We found her hideout.
---
Kept our distance.
Watched from cover.
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I'm not going to lie.
There were moments at night where we almost went to her.
Not to attack.
Just to stop.
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Three days now.
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We survived by hunting whatever moved in the forest.", "Small things.", "Fast things.", "Whatever we could catch.",
We found a small creek.", "Drank from it.", "Stayed close to it.",
We couldn't make fire.", "Fire would give away our position.", "So we ate what we could eat cold and said nothing about it.",
---
Eun Byol and I started getting sick.
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Not badly.", "Not yet.", "But enough.", "The kind of sick that starts in the stomach and works outward.", "The kind that comes from water you're not sure about and food you're less sure about and wounds that didn't get cleaned properly.",
Our smaller cuts got infected.", "The skin around them hot.", "Wrong colored.",
We managed.", "A little sleep here.", "A little rest there.", "Enough to keep moving.", "Not enough to feel like anything had been restored.",
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She hasn't made a move yet.
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But I think she has.
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I think she's been moving the whole time.", "Just not in a way we can see.", "She stands still when we watch her.", "She doesn't look in our direction.", "Doesn't give us the satisfaction of knowing that she knows.",
But she knows.
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That certainty has started to change something in me.
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It came to a head one night.
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I couldn't sleep.", "Lay on the ground listening to the forest.", "Then I heard footsteps.", "Small.", "Barely anything.", "Like mice finding their way across dry leaves.",
But I heard them.
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I got up.", "Looked.", "Nothing there.",
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But she was everywhere.", "I could feel it.", "Everywhere and nowhere at the same time.",
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Eun Byol noticed my condition.
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Didn't say anything about it directly.", "Just watched me.", "The way she watches things she's still deciding what to do with.",
I think she's going through something similar.", "The sleeplessness.", "The sound of footsteps that aren't there.", "The feeling of being observed from every angle at once.",
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We might be losing our minds out here.
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I don't know what to do.
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No.
---
I do know what to do.
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I have to get a single scratch on her.", "That's the mission.", "That's all it ever was.", "One scratch.", "Just one.",
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I don't know why that feels so far away right now.
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It shouldn't.", "It's just a scratch.", "Just skin.", "Just proof that we reached her.", "That we got close enough.",
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It feels like the other side of something I can't measure.
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The creek moving nearby.", "Quiet.", "Constant.", "The forest doing what the forest does.", "The stars above us through the gaps in the canopy.",
---
Eun Byol asleep beside me.", "Finally.", "Her breathing slow.",
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I sat there listening to footsteps that weren't there.
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Just one scratch.
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I don't know why that feels so distant.