Day 6

I was awoken early this morning by the puffy blast of Mitch’s Winchester outside the barn.  A quick glance at my watch show the local time was just after four in the morning.  The sky was beginning to lighten, but the forest outside was still shrouded in darkness.  Matt was casually leaning on a makeshift cane by the backdoor and motioned that all was well.  When I got down the two flights of stairs he informed me that they had spotted a wild hog in the trees and that Mitch was going to lure it far enough away from the barn so as not to bother the Zeds while harvesting the meat.  Shortly thereafter, the great white hunter emerged from the darkness carrying his bounty of bacon.

After yesterday’s events, I really didn’t have the motivation to accomplish much today.  Mitch wanted to climb to the top of Pop Ivan, the highest hill in the area, and see what was visible from there.  From our limited perspective in the forested valley the weather looked very clear; despite my lack of enthusiasm, I couldn’t let him go alone, so we ventured forth.  We headed out to the south to get clear of the local Zed population before turning back east towards Pop Ivan.  We hadn’t gotten far before Mitch dove to the ground quietly exclaiming that he saw another human running across the other end of a clearing only a few hundred yards away.  The individual had been running at a full sprint straight north.  He didn’t seem to be showing interest in the farm where Matt was still recovering, but we radioed him to be on the lookout.  Our progress slowed significantly as we spent the next several minutes crawling through the field grass.  We didn’t hear any gunfire and Matt never indicated that he made visual contact with the mystery runner, so we quickly sprinted east across a paved road and back into the forest at the base of Pop Ivan hill.

Our nerves were exceptionally frazzled after our near miss with the armed human; so when we reached the edge of the forest near the top of the hill only to find yet another lone survivor, the ensuing encounter was tense, to say the least.  It quickly deescalated though, when the crossbow armed man stared down the firepower wielded against him.  He lowered his weapon and exhibited genuine relief at finding survivors that don’t live by “Shoot-On-Sight” rules of engagement; we may have been through Hell, but we still have our humanity.  After introductions, Mitch and I conferred briefly before agreeing on a vetting process to accept the young man, Mackie, into our group; if he so wished he would spend the day with us on our reconnaissance mission in order to establish a level of trust and responsibility.  

At the top of Pop Ivan we found a 50 foot tall radio tower that proved to be an excellent vantage point.  A quick round of rock-paper-scissors decided that Mitch would climb to the top for a look around, which was fortunate since he was the only one who expressed interest in the climb in the first place.  After spending only a few minutes exposed at the top of the tower, he quickly returned to ground level.  Visibility was good and he had been able to see north into Stary Sobor and south to Vyshnoye and beyond to the ruins of Zub; however he was unable to discern any signs or recent activity or human occupation.

Slightly disappointed in the amount of intelligence gathered from Pop Ivan we decided to hike further east towards Pogorevka.  Just west of the town we found two deer hunting stands on the east edge of the forest.  Unfortunately there wasn’t much more than some scrap ammunition for weapons that none of us carry.  As midday approached the humidity began picking up and a storm was rising in the east and heading our way.  Not wanting to get caught up in the weather we decided against further reconnaissance of Pogorevka and began the return hike to our base camp.  On the eastern side of Pop Ivan we became aware of a faint thumping that sounded very much like a helicopter.  The arrival of that kind of hardware in the area means one of two things:  Civilization is still out there somewhere, or a bandit gang has managed to cobble together a wrecked chopper.  

It didn’t take long to discover which possibility was true.  As we sought concealment under the thick pine canopy around Pop Ivan, the Huey emerged from the east.  Machine gun fire rained down on the hilltop around us kicking up small explosions of dirt and pine needles.  Thankfully the shooting seemed random and the gunship didn’t hang around very long.  We all agreed on a very hasty, but covert, retreat to the farm, concurring that to use the radios at this point could be more dangerous than ever.  Once back inside the barn, introductions were made between Mackie and Matt; and a thorough debriefing/planning discussion has ensued since.