“Problems with Rose and Jake,” he’d said.
“What happened?” said Max, turning his attention away from the surrounding woods.
“Jake ran off. Panic attack. Rose ran after him.”
Max didn’t know what to do. He had to make a decision quickly.
At any moment, the enemy could attack. And Max was expecting the worst. Expecting that it’d be more men than they were counting on. That they’d have better guns than they were expecting. And that they were more strategically-minded and ruthless.
If they went after Rose and Jake, they’d risk leaving the camp less defended than it should have been. Even if they only sent one or two people. And it wasn’t something that Max could tell someone else to do. It’d have to be him.
If he left, that meant leaving the camp and his friends. It’d be as bad as leaving Jake and Rose out there alone.
After all, the longer Jake and Rose stayed away from the camp, the more likely they were to die.
“Are they armed?”
“I think Rose is. But Jake isn’t.”
“Shit,” muttered Max.
“Should we go after them?”
Max was thinking as fast as he could.
It was one of the tough decisions. But they all tended to be that way. And there was a limit to how used to it you could get.
Max shook his head. “No,” he said. “We can’t risk leaving the camp less defended than it is.”
“But they’ll die out there,” said John.
Max nodded. “Maybe.”
“You can’t just let them die.”
“We need to stay here,” said Max.
“We’ve got to go,” said John. “We can’t leave them out there on their own.”
John’s face was starting to show his anger and frustration.
Since meeting his brother again, Max had been impressed with how practical John had gotten. He was a different man than the one Max remembered from before the EMP. The events had changed him. His new life had changed him.
So it surprised Max that John wanted to risk all their lives for Jake and Rose. After all, Jake and Rose hadn’t been too keen to carry guns, to learn how to use them, or to learn any number of things that would have saved their own lives.
Everyone needed to be responsible for their own safety. To an extent. Those who weren’t, well, that was the breaks.
And John knew that. And Max knew that John knew that.
There was something else going on. There was some kind of frustration that John was carrying inside him. And it didn’t have to do with Jake and Rose. It had to do with Max.
Max knew what it probably was. John had thought Max had had all the answers. He thought that Max would save him.
And now that he’d found Max, the reality was tough to swallow. Sure, Max sometimes knew what he was doing. He was good at certain things. But he hadn’t been in the military. He wasn’t an expert fighter. He was a practical man who knew his own limitations. He thought clearly in desperate situations. He had a good head on his shoulders, and the ability to keep pushing on and on when the going seemed impossible.
But that wasn’t enough for John. He’d wanted a savior. Someone who wasn’t even human. Someone who could save not only John, but Jake and Rose too.
Maybe in John’s mind the fact that Max was “giving up,” on Jake and Rose meant that he’d give up on John at some point too.
And that wasn’t who Max was. He wasn’t a savior. He’d tried to save Chad. He’d done all he could, and Chad had died anyway. It’d been Chad’s own fault.
“John,” said Max, quietly. “Leave them. Hopefully they’ll come back.”
John didn’t say anything. His eyes gleamed with something that wasn’t quite anger. But it was as intense as anger.
There wasn’t time to worry about all that, though. Max knew it was only a matter of time before the enemy would arrive. This wasn’t the time to hash out some kind of strange sibling rivalry. Or whatever it was.
“I’m going to check on James,” said Max.
John nodded but said nothing.
Max left him, and began trudging through the snow towards the spot where James was hidden.
As soon as Max had been able to think clearly again after almost freezing to death, he’d come up with the idea of positioning three scouts around the camp.
Currently, James, Sadie, and Cynthia were in three separate locations, hidden in the snow and the trees. Each of their positions was a few hundred feet away from camp. If one looked at it from a bird’s eye view, the three points formed a triangle that surrounded the camp. That gave them complete visibility for anyone approaching.
James, Sadie, and Cynthia were chosen because they were some of the physically smallest members of the group. And they all had experience, too. Max had known he could count on them, whereas Jake and Rose were still a completely unknown quantity.
And it was good he hadn’t decided to count on them. They’d rushed off into the woods, probably to meet their own demise.
Max couldn’t think about them now.
Mandy, of course, had volunteered in Cynthia’s place, but she’d been still recovering from almost freezing to death. She’d needed time by the fire. If the enemy didn’t show up for hours, there was always the possibility of rotating the watch. But for now, Max had wanted those three out there.
The plan was that if James, Sadie, or Cynthia spotted anyone approaching, they were to dash back to the camp and warn the others.
The only problem with the plan was that the temperature had dropped, and the three wouldn’t have the warmth of the fire.
But Max had packed them all in with a good amount of snow, which would actually act as an insulator, helping to keep them warm.
He was headed now to check on each one of them, to make sure they hadn’t gotten too cold.
But before Max had reached the edge of camp, before he’d even gotten to the tree line, he heard footsteps pounding heavily on the ground.
Max’s hand was already on his Glock. He had it drawn and ready, finger on the trigger.
He saw movement in the trees. Someone was sprinting at top speed right towards him.
He saw the face, and it took him a moment to recognize who it was.
It was James, his gun in his hands, terror on his face.
“They’re coming!” He spoke in a hushed whisper, but the urgency was clearly there in his voice.
“How many?”
“Three or four. I’m not sure.”
“Come on.”
Max turned on his heel and dashed back to the fire, where the others were. He could hear James running behind him.
So far, Max’s plan had worked. They had advance warning.
But they’d need more than just that to survive.
If they stayed in the camp, they’d be sitting ducks.
The van probably wouldn’t work as any kind of permanent shelter, except to obscure them briefly from view. The bullets would pierce the metal. The van wouldn’t keep them safe.
To stay alive, they’d need to snap into action. They’d need to execute the second part of Max’s plan.
Max reached the fire only seconds before James.
James put his hands on his knees, doubling over, his breathing fast and rapid from sprinting.
“They’re coming,” said Max. “James saw them.”
The heads turned towards him. Terror colored their faces.
But they weren’t the types to let fear destroy them, to let it paralyze them. They were strong, and Max’s attitude had rubbed off on all of them.
They grabbed their guns, standing up rapidly.
They knew the plan. But they looked to Max for further instruction.
“We need to get the other scouts,” said Max. “Mandy, you know where Sadie and Cynthia are. Bring them to the place we talked about. We’ll meet you there.”
Mandy nodded.