing, almost four years of DVDs to look forward to. That has to be a better way to spend my last years than dragging myself across a frozen wasteland, through terrifying mountains and irradiated, shattered cities, abandoned towns, and lifeless forests. All of this to keep a promise made to a woman now dead.
When there are no other people, do ethics even apply? There are none left to judge me. I see no point in judging myself anymore. If there is a god, they have no moral authority over me either. I never studied philosophy or ethics or any of that, so I don't really have the right vocabulary to talk about this. What I do know is that there's some annoying kernel somewhere in me that insists I keep my word, and go.
So I did. Opening the bunker doors, stepping out into sunlight for the first time in years, was terrifying. I knew the radiation levels were safe, because the bunker had systems for monitoring that, and I knew it was cold as all hell, but not too cold for me to start walking. But even with all the rational reassurances, when the door actually cracked open and cold, bright light flooded the room, with my hand shielding my eyes from the blinding glare, I was still terrified that I was about to die.
I did not.
It is unnervingly quiet out here. In the bunker, there was a constant hum of electric generators and air filtration, running all-day-every-day. For a couple years, there were the voices of other people. Laughter, shouting, cursing, muttering. Out here, on the frozen tundra, nothing. Occasionally, a little gust of wind breaks the silence, but that's it. I don't know what gave me the idea, but somehow I expected there would be bird song? In hindsight, what a ridiculous thought. Radiation probably killed all the birds.
Snow and stone and scrub as far as the eye can see. I can't make out much of the horizon, it's all a wash of gray and white that blends with the barely-blue of the sky. I have a compass on my wrist that will help me continue to the south, and I am going to have to rely on that to keep me on course. When I was first learning how to fly, all of my instructors told the same story - the student pilot who flies into the cloud level, doesn't trust their instruments, makes a few adjustments here and there, flying by their own intuition, and... comes out of the clouds completely upside down. I get it now. I would walk in circles on this tundra forever if I didn't have the good sense to trust my instruments.
It's cold, but my gear is actually excellent. Connor was an experienced outdoorsman, and he insisted that we get the best that money could buy, back when we made these plans. Contingency plans. That's what we called them. Anyways, I can feel the cold but I don't feel the cold, y'know? It's just there, but it's not bothering me.
I took one last look at the bunker. The temptation to go back inside nearly overwhelmed me. I sat there and stared at it, paced back and forth. I actually shouted at it, like if I got angry enough it would shut its own doors and I wouldn't have a choice anymore. White Fang. I bit my tongue hard enough to draw blood, just trying to keep myself from surrendering. It felt like I stood there for an hour like this, but I think it was honestly only a few minutes. Even as I sit here writing this, I'm not convinced I made the right choice.
Goodbye, Bunker. Thanks for keeping them safe as long as you did.
Next: Endling III - Dances With wolves
Thus ends the introduction. These two posts were the first step in the game Endling. From here, the actual mechanics of the game begin, and I'll take note of those where it's interesting. Oracle results from Tarot cards and the tracking of supply and fuel and all of that. The hexflower-crawl mechanic is really neat, and I may throw up an image of that in the footnotes to the next post to give you an idea of what it's like.
I hope you're enjoying this so far. I'm enjoying writing it.
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