—The night caught them sooner than expected.
The rusted iron bridge creaked beneath their footsteps, its surface glazed with a thick sheet of ice. Below, the river lay frozen, a white crack in the dark. Wind threaded through the girders and gave out a long, almost human moan.
—We should rest, —Naomi said, raising her lantern to light the far end of the span.
A few paces on, a fissure in the rock formed a small cave, barely enough to shield them from the wind. They entered carefully and searched the interior before settling in. Lucas lit a thermal lamp and set it between them; the orange glow pushed the shadows back from the damp walls only a little.
Silence held. Only the tiny taps of ice falling from the entrance marked time.
—One less day, —Naomi murmured, wrapping her blanket tighter.
—Three more to go if we keep this pace, —Lucas replied, checking his weapon. —If the weather doesn't turn, we'll make it.
She nodded and closed her eyes. Outside, the storm roared like a living thing; inside the hollow, the world seemed to hold its breath.
---
Dawn came without color. A gray stripe lay over the mountains, giving them barely enough light to see the path. The squall had eased, but the cold bit deeper. Lucas was first out of the cave; he drew a deep breath—the cold cut into his lungs.
—Move, —he said, tightening his pack.
The valley forest greeted them with an unnatural hush. Trees stood sheathed in rime like ancient statues. Naomi led, senses open; her gift kept her ears tuned to any sound: a snap, a sigh among the branches, the echo of footsteps that were not their own.
Lucas followed, his sensory energy spreading around him like a radius of warmth. Every living thing in that circle—birds, insects, whatever—throbbed in his mind as points of heat. So far: nothing. Just the two of them.
Time grew viscous. They walked without speaking, boots sinking into the drift. The wood closed in, darker, denser.
Then Naomi stopped.
—Wait… do you see that?
On the packed snow in front of them was a print. Lucas crouched and studied it.
—Christ, —he said.
It ran almost a meter long and half a meter wide; claws had gouged deep furrows in the ice.
—Looks like a bear print, —Naomi breathed.
—No. Too big. No bear leaves prints like that, —Lucas said, intrigued.
Silence folded back in. Naomi turned her head, scanning with her amplified sight. Nothing. Lucas widened his perception—empty.
And still, both felt the same thing: the certainty of being watched.
—Keep moving, —he said finally. —Don't linger.
They quickened. Tension tightened like a cord around them; every shadow between trunks seemed to move, every crack of ice made hearts skip.
Hours passed. The forest stretched without end, mountains hemming them in, the valley swallowing them a step at a time.
At last the trees thinned. Trunks parted, the ground rose, and the pale light returned between branches.
Naomi sighed. —We're out, —she said.
Lucas nodded, glancing back once. The footprint lay half buried in powder, but its image lingered in his head. —Whatever it was… I hope it stays inside, —he muttered.
The trail climbed toward the peaks. The slope was steep, the air thin, the cold sharper. The landscape became a desert of ice and stone. The forest shadows fell away, but a hush trailed them, as if something unseen still followed.
They climbed ridge after ridge. The sun never truly rose—only a pallid wash moving across the clouds. Fatigue settled in: breath white and ragged, legs aching, wind cutting at exposed skin.
When night fell on the fourth day they paused on a wide ledge shielded by an overhang. From there the valley spread below like a white sea.
Naomi sank beside her pack. —Tomorrow we make it, —she said, eyes on the horizon.
Lucas watched the dark beyond the mountains. —Yeah… finally.
—What was the town called? —Naomi asked.
—Elden's Rest, —she answered after a beat—. "Elden's Rest."
Naomi smiled wearily. —Hopefully it lives up to the name.
Lucas didn't answer. He stared north, where shadows shifted in the squall. For the first time on the trip he wasn't sure the valley was truly behind them—maybe something kept pace from within.
---
The fifth-day dawn met them with a wind that keened between rocks. From the last summit Lucas and Naomi finally saw the town: roofs buried in snow, half-buried buildings, streets erased by ice. Elden's Rest looked suspended in time, trapped beneath its white shroud.
—There it is, —Naomi said, lowering the binoculars. —Looks empty.
—Same thing the last time, —Lucas said cautiously.
They descended slowly. Every crunch of boot on ice sounded too loud. As they closed in they picked out ruined facades, torn signs, a bus frozen at the main square.
The town lay under a thick, almost supernatural quiet. No birds, no wind through the lanes—only their footsteps echoing.
---
Crossing the first alley, Naomi pulled out Elara's list. —We split up, —she said. —I'll take north: supermarket and pharmacy. You check the garage and the police station. Supplies will be there if they exist.
Lucas nodded. —Keep the radio on. If anything odd, call me.
—Same, —Naomi said.
They split and threaded through the rubble. Lucas moved down the main avenue, glass frosted over display windows. A hanging sign tapped the wall with a dry clack in the wind. He entered the first shop—a mechanic's. The smell of oil and rust hung heavy. Shelves yielded fuel filters, cans of lubricant, a half-dead portable battery. Not much, but useful.
Outside, the sky dimmed though it was midday. Lucas glanced up, uneasy; the air felt heavier.
Naomi swept the other end. The supermarket was gutted: upturned shelves, broken glass, scattered tins like corpses. But in the back room she found sealed boxes of old military rations layered in powder-white dust. Under her scarf she allowed a small smile.
—Found something, —she said over the radio—. Rations and basic meds.
—Good, —Lucas answered—. I've got ammo and some fuel. Wrapping up.
---
A kilometer from town, two vehicles stopped at the roadside. Wheels sunk with a dry crunch into the snow. Engines died and silence rolled back over the wood.
The door of the lead vehicle opened and a man stepped out—bald, near six feet tall, soldier-built, eyes used to giving orders. His black military coat was powdered with frost, but his movements were crisp.
—Town's a kilometer ahead, —he said, lifting binoculars. —We go on foot to keep noise down.
—Why not use the vehicles? —a woman in the second car called.
—I don't want them making noise, —the bald man said without turning. —We'll proceed on foot. I don't want to alert any residents or moradores.
Three more climbed from the first vehicle: a dark-skinned man with a cheek scar and an old rifle; a red-haired woman with a medical kit; and a thin man with tactical goggles and a crumpled map.
From the second vehicle came four more: two men with heavy packs, a woman shouldering a precision rifle, and a young man—no older than twenty—nervous in that cold.
The leader paced them with his gaze. —Objective: fuel, medicine, electrical parts. Don't shoot unless necessary. We don't know what's in there, —he said.
The woman with the rifle cocked an eyebrow. —Think there'll be moradores?
—If there are, we'll kill them. If there are humans, same thing.
They nodded and moved into the snow. Each step sank the boots. Silence pressed in. Unseen, the town slept under ice, unaware that two groups were closing in on its heart from different directions.
---
Harlan's team moved in loose formation through Elden's Rest's icy streets. The wind swept everything white, hurling ice shards against buildings like tiny projectiles.
—Split into pairs, —Harlan ordered low—. Sweep the area, storage first. Tell me if you find batteries or fuel. Keep your eyes open... this quiet is wrong.
Harlan breathed steady. At his side Rhea carried a short shotgun; her expression flickered between bored and watchful.
—Another dead town, —Rhea muttered. —Always the same: empty buildings, rotten food, bodies that crumble when you touch them.
—As long as there's gas and meds, I don't care, —Harlan said.
Eli, the nervous kid, trailed behind. He closed his eyes sometimes and his vision shifted: the world washed in blue, heat sources glowing red. He paused at a warm print in the ice—a human step still holding residue of heat.
—There's someone else here, —he said softly.
—What?
—A footprint. Human. To the west, about two kilometers. It's still warm—no more than half an hour old.
Harlan stopped. His face hardened. —Not moradores? —he asked.
—No, the thermal pattern's clean. Human. But alone.
Harlan checked his pistol. —Could be a survivor. Could be a scout. We'll check.
Rhea snorted. —Perfect, exactly what we needed.
—Shut up and move, —he said, not looking at her.
They reorganized. Five members stayed to push through stores; three—a small scouting team—slipped into the alleys, following Eli's trail. Steps were taut and careful. The air felt denser; every second carried tension.
Eli led, his sight tracking the warm impressions cutting across the frozen town.
—Trail's fresh, —he reported, crouched by a print near a post. —It goes northwest.
Harlan nodded. —Follow it. Quietly. I want to know who's there before they see us.
---
Meanwhile, two kilometers away, Naomi worked in a collapsed pharmacy. Snow sifted through the broken roof, piling soft white on the floor. She moved with steady hands—pulling open rusted cabinets, sorting boxes, tucking bottles into a canvas bag. Her breath was slow; vapor rolled from her scarf.
—Two painkillers, three antibiotics, clean bandages… —she murmured—. If we ration, this'll last two weeks.
She arranged the finds and scanned the room. Her trained ear picked up wind in the streets, ice settling, the metallic moan of something bending in the distance… but no human steps, no voices.
Still, something nagged her. A tiny instinct, an absence rather than a sound.
She left the pharmacy and peered west. The gray sky melted into white earth. She crossed to an abandoned shop and found a box of water purification tablets and two sealed respirator masks. She stashed them and checked her radio.
—Lucas, Naomi here. I've got meds and some first-aid supplies. You? —she spoke quietly.
Static, then Lucas's voice, distant but clear: —At the police station. Found ammo and a bit of fuel. Wrapping up.
—Good. I'll move toward the center in twenty, —Naomi said, and the line went dead.
She looked to the horizon again. A hollow feeling crawled along her spine—not sound, but the lack of it. The kind of silence that comes before something breaks.