Chapter Text
Morning came reluctantly to the alpine valley that was Mystery Lake.
The sun never truly rose here anymore; it simply appeared, a pale smear of light behind thick winter clouds. The cold had settled deep into the land overnight, turning the snow brittle beneath every step and frosting the air so thoroughly that each breath left a slow plume drifting behind it.
Kratt walked ahead, rifle slung comfortably over one shoulder, boots crunching through the thin crust of ice that had formed along the logging road. He moved with the practiced rhythm of someone who had walked these woods for years, no wasted motion, no hesitation, each step chosen before his weight shifted.
Behind him, Sherma followed.
Sherma was still learning that rhythm.
His steps were quieter than they had been weeks ago, but every now and then he broke the surface of the snow too hard, producing a sharp crack that echoed faintly through the trees. Each time it happened he winced slightly, glancing around as if the forest itself might notice.
Kratt didn’t turn around.
“Relax,” he said after the third crack. His voice carried easily through the cold air. “You’re not stalking rabbits. Deer don’t care about one or two noisy steps.”
Sherma adjusted the strap of the rifle across his shoulder. The weapon still felt strange there, heavier than anything he’d carried before the collapse. It wasn’t just the weight of the metal or the ammunition.
It was the responsibility.
“I’m aware,” Sherma replied. “I’m simply trying to improve.”
Kratt snorted softly. “You’re doing fine, preacher.”
Sherma didn’t respond to that title. He never did. The cartel had started calling him that almost immediately after he arrived at the dam, and the name had stuck the way nicknames often did in small groups.
He didn’t like it, exactly.
But he didn’t hate it either.
The two continued down the logging road, the skeletal remains of old forestry equipment poking out of the snowbanks on either side. Rusted saw blades leaned half-buried in drifts, and the skeletal frames of broken trucks sat where they had been abandoned years ago when the world still functioned.
Kratt slowed slightly as they approached the clearing near the old logging camp.
This was where animals usually crossed.
The valley narrowed here, forcing wildlife between the ridge to the west and the frozen river to the east. If a hunter wanted venison, this was where they waited.
Kratt stopped.
Sherma nearly walked into him.
“What-” Sherma began.
Kratt raised a hand.
Sherma stopped speaking immediately.
They stood there for a moment, the wind whispering faintly through the pines.
Then Sherma noticed it.
The quiet.
Not just the absence of voices or machines or distant engines. That kind of silence had been normal since the collapse.
This was different.
There were no birds.
No squirrels rustling through the branches.
No distant cracks of ice shifting along the river.
Nothing.
The valley felt like someone had pulled the sound out of it and left only the cold behind.
Sherma frowned slightly. “Is it always this quiet here?”
Kratt didn’t answer immediately.
Instead, he crouched down slowly and brushed away a thin layer of fresh powder from the ground near the edge of the road.
Snow scattered aside in a soft arc.
Beneath it was the hard-packed surface of older tracks.
Sherma stepped closer.
He expected to see the usual signs: deer prints, maybe a rabbit trail, the delicate marks of fox paws cutting through the snow.
Instead there was… almost nothing.
A few faint marks where something small had passed through days ago. A barely visible deer trail already half-buried by the wind.
Kratt’s jaw tightened.
“That’s odd,” Sherma said quietly.
Kratt stood again, scanning the tree line.
“Yeah,” he muttered.
Normally this place would look like a map drawn by animals. Tracks layered over each other, deer crossing paths with wolves, rabbits darting between brush patches.
Today the snow looked almost untouched.
Sherma followed Kratt’s gaze into the woods.
“Do animals leave an area when something bigger moves in?” he asked.
Kratt finally looked back at him.
“Sometimes.”
“That’s not reassuring.”
Kratt huffed a small laugh.
“Relax. Probably just the weather pushing things around. Storms do that.”
But he didn’t sound convinced.
They continued into the clearing, moving more slowly now.
The logging camp emerged from the trees ahead of them: a scattering of wooden structures half-collapsed under years of snow and neglect. The old sawmill sat silent beside a line of rusted rails where carts once carried freshly cut timber down the mountain.
Sherma paused beside a stack of broken pallets near the entrance to the clearing.
“Kratt.”
Kratt stopped walking.
Sherma pointed toward the ground.
At first glance it looked like a shallow depression in the snow.
Then the scale of it became clear.
The print was enormous.
Kratt walked over and crouched beside it, gloved hand hovering just above the edge of the mark.
Sherma stepped closer.
Even from where he stood, the track looked wrong.
It was wide. Deep. The claws had punched through the snow hard enough to expose the darker ice beneath.
Kratt slowly placed his hand next to it.
His entire palm fit comfortably inside the track with room to spare.
Sherma blinked. “That’s… a bear.”
“Yeah,” Kratt said quietly.
Sherma studied the surrounding ground.
More prints.
Each one spaced several feet apart.
The stride was long. Much longer than Sherma expected.
“Are they usually this big?” he asked.
Kratt didn’t answer immediately.
He stood and followed the line of tracks a few steps across the clearing, his eyes narrowing as he measured the distance between them.
The tracks cut through the logging camp in a straight line, passing between the abandoned buildings and disappearing into the trees on the opposite side.
Sherma waited.
Kratt had grown up in this valley. Everyone knew that. If anyone understood the behavior of the wildlife here, it was him.
Which was why the expression on his face was… unsettling.
Sherma had seen Kratt irritated.
He had seen him annoyed, tired, even briefly angry when someone at the dam did something particularly stupid.
He had never seen him uncertain.
Kratt exhaled slowly through his nose.
“…That’s a big bear.”
Sherma folded his arms against the cold.
“That’s the technical term?”
Kratt ignored the comment.
Instead he crouched again, brushing away snow around the edge of the print to see how deep it went.
His gloved fingers disappeared nearly to the knuckle.
Sherma’s brows lifted.
“Should we be concerned?”
Kratt stood again, scanning the valley.
The silence pressed in from all sides.
He looked toward the tree line where the tracks vanished.
Then back at the empty clearing.
Finally he shook his head once, like he was dismissing the thought before it could settle too deeply.
“…Let’s keep moving,” he said.
Sherma hesitated.
“You’re sure?”
Kratt slung his rifle back over his shoulder and started following the tracks toward the far side of the camp.
“Yeah,” he said.
Sherma watched him walk for a moment before following.
They crossed the clearing slowly, their footsteps echoing softly in the brittle snow.
Sherma glanced once more at the enormous prints trailing through the camp.
“Kratt?”
“What.”
“You’ve hunted here your whole life, right?”
Kratt nodded without turning.
Sherma gestured toward the tracks.
“Then why do you look like you’ve never seen those before?”
Kratt stopped.
Just for a moment.
The wind stirred faintly through the pines, whispering across the frozen valley.
When Kratt spoke again, his voice was quieter than before.
“…Because I haven’t.”
And for the first time since Sherma had known him, Kratt looked genuinely unsettled.
Behind them, the valley remained silent.