It turns out, building a fire without an actual lighter was a bit complicated. From my experience playing DayZ, I remembered a method of building a fire and a hand drill kit, but to be honest, my memory of the process was a little hazy.

“Sticks and bark make a hand drill kit,” I mumbled aloud, “and then sticks and rags make a fire.”

Even if the process wasn’t one hundred percent sound, I felt sure that it was based in reality at least somewhat. I already had the sticks necessary, and it shouldn’t bee too complicated to find bark. My only concern was starting the fire itself. From what I remembered, starting a fire from scratch was no easy feat, and despite how easy it looked in games, I knew it wouldn’t be so simple.

I’ll find some suitable bark first.

That didn’t take long. There were plenty of trees to choose from. While some trees had really sturdy exteriors, I found a couple that had thick bark that could be carved off.

Taking out my hatchet, I sliced until I reached the underside of the bark, and then I started carving slowly downward taking special care not to break it in half. The result was a suitable portion of bark that I was frankly a little proud of.

Once that was complete, I marched back to camp and found a stick about two feet in length. Placing those aside, I made a pile of many smaller sticks, gathered dried twigs and pine needles for kindling. I sat on the ground cross legged with my materials in front of me. The bark was on the ground while the stick remained in my hand with some kindling resting against the base of it.

“Okay, I can do this.”

Placing the stick between my hands, I started twisting as fast as I could manage. The stick wasn’t smooth by no means and already the small notches in it rubbed mercilessly against the palm of my hand. I spun… and spun… and spun. Already, I could tell the place where the stick met the bark was heating up, but as for fire— well, I hadn’t seen the faintest hint of a spark. I started feeling kind of silly but kept going. It stayed like this for another half hour, in which my arms started to ache miserably and my hands stung; faint blisters were already forming and there were an array of cuts scattered across it.

I knew this would be hard, but I didn’t think it would hurt so much. At this rate, I’m going to get some sort of infection.

With that thought in mind, I washed my hands in the stream carefully and ensured all the cuts and blisters were cleaned out, wincing at the particularly sore spots. I went back to the hand drill kit and crouched down in front of it, frowning.

I had the idea to take off my socks and use them as gloves to keep them from getting more cut up than they already were. It helped somewhat, but the spinning process repeated without any results. I felt a little frustrated— especially since I had just made such a good shelter. For some reason, this felt like it should have been much easier.

After another hour, I was at wits end. All the frustrations about my situation starting pressing in the back of my mind, until I was grinding my teeth in annoyance. I shouldn’t have been here at all. Right now, I should have been at home in my room. It was true that I loved survival games, but not once had I ever really wanted to be in one. I had never even been camping!

I continued to work myself up— furious at the world for putting me here. I never asked for this. Not only that, but none of this even made sense. None of this should have been possible; and yet, I was standing in the middle of a forest with nothing but and INVENTORY and a MENU.

In a moment of weakness, I kicked the pile of sticks I was using for the fire, ripped the sweaty socks off my hand, and stormed back to the stream to wash my hands. My stomach rumbled. Even though I knew that most my frustration was coming from not haven eaten a proper meal in two days, it didn’t make managing it any easier.

I slowed my movements washing my hands and sighed. There was no point in getting aggravated. No point in complaining. The most I could do was go back to my camp and try something different if I wanted to survive this place.

Still. You would think that the survival guide would have given more specific instructions on how to build a fire. Just having a picture of a fire with a list of materials isn't really helpful.

I stood up and brushed off my clothes. They were filthy, and by the looks of it, I would have to wash them soon if I didn’t want them to be destroyed completely. But that would come another time. I looked across the water, wondering what kind of places were beyond the little camp I had made— when my eyes suddenly met those of another.

A boy my around my age or perhaps a year younger.

“Guh?!”

The sound slipped out of my mouth before I could stop it. We stared at each other, wide-eyed. There were a million thoughts racing through my mind at once, but the first one to hold was: what is he wearing? His clothes looked like some sort of military getup with beige pants and a shirt, a kevlar vest, and a belt with straps to hold tools and weapons. If I wasn’t mistaken, one of them looked like a gun.

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The boy must have recovered from his surprise because he yanked a knife from the small holster on his leg and pointed it in my direction. His hand was stable as his soft features hardened into a frown.

“What group?”

I raised my hands in the air. But then after a beat, I realized the boy was still a couple of feet across the stream. Heart hammering, I muttered, “Inventory.” I grabbed my knife and pointed it in his direction as well.

“Uh! You first!”

I had no idea what I was doing. Frankly, I felt a little silly, but I wasn’t going to go down without a fight.

The boy squinted at me then looked back at my camp. He must have deduced that I was alone because he lowered his knife and crossed his arms, raising an eyebrow.

“You’re a newbie, aren’t you?”

My jaw dropped. I recovered quickly, standing up straighter but keeping my knife close by. Clearing my throat, I tried to make it look like I knew more than I did.

“Perhaps,” I said, trying my best to exude an air of mystery, “or perhaps not.”

Looking me over, the boy smiled softly. “Look, I’ll put my knife away.”

As he said, he slipped the knife back into its holster and held his hands up innocently. He nodded his head at me, indicating I do the same.

I hesitated. I didn’t know who this boy was, for all I knew he could be some rampaging murderer living in the woods, but there was something in his eyes that made me trust him— the sort of kindness that is reliable and hard to fake. I pursed my lips and put the knife back in my inventory.

“Tell me your name,” I said, holding up my chin.

“Leon. What’s yours?”

I was just about to say, Joanne, when I paused. For some reason, I didn’t want to tell him my full name. It was just a gut feeling, but I decided to follow it.

“I’m Jo.”

Something in his smile twitched, but he said nothing. Instead he motioned to the stream between us.

“Jo.” He said, smiling gently. “Mind if I come over?”

I nodded, and he carefully maneuvered himself over some rocks— the same way I had done many times before— and followed me into my camp. Looking at him out of the corner of my eye, I was hyper-aware of his every move. If he attacked suddenly, I was going to go down swinging. There was no way I was about to be murdered in the middle of nowhere. The only thing that made me feel safe was that the boy was equal in height to me as we walked alongside each other, and while he seemed to have been out here for longer, his body wasn’t particularly toned, from what I could see— which I found strange.

“Did you build this yourself?” He asked, wearing the same smile. “You must have been trying to do the starter quest, right?” Not waiting for an answer, he circled my shelter until I felt a tad bit self-conscious. “Not bad, to be honest. I’ve seen better, but I’ve definitely seen worse. You did really good.”

“Um… thanks?”

What does he want me to say to that? For some reason, it feels like he’s belittling me, but maybe he’s awkward and just trying to be nice.

“So, how long have you been out here? A week?”

I shook my head. “Two days.”

He blinked for a moment, as if I had caught him off guard. The boy looked from me to the shelter. After a moment, he regained his momentum.

“It's nice meeting you, by the way.” He held out his hand and I shook it awkwardly. “I’ve got a camp a couple of miles north of here with two others. You should join us.”

The invitation came so suddenly that I chewed on the inside of my cheek nervously. Part of me didn’t trust this guy, but I knew that my time living in the woods had made me a bit paranoid. He would have to do some convincing.

Deciding to voice my thoughts, I said, “Isn't this a little sudden?”

Leon gave me a pitying look. He tilted his head at me, his light brown hair tumbling past his eyes as he did. “There's no reason to worry, Jo. Look, I’ll take you back to my camp, and if you hate it, you’re free to leave. How does that sound?”

I looked warily back at my camp.

“If you’re scared to lose it, just mark it with a waypoint.” Realizing I didn’t know how to do that, he nodded in understanding. “Just open your map and tap on the area where we’re standing.” He explained, “You’ll want to set your waypoints to WHEN NEARBY in the settings— it makes it much easier.”

I did as he instructed. As I was marking the area, he informed me that there were two types of waypoints: temporary and permanent, and that the temporary ones would disappear when I reached the area. When I marked my camp, it let me add a name to the marker, and since I couldn’t think of anything else, I simply named it Home.

“Very good,” he said, nodding in approval.

I raised an eyebrow but didn’t say anything. I didn’t know if it was this guy’s personality or not, but sometimes the way he talked felt a little condescending— but perhaps it was just my imagination. Letting the thought go, I took one last look at my camp and followed Leon across the stream.

“You’re going to love our camp. We have plenty of food, but we all work together to make sure that it stays that way. Heidi does most of the scavenging and Christine cooks for us.”

“And what do you do?”

“I guard our camp,” he said, puffing his chest out. “Someone needs to patrol the area. In the daytime, the job falls on me, but all of us take turns at night. It’ll be nice to add someone else to the rotation. More sleep!”

He squeezed his hand by his chest in victory and I smiled at him in return. Honestly, I was still thinking about the food he mentioned at his camp. I had been eating blueberries for two days and my stomach felt like a bottomless pit. And perhaps it was just me getting my hopes up, but I was starting to think that joining a group wouldn’t be so bad. Maybe they would know more about this forest and how we got here. A million questions raced through me, but I swallowed them down.

I really, really hope they have answers.

But there was one thing bothering me, one thing that I was too afraid to acknowledge: Leon seemed to know a lot about this place. Not only that, but he had a camp with a few others who were in a routine.

Why does it sound like they’ve been here for a long time? Long enough that they’ve given up on leaving…

Leon prattled on. I listened in silence, and when he turned to make sure I was listening, all I could manage was a weak smile.