The forest was fresh, the air cool, but Rod and The Mentor trudged through the pathless terrain wearing gas masks.
"So, how's your girl? Is she seriously working in the cafeteria now? That's brave," The Mentor asked as he slashed through a small branch in his path.
"Apparently, she's Harry's daughter! Can you believe that? I mean, look at Harry—that guy's a bear," Rod said, carefully stepping over a patch of thorny bushes, only to accidentally crush a poor lizard trying to cross his path.
"What do you mean by Harry's 'bear appearance'? That he's a bear so how could a woman want him? Maybe 17 years ago he was more handsome. Or do you mean he's a bear and ugly, so how come his daughter is that pretty? Why not? Look at their skulls, it must be similar," The Mentor replied.
"Yeah, but… she's working in the cafeteria now. I don't know if I should be happy or worried," Rod added.
"Hey, what's wrong with that? I don't see a problem. Some women work in the worker's tunnel too. You forgot the Doctor? She's doing great so far, isn't she?"
"You're right."
Without realizing it, they had wandered off track. They stopped walking and looked around.
"Eh? Where are we?" The Mentor's voice had shifted, his tone suddenly serious.
"What do you mean, 'where are we?'" Rod echoed, confused.
"Bro, I don't know where we are. We were supposed to be gathering mushrooms for research," The Mentor said, a note of panic creeping into his voice.
"Dude, you can't be joking right now. I've been following you!"
"I'm not joking! I was following you!"
"You kept telling me to follow you, but you were following me?!"
"Alright, alright—my bad. Let's stay calm and think," The Mentor said, spotting a small hill. He pointed toward it. "Let's climb that and figure out where the hell we are."
As they started climbing, the banter died. Silence took over—proof that the situation had turned serious.
The sky was getting darker. They had been out here for seven hours. If they didn't find their way back to the bunker soon, they'd run out of gas—and suffocate in the toxic air.
Suddenly, a black shadow swept over Rod . He looked up and saw a small, winged silhouette circling above them—then it dove, fast and sharp, directly toward him.
Clinging to the roots growing out of the rocky hill, Rod instantly sensed danger. With one hand, he yanked out his handgun and fired rapidly at the incoming creature. But like a total rookie, every bullet missed. The damn thing wasn't flying straight—it twisted and dodged mid-air, evading the shots as it zeroed in on him.
"Fuck, why won't you just get hit?!" Rod cursed, his frustration growing. The shadow drew closer, its form becoming clearer: a winged mutant with a human skull still dripping blood, its mouth shaped like a crow's beak, now slowly opening—ready to snatch Rod like a piece of meat between chopsticks.
Just before it struck, a bullet tore through the creature's face. The Mentor had fired from above, the shot shattering the beak. A second bullet came immediately after, destroying its skull. The mutant dropped to the forest floor, writhing in its death throes—until a mutated giant earthworm slithered out of the underbrush and devoured it in one grotesque gulp.
"I told you not to shoot from the front," The Mentor said calmly, resting on the stone cliff he'd already climbed while Rod was busy missing every shot.
"Did you just use me as bait?" Rod snapped, sounding both pissed and betrayed.
"Why do you think they send scouts in pairs instead of solo?" The Mentor replied, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.
"That's dirty! But… it worked," Rod muttered, climbing the rest of the rock. The Mentor reached down and pulled him up to the higher ground.
They climbed the rest of the cliff on foot now that the terrain had evened out. But once they reached the top, they found only grass, wildflowers, and butterflies dancing in the air.
Other bugs—ants, crickets, even a snake—slithered away, avoiding them entirely.
It felt… off.
"This is weird," Rod muttered. "Why aren't they mutating?"
The Mentor kept walking, silent at first. Rod repeated his question, thinking maybe The Mentor hadn't heard him. "Charles, why aren't they transforming into mutants?"
The Mentor sighed. "Rod, I've told you multiple times already. I'm not Charles."
"Sorry. I don't know what else to call you. I don't know your name, and 'Charles' is all I've ever known."
The Mentor looked at him and said clearly, calmly, "You don't know my name because you forgot who you are."
"W-what…?"
The words landed in Rod's chest like a blow. Just this morning, the disturbing hallucination had returned. When he'd rinsed his face and looked into the mirror, he'd seen something hollow staring back—like a void. A black hole where his face should've been. It had shaken him, but he'd forced himself to laugh it off. Just stress, he'd told himself. Just bunker fatigue.
"Don't worry about it," The Mentor assured him, turning to walk toward the edge of the cliff. "We'll get your memories back, bit by bit." His voice shifted, becoming analytical again. "But good observation, yeah—they're not mutating. Even though they're breathing the same air we are. Ever wonder—"
The Mentor suddenly unlatched his gas mask with a click.
"H-hey! What are you doing?!" Rod reached out, trying to stop him.
But it was too late. The mask dropped to the ground. The Mentor detached the breathing tube and let it fall, the weight visibly lifting from his shoulders.
"Y-you're insane!" Rod shouted, he want to call The Mentor's name but he couldn't call him 'Charles' again.
The Mentor inhaled deeply, deliberately, taking in the supposedly toxic air.
"Don't do that! You'll change! You'll—"
But The Mentor only laughed. "Change? Where? Do you see any change? Let's wait."
Rod was panicking now. He snatched the mask and tube from the ground and tried to put them back on The Mentor. "Put it on again! You'll die out here!"
The Mentor inhaled deeply, as if challenging the idea that the air was toxic. "Finally, I can breathe something without worrying that fungus will start growing in my lungs!"
The sun was setting now, casting the sky in deep reds and oranges. Shadows stretched long across the meadow.
"Holy shit..." Rod whispered, watching in disbelief. It had been long enough. The Mentor had been exposed for minutes, and yet… nothing. He looked completely human. Even a sparrow landed gently on his finger, chirped, and flew away. Unchanged.
"But... how?!" Rod couldn't make any sense of it.
"Because they told you nothing but lies."
"Why would they lie to me?!"
"Because they want you to be afraid of the world, so they can keep you down there!"
"Why do they want to keep me down there? What's in it for them?"
"Because that's how power works!" The Mentor's voice flared. "If people leave the bunker, who would they have power over? No one! That's why they lie—to make you believe the world is dangerous, that there's no safe place but under their rules. So you stay. So you keep feeding a system that benefits them, but doesn't care about what you really want—or who you really are."
Rod couldn't say a word. As a child, the women in the bunker had told him stories of a great war, a nuclear catastrophe that destroyed the surface of the Earth. In those stories, the hero was Cezar Boucher—the savior. He had rallied those who trusted him, digging deep into the earth to build a new heaven underground: the bunker, the only safe haven left on the planet.
For his entire life, Rod had believed Cezar was a hero. That the bunker was humanity's last hope. That saving mankind meant following Cezar's lead.
"They don't want you to have any choice but them," The Mentor said, voice low but firm. "So you'll follow. So they can use you. But in return, you lost yourself to the system. Do you understand now?"
"But... what for?" Rod's voice faltered, barely a whisper. The foundation of his world—the only one he'd ever known—was collapsing beneath him.
The Mentor scanned the horizon. From the elevated ridge, he could clearly make out the terrain. And there it was—the direction back to the bunker. He pointed.
"I found our way back. Let's go." Without waiting, he began climbing down the cliffside.
Rod stayed frozen at the top, trapped in a storm of doubt and realization. Unable to tell who was right, who was wrong. Who to trust—and who had been lying to him all along.
The gas mask stay attached on his face, keeping him safe from the hazardous air.
Rod's finger flinch, thinking of removing it.
***
Back inside the bunker, the air felt heavier.
They followed protocol: first, a bath in sterile mist, then the locker room to remove their protective armor and masks. After that, a proper shower and finally, a debrief to report their journey. Their mission was to investigate a mutant nest discovered by another team the day before. The Mentor taught Rod how to write the report, then handed it over to the supervisor.
Once they were dismissed, they entered the tunnel where the underground dwellers lived and mingled.
Rod walked behind The Mentor in silence, their boots echoing off the metal corridor walls. The same halls, the same faces, the same routines—but something had shifted. It wasn't just the knowledge of the outside world that haunted him. It was the realization that everything he'd believed in—his whole world—might have been built on lies.
Revelation is always terrifying. Because once the ground you've been standing on collapses, you don't know who you are anymore. It's scary. It's uncomfortable. It's ugly. And worst of all, you don't know what to replace it with.
"Don't say anything yet," The Mentor murmured, low enough for only Rod to hear. "Watch. Listen. Observe. You'll see."
Rod nodded faintly.
They passed a few guards near the entrance checkpoint. One of them nodded at Rod with familiarity, but Rod didn't respond. He just kept walking—unsure whether it was because of what The Mentor had said, or because he now saw the truth behind the lie: the guards weren't protecting them.
They were watching them.
In the cafeteria, the usual chatter and clang of trays greeted them. Rod spotted her—Harry's daughter—still serving food with a polite smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. She noticed him too and gave a small wave.
Rod hesitated.
If everything—the system—was designed to keep him underground, to keep him from reaching his potential…
Then was she, too, part of what kept him from the life he always wanted?