The Quiet Things That Keep Us Alive

Posted on Sun Nov 1st, 2026 @ 10:19am by Worker Cooper Hayes

1,880 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Pine Hollow
Location: Pine Hollow
Timeline: October 2010

'The woods can keep you alive if you just take a moment to slow down and listen.'. His grandfather had taught him that years ago, when Cooper Hayes was barely old enough to understand it. Truthfully, he had gone years just thinking it was something his grandfather had said in the moment, not a life lesson. It was not until recently, though, that Coop had comprehended that the woods sounded different when something was wrong. That comprehension would be exactly what had kept him alive for so long. Him and Rusty.

It wasn’t anything that he could explain to somebody who hadn’t spent half their life wandering the Appalachian foothills with a fishing pole over one shoulder and a pocketful of things that mom would have called junk. The birds still sang, the squirrels still fussed in the treetops, and the wind still moved through the pines, but there were moments when everything seemed to go quiet all at once. Those were the moments Coop came to realize meant a lot more. They meant danger, and being able to act meant survival.

Coop stopped beside an old stone wall, one hand resting on the strap of his backpack. Rusty stood there at his knee, her black-and-white coat speckled with mud and dead leaves. Her long ears twitched as she sniffed the air, and her tail gave a slow, uncertain wag. She too knew something was coming their way, something that had the odor of death but wasn't quite dead enough, but he looked at Rusty and she looked at him, that uncertain wag of her tail informed him that whatever it was was not too close. Not yet, at least, and the two of them had time.

“What's the verdict, girl?” he whispered. “You smell breakfast, or are you just trying to get us eaten?” Rusty looked up at him. He knew she was hungry. She was not being spoiled like she once was, even immediately after everything that happened, Coop had given her full cans of dog food. It did not take long for him to determine that they needed to stretch supplies.

“Yeah, that's about what I thought.”

He scratched behind her ear before crouching to examine the ground. The morning had brought a cold mist through the valley, leaving the fallen leaves damp and the stones slick. October was settling in properly now. The nights were getting colder, and Coop had started waking up with stiff fingers inside his sleeping bag. His little home in the abandoned train car kept most of the wind off him, but it wasn't exactly the Hilton that his mom liked to book. There was no spa. Coop had stuffed gaps around the windows with old cloth and cardboard, but the roof still leaked whenever the rain came from the wrong direction. It often chose the wrong direction.

They could have been worse off. At least he had shelter. At least he had Rusty. The two of them had been surviving for a while now, and, if he was lucky, they would have something to eat before noon.

Coop had brought his small collecting tin, a pocketknife, and a length of cord. His grandfather had taught him to look for food where other people saw nothing, just the dirt and weeds. More importantly, he'd taught him never to take more than he needed. There was a difference between knowing how to live off the land and treating the land like a grocery store that never ran out. If you took too much too often, then the land would run out. You would starve.

These days, that difference mattered, and it mattered a whole heck of a lot.

He worked his way toward a shallow stream, sticking to the edges of undergrowth. The cold water ran clear over flat stones, and he could see the occasional dart of a small fish beneath the surface. He'd tried fishing here before albeit it was with mixed results. The trout were quick little suckers, and he wasn't about to waste precious ammunition on something he could catch with a line, but it was cold and he could not afford to be cold and wet, not in October.

Rusty nosed around a rotting log.

Coop was quick to notice. Rusty was not a puppy, but she was only a few years old. She still had the energy and curiosity of a pup. “Hey, leave that alone for a second" he quipped. She ignored him. “Rusty,” he said in a tern tone. "I said stop." One floppy ear lifted.

“I'm serious. I don't know what you found in there, and I'd rather not find out the hard way.” During the summer, Rusty had once disturbed a hive of bees. Though he was glad to have Rusty as a companion, her curiosity and persistency sometimes got them into trouble. Coop was allergic to bee stings, and disturbing a hive of them was not something he could risk. Especially not these days.

She backed away, apparently satisfied that she'd made her point. Coop approached the log and rolled it over with a stick. Several salamanders scattered into the damp leaves.

He smiled despite himself. His grandfather had shown him how to turn over logs without crushing whatever lived underneath, then put them back afterward. Coop followed the same habit, even now. It wasn't that he thought the salamanders would thank him. He just didn't see the point in destroying something that hadn't done anything to him.

Still, he needed protein.

He studied the little creatures for a moment, weighing his options. As a Boy Scout, Cooper knew enough about amphibians to recognize that not everything that looked harmless was safe to eat. Some species produced skin toxins, and identifying an unfamiliar salamander by sight alone wasn't a risk he wanted to take. He'd rather go hungry for another hour than poison himself and leave Rusty alone in the woods. He looked at Rusty and shook his head. "Not safe enough, girl," he said to the dog.

“Sorry, fellas,” he murmured, nudging the log back into place. “Wrong place, wrong time, but today you get to keep your little salamander lives.”

Rusty sneezed. " Oh, don't be dramatic. We're still hunting breakfast.”

Coop moved along the stream, looking for overturned stones and signs of small game. A few yards farther on, he found what he wanted: a cluster of crayfish sheltering beneath the rocks in a shallow pool. They weren't much individually, but enough of them could make a meal for two.

Coop worked slowly, using a stick to lift stones and his hands to gather the crayfish into his tin. A few snapped at his fingers, and one managed to escape down a crack between the rocks.

“Good for you,” he told it. “You win this round.”

By the time he'd collected a modest handful, his fingers were numb. He rinsed the crayfish in the stream and covered the tin. It wasn't a feast, but it was something. He'd boil them thoroughly back at the train car, and Rusty would get her share. She'd have to settle for a little less than she'd probably like. Then again, so would he.

A rustle in the brush made him freeze. Rusty's head came up. Her body stiffened, and a low growl rumbled in her throat. Cooper caught a whiff of dead in the air. Coop's hand went to the camp hatchet at his belt. He didn't draw it immediately. Instead, he listened, his eyes following the narrow gap between two spruce trees.

There it was again. A dragging sound, followed by a wet, irregular breath.

His stomach tightened. A walker emerged between the trees, its clothes hanging in strips from a body that had long since forgotten how to be a body. Its face was gray and sunken, and one arm dangled at an unnatural angle. It stumbled toward them, catching its foot on a root before lurching upright again.

Coop swallowed, a hard gulp. He hated these things. Things that used to be people, but were definitely not people anymore. What was worse was having to take care of the problem.

“Okay,” he whispered. “That's enough of that.” He motioned Rusty behind him. She obeyed, though her growl continued, low and angry. The walker was close enough that he could smell it now. He could practically taste the disgusting odor in his mouth. Coop did not want to fire his rifle. He had fewer rounds than he was comfortable admitting, and the sound would carry through the valley. There might be other walkers nearby. There might be people, too, and he wasn't sure which possibility bothered him more.

He waited until the walker stumbled over the stone wall, then stepped sideways to keep the barrier between them. It reached toward him with a stiff, grasping hand. Coop's grip tightened around the hatchet. He was sixteen. He was cold. He was hungry, and he was a long way from home. He had a dog who depended on him and a grandfather he didn't know whether he'd ever see again. There were a hundred things he would rather be doing than standing in the woods deciding how to kill something that used to be a person.

But wishing didn't change much anymore. He moved when the walker leaned over the wall, striking once with the hatchet. The creature collapsed against the stones. Coop kept his distance until it stopped moving, his breathing uneven and his heart hammering in his chest. For several seconds, he simply stood there. Then he wiped the hatchet on a patch of dead grass and checked the woods again.

“Everybody okay?” he asked Rusty. She pressed against his leg.

“Yeah. Me too.”

He wasn't, really. His hands were shaking, and his chest felt tight from the sudden burst of fear and exertion. He took out his inhaler and used it, waiting until his breathing settled. Then he checked himself for bee stings out of old habit, though there were no bees in sight. His allergy was one more thing the world hadn't bothered to take away when everything else fell apart.

He packed the crayfish away and started back toward the tracks. There would be no triumphant march home, no grand speech about surviving another day. He'd cook breakfast, make sure Rusty ate, and check the trip wires around the train car before dark. If he had time, he'd patch the hole in his sleeping bag.

Maybe he'd even find something sweet to eat. An apple, if any of the old orchard trees still had fruit worth taking. He thought about that as he walked, and the thought made him smile.

“Hey, Rusty?”

The hound glanced up. “If we find apples, I'm calling it a proper breakfast.”

Her tail wagged. “See? That's why you're my favorite.” He didn't tell her she was his only companion. She already knew.

Together, they followed the abandoned tracks through the October woods, carrying what little they'd managed to find. Behind them, the stream continued to run over its stones, and the salamanders settled beneath their overturned log. For now, that would need to be enough. They continued on with their morning hunting and scavenging for more food.

 

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