There was little to disturb your peaceful way of living, a while away from any other signs of civilisation. In the depths of the countryside, you had decided to live a sustainable and cost-free life, growing your own food, sewing your own clothes and sourcing water from a nearby freshwater river. The isolation you had endured for most of your life was in some ways more peaceful than imaginable, and in others, painfully lonely. Regardless, you had come to accept your way of life, naive to modern technology and the privilege that is human contact.

However curiosity dug a hole in your brain, causing you to crave the touch of another human like sugar to a child. You often wished on every star in the night sky, just above the forest canopy, that you would live to interact with another person again, even just once.

It was on your weekly stroll to the river bank with your wooden water bucket that your wish was granted. You were forced to stop in your tracks down the path you had created towards your nearby water source when the splayed legs of an unknown man interrupted your footsteps. There, leant against a large oak tree in desperation for shade, lay some sort of soldier, his military uniform torn and his balaclava pulled up halfway over his face to reveal his bloody nose.

You froze. Now that you had a human in your proximity, you had no idea what to do. Especially in a situation like this. But the man’s ears easily picked up on the leaves that crunched beneath your self-tailored boots. His eyes flitted up to your figure, brown hues widening a tad and then relaxing into a look of relief. It was only upon another look over him that you realised the soldier’s leg was severely wounded with what seemed to be a bullet.

What the hell was a member of the military doing here?

“Sir...” The man began in a gravelly voice, wincing as he took too tight of a breath, his gloved hands moving up quickly to support what you assumed to be bruised ribs.