4338.209 · July 28, 2018 AD
Everyone Accounted For
Everyone gathers at camp, and the night's toll comes due. A dog lies dead in bloodstained sheets. A boy has vanished. A warrior woman speaks of pirates who steal through portals. And before anyone can process the losses, the group begins to fracture — some walking toward danger, some toward home, some toward revelations that will reshape everything they thought they understood.
The survivors together for the first time since darkness fell. What they find waiting is a ledger of losses no one was prepared to pay.
Jamie emerges carrying Duke's body wrapped in stained sheets, the faithful dog now nothing but weight and memory. The question of Joel follows like a blade — when did anyone last see him? The answer carves fresh wounds: he was in his tent when the attack began. He isn't there now.
Charity names the culprit with certainty that brooks no argument: the Portal Pirate. She'll hunt the creature down. Jamie will go with her, choosing a living son over a dead companion, kissing Duke's shrouded head in farewell before walking into the unknown.
But the departures don't stop there. Glenda collapses screaming the world's name, her fists pounding dust, her eyes seeing something beyond the horizon. Her father is alive, she declares, and nothing about her certainty suggests delusion. Beatrix turns toward the portal carrying Duke's body, heading for a home that suddenly seems reachable.
Those who remain must reckon with what stays behind: grief, confusion, questions that multiply faster than answers. The camp that felt like sanctuary now feels like a way station — a place people pass through on their way to fates unknown.
The morning held them together, briefly. By afternoon, they'll be scattered to the winds.
