T Connor: Bitter Cold Apocalypse 2

I peered through the binoculars, my mind racing, catching, and racing once more at what I was seeing in the distance. This was bad.

And I didn’t just mean sort of bad, or something that we might have to deal with at some point, if it came down to it. I meant bad like bad . Like something that was very dangerous to not only my town, but the people in it—which included the two people who were more important to me than anyone else in the world.

Because in the distance, right where the forest started, Randall Smith had now set up an entire encampment, complete with tents, campfires, and even—weirdly—several outbuildings.

“How the hell did he manage to get outbuildings set up so quickly?” I asked quietly. I wasn’t expecting an answer, not really.

Because although I wasn’t by myself, the man standing with me had been with me since we entered my hometown of Ellis Woods, Michigan—which meant he’d spent the last several hours inside Town Hall where the rest of the townspeople had set up. And that meant that he hadn’t been out here either. Whatever Randall and his men had been up to, Marlon hadn’t seen them any more than I had.

Dammit, we should have sent lookouts to watch them while we were in there. We’d known they were out here—and that they were after us, specifically. After the town, more generally. We’d known they would be out here causing trouble… or at least getting ready to. Why the hell hadn’t we thought about sending someone out to at least keep an eye on them?

Because you were more concerned with your wife at the time. And your daughter, a tiny voice reminded me bluntly. You had slightly more on your mind than what Randall Smith might be doing.

Okay, so the voice was right. We’d spent two days out there in the snow and ice, nearly freezing to death, and it had all been even more complicated by the fact that Angie, my wife, had been attacked by a bear and had her leg not only shredded, but also broken.

I know what you’re thinking, and yes, it sounds like a movie. For the last two days, I’d felt like I was living in a movie. One of those that are shot on the crunchy sort of film that makes the outlines too sharp. Makes the colors too cool. Makes you sort of cringe every time something happens.

Angie and I had gone out on a hunting trip as a delayed honeymoon. But on the first morning, just as we’d settled in for our first stakeout, everything had gone sideways on us. First, there had been an explosion in the sky—one that immediately drove all the animals crazy—and then the sky turned an eerie, unnatural shade of yellow.

We’d hightailed it for our truck, knowing the moment that deer ran right into a tree that we had to get the hell out of there before anything else went wrong. Unfortunately, the deer wasn’t the last animal we saw.

And the next one was a whole lot deadlier.

A bear had found its way into the bed of my truck—and into some food we’d had stored there. It had shredded the tent and thrown everything out of the truck, then destroyed what was left. By the time we got there, nothing was left. Nothing except that damn bear. And it had taken one look at us and come tearing at us like we were responsible for everything that had ever gone wrong in its life.

It had taken Angie out almost immediately, and I’d been lucky to get it off her and scare it away. But that hadn’t improved our situation much. Angie had been in really bad shape, and I hadn’t had any way of treating her. So I’d done the only thing I could do: get her into the truck, so I could get her warmed up and get her to the closest medical facility.

Unfortunately, the truck hadn’t started. No matter what I’d done. Everything inside—all the electronics—had shorted out, and I started to think pretty quickly that the shorting out had happened thanks to that explosion.

I mean what sort of damn explosion turns the sky yellow and makes all the animals go crazy?

That hadn’t been a normal explosion, I’d realized. It had to have been an EMP. That was the only way the yellow color of the sky made sense. The only answer for why my truck wouldn’t start. The only reason I could think of for not one, but both of our phones being out of commission.

It had really, really restricted our options. And with Angie in the shape she’d been in, I’d started to panic. But I’d also known it was my job to see her to safety. So I’d rigged a tourniquet for her leg, and then rigged something to tow her in, and gotten the hell out of there—before the bear could return.

After that, we’d spent a night at the shack of some backwoodsman who had then tried to kill me, escaped into the wilderness, met a man who knew a whole lot more about the military—and its weaponry—than he should have, and headed for our town. We’d accidentally gone sledding on the frozen river, lost Angie into the ice (and the water under it) and saved her, and eventually made it back to the town.

Only to find that Randall—the backwoodsman who had tried to kill me—had gathered up his cousins and followed us, still intent on…

Well, whatever the hell it was he wanted.

“Marlon, take a look at this,” I said, passing the binoculars to my companion—the man we’d met in the woods who had known too much, and had ended up saving our lives.

I’d known the man for two days and already felt like I’d known him for years. Already felt like he might be my best ally.

Even though I still didn’t know who he was, really—or how he’d come to be in the middle of the woods that day when he’d saved us.

But something in my gut told me I could trust him. And my gut had never led me wrong before.

Marlon took the binoculars from me, fitted them to his face, and stared off at the camp Randall and his men were building, his posture stiff as he tried to hold as still as possible. I reached up and pulled him back several steps so that we were at least somewhat sheltered by the building we were standing next to.

I didn’t think Randall was looking out for us. But if he was—and if he had a sharpshooter with him—I didn’t want him getting the bright idea of taking us out while we were standing there trying to figure out what the hell he was doing.

“They sure got those structures up in a hurry,” Marlon murmured. “Where the hell did they even get the material for those?”

“My question exactly,” I said, squinting my eyes and trying to count how many he had. Those weren’t just lean-to shelters, either. They were tilt-up sheds, if I was guessing right.

Sheds that came pre-packaged. Four walls, a floor, and a roof. All you had to do was tilt the walls up, secure them, and then slap the roof on, and presto, you had your very own shed. We’d used them in Afghanistan when we needed shelter—and when we were sure there was no one there to see us build them.

Or trap us in them.

But we’d always brought them with us from somewhere else. Here in the States, you could buy them at any hardware store… but you still had to transport them.

And there were no hardware stores within fifty miles of us right now.

Marlon dropped the binoculars and stared at the camp in front of us, his lips pressed together in thought. “We should have had lookouts out here, watching them,” he noted wryly.

“It’s like you’re in my head or something,” I answered. “I was slightly busy at the time. What’s your excuse?”

We’d gotten back to the town to find that all of the townspeople had taken up residence in the main room in Town Hall, which was big enough to house the barely two hundred people that lived here. We were out in the middle of nowhere, so the town had maintained a very specific plan in case of disaster. Town Hall was therefore equipped with generators to give the building electricity—and therefore heat—in case of any disaster. And that included an EMP that took out all the electric circuits in the area.