Fate

After resting and talking for a bit, me and Tara continued to explore down the path to search for Genevieve, Stephon, and Brian.

"Look at that, Tara," I said. "There's another humanoid thing attacking the same giant turtle from earlier."

"It's such an ugly-looking creature," she replied. "It looks like a mutant human."

"Yeah, it's definitely some kind of an abomination," I said. "Let's move past the beasts and let them fight it out themselves."

"Sounds good to me," Tara replied.

Me and Tara moved on and avoided the turtle and the mutant humanoid thing. We continued down the path and encountered a couple of giant turtles of our own. I took on one, and she took on the other. We slew and processed the beasts, and then we carried on with our search for our friends.

We came across a mutant attacking a pair of bandits. While they were fighting, Me and Tara tried to walk past them, but one of the bandits spotted her. She decided to act fast and fire her arrows at them. I was already a little way ahead, so I ran back to help her.

I joined Tara in combat with the bandits. I struck the axe-wielding bandit with my sword a few times, and Tara finished him off with an arrow to the heart. As I was moving towards the bandit with the bow, he managed to shoot an arrow and hit Tara in the arm. She let out a cry.

"Are you alright, Tara?" I yelled.

"The savage shot me in the arm with an arrow," she shouted. "I'm bleeding, but I'll be fine."

"Just stay put, Tara," I yelled. "I'll take care of this bastard."

I approached the bandit and struck him twice with my sword. The bastard fell to the ground and whimpered just before he died.

I went over to help Tara remove the arrow from her arm, but she had already removed it.

"You removed that arrow quite fast," I said.

"Damn, that hurts!" Tara shouted as she placed a cloth on the wound. "Yeah, I just pulled it out. The tip wasn't that complex and didn't tear anything when I removed it from my arm."

"Well, I'm just glad that you're alright, babe," I said as I gave her a hug.

Me and Tara continued down the path and ran into a couple more giant turtles. As we slew one of the giant turtles, another one of those mutant things joined us in combat and attacked the remaining giant turtle. I was slashing the turtle with my blade while Tara was shooting the mutant with her arrows. The mutant ended up killing the giant turtle, and Tara put an end to the mutant's life with an arrow to the heart.

After processing the turtles, we moved up the path a little way towards a giant bridge and was confronted by another mutant. This one came running at me, and then it put its hands on its head and exploded.

Me and Tara walked a little further up and another mutant attacked us. I sliced it down with my blade. These ugly creatures aren't really that much of a threat. They're actually quite weak and easy to defeat.

As me and Tara continued moving towards the bridge, we were attacked by three bandits.

"Here they come, let's take them out, Tara," I yelled.

Tara raised her bow. "With pleasure."

The bandit with the knives and the bandit with the spear came straight for me. Tara was shooting them with her bow, and I was slashing them up with my sword. As we were fighting, the third bandit was firing arrows at me from the distance.

"Tara, you focus on taking out the bandit with the bow, and I'll take care of these two," I said.

"Alright, Ricky," she replied.

After a brief skirmish, I put an end to the two bandits with my sword and Tara took out the third bandit with an arrow to his heart.

"Damn, this place is just swarmed with these savages," I said to Tara.

"I know! There's just way too many of them," she replied.

Me and Tara made our way to the giant bridge. It was really high, and when looking into the distance, we could see that some of the bridge was destroyed.

Me and Tara wanted to get on top of the bridge so that we could get a good view of the area, but we couldn't find a path that led up to the bridge. So, we were left with only one option.

"Well, it looks like we're gonna have to do some climbing if we wanna get on top of this bridge," I said to Tara.

"You first, Ricky!" Tara replied.

As me and Tara were about to climb the large rocks, we were attacked by another one of those mutant things. Tara shot an arrow into it, and I finished it off with a few strikes with my blade.

"Well, that takes care of that ugly bastard," I said." Alright, let's get climbing."

"I'm right behind you," Tara replied.

I made it to the top of the bridge, and the first thing I saw was spirits walking across it. After I spent a few moments examining the spirits, I heard a noise coming from behind me. I turned around and saw a mutant standing behind me. I struck it with my sword and it fell to the ground dead. I turned back and saw Tara. She had just made it to the top of the bridge. I told her about what I saw. We were both really puzzled. The spirits kinda reminded me of the ghost we saw walking into the cave by Felicia a little while ago.

Me and Tara saw another mutant in the distance. We were running towards it to attack it, but we got distracted by more spirits. There was a spirit of a man and a horse. The spirit of the man was looking at something on the obelisk that was near us.

"Well this is something," I said to Tara. "A spirit of a man and a horse."

Tara looked over to the spirit of the man. "I wonder why it's staring at the obelisk."

"Let's get a little closer to it," I replied.

Me and Tara got a little closer to the obelisk to see what the spirit was looking at, and the obelisk lit up with a bright light. Moments later, the lights dimmed out and both the spirit horse and spirit man disappeared.

After standing there for few moments taking in everything we just saw, me and Tara went to attack the mutant. She shot it with an arrow and I sliced it down with my sword.

As we walked past the mutant's body to go back to the bridge, the spirit of the horse and man re-appeared. They were doing the exact same thing as last time. The spirit of the horse was just standing there, and the spirit of the man was looking at the obelisk.

Me and Tara made it back to the bridge, and as we were walking down it, we saw the spirit of the horse and the spirit of the man again. We also saw a spirit of what looked like a lady. They were walking down the bridge and disappeared.

"Those were the spirits of the man and horse again," I said to Tara. "That third spirit looked like a woman."

"I wonder why they were walking down the bridge," Tara replied. "I wonder if it has something to do with that obelisk."

"I don't know, but there's definitely something happening," I said. "Or perhaps something already happened."

Things got even more bizarre. As me and Tara continued to walk down the bridge, we were getting to the part of it that was destroyed. The spirits re-appeared, and underneath them, a glowing platform appeared. They were walking across it to get to the other part of the bridge. I tried to walk on it, but I just went through it. After the spirits made it to the other part of the bridge, they vanished along with the glowing platform.

We were looking from the bridge to see the area, and what a sight it was.

"Look at the scenery, Tara," I said.

"It's beautiful," she replied. "We can see our camp at turtle beach from up here."

We could definitely see a lot from on top of the bridge. It was nice scenery, but at the same time, it was quite mysterious. "What the hell is out there," I was thinking to myself.

After examining the area from the bridge for a bit, the glowing platform and the spirits reappeared. The spirits were walking across the platform once more, and then the spirits and the platform disappeared again. Me and Tara looked at each other with much confusion.

Me and Tara decided that we were gonna head back to where we attacked the mutant near the obelisk. As we were making our way there, we saw the same spirits walking down the bridge again, we saw the same spirits by the obelisk again, and then we saw two spirits by a tent.

After examining the spirits by the tent, me and Tara went over to the cliff and reflected upon our new reality.

"Look at all of the fighting we did today, Tara," I said. "From bandits to monsters, it's hard to believe that this is our reality now."

"We're in a different time and place, Ricky." Tara replied. "It's going to take a while to fully adapt to our new surroundings."

I looked over the cliff. "Yeah, it is."

"As difficult as things are, we're only going to get stronger as we further learn to survive here," Tara said.

"And you're right, Tara," I replied. "Like you said, as long as we have each other, we'll make it."

Tara came next to me and gave me a hug. "We'll make it, together."

Me and Tara both knew that life was going to be very different being in this time and world. We both knew that we may never find a way back to Willow Creek 1994. I don't know what fate has planned for us, but all we can do is try to survive in this new reality.