Jack's Diary - Day 27, October 13th 2013

     We finally got onto the highway going in to Saint Angeles since we were less than 10 miles outside of it. We could've got on sooner, but I figured there was a greater chance of running into soulless or bandits on the road and I really didn't feel like risking my life in another city. The highway was relatively clear save for a few soulless. Surprisingly, Duke has kept his mouth shut for nearly two days straight. That explains why I don't have the urge to kill him now.
     Finally, the city was within sight. We found a safe spot and I scouted the city with the binoculars while Duke watched for approaching soulless. This city was much more lively then the previous ones; the day was approaching nighttime and I could still see a large number of soulless wandering around still looking eagerly for "food". Although I couldn't identify a human clearly, it appeared from the fortified buildings and makeshift structures attached to them on the outside that these places are or were safe houses for survivors. It was too dark and the windows were too fortified to see anything through them from far away. I knew if all these places were still occupied with people that it would be difficult to find Jane among them, let alone if they would even let her leave. One less person means one less hunter, or one less person to assist in survival. It is a numbers game where the humans are greatly outnumbered. Before we began moving into the city, on the opposite road heading into the city, I saw about five or six soulless walking down the road toward it. It is as if they know where we are at times.
     I could tell that Duke didn't want to go in by the way he purposely followed slowly behind me, making me wait for him to catch up. I whispered to him, "if you're going to lag behind then stay behind. I don't need you getting me killed." I moved on and he stood there for a few second before quickly, but quietly catching up to me. I figured we should check out the closest safe house first. I really hoped that if there were people in there that they wouldn't kill us on sight and take our stuff. In a building as well armed as the one we were approaching, the odds were that there were at least four times more of them than us. I knocked on the door with my knuckle and waited. A voice from behind the door spoke, "What do you want?"
     "Can we enter?"I asked.
     "No..." was the response.
     "Why not?" I asked.
     There was no response so I knocked again and then knocked harder when a machete pierced the door and would have pierced me had I been an inch closer.
     "That's your only warning. Go away," said the tense, but calm voice.
     I wasted no time to asking another question, "Alright, but can you answer one question: is there a woman named Jane in there?"
     There was silence. An uncomfortable silence.
     "Hello?" I asked.
     One of the windows opened up and a man with an uzi leaned out. He had just cocked it and had it aimed at us when I drew both my nail guns and shot in his direction multiple times. I must of hit him a few times since he fell out the window. I quickly grabbed the uzi and ran off with Duke trailing. I heard gun shots behind me as I ran away. We made it around a corner and kept moving, trying to keep our presence hidden from soulless to human alike. That group of survivors now has a reason to kill us so it was best to stay away from them. We went to a smaller hideout about five blocks over and knocked on the door. The same route (a voice behind the door asking what I wanted), but this time when I asked to come in, we were let in. However, there were a few people inside who had their hands on their guns. Jane wasn't there, but we were offered the chance to stay with them. I told them that we may take them up on that offer at some point, but we needed to find someone. The man who let us in, who seemed to be the leader of the group of survivors, gave us directions to each safe house in the city (or at least all of the ones he knew of). I decided to give him the uzi I "found" in exchange for helping us, just to show them we were good guys.
     We visited three more, with one of the visits ending like the first one did with two people shot. The last of the three was the most unique among the hideouts; it was the largest of all of them and the building itself looked like it had been built just for the purpose of being a fortress: no windows of the ground floor and tall stones walls around the perimeter. After we jumped the wall and knocked on the door, we were invited in without question and offered food and drink (which made me suspicious). When I asked about Jane, they said that they knew who I was talking about, but she wasn't there at the moment (she was out looting with others). She'd return in the morning, according to the doorkeeper, and he graciously allowed us to spend the night. We were shown to a room with two old spring beds. Duke went right to sleep, I closed the door, placed the pillowed provided under my bunk sheets, and waited in the corner. I wasn't that tired away. It must have been at least three hours after I closed that door that it was opened again and two men walked in. One went to each of the beds they thought were occupied. I snuck up behind the one that went to mine and stabbed my knife through his spine while covering his mouth. The other guy still heard and turned to me before he could do anything to Duke. I let the stabbed guy drop on the bed and threw my bloody knife at the other one, hitting him directing in the chest as he backed up into the wall and slid down limply. I looted them, took my knife back, woke Duke up, and we put them in our bunks. I think Duke thought they were sleeping because he really didn't look that shocked. I broke out the barricaded upstairs windows in the room as quietly as I could, tied off the rope I had to the nearby radiator, and we descended and escaped. We hid in the next door building. Duke went off to sleep again, but I just couldn't. I had killed at least three people today. Now, I just can't stop writing and the sun is coming up.

- Jack's Diary

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Jack's Diary - Day 11, September 26th 2013

     I'm already well on my way to Saint Angeles. I didn't go into detail in my last entry so I'll explain now. John, the man who saved me, talked about his past on request. I asked because most of the people I met in the past either wanted me dead or wanted something from me and they especially didn't help me out of pure kindness. He'd lived almost his entire life in this small cabin. Once he became a young man, he moved away from society and built this cabin with his bare hands. He loved people, but preferred a life of solitude surrounded by nature's wild life. He was by no means a hippy or nutcase so don't get the wrong idea. I've known people in my life that loved animals and plants and the rare beauty that in his words "has gone unchanged or destroyed by time". Surprisingly enough, he met a woman. She lived in a cabin as well about 2 miles from John's. They came upon each other in their gathering and hunting. He eventually moved into her cabin and together had a daughter named Jane. The daughter left to start her own travels when she was of age. She's been gone for six years, but she did send a few messages to John by way of a friend visiting the cabin. John's wife passed away in her sleep about three years ago for unknown reasons. As John said, she "entered this world peacefully and left in a peaceful silence." Soon after, he locked up his wife's cabin and moved back into his old cabin (he suggested that I could live there if I wanted, but I declined). He continued to live as he previously did and knew nothing of the horrors happening in the world until the messager stopped coming and he saw a lost soul for the first time.

     I asked how he could go on living his life without a purpose. He was shocked and offended by this question. He gave his answer. "Isn't living good enough? Isn't there purpose in happiness and in breathing a breath? So many people spend their lives in misery and will continue to do so no matter what you tell them. I'm merely balancing the scale by being satisfied with taking care of my life and smiling. And who are you to judge my life to have no purpose, a man who fell at my doorsteps, pleading for help? Without me, you probably would have died. If that is what you mean by purpose then yes, I have a purpose. When I came out here, I never expected to meet a woman, make her happy, make a child with her, raise her up right, but I did. You do not always find purpose, purpose finds you and let it find you prepared and willing!"

     I apologized to John and he accepted it. I suppose I could have summed up his speech, but I consider it something that should be remember and not just to die with the two of us. We talked more and I revealed my past. The talking made the time pass by very fast. I nearly ready to leave when I brought up the question as to why he didn't leave to find his daughter. I already had a few ideas as to why and it turned out I was right.

     "What happens if I leave here and Jane comes back to an empty cabin? I am long passed my prime and as much as I would like to find her, getting killed in the process won't save her and will only sadden her if she found out that happened to me. She'd have no one left in the world or at least from this world. Still, I often find myself wondering whether I should try."

     And that is why I am now off to Saint Angeles. The last message he received from her was that she was living there. He didn't ask me or intend to suggest that I go, but he knew I was going to try and bring her back. I couldn't agree with everything in his philosophy, but he was right: purpose does find you.

- Jack's Diary

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