21. Nightfall & Ambush
Nightfall his gaze was fixed on the sun bleeding out behind the Rockies.
They'd spent hours clearing the ambush site, scavenging what they could from the bullet-riddled cars, and ensuring no shooters waited for a second pass.
The work had cost them more than ammunition.
"We're not hitting Lakewood before dark," Jay said, glancing at the bruised purple sky.
Seth checked his watch, then looked west. The last light was already fading. "No." Driving into an unfamiliar town at night was an invitation for someone to get killed. "We hole up."
Cara unfolded the map across the hood of the Suburban and tapped a spot just off the highway. "There. School district maintenance yard."
Jay leaned over her shoulder. "Bus garage?"
She nodded. "Big building. Few windows. Easy to secure."
Seth looked to Cade. "You in?"
The stranger adjusted the rifle slung over his shoulder. "One night."
The school sat on the edge of a small farming community, long since silent. Snow blanketed the empty playground, where a lone swing creaked softly in the wind and brightly colored slides stood frozen beneath inches of ice, untouched for months.
Josie's throat tightened as they passed the entrance.
A faded banner, WELCOME BACK STUDENTS!, sagged over doors plastered with construction paper hearts.
She thought of the small hands that must have cut them out, the focused look on a child's face holding safety scissors.
It felt like a symptom chart for a world that had died in its sleep.
"So much for that," Jay muttered.
No one answered.
The bus garage stood fifty yards behind the school—a massive cinderblock building with six bays. Four school buses remained parked inside, their bright yellow paint muted beneath layers of dust. The overhead doors hadn't opened since the last broadcasts went silent.
Seth and Cade cleared the building first, moving with methodical silence, checking every corner, every maintenance room, every storage closet. They found nothing: no infected, no survivors—only abandoned tools, oil-stained concrete, and the lingering smell of diesel.
"Clear," Seth finally called.
Everyone began unloading. They positioned one bus sideways near the entrance to create an extra layer of cover should anyone force the garage doors, then spread sleeping bags across an open patch of concrete between the buses.
Cara found an old shop heater that still ran once connected to the portable generator, and soon a small circle of warmth pushed back against the cavernous cold of the garage.
Outside, snow continued falling. Inside, canned chili simmered quietly over a camping stove. It wasn't much—but after the day they'd survived, it felt almost peaceful.
Jay poked lazily at the heater with a screwdriver, then looked across the circle toward Cade. "So. You've officially saved our lives."
Cade glanced up from cleaning his rifle. "I'd call it evening the odds."
Jay laughed. "Still counts."
A comfortable silence settled between them before Cara finally broke it. "So where are you headed?"
Cade slid the bolt back into place before answering, "Alaska."
Josie's eyebrows shot upward. "Alaska?"
"Yeah."
"That's..." Jay whistled softly. "...one hell of a hike."
Cade shrugged. “That it is.”
"What's in Alaska?" Seth asked.
For the first time all evening, Cade smiled. It was small, gone almost as quickly as it appeared, but real.
"My woman."
Cara smiled. "What's her name?"
"Eliza."
Just saying her name softened him, smoothing something hard out of his face. The change was immediate, and Josie saw it.
"You love her." It wasn't really a question.
Cade looked down at the rifle resting across his knees. "Yeah," Quiet. Simple. Certain.
"So why Alaska?" Jay asked.
Cade exhaled through his nose. "Her family took her."
The garage grew quiet.
"Took her?" Cara repeated.
He nodded once. "They've got more money than God. The kind of money that made them think rules were suggestions even before the world ended."
Jay frowned. "And now?"
"Now..." A humorless laugh escaped him. "Now they've got enough resources to think they're kings."
Seth leaned back against a bus tire. "So you're going after her."
"There isn't another option."
"Do you know where she is?" Seth asked.
"I've got a pretty good idea."
"And if you're wrong?"
""I'll find another lead," he said without hesitation or blinking. "I'll keep looking until I find her."
No one spoke for several seconds. Something in Cade's voice went beyond stubbornness—not obsession, but conviction. The kind only someone deeply in love could carry across a dead continent on foot.
Josie found herself smiling. "I hope she knows someone's crossing the country for her."
Cade looked toward the garage doors, where snow drifted beneath the cracks. "She probably thinks I gave up." A pause. "I didn't. I won't."
The camping stove hissed in the silence that followed.
As Cade reached for another can of chili, something metallic slipped from beneath the collar of his flannel shirt.
Dog tags.
Josie's eyes caught them immediately. "You were military."
Cade tucked them back beneath his shirt with practiced ease before giving a small nod. "Marine Corps."
Seth looked over. "What'd you do?"
"Military Police."
Jay blinked. "Huh. With the way you shoot, I was expecting Recon or Force Recon."
Cade chuckled. "I spent enough time attached to infantry units. And enough range days."
Seth smiled. "It shows. Marine infantry, myself."
Josie smiled. "Air Force."
Cade looked at her. "What was your job?"
"Trauma surgeon."
His eyebrows lifted, and he glanced around the circle. "Well. I suddenly feel a whole lot better about getting shot."
The tension that had lingered since the ambush finally broke when Seth mentioned the coffee at Fort Benning. "That stuff could strip paint," he said.
Seth snorted. "Paint? The stuff they served at Lejeune could dissolve concrete."
Even Cade cracked a smile. The shared joke was a key turning a locked door.
First came a story about a drill sergeant from hell, then another about inedible MREs.
Once started, the memories flowed easily.
For a little while, they weren't just survivors huddled in a garage; they were veterans on a cold concrete floor, finding common ground in the universal misery of barracks life.
Outside, the wind howled against the metal building. Inside, one by one, conversation gave way to yawns. Sleeping bags rustled across the concrete floor, weapons laid within arm's reach by instinct.
Seth volunteered for first watch. Cade quietly joined him without being asked.
Neither man spoke as they settled near one of the garage
doors, watching the darkness together, two soldiers standing the same silent watch.
The bus garage still sat in darkness when Seth nudged the side door open, and a blast of icy air swept inside.
Snow had fallen most of the night, covering yesterday's footprints and leaving the world beyond the school buried beneath an unbroken blanket of white—as if the ambush, the blood, and the bodies had never happened at all.
Cade already stood outside.
He waited with his hands tucked into the pockets of his coat, eyes fixed on the horizon, steam curling from the battered metal mug clasped in one hand. He didn't turn at the sound of the door; a man that aware of his surroundings, didn't need to.
"You sleep?" Seth asked, stepping up beside him.
"Enough."
Seth smirked. "That usually means no."
Cade shrugged. "I've slept in worse places."
The two men stood in comfortable silence as dawn slowly painted the mountains in shades of pink and gold. Neither felt the need to fill the quiet. It was enough to watch the sun rise.
The stillness didn't last.
Jay pushed through the door carrying two more mugs of instant coffee, breath fogging in the cold. "You two planning on solving the apocalypse before breakfast?"
"No," Cade answered, accepting the mug with a nod. "But we are changing today's plan."
Jay frowned. "What do you mean?"
Cade lifted his chin toward the school, and the road beyond it. "We're not driving into Lakewood blind. Yesterday proved that somebody had been working these roads, and if they're organized enough to set an ambush, they're organized enough to be watching a supply run coming."
Seth looked at him, unsurprised. "I was thinking the same thing."
The school roof groaned beneath Seth's boots as he stepped off the maintenance ladder. A bitter wind cut through his jacket, carrying the sharp bite of snow and the diesel smell from the bus garage below.
The sun crested the eastern mountains, casting the valley into sharp relief.
From this height, the snow-covered landscape made Lakewood appear clean, almost peaceful—a deceptive beauty.
Seth ignored the shimmering rooftops and focused on the unnatural stillness, the abandoned cars dotting the streets like stones in a dry riverbed.
He scanned for movement, for anything that didn't belong in the deceptively quiet picture.
Then, an infected stumbled into an intersection, followed by another, then five more.
The illusion shattered.
"Pretty from up here," Jay muttered as he climbed onto the roof behind them. "Until you remember what's walking around down there."
Seth didn't reply, already studying the landscape.
The shopping district lay nearly a mile away, just off the interstate—big-box stores surrounded by acres of parking lots stretched across the valley floor.
Sporting goods. Hardware. A grocery store.
A pharmacy. Everything they desperately needed, and any one of them could become a coffin.
Cade knelt near the roof's edge, pulling military binoculars from his pack.
"No offense," Jay said, "but this feels a little elaborate for a grocery run."
Cade didn't lower the binoculars. "It stopped being a shopping trip the day people started eating each other."
Seth couldn't suppress a faint grin. "I like him."
Jay rolled his eyes. "Of course you do."
Seth crouched beside Cade, pulling a weathered notebook and pencil from a cargo pocket.
"You seriously carry that everywhere?" Cara asked.
He shrugged. "A bad map gets you killed faster than no map at all."
Josie smiled. "I've learned not to question Marine logic."
"You should question it," Jay said. "Just not while they're armed."
Even Cade chuckled quietly. The laughter faded as he brought the binoculars to his eyes, his focus narrowing on the town below.
"Starting north." He swept the town methodically. "No movement on the overpass. About thirty infected near the off-ramp."
Seth sketched a crude outline of the highway. "Thirty. What else?"
"Gas station..." Cade adjusted the focus. "...clear."
Seth made another note, the pencil scratching steadily.
Cade continued scanning. "The grocery store... it's bad."
"How bad is bad?” Cara asked.
He didn't answer right away, his thumb making tiny movements as he counted.
"The front doors are gone. They're just...
shuffling. A huge mass of them trapped in the entrance.
I count fifty in the lot, but inside..." He fell silent.
"At least two hundred. Some are still twitching, trying to make sounds. Like they remember speaking."
Jay let out a low whistle.
"Maybe more."
Josie's stomach sank. "So grocery's off the list."
"For today," Seth agreed.
"What about the pharmacy?" Josie asked.
Cade shifted the binoculars east. "Parking lot's mostly clear. Maybe fifteen outside." He lingered another few seconds. "No obvious movement inside."
Josie nodded. "That's manageable."
The wind picked up, rattling the old flagpole behind them. Cade turned slowly farther south.
"Hardware store..." He frowned. "Hm."
"What?" Seth asked.
Cade handed over the binoculars without a word.
Seth looked through them. The front entrance matched exactly what he'd expected—shopping carts scattered across the lot, glass doors shattered, one side of the building blackened by an old fire.
"I don't—"
"Keep looking." Cade pointed. "Around back."
Seth shifted toward the loading docks. There.
One section of chain-link fencing hung crooked, its gate standing half open.
Snow covered most of the pavement, and months of wind had erased any distinct tracks—but he saw it.
A stack of wooden pallets had been positioned just inside the half-open gate, creating a narrow, defensible channel to the loading bay.
"The employees."
Cade nodded. "They would've locked the front and loaded out the back."
Seth studied the building another moment. "The receiving doors. They're closed."
"Which means?" Seth asked.
"If nobody forced their way in..." Cade looked back toward the town. "...there's a decent chance the warehouse was never touched."
Jay folded his arms. "So we don't go through the front."
"We never were." Seth answered.
A small smile crossed Cade's face. “Im starting to like you."
Cara wandered closer to the edge of the roof. "What else are you looking for?"
"Smoke. Movement. Fresh tire tracks." Cade kept scanning as he spoke. "Anything that tells us we're not alone."
As if summoned by the words, he froze. The binoculars stopped moving.
"What?"
He ignored the question, adjusting the focus with slow, careful precision. "There." He pointed toward the western edge of town. "Top floor."
Seth took the binoculars. A brick office building overlooked the entire commercial district. At first, nothing. Then—a sharp, contained glint of light from a top-floor window. It wasn't a random reflection; it was a single, precise flash, gone as quickly as it appeared.
"You think that's a window?" Jay asked.
Seth lowered the binoculars. "No." He looked at Cade. "You don't either."
Cade shook his head. "It flashed once. Too controlled."
"Shooter?" Cara asked.
"Maybe. Maybe not." Cade's jaw tightened. "But we treat it as hostile until we know otherwise."
Nobody argued. The memory of yesterday's ambush remained too fresh, the sound of rounds punching through metal still lodged in their heads.
Seth looked back over the valley, committing every street and intersection to memory before opening the notebook to a clean page.
"Alright." He marked an X over the sporting goods store.
"Primary objective." He circled the hardware store.
"Secondary." Finally, he underlined the pharmacy.
"If we can get antibiotics, insulin, and trauma supplies, it's worth the risk. "
Jay nodded. "And if anything feels off?"
Seth looked at each of them in turn, letting the weight of his words settle. "We leave. No supplies are worth one of us."
The wind howled across the rooftop. Far below, a lone infected drifted through the empty parking lot of the sporting goods store, stopping once to claw at a shopping cart before moving on. It was oblivious to the six people crouched above, debating bolt cutters and exit routes in urgent whispers.
Seth closed the notebook.
"Let's go shopping."