[ WP ] A Knight 's journey through a plagued , disease-ridden land leads them to the core of the Earth 's corruption . It seems to be a young girl , and the Knight does not know what to do .

It had been three weeks since he'd seen another person. A family of four, mother, father and two young children fleeing to the west in an old pickup truck. The panicked look on the father's face as they drove past told him he was headed in the right direction. 
 
 It had been two weeks since he had seen any signs of wild life. Two malnourished squirrels he added to the dwindling pack of rations he brought for the journey. 
 
 Eleven days had passed since the bird sounds stopped. He had n't been able to see them for longer but now even the chirping was gone. Every step towards the east seemed to darken the landscape in sharp contrast towards the blue sky. Trees became stunted, the grass wilted, and the buildings began to crumble. 
 
 Ten days ago he moved outside of radio contact. He shook his head as he left it on the counter in the remains of gas station. `` No sense carrying dead weight'', he mumbled. The static lisp added to his voice through the systems air filters was as irritating as ever. 
 
 The bugs stopped buzzing three days after the gas station. The world was silent except for his breathing and the crunch of metal soles on dead grass. Nothing flew, nothing crawled, nothing squirmed. 
 
 Was it five days ago or six that the crying started? At first he could n't tell if it was just the ringing of his ears from the silence or some hallucination from exhaustion and loneliness. At first it came and went, seemingly with the wind, but the farther east he trudged the more terrible it was. 
 
 This morning the crying stopped, it was if a river of pain and fear had been dammed instantly. Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, he slumped against the blackened remains of a tree. Checking the air quality meter on his suit, he realized that the air read healthy levels of pollutants for the first time since he crossed the debarkation line a month ago. Disengaging the hermetic seals in his helmet, he lifted it off and greedily drank the fresh air. After ten minutes, the systems tanks had cycled in new air and he replaced the helmet on his head. After studying the map, he figured at worst he had drifted half a degree off and would head south east in the morning. He replaced the map in its pouch and drifted off to sleep. 
 
 Proximity alarms wailing in his head brought him out of sleep with a lurch. The atmosphere alarm that had been silent for days was screaming the toxicity levels of the atmosphere with well above lethal counts of arsenic, sulfur, and just about every airborne particle humans are n't meant to breathe. Activating the LED headlamps he struggled to gain his bearings as his eyes adjusted to the bright lights in front of him. Apparently also struggling with the high beams... a young girl, maybe eleven or twelve years of age, sitting cross legged in front of him. 
 
 Not dressed in an enviro suit like his... no, she was wearing light purple capris and a pink t-shirt with some cartoons on it that he did n't recognize. She shielded her eyes with her hand as she leaned back and frowned. Dimming the bulbs on his helmet he allowed her to adjust her eyes so she slowly put her hand down. As she did this, he reached towards the pistol at his side. Following his hand with her eyes she looked on sadly, `` You're here to hurt me too?''
