ENTRY 10:
Some interesting developments have just occurred. Whether they’re good or not is left to be decided. I guess my adrenaline was spiked the fuck up, because I decided to jump out of that dumpster, gun raised. As soon as I did, both cops rushed me. They saw that I was armed, for sure… but I guess they didn’t care. I shot the guy without the tattoo before being taken down by the other one. I took a couple of baton blows to the ribs before he was restrained by Christian. He groaned, shouting at me in short, guttural bursts. “Kill me you fuck! I don’t care!” I told him to calm the hell down. Then I laid it all out to him. I told him where we came from. That we were from Earth. His expression seemed to change drastically after that. He was listening intently. “What happened to you, huh? How’d you get here?” Christian eventually asked.
As it turns out, he was a German-American named Kunz Steiner. He used to be part of the 82nd airborne division of the US army. One day - on a mission to Iraq, some strange shit happened. The same shit that happened to us. “It was a cloudy day.” He explained. “One second, we were up in the air… you know the rest. Only five of us actually made it into the island. I was the only one who made it to this fucking place.” Apparently, he killed all of the guards who were outside the walls at that time. “I was running on fumes.” He said. “I didn’t even know what the hell I was doing. I guess my primal instincts just kicked in.” He had also realized that bullets didn’t do a whole lot against the jungle creatures, so he still had plenty of ammunition at that point. When the backup came, they wanted to just get rid of him. At first. But then they realized that he could be a valuable asset. “They just lost like 10 fucking guards.” He recalled. “I guess they thought taking me in and turning me into one of them wasn’t so bad of an idea. So that’s what they did. Been here ever since. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve thought about offing myself.” He continued. “Nobody should live in a place like this” His voice started quivering. “ But… I always knew something could happen. Now you guys are here.” I was a bit taken aback by this. I mean, what the hell was he expecting us to do? I asked him about it.
“Well, surely one of you knows how to pilot, right? Unfortunately, I don’t” I thought about it. Travis was still back at the settlement. I asked him how the hell that was gonna help, regardless. He looked around for a bit. That’s when we all heard the distant sound of boots stomping on concrete headed our way. “Look, come back to my place first. I’ll tell you about it there” So that’s where went. And that’s where I am right now. You’d think that somebody as important as law enforcement here would get better living conditions. This place was beyond a shithole. It’s on the fifth floor of some dilapidated building that feels like it’s going down any second. Apparently, Kunz only gets an hour of running water a day, and there’s no air conditioning. 90% of his meals consisted of these stiff, brown “energy bars”. He gave us some. I almost puked when I saw something blinking back at me after I’d taken a bite. But, this was his plan:
He’d sneak us out of this place and we’d go back to the settlement (Kunz knew how to get there) in order to pick up Travis, who would steer. Apparently, the controls were similar enough to that of Earth's. After that, we’d go back to Paradise X, break into one of the hangars where they stored the aircrafts, and fly out of there in search of the fog again. In search of the way back. Obviously, there was about a billion things that could go wrong with this. First of all, there were apparently only four small planes in that entire hangar, and it was heavily guarded. But he had a solution to that. He knew about 15 other guards who also wanted out of this place. “That should be enough to break into the hangar” Kunz stated. Over the years, he had told them about what Earth was like… and it fascinated them. Why they didn’t just disregard him as crazy was simple. They were desperate for something else. Anywhere else. Everybody thought about doing it before… but nobody knew how to fly. This would be a golden opportunity for them. I thought about the guards that we had encountered earlier. None of them did seem to care whether they died or not. But there was also Travis. There was no way in hell that he would come with us. He actually seemed to like it here. As crazy as it is, I can’t see him willingly going back.
And then there was the biggest problem. What if there was no fog to be found? Were we just going to drift around the sky until our fuel ran out? I ran this by Kunz. He sighed. “Honestly… anywhere is better than here. If we have to land somewhere else, then so be it. I’m not staying in whatever the fuck this place is anymore.” His tone was dead serious, expression unwavering. He was 100% committed to this. I told him we’d do it. Christian and Lauren didn’t have any objections. I guess I’d also had my fill of this island. However… I really don't think we're going to find the fog again. Deep down, I know Kunz doesn’t either. This is just a coping mechanism for him. This is all he’s got. It’s currently morning, but we’re going to leave at night. Easier to sneak out that way. I have to say… I’m still excited. I know I shouldn’t be, but I am. We aren’t going back to Earth. There’s no way.
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ENTRY 11:
It’s finally dark out. We’re going for it. Kunz says that there’s a hidden tunnel that we can take that’ll lead us out. There’s also a vehicle waiting for us, which one of the other guards has set up.
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ENTRY 12:
We’re driving back to the settlement now. Fortunately for us, this vehicle has blinds on the passenger windows. I decided that this would be a good time to ask Kunz some more questions about Paradise X. As it turns out, the place is sort of a combination between a dictatorship and anarchy. There is technically somebody who runs and has power over everything – they call him the "Pioneer". It’s ironic because he had absolutely no contribution in discovering the place. Now, this guy… he can make any laws he wants. But he doesn’t. He just leaves the cesspool of a city to fester in its own waste. That’s right, there were no actual rules against murder, or anything for that matter. The only real laws were that you couldn’t attack the law enforcement, which was broken on an hourly basis, and that you couldn’t step foot on the Pioneer’s personal property, where he and the ones close to him lived in relative luxury. This was a big deal. The punishment was supposedly worse than death. The only reason he sent out police at all were to monitor for any creatures that leaked past the wall. This wasn't uncommon, apparently. If they saw any, the regular police would notify what was known as the “Command operatives” to come and get rid of them, which was mainly comprised of the enhanced guards.
After that, I asked about the copies. I could see him become visibly paler at the mention of them. He didn’t know too much about them either. He’d never even seen one. In fact, nobody around him had come to a consensus on what they really were. “Just don’t touch ‘em” He said. “Simple as that.” I asked him what would happen if you did. Maybe he’d have a better answer than Grillo. “Well, you know how they can take your form just by looking at you?” He responded. “The thing is, when it's just staring at you, it's merely a hollow shell of yourself. But once you’ve made contact with it, you’re essentially giving it permission to become you. And you know… two of the same person can’t exist at once. So after that, you’re gone.” I still didn’t understand what the hell that was supposed to mean. I pressed him for more answers, but he left it at that. Nobody seemed to want to talk about these things.
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ENTRY 13:
The rest of the drive was uneventful. But then we reached the settlement. It’s… really hard to say what happened. But a massacre obviously occurred. There were abnormally large claw marks scraped into the sides of the cabins and bodies were haphazardly scattered everywhere. I tried not to look because… there were kids. We searched the place for a while, but found no survivors. Eventually, Christian went back to praying and Lauren just started bawling. I was… horrifically transfixed by the whole scene. I don’t know what to think anymore. Eventually, we found Travis’s upper body. Safe to say, the plan wasn’t going to work. Kunz cursed loudly and started pacing. I heard him mumbling: “This can’t happen. I have to do this. Fuck… I can’t stay here.” At that point, I echoed his sentiments pretty closely. We really needed to get the hell off this island. But, I never found any trace of Rust. His body wasn’t among the dead. I did find his journal. Or what was left of it, anyways. Most pages were torn apart and the rest was simply indecipherable. I tried analyzing it, but it just read like ramblings from a madman. However, I did find something interesting during the last few entries. He’d scribbled “THIS IS A TERRIFYING DISCOVERY, WE-“before the page was ripped off. Shit. Wonder what the hell that’s about. “Let’s go” Kunz’s voice echoed across the destroyed civilization. I asked him what the plan was now. “I’ll pilot myself if I have to. I don’t give a fuck, we’re getting out of here.”
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ENTRY 14:
We’re driving back to Paradise X now. Christian and Lauren just look disaffected now. Empty. Kunz said that the plan was still on. “It can’t be that hard, right?” He said in regards to flying. “Yeah, probably not.” I responded. He was obviously delusional at this point, but he seemed unstable and I didn’t want to piss him off some more. I really don’t know where this is going.
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ENTRY 15:
It’s happening. Kunz has gone out and notified everybody who wants in. The number’s actually increased to 22 now, including some civilians. I asked him how the hell we were all supposed to fit. “We won’t” He responded. “Not all of us are going to make it. They’re all well aware of that.” Well, that’s nice to think about. I also asked him what he told them. About not having a pilot. He said that he didn’t say anything. They probably wouldn’t have wanted to help if they knew this. “Just say that you’re the pilot” He told me. “Don’t worry, you don’t have to actually do it if you don’t want to. I’ll figure it out.” He said this with such unwavering confidence. It was definitely just a façade. I could tell that he had no hope this was going to work. But… fuck it. There’s always a chance. Besides, Dusk blue really isn’t worth staying on. “Make sure you use those bullets well.” He said. “Every shot needs to count now.”
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ENTRY 16:
Fuck me. So… this is what happened. We met up with the other 22 in some shitty warehouse. Kunz introduced me as the pilot. Or, the “savior” as he put it. It was really weird, honestly. They all cheered. Kunz gave a mini-motivational speech about leaving this place, and finding a “home worth living.” This got them all riled up. However, things were looking bleak from the get-go. Amongst us, we had about seven total bullets. Apparently, some cops liked to smuggle weapons. But not many. We started marching through the streets, towards the hangar. A bunch of civilians and other cops stared at us in melancholic curiosity as we did so.
The hangar soon appeared in front of us. The problem was… there were a lot more guards than we’d expected. I saw everybody’s collective faces drop. Afterwards, we learnt that somebody had sold us out in exchange for a week’s supply of meat. Yes, some fucking meat. What Kunz never told us was that the Hangar was directly on the Pioneer’s property. The next moments were a relative blur. The renegade cops charged the hangar with blatant disregard for their own lives. My vision was obstructed by red mist and bodies as I stumbled around. There was no way in hell that I was running into a sea of bullets, so I started scrambling out of there. At some point during the madness, I was clotheslined by some behemoth of a man. I blacked out soon after.
I woke up after god knows how much time. I can feel turbulence. Guess we’re on a plane. My chest hurts like fuck and my legs are shackled to a wall. My weapon is gone, but the journal’s still here. Great. I looked around the small space to find about six of the other cops/civilians who were there with us. Among them were Kunz and Lauren. I guess Christian didn’t make it. I called over to Kunz and asked him where the hell we were going. As it turns out, we were headed to some kind of prison located on an island called “Ghost Hazard”. He said it so solemnly. Everybody around here looks so defeated. I’m so tired.
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Credits
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