Kat had a nose for old bricks and concrete, the unique volitals it exuded when the lime reacted to the acidification of the rains that now flood the countryside. It was a subtle yet unique smell that could never be mistaken for anything else but was so rarely noted that those most often exposed to it would never notice it missing from the bouquet of poverty where it most often lingered. She blew out a ragged breath and shifted her frame pack around settling it more firmly on her curves, it pinched and hung up on her ample assets clearly not designed for anyone with any extra weight to carry comfortably. But she needed a real pack to carry all of her camera gear, Canon equipment was not cheap and certainly not lightweight carbon fiber.

Her hands were cramping from lugging the aluminum waterproof case for her drone, the octocopter had cost as much as her most expensive camera body but was heavy duty enough to mount a full frame camera into as well as having a GoPro HD camera built into the frame for navigating in the air. She took a break on a low stone wall that was topped with rusting wrought iron fencing, the first evidence that her instincts had been right. Setting down her pack and drone case she took a drink from one of her water bottles clipped to the side of the pack. Her gaze lingered fondly on the drone as she caught her breath. Recalling another adventure in the rust belt that had been very rewarding. At an old steel mill with fantastic crumbling brick smokestacks, she had run into another Urban Explorer Bartholomule Walker, Bary never Bart Walker, had been one of her most memorable finds while capturing the beauty of nature reclaiming its domain over abandoned structures.

Taking a deep breath Kat stripped out of her last layer of defense and propriety in the dusty kiln where red hot metal had cooled long ago into rusting icicles. Naked she stepped carefully through the red-tinged dust making each footprint clear and defined carefully composing the image she had glaring so brightly in her mind. She had always had the impulses to show the contrast between her feminine paleness and the hard sharp edges of urban decay. The classes that had helped guide her nubile photographic talents, just budding after a rough half decade of high school would not have approved of her nudity in such places. Partly due to the insurance risk it would have undoubtedly represented and scandalized at her refusal to feel out of place because of her soft curves in a field that was designed only for the hard angles of perfectly sculpted models. This was her first shoot on her own carrying all of her own gear with no one around to contradict her artistic vision.

Kat struggled to keep the smile at her freedom off of her face as she posed, arms up triumphantly, nearly touching the spears of frozen metal hanging like crooked teeth on the perfectly round edge of the tipped over metal bucket that once held manmade magma. She created tension by not actually touching the rusted and weathered metal. She admired the ingenious method of moving molten steel as her camera clicked steadily away, set up to fire every three seconds as she moved around her scene. Her final shot she had planned she wanted to have some dirt on her hands and legs from the elbows down and knees down so she grabbed a few handfuls of old soot and smeared them liberally blackening her skin dramatically before resting her weight on one foot and barely any weight on her other foot toes pointed and placed directly behind the other, stretching as tall as her 5’2” frame would allow she grabbed one of the hanging metal stalactites hard enough to make what muscles she had in her forearm flex and delicately ran her other hand down her flexed arm while looking back over her shoulder provocatively at her camera bending her body into as much of an S shape as she could manage to add extra contrast between the hard lines of metal and her soft curves. She shifted slightly after each click of her camera setup and flash of the lights she had so carefully programmed to get the most out of her carefully hard work and toil.

Her only warning was the telltale clatter of ruble against steel and she gasped ducking down cursing she grabbed her loose sundress and held it protectively over herself as someone stumbled down the broken wall she had used earlier to get into the furnace area.

“Hello? Is anyone there? I saw the flashes on my drone..” he trailed off spotting her camera setup and a glimpse of her extensive tattoos on her thighs and back. She was pleased by the beat red that crept into his face as he quickly turned his head and looked away from her as she pulled her dress hastily over her head. “OH, uh, sorry didn't mean to see anything there. I’ll, uh, just catch my breast, I mean Breath! And get out of your way,” Kat smiled at his awkwardness and gave him a quick once over.

“It's ok, I didn't know anyone else was out this far,” Kat said walking carefully over the stone floor to her small satchel where she stored the small pink 9mm pistol she carried. She smiled slightly putting it on, she liked how the strap went between her large breast, one of her favorite features about herself. He was a cute specimen for an explorer, they were usually rangy, and as rangy men went she was forced to admit, he was an excellent specimen. He ran his hand through his coal-black dust speckled hair nervously as he turned to her. She was not prepared for the absurdly bright blue eyes behind his square gold-framed glasses, he had a good face as well. Not classically handsome but strong, and weather beaten just enough to be interesting, his nose was slightly crooked and he had a small sharp cut on his chin that was still healing. In worn khaki cargo pants and a battered star wars T-shirt, he still managed to look dangerous and yet somehow kind.

“I didn’t expect to run into a Jaybird out here this far, uh, kinda makes me feel overdressed,” he swallowed at the beautiful women who stood so confidently where she had been naked just moments ago. He tried to keep his eyes off her ample deacleage that the strap of her purse like bag was not helping matters at all. Standing in bare feet, toes covered in factory grime she cut an impressive figure in the smoky light filtering into the old foundry, he swallowed cursing his idiot tongue as it wagged like it had a mind of its own as he struggled to find something to say to this dazzling concrete nymph he had stumbled upon.

“Jaybird? She asked quirking an eyebrow at his odd choice of words. He blushed even brighter at her look if that was possible.

“Yeah, sorry it’s what my Dad always called nudist,” he tried to clear his suddenly dry throat at her interested half glare, “I’ll just get out of your hair then…” he trailed off and turned to go cursing himself every inch he turned away from her.

“I’m Kat,” she said taking her hand off her gun and stretching it out for a handshake. The sun broke through the clouds streaming through the dirty skylights above them just as his face lit up and she vowed to get him out of his comfort zone and into her photoshoot.

Shaking away her reminiscing, she had spent a fun few weeks exploring the midwest with him and he had built her the drone she still used. She liked to picture him out there someplace like Detroit using his machines to get new perspectives and footage with his every growing swarm of drones.

She smiled patting the case and ran a hand over the black and white flock of Jaybirds she had gotten tattooed on the inside of her wrist to commemorate their short torrid time together on the rust belt. Now in the hills of the North East, she missed the sun-blasted heat of the Midwest sometimes. The cloying fog refused to burn off under the weak gray light of the hazy noonday sun. It hung low around her knees clinging to its existence as stubborn as the grass that turned the old cobblestones from the gate into treacherous ankle grabbing gremlins eager to twist an unwary foot.

Getting out her first camera she had a macro lens on it 80mm F:2.4 Canon with an optical doubler on it, a spur of the moment purchase while looking at the German cut crystal lens filters one day. It made the whole setup weigh a good three pounds but she could make a poster size print from Lincoln's profile on a penny with it, definitely worth every cup of Raman she had to eat to pay for it. The lichen and moss clinging to the uneven path looked like tiny fairy villages when magnified by her camera. Dr. Seuss like trees and mushrooms growing in defiance of gravity and reason. Neon red bulbous growths like something out of a science fiction movie, delicate coral pinks on impossibly slender trunks next to emerald green moss. A beautiful world in miniature where a ladybug trundled like a plow horse, and most simply crushed underfoot without a thought.

She stood back up her knees protesting the heavy load of equipment, but she smiled at the strain. She knew that most of the lithe yoga types her height wouldn't even be able to carry her pack let alone the rest of her camera gear. Suck it! Bunch of kale eating sheeple racing towards the cliff of their mid-30s like it was the end of their world. She hung the Macro off its place on her belt, far enough to the side so that it wouldn’t bang against her as she walked, but be ready for use in a matter of seconds.

The trees along the sloping curve of the asylum driveway had all overgrown the path, twisted limbs grasping each other overhead. Now twisted by years of storms blowing in off the nearby coast. They stood proudly gnarled and aged beautifully without the strict hand and unforgiving razors of gardeners constricting their freedom. Kat looked up as she entered the dappled shade that fought back the encroaching grass, leaving a beautiful sweeping carpet of moss, lying as thick as shag carpeting underfoot. The coolness of the early June day in New England closed in quickly once she entered the shade, the soft moss silenced her footsteps completely, the trees ate up the click and clack of her gear coating everything in a blanket of smooth silence. Her breath fogged slightly in the darkness under the trees the moisture coalescing on her eyelashes framing the path whimsically. Pausing to take a few shots of the shifting shadows and fog, she smiled at into the darkness between the trees.

Carefully she took a lense cover Bary had crafted for her, it was made out of strings of gauze draped on a metal shade. It collected the moisture and added bright glinting pearls to her raw photos without the aid of software the strings were so thin they disappeared once she focused on her subjects making the droplets seem to hover in mid-air. She only really used it on her small 35mm film camera she always carried in her pocket out of respect for the effort he had gone to for her art. After a few more minutes of enjoying the cool air under the trees, she caught her breath at the looming figure of the main building as it came out of the misty air seeming to exhale the moisture that hung into the air.

Instead of a hill like such places typically chosen for their resting places, this asylum sat in the depression between two large hills in its own secluded valley. The landscape had been flattened and the trees stripped back leaving a desolate, hostile strip of overgrown grass around the foundations. Sweeping stone steps curved out around the circle at the end of the drive. Like a grand staircase set in mortar to stand the test of centuries, ancient cast iron lamps designed to hold oil lights still graced each end of the stairs like metal newel posts.

It was breathtaking, just like the local expert at the consignment shop in the small town had said it would be, she was glad that she always asked around before heading out to such places. Just in case google earth hadn’t updated in a few years and a building had been demolished or burned down. Walking up to the blackened corpses of such senseless destruction was always heartbreaking. She loved turn of the century buildings that hadn't even had electricity run to them asides from steam-powered generators with huge boilers that aged more gracefully than most ballet dancers.

She slung her gear off her shoulders and leaned it against the last tree carefully and checked the sun once again out of habit, 3 hours till the golden hour. Her neighbor had been a veteran from world war 2, Korea and Vietnam, Richard, or to the kids in the neighborhood Tricky Dick. He had always had a coin on hand to pull out of any unsuspecting ear and he could tell what time it was just by glancing at the sky, it had always seemed like magic to her. She had pestered him until he had taught her to track the sun's path with her hands and measured hours by finger widths the sun was above the horizon no matter where she went it always worked within 15 minutes of what her phone said.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Kat set up her tripod and set out her collapsible solar panel to charge her spare batteries, it would work even in the dim light of the overcast skies to charge her lights or camera batteries as needed. Sighing in the warm breeze that pushed back the chill under the trees Kat sat down to enjoy the shifting light while she waited for the lighting to become dramatic and perfect to do such a building justice. Leaning against her back, the lullaby of the whispering blades of dry grass caressed her ears until her eyelids fluttered and she drifted off in a light doze her daily alarm for golden hour safely programmed into her ever vigilant phone.

Kat’s eyes flew open at a cheerful caw echoing out well before her alarm rang out to break the hush that had fallen over the fields and outbuildings as twilight began to build. She could feel the pressure increasing as the atmosphere shifted towards night. This was her favorite moment of the day when the shadows first began to stretch and the light took on a slight tint that softened edges and built dramatically until finally slipping into darkness.

“Yes!” she whispered out excitedly under her breath, sleeping or sitting still always made you blend into the background so that the birds and animals ignored your presences after a time. The Ravens were coming home to roost, she had made a study of the Corvids in college the genus that included crows magpies and ravens. They were territorial and family-centric living in large extended family groups and generations roosting together in the same area. They flew out each day, commuting to food sources and only returning as darkness camouflaged them from the prying eyes of predators. Kat loved the intelligent iridescent flyers, they were only black to those who didn't bother to see them in the light. A group of ravens was called a congress or unkindness as she recalled; it depended on their behavior at the moment. they could also be referred to as constables or a conspiracy again dictated by their observed behavior at the moment. She always called them constables as they were quick to police any hawks or raptors out of their areas with careful, coordinated harassment.

She caught them just as they flew low over the building circling over its tarred roof to catch the updrafts before heading further off into the eastern facing hill, where the sun would wake them up first with its warmth giving rays before the predators woke from their ground-level burrows. The gray skies were a perfect contrast behind their dark plumage as they created a dark halo, circling around the decrepit asylum. Once the last straggler flew off she only had an hour or so of daylight before night set in. grabbing her flashlight and headlamp she got her best camera out of her gear bag and put on an external flash so she could scout out areas for tomorrow's shoot.

Taking her satchel with the reassuring weight of her sturdy knife and small pistol she set out for the asylum. She stowed her bags under the low bushes at the base of the stairs that had been nearly choked out by weeds, out of sight of casual observers.

Walking up to the front door she admired the hollows in the steps that countless feet had worn into the stones. The right-hand stairs were more worn than the left which always made her smile. Psychologist had noted the average person's tendency to favor the side of their dominant hand when presented with equal paths to choose from, once she had been made aware of it she had always made sure to favor left-handed turns over right-hand to approach things from a different angle when she could. She made quick notes in her pocket notepad as she went, 22 steps to the door, four floors of windows, 24 windows to each side of the building. A cluster of four smokestacks on the western wing to take advantage of the prevailing easterly breezes used to carry the coal smoke away into the hills. Each window was covered with wrought iron grills each bare as big around as her thumb and the spaces between them barely large enough for her palm to fit through, a terrible fire design that would never pass code enforcement today. The front doors where both steel over wooden cores, the wood had long ago been eaten away by bugs but the riveted straps and hinges had kept the shell of metal in place. At her experimental shove and tug, they barely moved, rarely did the front door yield in such places.

She went down the right-hand stairs, snapping a few shots of the view of the overgrown driveway and lengthening shadows of the trees.once she was at the bottom of the stairs Kat began methodically trying a sharp pull on each of the window grates working her way clockwise around the building. At the east wing side entrance, she tested the chains holding the doors and was rewarded with the mostly wooden door leaning drunkenly on broken hinges. A few kicks and tugs had the last weathered bits of wood around the bottom hinge giving way and the door hung drunkenly on the still sturdy chain that secured it to the window grates framing the door.

She backed up and took a few shots of the broken door with her cell phone for her blog and qued them to upload once she had signal again. She always documented her entry points so she could have proof if she was caught trespassing that the doors had not been properly secured and no signage warned against entry. After all the wind could have made that last board give out it was perfectly plausible that she found it that way. Continuing around the building she kept trying window grates for alternate entry points but so far they had all proven rather well preserved.

She began to notice telltale signs of their individual craftsmanship, small imperfections in the hand-forged rivets and an elegant twist here and there of the square bars. As though the man crafting them couldn't stand the plain utilitarian purpose for his careful work. As she neared the corner furthest from the door a smile tugged at her lips as she took careful shots of the corners of the window grating, the blacksmith had added a slight tracery of leaves climbing up the outside of the window frame, she immediately liked the unnamed man’s subtle rebellion against his wasted talent on such a stark project. The leaves were twisted so that they didn't cast a telltale shadow from the ground level and where barely visible without her telephoto lens to bring them into focus. He had probably been able to add a few days onto his bill from this overlooked back corner. Good for him, gouging the rich owners a bit. She thought patting the bars fondly, as she rounded the corner, on this western side she found the remains of a coal shed and the generator building. Looking around carefully she could tell that there had once been some fencing most likely for horses and a three-sided pole barn to shelter them, odd that they didn't have a full barn with stalls for the animals. But the building had been built late enough that cars had likely come into vogue before it closed its doors in the early 30s according to her research. There was a recessed set of steps leading to a well-preserved metal door thanks to a badly rusted metal overhang that barely covered an ancient light fixture. The rest of the exterior lights had lost their bulbs long ago but this sheltered alcove had saved this one bit of spun glass and carefully crafted wire. Her fingers itched to touch the thinning glass but it would likely crumble at any attempt to pry it from its century-old resting place. She took a series of shots just as the last rays of light came around the building behind it causing the bulb to glow warmly, just as it must have when it had current running through its filaments so long ago. This side of the building was more sheltered from the wind and rain and the door was still solidly bared. The basement door was locked but not chained, a project for her knife tomorrow once the sun came up again.

hurrying back around the front of the building she retrieved her pack with about half an hour of sunlight still above the trees and turned towards the Ravens sheltering grove of pines, always a faithful indicator of a good spot to hole up for the night in her tent. Walking quickly she made her way under the thick canopy of pines a the crest of the hill. The thick boughs gave way to a welcoming bed of soft pine needles undisturbed for decades and kept dry by the thick roof of overlapping branches. Once she was sure her lights wouldn't be visible to anyone coming up to see the building she set up her camp with the ease of long hours of experience.

Kat took a deep breath sitting beside her small carefully banked fire. Across from her, she had her Camera set up on its tripod, she used her remote to start it recording and with a clap, as her sound marker started recording her end of the day Blog entry.

“What's up everyone? Kat here coming to you from… well, the locals just call it the Asylum in the valley; the old guy at the consignment shop actual said they don't have a name for it. But since it is in a valley up in the hills for this case I’m calling this one the Hill-Valley Asylum.,” thunder rumbled in the background at her pronouncement making her jump slightly. She smiled hugely into the camera you couldn't PAY for perfect sound effects like that. “Looks like I'm going to get rained on, after all, the clouds have been hanging around all day and the temperature dropped before the sunset sending the Ravens home early. You can hear them above me discussing why that crazy lady on the ground is talking to herself,” the gentle murmur of the birds and occasional caw echoed down to her muffled by the gentle rain and pine needles.

She had found years ago that thick pine forest where better than most sound rooms for recording audio, the lighting was always tricky but her fire put out plenty of Lumens spreading the Lux well. She also used the white front door of her tent opposite her to bounce some of the light back for better highlights and fill light so she didn’t end up with hard shadows or dark lines when she did her dialogue. She always filmed in black and white so the darkness and light were the most important parts of her scenes. Sighing she settled back into her spot by the fire and ran through her short intro a few more times so she could choose which to queue for upload or do some editing if she needed to.

Kat blew on her food trying to cool it from the edge of her tent, all of her gear was stowed in waterproof bags and wrapped up snug against the weather. she had enough fuel for her fire for another night at least if she chose to stay and food for three days plus her meal bars for the trail, it had been one of her longer hikes to get up to this one.

Glad that it wasn't a hard rain, she enjoyed weather much more than boring blue skies and wispy white fluffy clouds. Storm clouds were turbulent and never failed to entertain with their roiling path and pound sound systems when they really got going even added in plasma shows. One of her trips to Seattle had been rained out but she had stayed cozy on the top floor of her hotel watching the lightning lash out at the buildings spreading fingers of light to caress anything metal and shiny. Lightning storms always reminded her a bit of magpie in their single-minded search for the highest point in any area and compulsive need to investigate anything metallic and shiny. She smiled as she sipped the last of her Dashi from her bowl of rehydrated miso soup. She had to give it to the Japanese they made the best instant meals; so much better than the salted cardboard most of the granola munchers packed along with them on the trails. No, she had always known that food was meant to be enjoyed not simple fuel like so many tried to believe and tortured themselves with. Finishing the last of her meal she cleaned her camp up and carefully stowed anything that the Ravens could move away in locked cases with small airport baggage combination locks on it. She also had one for the zippers on her tent. The curious little feathered gremlins could get into anything not nailed down, tied, and hidden so she had a lock for her tent and all of her cases as well after her first encounter with a destroyed camp and scattered gear, it was messy but rarely damaged.

She had learned her lesson and now brought a small bag of little bells to bribe them with when she left camp. silver, brass, and bronze each the size of her pinky nail, it was amazing to see that different birds preferred different sounds and colours. Each one was on a simply inch long chain with a spring clip big enough to fit over the tips of most small tree branches. Five or six hung in the branches above her camp was enough to keep them cautious for a day and entertained for another after they investigated and worked out how to get them off the branches.

Kat doused her fire and watched the embers fade as the soft rain trickled down onto the small clearing safely extinguishing the heat. She had never understood people's fear of the dark, it was like a cloak that you could embrace or suffocate under. But then again she was a mutant, her eye doctors had been astounded to learn that she had nearly 5% more Rods in her eyes that most people did give her much better night vision. They had told her that humans had about four rods to every cone in their eyes, whereas cats had 25 rods per cone; She had 5 rods per cone which explained her oversensitivity to bright lights. The classroom lights had been giving her headaches but a pair of slightly tinted nonprescription glasses had cured her almost instantly.

5% might not seem like a lot but it was enough for her to drive on back roads by starlight if the moon was new, and she didn't need a flashlight if the moon was up at all. Starlight was such a fickle thing, even the slightest dust or clouds in the air could ruin your shots at night, but the unique tones and extremely subtle dappled effect from those burning star billions of miles away was something to be celebrated on film. She rolled out her sleeping bag and powered down her laptop and all of her gear for the night pulling the batteries that were easiest to reach from her devices to be as economical as possible with their charges. As true darkness set in kat checked her fire again to make sure it was completely out, as she stepped carefully back into her tent in the absolute pitch darkness a stiff breeze shook the branches and a faint yellow glow filtered through the branches. She froze, it was faint and sulfurous an odd mix of yellow and orange that usually meant fire. Cursing she grabbed her waterproof poncho pulling it on over her sports bra and light tank top she slept in and slid her hiking boots back on without socks, not bothering to tie them she grabbed her small GoPro, her satchel and a penlight to speed her path through the trees.