by Kyla Stone
“Somehow, it’s never at the top of people’s usual survival lists. We’ve become so used to its ubiquity that it’s hard to imagine that people could die without it. But who’s manufacturing salt? What will we do once the container in our pantry runs out?”
Liam toed a small mound with his foot. “This doesn’t look like that kind of salt.”
“Pink Himalayan salt is prized for its health and healing properties, but we can use it like regular salt, too.”
Liam made a face. “People put their bare feet in this stuff, you know.”
“Beggars can’t be choosers. You see any other mountains of salt lying around?”
“Touché.” Liam thrust the shovel into the salt and dumped a load into the extra-strength trash bag. “Don’t be salty.”
She rolled her eyes. “Really?”
He gave a sheepish shrug. “Humor’s not my forte.”
Her lips twitched. “Clearly.”
His cheeks reddening, he gestured at the room. “So, what’s the plan for all this?”
“We’ll split it amongst ourselves, sell small portions at Trade Day, and keep at least half for the food pantry at Crossway Church to distribute as needed. Tomorrow morning, I’ll get the children and older folks to separate it into small airtight containers.”
“It’s a good thing, giving them something to do.”
“If we all sit around thinking about what’s coming, we’ll go crazy. I know I will.”
For several minutes, they worked in silence. Liam said nothing. Hannah didn’t press him. His shoulders were taut, his entire body thrumming with tension.
When the trash bag was heavy, they tied the top and lifted it into the wheelbarrow, then started work on the second one.
The muscles and tendons in Hannah’s bad hand ached. It took an incredible effort to wrap her warped fingers around the shovel handle. Her hand would never be normal, but with blood, sweat, and tears, she could force the broken parts to bend to her will.
They filled three more bags, stacked them in the wheelbarrow, and hauled them out to the four-wheeler. They loaded both the rack and the trailer on the apple-red 1988 Honda Fourtrax 300. The 4x4 had belonged to Ray Shultz, but they’d redeemed it for good.
Once it was full, they’d bring it back to Molly’s to unload and return for round two.
Liam half-turned away from her, his eyes on the salt. “I should do it. I should turn myself in.”
Hannah stilled. She stared at his back. “No.”
“The town should turn me in.”
“They won’t turn you in.”
“They should.”
“Maybe so, but they won’t.”
He said nothing.
“Liam.”
He turned to face her, his expression bleak. “You have an incredible amount of faith in people.”
“There’s bad in the world. But there’s some good, too. It’s the good I believe in.”
The shadows from the kerosene lanterns wavered across the lines of his rugged face. Even in the low light, he looked exhausted. Shadows beneath his eyes. Tension and worry in every crease of his face.
“They have faith in you, too.”
His broad shoulders slumped, almost as if his body were caving in on itself. “The General has five hundred soldiers. I’m just one man. I’m not some kind of superhero.”
“You’re one of us, now. They won’t give you up, not even to save themselves.”
His face crumpled. Something despondent in his eyes. His stoic toughness faltered.
“I can’t save this town, Hannah.” His voice cracked. “I can’t.”
He carried the weight of the world on his shoulders. What an incredible burden to bear without breaking.
Her chest constricted, her heart swelling with compassion.
“We’re not asking you to,” she whispered. “Not alone. Not by yourself.”
His Adam’s apple hitched. “If I turn myself in—”
“Even if you turned yourself in, there’s no guarantee he won’t raze the town as soon as he kills you. We were all complicit in overthrowing Rosamond. And besides, there’s Winter Haven. I’m sure he’s already eyeing that prize.”
“I know,” Liam said. “I know.”
The silence stretched between them. What could they do? The question hung in the air, unspoken.
Then Liam said, “We could leave.”
15
Hannah
Day One Hundred and Five
Hannah stared at Liam, aghast. “What?”
Liam leaned his shovel against the wheelbarrow and spread his hands, palms out as if surrendering himself to the inevitable. “We’re overwhelmed. You know that.”
Her breath fled from her lungs. The room abruptly too small, the cave walls closing in.
She knew it. Of course she did.
Still, to hear him say it aloud somehow made it more real.
He took a step toward her. His face pained, the features she loved so much contorted in anguish. “We cannot win against these people. We’re building mud huts to stand against a tsunami. Like bows and arrows against tanks. What we can do—what we’ve done—it’s not enough. It won’t be enough.”
“What are you saying?”
He closed his eyes for a moment, opened them. A great weariness in his bearing, something like defeat in his face. “I have two trucks stashed with a full tank of diesel and two jerrycans of biofuel, plus three days of food and water.”
She blinked, surprised. “You…do?”
“I had supplies pre-positioned within two days of arriving at Fall Creek. I’ve added as I’m able.” His expression hardened. “I have a way out prepped. Should all else fail, I can get you and the children out.”
She stared at him, at a loss for words.
“We could escape the General’s net and head north, bypass Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, any cities, stick to the lesser roads and make it to the U.P.”
“The U.P.,” she echoed in growing dismay.
“Your brother is right. There are far fewer people. Plenty of land for good hunting and gardening, more lakes for fishing and fresh water.”
Her heart beat faster. Her mouth went dry. “You want to leave.”
“I don’t want to.” He shook his head. His hands opened and closed at his sides, something lost and vulnerable in his gaze. “I fear we need to. You and me, Travis and Evelyn, Milo, the babies. And Ghost.”
He paused as if steeling himself, testing his own resolve. “The journey will be dangerous, but we can take the back roads. We’ll have a couple of shooters and plenty of weapons and ammo.
“We stop at my cabin outside of Traverse City and stock up on supplies. It’s out of the way and likely undiscovered. We can bring another six months of food, seeds, tools, and other essentials with us to Oliver’s place. We could do it, Hannah. It would work.”
The vision shimmered behind her eyes. The reunion with her brother. Her parents’ house in the woods on thirty acres, surrounded by forest and lakes. The barns and outhouses, goats and chickens, and fencing for horses and cows. The flourishing gardens behind the chicken coop, a freshwater creek running the length of the property.
Her parents’ house was situated on the top of a hill at the end of a ten-mile dirt road, isolated—and defensible.
They could be safe. Her children could be safe.
They could make a life there, her and Liam. A life together.
Her eyes burned at the promise of something she so desperately wanted.
“And Quinn and Molly?”
Liam’s features tightened. He dropped his gaze, unable to hide the naked pain in his eyes—or the shame. “There’s no room. We don’t have enough vehicles or fuel.”
“They’re family.”
His mouth thinned into a bloodless line.
“And Bishop?”
He shook his head wordlessly.
“Bishop has been a brother to us. Reynoso and Perez. Dave and Annette. How could we abandon them?”
“If we stay, I cannot promise your safety. Or Milo’s or Charlotte’s.” He grimaced as if the words were bitter on his tongue, as if speaking them aloud was repugnant, antithetical to everything he stood for.
Her voice softened. “You never could.”
He looked tormented, his rugged face gray in the flickering light, his eyes hollowed. “I’m…I’m so sorry.”
She fought the urge to fall into his arms. To draw him close and ease his suffering. “These are our people.”
“I know.” His voice was gruff with restrained emotion—frustration, regret, fear. “Trust me, I know. That doesn’t change the fact that it’s foolish to stay. Tactically, our best chance of survival is to retreat. To flee.”
The temptation was almost too strong to resist. A promise of safety, of freedom. Of life.
A promise that didn’t truly exist.
No one could promise anyone’s safety, not even before the Collapse. People died in accidents and car crashes, of heart attacks and strokes. People stole and cheated and murdered.
It was worse, now. They survived on a knife's edge. No safety net. No room for error or self-delusion.
More safe and less safe. That was it.
And even if there was absolute safety—could she leave her community, her home, even to save her children?
Hannah felt torn in two. Conflicted to her core. Her children were her heart and soul. But so was Fall Creek. The people here, the community they’d built—she loved them, too.
Quinn was like a daughter to her; Molly, the grandmother she’d never had. Bishop meant more to her than words could say. Dave and Annette were dear friends.
She loved this place, these people, as much as she loved herself.
If she escaped with Liam and her children, she doomed her friends to certain death. Cursed to live with the insidious, inescapable guilt for the rest of her days.
If she stayed to fight, she placed her children in incredible danger. Liam might die anyway. They all might perish. Odds were, they would.
Damned if you do, Damned if you don’t.
Her ruined hand strayed beneath her coat for the American Ruger .45 holstered at her hip. She always wore her oversized western-style silver buckle so she could rack the slide one-handed.
The Ruger had been a gift from a kind, fierce woman named CiCi. A woman who’d taken in strangers, who had graciously fed and sheltered them in the face of grave danger.
A foolish decision, but also one of mercy, of extraordinary grace.
CiCi’s act of kindness had cost her her life. But it had saved Hannah’s.
She gazed down at the gun, felt the smooth, comforting heft of it. Her crooked fingers curled over the grip. Her misshapen hand—broken and re-broken in that dank prison basement. Once a source of shame and horror, but not anymore.
Her scars no longer a symbol of her weakness, but rather her strength.
Hannah looked up. “I won’t do it. I won’t leave.”
Liam said nothing, only watched her with those sharp, penetrating gray-blue eyes.
“Pike wasn't an anomaly of the universe,” she said. “There are others like him. Inhuman. Those who feed on fear, suffering, and destruction. Those are the wolves the EMP has unleashed. And they’re coming for us. They’re coming for everything good in this world.”
“I know.”
She’d sacrificed too much to get back to this place, to build a home for herself and her children. She wasn’t running now. She wouldn’t run.
She chose love. She chose community. She chose grace.
“These are our people. I won’t turn my back on them. I’ll do everything in my power to save everyone that I can, not just myself or my family.”
Liam gave a resigned sigh. “Can’t say I’m surprised.”
She holstered the pistol. “I’m sorry.”
“Never apologize for who you are,” he said, his voice husky.
She blushed. “It’s not enough to survive. I want more. We need more. I want justice. Peace. Freedom. Not just for me, but for others.”
“That’s all, huh?”
She gave him a tremulous smile. “I still want it. I still believe in it.”
“I know you do.”
She took a step closer. They were less than a foot apart. He smelled like clean sweat and wood and something musky and earthen. Her heart thrummed in her chest. Her belly knotted.
The words curdled in her throat. She was afraid to say them out loud, to make them real, but she needed to know. "Will you go?"
"Go where?"
"To your cabin." She swallowed. "Will you take the Brooks and L.J.?"
Liam tilted his head, a complicated expression crossing his features, his eyes dark and hooded, impenetrable. "No."
Relief flooded her, so intense her legs felt weak. “Are you certain? I don’t want you to make a decision because of me—”
“Hannah.” Liam placed his hand over her crippled one. His strong, calloused fingers enveloped hers. Once, she would have flinched away, but she didn't. He could have crushed her bones as easily as crushing an egg. He didn’t. She knew he never would.
Something softened in his gaze. That rugged face, those fierce eyes. She couldn’t look away.
Liam said, “If you stay, I stay.”
16
Liam
Day One Hundred and Six
Liam waited.
The seconds ticked by on his mechanical watch. Four hours remained on the General’s deadline.
And then what? that niggling voice whispered in the back of his mind. Then what?
Liam leaned back in the wooden booth of the bar at Fall Creek Inn. As usual, he sat in the furthest position against the wall, no exits at his back. His go-bag leaned against the booth along with his M4. The cleaned, polished Glock sat on the table out of Charlotte’s reach.
His gaze swept over the bar top, stools, and barren shelves, the rear exit, the front door, the empty booths in front of them.
The air smelled like stale beer and pretzels, though they’d consumed the last pretzel months ago. A portable propane heater provided warmth.
Morning sunlight streamed through the grimy, unwashed windows. Unlike many of the businesses in Fall Creek and elsewhere, the Inn still boasted glass windowpanes.
The streets were empty. So was the bar. It was closed during the day but open in the evenings and frequently packed as people sought warmth and companionship.
Dave Farris had procured some of Dominique West’s moonshine, which he traded for the usual beans, bullets, and Band-Aids.
This morning, Dave had called an emergency town hall meeting to discuss the General’s demands—and to vote on whether to turn Liam in.
Reynoso and Bishop were attending, while Perez and Hayes monitored security and patrols. They couldn’t afford to gather everyone in a large group and leave the town unprotected.
Hannah sat across from him, Charlotte on her lap. Though Hannah was a member of the town council, she had excused herself to avoid accusations of bias. Instead, she waited for the results with Liam.
She tossed Ghost a strip of venison jerky, then glanced behind her to check on Milo. The little boy sat at a booth near the door, studiously leaning over a drawing pad, his oval face scrunched in concentration.
For two days, he’d been working on his newest version of Wolverine—featuring Liam’s face.
Hannah’s gaze slid past him to the glass front door. Her frown deepened.
“What?”
She turned back around. “They’re sure taking a long time.”
He forced a wry smile. “They’re voting on whether to shoot me or turn me in first so the General can do it himself.”
“Have a little faith in your fellow man.”
Liam gave a noncommittal grunt.
She rolled her eyes. “We need a distraction.”
He felt lost and unmoored. Despair crept in on him.
He always had backup plans to his backup plans. Contingencies and
alternate exit routes mapped out in his head. Not this time.
To go along with the General’s demand meant his own slow and painful death. It might not protect the town, either.
No clear answer presented itself. For the first time, he couldn’t see several moves ahead.
He was blind.
He wasn’t sure why, but he’d decided to submit to the town council. If they turned him in, he would go. If they didn’t, he wouldn’t.
The temptation to save himself never even entered his head.
Hannah was right. Fall Creek had become his home. He didn’t want to abandon them.
And yet, he expected them to betray him. Their children’s lives were on the line. What other response was there?
Hannah could put everything on the line for the greater good, but most people couldn’t.
Most folks worried about putting bread on the table and keeping their loved ones breathing. That was it. He couldn’t blame them, either.
Still, the thought of the town he’d bled and fought for voting for his death twisted his guts. He dreaded the pronouncement he knew was coming.
“Hey.” Hannah studied him, her eyes a brilliant green in the sunlight filtering through the windows. “You okay? How’s your side?”
He winced and touched his dressings beneath his shirt. “I will be. Just need time.”
No amount of time would fix the crushed discs in his spine. Only surgery, and that option was long gone.
Evelyn had examined him this morning after his early training session with Quinn. Evelyn wasn’t happy with him, but then, she seldom was. If she had her way, he’d be bedridden for weeks.
The infection wasn’t spreading; that was the important thing. Pain was something he could live with.
Charlotte giggled. She bounced in Hannah’s lap, gnawing on a colorful teething toy as she cooed and gurgled at Liam.
Tense as he was, he couldn’t help but smile back at her. She wore an airplane onesie beneath a little jean jacket, her knit winter hat tilted over her big blue eyes.
