The sun began peaking over the top of the mountains surrounding what used to be Hope County. The fog that covered the whole county began to dissipate under the warm touch of the sunlight.

Eden crested over a hillside and stopped to lean on a rock to take a break. Her breathing was ragged and quick from all her hiking, but she knew she needed to put some distance between her and the Seeds. She didn't want Jacob trying to follow her.

She sat against the rock and took in the view in front of her. She was sitting on a hill overlooking the rest of Hope County from what used to be Jacob's region in the Whitetail mountains. She wasn't very far into the mountains, but because of the shifting river flows it was easier to get to now than it was before.

She left in the middle of the night, doing everything in her power not to wake up Jacob. She tried to go to sleep and just let the morning dictate her day, but she just couldn't. All night John's words rang through her mind, no matter how hard she tried to stop them.

What will my poor brother do without his favorite project?

Eden tried to shake off his words. They were just meant to taunt her, the same that John always did.

     But still...Eden couldn't help but think of Jacob. She didn't know how to address her feelings towards him. He kept her on edge, she never knew exactly what he was thinking, but he made her feel safe. She liked being held by him and being supported by him.

     But her body wasn't the same as it was before. Simple tasks were exhausting, it was hard hiking this far. She knew that the ulcer she had been dealing with before the bunker never healed. She was so angry and scared for so long, it became a background thought. Something that didn't even bother her with everything else.

She didn't know what had made it worse lately. Stress? Nerves? Lack of food? It could be anything, but she was feeling it wear on her.

It wasn't like she was going off on her own to die. But she just didn't want to burden anyone, or let anyone have something they could hold over her head.

While she laid there awake all night, she started playing scenarios in her mind. She couldn't help it.

What if Jacob found out how bad she felt? How hard it is for her to hike a short distance without pain? He'd do everything he could to force her to sit still. But she just spent the last 4+ years sitting still, not doing anything. She certainly wasn't hiking, or hunting, or climbing, and she didn't get better. It obviously didn't do much of anything, so why should she sit still now?

She wanted to go out and see what was left of Hope County. Who was still here and where did they go?

So she made up her mind. She'd leave and whatever happens, happens. If she got better then that would be great, if she didn't then at least she wouldn't have to drag anyone else through it with her. Especially not Jacob. This way was easier, like ripping off a bandaid. One and done.

It wasn't like this was the first time she decided to deal with something on her own. And she was older now, wiser, mentally stronger. At least that's what she told herself. Honestly she felt like the same damn fool as before. But she decided to fake it till she makes it.

Eden looked out over Hope County again. It seemed so fresh, so clean. Like it did all those years ago when she first arrived in the county. Before she got up close and saw all the problems. All the holes poked through the picturesque exterior.

Now she needed to go out and start trying to figure out what happened to the world.

Jacob looked up at the sky. High noon. Still no sign of Eden.

     "I should go look for her." Jacob said and John scoffed.

     "Why? It's obvious, she left. What makes you think you chasing after her would do anything?" John questioned, not realizing how close Jacob was to snapping on him.

     Jacob was silent. He finally got fed up and walked over to his rifle leaning against a box. Joseph stepped out of the church and looked at Jacob.

     "You can't go after her." Joseph said.

     "Why the hell not?" Jacob asked loudly, he's getting tired of people telling him what to do.

     "She left of her own free will, Jacob. Whatever she's decided to do you cannot change her mind. You would only be getting in the way of God's plan."

     "Maybe I don't care about God's plan right now. She's out there somewhere and I'm going to find her." Jacob stated as he swung his rifle over his shoulder.

     "This is her path, Jacob, not yours. You will see her again soon enough, but right now you must let her be." Joseph assured Jacob while staying firm.

Jacob didn't say anything else, he just started walking away.

"Stand down." Joseph spoke with a firmness that neither Jacob nor John had seen since before the bunker.

It stopped Jacob in his tracks.

"I know you care about Eden, but going and finding her now would only be like an owner dragging its dog back home. Your duty is to yourself and your family. She is not your family, Jacob." Joseph's words had an edge that he had lost for a long time.

Jacob was torn. Should he stand down and obey Joseph's order? Or should he go with his gut and search for Eden? If he doesn't go after Eden, what will she think? If he leaves Jospeh and John to fight for themselves, what would they do?

Joseph could survive, John could do what he has to. But could they really make it? Even after everything, they were still his brothers. His only family. The family he swore to protect years ago.

But Eden, he felt such a strong urge to stay by her side. He was driven crazy when he didn't know where she was.

     "Sit down, Jacob. We have work to do." Joseph ordered Jacob and turned around, walking back inside the church without another word.

     John was silent. He hadn't seen that side of Joseph since before their time in the bunker. He watched as Jacob fought a battle with himself.

     It was pretty rare, but John actually felt bad for Jacob in that moment. It wasn't like him to be so tore up over something like this, he must be pretty freaked out.

     Jacob stood frozen. Torn between two options, neither one without consequences. Go after Eden? Stay with his family and rebuild?

     He was stuck like a scared kid. His brain was totally blank.

     Then, he slowly pulled the gun off of his shoulder. He held it in his hand for a moment, then rested it against the box again. Slowly he turned and sat down on the ground in front of the box. He made his choice.

     Eden looked up through the tree canopy. The afternoon sun peaked through the branches, letting in warm light that combatted the cold shadows. Judging by the sun's position it was probably mid afternoon. She had been walking for a long time.

     Ahead of her, she saw a clearing in the trees. She decided she would stop there to rest for a little while.

     The clearing was a crazy beautiful spot. It overlooked the lake, with long grass that reached up to Eden's waist. It gently waved in the breeze, making the hillside look like it was waving like the ocean.

     Eden walked to the middle of the clearing and sat down. The grass tickled her as she laid back into it. She let the sunlight shine on her face, that familiar feeling she had craved for so long.

She was so comfortable, she could've gone to sleep right there. She wanted to drift off and enjoy this peaceful moment, but she knew she couldn't stop for long. If Jacob was tracking her he could be anywhere right now. She couldn't lower her guard like that.

Eden needed to find a place to stay for the night. Somewhere safe by clean water, she also needed to find food. They dined like kings the night before on the deer Jacob and Eden hunted, but after so long of not eating Eden was still so hungry. She should've taken some deer meat with her before she left. Oh well.

She needed to defend for herself again. She needed to get her own food, make her own camps, clean her own weapons. It was strange to be so...independent again. A part of her felt relieved, another part scared. She felt so weak now, all the hiking and carrying around her massive rifle was wearing on her. How could she make it on her own?

Eden thought way back, to before the bunker. She faced a fair share of shitty situations all by herself. She had been injured and concussed before. She managed to make it out alive all those times.

Yeah but you had help. A voice in the back of Eden's mind poked at her. You had friends that were willing to pick you up and dust you off. You always had safe places to go.

Eden shook off her thoughts. She had a lot of help yes, but she also did everything on her own when she wanted to. She didn't like burdening people, so she always tried to handle it on her own.

However, thinking about the past always took her back to her friends. Who lived? Who would've made it to a bunker in time? Who would have had enough food to last? Who could've stayed sane for that long?

They were impossible to answer. The answer scared Eden honestly. She knew she would have to go and face her friends eventually, if there was anyone still left. But how could she? How would she?

     These questions seemed so hard to ask herself in the bunker. Now that she was out, she was free, she needed to face these things head on. But she was scared.

     Positively assuming her friends survived, she didn't know how they would react to her. Sure she lived and that was something to be happy about, but would they trust her after spending so long with the Seeds?

     That thought formed a knot in Eden's stomach. She hadn't thought about it like that before. It hadn't occurred to her that her friends might not trust her after spending so much time with them.

    I'm getting ahead of myself. Eden thought to herself. I haven't even seen if anyone is still out there yet.

     Eden rubbed her face, trying to wipe away her unsettling thoughts. "I need to make a camp." She mumbled and looked around.

     She decided to focus on her campsite for the night, she needed a spot with water. She couldn't hear any moving water nearby, which meant that she needed to keep walking.

     So she stood up despite the aching in her legs and kept trekking along the mountainside. The further she went the better.

      After another hour of hiking, she finally found a stream. It was only about a foot wide, but the water running through it was quite clean. She decided she would trust it.

     She took the bag off of her shoulder and set it beneath a tall pine tree. She did the same with her rifle. She picked up some dead sticks and brown pine needles from the base of the tree. She didn't need a big smoky fire, but she needed to boil her water to clean it. Just because it was clear didn't mean it was safe, and after hiking all day she was thirsty.

     She piled the sticks and pine needles up in a small mound, then took some bigger rocks from near the stream and made a fire circle around the pile. She remembered taking some flint and steel from the bunker before she left, so she dug around in her bag for those.

     When she found it, she dusted them off and got to work trying to make a spark. She made sure her materials were nice and dry, so when she finally got a spark made it caught pretty quickly.

     She knelt down and blew into the smouldering ember at the base of her fire. As she blew, a coughing fit suddenly erupted from her chest and Eden began hacking and coughing into her hand.

     "Goddamn." She muttered and pulled her hand away from her face. Her palm was stained red.

     She tried not to get freaked out. This wasn't the first time that's happened. It's probably just an ulcer flaring up, maybe it'll go away.

     Eden snapped her attention back to her smouldering fire and gently blew on it again. It finally caught and the flames reached up through the rest of the pine needles. Eden set a couple bigger branches on top of the fire and walked down to the river.

     She dipped her hand into the cool water. The water rinsed a lot of the blood away, but some still lingered in the cracks of her palm. She pushed her hand into the dirt at the bottom of the stream and rubbed her hands together. The gritty dirt felt strangely nice against her skin, it was familiar.

     She's done this quite a few times. After processing a dirt she had spent two days hunting. After a gunfight. After attending to her own wounds.

     She rinsed off her hands and walked back to her fire to keep and eye on it. Once it was going strongly she collected some water from the stream in the small pot she brought.

     She decided not to try and hunt tonight. She needed to preserve her ammo incase she needed to use it in an emergency, so she would search for materials to start trapping small animals.

     As her water boiled on the fire, Eden laid out her sleeping bag. She laid flat on it with her bag as a pillow, looking up at the sky.

     The sun began to set over the quiet mountainside. A golden hue was cast on everything the light touched. Suddenly the warm air was turning cool as the sky burned bright orange. Eden watched from her comfortable place next to her own fire.

     Honestly, it wasn't half bad. Being independent, not dealing with anyone else, finally after so long getting a moment entirely to herself. She almost enjoyed it.