He stepped into his warmest thermal underwear, and then his fleece-lined pants. More thermal underwear on top, a flannel shirt, a sweater, and then a sweatshirt. He’d top it off with his heaviest coat before he went out into the cold.
He was planning to come back to the house before they left for Ellis Woods. But he didn’t know whether he’d have time to change. He wanted his warmest clothing on his body before he left the structure.
One sweep across the top of his dresser and he had his compass, his watch, and two of his Swiss Army knives. The good ones. The ones with the most attachments. Yes, those knives had started as a harmless collection when he was young. Then he’d realized how useful they were—and how flexible. He’d made a habit of always keeping one on him when he went out into the field. Two, if he could manage it.
And today felt like a day when he’d need two.
Of course, he didn’t make it out of the house without waking John. And that shouldn’t have surprised him.
The man came up behind him as he was putting on his coat and reaching for his hunting rifle.
“Going somewhere?”
Marlon turned, lecturing himself about getting sloppy, and saw John standing in the hallway into the kitchen, sipping a cup of coffee.
“I see you’ve figure out how to make coffee over the fire,” Marlon said by way of answer.
John gave him half a smile. “Not my first time living without electricity. Hope you don’t mind.”
Hm. Marlon put that bit away for future study—he still hadn’t figured out what exactly John had been in the military, and thought it might come in handy to know—and gave John a return half-smile.
“Not at all,” he said. “There’s bacon in the cooler next to the fridge as well, and potatoes, if you’d like to get some breakfast started.”
At that, John’s face turned serious. “I’ll start breakfast. Once you tell me where you’re going. And when you’ll be back.”
Well, he couldn’t blame the man for not trusting him. He’d had a run-in with Randall and his cousins, and didn’t know the first thing about Marlon. In fact, Marlon thought he should probably count himself lucky that John hadn’t chosen to fight him yesterday when he first woke up.
He took three steps forward and put his hand on the younger man’s shoulder, gripping more firmly when John jumped in surprise at the contact.
“Out to check the traps,” he said simply. “It’s only ten miles between here and Ellis Woods, but I don’t know how long it’ll take us if another storm comes up. And I don’t want to have to stop to hunt out there if I don’t have to. Not when Randall might be after us.”
John narrowed his eyes in suspicion for a moment, but Marlon could see the wheels turning in his head, and the exact moment when he realized that Marlon was telling him the truth.
One nod, and he replied, “Fair assessment, I think. I’m glad to hear we’re that close to town. Closer than I thought. You need any help out there? Angie can take care of herself for the time being.”
Marlon shook his head. “You stay here. Get ready to head out. Build a sled for Angie. Once I return, I’ll want to leave immediately. Keep the door locked and bolted. Don’t open it for anyone but me. Anyone, understand? I’m not only worried about Randall. Whatever’s going on out there… Well, we just don’t know who’s a friend and who’s an enemy right now.”
He squeezed John’s shoulder one more time, then turned and walked through the door without looking back.
Marlon bypassed the barn, where he kept his snowmobile, and walked right into the woods. The vehicle would have been a nice perk—and certainly would have made the trip quicker. It also would have given him a better mode of escape if anything went wrong.
Hell, when it came down to it, the thing would have changed everything. Made their escape even easier. Given them a way to actually tow whatever sled John put together for Angie. Ensured that they were moving at 10 to 15 MPH rather than a walking pace.
Unfortunately, the EMP event—or solar storm, or both—meant that the snowmobile was down and out for the moment. As were both of his trucks. And the four-wheelers he also kept in the barn. He had a whole armada of motored vehicles in there, just in case of emergency—and in case he needed to evacuate more than one person at a time. But they were of absolutely no use to him now.
The irony wasn’t lost on him. And in the back of his mind, he had a feeling that whatever had happened up there in the atmosphere, whatever had caused this blackout, had been manufactured for exactly this sort of purpose. He just couldn’t figure out why. Or who might be responsible.
Then, in a shorter time than he’d been expecting, he found himself at the first trap and put the thought of the EMP, his vehicles, and responsibility for the attack from his mind. Now wasn’t the time to be delving into problems like that. And it certainly wasn’t his problem anymore. No, it was up to someone else to figure out.
Right now, he had his own problems. And they started with a man named Randall, a poisoned wife, and the man’s vendetta against him—and, it seemed, against the man he was now sheltering.
He dropped to the trap, finding that it had caught one snow hare, and quickly lifted the trigger to release the rabbit. It had been a clean trapping, he was glad to see, the trap having broken the animal’s neck, and he sent a quick thought of thanks up into the sky. Living in the wild meant it was necessary to kill or be killed. Hunt or starve. But he’d never been good at killing—whether they were humans or animals—and that hadn’t changed when he moved out here.
“Dear God in Heaven, Marlon, will you listen to yourself?” he hissed into the cold snow. “This is no time for philosophical discussions with yourself. Get the job done, old man.”
He shook his head at himself, then pressed forward into the snowed-in forest, already looking down at his compass and directing himself toward the next trap as he put the rabbit into the bag he carried at his side. One trap down. Fifteen to go.
And then they’d head toward civilization, and the safety he hoped it would offer them.
Marlon was on the tenth trap, his bag of game close to full, when he happened upon the men in the woods. He’d just bent down to spring the trap and collect another rabbit, his mind doing the math of how far they could get on the number of carcasses he had in his bag, when a shot rang out in the distance.
Marlon dropped to the snow without thinking about it and made himself as flat as he could, his belly crunching down into the ice underneath him. He slowed his breathing to a standstill and strained his ears, listening for anything that might tell him where the shot had come from—and where it had gone.
They hadn’t been shooting at him, he thought a moment later. There had been no telltale crash of a bullet hitting a tree behind him, or the hiss of sound bullets made when they entered snow. A quick check of his own body assured him that he hadn’t been shot, himself—he knew how it felt, and had long ago trained himself to get past the shock and detect it immediately—and no matter how hard he listened, he didn’t hear any other sound.
When he started to move, to lift his head above the level of the snow, he realized that he’d hit the ground right behind a bush. Perfect. By simple luck, he’d managed to get himself into a position where there was a bush in front of him and trees behind him.
Ahead of him, a wide-open clearing stretched for several miles.
He moved a bit, found an opening in the bush, and peered through it, his eyes on the clearing, his ears on the alert of any sound of human presence.