The faded road sign at the edge of town says GREENVIEW, though the sun has bleached most of the lettering nearly white and ivy has swallowed the lower half. Beyond it lies a modest American town of low brick storefronts, leaning utility poles, and quiet residential streets disappearing beneath waist-high weeds. Abandoned cars sit where they were left two years ago, doors open, tires sunk into cracked asphalt. You have been traveling alone long enough that distance has become easier to remember than time. The possibility of sealed supplies, drinkable water, or even a roof sturdy enough to survive another storm keeps your momentum pointed deeper into town.

The sound reaches you near the old commercial strip: faint at first, stretched thin by wind and empty streets. It is not a coyote or an animal caught in fencing. It is a woman’s voice, hoarse and desperate, calling for help. The cries lead to a supermarket with sun-faded advertisements pasted across its windows and one glass door hanging crooked from the frame. Inside is pitch-black beyond the narrow blade of afternoon light at the entrance. The voice comes again from somewhere between the aisles—then abruptly cuts off when movement reaches the doorway.

A flashlight snaps toward you, followed by the dark edge of a machete held in both hands. The woman behind it is short and slight, with orange hair gathered beneath a powder-blue beanie. Her royal-blue sweater and freckled face are streaked with dust, while medical pouches, tools, and supplies hang from her pack in careful, deliberate order. Fear sharpens her green eyes as the beam travels over your clothes, hands, face, and anything that might conceal a bite. Finding no obvious signs of infection does not ease her posture. Her attention drops to your pack and weapons instead. "Wait, stay there," she warns, voice shaking despite her grip. "Don’t come any closer."

From somewhere below the floor, another woman calls out. "Ann? What is it?" Her voice is low and tightly controlled, each word clipped between shallow breaths. Beside Ann, a ragged section of tile and concrete has collapsed into the basement, taking shelving, timber, and twisted rebar with it. A flashlight rests near the edge, aimed down toward flashes of safety-yellow fabric, coyote-brown gear, and a red Ferrari cap. One of the woman’s legs is pinned beneath the wreckage below the knee, her shin swelling around a fracture she plainly understands is worse than she wants her sister to know. She flexes her toes again, then again, checking for movement and sensation while sweat beads beneath her cap. "Someone came in, they heard me," Ann answers. "Turned?" "No." A strained pause follows. "Could be a raider." Metal shifts below, drawing a sharp inhale Lucy tries to bury beneath irritation. "Then keep your distance. Don’t tell them what we have."

Ann’s grip tightens, but her gaze flicks helplessly toward the hole. Bandages, water, a short steel pipe, flashlights, and loose lengths of rope have already been arranged beside it with meticulous care. She has clearly been working the problem, but not quickly enough for the numbness creeping through Lucy’s foot. "My sister fell through," Ann admits, each word reluctant, as though even the truth might be used against them. "Her leg is trapped. I think the bone is cracked, and the floor keeps breaking when I get near her. I have rope, but I don’t know how to get down safely or move the rubble without making it worse." Below, Lucy presses the back of her head against the concrete and forces another measured breath, fighting the rising certainty that she may not walk out of the store—and the worse thought of what happens to Ann if she cannot. "Ann," she says, sharper than intended, "you don’t know them." Then, louder, toward the entrance: "You take one step toward her without permission, I don’t care how pinned I am—I’ll make it your problem."

Somewhere deeper inside the supermarket, beyond the reach of either flashlight, something drags slowly across the tile and becomes silent.