If I had known the Forward Operating Base would be the last place I'd ever see soldiers in uniform standing beneath a flag that still meant something, I would've memorized every detail. Instead, I walked through those steel gates numb, exhausted, and clinging to my children like a man clinging to the edge of a cliff.
Zara led the way, confident and unflinching, slipping into command mode the moment the camouflage netting above us parted and the base came into view.
Floodlights cut through the gloom, painting sharp shadows on tents arranged in uneven rows. The old-world smell of diesel and gun oil mixed strangely with the scent of the new forest—sweet, floral, and unnervingly alive. Vines crept up the Hesco barriers, glowing faintly in places where their veins pulsed with light. Soldiers stamped them down every few hours, but they always grew back.
The world had changed so fast that even military bases were starting to look like ruins swallowed by nature.
A corporal with tired eyes and a patchy beard raised a hand when he saw Zara.
"Rendu?"
His voice cracked with disbelief.
"You're alive?"
Zara nodded. "Long story."
"Good," he said. "We… we could use you."
And he wasn't lying.
Inside the FOB, there were more civilians than soldiers now. Families huddled together under blankets. Engineers tried to keep ancient generators humming. Medics struggled to catalog illnesses that vanished overnight. It was a strange, desperate mixture of order and chaos.
Lyra clung to my jacket, her wide eyes darting around the base like she expected it to evaporate. Orion stayed pressed against my side, hands in his pockets, quietly absorbing every emotion around him. I could feel him trembling through the fabric of my sleeve.
We were safe… for now.
But safety had become a temporary luxury.
We were assigned a tent near the southeast perimeter where the forest pushed closest. It rustled at night with creatures we couldn't see and didn't want to.
The first morning, I went out to help reinforce the perimeter. I needed to keep my hands busy—the silence around Orion worried me, and Lyra's power flared whenever she felt cornered. Work kept me calm. It kept me human.
Orion joined me sometimes, handing nails to carpenters or bringing water to tired soldiers. His presence soothed people; they didn't know why, but they relaxed when he approached.
Lyra, on the other hand, gravitated toward Zara.
They were oil and fire at first.
But fire molds to the container that can withstand it.
Zara became that container.
She taught Lyra how to breathe through the panic, how to let energy flow instead of explode. I'd watch from afar as Lyra mimicked Zara's steady movements, her flames dimming from wild flares to controlled flickers.
For the first time since the sky cracked open, my daughter began to feel like herself again.
Food was no longer scarce.
That was the first miracle.
Foraging teams returned with baskets of new-world fruits:
Lumafruit that glowed like lanterns at dusk, sweet as honey with a tang that left your tongue tingling.
Skyvine berries, tiny star-shaped things that grew in upward spirals, tasting like mint and sunrise.
Stone-grain pods that rattled when shaken and made a nutty flour when ground.
Hunting teams brought back creatures that looked like they had leapt from a myth:
Riverback beasts—massive reptilian mammals with humps that stored clean drinking water.
Their milk was rich, warm, and strangely healing; even the terminal patients improved after drinking it.
Glider hares, long-legged animals that opened thin membrane wings to glide between trees.
Bluehorn elk, shimmering with a coat that refracted moonlight like glass.
No one starved.
Not a single child in the FOB went hungry.
It felt wrong to enjoy this abundance, knowing the world was collapsing beyond the perimeter.
But hunger makes people desperate; full stomachs made them hopeful.
Hope was in short supply.
It started with a whisper:
"Hey… is it true? Margaret remembered her own name this morning?"
Then:
"Colonel Duwa's lung cancer is reversing. The scans are clean."
"What about the boy with the heart defect?"
"Running laps. LAPS. A KID WHO COULDN'T WALK IS RUNNING LAPS."
By the end of the first week, the med tent felt like a place of resurrection.
People who had wheezed through oxygen masks now told jokes.
A diabetic man threw away his insulin after his blood sugar normalized on its own.
A woman with late-stage dementia looked at her daughter and said, with perfect clarity:
"You've grown so much. I'm sorry I wasn't there."
Not all was cured—but enough was to spark awe.
The world was healing itself
—physically
—spiritually
—and incomprehensibly.
Even Orion seemed steadier. The voices didn't overwhelm him as often.
Even Lyra burned cooler.
Even I felt lighter, like someone had quietly lifted a weight I never knew I carried.
But every miracle had its shadow.
And Eden was no exception.
Day by day, the radio broadcasts grew stranger.
One week before the Event, news anchors had insisted everything was fine.
Two days before, they said governments were coordinating containment.
Three days after the Event, the broadcasts were frantic:
"State of emergency declared—"
"Unknown biological—"
"Military bases falling silent—"
"Stay indoors—"
"Do not approach the forests—"
Halfway through the month, even the military couldn't pretend anymore.
We gathered around a crackling radio the night a trembling voice announced:
"This is the final message from the United Nations Communications Office… the government has—"
Static.
"—lost contact with—"
More static.
"…we advise all survivors to remain where they are. God help us all."
A heavy quiet fell on the barracks.
The kind that meant everyone understood:
The world had no leaders anymore.
Only survivors.
It began as a joke. Scouts returned saying they saw "a lot of movement" in the forest. Then the movement turned to shadows. Shadows turned to shapes. Shapes turned to predators.
The perimeter alarms blared twice in one night. Soldiers fired warning shots at hulking silhouettes that paced just beyond the floodlights.
By the end of the second week, the scouts reported; "They're gathering. They're circling. They're watching us."
One night, I overheard two privates whispering near the ammo tent, "We're down to three crates."
"That's it?" "
We haven't had a supply drop in seventeen days."
"And command?"
"No contact."
"So what do we do when they rush us?"
"…Hope we die fast."
Their words chilled me more than the night air. That same night, Zara found me sitting outside our tent, staring at the pulsing glow of a vine wrapping around a fence post.
"You heard them," she said.
I didn't deny it. She sat beside me, boots heavy, shoulders tense.
"The government was scrambling long before this," she said. "Half the reports were falsified to avoid panic. The other half were buried by corporations who wanted first access to whatever was coming."
I exhaled slowly. "Is that why your team—?"
"Went missing?" She nodded grimly.
"The forest was moving before the world admitted it."
Lyra had fallen asleep against Zara earlier that day, trusting her fully. Orion already saw her as another anchor. Now I realized why she carried so much weight in her eyes. She had known. Or at least suspected. No one listened.
On the twentieth night, the forest sounded different. Deeper. Heavier. Hungrier.
Orion froze during dinner, staring into nothing. "They're coming," he whispered. "They're not animals. They're Shadows being drawn to us. Pulled."
Lyra grabbed his hand and held tight. Floodlights flickered. Guttural howls echoed. Something massive brushed the outer fence.
A sergeant ran past our tent yelling for soldiers to take positions. I held the twins close and listened as the forest pressed closer than ever before.
That night, Zara stood watch until dawn, rifle in hand, her silhouette dark against the glow of the vines.
And as the first weak light of morning touched the horizon, the radio sputtered its final, faint, broken message:
"—this is… final broadcast…
The United Nations… has fallen.
We are no longer…
…in control."
A long silence followed.
Then a single sentence, whispered by a terrified soldier in the dark;
"They're coming. And we're out of bullets."
The world didn't end that night.
But it stopped pretending it still had rules.