A Day In The Mist: Chapter Two — A Random Pieces Short Story

The Final Journal of Aaron P.

Author's Note: Read the Prologue and First Chapter here first!

Everything Falls Apart, No Matter How You Try To Hold It Together

July 26th, 2024

My name is Aaron, and this is my truth.

Nahhh I'm just fucking with you, I would never say something like that. Had you going for a second though, didn't I? So I figure that we need people to keep some kind of record of whatever the hell is happening, you know? So future generations or whatever can look back and avoid our mistakes. Or whatever the hell people say in a situation like this when they start writing about the end of the world. Maybe someone will find this journal and write some kind of "deep" intellectual quote for me so I don't seem like a dumbass. If there's anyone else left out there...I haven't seen any signs of it. If I'm the last man on Earth, then Earth is fucked. And so am I.

Let me go back to the beginning here. Well, not exactly the beginning I guess, but pretty close to it. My mates and I had been out camping for a few days. We wanted to get away from civilization, you know? Hah, that seems like such a callous thing to say now. God, what I wouldn't give for some civilization now. Any sign of it at all. A fucking glimpse.

Doesn't matter. The point is, we were out in the mountains "getting away from it all", as they say. We came out here to camp a few days ago - Seth, Micah, Ollie and myself - on what has been an annual trip for the past few years. It gives us a chance to decompress, normally. We get together, camp, drink, and do some hiking and fishing. The usual things. On the 21st, this really heavy fog rolled in. For this time of year in the mountains, we didn't really think much of it. A little odd, but these days the weather is always a little odd even at the best of times. We spent that evening around the campfire, telling old stories and chatting. The roiling fog wasn't a big deal initially. We had no idea what was coming...

July 23rd, 2024

"What the fuck? Jesus Christ, everyone get the fuck out here!" Seth shouted, "Something is wrong with Ollie!"

I shot out of my sleeping bag, woken up by Seth's sudden shouting. Rubbing my eyes, I threw on my pants and darted out of the tent. That damn fog was still there. It hadn't dissipated in the two days since it rolled in and showed no signs of thinning that morning either. The normally bright sun was a dim glow through the mist, giving everything an odd orange tinge to it.

"Seth, what the hell is going on," I asked, "What's all the screaming about?"

"Aaron, Jesus man, I think Ollie is fucking dyin' here," he said, eyes wide with a fear I wasn't used to seeing on his face.

"What are you talking about?" Assuming Seth was hungover and not thinking straight, I poked my head into Ollie's tent. I saw it immediately - Seth wasn't crazy, and something was very wrong with Ollie. "What the fuck, man! What's happening to his face?" I shouted, not thinking clearly anymore.

That was the moment Micah came out of his tent, looking a little pale, and came over to where Seth and I were. One look into Ollie's tent and Micah immediately threw up, retching and gagging.

"Oh god," sputtered Micah between retches, "What the fuck happened to him? What do we do?!"

None of us had an ounce of medical training, and no one had the slightest idea what to do. Not that it would have mattered. Ollie was..well, for lack of a better word, he was melting. The normally tanned skin of his face and chest was a sickly pale white, with black streaks running along under the skin, seemingly following the pattern of the veins. His features were sunken, the flesh wasting away in patches. It almost looked like he was being eaten from the inside out by something.

We panicked. Micah was screaming something about poisoned food and forcing himself to throw up even more than he already had. At this point, it was just dry heaving and retching. Seth was sitting on the ground near Ollie's tent, wide-eyed and staring at the space between us, not focused on anything. And me? I was trying not to shit my pants with the fear and anxiety I was feeling. So far, so good. I'm not a proud man, but I'm proud to tell you that I held it together at least well enough to retain control of all of my bodily functions.

Eventually, we got our shit together enough to decide someone needed to get close enough to check on Ollie. No one was going to volunteer, so we decided to draw straws. Or sticks, in this case. The short stick goes into the tent and checks to see if Ollie is still alive. The other two get to stay safely at a distance. Naturally, I drew the short stick.

I entered the tent and skirted the edge until I was within reach of Ollie. I couldn't see any breathing and he wasn't making any sound, but we agreed that we had to be sure of his condition. I reached out, trying to keep my arm and hands from shaking as much as possible, and put a finger on Ollie's neck to check for a pulse.

I learned three things immediately: First, Ollie's skin was ice cold and yet somehow also clammy, and his skin was paper thin.

Second, Ollie was very much deceased - at the slightest touch, my finger pushed through the skin of his neck and went inside the wound.

Third, I can projectile vomit nearly across an entire single-person camping tent.

Desperately backing out of the tent, still retching and screaming, I backed directly into Seth where he was once again seated on the ground. We both toppled over and scrambled back to the edge of our campsite, where Micah was lingering. I rapidly relayed the situation and what had just happened to Seth and Micah, and we made the wise choice to leave all of our shit and sprint as far away from camp as we could.

As I said, we weren't experienced with emergency situations like this.

July 24th, 2024

We were a full two day hike from anything resembling civilization that morning. The rest of that day was mostly the three of us alternating between sprinting until we couldn't anymore and trying not to vomit any further. We were mildly successful in both endeavors. Around noon, Micah began to lag behind us. Seth and I urged him to keep moving, but it was clear that he wasn't doing great. It wasn't long before he was having coughing fits.

By 1:00, the marks began to appear. The black "ink", for lack of a better word, began to show up on his face. I nudged Seth and drew his attention to this, trying to be subtle and not panic Micah further.

"Fuck!" Seth shouted, "Micah's gonna die man! He's got that shit on his face!"

"Thanks, Seth, nice job," I sighed, "I was trying not to freak him out!"

Micah freaked out.

"What do you mean?! What's on my face? What the fuck is happening?!"

We had no answer for him. Seth pointedly avoided meeting his gaze, and I was at a loss for words. What can you even say to a person in that situation? I didn't know at the time. I still don't know. We sat in silence for a few minutes, then continued walking towards the nearest ranger station. The fog was thicker than ever, and we had to be careful where we stepped in order to avoid breaking an ankle or falling into a pit. We were tired, scared, and hungry, and the last thing we needed was injuries on top of it all.

At around 3:00, we found the deer. Three of them, lying motionless in our path. We tried to shout at them to spook them but it had no effect. Seth threw a rock - it bounced off of the closest deer, and there was no movement. Slowly, we walked towards the animals, edging around so we could see them better in the fog.

All three were dead, their eyes wide open and staring at nothing. The black "ink" was running from their noses. Whatever the hell was happening, it wasn't just happening to us. No one said a word, we just moved around the carcasses and kept moving. We were all thinking the same thing now: What if this is happening everywhere?

At 5:00, Micah collapsed suddenly. Seth and I were walking a bit in front of him and we heard him hit the ground. Turning around and seeing him there on the ground, not moving, neither of us moved for a moment before moving to check on him. Micah lay on his side, his face turned towards the ground. He hadn't even tried to arrest his fall - he simply dropped. Gently, I reached out and turned him over, then quickly snatched my hand back.

The marks had grown to nearly cover his face, trailing down his neck and under the collar of his shirt. Below the hem of the shirt, where it had raised up a bit from his position on the ground, I could see the marks continuing downwards. They seemed to cover his entire body. His skin was paper white. Micah lay there, chest heaving as he breathed, eyes wide open and staring upwards through the trees. I looked at Seth.

"I think he's done, man. He isn't going anywhere."

"God damnit..." Seth whispered, "Fucking god damnit..."

I sat next to Micah, waiting. It only took a few minutes. He took in one deep, ragged breath, his back arched and his face contorted in agony. Then he expelled the breath in two large gasps and fell back flat, and he was gone. I looked over to Seth and nodded - I didn't have to say anything and he knew that Micah was gone.

"We have to go..." Seth said quietly, "We have to find help before we die out here too."

"I know." I didn't want to just leave him, but we had no way to bury Micah even if we felt like we had time. So we left him there, lying alone on the trail, and we continued towards the ranger station in silence. We walked a few more hours before finally just lying down for the night on the forest floor, too exhausted and emotionally drained to go any further.

I didn't have the heart to tell Seth that his face was beginning to show those same ink-like markings, faintly tracing the path of the veins. He didn't seem to be feeling poorly, and he'd had a long enough day. We would deal with that tomorrow, I figured, if he started to feel sick or experienced any pain.

July 25th, 2024

When I woke up, Seth was gone. Not gone as in dead, which I guess is something, but he was nowhere to be seen. There was no indication that he left in distress in the middle of the night or any signs of violence that I could see. There was no sign of anything - he just wasn't there anymore. I spent a few minutes looking around the area, calling out for him, hoping he had just moved out of sight to answer the call of nature. But he was simply nowhere to be found. Eventually, I had to give up my search and keep moving. Trying not to assume the worst and hoping maybe Seth had gone on ahead, I headed out.

I saw nothing living on my way down to the ranger station. No people, no wildlife, nothing. Everything was completely silent except for my footfalls and my own breathing. I reached the ranger station by midday, hoping to finally get some help and report what the hell was happening and get the hell home. Sprinting into the ranger station to report the events of the last two days and call for help, my heart immediately sank. Lying on the floor by the desk was the ranger. The inky lines crisscrossing her face and hands made it clear she was already dead, and whatever was happening out here was not isolated.

I grabbed the phone and dialed 911 - but there was no tone, no ring...nothing. I slammed the phone down and looked at the ranger. With the bile rising in my throat, I gingerly knelt and checked her pockets for a cell phone, hoping there was something, anything, I could use to get a message out, but her pockets were empty. Frustrated and scared, I left the station and walked a short distance to the parking area. Seeing the truck still there, right where we left it, lifted my heart. At least I could finally get out of there, head back into town and get help. Things were finally looking up the tiniest bit. Reaching for my pocket for the keys to unlock the doors, a thought hit me and my stomach plummeted with a sickening realization.

Ollie had the fucking keys. In our panic and rush to get the hell away from there, we never grabbed them from his things. They were still there, in that tent with his body.

"Fuuuuuuck!" I shouted at the top of my lungs, screaming over and over and pounding on the door of the truck. Exhausted, physically and mentally drained, I sat down with my back to the truck, crying angrily at how stupid I had been. How stupid we had all been. Ollie, Micah and Seth were gone and I was stranded with no easy way home. The fucking fog still hadn't gone away and the entire world seemed to be dead and silent. I'd had enough.

July 26th, 2024...Again.

Which brings us back to where we started. I sat there against the truck for a while, then I came back inside the ranger station and grabbed this notebook. I decided I had better write some of this down, in case I didn't make it home. At least that way someone might know what happened. Now I realize that, given everything I've seen, there may not be anyone else left to read it. Whatever is happening is killing animals as well as people, and I haven't seen or heard any signs of any other life. The phones are down, and I have no transportation.

If I really am the only one left...if I really am alone...then I guess no one will ever know I even existed and writing all of this down is pointless. I guess I hope there are others. There has to be someone else left. Why the hell would it just be me? I hope I don't die out here alone.

Fuck, I don't want to die at all...

I'd better start walking. If you're reading this...be careful, and good luck.

My name is Aaron, and this was my truth.

Yep, that's still the best I've got. Deal with it.