Chapter Three

i scour the rest of the cabinets, driven by hunger, desperation, and a flicker of something else—curiosity, maybe. In the back of the lowest cupboard, beneath a rusted tin, I find a thin paper packet, bound with twine and stained by time.

POTATO – VAR. BLACK MOON

The handwriting is crooked, crude and hurried. Below it, a faint scrawl: "They grow slow, but they grow."

Seeds.

My hands tremble as I open the packet, cradling the tiny, dry kernels of potential.

Life. Or something close to it.

I step outside, shielding my eyes. The scarlet sun still looms above, a bloody god watching from behind the dust veil. Ash swirls in lazy currents, never still.

To the side of the shack, half-buried in soot and silence, I find it—

A pump. Iron and stubborn.

I grasp the handle and heave.

Once.

Twice.

Ten times.

Then: a cough. A groan.

A trickle of water, sluggish and brownish, sputters from the spout.

I taste it. Harsh, metallic—but not death.

Behind the cabin, a box rests beneath a warped wooden awning. A planter.

The soil within is dry and cracked, choked by the remnants of plants long dead.

But it is soil.

I kneel before it. Dig gently, clearing space, burying the tiny seeds like precious bones. I cover them with care.

My arms ache, my hands blistered. Still, I return to the pump, fill a chipped tin bowl, and return—again and again—until the seeds are damp, until the earth is dark and soft with moisture.

I kneel and press my hands into the soil.

"Grow," I whisper. "Please," I beg the seeds though I know they can't hear. It gives me something to do, anyway, some feeling of control, a warm tingle in my chest. Maybe that's the ash getting to me.

No divine light answers. No warmth spreads through the ground. But I sit a while longer, head bowed, pretending it does.

When my strength is gone, I stagger back inside.

I find a small cot in the corner, its blanket eaten through in places but still a comfort. I collapse onto it, every muscle surrendering.

Through the cracked window, I glimpse the planter. A black box against a grey world.

I close my eyes and dream of green.