 
Priden Queen

Meet Me at World's End

Superpowers Versus the Apocalypse Chronicles
First published by Story Arc Press 2019

Copyright (C) 2019 by Priden Queen

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

First edition

ISBN: 978-1-949579-01-7

This book was professionally typeset on Reedsy  
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This series is intended to be read as one continuous story.

#  Contents

  1. Prologue
  2. Chapter 1
  3. Chapter 2
  4. Chapter 3
  5. Chapter 4
  6. Chapter 5
  7. Chapter 6
  8. Chapter 7
  9. Chapter 8
  10. Chapter 9
  11. Chapter 10
  12. Chapter 11
  13. Chapter 12
  14. Chapter 13
  15. Chapter 14
  16. Chapter 15
  17. Chapter 16
  18. Chapter 17
  19. Chapter 18
  20. Chapter 19
  21. Chapter 20
  22. Chapter 21
  23. Chapter 22
  24. Chapter 23
  25. Chapter 24
  26. Chapter 25
  27. Chapter 26
  28. Chapter 27
  29. Chapter 28
  30. Chapter 29
  31. Chapter 30
  32. About the Author
  33. Also by Priden Queen

# Prologue

Liam West awoke from his nightmare drenched in cold sweat. He frantically reached to the other side of the bed to find his wife.

Cold. Empty.

As he regained clarity from the fog of sleep, he was also reminded that he was living that nightmare.

The nightmare always started the same way: a replay of that last morning when he'd woken up with his wife sleeping by his side. He was getting up to get ready for work when he felt a tugging on his hand. His wife had always been a light sleeper, so she would wake up at the same time he did, but she'd never taken the initiative to make physical contact before. He had turned around to face her. She had been having trouble starting the conversation--something she had always struggled with. He had sat back on the bed, took her hands in his, and patiently waited. He'd known it had to be something important.

"Happy birthday, Liam."

A smile had bloomed on his face. It was just another day to him--completely forgotten about, actually--but he'd been glad she remembered.

"I...I tried to tell you last night, but..." After a long pause, she had continued. "And I don't know if today is a good day to tell you because I don't know how you feel on the subject."

"What is it, Angel?"

She had opened her mouth and closed it again twice before she reached over to the nightstand drawer, pulled something out, and showed it to him. It was a white plastic stick with two pink stripes on it. He hadn't known what he was looking at to begin with, but then suddenly remembered seeing something like it in commercials from time to time. It was one of those pregnancy test kits. He hadn't known what two pink stripes meant, but if she was showing it to him, it could only mean one thing: she was pregnant. They were having a baby.

He didn't know how long he had sat frozen, but when he came to again, his chest was inflated with joy. He'd reached for her face and pressed his forehead against hers.

"Angel..." Then it was his turn to have trouble expressing himself.

Words wouldn't have cut it, anyway. The woman he loved was pregnant with his baby. He had expressed his joy in a long, deep kiss that made them both run out of breath by the time he broke it. He'd put a hand on her flat abdomen as he reveled in the feeling of happiness overflowing from every pore. Then it had hit him like a brick.

_Last night..._

"Are you feeling all right?"

She'd nodded.

At times like these, he wished she wasn't so afraid of him. They had been married for nearly four years, and she still had not realized how much he loved her. But then again, he couldn't blame her; he knew she was an orphan, growing up under someone else's roof. All of the psychiatrists he'd consulted told him the same thing: that she was lacking a sense of security in everything around her and that trusting someone fully was against all of her instincts.

His thumb had gently brushed the burn scar on the side of her face. She'd immediately turned away to hide it from view. It was another source of her insecurity.

He had cupped her face once again and made her lock in his gaze. "Angel, we're going to be parents!" He'd pecked a kiss on her soft lips. "I'm going to be a dad!"

The beautiful moment that morning would always give way to a recurring nightmare. He had been in a meeting when he received the call.

"Liam...it's your wife."

He had dropped everything he was doing, raced to the airport, and took the first flight back. He'd sped to the hospital where his wife was admitted. He couldn't recall how many traffic lights he ran, only that when he got to the emergency room, they'd told him his wife had passed away. He hadn't believed it for a moment, thought they'd made a huge mistake, thought perhaps he'd gone to the wrong hospital or it was just someone with the same name as his wife. It had been when they showed him her cold, lifeless body on a steel table that reality finally caught up with him. It was real. It was happening. There was no rewind button to undo any of it.

That morning when she had walked him out the door, she was still alive and they were going to have a baby. He'd reached for her face, which had been horribly disfigured by dozens of cuts. Cold. He could still remember the warm goodbye kiss on his lips from that morning. His gaze had gone to the old burn scar on the side of her face, to the necklace she often wore, to the wedding band on her finger, and then at last to her abdomen where their baby...

Liam grabbed the lamp on the nightstand and smashed it against the wall in a fit of rage. At this part of his nightmare, he often broke down and cried. There were times he just stood there staring at her corpse until he woke. And then there were times when there was a gun in his hand and he'd pulled the trigger on himself.

Afterward, he would wake in a cold sweat, frantically searching for her on the other side of the bed, hoping to find her warm body so it would all just be a nightmare. All of it.

Sometimes he would sit there quietly until morning light shone through the windows. But sometimes when it got too unbearable, he would leave his room and go down to the basement. This night was one of those nights.

The sound of the airtight door creaked open, amplified by the silence of the night. Liam walked into the brightly lit basement and was greeted by a man and a woman dressed in black suits. They closed the door behind him as he entered. He then took a seat in the only chair in the room. The deep blue of his eyes lightened several shades when he laid eyes on the woman cowering against the wall in front of him. There was a cruel expression on his face, one so uncharacteristic that it made him look like a completely different person.

The woman cowering against the wall didn't look like herself either. Once considered a beauty, she was now beyond recognition. Her prized, beautiful hair was scattered all over the floor. Every inch of her body was covered in bloody bandages. Her once-beautiful face was layered with fresh cuts over old ones. She looked barely human anymore. And there were mirrors all around her, constantly reminding her of what she had become.

The moment he walked into the room, he could see she was visibly terrified of him--so terrified that she tried to claw at the wall with her shortened fingers in an attempt to get farther away from him, staining the mirrored wall with blood in the process.

A twisted satisfaction laced his cruel expression. There were many nights just like this when he would come down here to watch her suffer. He once decided that death would be too quick and merciful no matter how tempting it was to choke the last breath from her lungs and watch her die. On the contrary, he wanted her to live as long as modern medicine could keep her alive, and he wanted her to suffer every moment of it. He wanted to take away everything from her just as she had done to him.

Another sleepless night.

# Chapter 1

I was burning up with fever. It felt so hot that I thought I might turn to ash at any moment. _Cry,_ I repeatedly said to myself. _Cry and everything will be fine._ It was easier said than done, especially when I could not recall anything that would make me cry. My memory was completely blank. I woke up a month ago with a textbook case of amnesia as a result of a car accident, I was told. But amnesia wasn't the only thing I awoke to.

Since the rain turned crimson four months ago, I had developed a strange ability, as had many other people. When I opened my eyes for the first time after the accident, I could see colors I had never seen before--colors that I could not even fathom if I'd lived to be a million. I would imagine it must be something similar to a colorblind person seeing colors for the first time, only I had never been colorblind. These colors, these auras, to be more accurate, were present everywhere: on objects, on people, even in the soil and the sky itself. Lately, I could even feel the auras, like an additional sense to my existing five.

At first, I didn't know what they were. I thought they were just colors people couldn't see. But after a month of observation, I could say with confidence that the auras were like leaking information. I discovered that every single person had their own layers of auras--their own unique signature of who they were. No two were alike. At the very least, I hadn't encountered two that were alike. I would like to believe it was like looking at people's very souls.

But this new ability has its drawbacks. Every few days, I come down with a high fever that threatens to boil my insides, and the worst part is the piercing pain and pressure in my eyeballs. The only way to fend off the fever is to cry. But I cannot cry on cue. Didn't have any sad memories to aid me. When the uncomfortableness reaches an excruciating level, my body will start crying on its own. Every time, I cry these large droplets of tears that accumulate and solidify into a gem after they dry.

This time, the gem I cried was larger than usual.

I stared at the marble-sized gem in my hand. I had asked other people what color it was, and the answers were always the same: clear. But to me, the gem looked like a swirling liquid of all the colors of the auras. I didn't know what they were but thought they were beautiful, so I kept them all in a small glass jar inside my drawer. The strangest thing about these gems was that after I closed the lid on the jar, the gems would slowly return to liquid form. When I opened the lid, they would slowly solidify again.

I couldn't tell anybody about my ability. I didn't think it was wise. I saw on TV that experts predicted three out of a hundred people had developed supernatural powers. A small three percent, but it was a large number when scaled to the Earth's population of seven and a half billion. Widespread discrimination and paranoia had turned society upside-down since the first wave of people started developing superpowers. It was all TV journalists ever talked about these days. The government had pinpointed the most probable cause to be the crimson rainfall and warned the public to avoid exposure to the rainwater. Scientists around the globe were debating evolution vs. mutation while ordinary people were protesting about discrimination, rights, and public safety.

Many people weren't afraid to show off their new abilities. Just the other day, I saw people on TV who could materialize water, fire, and ice projectiles from thin air. On another channel, people stood in the rain on purpose in the hope that they would develop extraordinary abilities, because these days, anything was better than ordinary. Over two hundred million people roaming the streets with a wide array of superpowers was a huge call for change in society's infrastructure.

But they were all missing the bigger picture.

I stared up at the ominous sky through the glass window. No one seemed to notice it. The sky probably looked like it always had to them, but it was reddening by the day. Even the soil had reddened from the frequent crimson rainfall. I had a feeling these were signs of things to come. Terrible things.

Someone was approaching my room. Judging from the aura, it was Lara.

I hid the jar of gems in my drawer and turned my gaze toward the bedroom door for about half a minute before Lara kicked it wide open.

Lara strode in and loomed over me. "I just got off the phone with the bank, and they told me of your recent shopping spree. How the fuck can you possibly spend over five million dollars in a month?!"

"Declan said that account is mine," I calmly replied.

"Declan thought that amount would last you quite a while."

"Then he's wrong." I found the subject of the conversation much too dull. "Either way, it has nothing to do with you."

When I said the last part, I could see her expression turn ugly. It was the truth, and the truth seemed to be impaling her. Lara had been managing Declan's estate for years, and I'd heard he let her take liberties with those accounts too. I surmised that could be the reason she must have forgotten all of it wasn't hers. That reminder was like a slap in the face.

"Listen here, you spoiled rich bitch! The only reason I haven't slit your throat where you stand is because of Declan. But talk to me like that again and there's no guarantee. We didn't risk our lives on every job just so a spoiled bitch with no sense of money like you can waste it on a few more additions to your closet! Declan and I have something that you could never hope to--"

My gaze panned from the angry woman to Declan walking into the room. Lara noticed I was no longer paying attention to her, so she sharply turned around. Their eyes met for a brief second, and then Lara lowered her eyes and backed down.

"Get out, Lara," Declan said.

"Declan, do you really think you can keep up with her lifestyle?" she protested.

"Out." This time, an order.

Lara inhaled deeply, shot a glare my way, and headed for the door.

Peace was returned to the room again. I waited for him to pose the question. If I were in his place, I would.

"You don't look so well," he began.

I was a little thrown off because I'd really thought he would ask about the money first. "Must be the morning sickness."

There it was again: the look of contempt in his eyes when his gaze fell on my slightly-showing pregnant belly. It appeared very briefly, but I caught it. Declan hated this baby, I had no doubt about it. Though it didn't make sense, because it was supposed to be his, or so he'd said. Of course, there was also the possibility that I had an affair with another man before my memory loss and he didn't want to bring that to light for reasons of pride or something like that.

I didn't think I was the type to have an affair, but his attitude toward this baby was making me question my character. It would make a lot more sense that way.

"I felt the baby moving this morning," I said, a last test.

A muscle in his jaw ticked. "Most people wouldn't even be able to make what you spent this month," he said, ignoring the conversation about the baby completely.

A disparaging smile appeared on my face. I didn't know if I was mocking him or myself. "What is it exactly that you do, Declan?" He wasn't the only one who could change the subject.

"I'm a businessman. I told you that."

"Risking your life on every job?"

"Occupational hazard."

"Hmm. Spoiled rich bitch...keeping up with my lifestyle..." I locked gazes with him. "I thought you said we grew up in the orphanage together. You said we came from nothing. Why do you suppose Lara said those things?"

A moment of silence came between us. It was actually a good thing he didn't underestimate my intelligence by feeding me more lies. I'd said my piece, now it was time to let go--I didn't want to unravel this web just yet. There were four other people living in this high-rise penthouse, including Lara, from the same orphanage where Declan grew up. They stayed together like a pack of wolves, and to have gotten here from literally nothing must have taken considerable measures. I didn't want to dig too deep into it.

"Aren't you going to ask me what I bought with five million?"

"My wife has expensive taste. It's a good thing I'm not a poor man."

If he'd asked, I would have told him the truth. I used the money to buy food and supplies, and lots of it. If he'd asked why, I would have told him about the red sky.

"Declan, something terrible is going to happen," I started.

He stared at me for a moment, then asked, "You had a premonition?"

"Well, no. I don't have that kind of ability. I just have a feeling like something terrible is going to happen. When I look up at the sky, all I can see is a crimson blanket stretching as far as the eye can see. There's a suffocating stench of death in the air. Every instinct in my body is telling me something terrible is going to happen."

I couldn't keep it in, after all. If there was anyone I wanted to be prepared for what was to come, it would be Declan.

"When did you start having these...feelings?"

"You must think I've lost it."

"No, I don't, Sienna. The world around us is changing. I have no reason not to believe you. Since when did you start sensing this?"

"It's always been there since I woke up from the accident, but the sense of urgency began two weeks ago."

"Do you have any idea what it will be?"

I shook my head. "Not a clue."

He turned for the door, but I called him back. There was something equally important I needed to discuss with him.

"I'm thinking perhaps I could visit the country house this weekend."

"Country house?"

"The country house at my vineyard. The one in the photos you showed me."

His lips thinned.

Another thing about Declan: he said our fondest time was at the vineyard, but something always came up whenever I asked him to take me there for a visit.

More secrets, I supposed.

There were only two things I was sure of. One: I was four months pregnant, and two: I knew Declan before the car accident wiped my memories. He showed me photos of us at the vineyard, but nothing before that. He said all of the other photos, including the wedding albums, were lost in a fire. I couldn't be sure of anything else, especially whether this baby was even Declan's or we were married like he'd claimed.

Before he could come up with another one of his excuses, I took his hands in mine. "I thought since you described it so beautifully that perhaps if I go there, see the place for myself, then maybe I could remember a little more about us." I really needed to convince him to take me there.

When he first told me about this vineyard, I was thinking about selling it to get more funds to buy supplies, but then I changed my mind. The vineyard was situated far from the city, which made it ideal to be used as storage. The trouble was, the delivery people called me and said they couldn't make the delivery via trucks because the land was walled in. I didn't have the key to the gate, couldn't remember where it could be, couldn't physically go there anyway, so I made a call to the vineyard. A man named John Jenson picked up, and he seemed to recognize my voice. He even called me by my first name. I asked him to accept the deliveries, and he told me "no problem."

I could tell Declan was not quite persuaded yet.

"Declan, you know I have doubts in my head. I can't remember anything and, because of that, I can't completely trust everything you're telling me. I want us to work, I do, but I need to remember something. Anything. You spoke so fondly of the place... We were very happy there, weren't we?"

"We were," he said. There was conviction in his eyes as he peered into mine. Strangely, I could tell this part wasn't a lie.

They say every lie always had at least a grain of truth, but with all of these half-truths, what was I supposed to believe?

"I need to remember that. Declan, I need to remember that."

His eyes grew contemplative. Then he said, "I need to check my scheduling first."

"But you'll take me?"

Finally, he nodded in agreement.

Early morning four days later as I was sleeping in my bed, Declan shook me awake. I was still hazy-eyed and disoriented when he pulled me out of bed.

"Sienna, we need to leave the city. Now." The tone of his voice was so solemn, it shocked me wide awake. The first thing that came into my head was, _Could this be it?_ What was this terrible thing that I'd been so afraid of? Was it a mega tsunami? A mega volcano? A meteor heading right for us?

As he was pulling me by the arm out of the bedroom, I pulled back. "Wait! I need to grab my bag!"

His brows winced in annoyance.

I ignored it and quickly grabbed my backpack from the closet that I'd prepared in advance. Inside was a change of clothes, a six-pack of water, a handgun, ammo, a flare gun, a lighter, first aid kits, a jar, a plastic-encased photo, and packs of dehydrated food. I'd been careful not to add too much weight so it wouldn't slow me down. I put it on and followed closely behind Declan.

Lara and the other three men were waiting in the living room with guns in hand. When they saw me, it was like they were looking at dead weight. Something else was even more eye-catching than five people wielding a considerable number of firearms in a civilian living room: the huge red headlines on the news channel--"The Dead are Walking" and "The Zombie Apocalypse is Here." The news channel was broadcasting chaotic street views of people screaming and running from the walking dead. They didn't look like the undead from movies, with decaying skin and exposed bones, but the other symptoms were recognizable enough: corpse-like pale skin, sunken eyes, savagely attacking people on sight.

Not what I was expecting at all. But it didn't matter.

I took out the loaded Desert Eagle from my backpack, much to the surprise of everyone in the room. I had done my research and gone to the gun range a few blocks away every day for the past two weeks. I knew I was going to be weight, but I refused to settle on being dead.

I didn't know what Declan had planned, but seeing as things were, the sooner we got out of the densely-populated city area, the better. When Declan gave the order to head out, I followed closely behind.

# Chapter 2

We took the elevator down to the first floor. During the sixty-story elevator ride, I forced myself to process everything as quickly as I possibly could, cramming as much into my head as I could before that elevator door opened again. _Expect everything. To falter is to die._

_Ding!_

I followed the group to the garage building. On the way there, we encountered a few zombies just like the ones on the news, but most of them were busy with an existing target and the rest were slow. We ran for it. When we couldn't outrun them, we opened fire.

James took the driver seat on the Land Rover with Lara as the front passenger. The remaining four of us crammed into the back with me on Declan's lap.

The tires screeched as James made a quick reverse and then pressed hard on the pedal, running a few people over as he drove out of the garage. Everything was happening so fast. I couldn't tell if people were zombies or not, but judging by everyone's undaunted expression, it didn't matter to them. It didn't occur to them for a second to save anyone on the way either. It might have been a first-time apocalypse, but it was not their first rodeo.

At least now I understood what kind of people I was dealing with. If I become too much of a dead weight, there was a good chance they would leave me behind. Maybe not Declan, but no guarantee about the rest. What would happen if they voted four against one? I really didn't want to find out. Seeing things as they were, my greatest chance of survival was with them.

James called for Declan's attention.

The streets were barely drivable with accidents piling up on both sides. Outside the windows, people were running in fear, but there were some fighting off the zombies with their super abilities. There were even looters breaking shop windows.

I peered out of the car window and, as the world was descending into madness right before my eyes, something about it made sense in a twisted way. The last four weeks of anxiety and restlessness finally made sense.

"We should get out and loot too," Lara suggested. "We don't have any food or water. What are we going to do once we get out of the city?"

"Lara's right," Alex agreed. "We're armed; we should be okay."

"Stay on track," Declan said. "We need to drive out of here first, before the road is completely blocked up. We'll loot at the edge of the city."

No more debate on the matter. James drove on. And it was a good thing too, because soon, just like Declan said, the road got worse and worse. There were times James needed to bump a few cars out of the way to see the road again. Good thing this Land Rover was built like a tank. Some stray bullets hit the glass and bounced right off.

A sigh of relief escaped me once we made it to the city's edge. The road didn't look as bad as it was inside the city. Declan told James to stop by the gas station on the side of the road.

"Lara, fill up the tank. Alex, get extra gas for the road. James and Hunter, with me."

I was the only one who wasn't assigned anything, but I wasn't about to call attention to myself. I didn't want to remind them how useless I was, and this didn't seem like the time they would find something for me to do just to make me feel included.

Declan's group cocked their guns as they headed inside the gas station. I could see the store clerk holding his arms up when Hunter pointed a gun at him. Declan and James scouted the store. They came back five minutes later with two baskets of canned food, a basket of milk and bread, and six cases of water.

"This won't last for two days," Lara grimaced, looking at the baskets.

"Nothing but beverages and snacks in there," James grumbled. "If you want, I can go back and grab you thirty pounds of gum, mints, and gummy bears."

"And a few cases of beer too," Alex jested.

No one was laughing.

Declan put the baskets in the back and closed the trunk. "We'll just need to make more stops along the way. It isn't safe to stay here."

"I have some dehydrated food on me." I poked my head out of the car window and gestured toward my backpack. A hundred servings of dehydrated food. With the canned food and water they just obtained, we should be able to stretch it for ten days. Contributing should be lifting my weight a bit.

My offer was ignored.

"Declan, three of the tires are damaged. I just replaced the badly damaged one with the spare, but the other ones won't last us. If we're heading out of the city, I doubt we'll find a place to fix them anytime soon."

James browsed on his phone. "The next repair shop is in the next town over. There is a tire store five minutes away, but it's that way." He pointed toward the city.

Everyone looked to the road. Fat chance they could drive through it now.

"How far if we walk?" Declan asked after he inspected the tires.

"Ten, fifteen minutes?" James replied.

"James. Hunter."

The two men nodded.

"Lara. Alex. You two stay in the car with Sienna. Keep your heads low and unseen until we get back."

Lara and Alex got into the car and locked the door. The moment Declan's group was away from view, the aura in the car changed. I looked at my hands to avoid eye contact with the woman sitting in the front seat staring at me through the side mirror, hoping to minimize my presence as much as possible.

"You must think your pretty face can get you through anything in life," Lara said. "Even at a time like this."

I knew she was talking to me but stayed quiet because I didn't want to piss her off.

"I've always hated girls who were born into privilege like you. Mommy and daddy's precious little spoiled brat. And when it's time to get married, you marry rich and spend your rich husband's money until the end of your days. You never had to work for any damn thing in your life."

"I don't know what you're talking about. We grew up in the same orphanage." Their story.

She scoffed. "Real orphans like us had to fight for every bit of scrap in life. Even at a time like this, Declan wants to bring along his little pet." She sneered at me through the side mirror. "No, _princess_. Alex, James, Hunter, Declan, and I came from the same orphanage. Declan snatched you from some castle tower because he has delusions that he can have a princess for a wife."

I folded my arms and stared out of the window. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"The first moment I touched your hands, I thought to myself, 'How could anyone's hands be so soft?' I knew then that we weren't the same kind of people. Haven't you noticed how calloused mine are? I worked for each and every one. But I suppose men like women with soft hands. Declan's especially smitten." Jealousy tinted her voice.

"Are we seriously having a conversation about my hands right now?"

"You just don't get it. Take a good look around you. The world is changing. It isn't your oyster anymore. This is as far as your pretty face will get you." She turned around and pointed a gun at my head. "Get out."

"Lara!" Alex finally intervened. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

"I'm telling her to get out. This is where we say our goodbyes."

"Declan will kill you!" Alex grabbed her shoulder.

"Not if he doesn't find out. I can just say she wanted to go to the little girls' room and got abducted by some anarchists." She smiled, quite pleased with the lie she just came up with. "I'll use that one."

"And if I don't get out, you would put a bullet through my head? How are you going to lie to him then?" I asked.

"He'll be mad at me for a while, sure, but kill me?" She shook her head. "No, not kill me. We don't kill our own. Now get out, or I put a bullet in your head. I'd rather not have Declan grudge me for the next few weeks."

"Fine, I'll get out. But tell me this--I know you're dying to--is Declan the father of my baby?"

Lara laughed hysterically. "You think I'd let your bastard live if it was Declan's?"

Good point. "You said Declan snatched me away...does that mean he abducted me? Do you know who I am?"

"Quit wasting my time and get out." She pressed the gun against my temple.

Seeing that I couldn't squeeze any more out of this lemon, I unlocked the car door and stepped out. This area may have looked like it was clear, but my instincts were telling me otherwise. Groups of zombies were nearby, and they were wandering closer. That moment, I had a wicked little thought that I quickly set aside. Declan needed this ride to make his escape. That bitch Lara might have deserved it, but Declan and the others weren't so bad. Besides, those two were armed.

At least I still had my backpack. I went into the gas station to purchase a road map and quickly departed before Lara changed her mind and wanted my backpack too. Without it, my chance for survival would plummet. And the map I just purchased, well, I highly doubted I would be able to charge my phone once the battery drained.

Two options were available: I could wait nearby until Declan's group came back, or I could try to make it to the vineyard. If I rejoined Declan's group, Lara might try to chase me off again or murder me altogether. But the vineyard was about a hundred miles away, about two to three days on foot. Could I make it there in one piece?

The vineyard was the more tempting option. It was located in a remote area, so the chance of it being raided by looters was very low. There was the possibility of someone claiming the place for themselves, but first things first--I should try to find a car with the key in it.

After half an hour going around parking lots looking for a car with a key inside while evading zombies, I came to the realization that I might have to abandon that ambition. None of the parked cars had a key left inside and whatever cars I could find on the road with the key still inside were so closed-in that the original owner had been forced to abandon it to travel on foot.

Declan was right: the city wasn't the place to dawdle. The stench of death was building up at a rapid rate. It most likely meant that the infection was spreading through the population at a terrifying rate. A city of five and a half million people will soon become a city of five and a half million undead.

I did not want to stick around for that.

I climbed on top of a truck and spread the map on the surface. The vineyard was about 100 miles northeast of the city and the highway would take me three-quarters of the way there. I needed to at least grab a bike. That should shorten my travel time significantly.

I sensed three people approaching from the inner city. A mob of undead was following closely behind. I got up and stepped on the map to prevent it from being blown away. From this height, I could see two guys and a woman running down the streets, carrying as much as they could. Behind them were a few dozen undead.

I was hoping they could just run past me, taking the horde with them, but when they spotted me standing there, they headed for the truck I was standing on. Two of the guys climbed up first, and then they both grabbed the woman up. Soon we were surrounded by a horde of hungry zombies clawing at the truck we were standing on. Good thing they couldn't climb.

_Thanks a lot._ I said nothing. Not a good time to generate animosity. I knelt back down to look at my map. "Do you mind?" I said.

The three people who were trying to catch their breath looked down and saw that they were standing on my map, so they stepped off. Thanks to these jerks, getting out of here would be a challenge enough without the bike. I would need to plan rest stops along the way, some place high up that would require climbing.

"I'm Mason. This is my brother, Luke, and my sister, Elise."

_Yeah, this is the time for introductions._ "Pregnant woman trying to make it out of the city alive." I didn't bother trying to remember their names. I was annoyed at them for drawing the horde here. It wouldn't matter anyway. If they could make it out of here alive, then maybe I would reconsider.

I quickly did a headcount of the horde. Fifty-one in total. I had enough bullets to take them out, but the noise would draw more. Besides, it would be a waste of ammo, and I had a limited supply. I neatly folded up the map and carefully placed it into my backpack.

"Hey, do you have any water?" the woman asked me.

I ignored her. The water I had in my backpack needed to last for my three-day trip, no thanks to them. It wasn't the time for a charity case.

The other two men got the message, but the woman continued on. "Trade?" She opened her backpack and showed me its contents.

"Elise, she doesn't have it," her brother said.

"Can any of you hack a ride?" I asked.

"I can try," Mason replied.

I grabbed a bottle of water from my backpack and handed it to the woman. She uncapped it and chugged it down halfway before she remembered to pass it to her brothers.

_Yes, in a time of crisis, make sure you drink all your water supply in one sitting._

At least the two brothers took small sips and then stored the rest away.

"Get to it." I made a gesture toward the head of the truck.

The man who spoke to me first, the one named Mason, took off his jacket and wrapped it around his fist. He jumped down to the head of the truck, lay flat on top, and then punched the glass window on the passenger side. It shattered open. He crawled inside.

He should not be able to do that. Super strength?

His ability beckoned me to take a closer look at him. His aura wasn't as complex as other people's. A simple man. An honest man. A gem among the pebbles. I turned to examine the other two. I couldn't remember the other guy's name, but his aura was similar to Mason's, though the balance was a little off. The woman's aura, however, was the petty, selfish type. Not good company to have during the apocalypse. But they were siblings, which meant they were a package. Would the benefit outweigh the harm in this case?

A few hours without progress later, the other brother wanted to have a try. By the time they both climbed back up and shook their heads, it was already sundown. Most of the dead had been lured away by other people running by, but it wasn't a good idea to move out in the dark. The siblings agreed.

Elise was holding two cans of chili in her hand, trying to figure out how to open them without a can opener. She handed it over to Mason, who was about to crush it open and probably spill everything in the process.

"Wait." I tossed each of them a pouch of dehydrated beef and pasta. I had plenty of dehydrated food. It would be difficult to eat without adding water, but it was food and it was edible.

I didn't want to torture my teeth, so I added water to the pouch and waited for it to rehydrate again.

"Thank you," the brothers said in unison.

"It's too hard," Elise complained as she chewed. "Can you give us another bottle of water?"

"I don't have a lot of water left to give you."

"Which means you _have_ water," Elise pursued.

"Elise!" Mason scolded her.

"I'm pregnant and I need water to keep my baby alive." I intentionally uncovered my slightly-showing pregnant belly. "People are selfish in times of crisis, especially a mother. Deal with it."

"If we had water, we would have shared it with you!" Elise furrowed her brows.

Probably forgot that I gave her a bottle of water earlier. "Interesting logic." I turned away and ignored her.

Mason seated himself next to me. "I'm sorry about that. Elise is the only girl in the house, so our parents spoiled her. Reality will catch up with her soon."

I shrugged. "Nothing to do with me." This package might be more trouble than it was worth.

"So where are you heading?"

"Angel's Field. I have a piece of land there."

"Better off than us. We've got no idea where we're going. Just out of the city, I guess. They're going to quarantine this place soon. Maybe even nuke it all."

"The crimson rain is a worldwide phenomenon. Unlikely there would be a quarantine if the infection is everywhere."

He blinked. "You think this is caused by the crimson rain?"

"Just speculation." I wasn't about to tell him about my ability, of course. I doubted there would be anyone I trusted enough to confide that secret. Most likely will take it to my grave.

"That makes a lot of sense, actually. They said the rain is responsible for so many people developing super abilities. I, myself, developed super strength. Got to be careful with it though...broke a lot of things the past few months. My brother, Luke...well, his ability is a little weird. He can make plants grow faster. Or so he claimed. I haven't seen it." He chuckled.

"Yeah? That's neat." I turned my head toward Luke. His ability immediately piqued my interest.

Luke noticed I was looking and hastily averted his eyes, his face visibly reddened.

# Chapter 3

While I was on guard duty and the others slept, the emergency alert on our phones went off. I quickly turned mine off to avoid attracting unwanted attention and reminded the others to do the same. The message said the military had secured the northernmost section of the city and was calling for survivors.

I took out my map and shined the flashlight on it. The siblings gathered around. We were at the eastern edge of the city. From here to the northern district would take about an hour and a half on foot. Going through the city streets would be suicide. If we went around the edge, it would take two to three hours. It was still a better option than risking a three-day trip to the vineyard.

Mason pointed at the map. "We should take the smaller road out here."

I nodded in agreement.

When morning's first light came, I took my Desert Eagle from my backpack and said to the siblings, "I'll shoot the ones in front of the truck, and then we run for it. The noise will draw more of them, but hopefully we'll be gone by then."

The siblings stared at the gun in my hand.

"Any of you not fast enough, not my problem. Got that?"

They nodded.

I inhaled deeply, held the Desert Eagle in a firm grip, then took aim. I fired eight rounds; six went through heads and the other two through chests. I climbed down the truck as quick as I possibly could and ran for it, reloading my gun in the process. I didn't look back to see if the siblings were following behind.

When I reached the small road we'd planned on traveling down, I was having second thoughts. This road was also packed with abandoned cars. Some even had zombies trapped inside. There were also quite a few roaming around. Before they could detect me, I climbed on top of the gray car next to me and jumped onto a white van next to it. The siblings soon caught up to me. They climbed on a different car.

Farther east was the river and a bridge a mile in the opposite direction of where we were heading. It was this road or go back a mile and then loop around the forest path. I decided to stick to this road. There were cars lined up as far as the eye could see.

"We could jump on the cars to go down the road," I said softly.

Elise grabbed onto Mason's arms and strongly shook her head. She didn't think we should take this route.

I wasn't going to wait around for them to decide. I tightened my backpack straps and jumped on top of another car. Eleven cars later, I spotted a sedan with a window half-open and a key left inside. There was a zombie driver inside, though. I looked behind and saw the siblings trying to catch up with me. I waited for them. While I waited, I sensed the aura of a live person nearby. A child.

"That car still has a key inside." I pointed when the siblings were close enough.

Their eyes lit up like candles in the dark when they looked. I took aim and shot the five zombies trailing after us and then shot the zombie inside the gray sedan. When the coast was clear, we opened the door, dragged the limp zombie driver out, and rushed into the car. Luke took the driver's seat and began maneuvering the car off the road and onto the grass. More zombies were coming.

"Wait!" I grabbed Luke's shoulder before he stepped on the petal. "Drive about twenty cars down and then stop."

Luke gave me a look of confusion but did as I asked.

"I'll be back in a minute. Wait for me." If he didn't, then oh well.

I barged out of the car and sprinted to the car with the child's aura inside. The door was locked. I could see a small child lying on the floor of the back seat, looking at me with round brown eyes. Zombies were approaching. I grabbed a rock and tried to break the glass window on the front seat.

"What are you doing? Get in the car!" Mason got out of the car and grabbed me.

I shoved him back. "There's a child inside! In the back!"

Mason grabbed the back car door and ripped it right off. I grabbed the child and rushed back to our car. Once inside, I aimed my gun and shot at the three zombies closing in on Mason. Mason got in, closed the door, and I screamed at Luke to step on it.

I looked down at the three or four-year-old child sitting in my lap, staring back at me with those round brown eyes again. I saw my own reflection staring back.

Was I really going to leave her there? I'd thought about ignoring her. I'd almost let myself ride away. And even now, I was screaming at myself inside my head for my impulsive behavior.

What kind of person was I?

I put the child on Mason's lap and shook my backpack off. I took out the photo I put in a special compartment and stared at it. It was the photo Declan showed me when I first woke up. A photo of us picking grapes from the grapevines and smiling together with a country house behind us. Smiling. When was the last time I smiled? I realized I couldn't recall.

Was I really the woman in the photo?

All I could recall was the complicated look in Declan's eyes whenever he looked at me. It made me feel extremely uncomfortable, like he was looking at an entirely different person through me. Whenever he looked at me that way, I felt like I was living in someone else's skin. And sometimes when I got too close to him, I could even sense fear.

"What the fuck...?" Elise had been staring at the little girl for quite a while now. After she shook off the initial shock, she screamed at me. "Who the hell do you think you are?! You almost got my brother killed!"

"If I were you, I wouldn't scream at the woman with a gun in her hand."

That easily shut her up.

I slipped the photo back into my backpack. The ride was more than just a little bumpy. Luke was running through a lot of debris on the road.

A supposed hour walk was reduced to that of a few minutes' drive. Soon, we reached the military barricades. We got out with our hands in the air. The soldiers at the barricade let us through and led us to a long line of people waiting to get inside the wall the military had set up. They were sorting us out.

Inside the first layer of walls were multiple medical tents. Doctors were conducting physicals. Anyone with unidentified wounds on their body would remain outside the inner wall for a blood test. People without wounds were to be put into isolation for twenty-four hours for further observation inside designated guarded buildings. Two and a half hours in line, and we were permitted to go inside the wall. The hazmat suit soldiers led each of us to our own cell made of clear plastic. Apparently, they were running out of rooms to put people. Our twenty-four hours of rations was sealed in with us. We needed to be escorted to go to the bathroom.

Twenty-four hours later, I was released from isolation. A uniformed woman with a clipboard came to each room to ask if we had any special abilities. I answered no, so they took me to a registration area. I waited another two hours in line again. The person at the registration desk asked for my identification and if I had any relatives I wanted to get in touch with. All I could give him was my name and "I don't know" about relatives.

After I was done with registration, I was provided an identification card. I got on an assigned shuttle that transported me to a residential building where I was assigned a living space on the second floor. At the apartment door, I found out I would be sharing the three-bedroom apartment with half a dozen other people.

A married couple. An old man. A middle-aged lady. Two teenage girls, probably eighteen or nineteen years old.

All the bedrooms were taken, of course. I had the choice of sleeping in the living room, the kitchen, or the laundry room. I chose the laundry room. At least I would have some privacy while I slept.

As I was putting my backpack down, I overheard my teenage housemates talking. One girl was complaining about the place being crowded enough without me showing up. The other girl said if only they had super powers, then the military would give them their own apartment. Then the other girl said they could try to find someone with superpowers to rely on, etcetera, etcetera...

I had lied to the military people about my abilities because I knew they were recruiting people with superpowers. God knows what kind of experiments they would conduct on me, and if not experimentation, then they would probably send me to fight zombies or something along that line. My extrasensory ability was no fireball or ice projectile. I'd rather sleep in the laundry room.

Three days later, I discovered my laundry room was not all that bad. More people were sent to this apartment and the bedrooms had to be split, the living room divided into sections, but my cozy laundry room was too small to be divided any further. When they could not cram any more people into buildings, they set up tents outside for new arrivals.

At first, we were provided three meals a day, then it was reduced to two. The portions were getting smaller too. I had my own supply of dehydrated food, but the people out there constantly complained about being hungry. I started out with 100 servings of dehydrated food. Now I had 88 left. I decided to start reducing it to one pouch a day, plus the rations. It should last me another three months.

I heard that yesterday the military sent four squads outside the walls on a rescue mission and to search and retrieve supplies. Only half the soldiers came back in one piece. There were fewer survivors too. Even without ESP, the energy at this base was noticeably low.

And then today, the crimson rain returned. It had been raining nonstop since earlier this morning. The people living in the tents had to be temporarily evacuated into buildings.

I sprawled over the windowsill of my second-floor apartment, staring at the pouring crimson rain. The cool mist felt nice against my skin. Among the people still out in the rain, I saw a familiar face in the crowd. I had seen him more than a few times in magazines and newspapers. Even a few times on TV. Liam West, chairman of West & West, the business empire that employed more than a quarter of the workforce of this city. I once read an article in the paper that said if you go to any supermarket in the country and grab an item at random, there was a good chance it was made by one of the companies owned by West & West.

I recalled a few magazines had dubbed him "The Man Who Sits Atop the World."

Looking at him now, rugged and unkempt, it was a wonder how I could recognize him in the first place. He looked nothing like the god walking amongst men on the spreads of magazines.

The first time I saw his face in the news had been when he was putting up a ten-million-dollar reward to any detective who could solve his wife's murder, and a million-dollar reward for anyone who could shed light on the case. A week later, the reward doubled. At the time I thought, _That 's a man who really wants revenge_. He used to be a man who sat atop the world but now had to live inside a tent like everyone else. Falling from such height must have hurt.

Suddenly, he stopped in his tracks and tilted his head up. Our eyes met. The moment I looked into those striking deep blue eyes, I felt a shiver down my spine. Not even the unholy dead outside the walls could have garnered such a reaction from me. I immediately averted my gaze. I stole a glance at him a few seconds later and discovered he was not there anymore. A great sense of loss swept through me, and I didn't know why.

Could it be that I had known him in the past? If I were a rich spoiled brat in the past, perhaps we'd met at one of those high-society parties or something. That possibility wasn't too far-fetched.

The sound of an alarm drew me back from my thoughts. The outer wall was under attack. This usually happened when new people arrived with a trail of zombies behind them or whenever a group of zombies wandered too close to the perimeter. All military personnel were to report to their positions, but it had nothing to do with common folk like me. Still a cause for concern, though.

I sat up straight and closed the window when I felt droplets of cold rain on my arm. The wind was probably coming in, and I didn't want to get wet. Strange, I still felt cold water dripping on me. I detected someone standing next to me from the corner of my eye and turned around.

The man who'd been standing in the rain no more than a minute ago was standing over me, still dripping wet. I glanced behind him and saw that the front door was closed shut and the carpet was completely dry except for the spot he was standing on. Was it teleportation or superspeed?

I was dying to ask "Do I know you?" but successfully suppressed the temptation and waited for him to say something first. He came up here as soon as he saw me, which strongly indicated he had something to say, but the matter of him being friend or foe was still in question. The last thing I needed in my situation was another person taking advantage of my amnesia. I didn't want to give away anything just yet.

He was staring at me as though he were staring at a ghost. His irises were constantly moving as though he were measuring each feature on my face. Finally, his gaze locked onto my jawline. His brows furrowed as though there was something horribly wrong with it. Strangely enough, I knew what he was looking for. The woman in the picture Declan showed me had an ugly burn scar there, whereas I did not. I'd asked him about it before, and Declan had said he'd elected to have the area grafted while I was in that month-long coma. Said that scar had been doing so much harm to my self-esteem. I'd looked at the area very closely but couldn't even see any telltale sign of a skin graft.

"I-I had the scar removed." I didn't know why I stuttered or even why I was explaining it to him. I just didn't want him to say, "Sorry, wrong person." I even added, "Skin graft."

A hand reached for my jawline, his thumb gently rubbing it. I didn't stop him. I was hoping this could be it, that I'd found the one person who could tell me everything about my past. That I could be a sister or a friend or someone's daughter. That I wasn't just this one person in this big wide world, the very reason I didn't confront Declan about the holes in his story. But deep down, I wanted the truth more than anything.

His hand slowly traveled down my neck and lifted the fold of my shirt. I knew he was looking for the red birthmark just above my breast. His eyes reddened when he found it. His hand traveled lower still to my pregnant belly. The moment he placed his hand on my abdomen, his stern expression was immediately washed away by the rainwater dripping down his face.

Suddenly, he wrapped his arms around me and buried his face between my neck and shoulder, his coarse breathing in my ears. I felt a warm wetness on my neck and couldn't tell if it was the rainwater warmed by his body temperature or...

A faint smile touched my lips. It felt nice...being important to somebody.

I pulled away when I heard something hit the window. A man in uniform and a raincoat was standing in the rain, waving, and saying something that couldn't be heard through the window until I opened it.

"Liam! Didn't you hear the alarm? You're needed on the wall!" the man shouted, his voice barely audible over the rain.

Liam West was a well-known businessman, unlikely to be a career military officer. He also wasn't in uniform, so I was a little curious as to why he was needed at the wall. Could he have been recruited because of his ability?

"Angel, I need you to stay right here until I get back. Can you do that for me?"

_He called me Angel?_ I nodded.

"Don't go anywhere!"

I nodded once again, reassuring him that I wasn't going anywhere.

He joined our lips in a quick kiss and then he was gone. I was stunned where I stood. Images were flashing in my head, but they were going by so quickly I couldn't make out what they were. By the time I shook off the stun and turned to look out the window, neither of them was there anymore.

_He..._kissed _me. He --_

All right, so that crossed "sister" off the list of possible relations then, or that would make for one awkward family reunion. But didn't his wife just pass away a few months ago? Former _amour_? Current love affair? Mistress? The possibilities exponentially worsened. The first one was acceptable, but the rest?

"Sienna, you know that man?" Hannah, one of the teen girls, asked.

"Yeah." _Apparently so._

"Does that mean you're going to move out?" Clara, the other teenage girl, asked.

The girls had been jealous of me having the laundry room all to myself ever since the apartment became so packed that they had to share the bedroom with three other people. From tuning into their gossiping--my only entertainment for the past three days, by the way--they couldn't sleep well due to the snoring.

"Of course she's going to move out with him!" Hannah retorted. "Didn't you see that he has superpowers? The military most likely gave him and his family their own apartment and three meals a day. Why would she want to stay in this rat's nest?"

"Say, don't you think that man looks familiar? I could have sworn I've seen him somewhere."

"You're right. He does look familiar. Wait a minute. Wait a minute, could that be...?" Hannah shook her head. "No, he couldn't be..."

Clara covered her mouth and gasped. "I think that was Liam West!"

"No way!" Hannah screeched. "Liam West? Sienna, you know Liam West?!"

All eyes in the room turned our way.

"So what if he's Liam West? It's the end of the world. Who cares!" Mr. Thompson butted in. He was also a well-to-do businessman before all of this. He'd been so upset that no one would accept his wallet full of cash when he tried to buy rations. "All of his billions couldn't buy a loaf of bread now!"

The value of government-issued money had plummeted. There were rumors that some people still accepted it as currency, but I personally had not encountered anyone who would. These days, those who had supplies were the rich and those who had not were the poor.

I finally noticed a piece of wet paper on the puddle of water on the carpet. Liam West must have dropped it. I picked it up from the floor and, although the writing was smudged, it was still somewhat legible. It looked like a list of names and addresses.

Sienna Carmichael.

My name was on it and the address on the same line as my name looked to be the address of this apartment.

_He was looking for me? But why did he call me Angel?_

"Didn't his wife pass away some months ago?"

"Yeah, it was all over the news."

I quietly slipped back into my cozy laundry room.

# Chapter 4

I was eating dinner out of a pouch when the laundry door swung open. Liam West was holding the knob on the door, looking more than just a little aggravated. When he found me sitting on my sleeping bag in the laundry room, he placed a hand over his chest as though he had just had quite a scare.

On a good note, he didn't look as disheveled as he had earlier. He wore a tailored charcoal suit now, his hair was combed back, and it looked like he'd shaved. He resembled his photos a little more.

"Close the door," I said, not wanting to become a show for prying eyes.

He closed the door behind him and then we were two people enclosed in a tiny space, half of which was taken up by shelving units and the washer and dryer. He made a quick scan of the room we were in and then his gaze went from the sleeping bag on the floor to the backpack against the dryer, and at last to the pouch and spoon in my hand. I thought he might be hungry, so I used my free hand to take out a pouch from my backpack and offered it to him.

His lips thinned. He knelt down on the sleeping bag and grabbed my backpack.

I suppressed the urge to snatch it back. He was the first person I'd showed my stash to and I instantly regretted it. He quickly went through my belongings, spent a little longer looking at my Desert Eagle, and then put the backpack on himself. He even tried to take the pouch and spoon away from my hand, but I held on tight. I would have growled at him if I were a dog. I was holding on so tight that he had no choice but to let me keep it. A complicated look passed through his deep blue eyes.

He pressed a kiss on my hairline and then pulled me up to my feet. "Come on, we need to get out of here."

So we were moving. I was about to grab my sleeping bag too, but he shook his head. "We have a bed."

Only then was he successful in convincing me to leave it behind. He led me out of the apartment building under the watchful eyes of my housemates. The rain had stopped, but the streets were still flooded with three inches of water. He swept me off my feet and carried me to a waiting vehicle on the road. The driver took us to another residential building, this one much less crowded than the one I was in. I supposed it must be housing the military provided to people with special abilities. Liam West's apartment was on the fifth floor.

It was slightly smaller than the one I'd just left, but it was neat and clean. The best part was that it didn't have a dozen other people inside. I was about to ask who else lived here besides him but decided to let the question answer itself. Liam barred the door behind us and then set the backpack down.

While he did that, I took the liberty to take a good look around. It was a two-bedroom, one-bath apartment with access to an outdoor patio. Not much could be said about it, but it was more than what a lot of people had these days. I went to the kitchen to throw away the empty pouch of dehydrated food I'd finished on the way.

When I came back into the living room, Liam was sitting on the sofa. When he saw me coming from the kitchen, he tapped twice on his lap, a gesture I read as an invitation to sit on it. I decided to turn down the invitation and take a seat next to him instead. Before my bum hit the sofa, he pulled me toward him and easily seated me on his lap. Then suddenly, his lips collided with mine. I felt his hand stationed at the back of my neck, and he held me firm as he fervently deepened the kiss. I was a little frightened by the intensity, but at the same time I was bewildered by the familiarity of it.

A dream I often had was rolling inside my head. I was sprawled out on the white linen inside what looked like a botanical garden filled with blooming blue peonies. There was a man on top of me, passionately kissing me. His appearance had always been blurred out by my missing memory, but the fog of obscurity was lifting. I stopped resisting on the inside and closed my eyes to see if this feeling of familiarity could clear up the image inside my head even more.

He only broke the kiss when we heard knocking on the front door. We both got up, and Liam went to get it. At the door were two men in uniform, both looked like they were in their fifties. One of them had two stars on each of his shoulders. I wasn't very knowledgeable about military rankings, but I learned from TV that only generals can wear stars.

"Liam, about today's situation--" the man I assumed to be a general began but then stopped dead in his tracks when he laid eyes on me.

The other man's reaction was even more colorful. He stared at me, wide-eyed, as though he were looking at a ghost.

Liam strode to my side. "General Grant, Colonel Hayley, I believe you met my wife at our wedding."

The atmosphere went eerily quiet. The two men in uniform exchanged looks with each other and then turned their gaze to me. I was in shock too, except I didn't have anyone to exchange looks with.

"How do you do, General? Colonel?" Should I be offering tea or something? Do we even have tea?

General Grant nodded. "It's good to see you looking well, Sienna."

Colonel Hayley took my hand and kissed it in a gesture I'd only seen on old TV shows. "You look as lovely as ever, Mrs. West. You haven't aged a day in four years."

Four years since the wedding? "Can I offer you gentlemen some refreshments?" _Whatever they might be._

"Just water, thank you."

"I'll be right back." I went back into the kitchen and pressed my back against the wall. _What the hell was that?_ From here, I could hear them discussing the situation beyond the wall.

I grabbed two bottles of water from the noticeably empty fridge while listening. They were using a lot of code words. Something about the crimson rain making the zombies even stronger...losing contact with some other bases...water filtration...borrowing more supplies...

I took three clean glasses from the cabinet, put them on a tray, filled them up with bottled water, and brought them to the living room. They stood up when I entered the room, thanked me for the water, and only sat down again once I'd left. I didn't know people who still did that anymore. Probably some high-society rules I had no clue about. Liam agreed to something and then they got up and said their goodbyes.

From their conversation, I guessed the military was ordered to set up bases in multiple cities as the last line of defense. Some of them weren't successful in securing the area. The base here was running low on supplies, which made sense because rations were getting smaller and smaller.

I was startled when Liam came from behind and wrapped his arms around me while I was deep in thought. I felt him press a kiss on my head.

"Why are they trying to borrow when they could just take everything from you?" I inquired. Curiosity bested me.

"West & West has been a provider for the military for decades. Besides, if they can borrow, then why steal? Society hasn't entirely collapsed yet. They need to keep enforcing the concept of ownership as an incentive for people to keep working for them. If I don't let them borrow, then that's another story.

"The military has been recruiting people with special abilities under commission. They get to keep a portion of the supplies retrieved from their missions. Don't worry, my uncle is an honorable man, and that reputation means a great deal to him."

"Your uncle?"

"You forgot? General Grant is my mother's younger brother."

"I've forgotten a lot of things."

I gasped when he picked me up all of a sudden, strode toward the bedroom, and then laid me on the plush bed. "Where were we?" He dove in to kiss me again, but this time I managed to dodge.

"I want to take a shower," was the only excuse I could come up with on the spot. The weird part was he looked like what I said wasn't out of the ordinary at all. He released me, and I went to grab my backpack from the living room. My change of clothes was in there. On my way to the bathroom, Liam walked out and handed me a folded towel and some clothes. At a glance, they looked like women's clothes and the material looked expensive.

"Thank you," I said as I accepted them.

I went into the bathroom, locked the door, and laid the clothes on the sink counter. _Whose clothes are these?_ I wondered as I unfolded an article of clothing and pressed it against myself. It was a lace, rose-beige colored dress with a high neckline, short sleeves fanning out from the shoulders, fitted at the waist, slightly tapered at the hips and thighs, and free-flowing to knee-length. It looked like it would fit me.

Were they mine? If so, why was he carrying it around with him during the apocalypse?

The other article of clothing was a pair of men's briefs. No bra. Yeah, I wasn't about to wear that. Good thing I brought along a few sets of undergarments with me.

I took off my clothes and got into the shower once the water was hot enough.

It was the first hot shower I'd taken in days, and it felt great. Sharing the apartment with a dozen people meant infrequent cold or barely lukewarm showers. I should enjoy it to the fullest while power and hot water were still available.

Half an hour later, I stepped out of the shower, steamy and wrinkled like a prune. It was worth it. I put on the dress. It felt slightly tight around the belly due to my pregnancy, but the material could be stretched, so it wasn't a problem. The rest fit me well. I looked at myself in the mirror and the feeling of familiarity came back to me.

When I stepped into the living room, Liam stared at me, unblinking. My gut feeling was right: this dress had sentimental meaning. A moment later, his gaze was fixed on my abdomen. With this dress, the four-month pregnancy was noticeable.

He walked up to me and placed a hand on my belly. "Is it too tight?" he asked, concerned.

Just a tiny bit, but I shook my head. Can't be too picky during the apocalypse. "No, but I don't think I'll be able to wear it, say, a week from now."

"I'll go to the distribution center later and see if I can find some maternity dresses for you."

I nodded. Something loose and comfortable would be nice.

"Come on, I'll take you to the cafeteria. You must still be hungry."

They had a cafeteria here? Talk about special treatment. A pregnant woman like me could always eat more.

"Give me a minute. I need to throw my clothes in the washer first."

Apparently the cafeteria was on the first floor of the adjacent building. The moment I entered the cafeteria, quite a few pairs of eyes were on us. It must have been because I was a tad overdressed for the occasion. There were a lot of people in uniform, which suggested this cafeteria was for military personnel. Liam seated me at a table with two empty seats and asked what I wanted to eat. I saw people eating pizza and told him I had a craving for pizza. He nodded and then lined up to get food for the both of us.

The people in the cafeteria were talking about Liam. It almost made me feel vain for thinking they were looking at me. Liam was an instantly recognizable face in this city. Now the subject shifted to the murdered wife and me. A lot of assumptions and guesses were made that I could have eaten my meal without.

A man just walking into the cafeteria headed straight for the table I was sitting at. Three men behind him followed.

"This seat is taken."

He sat down anyway, flashed a smile, and said, "Gorgeous, I'm not here for the seat. You must be new here. I can show you around."

"The seat you're sitting in is already taken."

"What's your name, sweetheart?"

"I said the seat you're sitting in is already taken."

"By whom?"

"Liam West."

The name instantly wiped the smile off his face. His buddies didn't look too comfortable when they heard the name either. They grabbed him by the shoulders and gestured for him to leave. The man sitting next to me was unwilling to move. He shook his buddies off.

"How about you and me go sit at another table?" he said to me. "You wouldn't want to sit next to Liam West."

I pretended to look surprised. "Why not?"

"The man's not right up here." He tapped on his head. "He lost everything to the epidemic. All of that wealth and power. He's like a ticking time bomb, and you don't know when he's going to go off. You certainly don't want to be around when it happens."

"Why would you say that?"

The man opened his mouth to reply, but his buddies gave his shoulder a hard tug. He turned and saw Liam holding a tray, coming this way. He pushed to his feet and walked away with his buddies.

Liam soon came back with half a pepperoni pizza and a carton of milk that had everyone nearby eyeing it. It didn't seem like it was a common practice around here. I tried to ignore the prying eyes and got started on the first slice. A pregnant woman has to eat.

"Who are those people?" I asked Liam while eyeing the group of four men sitting at another table.

"Rising star recruits," Liam replied without even looking.

"Ah." That would explain the cocky attitudes. I didn't press any further.

After the second slice, I was stuffed. I told Liam I couldn't eat anymore, and he finished the rest. We left the cafeteria with the unopened carton of milk and headed back to the apartment. Liam barred the door and then went to the bedroom. He came back with one of his dress shirts and gave it to me.

"You don't look comfortable in that dress at all."

I wasn't. I went to the bathroom to change. Liam appeared to be six-three or six-four, so his shirt looked huge on me. The bottom edge almost touched my knees.

Now that I was clean and fed and comfortable, I felt like going to bed.

Liam was playing around with my Desert Eagle in the living room.

"Which room is your room?" I asked so that I could take the other one.

"The one to the left." Then he said, "This weapon isn't compatible with you. It has too strong of a knockback. You can easily hurt yourself in the process. I can find you something easier to use."

"This one is fine."

"You've fired it before?"

"I made it here, didn't I?"

He put the Desert Eagle back on the table and looked up at me. The quiet staring made me feel a tad uncomfortable. Still, I looked him in the eyes because I knew he was trying to read me. Probably already figured out something wasn't quite right with me. I couldn't remember what kind of person I was, but if he'd been my husband for four years, it didn't come as a surprise that he could tell.

There was no better time to come clean than now. Hiding my condition would only worsen things and rouse more suspicion, and I knew how suspicion worked. It starts out as a tiny thought, but soon it will consume you and take over. Learning to trust again becomes a nearly impossible task.

He was the only person I could rely on now. I could not afford to lose his trust.

"There's something I haven't told you yet..." I paused to organize what I was about to say. "I can't remember anything beyond the past month." I was about to add "even you," but decided that might have been too cruel. I could tell this man cared about me a great deal.

He didn't give me a reaction, so I continued explaining. "When I woke up, there was a man named Declan Howell who told me that I'd been in a car accident. He told me that I was his wife. That we grew up in an orphanage together and got married after we got out. He told me that my baby is--"

"Declan." He grounded out the name. The change in his aura was sudden.

I sensed a chilling intent to kill.

He got up and walked to me. I almost took a few steps back but controlled myself and stood firm. He pulled me into his arms and trapped me in a tight embrace. "You are my wife, Angel. Your baby is _mine_. You're both _mine_."

"What really happened? If I'm really your wife, then why did all the papers say I was murdered?"

His arms tightened around me.

Though it felt uncomfortable, I said nothing.

"That woman attempted to have you killed, and Declan had you switched with a similar body, that's all."

"That woman?"

"Your foster sister, Ruby."

"And Declan?"

"Nobody."

"Nobody?"

"He's just a killer for hire. An expensive one. Did he do anything to you?"

I shook my head. "He didn't do anything to me... except took advantage of my amnesia and tried to keep me living inside his lies."

"Which you didn't buy."

I shook my head again.

Something didn't sound right, but I couldn't quite put a finger on it. "So...this woman named Ruby hired Declan to have me killed, but he made a switch and hid me away? Why would he do that? Please, no more half-truths. I don't want any more half-truths. I got suspicious of Declan because of all of his half-truths."

I picked up that he hesitated before he spoke. "Declan Howell is the leader of a small mercenary group. They will accept any job for a price. Five years ago, Declan Howell's target was a fish too big for even him to swallow and he got hunted down as a result. He took a job at your vineyard as a cover until the rest of his team could finish the job. He'd taken a liking to you while he was there."

That would explain the photos of us taken at the vineyard and nowhere else. "Taken a liking" was an understatement, but it was understandable for a husband to brush it off.

I gaped up at him. "What about you? What about us?"

# Chapter 5

According to Liam, the first time he'd laid eyes on me was five years ago. He was leaving work when he saw me in front of the West & West headquarters playing my violin for tips. He stayed a moment to listen and then dropped a twenty into my violin case. The next day, he noticed I wasn't there anymore. He asked the security guards, and they told him I usually would not stay in one place longer than a day or two. He then went on with his day.

The second time he saw me was when he was driving home from work a few weeks later. I was a few blocks away. He said he recognized me almost instantly even though it'd been weeks since he last saw me. He parked on the side of the road and rolled down the window to listen to me play. This time, he got out of his car and dropped a fifty into my case. He remembered I was smiling at him and said, "Thank you."

He found me the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth times just the same way. After work, he would drive around looking for me on the side of the streets. Some days he could find me, some days he missed me entirely. After the sixth time, I seemed to have disappeared from the area altogether.

He found me the seventh time playing the violin at the nearby park, three months later and by sheer coincidence. He was invited to attend a charity art auction, but the parking lot at that building was full, so he'd decided to leave his car at the park and walk. As he was walking to the gala, he spotted me playing my violin by the duck pond. Later on, he found out that law enforcement had told me I couldn't perform on the side of the streets anymore. He took a seat on the park's bench and listened to me play. That time, he'd dropped a hundred into my violin case. From then on, he would almost always stop by the park after work. There were days I came, and there were days I didn't. It didn't deter him from stopping by. That went on for a year.

Playing at the park wasn't as profitable as playing on the streets. Most of the time it was just him and me, but he always dropped a hundred as an incentive to keep me coming back to the same spot. That was what he thought, anyway. He didn't ask for my name, but there was an engraving on the side of the violin that said "Angel," so he thought that was my name. He thought it was fitting, because to him, I was the image of an angel. He later found out that "Angel" was the name of the violin. But even after he learned my name was Sienna Carmichael, he still liked to call me Angel.

Imagining the story as he was retelling it made me laugh. "And after a year, you finally mustered up the courage to talk to me and then proposed?"

"It wasn't like that," he said, smiling fondly from reminiscing. "Don't undersell yourself; you were a very good violinist. Some people just have the ability to play with their souls and you were one of those rare few."

"You're a music lover?"

"Not exactly. I just like to listen to you play. Besides, at the time, I thought you were much too young for me."

"How old were you?"

"Thirty by the time we walked down the altar."

"And me?"

"Twenty."

"Go on. How did we get married if you thought I was too young for you?"

"Do you want the shortened version or the thorough one?"

"I want to know as much as I possibly can."

"The thorough version actually began with your parents..."

My parents had been married for eight years but were still childless. They divorced and my father remarried, but my mother had never told him she was pregnant during the divorce. I lived with my mother at the family vineyard until she fell ill and then entrusted me to the guardianship of the Winstons, her two best friends since childhood who had married each other. Little did my mother know that Garnet Winston had always been suspicious that there was something going on between my mother and her husband. She even suspected that I might be her husband's secret bastard child, which was the cause of my parents' divorce.

As my guardians, the Winstons also managed my sizable inheritance. The Winstons were a well-to-do family, but Garnet had grown accustomed to the high life of frivolous spending with the profit generated by my inheritance, and she knew she would lose it all once I turned twenty-one. The only way she could continue to manage my inheritance was to remain my guardian indefinitely.

Fortunately, I was allergic to the drug she was slowly poisoning me with. During one of my performances at the park, I became delirious with fever. Liam took me back to his penthouse and made a call to his personal doctor. The doctor noticed something wasn't quite right and sent my blood sample in to have it tested. That was when they discovered the drug in my bloodstream. Liam said that was when he had people investigate my living situation.

The very next day, photos of Liam carrying me into his penthouse surfaced as the scandal of the month. That put me in hot water with the Winstons. I was also facing expulsion from my private college. Then Liam added the last straw to the camel's back when he showed me the test results: Garnet was trying to make me mentally incapacitated so she could remain my legal guardian.

"So you offered to solve all of my problems with marriage to you?"

" _Our_ problems. My grandfather thought I was past the age for bachelorhood and had a candidate in mind. Our little scandal at the time worked out in my favor too."

I stared at him. He stared back. An awkward silence followed.

"You entered into a marriage so you could escape another?"

"Of course not. Not even my grandfather could force me to do anything I have no intention of doing in the first place."

I gave him the "you know you don't make sense" look.

The corner of his lips curved into a smile that contained a hint of mischief.

"A loveless marriage of convenience then," I concluded, tossing him a derisive glance.

"Now who said that?" He put his arms around me and pulled me closer. "I don't recall saying any such thing. You need to read between the lines, Angel. You can't expect a grown man like me to be like a schoolboy and spell everything out."

"Which line? The one where you thought I was too young for you or the one about you offering to marry me because you didn't like the candidate your grandfather had in mind?"

"A certain somebody at a certain point in time bought it."

"Ah." I nodded in realization. The younger version of me would find the offer of marriage tempting in that situation, and if I was anything like the me right now, I would want to know the reason why the other party wanted to offer me this deal. "So it was like that." _Interesting man, this Liam._ "I would have accepted 'I'm head over heels in love with you' or something along that line."

"I'm a businessman, not a gambler."

"A shady businessman."

"I closed the deal and that's all that mattered in the end." He gently stroked my pregnant belly, then said something unrelated. "September is just around the corner."

Then I remembered that my baby was due in late September. He was keeping track.

"Were we happily married?"

A pause. "The happiest."

_The first lie he 's told._

There was something he wasn't telling me. Should I dig further or be content with things thus far? I was someone's wife. I was going to be someone's mother. I had an identity. If I kept digging, I might lose it all.

# Chapter 6

"That's Hiroki's bedroom," Liam said to me just as I was entering the bedroom to the right. "Our bedroom is next door."

_Who is Hiroki?_ I wondered. It didn't look like I would have a choice on where to sleep tonight. I left the right bedroom and went to the one to the left. The queen-sized bed looked big enough. The bedding probably belonged to the previous owners of this apartment, but it wasn't the time to dawdle over that. I lifted the corner of the blanket and crawled into bed.

As I drifted asleep, I felt a calloused hand stroke my inner thigh as his other hand found its way to my breast. Sleep was chased away almost immediately. I could feel the dampness on my neck as he kissed and sucked on it. His coarse breath felt hot against my skin.

"Liam..."

"Angel..." he murmured back.

"Liam, my belly hasn't been feeling well lately," I quick-wittedly complained.

He lifted his head from my neck. "Is it the baby?"

"Yes."

His right hand released my breast and slid down to my belly. He lay next to me and started rubbing in a circular motion as though I was a child with a tummy ache or something. His coarse breath started to calm down quite a bit too. I could tell he'd abandoned his intentions.

"Last time we went for a checkup, the doctor said it was a normal pregnancy. I'll ask for a doctor to have a look tomorrow."

I shook my head. "It's probably just my diet."

"It's your first pregnancy; we can never be too careful."

Hearing him say those words felt like warm honey dripping inside my chest. I turned to lay on my side and hide the smile I couldn't hold back. I finally felt something other than the restlessness and uncertainty that had plagued me for the past month.

I closed my eyes and allowed that feeling to sink in as I drifted off to sleep.

I was woken in the middle of the night by painful pressure in my eyeballs just as I had many nights before. They felt like they were going to explode. I gritted my teeth and curled up from the pain. _Cry,_ I was screaming at myself inside my head. _Just cry!_

"Angel? Angel, what's wrong?" Liam switched the lamp on and pulled the blanket off me. "Tell me, what's wrong?"

"My eyes," I managed to say through gritted teeth.

"Your eyes? Let me have a look."

I turned to let him have a look. I tried to open my eyes, but even the tiniest bit of light sent a piercing pain through my skull. I screeched and shut my eyes again.

"Wait here. I'll get help!"

I grabbed hold of him and refused to let him go. The harder he pulled away, the harder I gripped. No one could help me. Nothing could help me. I just needed to cry.

When the pressure became too great and the pain became too unbearable, I wept. Both the pressure and the pain quickly faded away like they were never there in the first place. I opened my eyes and saw a reddened pair of blue eyes staring back at me.

"I'm fine now. It went away..." I tried to come up with some sort of excuse but came up blank, especially when the tears were still pooled on the bed linen like liquid mercury. "But it comes back every few days. There'll be pressure in my eyes, but it'll go away as soon as I can cry. It's a side effect of my ability." I couldn't hide something like this with the person sharing my bed if I tried. Then I added, "I don't want anyone to know about it."

These days, having a useful ability but no power to protect yourself was equally a curse and a blessing.

He held my face in his hands, tilting my head back and forth, left and right to examine my eyes. I knew he couldn't see anything out of the ordinary because I'd inspected them in the mirror many times before.

"Does it still hurt?"

I shook my head. "No."

A few minutes later, he finally let go.

I laid my head back down on the pillow. He followed suit and pulled the blanket over both our bodies. I waited for him to ask me about my ability. I waited a while, but he still hadn't asked anything. I tilted my head and saw him staring blankly at the ceiling, appearing to be deep in thought. Neither of us said a word the rest of the night.

The next morning, I woke up in Liam's arms. He was staring out the window, still deep in thought, but his right hand was gently stroking my belly, almost out of habit. I wondered if he'd even slept last night. He didn't notice I'd woken until I purposely made a soft noise. His attention went back to me and a small smile touched his lips.

I didn't want to say anything with morning breath, so I got up and headed to the bathroom to brush my teeth, stopping by the laundry room to grab my clothes from the dryer on the way. I noticed that his toothbrush looked like it had been used. _So he got up earlier,_ I thought as I took off my clothes and stepped into the shower. After a nice hot shower, I re-wore my old clothes.

Liam was in the kitchen pouring milk into a glass. He handed it to me when he saw me come in. He even knew I had a habit of drinking a glass of milk every morning. Or was it just a sheer coincidence that all we had was a carton of milk left over from yesterday's dinner?

"The cafeteria isn't open in the morning."

I was fine with just a glass of milk for breakfast. I walked out to the balcony to enjoy my glass there. From this height, I could see some interesting red and blue sparks from the running track close by.

"What's over there?" I raised my voice to ask Liam in the living room.

Liam joined me on the patio. "That's the new training ground. It's a decent-sized space for the new special recruits to practice their abilities. We have a limited supply of ammo so when that runs out, they are the future."

"Then aren't you supposed to be there right now?"

"I didn't enlist. Those people signed their freedom away in exchange for supplies for themselves and their loved ones. The military is borrowing supplies from me."

"From the look of things, they might never be able to repay what they borrowed. And even if this thing blows over in a few weeks, or months, or years, the repayment won't come close to current values. But you knew that."

"Worry not. I will make sure my wife is always fed."

"A difficult thing to guarantee these days." I placed a hand on my belly. "This baby chose the wrong time to come into the world." I hesitated a moment, then confessed, "Since this whole thing started, I keep wondering if bringing this baby into this world is even the right thing to do."

He placed his hand over mine. "Angel, I've waited for this baby a very long time. I don't want you to ever think like that again."

"Right now, we have this apartment, we have rations, we have the military keeping us safe from those things out there, but for how long? Even if we managed to fend off five million dead out there forever, we would soon exhaust our supplies. What then? Nothing brings out the worst in men like starvation. Things will only get worse from here."

"The general is sending squads into the city to retrieve more supplies."

"It will only prolong the situation if they are not producing anything to support the tens of thousands of people living here. It's not sustainable. Everyone is waiting for this whole epidemic to blow over soon, but it won't. I know it won't. Everyone is waiting to be rescued, but no one is coming." I looked straight into his eyes. "It's the same everywhere."

"I know, Angel. _I know._ But you have to trust me on this. There will be a future worth looking forward to, worth raising our children in. We will create one."

_What can two people do?_ I wondered if Liam had been sitting atop the world for too long and forgotten that it was no longer at his fingertips.

He pressed a kiss to my forehead. "I know it isn't safe here. That wall out there and a few flimsy barricades are the only things separating us from nearly five million undead on the other side. It's like sitting on thin ice, but this thin ice is all we've got right now. The military cannot evacuate half a million people from the city unless there is another place to relocate. General Grant is on the verge of picking one of two options on the table right now. The first is to pick a town nearby and clear it out for relocation. The second is to slowly reclaim the city, section by section."

"But the crimson rain--"

We both turned around when there was a knock on the door. Liam went to answer. Behind the door was a tall, young Asian gentleman wearing a black suit. He addressed Liam as "Chairman," but was distracted by my presence almost immediately. There wasn't any expression on his face, but I could tell by the widening of his eyes that he was surprised to see me. His surprise didn't last more than a few seconds. He turned to Liam and whispered something in his ear.

Liam nodded. "Send a message to Ayaka that she has been reinstated. She is needed at her post."

The man whispered something else to Liam. Liam's deep blue eyes turned icy cold for one brief moment.

"Let Ayaka wrap it up."

The man bowed his head and then exited the apartment, politely closing the door behind him.

Liam strode back to my side and said, "Hiroki is my bodyguard. Has been since I was a boy. In times of crisis and if you can't find me, you can trust him to keep you safe."

"How old was he when he first took the job?" He didn't look that old. Thirty at most.

"He was a boy himself when my grandfather contracted him as my bodyguard."

"Your grandfather employed a boy to be the bodyguard of another boy?"

Liam chuckled. "You asked me the same question when we first got married. My grandfather was a very powerful man in his youth, but he was also a very distrustful man--and rightfully so after so many attempts on his life. Run-of-the-mill bodyguards would only keep him up at night. He found his good night's sleep in the Far East. There were clans in Japan specializing in contracting their highly-trained warriors for the price of ten kings' ransoms. Even so, my grandfather thought it was money well spent."

"Why's that?"

"The selling point of these warriors is that once a contract has been made, the warrior will even turn his weapon against his own clansmen if given the order."

I gave him a look of confusion.

"It's to prevent conflicts of interest."

"And they're okay with that?"

"That is how they have been trained since birth. It's their selling point."

"And where do these clans get these children to train since birth? The orphanage?"

"As far as I know, they are children of the clan."

"Their _own children_?"

"This has been their way of life for centuries, Angel. You can ask Hiroki all about it if you are interested in finding out more. Quite contrary to what you're assuming, Hiroki is quite proud of his lineage."

Maybe another time. "Who is Ayaka?" I inquired.

"Ayaka is _your_ bodyguard. She is also Hiroki's younger sister. Hiroki made the recommendation when we were looking for a female bodyguard for you. I sent for her. She should be here by nightfall."

Something didn't sound right. "Here by nightfall? Where is she now?"

"She's still back at the house."

"You and Hiroki left her back there? With millions of undead walking around?"

"Ayaka has a job to do, and she's just about finishing up. Don't worry, she can take care of herself. She wouldn't be much of a bodyguard otherwise."

* * *

Like Liam said, that afternoon while we were heading to the cafeteria, Hiroki brought news that Ayaka had arrived. She had been detained at the isolation building for twelve hours before she could be released. The medical staff reduced isolation time in half due to new findings that symptoms of the infection manifested within the hour, full transformation in less than three.

Liam gave an acknowledging nod and then continued with me to the cafeteria. Hiroki followed behind us.

The same as for lunch earlier, I sat at a table and both Liam and Hiroki lined up to get food. On the menu tonight was spaghetti with a side of baked potato. There were no fruits or greens offered. Liam did manage to bring back a carton of milk and a small tub of yogurt, which I didn't see on anyone else's table.

The meat-flavored sauce for the pasta tasted like it came straight from a can. I didn't like it but forced it down anyway. Just as I was trying to open the tub of yogurt, a tall, raven-haired woman came to our table. There was an empty seat in front of her, but she didn't sit down. She scrutinized me, paying special attention to my jawline, and then turned to Liam.

"They said you lost it, but I didn't believe them until now. This is sick, Liam!"

Liam kept on eating his meal. Didn't even bother to look up. Hiroki had the same reaction to the woman.

I kept pulling at the lid, but it wouldn't open. Liam grabbed the tub from me, pulled the plastic siding out first, lifted the lid with ease, and handed it back to me. I suddenly felt a little embarrassed.

The woman's face visibly reddened when no one paid attention to her. "I don't know what kind of delusion you're trying to keep yourself in, but this woman here is not your wife!"

The whole cafeteria went quiet. Every pair of eyes was looking at us.

When she didn't get the reaction she wanted from Liam, she turned her attention to me. "Time's hard. I get it. You're trying to get a free meal with that face of yours, but the show's over now, so go back to whatever hole you crawled out of."

This time, Liam looked up. "Mind your tone when speaking to my wife, Miss Noble."

I, on the other hand, said nothing. I didn't know who this woman was or what kind of power she wielded on this base. Starting a conflict with her would be more trouble than it was worth. I was in no position to afford any trouble.

"Liam, you need to listen to me. I was stunned by the resemblance too, but she's not your wife Sienna. She can't be. We both saw her lifeless corpse on that steel table. We had a funeral. We _buried_ her!"

A muscle in his jaw visibly ticked. If the raven-haired woman could see his auras right now like I could, she would have wised up and walked away already. His intense rage was palpable.

A sliver of memory cut through my mind like a piece of sharp glass. Everything was being drowned out. It was dark. I could not see a thing, but I could hear the heavy rain hitting the soil. There were walls around me. I panicked. I screamed. The only reply was the sound of heavy rain hitting the soil.

"Angel!" Liam shook me. "Angel!"

I blinked as my vision began to focus.

"Are you all right?" Liam asked.

"Yeah. I was just...zoning out."

"Liam!" The raven-haired woman tried to get his attention back.

Liam got to his feet, cold blue eyes staring down at the raven-haired woman. He then turned to face everyone in the cafeteria. "I don't think I need an introduction. I want to make a public apology about what was written in the papers recently. My wife had gone missing, and I was misled into believing that she...fell victim. When the police brought me in to ID a horribly disfigured woman who fit my wife's description, I wasn't in the right mental state to make an accurate ID. I made a mistake. My wife has now returned to me, and I couldn't be happier. Again, I apologize for causing a stir."

"Come on, let's go back to our place," he said as he helped me to my feet.

I couldn't agree more. As we were walking out of the cafeteria, the raven-haired woman tried to get to us, but Hiroki blocked her path.

"I know what I saw, Liam! Liam!"

On the way back to the apartment, I kept trying to remember the flashback I'd just had. Liam hadn't filled me in on the details of what happened to me. If he wanted to, he would have already told me. So far he'd told me mostly truths, but there were many things left unsaid as well. I pretended not to notice.

Just now in the cafeteria, Liam was truly enraged when that woman reminded him of that event. There was no mistake about that. Even now as we were walking back to the apartment, he was seething. One couldn't tell from the look on his face, but a man like him was probably taught how to keep emotions in check. Unfortunately for me, I had the ability to see beneath the surface.

I kept quiet as we walked.

Behind the closed door of our apartment came a kiss that took me by complete surprise. It only took a few steps to the bedroom. He kicked the door closed and slowly leaned my back against the mattress. His mouth never left mine.

At the first opportunity when he broke the kiss, I said, "I don't remember."

"Leave it to me," he grated against my ear.

That wasn't exactly what I meant. I couldn't use the baby as an excuse anymore. The doctor said that everything was proceeding normally.

"I meant give me a little more time. To you, we've been married for four years. But to me... Liam, to me..." I didn't have the heart to tell him that to me, he still felt like a stranger. I believed him, believed that I was his wife. But in my head, I'd only met him yesterday. It didn't feel right to move to this stage so fast.

"To you, I'm a stranger." He took a deep breath. "You don't know me."

"I'm sorry..."

"I didn't sleep a wink last night. I was afraid when I opened my eyes again, you'd disappear like every other dream. I would wake up to an empty house. Everything would still be there except for you. Your toothbrush would still be by the sink. Your clothes would still be in the closet. You don't really know how much space a person takes up in your life until that person leaves and takes it all with them. Angel, I'd give anything to have you back."

"I'm not a dream, Liam." I swept a stray hair away from his face.

He took my hand and kissed it. "If you are, I'll kill whoever wakes me up."

"It's not much of a dream. Here, you've lost everything."

"But not you. Not our baby. I think somebody accepted my bargain."

He made me laugh. "You said you'd trade everything to have me back?"

"Yeah."

"No regrets?"

He shook his head. "This is exactly where I want to be."

"Give me a little more time, Liam."

He smiled. "You'd be surprised how often you repeat things."

"This is the first time I repeated myself."

"I don't mean tonight." He leaned in closer to whisper into my ear. "You said the same thing on our wedding night."

My cheeks were burning. I shoved him back and turned to lay on my side. I could hear him chuckling behind my back. There it was again: that feeling like honey slowly dripping into my soul.

# Chapter 7

The next day, Hiroki brought a stunning girl to our apartment. Beautiful straight black hair, oval face, round brown eyes; she looked like a prized doll sitting on the shelf of the most prestigious Parisian doll shop. But she was much younger than I'd imagined. About seventeen or so.

Her eyes reddened as soon as she stepped foot into the apartment and saw me sitting on the couch. She was tearing up.

"Ma'am..."

Hiroki shot her a glare that made her straighten up and swallow it all back in.

"Ma'am, I brought your belongings." She slightly lifted the designer suitcase. It looked rather big compared to her frame. There was a backpack on her too.

"Thank you. You can set them down." Having more changes of clothes would be nice.

Hiroki pointed her to the bedroom and she carried it all in.

"Ayaka will keep you company. Hiroki and I are needed in the meeting room. If we don't make it back before lunchtime, send Ayaka to bring back your lunch. She has my pass."

I nodded.

He pressed a kiss on my forehead and then headed out the door with Hiroki.

I got up to bar the door and then went to the bedroom. Ayaka was unpacking my clothes and hanging them up in the closet. From a glance, they looked loosely fitted and comfortable enough. Ayaka only unpacked half of the suitcase and closed the rest in.

She answered my questioning gaze. "They're clothes for the later months, Ma'am."

"Ah, okay. You can call me by my name, you know."

"I can't do that, Ma'am."

"It's just that 'ma'am' makes me feel old."

She smiled. "You said the same thing years ago." She hesitated a moment, then said, "The chairman said you had amnesia."

"Did he now?" I wasn't pleased that he told someone about my condition, but if Liam truly believed these siblings could be trusted, then I should at least give them a chance. There was a dangerous aura around her, but I didn't detect any ill will toward me.

"Did you have any trouble getting here?"

"No trouble, Ma'am."

It would have been a perfectly acceptable response if the city wasn't crawling with millions of undead. "How old are you, Ayaka?"

"Eighteen, Ma'am."

"How old were you when you became my bodyguard?"

"Fourteen, Ma'am."

"Is it normal for your clan to contract out bodyguards so young?"

"It depends on the completion of the training. Hiroki was twelve when he became the chairman's bodyguard. Hiroki is what the clan considered a prodigy."

I seated myself on the bed. "I was just surprised your clan sent you out so young. Do you miss your family?"

She looked at me as though I'd just asked her a difficult question that required a significant amount of thought, then said, "Hiroki is here. He is family."

"What about your parents? Do you miss them?"

"I don't have many memories of my parents."

"Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know they passed away."

"Oh no, Ma'am. They're alive and well. I just don't remember them very well. I don't get to see them very often."

"How did you and Hiroki get selected to become bodyguards?"

"We weren't selected, Ma'am. Our oldest brother remains at the clan, and the rest of us are sent out. It's like that with all the other branches of the family. Only the masters and ladies of the main house and the oldest males of each branch stay within the clan to continue the line."

"Who are the masters and ladies of the main house?"

"The main house of the clan, Ma'am." Seeing the confused look on my face, she went on. "The clan leader and his family are referred to as the 'main house.' His other male siblings and their families are the branches. Children from the main house are the masters and ladies of the clan."

"Why do you call the children of the main house 'masters' and 'ladies'? It doesn't exactly roll off the tongue."

"The branch families serve the main house. It's the social hierarchy of our clan."

"Ah." I nodded, pretending to understand. "Look at me running on with questions. Have you eaten yet?"

"Not yet, Ma'am."

"I would really prefer that you call me by my name."

She looked hesitant.

"Don't worry about Liam and Hiroki. I'll let them know it's what I want. If you haven't eaten yet, you can take the pass to go to the cafeteria by yourself."

She looked visibly shaken. "I can't leave your side for even a minute, Ma'am."

"Not even for a lunch break?"

"I must always be in viewing distance unless you're with the chairman."

"Do you find it difficult, Ayaka?" I asked out of sheer curiosity.

Looking confused, she asked back, "What?"

"Your job."

"This is what I've been trained to do my entire life. If this is difficult, then I can do nothing else."

"How do you find the time to get married and have children if you're stuck with this job twenty-four-seven? When do you and Hiroki plan on retiring? I mean, at what age do people of your profession usually retire and start a family?"

She shook her head. "We don't."

"You don't?"

"There is no concept of retirement in our profession. The shift ends with our last breath."

When Liam and Hiroki returned an hour later, I grabbed Liam at the door and dragged him by the arm into the bedroom. I closed the door behind us for some privacy.

"Liam, did you know what Ayaka just told me?" I said in a whisper. "She said 'the shift ends with our last breath.' What does she mean by that, aside from the obvious? The contract is for life?"

"My grandfather slept very soundly for fifty years until his death. His last two bodyguards went with him that same night. My grandfather was 87 at his passing. He'd outlived many of his bodyguards, but two did make it to old age and went with him. He'd left a will to have their bodies returned to their clan."

"If you knew all about this, why did you employ Ayaka? Your grandfather employed Hiroki for you, that I can understand, but it was your choice to employ Ayaka for me. The girl said she can never get married or have children of her own. That is insane. You should release her from her contract."

"Are you sure that is what you want?"

"Yes."

"Do you know what would happen once you release her from her contract?"

"What?"

"Go ask her."

"I want you to tell me."

"I think it's best that you ask her yourself. They have their own rules and their own honor code. The value of honor far outweighs their own lives. Go ask her what would happen if you want to break the contract that she has spent her whole life training and competing for."

_That sounds serious._

"Angel, people in this world are very strange. Things have different values to different people. A man might choose to die for honor while another man might want to trade all of his honor for a small sum of money. We're all living on the same planet, but don't all see the world in the same light."

_That 's truer than you realize,_ I thought. "I'll look for an opportunity to ask her later."

"Hungry yet?"

"Chairman," Hiroki knocked on the bedroom door. "General Grant sent for you."

Liam opened the door. "We just came back from a meeting with him."

"The captain at the door said it's regarding the death of Miss Emmaline Noble this morning. Colonel Noble and General Grant want to ask you a few questions."

Liam furrowed his brow. "I'm a suspect?"

"Miss Noble is dead? This morning? What time this morning? Liam didn't leave the bed until ten, and he spent the entire night with me." I turned to Liam. "Take me with you. I'm your alibi."

Liam agreed to take me along to see the general. Awaiting us was a room full of men in high-ranking uniforms.

"Gentlemen, my wife, Sienna."

"Good to see you again, Sienna." The general said to me, then to Liam, "Now, Liam, as you know, Colonel Noble's daughter was found dead this morning in her apartment. There are many reports of your conflict with her at the cafeteria yesterday afternoon, which put you very high on the list of suspects. Can you tell us what this conflict was about?"

"There was no conflict, General. As all of you know, until recently we all thought my wife had passed away. Miss Noble saw my wife in the cafeteria yesterday and was acting on the same assumption. She came up to our table and accused me of trying to delude myself by...finding a replacement for my wife. I did not dignify her accusation with a reply. It was only when she raised her voice at my wife that I asked her to mind her tone. I made a public apology about the false news in the paper and then left the cafeteria with my wife."

"I see. And where were you between midnight and five o'clock this morning?"

"Like most married men, I was in bed with my wife."

"He was sleeping next to me, General."

"Mr. West, is it true that your hyperspeed ability allows you to go anywhere on base in the blink of an eye? Come and go anywhere, without notice?" Colonel Noble inquired.

_Hyperspeed?_

"I'm very sorry for your loss, Colonel, but as you already know from my report, my ability has limitations. Miss Noble and I attended the same university. We've known each other for over a decade and never had a single conflict. Yesterday afternoon, she raised her voice at my wife, but that is no reason for murder."

"He's right, Colonel. That's no motive," General Grant said. "If we pin this on the wrong man, then the real culprit will get away scot-free. I know Liam had been a little on edge after he thought he lost his wife, but he found her and look at him now--happy as a clam. If we know _anything_ about Liam, it's that he's an extremely rational man. A content, rational man would not commit such a heinous act over a non-issue."

The other men in uniform nodded in agreement.

Colonel Noble turned his gaze to me.

I purposely stood in a way that made my pregnant belly look even more noticeable than usual.

"My wife only briefly met Miss Noble twice before yesterday--the first at our wedding and the second at my grandfather's funeral."

"That will be all, Liam, Sienna." General Grant dismissed us.

Liam placed a hand behind my back and guided me out of the meeting room. I had my suspicions about Liam since I saw exactly how enraged he really was yesterday, but his statement in the meeting room wasn't a lie. It was no motive for murder.

On another note, if Miss Noble's father wasn't a colonel, no one would bother looking into the death of some random woman during times like these. Justice wasn't for everyone. The new reality was cruel like that.

Hiroki walked up to Liam and whispered into his ear.

Liam looked a little taken aback. A few seconds in thought later, he said to Hiroki, "Tell the rest to report. Take the Land Rovers."

Hiroki nodded and departed.

Liam walked me back into the meeting room.

"I apologize for the interruption, gentlemen, but I need to have a word with the general regarding an urgent matter. It will only take a second." He turned to General Grant. "There is a problem at one of my warehouses that is in need of my immediate attention. Request to leave the base, General."

"What kind of problem with the warehouse? What's the damage?" General Grant took a step forward. There was deep concern in his voice.

"Report of some flooding. I need to take my team there to assess the damage and salvage what I can, but I need to leave immediately."

The general nodded. "You have leave."

"Thank you, General. Good day, gentlemen."

Liam walked me out of the meeting room again. This time, he was heading toward the main gate. Did he mean to take me with him? Take his pregnant wife with him to check on a warehouse? Out there?

"Liam..."

"Come along. Don't say anything," he discreetly whispered into my ear.

I kept quiet and walked with him.

At the front gate, Hiroki was in the driver's seat of an SUV, speaking to a man in uniform. Ayaka was sitting in the front passenger seat. Behind Hiroki's SUV was a line of large trucks.

Liam opened the back seat and let me get in first before climbing in.

"Liam, my backpack." I turned around to have a look at the back. There were four backpacks there, one of which was mine. There was also the designer suitcase Ayaka brought along with her. Seeing my backpack calmed my nerves quite a bit.

Soldiers were lined on top of the wall with their weapons on standby as the front gate mechanically opened to allow us and the caravan of trucks through. The front gate was aligned with the road out of the city. The number of undead thinned quite a bit the farther away from the city we got.

# Chapter 8

We were on the road for about two hours before Hiroki stopped in front of a metal gate. The area was encircled with ten-foot-high, wire fencing. Liam gave Ayaka a key. She got out of the car to unlock the gate and let the SUV and the caravan of trucks in. We drove quite deep into the property and parked in front of the entrance to an underground structure more than big enough for two trucks to drive through.

"Liam, don't get out yet." I grabbed him by the arm. "There are over a dozen undead within a hundred feet. They've detected us and are coming this way."

"Radio the team and keep them informed," Liam said to Hiroki. Surprisingly, he didn't doubt me for even a second, but despite me telling him not to get out, he did. "Keep your head down," he said before he closed the door behind him.

Hiroki and Ayaka followed.

The other men from the trucks behind us got out too. They rushed down to form a circle around the SUV with weapons on standby. I slid to the floor of the car and kept my head down like Liam said. A few minutes later, I heard multiple shots fire in rapid succession. When I no longer sensed any undead nearby, I lifted my head and looked out the window. The undead were sprawled on the pavement with at least one bullet through their heads.

I unlocked the car door and stepped out when I saw Liam inserting his key card into the security system and input the access code.

"Ma'am!" Ayaka, who was standing right outside the SUV, tried to get me back inside.

"Get back in the vehicle!" Liam shouted at me when he turned back.

"Liam, let me come with you. I can help!"

"I said get back in the vehicle right now!"

It was no use talking sense to him. "Give me a minute!" I shouted back as I tried to focus on my sixth sense.

The auras were everywhere, emitting from everything. I could feel them flow in three-dimensional space. When I focused just on the flow, the material world became nothing more than a backdrop. I sensed a mega underground structure beneath where I was standing. Inside was lined with hundreds of industrial pallet racks stocked with supplies. There were undead down there, definitely, but there was something else that I couldn't quite identify. I'd never encountered such an aura before.

Liam broke my focus when he picked me up and dumped me back in the SUV. I leaned in to whisper into his ear, "Liam, there are quite a few undead down there."

"I know. They were people who worked here. But I need you to stay put in this vehicle. Ayaka will keep you company."

"Liam, I can help. I have extrasensory perception. I can warn you about their locations so you won't be taken by surprise."

"Angel, look at yourself. You're four and a half months pregnant. I'm fully prepared to go down there, but if I take you with me, I will be distracted constantly. It won't take long. We'll clear the area, load the truck, and we'll be right up."

"Stay here with me. Let them go." I gestured toward the men getting back into their trucks.

"I need to fetch something very important down there."

"Can't Hiroki get it for you?"

He shook his head. "It's something only I can access. Be a good girl, Angel. I can't keep the team waiting." He pressed a kiss on my forehead and then got out of the SUV.

"Wait!" I grabbed the two-way radio from the front of the SUV and forced it into his hand. "I can help you navigate from here."

"No."

"No?"

"Not everyone here can be trusted with that secret. I'll be fine." He put the two-way radio back into my hand. In the blink of an eye, he was already standing by the entrance again, inserting the key card and punching in the access code. Ayaka got in and sat beside me, closing and locking the door.

The line of trucks drove past us and toward the entrance. The first truck stopped to let Liam get in, then the line slowly disappeared down the sloped tunnel.

"Hiroki is with the chairman. My brother will protect him with his life." Ayaka tried to console me. "The chairman can also protect himself."

"He's just a gray suit; he has no business going down there," I muttered in annoyance.

"Gray suit?" She shook her head. "I'm not familiar with that expression."

"I mean that he's just a businessman. He can hold a pen, sure, but a gun?"

"The chairman is an excellent marksman. He also had sufficient training in self-defense combat."

"He's taking an unnecessary risk, and that's counter-intuitive to me." _Then why did you ask to come with him?_ a voice in my head asked. "Doesn't he know that if something happens to him, I have no one else to depend on? It's infectious! Just one little scratch, one little bite..." I took a deep breath to contain my rising anger.

"Ma'am...your eyes..."

"What?"

Ayaka lowered her eyes and shook her head. "It's nothing."

"What about my eyes?"

"It's nothing. The light was hitting it differently for a second, that's all."

* * *

"It won't take long," he said, but I waited in the SUV for nearly three hours before the first truck drove back up the tunnel. It was a good thing that it was a cool, cloudy day or Liam would have come back to two dead women in his SUV. Liam and Hiroki got out of a truck and ran back to the SUV. Hiroki took the driver's seat again. Ayaka got out and went to sit in the front passenger seat.

Liam tried to hug me, but I rebuffed him and pulled away to the other side of the SUV.

"Is the headcount still the same as before you and your team went down there?" I asked out of spite.

No answer.

Once we were on the highway for about twenty minutes, Hiroki took the exit while the other trucks stayed on the highway.

"They're taking the supplies back to the base," Liam explained when he saw me looking confused.

"Where are we going?"

"The vineyard."

" _My_ vineyard?"

He nodded. "Four more people have been found dead in their apartments, all of whom have had conflicts with me in the past--important people. Fortunately, today has been a busy day for me. I was always in sight. I still needed an excuse to temporarily leave the base for a few days to get under the radar."

This sounded like... "Is the killer purposely trying to pin this on you?"

"One thing I do not lack is enemies. We'll be staying at the vineyard for a few days. The property is walled in with steel and solid concrete, so it should be safe for a short stay."

So he was the one who walled up the property.

"Chairman," Hiroki called, nodding toward a woman standing by the side of the highway trying to hitch a ride.

"It's a trap. Keep driving," Liam said.

When Liam mentioned a trap, I suddenly noticed there were three other auras nearby. "There are three guys hiding in the bushes behind her."

Through the back window, we watched three men come out of the bushes and stare at us as we drove farther away.

"They're preying on people's kindness. Pity the souls who fall victim to them. We'll meet a lot of depraved people in the near future; there's no doubt about it. We can't read minds; that's why I want you to assume the worst of everyone. You always need to protect yourself first. Even if you think you know someone in and out, even if you could read their minds, the truth is nobody knows who they really are until they're forced to make a choice during a crisis."

I couldn't read minds, but I had the next best thing. Still, I understood where he was coming from. "What about you, Liam? Should I place my trust in you?"

"I already know who I am, Angel. I would never bring harm to you. Never."

Twenty minutes down a small road, and Hiroki took a turn onto an even smaller road through a dense forest. It wasn't long before we came face to face with a fifteen-foot metal gate. It looked a lot taller than I'd imagined.

"Don't get out yet. Let Hiroki and Ayaka sweep the area first."

"Wait," I said to Hiroki and Ayaka as I scanned the area. "There are three undead inside a small house at ten o'clock. No live presence." They were most likely the Jenson family who worked in the vineyard. I'd spoken to a man named John Jenson over the phone when I needed someone at the vineyard to accept the deliveries.

About fifteen minutes after Hiroki and Ayaka went through the gates, I heard exactly three shots in the direction of the small house. We waited a little longer until Hiroki and Ayaka did a thorough sweep of the place. By the time we drove through the gate, it was almost sundown.

Hiroki parked in the driveway and locked the gates. Liam got out and furrowed his brow when he saw two huge steel warehouses sitting on the lawn next to the perfectly beautiful English-style country house.

"I had those pre-fabricated warehouses delivered here about three weeks ago," I explained. Then I added, "Along with some supplies."

A moment of silence stretched on.

"What kind of supplies?" he inquired.

"Food, clothes, medicine, tools...etcetera..." All sorts of stuff from a prepper's checklist I got off the internet. "Mostly food. There should be five grain silos in the back somewhere."

"You had a premonition that this would happen?"

"I don't have that kind of ability. I sensed something terrible was going to happen, but I didn't know exactly what it would be. I thought I was prepping for some catastrophic natural disaster. Honestly, this situation is beyond anything I was prepared for."

"Does anyone else know about the deliveries?"

"I haven't told anyone else. I bought everything through a broker, gave him a deadline, and he made arrangement for everything to be delivered here."

He nodded. "Let's go inside."

They called it a country house, but it wasn't the size of a typical home. It looked more like where the royal family would vacation during the hot summer months. I was beginning to get why Lara kept yapping on about me being a "spoiled rich bitch."

A feeling of familiarity hit me as soon as I stepped through the front door. I didn't have any flashbacks, but I felt like I knew every object in the room. It wasn't like seeing the place for the first time. If what Liam told me was true, then I'd lived here with my mother since I was born.

"Chairman, there's no power. I'll look for some candles."

Liam called for my attention to the top of the double stairs. I looked up and saw a huge painting of a silver-blonde woman sitting on a chair with a little silver-blonde girl on her lap. Behind them were potted blue peonies in full bloom. I couldn't look away. I started heading up the stairs to have a closer look. Liam put an arm around my waist and walked with me.

The woman in the painting... "Is she?"

"Your mother, Evelyn Carmichael."

A bitter feeling rose in my chest. I couldn't remember my own mother. "I had my mother's last name?"

"Your mother didn't put your father's name on the birth certificate. I assumed she didn't want to lose you to a custody battle."

"If my father is still alive, then why did she entrust me to the Winstons?"

"That I don't know."

"Does he have children of his own now?"

"A son and a daughter."

"I see."

"Do you want to know who he is?"

I shook my head. I didn't know if I wanted to yet. "He doesn't even know I exist."

"Your mother had another child a year after she had you. A boy."

"Where is he?"

"Your mother gave him up to the orphanage as soon as he was born."

"What? Why?"

Liam couldn't answer.

"If she was afraid to lose me in a custody battle, then why did she give her other child up?"

"Paper trails can only tell you so much, Angel. Perhaps your brother was the result of an unwanted incident."

_Unwanted incident..._ I turned back to look at the woman in the painting. "Do you know what happened to him?"

"Four years ago, you asked me to look him up after you learned about his existence. The paper trail ended at an anonymous adoption. We never found out what happened to him."

"At least he was adopted. A childhood spent in an orphanage can really twist you up on the inside." Like Declan and the others.

I wanted to go to the bathroom, so Liam led me to a room upstairs with an en suite. Hiroki handed us a lit candlestick on a candle holder.

There was something very charming about the bedroom that I especially liked. I guessed that this was my bedroom. When I found clothes in the closet and they were all my size, I knew I'd guessed right.

Liam was looking around too, but in reminiscence rather than exploration. After he had made a circle around the bedroom, he seated himself on the bed. The corner of his lips curled into a smile, and I knew he was recalling fond memories. Liam noticed I was observing him and lightly tapped on the bed, inviting me over.

I ignored his invitation and took the candle into the bathroom with me.

I heard hammering noises downstairs. After I took care of business, I went down to see what was going on. Hiroki and Ayaka were boarding up the windows. It really ruined the aesthetic of the country house, but it was a necessary measure.

"Can they climb over the wall?" I asked.

"Probably not, but we can never be too safe. There are also mountain lions in the area that can jump surprisingly high."

"The animals are getting infected too? Are there many wild animals around?"

"Quite a few in the area. Wild animals sometimes wander onto the property. The original fence was meant to keep large ones out, but two years ago, a bear broke through the perimeter fence. You and Ayaka were working in the garden at the time, and the only thing between you two and the bear was the wooden garden fence. Fortunately, the bear left on its own and we didn't have to find out how Ayaka would fare against it."

Ayaka smiled when she heard what Liam said.

"Still, you love to come here, so compromises had to be made."

It sounded like a beautiful marriage. She was lucky, the old me. Liam gave her the sky to soar and a place to land. But that made me wonder even more why Liam lied when I asked him if it was a happy marriage. Could it be another woman?

The thought of that possibility made my stomach twist and churn. I lifted my head and stared at him. I couldn't remember the old me, couldn't remember what she was like, but the me right now was certain I couldn't forgive that. _Anything but that, Liam. Anything._

Later into the night as we lay together in bed, I asked him, "What was I like?"

Liam was already half-asleep but still answered, "Shy, sweet, timid."

That answer kept me up late into the night.

# Chapter 9

My plan was to wake up early and go to the warehouse to look things over, but Liam was way ahead of me. By the time I got to the warehouse, he already had the shipment receipt in hand. Not that we could still call the company and tell them a few crates were missing. I leaned in to have a look at the shipment receipt:

50,000 cases of MRE; 24 per case.

20,000 buckets of dehydrated meals; 120 servings per bucket.

20,000 cases of canned food; various types and sizes.

20,000 cases of dried processed food; various types.

50,000 pallets of purified water; 1,152 liter bottles per pallet.

400 tons of dried potatoes, dried sweet potatoes, dried beans, dried vegetables.

5,000 tons of barley, oat, wheat, rice, dried corn.

For the tools section...

"You bought all of this on a bad feeling?"

I looked up from the shipment receipt and noticed that Liam was staring at me, probably for a while now. Hiroki was also looking my way.

"So you think seeing the future or traveling back in time is more plausible? On second thought, we should watch out for people who have the ability to see into the future or travel back in time. Anything is possible these days. I forgot to ask you, Ayaka. Do you have any ability?"

"I can make water." Ayaka formed a ball of water in her hands right before our eyes.

"Water generation. That's super useful." Then I looked down at the 50,000 pallets of purified water on the shipment receipt. That actually cost a huge chunk of money. Well, better to have it.

"What about you, Hiroki?"

Hiroki shook his head.

"Ah, okay." Then I said to Liam, "The medicines I bought are all over-the-counter products. No good stuff like antibiotics and strong painkillers. We probably need to use our supplies to trade with the military."

Liam disagreed. "We can't let the military find out about our little stash. When we get back to the base, I'll try to negotiate with the supplies they're borrowing from me right now."

"Are we still going back there?"

"You want to stay here?"

"We've got all we need right here. Don't go back there. I can't sleep through the night there. I can hear things when night falls and the atmosphere quietens. I can hear them beyond the walls, breathing, growling. Especially when the rain falls in the middle of the night...

"There's something about the rain that makes them even more active than usual. Those nights when the rain falls, I can hear so many of them at once, coming closer and closer. I don't want to go back there, Liam. I feel safer here." I looked straight into his eyes so he could see my conviction, to let him know I meant every word. My instincts were telling me not to go back there even though the military base had an army to protect it and we were just four people alone in the middle of nowhere.

A full minute of contemplation later, Liam placed his hands on my shoulders. "Give me a little more time to think about it. I can't make rash decisions when it comes to your safety and our baby's. We would be near defenseless out here, and not just from the undead. They're the least of our worries."

I understood exactly what he was talking about. I had the same worries way before we came all the way out here. This place was still intact when we got here because we were early, but soon, people would find their way here, whether to loot or to claim it for themselves. Whatever their reasons were for coming, we would be an obstacle in their way.

I nodded.

"In the meantime, let's not make this place look like such a prize," Liam said as he led me out of the warehouse. I didn't understand what he meant until the four of us were standing on the green lawn and I witnessed the warehouse disappearing before my own eyes at the mere touch of Liam's hand. Liam strode to the other warehouse and, at a touch, it too disappeared.

I thought it was some camouflage ability, but when I picked up a pebble from the lawn and tossed it at where the warehouse used to be, it didn't hit anything and landed on the flattened grass. It had simply disappeared.

I stood there perplexed for quite a while.

Then the three of us caught up to Liam in the backyard and discovered the five grain silos that were there yesterday had also disappeared.

Didn't Colonel Whatshisname say Liam's ability was hyperspeed?

Or...teleportation disguised as hyperspeed?

The ability to remove material objects from three-dimensional space...spatial manipulation?

Liam walked toward us as I stared at him wide-eyed. He placed a hand behind my back and guided me toward the house. "We should have breakfast," he said.

By the time he had seated me the breakfast nook, I was still staring up at him.

All the while, he was casually talking about something else entirely. "Ayaka found five eggs at the Jensons'. The weather is still very cool, so they should be safe to consume. I'll try to see if I can get the generator working after breakfast." He turned to look at me and asked, "What's wrong?"

I had so many questions but didn't know where to begin. I also didn't want to have a conversation about it here, now, with two other people in the room. I shook my head and finally looked away.

Ayaka was standing by the kitchen counter trying to start a match to light the gas stove. After she'd lit it, she filled the water boiler with water she generated and set it on the stove. When she opened the cabinets to look for ingredients to work with, I saw a whole cabinet full of what looked like to be fruit jams with the vineyard's logo on them. Normally I would have asked about them, but my mind was occupied by something else entirely.

_Liam made the entire steel structure disappear in an instance, but where did it all go? Another plane? A whole other dimension? Tucked up somewhere between the folds of space?_

Regardless of where it went, he wouldn't have made them disappear without having the ability to bring it all back. If he could do that at will, then...his ability was a hundred times a better secret than mine.

_Hyperspeed_... I wondered how long it took him to think that one up. Hyperspeed was a pretty neat ability to have, but spatial manipulation was on an entirely different tier. _Several different tiers,_ I corrected myself. _If I had that ability, I wouldn 't reveal it to another soul._

For breakfast, we had eggs over easy on a slice of bread, plus oatmeal and a side of strawberry preserves. Liam, Ayaka, and Hiroki each got one egg on their plate while mine had two. I guessed the baby got a portion too; I wasn't about to complain. We probably wouldn't be having eggs on the menu for a long while, maybe even never. I took my time to savor the taste and silently said my goodbyes.

After breakfast, Ayaka followed me to the vegetable garden out back. It looked like a 20-by-20 area that grew all sorts of vegetables and herbs. Since it was only April, most of the vegetables wouldn't be harvestable for months, but it was more likely that nothing would be harvestable at all. To the naked eye, it might have looked like a healthy vegetable garden. But in my eyes, they were slowly dying.

Behind the vegetable garden was a field of grapevines extending toward the wall at the distant horizon.

"What's over there?" I pointed to the far right of the house beyond the grapevines, to what looked like an area carpeted with trees.

"That's the orchard, Ma'am. The vineyard grows its own fruits to make wine. Around this time of the year, the chairman would take you here to pick oranges."

"Oranges?"

"Yes."

"Are there a lot?"

"Not as much as the other fruits. The vineyard doesn't make orange wine, but you said you wanted to keep them as is for memory's sake. You said you used to pick oranges with your mother after the snow melted."

"How often does Liam take me here?"

"At least once every season."

I should have stopped there with the questions, but curiosity bested me. I couldn't help myself. "Ayaka, in your opinion, what was our marriage like before my amnesia?"

"The chairman was a good husband to you. He still is."

"Yes. Was it a happy marriage?"

Ayaka paused. I could see that she was trying to form an answer in her head, but it was taking her a lot longer than usual.

"Was it another woman?"

Ayaka blinked at my question and then violently shook her head. "No, no, it's not that! The chairman was, um, _is_ a faithful husband."

I exhaled and then realized I'd been holding my breath the entire time. At least it wasn't another woman. Perhaps that was all I needed to know.

Ayaka walked with me to the orchard. There were only a few orange trees in the entire lot, but each branch was heavy with fruit.

The trees here were dying too.

I was thinking about what I could do with the oranges when Ayaka finally said, "I think...your marriage had some miscommunications."

I listened in silence.

"When Hiroki first brought me to your home to become your bodyguard, I was a little puzzled why you seemed...afraid of the chairman even though you were his wife. You acted very carefully around him, afraid to make even the smallest mistake. Then I realized that you were a timid lady, easily frightened by everything. Perhaps that's the reason why the chairman tried to filter himself and hid everything threatening out of sight. That frightened you even more, I think. That the person sharing a bed with you was always shrouded in mystery."

"Then how did Liam act toward me? Was he like he is now?"

"Not like he is now, exactly." Ayaka pressed her lips together. "You two didn't talk to each other much...or often. In the morning, you walked him to the door. In the afternoon, you waited by the door for him to come home. Then you had dinner together. After dinner, the chairman went to his study and you to your workshop."

"My workshop?"

"You liked to craft things, all sorts of things, from dresses to trinkets. It was a hobby of yours. The chairman had three rooms in the house renovated to become your workshop. Every time he came back from a business trip, the workshop would be restocked with exotic materials from his place of travel. When nightfall came, the two of you went to bed. Then the next morning was rinse and repeat."

"It was like that for four years?"

Ayaka nodded. "You weren't very happy with that life. Sometimes looking at you was like staring at a caged nightingale. This place was the only place that seemed to lift your mood, so the chairman tried to take you here often. I think the chairman is a lot like Hiroki--they're men of few words, so you have to look at what they do and not what they say. Ma'am, I think the chairman tried very hard to make you happy. He just didn't know how. I wanted to make you happy, but I didn't know how either. He was so broken when he lost you..."

Ayaka wiped her moist eyes with the back of her hands. "Every morning before he went to work, he would stare up the stairs for a few minutes like you were going to run down any second. When he came home from work, he would stand at the door for a few minutes too. There were always plates for you at the dinner table. Afterward, he would go to the half-finished nursery and sit there for hours. That went on for a month and then..."

"And then?" I pressed on.

"The chairman wouldn't want me to tell you what's next."

"He wanted revenge." I saw it in the papers. He was going to pay twenty million to whoever could crack the case.

"Since the beginning, he wanted revenge. Forgive me, Ma'am. I can't tell you any more."

"Are you filtering, too?"

"I don't want you to be afraid of me."

"Ayaka, were we good friends?"

Ayaka shook her head. "I'm your bodyguard."

"You sound like you care about me a great deal."

"Aren't I supposed to?"

"Caring for someone is voluntary."

"I'm your bodyguard. I'm not allowed to care about anyone else."

Then I remembered how crazy this profession of hers was. If given the order, she would need to turn her weapon against her own kin. Couldn't have a family of her own. Couldn't have children of her own.

The poor child. Even her aura was still that of a child's.

_No more grim thoughts_. The important thing was to look forward. "Come on, help me pick some oranges. We'll juice them when we get back to the house."

"Yes, Ma'am."

"I still prefer Sienna."

She smiled. Still didn't agree, though.

Ayaka and I brought back as many oranges as we could carry, but in hindsight, we should have brought along a basket or something.

Liam was standing by the kitchen pantry, restocking the shelves with canned and processed food supplies that were laid out on the kitchen floor. I regretted that I hadn't come back earlier to see how he took them back out.

When he saw us coming in from the back door, he said, "The generator runs on natural gas for now, but we can't depend on that forever. If we lose the gas too, then we still have a few propane tanks to fall back on. But that would mean very limited use of electricity for one to two hours a day."

"We picked oranges." I showed him the oranges cradled in my arms.

He beamed when he saw me holding them. It was the first time seeing such a big smile on his face. "They came in quite big this year."

Since Liam got the emergency generator working, we had use of the kitchen tools again. I decided to juice the oranges. I cut them in halves, juiced them into a glass, and handed the first glass to him. "Here, try!"

He drank a big gulp and nodded. "Sweeter than last year for sure. I shouldn't have doubted you when you said the fruits would come in sweeter if we pruned the trees each year. You try too." He brought the glass rim to my lips.

What Ayaka said to me earlier was still repeating inside my head. Even though this marriage wasn't a happy one, Liam tried. The problem had been on my side. I was the one with a track full of psychological hurdles. I was the one who didn't give this marriage a chance.

I took a sip from the glass of orange juice and tried to smile for him. "It's good."

Liam smiled back.

I should have smiled more often.

Hiroki came into the kitchen from the back door, holding a live pheasant by the legs in one hand and an ax in the other.

"Where did you get that, Hiroki?"

"We found it wandering next to the generator. He probably flew over the wall and got trapped in here."

"Can it lay eggs?"

"This one is male, Angel."

"Oh." Then I eyed the ax in Hiroki's other hand. I was a little curious if pheasant tasted like chicken, but I had a better idea. "I think we should keep him around until we run into a hen. Maybe then we can try to breed them."

"We need a place to put him then. I'll make a simple wire net over the garden fence and put him there."

"Thank you." I tried to smile again to show my appreciation. I just hoped that it didn't look strange.

He smiled back.

# Chapter 10

It started to rain just before sundown, and now it was pouring down. I stood by the huge window in the bedroom, staring through the rain-beaten glass to the field covered by a shroud of crimson mist.

If everything was dying, then what would remain in the end?

I was a little startled when Liam came up from behind me, wrapped his arms around my waist, and caressed by pregnant belly. He lowered his head to nip my ear and asked, "What's wrong? You've been staring out of the window for a while now."

"Just wondering about the future. The crimson rain is soaking into the soil, killing everything. I was wondering what will remain in the end."

"We will, Angel. You, me, our baby. All three of us."

"I can see things other people can't, Liam. Auras that cannot be seen with the naked eye. I can even see them when I close my eyes. There is a flow to it, and I can feel it stronger and more clearly each day. In a way, I can see everything in this house, every room, everyone, everything, if I just close my eyes and concentrate. I can also tell a lot about a person just from their aura. Their intentions, their moods."

"Why are you telling me this?" he asked, his tone solemn.

"Because you revealed your ability to me. You gave me a dagger and turned your back to me. It is only fair that I do the same."

"Fairness didn't exist before, and it doesn't exist now. Don't ever tell another soul what you just told me." He turned me around, cupped my face in his hands, and forced me to look into his eyes. "I need you to promise me."

"I promise."

He heaved a heavy sigh and touched his forehead to mine. "Angel...what am I going to do with you?"

This felt familiar to me as if he had said it to me in this helpless tone many, many times before. Then he would kiss me.

When he leaned forward, I knew he was going to kiss me. I closed my eyes and felt his lips soft and moist against my own. When his tongue slipped into my mouth, I gave him entry and didn't put up a single ounce of resistance.

While I was listening to Ayaka in the orchard, I didn't feel much of anything. It was like listening to someone else's story, a story of a woman who was loved and didn't know it. I still couldn't put myself in that woman's shoes, couldn't even see myself as her for a single second, but I wanted to be her. I wanted her life. I wanted the love that she had. I wanted this man to love me the same way he loved her.

I kissed him back. I didn't know what I was doing but followed his example and mimicked him exactly. If he licked my tongue, I'd lick his tongue back. If he bit my lip, I would bite his lip back. I could feel his body temperature rising rapidly, his breathing becoming more coarse by the second. He rushed to unbuttoned his dress shirt and tossed it aside.

"Angel..."

Two steps to the bed and my back was against the mattress. One knee on the mattress, he crossed his arms to lift up his white undershirt.

"Liam, someone's coming," I said, sensing something from the distance approaching. "I think there are vehicles heading this way."

He froze, listening. A moment later, he pulled his undershirt back down and grabbed his dress shirt and buttoned up. Next, he grabbed the jacket hanging on the chair's back. I sat up and watched him. The whole time, I could see him struggling to calm his breathing again.

"Stay here," he said. He grabbed the handgun sitting on the bedside table, looked at me once, looked at me twice, then he bent his neck to peck me on my lips before heading downstairs.

I left the room a minute later and went down the hall to the room with a window facing the front gate. I peered out the same time two military trucks arrived at the front gate. The light at the gate automatically switched on.

From here, I could see Liam, Hiroki, and Ayaka heading toward the front gate, weapons in hand. Two people got out of the front of the truck when Liam's group reached the gate. The two men said something to Liam and then pointed at the truck. Hiroki and Ayaka both turned to face Liam as though they were waiting for him to give the order. A few seconds later, Liam nodded.

Hiroki opened the gates to let the trucks in.

I went back to my bedroom to wait for Liam to come up and tell me what had just transpired.

Liam came upstairs a few minutes later. His hair and jacket were a little wet, so he took off his jacket and placed it on the chair again. I handed him a bath towel I grabbed from the bathroom, and he wiped his hair quickly.

"It's my team," he said. "They fled here after the base was overrun. They brought their families with them. The general ordered a mass evacuation to the north when the first south wall fell. The second wall quickly followed. There wasn't enough time to evacuate half a million people. Many didn't make it out."

"How did it happen?"

"There were too many of them flooding in, and the wall wasn't high enough."

"Maybe I should have said something to the general."

"No." He shook his head. "Even on the off chance that they believed you, they wouldn't have ordered an immediate evacuation." He closed his arms around me and pressed my head against his slightly damp chest. "And I was going to take you back there in a few days. Forgive me."

"There's nothing to forgive. How many people are moving in?"

"Twelve people from my team, four from my staff, and forty-four family members. Their fathers and their fathers before them have stuck with my family for over five decades. I can't turn them away."

"Sixty people. We can feed that many."

"You know that's not the problem."

"The more important question is, how strong is your team's loyalty?"

"At times like these, loyalty isn't a thing you can count on. Not when they and their families are starving. Not when they have more important things to protect than empty loyalty."

"Things will get worse, yes. People will change, yes. But they haven't. Not at this point in time. If they have something to protect, help them protect it. If their family is hungry, then feed them. We have plenty of food. Loyalty isn't the thing you can count on, but it would be a hell of a lot better to have. Weren't you concerned that the four of us weren't enough to protect this place? Turn this place into something they want to protect too. For themselves and their families."

He released me and looked into my eyes. He looked...touched.

"Besides, I can always let you know if there's a rotten apple in the basket."

"Angel..."

I turned my head away when he tried to kiss me. "Let's go greet our guests, shall we?"

Liam switched to another clean jacket from the closet and went downstairs with me.

The foyer was packed with people in torn and muddied clothes. Some of them were even wailing on the floor, their auras full of grief. The mood couldn't sink much lower.

"Ma'am!" An old man among the group stared at me wide-eyed. A good many people looked at me as though they had just seen a ghost. An expected reaction for me by now.

"Good to see you alive, Wilfred," Liam said to the old man. Then he raised his voice to speak to everyone in the foyer. "My wife and I welcome all of you into our home. This house has seven empty bedrooms and a few other rooms that can be converted into bedrooms. There are two other smaller houses on the property, each with four bedrooms. I suggest the two families with the most members move into them. I know all of you evacuated in a hurry and left behind all of your belongings. We don't have much here, but we will offer what we have. It's been a hectic day for you all. We'll get organized first thing tomorrow morning." He then turned to Ayaka. "Offer our guests what we have in the kitchen for now. I'll bring up more supplies from the cellar tomorrow."

"Yes, Chairman."

"How many people will be going to the other houses and how many sleeping spots do we need over here?" I asked Liam.

Wilfred walked up the stairs and offered to help me out. "Ma'am, I can help you with the arrangement."

"Thank you."

"Certainly, Ma'am."

"How many sleeping spots do we need for the people staying here?"

"If we keep each family to a bedroom here, we would need about sixteen sleeping spots."

"Thank you, Wilfred. I'll try to see how many I can set up."

He looked at my pregnant belly and then up to me again. "Oh no, Ma'am. We can take care of that ourselves."

"It's no trouble at all, Wilfred. I'm just so glad to see you made it here safely. Please, let me do this for you. It's been a terrible day."

Wilfred's eyes reddened a little. "Yes, Ma'am."

First, Liam and I went back to our bedroom and grabbed all of the loosely fitted clothes I could find from my closet and put them into a laundry basket. Then I did the same with Liam's clothes, except he had lots of unused dress shirts and pants still in their packaging, so I took those. Liam helped me haul them downstairs.

"If anyone wants to take a shower and change, here are some clothes. There's a full bath down the hall and each bedroom has an adjoining bathroom," I said as I placed my basket of clothes on the foyer floor. There might not be enough hot water for everyone, but the option was there.

I heard a few, "Thank you, Ma'am's," as I went to the walk-in linen closet to see what was available. I remembered how to find it because I'd gotten fresh linen for the bed yesterday.

I began to do some calculations in my head. There were five bedrooms with single king beds and two guest bedrooms with double king beds. There was plenty of linen in the closet, but only nine sets of blankets. I made the assumption that people from the same family wouldn't mind sleeping under the same blanket at a time like this, so I set up nine king-sized sleeping spots in the various rooms throughout the house. Liam helped me carry the blankets from room to room. Six sofas could be used as sleeping spots as well. I used the remaining linen and doubled them up to be used as blankets for the sofa.

Unfortunately, there weren't nearly enough pillows for everyone.

After I was done, I went to the kitchen to see what Ayaka was cooking and saw that she was struggling with eight large pots on eight burners. I jumped in to help. Cooking was a skill that came naturally to me; I could always whip up something tasty even without recipes.

Each pot was cooking something different. From a glance, it looked like mac and cheese, pasta, tomato sauce, mashed potatoes, canned chicken soup, canned chilies, canned beef stew, and corn with potato cream soup or something. I helped Ayaka stir and flavor all eight pots. When everything looked about done, we had to use almost every plate and piece of cutlery in the house to set up the tables.

Hiroki and Liam brought a round table to the dining room, put a small rug on it, and then placed all eight pots on it. The dining room table was a twelve-seater, but Hiroki brought more chairs to fill in the gaps. In the end, it fit eighteen. The rest got their food and ate in the kitchen or found some corner to sit and eat their meals.

The day ended with me feeling completely exhausted. It wasn't a lot of work really, but a pregnant woman like me was easily winded.

"We need a system," I said to Liam as we lay in bed together. "I don't think Ayaka and me can keep this up three meals a day, every day."

"Of course not, Angel. Tonight we are hosts. We are welcoming them into our home. Tomorrow, they will be residents, and residents need to take care of themselves."

"We have the food to feed them, but what are you going to do about their living space? They can't sleep on our sofas and floors forever. Do you know how to build houses?"

Silence.

"What about if we haul back a few RVs? Those can be counted as houses."

"Too dangerous. We don't have a lot of gas to go on a search, either. I'll ask if any of them have any experience in constructing houses, especially with our limited resources."

"That means we just have to temporarily convert all the rooms we have into bedrooms, then. Now, about mealtime. Who's going to do the cooking, and where are all those people going to sit?"

"We could build a bigger dining room table. Our dining hall is big enough to seat many. As for who will do the cooking, I expect our new housemates to pull some weight." He gently rubbed my belly. "Don't stress about it. It's not good for the baby. I'll keep them all in line."

I closed my eyes and fell asleep almost instantly.

# Chapter 11

The next morning, I woke up alone in bed. I washed up and went downstairs to find Liam. He was sitting on the foyer stairs and in front of him sat sixty other individuals. He was holding a clipboard in his hand and a pen in the other. I took a peek to see what he was writing and saw names ordered by family and by age, and then next to each were skillsets and a job description. On the far right, he made a note of special abilities.

I sat next to him and observed.

Most families had four or more members. Out of those numbers were six seniors, six young children, and four teenagers.

"Who will be taking care of the children?" I asked.

"Their parents, of course," Liam answered without looking up from the clipboard.

"Like a teacher. Like someone to round them up when there's an emergency."

A young woman sitting in front raised her hand. "My name is Alycia Davis. I can do that. I'm-- Well, I was a school teacher."

"Your job, then." Liam scribbled "teacher" next to her name.

"We have a library you can use," I said to Alycia.

"Thank you," she replied.

I leaned over to look at the list again. Apparently, a Mrs. Jones and a Mrs. Rosenstein were in charge of the kitchen. The first and second names from each family underlined seemed to be men from Liam's team. Next to their names was "guard." Some of the other people on the list had "farmer" next to them.

I couldn't help but sigh. They could try, but I doubted anything would be harvestable in the end.

"Chairman, I want to be of use too. I'm old, but I still have a lot of fight left in me," the old man named Wilfred from last night said.

A few chuckles came from the group.

"You manage the list and make sure everyone is doing their job, then," Liam said.

Wilfred smiled and nodded. "Yes, Chairman."

"That shall be all."

"Liam, we need people to harvest the fruits and dry them," I reminded him. "We don't have gasoline to operate the heavy machinery."

"You heard my wife. Anyone who was not assigned a job will be fruit picking. After we have picked all the grapes, we will clear out a big section as farmland. Let's all go to breakfast. My pregnant wife is starving."

Everyone laughed.

I glared at Liam.

He smiled back, put a hand behind my back, and walked with me to the kitchen. Poor Ayaka was on kitchen duty again. Two middle-aged women, likely Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Rosenstein, went to the kitchen and started helping out.

After I had four just-add-water pancakes with grape preserve for breakfast, Liam and I went to the wine cellar to grab supplies. Hiroki was standing guard by the entrance. I'd never been in the wine cellar; I assumed it was just a small place underground to keep wine. But when I actually went down the tunnel, I realized it was far from my imagination. It was a huge space about fifteen feet high, thirty feet wide, and stretched as far as a football field, with two huge rows of supporting columns running down its length. There were shelves built against the wall, full of all sorts of wine bottles arranged according to year.

"It's a very profitable winery," Liam said as he walked down the cellar, making the wine barrels in the center disappear as he walked by.

I followed as he walked all the way to the end of the cellar and then walked back. This time, pallets upon pallets of supplies appeared in neat rows where the wine barrels used to be.

Most of the pallets had the West & West logo printed on plastic wrapping.

"Liam."

"Hmm?"

"You chose to go down to the warehouse that time so you could loot your own supplies?"

"I do have a wife and baby to feed."

"Who will feed your wife and baby if something happens to you?"

He paused in his tracks and turned to face me. "That was before I found out you have a stash of your own. Angel, in the future, there will be things I feel like I must do as a man, as a husband, as a father, and you will not always find them agreeable. I can only promise you that I will use my best judgment, my utmost caution, so that I won't leave behind a widow and an orphan."

"Widows and orphans most likely won't survive in the world to come."

"I won't let anything happen to myself."

"Good, because I'm telling you now, I won't stay your widow. Let that be an incentive to you."

"Angel, I should have mentioned this much earlier: I'm a very jealous husband," he professed, then resumed walking toward the exit tunnel.

_A good incentive, then,_ I thought as I followed him out of the wine cellar.

He stopped at the entrance and said to Hiroki, "From now on, you're in charge of the supplies cellar. You'll help them get whatever supplies they need, but no one is permitted inside except for the four of us."

Hiroki nodded.

Ayaka was right about Hiroki not being much of a talker.

Having been relieved of kitchen duty, Ayaka returned to her post and followed me around again. I was curious what they were going to do about the housing issue, so in the afternoon, I went to the study to attend the scheduled meeting.

Liam was sitting behind a desk, listening to each proposed project. One of the men offered up his seat to me when he saw me standing by the door. I declined, but he insisted.

The man standing to speak at that moment was proposing that we build simple log cabins for each family, to serve mainly as sleeping quarters. When Liam asked about heating in the winter, the man went silent for a moment and then sat back down.

Another man stood up and said, "I think log cabins are our best choice when it comes to materials. We're surrounded by forestry. It also insulates very well in the winter. The problem is that we would need to build at least eleven--one for each family--and that would be a drain on resources, especially heating in the winter. I think we need to rethink this housing situation in a less conventional way than one house per family."

Another man stood up and expressed his objections. The discussion went on and on.

Liam was losing patience after two hours and decided that they would build wood cabins for each family where they would live for most of the year. Come winter, everyone would cram back into the country house for heat conservation.

The design of the cabins was a modest 20-by-25 with stairs and a double loft.

Then everyone moved on to another subject: guard duty.

"The twelve guards are to be divided into three teams. Each team will be on guard duty for six-hour shifts. The remaining six-hour shift will fall back on volunteers. Every able man must take up arms."

A woman pushed to her feet and voiced, "Chairman, us women can take up arms too."

Liam nodded in agreement.

"I volunteer." Someone raised a hand.

A few others followed suit.

Anyone with half a brain understood how serious guard duty was at times like these, especially when most survivors had fled north of the city. No one objected to Liam's decision.

"Next. Every man, woman, and child has a duty of care. Anything that would be considered a crime before is still a crime now. I will not tolerate theft, rape, murder, and especially disclosing anything seen at my base with outsiders."

"Chairman, we're all good people here," someone said.

"I just want to be perfectly clear about my expectations so no one can say I haven't warned you. If you don't like my rules, the door is wide open, but break my rules in my territory, and by God, I will not hesitate to put a bullet in your head."

The room fell eerily quiet. I hadn't expected Liam to say that either.

Liam continued. "I'm a husband and a father. Like any of you sitting here right now, I have a family to protect. I'm going to be perfectly honest with you: I almost did not let any of you through those gates. I was afraid that if I let in one wrong person--just one wrong person--he might destroy everything I stand to protect. Regrets won't count for anything then. Revenge will ease the pain, but it can't undo anything.

"I let you through those gates, which means that I have already placed my faith in you to be good, decent folks. You want a safe place to stay? Stay. You want to protect your family? I will stand with you to protect them, but before that, bring any harm to mine, and I will not hesitate to send you back to your maker. I want to make this a safe place I can raise my children, and if I have to take out a few bad apples to make that happen, then I will."

Everyone was speechless. Even I was speechless.

"Chairman, I have a wife and two young daughters. They mean the world to me. I know exactly what you're talking about."

"Chairman, I didn't mean any disrespect. I just assumed..."

"Chairman, if anyone breaks your rules, no need for you to dirty your hands; I'll put a bullet through their head myself."

"I think it's perfectly reasonable. I don't want any of the mess out there in here. I have a family to protect and a kid to raise too."

After those two important discussions were out of the way, it was time for a little ability demonstration in the backyard. Among the sixty residents, there were nine people with special abilities. I thought that percentage was a little high since it was speculated that only three in a hundred people would develop special abilities. Then I reminded myself they probably survived this long because of their special abilities.

Seeing it on TV was one thing, but seeing it with your own eyes was an entirely different experience.

# Chapter 12

The next few days went a lot smoother than I expected. No conflicts arose. Everyone was doing their assigned job, and every single person except for the children lent a hand in the construction of the new cabins in one way or another. On the sixth day, we almost had the second cabin completed. No one moved in them yet because the late April weather was still a little chilly and it was warmer to stay inside the country house.

Early this morning, the guards had sounded the bell. By the time Ayaka and I showed up at the front gates, we saw a group of five strangers standing just outside--a man and a woman in their fifties, a man and a woman in their twenties, and a boy in his early teens. All looked extremely ragged.

Our men had already gathered at the gates with firearms in hand. They made way for Liam to get in front. Liam furrowed his brows when he saw me among the group. He gave Ayaka a warning look. She chickened out and started herding me back into the house.

"It's fine. It doesn't look like they have any weapons on them. Besides, you're here with me."

Ayaka was a little convinced.

"What are you people doing here? This is our property!" The middle-aged woman spoke first.

The middle-aged man shushed her and stepped forward. Though dressed in rags, it wasn't hard to see that, by the way he carried himself, this man was the polished type. He introduced himself. "Mr. West, my name is Joel Clarke. We've actually met on a few occasions. Before all of this, I was a businessman. Have you heard of the Elyse chain department store? I'm the owner. This is my wife and three children. We escaped the city after the fall about a week ago and are looking for a place to stay. This vineyard used to belong to my family. It is yours now, I will not contest that, but I ask that you find it in your heart to let my family stay here."

When I heard him say this place used to belong to his family, my eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"This vineyard belonged to the Carmichaels," Liam corrected.

"Yes, Evelyn Carmichael was my first wife. She passed away many years ago."

"That still doesn't make this vineyard legally yours."

"No, no, it's yours now. I understand that. I just want a place for my family to stay."

"You misheard me. You and Evelyn Carmichael divorced many years ago. This place isn't legally yours."

Joel Clarke looked surprised, but quickly replied, "Mr. West, you are an extremely knowledgeable man. Evelyn and I divorced many years ago, and she passed away without any living kin. By the law of inheritance, I still have claims to this property. But like I said, I just want a place for my family to stay. No more."

"We have rules here, Mr. Clarke. Once you walk through these gates, you live by our rules."

"Naturally!"

Liam gave the order. Two men went to open the gates to let them in.

Liam turned to walk toward me. I gave him a questioning look, and he discreetly nodded. My gaze fell on Joel Clarke's three children.

Liam put an arm behind my back and said to the newly arriving family, "This is my wife, Sienna. Remember her face. Put a scratch on her, and I will send all of you on your way."

Everyone standing there knew exactly what Liam meant except for the oblivious new arrivals.

"Mrs. West, thank you for welcoming us into your home." Joel offered a handshake, but when he saw his own dirty hand, he retracted in embarrassment.

"Come with me," I said, not even bothering with etiquette.

I led the new arrivals into the country house. Joel stopped dead in his tracks at the door, his eyes immediately glued to the painting of my mother in the foyer. The middle-aged woman walking behind him gave a forward push, and he looked like he had just woken from a trance.

"Come this way," I said and then led them to the full bathroom on the lower level. I told them to wait there while I went upstairs to find some clothes. They arrived with the clothes on their backs, and it didn't look like they would stay there much longer. I brought some clothes downstairs and handed them to Mr. Clarke.

He gratefully accepted.

"There is another full bath upstairs. Ayaka, would you show them the way?"

"Ma'am..."

I knew what she was going to say. "I'm going to the kitchen. Liam is there."

Ayaka finally agreed.

They divided up the clothes, and the two women followed Ayaka upstairs.

Liam was in the kitchen taking a sip of his morning coffee. I sat back down on my chair and resumed my half-eaten breakfast. Neither of us said a word to each other until I finished my cereal and water-thinned evaporated milk.

"Why did you let them in?" I finally asked.

"You know why."

Because he was my father.

"How old are his children?"

"The daughter is your age. The son is two years younger."

"How many months apart?"

He knew I was asking about the daughter. "She's one month older."

"That explains why my mother gave me to the Winstons instead."

Liam took another sip of his coffee.

"The baby is kicking me again."

Liam abruptly placed his mug on the counter, spilling the coffee in the process. He took two quick strides to me, knelt down, and placed his hands on my belly. Last night I told him that I felt the baby kicking during the day while he wasn't around and he'd spent half the night feeling my belly for movement. In the end, he fell asleep disappointed.

He even pressed his face against my belly this time.

"I felt it!" He was wide-eyed and amazed. Then a bright smile stretched across his face. "That was a strong kick! We're going to have a very strong baby!"

That was not how it worked, but I did not want to spoil the moment for him. He was a thirty-four-year-old man expecting his first child. I decided just to let him have his moment.

Joel, now wearing a set of clean clothes, walked into the kitchen and saw our little scene. "I didn't mean to interrupt."

Liam ignored him and continued to move his hands around to detect anymore movement.

"I was the same when I was expecting my first child," Joel said to me.

He thought it was a good conversation starter, but to me, that sentence felt like a bucket of cold water poured over my head. "You must love your children, Mr. Clarke," I said.

"My pride and joy."

"What are their names?"

"My daughter's name is Scarlet. My older son is Reid, and the younger boy is Rory."

"What an interesting name, Scarlet."

He smiled at the compliment.

"Have a seat at our table, Mr. Clarke. What would you like for breakfast?"

He eyed the box of cereal and pitcher of milk on the table and said, "Cereal will do just fine."

"The bowls are in that cabinet over there. The utensils are in this drawer here."

He went over to the cabinet to fetch five empty bowls and five spoons.

_A family man,_ I thought.

He came to sit at our table and then put a little bit of cereal in each bowl. He looked rather shy about it. The value of food wasn't what it used to be.

"Liam, grab another box of cereal from the pantry. What's left in that box isn't enough for five people."

Liam looked displeased to be interrupted from his father-child time, but he got up and went to the pantry to grab another box. He put the box on the table, took the seat next to me, and then placed a hand on my belly again.

"This box is enough," Mr. Clarke said.

"Don't be shy, Mr. Clarke. We have plenty of cereal here."

"Thank you for your hospitality," he said and then poured every bowl to the rim.

Ayaka showed his wife to the kitchen a short moment after. She took a seat next to him and stared at the bowl in front of her. They looked like they hadn't seen food in ages.

"Ayaka, would you please fetch our guests another pitcher of milk?"

"Certainly, Ma'am." Ayaka grabbed another pitcher from the cabinet and filled it with evaporated milk from a can. She then stirred it up with some of her generated water and placed it on the breakfast table.

Sometimes Mrs. Clarke would glance over at me as if to ask me for permission to start eating. I pretended not to notice. When she couldn't wait any longer and reached for the spoon, Mr. Clarke said to her, "Wait for the children."

Fifteen minutes later, Hiroki showed their three children to the kitchen. They all stared at the bowls of cereal on the table the same way.

"Come thank our hosts for sharing their food with us, children." He was calling them children though two of them obviously weren't children anymore.

They leaped to the table, poured the milk, and devoured the cereal like hungry beasts. The cereal overflowed onto the table, but by the end, it was empty bowls and a clean table.

"Have some more," I offered when I saw that they were still eyeing the cereal box.

They said "thank you" and took me up on my offer.

"Father, will we be staying here tonight?" the boy asked Mr. Clarke. "Please say we will. I don't want to sleep in the woods anymore."

Mr. Clarke didn't know what to answer the boy, so he looked to Liam.

"There isn't space in the house for any more people, but we do have a newly constructed log cabin your family can move into," Liam said.

I eyed Liam, silently asking him why. The residents would not be happy to hear that the first house they constructed together was offered to a family of newly joined strangers.

"Why can't we stay in here?" asked the boy, his brows furrowed together. "I like it here."

"There isn't enough room," explained his father.

"Well, then pay someone to _make_ room for us! I want to stay in _this_ house!"

"Rory!" Mr. Clarke warned.

The boy quieted down.

Mr. Clarke then turned to us. "That is beyond generous of you! Thank you!"

I said, "Your son isn't very happy with the arrangement. Perhaps we can ask someone to switch--"

"No, Mrs. West. Your offer is beyond generous, especially during these hard times. My son is a little spoiled by his mother, and he needs to learn that he can't always have things his way."

"You're Liam West!" Scarlet suddenly cried out, garnering our attention. It looked like now that she had some food in her belly, she could finally recognize people. "You're the chairman of West & West! I saw you in the papers. Your wife was murdered."

The room went so quiet I could hear crickets chirping outside. I felt the hand on my belly stiffen. I looked to Liam and saw his face visibly reddening from rising anger like someone had just poked at his wound. Anyone who could bring color to Liam's face had talent.

Scarlet pressed both of her hands to her mouth as though she just realized what she had said. Then she put both of her hands on the hand Liam was resting on the table in a gesture of comfort. "I am so sorry for your loss!"

Liam yanked his hand away. "It was all a misunderstanding. My wife is sitting beside me."

Scarlet's gaze went to me, then dropped to Liam's hand resting on my pregnant belly. "I'm sorry. I didn't know."

He ignored her apology and helped me get up from my seat. "If you would excuse me, my wife and I are needed elsewhere."

"Mr. West, if you would just give me a moment." Joel got up from his seat and walked to us. "With your permission, my family and I would like to stay here long-term. Of course, we will pull our own weight around here. I have an ability that may be of use to you. I discovered that I have the power of suggestions. I can...suggest people to do what I tell them. Just little things."

Liam nodded. "I will send Wilfred to talk to you about job distribution. Now, would you excuse me?"

"Yes, of course."

Turning away, I caught Joel furrowing his brows and looking at Scarlet disapprovingly.

She shrugged, then whispered, "What did I do?"

# Chapter 13

"Why did you offer them the cabin?" I asked Liam as soon as we left the house.

"The weather is still too cold. Nobody wants to move out of the house yet. By the time the weather warms up, we should have enough cabins for everyone."

"Every cabin has a fireplace," I argued.

"Yes, but they would have to chop wood from out there"--Liam gestured to the wall, then to the completed cabin--"and haul it back here on a daily basis if they want heating."

Everyone greeted us as we walked by.

"They call you chairman because they used to work for you, but could you tell them not to call me ma'am?"

"They can't very well call you Miss. Or would you prefer Mrs. West?"

"My name is fine."

"It's ma'am or Mrs. West, Angel. I don't want people calling you by your first name."

"It creates closeness and familiarity. You rarely call me by that name anyway."

"I've been calling you Angel in my head since before I knew your name."

"It's the name of the violin."

"It suits you better. Besides, I don't want you to create 'closeness' and 'familiarity.' Not at a time like this."

"Why were you calling me that in your head before we even spoke?"

He smiled and kept on walking.

I caught up to his pace. "Liam, did anyone ask you why you let those five through the gates?"

"He said Evelyn Carmichael was his first wife. Everyone here knows she's your mother, so it wasn't hard for them to guess that those five were my in-laws."

"I see."

"How do you feel about them so far?"

"Joel's a manipulative persuader, but his aura is fine. His family, however..."

"A scheming and extremely selfish lot."

I looked at him, questioning how he knew.

"I looked them up many years ago. I decided then it wasn't worth it to introduce them to you. Your father's tagalongs are heavy baggage, but I know you wouldn't want him to die out there."

"I wonder how a man like Joel raised children like them."

"He didn't. He wanted children, but a busy man like him didn't have the time to be a father. He left the raising of his children to his wife. His wife taught his children all she knows, and the end of the world is where their skillsets shine."

"I'm not missing out on anything then. Did you have a good father, Liam?"

"My father remarried when I was a boy. His new wife didn't want me around, so he sent me to live with my mother's brother. He remarried two more times after that. He died when I was twelve. A car accident. His three sons from later marriages were also in the car, making me the sole heir to my grandfather's fortune. My grandfather was quick to assemble a team of lawyers to win back my custody after the accident."

"Was your grandfather a father figure to you?"

"I suppose he was. After my father's accident, he became extremely fearful of leaving this world without an heir to inherit his legacy. To my grandfather, I was first and foremost an heir."

"We don't know anything about being parents, then." I sighed as I stroked my belly. I couldn't remember my own mother. I didn't know how to be a mother myself.

"We will learn as we go, Angel."

"We do not have a choice."

The guards sounded the alarm again. Ayaka, who had been following us from afar, ran to my side.

"Take my wife inside," Liam said to Ayaka.

She nodded and ringed her arm around mine to get me to go with her.

"Liam, listen." I tiptoed, and he bent down to lend me an ear. "I sense a group of six men and two women coming down the road. One person is being carried, so perhaps he's severely hurt. Most are armed."

He lifted his head and nodded. "Go inside."

As I headed inside, the Clarkes were heading out. I walked past them and went upstairs to the room with the window facing the front gates. The people at the gates didn't look like regular folks. They were wearing dark vests over dark clothing. One of them was badly bleeding through makeshift bandages and had to be carried by two other men.

"I wonder what they're saying."

"They're asking to come inside," said Ayaka. "They said they're soldiers on a recon mission and they encountered a mountain lion in the forest. The woman said if her comrade continues to bleed, he will die."

"You can hear from this far away?"

"I can read lips, Ma'am. It's part of my training."

"Tell me more. What are they saying now?"

"Miss Scarlet is asking the chairman to open the gates to let them in. She said we can't just leave them to die out there. Some of our residents are also trying to convince the chairman to open the gates and lend our help."

Liam was standing with his back to us the whole time, so we didn't know if he said anything. When he turned around and walked back into the house, Ayaka said, "The chairman told the residents to decide on their own what they should do, but those people must be disarmed before entering."

A few minutes later, Liam walked into the room and stood behind me. He placed both hands on my shoulders as we looked out of the window, waiting to see what the residents would do. They decided to open the gates after all.

"Angel--"

"You don't have to say anything. I understand. They are asking for help, and if you turn them away, there will be a risk of confrontation. They are armed."

"I want you to stay out of sight while those people are here. Their weapons aren't civilian, but there's no way to know for sure if they are who they say they are."

"I can't just stay in the bedroom indefinitely. Don't worry, Ayaka is always with me."

"The second cabin should be finishing up today. I'll place them there."

"You were also right, Liam. What would we do if it was just the four of us here?"

He pressed a kiss on top of my head and then headed downstairs.

"Ayaka, for my safety, don't call me ma'am anymore."

Ayaka and I went downstairs to the kitchen to help the two missuses prepare lunch. Even though the cooking was assigned to Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Rosenstein, most of the women volunteered to help with preparations. It was also quality time for them to gossip. I usually did not partake in it, but since there was no TV or internet to curb my boredom, listening to them was a form of entertainment. This morning, their subject was the new arrivals.

I listened in as I peeled the potatoes, until the guard sounded the alarm again. _Three alarms in one morning --this must be a special day. _Some women picked up arms and ran to the front gate while others gathered up the children. I got up to have a look.

There was a line of military trucks at the front gates. A group of soldiers got out of the truck, among them General Grant himself.

Liam had the gates opened, then walked General Grant toward the house. I greeted the general in the foyer and we walked him to the sitting room. The guests who slept on the sofas were polite enough to fold up their linen, so it wasn't too much of an embarrassment.

"You must've heard about what happened," General Grant began.

"Yes, from the people who'd fled here."

"You two were lucky that you weren't at the base when it happened. We lost a great number of people."

Liam nodded.

"Liam, I have a favor to ask of you. I know we have asked a lot from you already, but the situation has forced me to come here to ask more of you."

"You are my uncle, General. You are one of the few family members I have left. If you're troubled and it is within my ability to help, you have but to ask. My wife and I will do all that we can."

"As of this moment, I have over fifty thousand survivors under my care, and I have no place to put them. We've lost too many people and don't have the manpower to clear out an entire town. The last place I can think of to relocate them is here."

"Here, General? It's nowhere near the same thing as a town."

"At the very least, you have a perimeter wall. This place is also remote, far from the population."

"General, with all due respect, fifty thousand people won't fit here. That wall was built to fend off wild animals, not the undead. All we have here is three houses, a winery, a hundred acres of grapevines and another hundred acres of orchard. I can't even imagine how we could house fifty thousand people."

"Now you see my dilemma, Liam. Those people are sleeping in tents in an open field right now. At least here, they'd have a wall to offer them some protection. Structures we can build, but first we need stability."

Liam's deep blue eyes turned contemplative.

I suddenly thought about the warehouse we stopped by last week. The warehouse area also had a perimeter fence, and better yet, a structure already built. I had not gone down there, but if I wasn't mistaken, the warehouse was several levels deep.

Just as I was about to remind Liam, he said, "General, what if I can offer a better place to house fifty thousand people?"

General Grant's eyes lit up. "What do you have in mind?"

"As you know, I have warehouses."

"People can't live in warehouses, Liam. It doesn't insolate well, and the summer heat gets trapped underneath. It's better to build new housing structures."

Liam went on. "One, in particular, is an underground warehouse on a square mile of fenced land. It was built as an underground community shelter in the nineties, but the project was abandoned due to its over-ambitious planning. My grandfather acquired the property for a bargain price, and you know how he loved a good bargain. He then converted it into a warehouse. I don't see any reason why we can't convert it back to its original purpose. The warehouse itself is over a million square feet of space spanning five levels. It has a central air system built in, along with enough supplies to support fifty thousand people for some time. It may not be enough space to comfortably house that many people, but it's a start." He took his wallet from his pocket, pulled out a transparent blue keycard, and placed it on the table. "I can give you the keycard and the access code."

The general's eyes lit up like a beacon in the dark. "Liam, this is..."

"It's worth a lot more than a piece of land with a perimeter wall. I think it's what you need right now."

"I-I..." The general stammered for a few seconds, then his expression firmed up. "We must speak terms."

"It's all yours, Uncle."

"Is there nothing I can offer?"

"No, Uncle, no terms. It's all yours."

General Grant looked a bit touched and placed a hand on Liam's shoulder. "Liam, I've always thought that you would have gone far if you took the military route instead of becoming a businessman."

"I know. You wanted me to become a general just like you and grandfather, to continue the family tradition. But another path was already paved for me."

"The path I had in mind for you was already paved for you too. Either way, general or not, I'm very proud of you today."

Liam wrote a long list of locations and access codes and handed it over to General Grant. Ever since he'd jotted down a second line, General Grant had his eyes glued to the sheet of paper. The moment Liam handed that sheet to him, he stared at Liam, wide-eyed in disbelief.

"Liam, are you sure?" the general asked, still staring in disbelief.

"They're of no use to us right now, but they're lifelines to people far away."

General Grant gripped Liam's shoulder once again, but this time, there were no words.

We walked the general out to the gates and said our goodbyes. At the gates, General Grant looked down at my pregnant belly and said, "Perhaps one day my grandnephew will take an interest in continuing the family tradition."

The group of seven strangers walked up to us. The man in front stood with his back straight and said, "Lieutenant Colonel Ashe reporting, General. My recon squad lost two members on our mission. Another is severely wounded. We have assessed the surroundings and found this site to be a good candidate for relocation, General."

"We have found a site for relocation, Lieutenant Colonel." General Grant glanced over to Liam and said, "Your squad is to stay and protect the civilians on this base under the direct command of Liam West."

Lieutenant Colonel Ashe blinked and quickly panned over to Liam standing beside the General. "With all due respect, General, this man is a civilian."

"That is an order, Lieutenant Colonel!"

"Yes, General." Then he said, "A member of my squad needs immediate medical attention."

General Grant gave an acknowledging nod and had the injured man loaded onto a stretcher and carried into the back of the military truck.

We waved to the trucks as they drove away.

As we were walking back into the house, Liam explained, "My uncle has two daughters, but neither has any interest in becoming a general. He always hoped he could persuade me to follow in his footsteps."

"You said your father sent you to live with your mother's brother."

"I lived in his home for five years. Thought of me like the son he never had."

"So you did have a father figure growing up."

Liam smiled and walked me back into the house.

# Chapter 14

Lieutenant Colonel Ashe wasn't too pleased about being put under the command of a civilian, and it showed in the look he was giving Liam. I didn't know much about how the military operated, but from the colonel's reaction to the general's order, I could tell this was not normally done.

Now that their identities had been confirmed by the general, Liam gave the soldiers their gear back and told them they could stay in the cabin that should be finished by tonight. The cabin most likely would not house seven people comfortably, so Liam promised them a second cabin once it was completed.

I was just glad they were who they said they were.

At lunchtime, everyone gathered in the dining room. Wilfred and the others grabbed a few more chairs to fit our new arrivals at the table, then went to the kitchen to help bring out all the food Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Rosenstein had prepared since morning.

Breakfasts were always simple: protein bars, cereal, or oatmeal with a glass of orange juice. Everyone woke up at different times, so Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Rosenstein just put baskets of protein bars, boxes of cereal and oatmeal, and pitchers of orange juice in the dining room, free for anyone to grab.

For lunch, however, everyone except for the people on guard duty would gather in the dining room for real meals served up by the two cooks. The guards' portions were delivered to them in advance so they could eat at their post. Dishes made of dehydrated meat such as meatloaf were divided evenly amongst everyone, but there was plenty of other food free for the picking on the table. French fries and pizza were always a favorite of the children.

Both the Clarkes and the military folks were surprised by the sheer amount of food served at the table. Even at the military base, food was rationed to people in servings. Half a pizza for two people was already considered surprising, and that was for the man whom they were borrowing supplies from. I could understand their reaction.

One of the children would say grace and then everyone would dig in. The Clarkes were especially aggressive with grabbing food for their plates.

Lieutenant Colonel Ashe turned to Liam and said, "This is no way to ration your food supply."

Everyone at the table except for the Clarkes stopped eating and looked over to the lieutenant colonel, then to Liam.

"There is no food waste at my table," Liam replied as he picked up a hot baked potato from the tray and placed it on my plate.

"You know that is not what I mean."

I knew where the lieutenant colonel was coming from. I didn't know how much Liam looted from his own warehouse, but I knew what I brought alone could easily feed a group of a hundred people for decades. Having this much food or even more on the table wouldn't dent our supply one bit. But the lieutenant colonel didn't know that. At times like these, it was considered wise to ration your food supplies for the long run.

"There is no food waste at my table, Lieutenant Colonel. That is all I care about. Our residents need to be fed so they can focus on their assigned jobs."

After hearing a definite answer from Liam, everyone resumed eating. I could tell they were afraid that food would be cut, but even more afraid there wouldn't be food in the long run. A few sentences from Liam calmed their fears. The residents had grown to rely on him as the one with all the answers.

"Their survival is more important than being full, Mr. West. I don't care how many supplies you have on hand; it'll run out eventually. Rationing is the answer for these people to survive a little longer."

Mr. Clarke was about to say something but decided not to. He lowered his head and resumed eating his meal like the matter at hand had nothing to do with him.

"How much of a food cut do you propose, Lieutenant Colonel?"

"Half. At least," the Lieutenant Colonel replied.

The table went quiet again.

"So be it then," Liam agreed. "My wife is pregnant, and even if she wasn't, I refuse to cut her food. On the contrary, I'm trying to make her eat more for our little one. I don't see why I should cut my portion just because of your say so, either. But if you think everyone will survive longer if I cut down the food that I provide them, then it shall be done. Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Rosenstein, take half of the food on the table back to the kitchen and store it for dinner."

The two missuses got up from their seat and did as Liam bade. The mood in the room sunk quickly.

Since everyone's plate already had food on it, the missuses took entire pots and trays back into the kitchen. A few other women got up to help them.

At the very least, half of what was on the table was still more than the rations the military had handed out to regular folks during my stay there.

Everyone cleared their plates quickly and got up to go back to whatever they'd been doing. Children who were old enough to understand what was going on left the table with frowns on their faces. They were fed, but it was their parents who shared their portions with them.

A little boy named Daniel, who was about five years old, slipped away from his mother's hand, ran toward the lieutenant colonel, and kicked him with his tiny foot. I remembered his name because he gave everyone a bit of a hard time the first few days. He lost his father at a young age and was extremely protective of his mother. He'd been surprisingly good for the last few days, but seeing his mother had to share what little food she had with him made him angry. His little face was red with anger. Tears pooled in his round gray eyes, but he was trying to be a big man and not let them fall. It looked rather cute.

"We will not cut the children's portions, Liam."

He patted my hand. "I didn't say we will. The children will be fed, I promise. Isn't that right, Lieutenant Colonel?"

Every pair of eyes in the room was on him.

The lieutenant colonel said, "I didn't say we should, either."

"That's settled then. Liam, I don't feel very well. I'm going to bed."

"I'll escort you."

The lieutenant colonel's motives were coming from a good place, but the mood was so low that I just didn't want to be in the room any longer.

At dinner time, the missuses brought out the leftovers from lunch. The difference was that they were going around dividing equal portions on each plate. According to Liam's instructions, the children's plates and my own were fuller than the rest. After grace, everyone dug in like the Clarkes had earlier that day. Everyone was starving.

# Chapter 15

Liam had been taking cold showers for a week, and I didn't know how long he could keep it up. It was not that I disliked the thought of being intimate with him, but I was a first-time mother, five months pregnant, with a bad case of amnesia. I wasn't sure if sexual activity would harm the baby or not. I read somewhere that it was okay, but because I didn't know for sure, I didn't want to take unnecessary risks.

So I used the "my belly is not feeling well" excuse again. Liam didn't want to risk his baby either, so he'd been taking cold showers without complaint.

It certainly didn't sound healthy. The weather was still chilly. I was afraid he'd get sick if he kept it up.

"Liam, go to the other side of the bed." I shook him off.

We had a king-sized bed, but he liked to sleep right next to me. Sometimes he would go to sleep quietly, other times his hands would accidentally brush by here and there, and once that happened, he couldn't stop himself from running his hands all over me. I let him touch me, let him kiss me, but it always ended up with a cold shower. I didn't know why he wanted to torture himself so when it could be easily prevented. Couldn't he just sleep a little farther away?

"I'll sleep quietly tonight," he said.

I'd heard that before, but when I would change my laying position, my breasts would brush against his arm, and he would immediately throw what he just said out of the window.

Just like now.

I felt his hands slip right under the pajama, cupping my breasts and fondling them, his coarse breathing against my ear. And just as I predicted, soon that wasn't enough. He unbuttoned my shirt, lifted his head from the pillow, turned me, and closed his mouth over my breast. The warm, damp wetness always made me feel so strange, like something was running underneath my skin. Felt like I was turning inside out. I tried to writhe away from him. I squirmed away, and he caught up. Soon I was laying at the very edge of the bed.

He wouldn't let go until he thoroughly sucked on both, then he lifted his head from my breast and kissed me long and hard. His body was burning up again. He was burning me up too.

I vaguely knew how the male body worked, but what would happen if he kept this up the entire duration of the pregnancy?

"I'm going to take a shower," he rasped after he lifted his head from my lips. The same old line.

"Wait, let me try something first." I sat up, both hands on his burning chest, pushing him back against the mattress. He went along with the momentum of my push, deep blue eyes questioning. I slipped under the blanket to try something that just came into my head. I'd seen it done when I walked in on Alex and the girl he brought back to the penthouse. It was only for a brief few seconds, but I got the gist of it. It didn't take a genius to understand friction.

It wasn't as easy as I'd imagined. I had a vague understanding of the male anatomy, vaguely knew what it looked like, vaguely understood its reproductive functions, but even with that, I could still tell his size was out of the ordinary. I could barely fit the tip in my mouth.

The moment my tongue accidentally touched it, I felt his body tense up and quiver. I heard a low groaning from the back of his throat and thought perhaps I was doing it right. I tried to create friction with my hands and heard his breathing grow harsher and harsher. Sometimes, I heard him murmur, "Angel."

The aura he was emitting was one of bliss.

I knew I was doing it right, so kept at it. The entire time, I was doing some measurements inside my head. Erect, the length almost touched his belly button. It seemed absurd to me that it would fit if we were going to be intimate the traditional way, but then again, this baby I was carrying had to have been conceived somehow.

Just when I was wondering how long I had to keep this up, I heard a grunt coming from him and then felt a warm jet. I crawled out of the blanket and was met with a pair of bewildered deep blue eyes.

I got off the bed and went to the bathroom to rinse my mouth. When I came back, Liam was staring at the ceiling, his chest rising and falling with each breath. I climbed back into bed and flopped onto my pillow. He stared at me. I closed my eyes and tried to go to sleep, but I could still feel his stare on me. I opened my eyes, and he was still staring at me like I was some strange woman who had just crawled into his bed.

"What?" I asked. His staring was starting to make me feel uncomfortable. "You're staring at me like I've never done that before."

"You haven't."

We were staring at each other now. We had been married for four years. I'd assumed that whatever needed to be done was done already.

I saw a smile creep up his face that brought a burning sensation to my cheeks. I turned to lie on my side, facing away from him.

"Angel..."

"Go to sleep."

"Angel, could you be any more lovable?"

"Go to sleep," I said between gritted teeth.

He gathered me into his arms and pressed a kiss on my cheek and shoulder. "Angel, where did you learn that?"

I ignored him and closed my eyes.

That night, I had the same recurring dream again. I was in that blue peony garden that was often the backdrop for my dreams and there was a man on top of me, thrusting fast and hard. I was in pain. I was in so much pain, but I couldn't cry out. I didn't have a voice. All that came out when I tried to say something was the sound of my own breath.

I woke up in my own bed, panting. That recurring dream usually ended when I tried to remember his face, but this time, it went further. The pain inside my dream felt so real, as though I'd physically experienced it before.

"What's wrong?" Liam asked, lifting his head from the pillow and rubbing away the tears on my face with his thumbs.

I shook my head. "Just a bad dream," I replied.

"Come here, you." Liam pulled me into his embrace. "Want to tell me about it?"

"Someone was hurting me."

"Who?"

"I don't know. I can't see his face in my dream."

"It's just a bad dream, Angel. I won't let anyone hurt you."

"I dreamt I was in a garden with blue peonies. A man was hurting me."

"Garden with blue peonies?"

"Some sort of botanical garden with a domed glass ceiling. All the flowers there were blue."

"Angel, that was our bedroom."

"Huh?"

"You had a dream about our bedroom. On our first anniversary, I had a botanical garden built adjoined to our bedroom as an anniversary gift. Blue was your favorite color and peonies were your favorite flowers. To keep it a surprise, I took you here for an entire month. You loved being there so much that I had a daybed placed in the center. We slept there a good many days of the year. It became our second bedroom. Angel, you're remembering!" His voice was filled with anticipation, nothing like a person with something to hide.

I wasn't sure if that was even a good thing or if I wanted to remember. I put both of my hands on my pregnant belly. Something terrible happened in that garden, and Liam had no idea it took place.

I was afraid to tell him.

"You said a man was hurting you. Hurting you how?"

I shook my head. "It was just a bad dream. I've forgotten about it already."

"Go back to sleep, Angel. I'm here."

The next morning, Liam and I found Mr. Clarke standing in front of my mother's portrait painting.

Liam asked Mr. Clarke to join us for breakfast. After he ate a full bowl of oatmeal, he asked us the reason for wanting to speak to him. I didn't know why either, so I left the talking to Liam.

"Mr. Clarke, I heard that Wilfred assigned you to help with construction. How do you like it there?"

"It's fine, Mr. West. I'm a little rusty, but eventually I will be able to do my job like everyone else." His manner was calm, but his aura was telling me that he was extremely nervous.

"But I feel that a man with your skillsets can be utilized elsewhere."

"What do you have in mind, Mr. West? I can do any job you assign if given the time to learn."

"The job I have in mind for you is something you naturally do best, Mr. Clarke."

Mr. Clarke lifted a brow.

"Mr. Clarke, unlike me, you're a self-made man."

"Mr. West, please don't embarrass me. I'm the owner of a few small shopping departments, nowhere near comparable to you running a business empire."

"Let me get to my point, Mr. Clarke. We're both businessmen, but we're very different. I'm well aware that everything I have-- _had_ --was handed down to me. But you, Mr. Clarke, you started from absolutely nothing. You slaved your way to your first convenience store, and with sheer talent, you turned that little store into a multimillion-dollar business. You have a skill I sorely lack. Do you know what it is?"

Mr. Clarke's aura turned from nervousness to fear. He must have been wondering how Liam knew so much about him. "I can't think of anything."

"Persuasion, Mr. Clarke. You're a man of immense persuasion; a skill you've sharpened to perfection. I, on the other hand, had very few opportunities to put that skill to practice. My greatest accomplishment in persuasion was that I persuaded my wife to marry me."

I glared at Liam. He smiled back.

"Let's get back on topic. There are over seventy people living here at the moment. That number will likely increase in the future. The more people, the more conflicts. Conflicts are undesirable on my base. That is why I need a man like you to be the mediator, so to speak, resolving little hiccups along the way. What do you think, Mr. Clarke? Is it up your alley?"

"I've been a fool in front of you the entire time. You saw right through me from the very beginning. Mr. West, I gratefully accept the job."

"Mr. Clarke, you are now our counselor."

"I will not disappoint, Mr. West. Mrs. West."

"A small reminder, Mr. Clarke. Impartiality is crucial to gain respect in your line of work."

"I understand that very well."

Liam got up from his seat, went to the pantry, and grabbed a case of canned food. He also grabbed another freshly baked loaf of bread from the counter and placed it in a plastic bag. He went back to the table and placed them in front of Mr. Clarke. "A small welcoming gift to you and your family, Mr. Clarke."

"Mr. West, this is--"

"Yesterday was your first meal with us, and a few hiccups came up. Your family wasn't well fed, and that was on me."

Mr. Clarke looked hesitant, but he eventually accepted the small gift. He had a family to feed, after all. He said his goodbyes and then went back to his cabin.

Liam went back to the counter and made himself a cup of coffee. When he saw me looking at him, he said, "He is my father-in-law, after all. Can't have him go hungry under my roof."

"The others will talk."

"His job requires him to be impartial, but that doesn't apply to me. I'm biased toward my family. Let them talk about that. I want to see who's going to come up to my face and tell me that I can't."

"Lieutenant Colonel Ashe might. He might give you the talk about conserving food so that I can survive longer."

"How absurd!" Liam chuckled, finding what I said extremely humorous. "If I want my wife to survive longer, I would have conserved food by not giving it out to strangers. Isn't that right, Lieutenant Colonel?"

I was wondering who he was talking to when the lieutenant colonel walked into the kitchen. At a closer look, the lieutenant colonel was a tall man in his late thirties with gray eyes and a stern expression that seemed permanently stuck on his face. One look at him and I could tell he was a man who did things by the book.

He came to our breakfast table and said, "My mission is to protect everyone here, and that entails doing everything I can to ensure their survival."

"And if I stop providing food to the people here? What would you do then? Would you rob me, Lieutenant Colonel?"

"My squad would go to nearby towns to search and retrieve supplies, but I hope to God you won't."

"We understand each other then, Lieutenant Colonel."

"Quite."

"Sit down and have breakfast with us, Lieutenant Colonel." Liam pushed the chair next to him out and gestured for the man to sit.

The lieutenant colonel took him up on the offer.

Liam grabbed a bowl from the stack on the table, poured the cereal and milk, placed it in front of the lieutenant colonel, and said, "You want everyone to survive. I want everyone to survive. We have a common goal, so let's work toward that together."

"My mission is my goal. Being king of the hill is your goal."

"Is that what you think? That I want to be some sort of warlord at the end of the world?"

"You control the food supply. You control them."

I furrowed my brow at the lieutenant colonel's assumption. That was never our intention.

Wilfred ran into the kitchen and shouted at the lieutenant colonel. "How could you say that about the chairman! I've watched him grow up. In my heart I know what kind of man the chairman is. He took us in because he still remembers the ties between our families and our services after all of these years. He took us in, all of us, women, children, even useless old men like me, when our lives had turned to turmoil! How dare you say such a terrible thing about him!"

"Wilfred, the lieutenant colonel just got here. He doesn't understand us yet."

"Please, Ma'am, I need to say my piece. Lieutenant Colonel, I'm sixty-two years old, and I have worked for the West family for over forty years. My father was ninety on his deathbed, and he worked for the Wests for sixty-five of those years. My son was one of the chairman's bodyguards. He broke his leg ten years ago on a non-job-related incident. The chairman spent a large sum of money for his medical care and therapy, but it didn't do any good. A bodyguard who couldn't move around was no bodyguard. The chairman then put my son through college while still paying his salary and gave him a desk job at the headquarters so that his wife and kids wouldn't starve. My son still can't walk without a crutch today. The chairman took my family in. An old man, a crippled man, a pregnant woman, a teenage boy, and a four-year-old child. Lieutenant Colonel, to put it lightly, we're burdens! I wish we could be more useful to the chairman, but no one in my family is capable of carrying our own weight! Do you know what would happen to us out there in that living hell if the chairman did not take us in?"

"Wilfred, you need to mind your blood pressure," I reminded him. I didn't know if he had a blood pressure problem or not but assumed it was common for most people his age.

"Thank you, Ma'am. I'll get back to work now." Wilfred glared at the lieutenant colonel on his way out.

Since Wilfred lashed out at the lieutenant colonel already, it didn't seem like I needed to, so I sat quietly and ate my breakfast.

"All of the people here used to work for you?" the lieutenant colonel asked, still an unshaken stern face.

"Over a dozen and their families." Liam sipped his cup of coffee. "We have a lot of mouths to feed, but not enough people who can bear arms. Aside from their regular assigned jobs, they still have six hours of guard duty a day. I was glad General Grant ordered your team to stay and protect us. The end of the world is a stage for anarchists. We just want to stay safe and rebuild our lives here."

Another sip. "Besides, if I have the ambition to become 'king of the hill' like you said, I wouldn't have given General Grant a million-square-foot underground structure stocked full of supplies to be the new relocation site. I could have set the base there myself. If I'd spoken terms with my general of an uncle, the Post-Apocalyptic King of fifty thousand people sounds much cooler than the Post-Apocalyptic King of a few dozen men, women, and children, don't you think?"

The lieutenant colonel blinked in disbelief. "You gave him what?"

"If the opportunity arises, you should go see it for yourself. It was originally built as an underground community shelter. This vineyard is my wife's family home, and it means a great deal to us for all the memories it holds. My wife and I chose to stay here because this is home. Those people came asking for help and we opened our gates. It's as simple as that."

A minute later, the lieutenant colonel said, "I misjudged you, Mr. West."

"I don't care what you think. As far as I'm concerned, if you can help me defend our home, you're a comrade. And, Lieutenant Colonel, your cereal is getting soggy."

# Chapter 16

"Hiroki told me that Miss Scarlet has been running into the chairman very often lately," Ayaka whispered into my ear as we looked out the window.

Liam was sawing lumber for construction when Scarlet came up and offered him a bottle of water. He accepted it, drank the entire bottle in one go, then resumed sawing.

"I noticed," I replied.

Recently, Scarlet had been wherever Liam was. If Liam was there, eight out of ten times, she would always be somewhere in sight. I pretended not to notice, but that didn't mean I didn't know what she was trying to do. The aura she'd been emitting lately was of jealousy and lust.

"The chairman is a married man," Ayaka said, unable to mask the anger in her tone of voice.

"What does marriage mean to her and her mother?"

I had not forgotten that my father had an affair with her mother. One month older--it didn't take a genius to figure out that the affair resulted in a child my father wanted so desperately that he was willing to divorce his wife of eight years and marry his mistress to legitimize his bastard. According to Liam, Mrs. Clarke was a clerk at one of Mr. Clarke's department stores when they got together.

She'd taught her daughter well.

In a way, it wasn't hard to understand. Liam was an attractive man in his prime, had control of the resources, and at this base, his words weighed very heavily if not considered absolute. Scarlet and her mother had chosen an excellent candidate to dig their claws into.

Too bad he was mine.

"Ma'am." Wilfred gently knocked on the open door and then stepped into the room. "Your breakfast is ready."

"Has Liam had his breakfast yet?"

"The chairman said he's waiting for you to have breakfast together."

"Ah. Could I trouble you to go fetch him for me?"

"No trouble at all, Ma'am!"

Ayaka walked with me to the kitchen. It was empty as usual. It was like everyone was reserving the table solely for us. I seated myself on a chair, and Mrs. Jones brought me my breakfast. One over easy egg and three pancakes.

Two days ago, Liam had caught a female pheasant while going beyond the walls for lumber. Instead of breeding it with the male pheasant we already had, he decided to have it lay eggs for me to have for breakfast. He said pheasants were common in this area and he'd try to catch a few more hens for the breeding plan. As for this particular hen, the baby and I needed the protein from its eggs.

It seemed counter-intuitive to other people to waste a perfectly good egg-laying hen at a time like this when it could be used to breed more pheasants, but it somehow made perfect sense to Liam. I tried to convince him multiple times to use the hen for breeding but was never successful. He was very firm on using it to lay eggs for my breakfast.

Liam was right about pheasants being common in the area. Over the next few days, he and Hiroki trapped two more healthy hens beyond the wall. Liam then decided to build a large coop for the pheasants, and with a few pointers from our experienced farmers and helping hands from everyone on the base, we had one built in half a day.

It was a simple 30-by-50 wooden frame with metal wire built in an area with trees and bushes already there to mimic their natural habitat. It looked huge and a bit excessive for three breeding pheasants, but Liam said he was making allowance for population growth. It made sense.

The farmers then placed a few wooden tents inside the coop for the pheasants to hide from the weather and two different-sized ceramic bowls as the water bowl and feeder.

It came out looking better than I'd expected. Much more like a zoo exhibit for exotic birds than a chicken coop.

The farmers said that a hen could lay 50 to 60 eggs during the spring and summer seasons, and most of them were expected to hatch. Upon hearing this, everyone at the base was optimistic about this new breeding plan. If successful, it meant that at the same time next year, everyone would have a steady supply of eggs and meat on the table.

Many residents even went beyond the wall to set traps of their own in hopes of catching a few to add to the coop.

I could tell everyone's mood was significantly lifted by this new coop. There was excitement in the air and a sense of community building. The future no longer looked so bleak to them, all because of a pheasant coop.

Pheasant eggs tasted similar to chicken eggs, but with an added gamey smell and taste.

I was pouring syrup on my pancakes when Liam walked in from the back door. I handed him a small towel I'd brought with me from the bedroom, and he wiped the sweat from his face and neck. Scarlet was peering in through the window, but I pretended not to notice her. When she'd done the same thing the first time around, I was unsuspecting and had invited her in for breakfast. Then I caught on and had ignored her since.

"We should be able to complete the fifth cabin today," he said as he seated himself next to me.

"That's good news. The weather is getting a little warmer, so the residents should be able to move into their new homes soon."

Liam nodded. His breakfasts were always simple. Today was plain oatmeal. Sometimes I would put a spoon of fruit preserve on top because I found it too bland. He didn't care for it either way and would eat it with or without the fruit preserve. Then afterward, he always wanted a cup of coffee. Black.

After breakfast, Liam went back to work on the cabin. I wanted to get some sun on my skin, so Ayaka helped me pull a chair outside where I sat and watched the men work. Farther down the field, a good portion of the grapevine had been removed and replaced with plowed, seeded land. Nothing had sprouted yet, which had been a cause for worry for many of our residents.

Another major concern was the power. The natural gas had been cut off for the last few days, and we had been fueling the emergency generator with propane. Lights would be on at eight-thirty and out at eleven. Everyone needed to take quick turns taking a shower while the broiler was still working during the designated hours. Fortunately, the weather had gotten warmer.

"Liam, the baby kicked."

Liam dropped everything he was doing, sped to my side, and placed both hands on my belly to feel. He'd felt it many times before, but it never ceased to amaze him. Sometimes he would even put his ear next to my belly for a listen.

"Getting stronger! Angel, I think we're going to have a son!"

"That's not how it works, Liam..."

The children playing together nearby walked to us and asked, "Ma'am, can I feel the baby too?"

"Me too!"

"Me three!"

I didn't mind children's touch, so I said yes. They felt my belly for a while, but there was no movement. Their faint brows knitted together.

"Maybe next time," I consoled them. Then I took out little boxes of raisins from my huge maternity dress pocket and gave one to each. I didn't buy any candy or snacks because it wasn't really a priority at the time, but the vineyard produced raisins with the excess grapes and packaged them to sell. I discovered a huge volume of raisins in the vineyard's workshop, so I thought they would make nice treats for the children. When food was scarce and candy was nowhere to be found, the children developed a taste for raisins.

"Thank you, Ma'am!" they said in unison, then went to sit on the porch to eat their raisins.

"You're so good with children, Angel. I think you'll be a spectacular mother!"

I wasn't so sure about that, but I humored him with a smile.

Suddenly, surprised gasps and screams distracted our attention. Wilfred's teenage grandson fell to the ground. Liam rushed over to see what had happened to the boy. People who saw what happened gathered up around him. We didn't have a doctor in the house, but one of our residents was a registered nurse.

Isabelle Davis got down to check on the boy. "He's okay, folks. He just fainted."

Everyone's expression turned grim. The Harrison boy didn't have any medical conditions, so the most likely cause was hunger or malnutrition. I looked around and suddenly realized that nearly everyone had lost some weight.

"Let's get him back inside," said Isabelle.

Two men volunteered to carry the Harrison boy back into the house and lay him on the couch. We followed them inside.

I grabbed Liam by the arm. "Liam, everyone's thinned."

Liam looked around and came to that realization too. He nodded. "I'll tell the missuses to increase portions."

"Wait a minute," the Lieutenant Colonel interrupted. "We don't know why the boy fainted. Let's not make any rash decisions."

Everyone turned their eyes to him.

I sensed anger thickening in the atmosphere.

"We can't have people keep fainting on us, Lieutenant Colonel!" Liam retorted. "We need people to be fed so they can focus on their work!"

"I am only thinking about the future of this base. I don't know if you noticed yet, Mr. West, but nothing we sowed is growing!"

"Let me worry about that, okay, Lieutenant Colonel? Mrs. Jones or Mrs. Rosenstein, are you here?"

"I'm here, Chairman," Mrs. Jones replied.

"I want the table to look like it was before. I don't want any more people fainting on me."

"Yes, Chairman."

All of us were soon distracted by the sound of the alarm.

Liam told me to stay put while most of the people in the room took up arms and rushed to the front gates. From the window, I could see a group of about twenty-odd people in rags coming down the road. I did not sense any initial hostility from them.

A few minutes later, the gates opened to let them in.

"The lieutenant colonel ordered his men to let them in," Ayaka said to me as we walked up the stairs.

"What did Liam say?"

"The lieutenant colonel didn't ask the chairman."

When Liam came back into the house, I immediately asked, "What are you going to do?"

"Feed them, then have a truck send them to General Grant's base. They are better equipped to take in survivors."

"But we don't have a lot of gas to transport them."

"I'll have a talk with the lieutenant colonel about going to town to retrieve some gas on the way back. We do need gas for a lot of reasons."

"It's too dangerous. Just let those people stay here."

Liam turned contemplative for a moment. "We need to observe them first, then look at our options. I don't want you to be seen until I can determine what to do with them. In the meantime, the lieutenant colonel will be the man in charge."

I couldn't agree more. If they thought the military was in charge of this place, it would greatly reduce the chance of conflicts.

"Mr. Clarke!"

Mr. Clarke came running at my call.

"Could you be our representative and greet the guests?"

"Certainly, Ma'am."

Twenty-five people were brought to the main foyer for a welcoming speech and a quick briefing on the rules. I saw three familiar faces among the crowd: Mason, Luke, and Elise. They spotted me too. Mason raised a hand and waved to me.

"You know him?" Liam asked me in a low voice while Mr. Clarke continued his speech.

"They were my companions on my way to the military base," I answered. "The two men, one has super strength, and the other I heard has the ability to promote plant growth."

"Good folks?"

"Honest men, both. The sister is petty and spoiled, but not a threat."

I surveyed the rest of the group. One man stood out like a rooster in a flock of hens. He had a dangerous feel about him and his aura was something I'd never encountered before with anyone. I could not make anything of them.

I did not sense any ill intentions, but it was still a good idea to keep an eye on him.

After the briefing, the residents acted like good hosts and showed the new arrivals to the shower and shared what few articles of clothing they had with them. We had a lot of food, supplies, and tools, but we lacked almost everything else. Some of the women even made their own clothes out of the extra linen we had. My clothes weren't much use to women larger than me, so my closet was still full for the most part. I spotted a few women that looked about my size amongst the new arrivals, so I went upstairs and picked out a few outfits to donate. Elise was among those women.

Liam followed me upstairs and into the walk-in closet. "What do you think?" he asked me once the door was closed behind us.

"There are a few people among them I think we really need to keep an eye out for, especially the tall buff man with arctic blue eyes and the woman in the black dress suit. They just give off different auras than everyone else. Five other men among the group didn't give me a good vibe either."

"I'll keep an eye on them."

I picked out four outfits, and Liam helped me carry them downstairs and give them to Mrs. Evans to pass out.

"Ma'am, these are all designer clothes. Are you sure you don't have any other old things sitting around?" Mrs. Evans whispered into my ear.

I looked down at the clothes in her arms with a question mark in my head. I could only recognize two or three designer labels because they were frequently shown in magazines, but that was about it. I didn't know any other brands or their worth. Mrs. Evans was a woman in her early thirties and quite knowledgeable on this sort of things. She'd complained on multiple occasions that it was too bad she couldn't fit in my clothes.

"I don't think designer goods are worth anything anymore," I said to Mrs. Evans. Everything had lost its value these days. The only thing that kept increasing in value was food. The clothes were of superb quality, but I could not tell what from what. I wondered if I would regret giving these out once I fully got my memory back. "It's all right, Mrs. Evans. They are guests."

Mrs. Evans didn't look too willing to give them away, but she did as I requested.

There wasn't enough room at the dining table for everyone to sit, so the men quickly put together a temporary table with two smaller tables on each end and a long plank of wood in between. They also gathered all of the chairs in the house and even made a few benches on the spot.

There was plenty of food on the table for lunchtime today. Everyone's mood, including the new arrivals, lifted significantly. Some didn't even wait for grace to dig in while others kept holding back drool while waiting for the children to finish saying grace.

The large table was full of food, but the small table had about less than half per person, at the request of Lieutenant Colonel Ashe.

When complaints were made by the new arrivals, saying they were fed scraps like dogs, the lieutenant colonel replied, "Refeeding syndrome. People can die from eating too much after a long period of starvation."

"It's a real medical condition," confirmed our registered nurse.

A man stood up and said, "Let me die full then!"

The lieutenant colonel ignored him and started filling up his plate. Liam didn't say a word either. After that same man finished his portion, he went to the large table and filled his plate all the way up. No one stopped him.

After lunch, the residents gathered in the library for an emergency meeting. I joined too. Everyone sat anywhere they could put their bums. Wilfred went to get a chair for me. I supposed people of every age have the need to feel useful, especially during times like these.

Once everyone was seated, the meeting began. After a long discussion about what we would do with survivors finding their way here now and in the future, we decided on sending them to the military base.

The lieutenant colonel wanted to talk about our fuel problem. "The safest way to get gasoline is to go to gas stations along the highway. If they're all tapped out, the more dangerous approach is to charge into towns. The closest town is half an hour away, population 47,000. It was one of the candidate sites for relocation. There is no guarantee we would find gasoline there, though."

Liam agreed. "We can always try the gas station by the highway first."

"If it is agreed, my team and I will prepare to set out first thing tomorrow morning."

Liam turned toward everyone. "Once we retrieve the gas, if anyone else here wants to go to General Grant's base, you are free to go with the new arrivals."

Everyone turned their heads to look at one another.

# Chapter 17

As I was leaving the library at the end of the meeting, the three siblings, Mason, Luke, and Elise, came up to me. They couldn't believe they'd run into me here.

"This is my husband, Liam West. Liam, this is Mason, Luke, and Elise. They're friends of mine."

Liam shook each of their hands.

After we got formalities out of the way, Mason said to me, "You know, we were wondering what happened to you. We assumed the worst since the fall of the city. We're so glad to run into you here."

"Yes, good to see all of you made it too."

"It wasn't easy, I can tell you that. And after the fall of the city, we were living in literal hell, roaming everywhere trying not to starve. Coming here was like arriving at heaven's gates. There's food here, and everyone here is so welcoming. You should see what's happening out there. Everyone is at each other's throats for morsels of scraps. Sharing? A dead concept!"

"They didn't give us enough to eat here," Elise muttered.

"I keep telling you refeeding syndrome is a real thing!" Mason snapped at his sister.

She glared at him and then turned away.

Mason sighed and turned back to me. "Lieutenant Colonel Ashe is a good man. Running this joint attests to his character. If he'd talk to me, I'd love to thank him for taking us in. I saw some construction going on, and I want to repay his kindness by helping out. Elise can't really do anything, but Luke and I can do the work of ten men!"

I smiled. "I don't doubt it with your super strength, but Lieutenant Colonel Ashe is planning to take your group to General Grant's new base."

"Couldn't we just stay here?" Mason frowned. He saw Lieutenant Colonel Ashe coming out of the library and went right up to him. "Lieutenant Colonel, my name is Mason Mansfield. I would like to thank you from the bottom of my heart for taking us in!"

The lieutenant colonel shook the hand offered to him.

"Lieutenant Colonel, I just heard from my friend that you plan on taking us to General Grant's new base. I just want to know if there is any way the three of us could stay here under your command. Both my brother and I have abilities. I have super strength--I can do the work of ten men! My brother Luke here, he can make plants grow faster. He can be considered a farmer. I saw some construction going on, and there's also land in the back. Perhaps we can be more useful here."

I was a little curious as to why Mason didn't want to go back to General Grant's base. The rations for regular folk were only enough to survive on, but both Mason and Luke had abilities. They wouldn't be treated too badly there.

The lieutenant colonel glanced over to Liam, who subtly nodded. "Mr. Mansfield, you and your brother's skillsets are exactly what we need. If you think the environment here suits you better, then you are welcome to stay."

"Thank you, Sir! Thank you, Lieutenant Colonel! You won't regret this decision!"

The lieutenant colonel nodded, then went on his way.

Mason placed a hand over his chest and exhaled a sigh of relief.

"I don't understand," I said to him. "Why don't you want to go to General Grant's new base? The military has a new facility, they have the supplies, they have the manpower and the weapons to ensure your safety. With your abilities--"

"Our abilities are near useless to the military. Luke can't prove that his ability works, and my ability wasn't deployable for missions. One scratch or one bite and I'm done. People with special abilities can only get a small commission on missions they carry out, and none of us can even go on missions. We didn't have cafeteria privileges like the other recruits and had to survive on small rations like everyone else. Also, there is a new class system rising up with people with special abilities at the very top. The military assigned recruits with ranking based on their abilities; the higher the ranking, the more privileges they were given. We're at the very bottom. I don't want to go back to that, not after what I've seen here."

Upon closer inspection, all three looked like they had lost a lot of weight since I had last seen them. Even their cheeks were slightly hollowed.

Since there weren't any more sleeping spots in the house, Liam and I decided to give the siblings their own cabin. We walked them to the cabin right next to the Clarke's and showed them inside.

The 500-square-foot cabin was organized to look like a home with a fireplace in the center, a kitchen area to the left, and a bathroom to the right. We couldn't get the plumbing to work right now, but it was space planned for the future. Or it could be used as a sleeping area. Above the kitchen and the bathroom were two lofts intended to be used as sleeping areas.

"This is for us?" Luke asked in amazement.

I couldn't remember if this was the first time Luke had spoken or not. He had always been such a quiet man.

"You're giving this entire cabin to us?" Mason too stared at us, wide-eyed. "We don't have to share it?"

I remembered back at the military base, every apartment was packed with at least a dozen people.

"All yours." Liam nodded in confirmation. "Of course, you will help us build more for the others."

"Of course! Yes, of course! I need to thank the lieutenant colonel again the next time I see him."

"There is room in the back for possible expansion someday, but for now, we need to finish making all the cabins first. Luke, I heard from my wife that you have the ability to make plants grow. We're having a bit of trouble with our crops not sprouting. If you could help out, that would be great."

Luke nodded. "I will try my best."

Liam and I were about to leave the cabin when Wilfred ran up to us. "Chairman, Ma'am, someone just dropped dead."

Liam and I followed him to the foyer to see what was going on. The siblings were right behind us. When we got there, we found a man on the floor. He didn't look familiar to me, so I assumed he must be one of the new arrivals. A group had already circled him. A few minutes later, our registered nurse was rushed to the scene by the lieutenant colonel.

She examined him and then shook her head. "Cardiac arrest most likely caused by refeeding syndrome," she announced. Then she tried to resuscitate him.

I suddenly remembered that this man was the same man who had complained about feeding scraps to dogs during lunchtime and grabbed seconds from the large table.

The nurse wasn't successful in her attempt and was forced to pronounce him dead. Everyone looked to Lieutenant Colonel Ashe, who was standing there without an expression. No one doubted him now.

A moment later, he said to his team, "Bury the corpse beyond the wall, as far as you possibly can."

His team started hauling the corpse out of the foyer.

That was when I realized it was good to have a straight-laced person like the lieutenant colonel around. Even though he and Liam butted heads on how the place should be run, I could tell Liam didn't dislike the lieutenant colonel. Sometimes he made compromises, other times the lieutenant colonel made compromises. It all worked out in the end.

After that incident, no one at the smaller table complained about the servings at dinnertime. The lieutenant colonel gave the order to slowly increase the servings over the course of a week to get their bodies up to speed again.

Early next morning, Liam told me that the lieutenant colonel and his team took one of the trucks and headed out at sunrise. By the time I woke up, the team had already returned with over two hundred gallons of gas. I thought that should solve our gas problem for a while, but during the debriefing, the lieutenant said that he almost lost one of his members during the mission.

He said they were getting faster and stronger. He said it took them twice the bullets to take one down compared to before. Attempting to go to town to retrieve supplies would be a suicide mission.

The mood throughout the base plummeted. It looked less optimistic for mankind. There was no telling if they would continue to get stronger. The only good news was that we were about forty miles away from the closest town. The horde wouldn't reach here.

The lieutenant colonel proposed that we build another wall around ourselves. The perimeter wall was tall and fortified, but it covered too big a radius for proper patrols.

Liam agreed.

And so, in addition to building the cabins, we were also building a wall around the living areas.

The lieutenant colonel then prepared a truck to take the new arrivals to General Grant's base. Any additions were welcomed to come along. Only ten wanted to go, and they were all new arrivals. Fourteen new arrivals refused to leave. None of the residents wanted to leave either.

"Lieutenant Colonel, with your permission, we'd like to stay here."

"Why do you want to stay?" the lieutenant colonel asked the fourteen new arrivals who refused to leave.

"I like it here. Want to see what you folks are going to do with it," said the unnaturally tall man with the arctic blue eyes.

"Lieutenant Colonel, my name is Roy Jackson. This is my wife and two sons. The family and I would like to stay here, Sir. We're simple farmers and the land is where our heart is. This place is like the only good dream left when the whole world has gone to hell. There is nothing at the military base for us to do but sit and wait for the world to end. We want to take our gamble here. If it doesn't work out, well, at least we'd die doing something we love."

That was a more acceptable answer than the first.

The woman and five other men didn't say. They just didn't want to leave. So the truck left through the gates while twelve new arrivals stayed, not counting the three siblings.

Liam whispered something to the lieutenant colonel and it looked like the latter agreed.

When we got back into the house, the Mansfield siblings were standing in front of the dining table, staring at the food. They kept staring for a few minutes.

Curious, I went up to them. "What are you three looking at?" I finally asked after I couldn't see anything out of place.

"We're waiting for someone to come and pass out our breakfast," Mason replied.

"We've been waiting for an hour," Elise complained.

I looked up at the wall clock and saw that it was nine-thirty.

So they were waiting for someone to come. "No one is going to come pass it out. It's there so you can take as much as you can eat for breakfast."

"Really?" Elise's eyes lit up. "As much as I want?"

"Normally you can take as much as you can eat, yes. But remember, you have to slowly increase what you eat to be safe."

The Clarkes were coming in the dining room to grab their breakfast. They weren't early risers. Mr. Clarke had his counseling job that didn't need him to wake up early, and the rest of his family followed suit.

Mrs. Clarke and Scarlet were assigned cleaning duties while Reid was supposed to be helping out with construction right now. Scarlet saw me first, but her gaze quickly went to Elise. She was distracted by the outfit Elise had on. A pregnant woman like me could only wear maternity clothes these days, so young and pretty Elise in a designer outfit stood out by comparison. I noticed that Scarlet had been eyeing all the women I donated my outfits to. Designer clothing must have been up her alley.

Mr. Clarke greeted me. "Good morning, Ma'am."

"Good morning," I replied.

The Mansfield siblings chose their breakfasts and sat at the table to eat. The Clarkes did the same. The entire time, Scarlet wouldn't move her eyes from Elise. Elise seemed to be enjoying the envy. Sometimes she would purposely run her hands over her designer dress to flaunt it.

"There you are, Ma'am. Your breakfast is ready." Wilfred found me sitting in the dining room. He asked me, "Would you like to have your breakfast in here?"

If I said no, then that might have come off as snobbish, so I agreed.

Wilfred left the dining room to notify the cook and fetch Liam, and soon Liam walked into the dining room and took a seat next to me. Mrs. Jones brought our breakfast out. Plain oatmeal for Liam and a pheasant egg on a baked potato for me. Scarlet was already used to seeing me having eggs for breakfast, so she didn't say anything. Her attention went from Elise's dress to my plate.

"I want eggs too! Give me three on toast!" Elise said to Mrs. Jones.

Mrs. Jones lifted a brow at the request and then replied, "That's our only egg for today."

Elise turned to me. "I'll trade you my breakfast for yours."

"Elise!" Both of her brothers scowled at her.

"What? It's a fair trade. My breakfast for hers."

Everyone at the table knew it wasn't a fair trade.

"My wife is pregnant; she and the baby need the protein," Liam said.

Elise glowered, turned to Mrs. Jones, and said, "Will there be more eggs tomorrow? I'll have dibs on those."

Mrs. Jones got impatient and retorted, "You can't have any!" Then she turned and walked away.

"Just because she's pregnant? What's so special about being pregnant?!" Elise shouted at Mrs. Jones's back.

"Elise!" Both of her brothers grabbed her by the arms and pulled her back down in her seat.

"Because the egg-laying hen belongs to me, and I want to feed my wife," Liam explained. "Any more questions?"

That shut Elise up. She grudgingly picked up her spoon and ate her breakfast.

Late in the afternoon, Scarlet knocked on my bedroom door and said she wanted to talk to me in private. Since Ayaka was with me, I invited her into my bedroom. Scarlet had never been in my bedroom before and seeing it stunned her for a few seconds. It was the largest bedroom in the house by far.

I invited her to sit on the sofa in the sitting area. "What is it that you want to talk to me about?"

"Ma'am, I want to ask a favor from you. As you can see, I only have two outfits to switch back and forth, and sometimes when I forget to do the laundry, I'm stuck wearing the same thing for two days. You and I are about the same size, so I wonder if I could borrow some clothes from you."

I thought she'd wanted to talk to me about something important, so was a little annoyed. She could have said so when Ayaka answered the door. I didn't like having strangers in my space. I got up from the sofa and headed for my closet. I didn't invite her, but she followed me anyway.

My walk-in closet was the size of a regular room with built-in shelves and drawers. A huge crystal chandelier hung down right in the middle. I went over to the island and pulled out the drawers where I knew there were some t-shirts inside. I grabbed a few, but when I tried to hand them to her, Scarlet was going around the closet like she was lost in some wonderland. I guessed that she wouldn't be interested in t-shirts, so I put them back in the drawer and let her choose.

"You may choose two outfits," I said, so she wouldn't get carried away and grab everything. I had been told that Liam bought most of them over the course of our four-year marriage. Besides, I didn't like Scarlet enough, and this "loan" likely wouldn't be returned in its original condition or at all.

She looked around for half an hour and, fortunately for a pregnant woman like me, I was seated the entire duration. I was getting tired and the afternoon was growing late, so I said, "Can you just pick something already?"

In the end, she chose two dresses. One was a black dress much too fancy for daily wear and a rose-beige lace dress I especially liked placed inside a glass door cabinet all by itself. It was a sentimental dress.

"Not the rose-beige dress," I said.

"I really like this one."

"That one has sentimental value to Liam and I. Choose something else."

She looked at the dress again and again as she tried to pick out something else. In the end, she picked another fancy dress, and I sent her on her way.

"Why did you let her 'borrow' your clothes?" Ayaka asked, obviously displeased.

"And have her come crying to everyone that I turned her away and won't even let her borrow an outfit to wear? Let her have small things so that we won't lose bigger things. I don't want any gossip about me at the moment."

"I understand."

I went back into the closet and carefully hung the rose-beige lace dress back in the cabinet.

# Chapter 18

Ever since Mason joined the construction force, cabins were being produced twice as fast. He wasn't exaggerating when he said he could do the work of ten men. Since he was doing most of the work, Liam told Mrs. Jones to triple his servings of meat dishes to keep up his strength.

Mason enjoyed the special treatment and would always share it with his two siblings. Nobody could really say anything on the subject since Mason really did earn his meal ticket. Having him around made everything much easier. He was also a likable person, so it didn't take long for him to be a part of the guys.

Mr. Jackson and his two sons requested to be among the farmers. Lieutenant Colonel Ashe approved. More vines were being taken down to make room for more farmland. Nothing was sprouting, though, and Mr. Jackson believed that his experience could make miracles happen.

After breakfast, Liam and I left the house and visited the construction site. Me to get some sun and Liam to work. The morning sun didn't burn like the noon sun; it felt nice and warm on the skin. I was closing my eyes and enjoying the warmth when Ayaka, who was sitting next to me, tapped me on the shoulder. I opened my eyes and saw Scarlet coming this way wearing the rose-beige dress I'd specifically told her she couldn't have. Which meant she'd snuck into my room. I felt anger rise up the back of my neck. The dress was one thing, but sneaking around my space was crossing the line ten times over.

Scarlet went over to Liam and handed him a bottle of water. He took it, drank it all in one gulp like he usually did, and then got back to work. Then suddenly, he stopped and turned around to look at Scarlet. She smiled back at him.

His complexion visibly reddened when he saw the dress she had on.

She smiled even brighter.

Liam turned his head toward me, and I shook my head to let him know I had nothing to do with it. His face turned even redder. I could still sense his rising anger even though we were a good ten meters away from each other.

He dropped everything in his hands and went to knock on Mr. Clarke's cabin. Mr. Clarke answered the door. Liam said something and pointed toward Scarlet. Mr. Clarke rushed out of the door, ran up to Scarlet, and gave her a swift slap across the face. Scarlet stared at her father, shocked and confused. Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked on. I went over to see what was happening, and Liam walked up to stand next to me.

"You know the rule, Scarlet! How could you sneak into the chairman's room and steal the lady's clothes!"

"How could you hit me? You--you never hit me before!" She covered her face and cried.

Mrs. Clarke ran up behind Mr. Clarke and started hitting him. "How could you hit my daughter! How could you!"

"Why don't you ask your daughter what she did?" Mr. Clarke grabbed his wife by the wrists to stop her from hitting him. "Ask what she stole!"

"I didn't steal it! I borrowed it!" Scarlet screamed back at her father.

Everyone looked at me.

I felt the need to explain. "Three days ago, Miss Scarlet knocked on my bedroom door asking to borrow some clothes. I took her to my closet and let her choose. She chose this dress and another black dress, but I told her that she couldn't have this dress because it has sentimental meaning for me and my husband. She chose another dress, and I sent her on her way."

"One of the dresses didn't fit!" she argued. "I went to your room, but you weren't there, so I made a switch. I left the other one in your closet! It's not like I stole it! I just switched them out, that's all!"

"S--she didn't steal it! My daughter is not a thief! She was simply borrowing, that's all! You can't accuse her of stealing!" Mrs. Clarke defended.

"You shut up!" Mr. Clarke warned his wife.

Liam stepped in front of me. "Entering our room without our permission is one thing. Taking something that doesn't belong to you without the permission of the owner is another. Mr. Clarke, what do you think we should do with thieves?"

Mr. Clarke stammered but couldn't say anything. It was the first time I'd seen him at a loss for words.

The answer was obviously eviction.

"Mr. West, I think my daughter misinterpreted the situation."

"Which part did she misinterpret, Mr. Clarke? The part where my wife said that she can't take that particular dress because it has sentimental meaning to us? Or the part where she snuck into our room and switched the dresses because my wife wasn't there? Or the part that she thought it was okay to take something after the owner specifically told her she couldn't?"

"Mr. West, I admit that my daughter is a spoiled brat. She has to have things her own way. I--I failed as a father. But please, one father to another, if you evict her from this community, the rest of my family will have to go too. I'm not asking to let bygones be bygones. She has to be punished, that is absolute, but couldn't we change the punishment to something other than eviction?"

Liam glanced over to me. "I do not want her at my table, and no one is to give her food from my table. Is that understood?"

"Thank you, Mr. West!"

"Understood, Chairman," replied everyone else.

"Then--then what will she eat?" Mrs. Clarke asked. "You can't--"

"Woman, shut up!" Mr. Clarke glared at her.

"From now on, she will need to pull her own weight to earn her meals," Liam replied. "Wilfred will see to it that she does some real work around here."

"I will, Chairman." Wilfred gladly accepted his new assignment.

"And take that dress off!" Liam shouted at Scarlet.

Liam was an entirely different person when angry. Even I had the chills, and I wasn't the subject of his anger.

Scarlet quivered in fear, then ran back to her family cabin. A few minutes later, she came out with the dress in her hand. She handed it to me, and I accepted it. Liam led me back to our room and told Ayaka and Hiroki to do a sweep to see if anything else was missing or out of place.

Liam was sitting on the edge of the bed, fuming. He glanced at the dress in my hand, and his anger rose even higher.

Ayaka and Hiroki reported back a few minutes later. "Nothing out of the ordinary, Chairman."

"Keep the door locked from now on." Liam waved a hand to dismiss them and they left.

I placed the dress on the bed and sat on his lap. I ringed my arms around his neck and said, "It's washable, Liam."

"Now the image of her wearing it is in my head!" He blinked when he realized he'd shouted at me and swept a hand down his face. "I'm sorry, Angel. That dress is important to me."

Carrying it around with him through the apocalypse instead of other essential items meant it was important.

"Liam, you never told me the story about that dress. What makes it so important?"

"You wore that dress on our first night together."

I blinked.

"You were a bride that night. We became proper man and wife. To me, it was the equivalent of your wedding dress."

There it was again, that feeling like honey dripping into my soul, but this time it was overflowing. So this was what it felt like to be loved.

"Liam, let me cheer you up." I tightened my arms around his neck and kissed him deeply.

Liam returned to work an hour later with a visibly lightened mood, and I went back to my sunbathing.

# Chapter 19

"Angel, what are you doing?"

Ayaka and I were squatting next to each other in the orchard when Liam came up behind us. She got up and straightened her back, but I didn't move a muscle. I was on the verge of discovering something that might be vital to the survival of mankind.

This morning, Ayaka and I were going to the orchard to pick more oranges when I spotted an unnaturally red plant hiding behind one of the apple trees. I went over to have a look and discovered that the soil around the plant wasn't red and the apple tree was perfectly healthy. It rained frequently lately so I was extremely intrigued that the soil looked so clean.

Through Ayaka's eyes, the soil looked like it always had, but through my eyes, it was a deep crimson red. It was the same with this plant. Ayaka said it was green, but I saw it as red. It wasn't that I couldn't see the soil as a dark brown or that the plant was green, it was just that the aura was such a red hue that it overshadowed the original color.

Liam squatted next to me and looked at the same plant. "What are we looking at?" he asked after a few minutes.

I told him my discovery. "I think this plant absorbed the impurities from the ground left by the rain. This apple tree next to it is in good health."

"Are you sure?"

"I think so. The soil in a two-foot radius of it looks pretty healthy too. What type of plant is it?"

"I don't know. Let's dig it up and ask the others who are more knowledgeable in botany." Liam took out the seven-inch blade knife he always carried with him and began digging around the plant.

It was soon revealed to be a taproot plant with multiple taproots and, despite its small size, the taproots were almost the size of white radishes. I knew what white radishes looked like and this certainly wasn't it. The taproots were a deep burgundy red through my eyes.

Once it was completely pulled from the ground, Liam put his knife back into its casing that was attached to his belt. "Let's go back to the house."

"You go ahead. Ayaka and I still haven't picked the oranges yet. We'll be back in a few minutes."

He pecked a kiss on my cheek, got up, and headed for the house in the distance. I got up and picked my basket off the ground. There were only a few oranges left on the branches, so after this week, we wouldn't be having a glass of orange juice for breakfast anymore. Ayaka and I each picked a basket full and headed back to the house.

As we were going past the construction site, I found it strange that nobody was there. I hadn't heard the sound of the alarm, but I thought that I was much too far away to hear it. I thought everyone must be gathered at the gates likely due to protocol, so Ayaka and I rushed into the house.

As soon as we walked into the foyer, Ayaka immediately stepped in front of me. I looked to see what was going on and saw two groups of people pointing guns at each other. Liam, Lieutenant Colonel Ashe, and the residents on one side, and four other men of the new arrival group on the other. Behind the four men was a bag full of firearms. I looked back to Liam's side and discovered that only a few of them had guns.

My first instinct was to flee the scene, but before I could sprint away, I felt a pair of arms grab me from behind. I dropped the basket of oranges, the fruit rolling all over the floor.

"Got you!" the man yelled out triumphantly as he pressed his gun against my head. "Been looking all over the place for you." Then he said to Ayaka, "Any movement and I blow her brains out."

Ayaka didn't dare make a move. Behind her, Liam's complexion had gone sheet-pale.

"Now are you willing to talk terms?" the man asked the residents, though it was more obvious that he was talking to Liam. "Oh, we know you're running this joint. This is a nice place you got here, it really is, and we want to take it from you. Your wife for this joint, what do you think? Fair?"

"Let my wife go, and this place is all yours," Liam replied as he slowly put his gun down on the floor.

The other four men laughed. "You're making this way too easy for us. What about you, Lieutenant Colonel?"

"I'm not Liam West and she's not my wife," Lieutenant Colonel replied. "I'm responsible for every life here, and it just doesn't make sense to risk so many lives for one. How do I know that once my team and I put our weapons down, you'll keep your end of the bargain and let us live?"

"Mr. West, help us out here," the man pressing his gun to my head said.

Liam picked up his gun from the floor and pointed it at the lieutenant colonel. "You know where my priority lies, Lieutenant Colonel."

"Six against eight, Lieutenant Colonel. How do you want to end this?"

"I don't negotiate," was his answer.

It was like the lieutenant colonel to not want to negotiate because he was right. They were unlikely to let any of us live if the lieutenant colonel's team put down their weapons. These five had their eyes on our base and our supplies, and they definitely wanted to sleep soundly at night. Letting us live would leave us plenty of chances to get revenge. It simply wasn't the smart thing to do.

While everyone's focus was on Liam and the lieutenant colonel, I subtly reached down to my inner thigh and used all of my strength to dig my nails in, through the thin fabric. Two lines of blood started trickling down the curvature of my thighs.

I suddenly screamed out loud and clutched my pregnant belly, making myself appear to be in excruciating pain. Everyone looked my way and saw the blood trickling down my thighs. Acting like I was unable to stand, I began slipping down to the floor. The man holding me at gunpoint slowly slipped down with me.

"Act quick, Mr. West. I think your wife is miscarrying." The man holding me in his grasp chuckled in amusement.

While he was chuckling and his hold on me loosened, I seized the opportunity and sunk even closer to the ground. When the gun was no longer pointed at my head, I used a quick burst of strength to knock the gun away from his hand, but it wasn't enough force. Ayaka reacted instantly and successfully kicked the gun out of his hand, pulled a dagger hidden in her belt, and aimed for the man's throat. At the same time, the man with the arctic blue eyes also jumped at my captor, beating Ayaka to it.

The four other men turned their guns this way, and Ayaka shielded me with her own body. I could only get a partial view of what happened next. Liam suddenly appeared behind the four men and slit one throat after another. Shots were fired.

When everything turned quiet except for the pummeling sounds of crushing bones behind me, Ayaka was peeled off me, and her presence was immediately replaced by a masculine embrace. The blood on his clothes was still warm, pressed against my face. He let go and then a shaking hand hovered over my belly and my bleeding thighs.

"I faked it," I confessed in a calm voice to put his fear to rest. "The baby is fine."

He looked into my eyes for confirmation and saw that I was telling the truth. I wasn't in pain. He exhaled, then pulled me into a tight embrace.

Behind us, the man with the arctic blue eyes was still punching the man on the floor and shouting, "These people took you in! Put a roof over your head! Clothed you! Fed you food from their table! Holding a pregnant woman hostage, huh?! You bastards really piss me off!"

I tried to turn my head to see what was happening, but Liam held me firm and refused to let me see it. There was enough to see in front of me. Four corpses, throats slit open to the bone, their blood pooling on the marble floor.

_Better them than us._

Lieutenant Colonel Ashe and the others were staring in this direction. I didn't know if they were staring at the man embracing me or the man still pummeling the corpse behind me.

Hiroki walked up to Ayaka with a smoking gun in his hand. The two siblings stood in front of each other. I thought they would be like Liam and me, rejoicing in each other's safety, but Hiroki lifted his empty hand and slapped Ayaka across the face. The sheer force knocked her off her feet, to the ground.

"Hiroki!" I furrowed my brow. "Ayaka saved me."

Ayaka got to her feet almost immediately and didn't look the least affected by that blow even though the corner of her mouth was bleeding. She didn't retaliate against Hiroki. Instead, she lowered her head and said something I didn't expect. She apologized.

Liam's cold blue eyes glanced over to Ayaka. There was a frightening expression on his face that was almost cruel. That and the blood stain still dripping from his face made him feel alien to me.

"Liam..."

When he turned back to face me, it wasn't the same expression on his face anymore. He'd returned to the Liam I knew. He picked me up in his arms and carried me across the foyer, through the pool of blood, corpses, and stares.

# Chapter 20

There was something terribly wrong with me and it wasn't just memory loss. That little thought was creeping into my head as Liam carried me up the stairs and I came face to face with the portrait of myself and my mother. I then turned to look back at the bloodbath in the foyer.

I wasn't afraid, I wasn't disgusted, and I wasn't terrified as was expected of the shy, sweet, and timid girl I'd been told I was. The only thought going through my head when I saw those corpses on the foyer floor was _better them than us_.

I always suspected something wasn't quite right with me, but now I knew it for certain. My memory wasn't the only thing I'd lost.

"Not the bed," I said to Liam when he tried to carry me to the bed. We were drenched in other people's blood, and I didn't want to ruin the bedding. It was the only set we had.

Liam carried me into the bathroom and set me on the closed toilet seat. He dropped to one knee in front of me and pushed the skirt of my dress up to my hips. There were blood stains on both of my thighs--my blood--but there were no injuries.

Liam lifted his head and looked at me. I was confused too, certain I had injured myself. I brought my hands in front of me to have a look, and indeed my fingernails were stained with blood. I felt the pain then, too.

I looked into Liam's eyes again, trying to come up with an explanation for it, but then I realized he was just simply looking at me. He wasn't shocked or looking for an explanation.

It was like he knew in advance that I would heal.

My head was backtracking, looking for all the clues in our past conversations to find out what could possibly be the reason he knew in advance while I didn't even know it myself.

I didn't like the answer I came up with one bit.

We took a hot shower to wash off all the blood, changed into clean outfits, and for the rest of the day, simply just lay in bed with each other. Neither of us said a word for hours. I needed time to think and he just wanted to hold me.

Our resident nurse came up a few times to check on me. Liam allowed her and only her in the room. The nurse told us everything seemed to be fine, but I should stay in bed for a few days.

When first morning light shone through the glass window, I suddenly realized I hadn't slept the entire night. Even when Liam got up, I still didn't want to budge.

"I'll have Ayaka bring your breakfast," he said before he headed out the door and locked it on his way out.

Ayaka came to unlock the door about twenty minutes later and brought me breakfast on a tray. I patted on the bed to invite her to sit next to me. After she sat down, I reached for the cut and bruise at the corner of her lips, fingers just hovering over it.

"Does it still hurt?"

Ayaka shook her head. "This is nothing."

"It doesn't look like nothing. Hiroki shouldn't have struck you like that. It wasn't your fault."

"Anything that happens to you is my responsibility. Hiroki was in the right to discipline me."

"Discipline? It wasn't your fault."

"That's not how we see it from our perspective, Ma'am. It's not how we were trained to think."

"Ayaka, I still don't understand why your clan would do this to you and Hiroki, their own flesh and blood. I find it cruel."

"I thought so too, when I was a child."

"You're a still a child."

She smiled. "Then Hiroki told me a story. Would you like to hear it, Ma'am?"

I nodded.

"There was once a nation divided into three kingdoms that were at war with each other in a battle for supremacy. During those times, the noble families would choose to support the warlord they were most confident would win the war. It was important for them to choose the right warlord because they would rise with their lord or fall with him. One of the noble family realized there could only be one winner; if they chose the wrong lord to support, then their family would end. There was only one out of three chances they would live and two out of three chances they would die. So that noble family adopted a new strategy. They divided up their best and brightest and sent them to serve all three lords. It didn't matter who would become the victor in the end. The family itself would continue on."

"But they would be at war with each other," I pointed out.

"Yes, Ma'am. On the battlefield, it didn't matter if the opponent was brother or father. Each served their own lord by bringing their opponent's head. At the end of the great struggle, many families died out, but that one family who chose the ultimate sacrifice continued on. That, Ma'am, is the same principle our clan has lived by for centuries. We serve with our utmost loyalty and the clan endures."

"Is that principle still applicable to modern day?"

"Yes, Ma'am. The clan earns a substantial income from the contracts to buy power and influence in our own country. Powerful people will pay whatever price for a good night's sleep, as long as our reputations are untarnished."

"Throughout the centuries, there has not been...people who defected?"

"The clan has an internal system in place to take care of defects, Ma'am. Our reputation must not be tarnished by any means, at any time."

"Like customer service?"

Ayaka thought about it for a second and then nodded. "Exactly, Ma'am."

If this survival strategy had been time-tested for centuries, it wasn't my place to say another word on the subject. I was the one who didn't know better.

"Ayaka, could you tell me about the event that took place before my disappearance? What happened that day?"

"I-I-I don't know what happened, Ma'am. You left the house alone. I-I wasn't there," she stammered.

"Oh, okay. Did that woman they called Liam in to ID really look like me?"

"I-I-I also wasn't there, Ma'am."

I sighed. Just two questions and the girl was already sweating bullets. But at least now I learned that one of her statements was true. I left the house alone that day. Why didn't I take Ayaka with me? Why did Ayaka let me leave the house alone?

"What did they do with the bodies in the foyer?"

"The lieutenant colonel had them brought out of the base to be buried. To where, I haven't asked."

"That man with the arctic blue eyes. He helped us."

"His name is Lysander. The chairman went to thank him this morning with two pallets of gifts and his own cabin to put all the supplies in. The lieutenant colonel wasn't too happy about it."

Liam had pointed his gun at the lieutenant colonel yesterday. I quickly finished my breakfast and went downstairs. The residents in the house saw me out of bed and came up to ask if I was all right, if my baby was all right, if I was frightened yesterday, et cetera. I entertained them for a bit and then went to find Liam. He was standing next to the lieutenant colonel at the construction site for where the inner wall sections were going to be built. The colonel was holding the blueprints while Liam was pointing to it and then the site. When they saw me walking up, Liam took a few quick strides toward me. The lieutenant colonel casually followed.

"You should be in bed," Liam said.

"I'm fine, Liam. I told you I faked it to cause a distraction."

"Mrs. West, you really opened my eyes yesterday," the lieutenant colonel said. It sounded like a compliment.

"Liam, did you apologize to the lieutenant colonel?"

"Apologize for what?" Both men asked the same question in unison. Then the lieutenant colonel realized what I was referring to. "Believe me, Mrs. West, if my wife was the one being held hostage, I'd do the same."

"Is your wife at General Grant's base?"

"No, Mrs. West. She died many years ago."

"I'm so sorry."

He forced a bitter smile, patted Liam on the shoulder, and walked off.

"I didn't know," I said to Liam.

"He understands, Angel."

I sighed. "I'm going to go thank Mr. Lysander. Which cabin is his?"

"I already thanked him earlier. Also, Lysander is his first name. He didn't give us his surname."

"I want to thank him personally."

"I'll escort you there."

Liam escorted me to the third cabin and knocked on the door. Lysander answered and, from the look of things in the cabin, he'd been trying to find room for his supplies when we came knocking. Up close, he looked a lot taller. I had to tilt my neck back to look up at his face. The door was a standard six-foot-eight, and his head was only half an inch shorter. And here I thought Liam at six-foot-four was already a giant.

"Mr. Lysander, I just wanted to drop by to thank you for saving me yesterday."

"Your husband already thanked me earlier." He gestured to the piles of food supplies behind him. "And it's just Lysander."

"I want to personally thank you."

"I'm going to be completely honest with you two. I decided to stay here for a few days because I sensed trouble from those five thugs. They only joined that survivor group a few miles from here. I suspect that they had their eyes on this place beforehand. Yesterday was a common enough occurrence; victims are everywhere, nobody has the energy to police it. I usually just move along, but I can see that you folks are genuinely good people, so I stuck around to keep an eye on them. I discovered that I like this place; it's completely removed from what's out there, so I'm going to stay a while. This cabin here is not too bad. Relatively sturdy...cozy...the closest thing I have to a home these days, so you can't kick me out even if you want to. The best 'thank you' is to let me stay until I decide to leave."

I determined he was telling the truth, so I said, "You're welcome to stay here as long as you like, Lysander."

After our visit with Lysander, Liam and I went to check on the pheasant coop. We had a total of three roosters and five hens now. Some were ours and some were caught by the residents. There were five nests inside, each containing five to ten eggs.

"Each hen is laying one to two eggs a day!" Mr. Robert told us with pride and a bright smile on his face. He had been taking care of the coop since the first day.

After checking on the pheasants, Liam and I went to the field to have a look. Nothing had sprouted. The seeds had probably gone bad by now. Mr. Jackson and his two sons were sitting by the fields, and when they saw us coming, they got to their feet and walked to us.

"Sir, Ma'am, we can't figure out what's the matter with the soil. We planted a new batch of seeds, we did everything right, but nothing's growing."

Liam got down and grabbed a handful of soil in his hand and shook off most of it until he found half a potato seedling underneath. It looked like it was decaying.

"Mr. Jackson, please call all the farmers to the library in half an hour."

"Will do, Sir!"

Half an hour later, most of the residents showed up--not just the farmers. Everyone was concerned about the crops not growing.

"Can anyone identify what this plant is?" Liam pointed to the plant we'd found yesterday, now sitting on a plastic bag on a desk.

People took turns looking at the plant on the desk, and each one said it was a cassava plant, although they'd never seen taproots this huge from such a young plant. Cassava could be grown in poor soil, both wet and dry, and thrived in warm environments. It was a high-yield crop, but poisonous if eaten raw.

"Yesterday, my wife was in the orchard and discovered this plant next to some new sproutlings."

People began to ask questions on top of each other. Liam sat with his arms folded in front of him and waited for everyone to calm down and learn to ask one question at a time. Eventually, the questions began to die down.

"Only the standing person can speak, and I'll listen."

"Sir, are you saying that this taproot can somehow promote growth in other plants?" Mr. Jackson was the first person to stand up and ask. "But it is not known to do so."

"The land is not growing anything, so it's safe to assume the problem lies with the soil. As you've all pointed out, it is not common to see taproots this large for a plant so small. Amuse me and suppose this cassava plant is somehow absorbing whatever is causing the problem in the soil."

Everyone tried to stand up at the same time, but Luke was the last one standing. "Mr. West, are you proposing that we plant cassava between the crops we are trying to cultivate?"

"Exactly."

"Will we be eating the cassava we grow?" Luke asked.

"If it's absorbing whatever is wrong with the soil, I don't recommend it, but food is a scarce resource, so I will send them to General Grant's base for his team of scientists to conduct experiments on. If it is deemed safe to consume, but we don't want to consume it ourselves, we could always donate it all to starving survivors out there under the assumption that consuming questionable food is a better option than starvation."

Mr. Adams got up next. "Chairman, how are we going to get cassava seeds for this project? And if we are planting the cassava first and waiting for it to cleanse the soil, wouldn't we miss the planting season for our crops?"

"We don't have a choice on the matter, Mr. Adams. We can form search groups to go into the woods to look for adult cassava and extract the seeds. Meanwhile, we can grow our seeds hydroponically and transplant the crops to the soil once it is cleansed so that we won't miss the planting season. If possible, I want to keep a hydroponic system running just in case this theory of mine doesn't work out. Anyone knowledgeable on hydroponic systems?"

When no one answered, Luke looked around and then raised a hand, looking a little unsure. "I read a few books on hydroponics but have never actually grown anything from it."

"Well, this is your chance to put your knowledge to the test, Mr. Mansfield. You are now the head of our hydroponic division."

"I would need materials to build a hydroponic system."

"Make a list and we'll see what we can get. We'll improvise for whatever we can't get our hands on."

"Yes, Sir."

"You would need a few assistants, of course. Anyone volunteering to lend Mr. Mansfield a hand to build our new hydroponic system?"

Three people raised their hands.

"Did you get that, Wilfred?"

Wilfred was sitting at another smaller table scribbling down the volunteers' names. "Yes, Chairman," he replied.

The meeting started to go into details, and I felt a little bored, so I left early with Ayaka.

# Chapter 21

At 5 in the morning, while Liam and I were sleeping, there was a knock on our door. Liam sat up wide awake and grabbed the Desert Eagle under his pillow. He then switched on the battery-operated lantern sitting on the nightstand.

"It's the lieutenant colonel," I whispered.

Liam still answered the door with the gun in hand. "Lieutenant Colonel?"

"Mr. West, I just received an emergency radio call from General Grant's base. General Grant has passed away. Colonel Hayley is now in command of the base."

Liam was speechless for a long moment. The silence stretched on and on, and then he finally said, "My uncle was in good health. How did it happen?"

"I don't know, Mr. West. I am deeply sorry for your loss. General Grant was a great man, and I am honored to have served under his command."

"Thank you, Lieutenant Colonel."

Liam locked the door and returned to bed. Instead of laying down, he sat on the edge with his back to me.

I couldn't see his expression, but his aura had darkened significantly. He was in mourning. General Grant had been a father figure to him.

Liam sat unmoving until sunrise. Then he said, "Angel, I need to go see my uncle one last time."

"You should," I agreed.

"Both Hiroki and Ayaka will stay here with you."

"You're leaving me behind?"

"A few days at most."

"Liam, do you know what could happen in a few days during a time like this? What if another group of survivors arrives? Do you think the Lieutenant Colonel will turn them away? Do you trust the lieutenant colonel to keep me safe? I don't doubt his character, but if the same situation happened like last time, what do you think the lieutenant colonel would do? Liam, I'm just one person to him. I only trust you to keep me safe."

"It might be more dangerous where I'm going, Angel. I don't know how my uncle died, but it is likely that he was murdered."

"You think Colonel Hayley mutinied?"

He inhaled deeply, then exhaled. "Anything is possible these days."

"Take me with you. I can help you solve your uncle's murder. I can tell lies from truths."

"Give me a little more time to think about it."

"Liam, if you really want to solve your uncle's murder, do it while they still haven't disposed of the body. I can help you. You'd keep me safe, wouldn't you, Liam?"

He pressed a light kiss on my lips. "I don't have control over everything, Angel."

"Without you, this place isn't safe for me either. I _feel_ safer with you. Please don't leave me behind."

And with that, I successfully convinced Liam to take me with him to General Grant's base. We decided to take the enhanced civilian truck and left our base in Lieutenant Colonel Ashe's care along with the key to the supplies in the cellar.

Liam took the driver's seat, and I sat on the passenger side. Hiroki and Ayaka squeezed into the two-foot space between the seat and back wall. There weren't seats built in that space, so we ripped two cushions from the sofa and set them on the floor. At the driveway, everyone gathered to see us off. Lysander wanted to come with us. Liam didn't object, so he climbed into the back of the truck.

As we drove out the long, small road, everything outside the window no longer looked how I remembered. The roads were littered with decaying corpses and some even got up when we drove past. I felt a little sick, so I asked to switch with Hiroki and went to sit in the back with Ayaka.

I'd read up in the library that morning sickness usually started early on during pregnancy. I had not felt its effect and was close to twenty-five weeks already, so I thought I'd dodged a bullet. But for the last few days, I had been feeling a little sick. No vomiting yet, which was the upside.

Ayaka handed me a bag of freshly picked apricots from this morning. I thanked her and began munching. Ayaka picked out an apricot and munched with me. She handed one to Hiroki, and he accepted it. What was happening outside the window didn't seem to bother his appetite one bit.

The ride was especially bumpy, but one particular bump brought the truck to a full stop. Ayaka and I got knocked around a little, but fortunately for us, the space between the seat and the wall was narrow, so we didn't move a whole lot.

Liam turned back to check on me.

"I'm fine," I said. "What happened?"

"A group of men threw hooks at our truck as we drove past. The hooks are attached to the base of the highway lamps."

Ayaka got up to have a look out the windshield. I followed suit.

There was a group of four men in front of us. More were coming from behind the truck. I counted twelve in total, dirty-looking, all with some sort of homemade weapon on hand. They had disgusting auras, each more disgusting than the next.

"They don't have any firearms," I whispered to the group.

A man among them climbed up the steps outside the truck and tapped on the window.

Liam cracked it open.

"What's in the back of the truck?" the man asked. He was then immediately distracted by Ayaka and me. He turned back and howled at his buddies. "There are two chicks in the back. Beautiful ones! Clean-looking too!"

The group of men exchanged lewd smiles as they approached.

He turned back to take a closer look at us. "One is pregnant, though."

"It's alright, I've always wanted to fuck a pregnant chick," one of the men in a red flannel shirt replied.

The rest laughed.

The man outside the truck stepped down to let the man in the flannel shirt climb up to have a look. The moment he saw me, he ran his lustful eyes all over me like he'd never seen a woman before in his life. He had to swallow the excess saliva in his mouth multiple times before he said to the rest of them, "I call first dibs on this one."

"All right, fellas, get out of there." The man outside Liam's window made a gesture with his head, meaning to tell us to get out.

"Why?" Liam asked.

The lewd expression dropped to that of a serious one. "Because there are twelve of us and four of you, dipshit! Get out right now! I like this truck. It's a nice truck. Don't make me smash the glass and pull you out!"

Liam pulled out his Desert Eagle and rested the end on a small crack in the window, aiming at the man's head. "What's the tally now?" he asked.

The man in the flannel shirt stared at the gun pointed at him, slowly dropping his weapon.

"Why did we stop? Are we there yet? You guys need to work on your driving skills! Made me bump my head!" From the side mirror, we could see Lysander getting out of the back and walking a little disoriented toward the front of the truck. He paused when he saw the ropes at his shins. He scanned the surroundings until finally his eyes focused on the twelve men bearing weapons in front of us. He shook his head. "You got the wrong target."

Lysander charged at the twelve men like an enraged bear. He grabbed the first man he could get his hands on and slammed him on the ground like he was a rag doll. He was so quick that we could barely see all of his moves, and none of the weapons even got a chance to touch him. The man standing outside of Liam's window jumped down and joined the fight.

Liam opened the door and stepped out of the truck. He walked up to the man in the red flannel shirt holding a baseball bat, trying to attack Lysander from behind.

Lysander made a swift turn and grabbed his assailant by the bat and face.

"This one is mine," Liam said to Lysander.

Lysander shrugged, then released the man in the flannel shirt.

Liam pointed his Desert Eagle and fired eight rounds at the man's head in rapid succession. Whatever was left of the man fell to the ground where he stood.

"Damn, Liam!" Lysander chuckled. "Did he say something about your mama?"

Liam left the rest to Lysander and got back in the truck, closed the door, locked it, and proceeded to reload his gun.

Lysander grabbed two men by the back of the neck, lifted them off the ground, and slammed their heads on the asphalt.

"Liam, I sense a group of nine women being held captive inside that rest stop over there."

A few minutes later, Lysander tapped on the window. "I got all the hooks out. We can go."

Liam said, "That rest stop ahead is probably their base. There are most likely captives in there. What do you think?"

Lysander shrugged. "Got nothing planned for the rest of the day."

Liam started the engine again and stopped at the rest stop up ahead. Liam, Hiroki, and Lysander went in there together. Four rounds were fired. A few minutes later, a group of women ran outside. Some were dressed, others were not. Hiroki and Liam got back in their seats while Lysander helped the women get in the back of the truck. Lysander gave a thumbs up in the side mirror, and Liam started the engine. We were back on course again.

The road leading to the warehouse was lined with barricades and soldiers guarding the gates. It looked like they were replacing the wire fencing with a taller, more solid structure. The soldiers at the gate recognized Liam and allowed us access. We still needed to be in isolation for twelve hours before we were allowed to join the general population. Twelve hours later, we were given a number ID and taken through yet another wall, though this one was only about seven feet high. The outer walls looked to be at least fifteen feet.

I noticed there was a lot of construction going on inside the second wall. Military tents carpeted the area. Through the warehouse entrance and down the tunnel was a gate guarded by soldiers. They let the guide's group through without checking. Through the gates was a very large open space filled with cubicle walls dividing up living spaces. We were told a family of two to four were assigned a 6-by-7 standard living area. Bigger families were assigned larger living spaces. Single people were assigned military cots with no space divider.

Liam asked to speak to Colonel Hayley but was denied by the guide. The guide led us to our living space and then left us to settle in. Liam spoke with more military personnel regarding seeing Colonel Hayley but was denied several times. Fortunately for us, Liam ran into Colonel Lee the next evening. She was more than happy to take Liam to Colonel Hayley.

"Liam!" Colonel Hayley greeted Liam when he saw us standing at the door. "My condolences. I am deeply sorry for your loss."

"May I see my uncle?"

"I'm sorry to tell you this, but we buried him with the flag this morning. I deeply regret that we cannot bury him properly according to military rites, but given our current circumstances, you must understand. We are losing dozens of people on a daily basis. We can't keep the bodies decaying in the base."

"Colonel Hayley, how did it happen?"

"We found him in his room last night. The doctor said it was a blood clot in his head that resulted from a stroke he'd had earlier this week."

"My uncle had a stroke?"

"The stress must have gotten to him. He was given proper medical care after and then mandatory bedrest. We thought he'd pulled through, but last night... I'm so sorry, Liam."

"Thank you for the information, Colonel."

"No, Liam, it's us who need to thank you. You've given us this warehouse to be used as our new base. You've saved many lives."

"I gave this base to my uncle because he asked."

The corner of Colonel Hayley's mouth twitched, then turned into a smile. "Either way, you've saved lives. Where are you staying tonight?"

"The guide gave us a cubicle."

"Nonsense! I'll see to that you and your wife get a proper room here. And your bodyguards too, of course."

"Thank you, Colonel."

Colonel Hayley then had a major lead us to the fifth and last level of the warehouse. This level had actual rooms.

"My grandfather only converted the first three floors of this shelter into warehouse space. He didn't believe in wasting money on converting space we didn't need," Liam explained as we walked down the hallway. "The first and second levels weren't finished when he acquired this project, which is the selling point when you're looking for a warehouse."

In the hallway, I encountered Dr. Bailey wearing a white dress suit coming out of one of the rooms. Dr. Bailey was the friend of Declan's who had diagnosed me with amnesia months ago.

"Mr. West? Hi, I'm Dr. Paige Bailey. I don't know if you remember me, but I was briefly your physician a few years back." Dr. Bailey offered Liam a handshake.

Liam shook her hand. "It's good to see you here too, Doctor."

"Hello, Dr. Bailey." I greeted her with a smile.

Her attention panned over to me when she heard my voice and finally noticed my presence. "Sienna? Where is Declan?"

"We got separated," I replied.

"I'm running late at the moment, but I'll ask you about the details when I get back. Mr. West, please excuse me."

After Dr. Bailey walked past us, we followed the major three rooms down where he unlocked a door for us and handed us the key. Liam and I went inside. The major led Ayaka and Hiroki to the next room.

Behind the closed door, Liam asked, "Who was that woman?"

"Dr. Bailey was my doctor. She's your doctor, too?"

"I don't recall a Dr. Bailey. Dr. Price was our family physician and later, in addition to Dr. Price, I hired Dr. Callie to be your obstetrician."

"Dr. Bailey worked at Saint-Laurent Hospital."

"That clears things up a bit. I was admitted to that hospital some years back."

"What for?"

"Fractured wrist from a brawl. The hospital was nearby."

Liam didn't seem like the type who'd get into random brawls. I changed the subject. "Colonel Hayley was lying."

"About the stroke?"

"About everything. They didn't bury the General yet, or they didn't bury him at all. I couldn't sense the General's presence anywhere on base, so I'm thinking perhaps there's a small possibility that the General may still be alive. Don't get your hopes up, though; I'm only speculating."

"Don't stress yourself, Angel. Leave everything to me."

"Colonel Hayley wasn't too thrilled to see you. I just thought you should know."

"The feeling is mutual."

"We left Lysander back at the second level."

"He has all that space to himself."

I looked around our new room and found it to be quite cramped. There was a full-sized bed on the left and right side of the room, plus a door leading to a tiny bathroom. Aside from that, the room was empty. I was wondering what the handle on the wall on top of the full-sized bed was as Liam pulled on it. Another full-sized bed popped out three feet above the existing bed. Liam pushed it back into the wall again since we didn't need it.

"There are four beds in this room," I pointed out.

"I know, Angel."

In the evening, the same major knocked on our door and invited us to the cafeteria for dinner. Apparently, the original plan was that every level was supposed to have a cafeteria and recreation center, but space was limited, so only the cafeteria on the fourth floor was opened to VIPs. The recreation areas and the cafeterias on the fifth floor were being used as researchers' laboratories and an assembly room. People on the first two floors were given rations daily to be eaten at their own living space.

When I asked who the VIPs were, the major replied, "The VIPs are the residents of the fourth and fifth floor: high-ranking officers, doctors, researchers, and special recruits."

Special recruits referred to people with useful special abilities.

In the cafeteria, I ran into Dr. Bailey again, but unlike our meeting over an hour ago, she was giving me a judgmental look. Her gaze kept shuffling back and forth between Liam and me.

"How did you and Declan get separated?" she asked. There was a chilling coldness in her tone of voice. No greetings, no casual chitchat, didn't even bother to sit down first.

I told her the truth. "Lara thought I was a burden and left me at a random gas station."

Liam looked down at me, and I smiled. I couldn't recall if I'd told him that.

Dr. Bailey narrowed her brow in suspicion. "Where was Declan when this happened?"

"He was going down a few blocks to get new tires."

"Uh-huh." Her tone was disbelieving. "You moved on fast. But then again, what is the value of a marriage vow these days?"

"Actually, Dr. Bailey--"

She didn't wait for me to finish my sentence. She turned on her heels and walked away.

Liam's hand at my back gave me a little push to get me moving. We were in the middle of oncoming traffic. He led me to a table to sit down. I thought he meant to go get our dinner alone, but he sat down at the table too.

"What _is_ the value of a marriage vow these days?" I asked out of sheer curiosity.

"For us? Still sacred. Although... Angel, we should renew our vows. Change it to not even in death shall we part." Liam pressed a light kiss on my lips.

When he lifted his head, I gave him a "this is not the right time" look, and he chuckled. He seemed to enjoy it when I tried to communicate with my eyes, even when I glared at him.

Ayaka and Hiroki returned a few minutes later with a tray of four tuna sandwiches, nothing else. I looked around the cafeteria and realized that everyone was eating tuna sandwiches. If this was what the elites were eating for dinner, I couldn't imagine how many rations they were giving out to regular folks on floors one and two.

At first bite, the smell of tuna went straight up my nose and made me feel nauseous. I spat out whatever was in my mouth back onto the tray, then set the sandwich aside. Liam pulled the tray away from me and started stroking my back.

"Ma'am, I packed some of Mrs. Rosenstein's cornbread. Would you like some?"

I nodded.

Ayaka searched her backpack for a small baking tray of precut corn bread wrapped in plastic and set it in front of me. Liam gave his tuna sandwich to Hiroki and ate the cornbread with me.

Colonel Lee placed her tray on the table and took a seat next to me. "Sienna; may I call you Sienna? I'm Corrine Lee, a friend of Liam's. I was on a mission when I was invited to your wedding a few years ago, so we never had the chance to meet. Better late than never, I suppose."

"Colonel Lee, hello. Liam has said much about you."

"I'm surprised to hear that." Colonel Lee smiled. "Liam, you mentioned me?"

"Suppose I did. I don't recall."

"Let me properly introduce myself then. I was Liam's mother's best friend when she was still alive. I'm like an auntie to Liam; I just don't want to be called Auntie."

"It's an honor to meet you."

"You know, I was also surprised that you looked so young. How old are you?"

"Twenty-four," I guessed.

"So young? I thought you only looked young." Colonel Lee stared at Liam wide-eyed. "Liam! How old was she when you two got married?"

Liam continued chewing his cornbread and said nothing.

Colonel Lee turned to me. "I saw your little baby bump earlier. Do you know the gender of your baby yet?"

I shook my head. "No, Ma'am. We want it to be a surprise." We didn't have a choice on the matter now.

"We do have a few female doctors on base. Let's see, I can help you set up an appointment with Dr. Bailey to check the health of your baby."

"Dr. Bailey was my doctor."

"You're in luck then. Dr. Bailey is a miracle worker around here. She can diagnose and treat with her healing ability."

After dinner, Colonel Lee followed us back to our bedroom. Behind the closed door, Liam said, "Colonel Lee, Colonel Hayley told me that my uncle suffered a stroke earlier this week."

"That was what I was told too," Colonel Lee replied.

"Told? You mean you didn't see my uncle until he was found dead?"

Colonel Lee lowered her voice and replied in a whisper, "I went to see him, but every time I stopped by for a visit, I was always told he was asleep."

Liam lowered his voice too. "Did you see my uncle's body at least?"

"No. I was on an off-base mission and had only just returned when I ran into you on the second level."

"Thank you, Colonel."

The colonel leaned in closer to Liam and whispered, "Liam, I know what you're thinking, but don't do anything rash. Hayley has this base completely under his control. He has all the support and we can't prove anything!"

"You suspect him too, then."

"I don't have any proof."

"Why do you think Hayley murdered my uncle? Was it for control of this base or some other reason unknown to me?"

"They had disagreements."

"About what?"

"Your uncle wanted to keep the base balanced as far as human rights went. Although he provided people with abilities special treatment so that they would have the incentive to work for the military, he didn't believe they had more rights than anyone else. Colonel Hayley believed the opposite was true. He had an ability himself, and he believed that people with abilities were the future of mankind. He's working toward a higher status for people with special abilities."

"And the other officers agreed with him on this?"

"Some do because they have abilities themselves, but most can only go along with him because, despite our rank, we don't have the kind of power we used to wield. The world's changed, Liam. With no government, no system in place, the military is falling apart. We had many deserters."

"Why's that?"

"Because they're being sent into zombie-infested territories to retrieve supplies and most do not make it out alive. Firearms are not as effective against the undead as they used to be, and we are running low. One little scratch can turn a live soldier into an undead one, but people with special abilities have much stronger resistance to the infection. Turning rates are much lower than normal soldiers. Their abilities are effective in combat too. That's how Hayley was able to convince the officers that people with abilities are the future of mankind. He has a plan and he's going to put it into action soon."

"What plan?"

"A plan for our future. A new system. A new hierarchy."

"And you're going along with this?"

"My one vote won't change anything."

"Liam." I grabbed him by the arm. "If Colonel Hayley introduces this system, this new hierarchy to the population, if it gets into people's heads, then there's no reversing it. Liam, when there's no equality in basic human rights, where will the future of the human race be heading?"

Neither Liam nor Colonel Lee could give me an answer.

I rarely felt strongly about anything. I didn't have a full set of emotions as I used to, but I was still a logical person capable of rational reasoning. I could tell right from wrong, and what this Colonel Hayley had in store for the future of mankind had "wrong" written all over it.

"On our way here, we saved a group of women being held captive as sex slaves, and I don't want to know what else. We saved them because we knew it was the right thing to do. But what if one day that becomes the norm? Is that the world you want to bring our children into?"

"Sienna, we agree with you, but you can't expect Liam to be able to make any difference. He's just one man."

I lowered my eyes and sat quietly. I had said too much in front of her already. Colonel Lee had no ill intention toward us, but that didn't mean she could be trusted. I'd been careless.

Colonel Lee left our room when she received a radio call that she was needed elsewhere.

When it was just me and Liam, I asked, "Do people get to go out for walks and get some sunlight?" I suddenly noticed how strange it felt to be inside a room with no windows.

Liam joined me on the bed, and we lay down next to each other.

"This is only temporary living until they can construct housing units," he said as he gathered me into his arms, a hand placed on my belly, gently stroking out of habit.

"But that would take a while, wouldn't it?"

"I can't imagine it would be easy to obtain enough materials, even if the military has the manpower. This will have to be it for a long while."

"What do you suppose the survivors in other cities do?"

"I don't know. What we have here may be mankind's last stronghold, or there could be many other well-established bases out there. I'd prefer to believe the latter."

"Me too."

I closed my eyes and, as I was drifting asleep, I thought I heard Liam say, "I promise you a world worthy of raising our children in."

# Chapter 22

I was woken in the middle of the night when I felt like I was being lifted from the bed. I couldn't see in the dark, but the scent and aura was Liam's for sure. I lay still and allowed him to pick me up. He carried me a few paces and then set me on the floor. I could feel cold square tiles beneath my feet and guessed that he'd taken me into the bathroom.

I was more awake now. I could hear the doorknob slowly turning. The door was slowly opening, allowing the dim light from the hallway to pour in, but it didn't reach us. The major who had been our guide earlier slightly closed the door behind him, then went over to the bed still in shadow and began stabbing the pillow repeatedly with a knife. He noticed something wasn't right and backed off.

Liam left my side and closed me in the bathroom.

In that dark bathroom by myself, I heard a voice calling to me. I turned around and saw a woman in red whose face I couldn't make out. She was calling to me across a field of tall grass, telling me to come to her. She said _he_ was hurt. I rushed over in a panic. As I was running, I felt something bite hard into my ankle and fell forward. I looked back and saw my bloody ankle inside a bear trap. The woman in red pressed me down on the ground, raised a knife over my abdomen, and stabbed me over and over again. One sharp blow after another pierced into my flesh.

_My baby!_

I screamed.

I felt a pair of hands on my shoulders and fought them off.

"Angel! Angel!"

There was only one person who would call me Angel.

"Help me, Liam!" I cried out. "Help me! She's stabbing the baby! Liam, help us!"

"Angel! Angel, I'm here! Look at me, Angel! Look at me!"

When I saw his face through my tear-filled eyes, the vision in my head began to fade away. I was no longer in the field of tall grass. I was inside the bathroom, and Liam was right in front of me. I looked down and only found relief when I saw my pregnant belly was still there.

"Liam..."

He pulled me into his arms and pressed my head against his chest. "I'm sorry, Angel. I'm here."

As soon as the vision faded away, the genuine, palpable fear I felt just moments ago also faded away like a receding tide carrying everything along with it. All that was left behind was an eerie calmness inside of me, as though what I had just experienced--all that fear and pain and anger--did not belong to me.

"What happened to the major?" I asked.

Liam released me and helped me get up from the bathroom floor. "Are you all right now?"

"Yes."

"The major has been neutralized. Hiroki and Ayaka are keeping an eye on him in the hallway. It's causing a bit of a stir with the residents."

"Is it Colonel Hayley?"

"All I know is we can't go back to sleep. Come with me, Angel."

"Where are we going?"

"To the control room. I want them to know exactly how far they pushed me."

Out in the hallway, the major was unconscious on the floor with his arms tied behind his back with a piece of ripped cloth. It looked like a piece of linen. A dagger was on the floor next to him. The residents were standing by their doors, staring at us. Dr. Bailey was also standing by her door, beautiful gray eyes glued to Liam's arm around my waist.

The control room Liam was talking about didn't belong to any floor. We got into the elevator, he entered his access code, and the elevator then took us to a place called the control room. It was a spacious room filled with high-tech equipment. The walls were gridded with surveillance monitors of the entire warehouse. In the center was a huge flat-screen monitor made entirely of glass.

Liam seated me on one of the chairs in the room and went over to the front screen. He inserted a red key card into the system and entered a nine-digit access code on the glass screen. He typed in a few commands and the whole control room turned red.

On the surveillance monitors, automatic doors were closing on their own. Alarms were set off, waking nearly everyone. Some people figured something wasn't quite right and tried to get the doors to open.

Liam straightened his back in front of the glass monitor. "Do not be alarmed. This is a lockdown drill."

I thought he was talking to me, but then I saw his image showing up on the screens all over the base through the surveillance monitors. He was broadcasting. When they heard it was only a drill, everyone visibly calmed.

"I'm Liam West, and for most of the residents of this fair city, I need no introduction. But for those of you who are unfamiliar, I'm the chairman of West & West, the entity in ownership of the base you are currently residing in. From today forth, this base is under my command. In addition, I will be leading an investigation into the death of General Grant. I call in session an emergency meeting. All colonels on base are to report to the conference room on the fifth level. The doors on your way have been unlocked for your convenience. The lockdown drill will end at the conclusion of this meeting."

Liam pressed the End Transmission button on the glass monitor, then rapidly typed in coding commands for the system. It was incomprehensible to me.

"We're not going to go down there, are we? They'll shoot you on sight."

"No, Angel. We'll attend the emergency meeting from here. I had been complaining about the lack of opportunities to sharpen my persuasion skill, and now here it is."

Liam widened the picture from the conference room to full screen. Five colonels arrived about the same time. Seeing everyone seated, Liam broadcast himself on the conference room's screen.

"Hello, colonels."

"Can you hear us?" Colonel Lee asked.

"Yes."

Colonel Hayley didn't bother to sit down. He looked around for the surveillance camera and shouted at it once he'd located it. "You won't get away with this, Liam!"

"Colonels, someone sent an assassin to my room earlier, which means that one or all of you didn't plan on seeing me leave this base alive. Well, this wasn't my plan either, but here I am, and there you are."

"You're holding this base hostage! You're a terrorist!"

"Didn't you hear my announcement earlier, Colonel Hayley? This is simply a lockdown drill."

"Who ordered this lockdown drill?" Colonel Noble demanded.

"I'm a civilian, colonels. I don't take orders. This warehouse is under the ownership of West & West, and I'm the chairman. I can issue a lockdown any time I want, and it is well within my rights to."

"Ownership? Liam, have you looked outside lately?"

"Colonels, forcing ownership while the current owner is still present is robbery."

"Haven't you heard of eminent domain?" Colonel Hayley scoffed.

"Eminent domain constitutionally requires 'just compensation' measured by fair market value plus severance damages. And all of you have sworn an oath to defend the Constitution of our country. What do you think is 'fair market value' for this base and all of the supplies here? What do you have that you think would be fair compensation to call this eminent domain?"

The room went silent.

"And I haven't accounted for the outstanding debt the military still owes me. Each of you co-signed it."

"How did you manage to put this base under lockdown?" Colonel Hayley finally asked.

"Allow me to explain, Colonel. A few weeks ago, I gave General Grant a keycard and an access code. I have no doubt he shared it with all of you in that room. The access code would have worked indefinitely, but you must have figured out by now that you cannot override the lockdown with that same access code. That's because I have a bypass passcode that immediately renders the previous passcode completely useless. I also have passcodes to bypass this one, and so on. And everything is all in here." Liam tapped on his temple. "I've set the security system to require the correct passcode to be input every three days, or it will go into automatic lockdown mode. You can try to get a hacker to figure out the passcode, of course, but I must warn you ahead of time, you better have one hell of a hacker, because there is a limit of three wrong inputs before the base will set itself into lockdown again. Normally, the use of a passcode and a keycard together serves as a failsafe, but the keycard is now useless after I input this new passcode. If this underground complex is under lockdown for longer than seventy-two hours, it will automatically trigger the self-destruct sequence. This underground complex was built for end-of-days scenarios, after all."

"What do you want, Liam?" Colonel Hayley said between gritted teeth.

"Like I said in the announcement: This base is now under my command. I will also be leading an investigation into General Grant's cause of death."

"If we agree to your terms, are you going to be constantly manning the entrance?"

"I will give all of you access codes that will allow your ease of access to this complex. However, the security system will still require my passcode every three days."

Colonel Hayley laughed. "Is this all you've got, Liam? You do realize that once we no longer need this warehouse of yours, you'll have no cards left to play."

"Colonel Hayley, you've known me since I was a boy. You watched me grow up and become the man I am today, so I have a question for you. Have you ever seen me run out of cards?"

Colonel Hayley's laughter died out and was immediately replaced with a sober expression.

"Good day to you, ladies and gentlemen. I will see you all in the morning!"

As Liam promised, he lifted the lockdown on the base. The meeting only took place for less than fifteen minutes, so it hadn't caused any of the residents to go into a panic. When the doors automatically re-opened again, everyone proceeded normally and most went back to sleep like nothing had happened. It was still only 4 in the morning.

The control room looked spacious until Liam made a king-sized decorative carved bed appear in the center. The details were crazy elaborate. Now the control room looked a tad cramped. I assumed this place would become our bedroom from now on, so I climbed onto the bed to test the plushness. It felt much more comfortable than the hard mattress in the other bedroom. In fact, it felt just right.

"Where did you get this?" I inquired.

"It was our bed. I couldn't stand to leave it behind."

I stopped moving about on the mattress and eyed him.

"I had it made from one of your blueprints."

"My blueprints?"

"You're the artistic type, Angel. You love to sketch and paint and design all sorts of things around the house. You also like to craft all sorts of trinkets and dresses." Liam made a stack of sketchpads appear on the bed. "Look, they're all yours."

I took the sketchpad on the very top and started flipping through it. They were beautiful, whimsical designs of everyday items like pots, plates, and teacups. Another one was of furniture around the house. All the designs were elaborate and a little over the top; it certainly didn't have the type of design one would find in a typical department store.

I skimmed through another sketchpad. It was filled with designs of elaborate ball gowns. Liam stopped me at a page that featured a wedding dress and showed me a photo album of me wearing the same dress on the cover.

"You made the wedding dress yourself."

"It looks over-the-top."

"It looks beautiful and even more beautiful on you. We had offers, but it wasn't for sale. You didn't want to sell any of your designs. We didn't need the money."

I put the sketchpads aside and looked through the wedding album. Three pages in, I decided I didn't want to look at it any more. That woman with the burn scar on her face, that woman who was me but also wasn't me, I didn't want to see her anymore. At first, I was curious about her. Then I wanted to be her. But now all she was to me was a reminder that I was no longer her.

I wasn't her. I could never go back to being her.

I closed the album and set it on top of the pile of sketchpads. "I'm tired," I said, then lowered my head to the soft pillow.

"Angel..." Liam crawled up next to me and gently stroked the back of my head. "Tell me what's wrong."

"Nothing's wrong. I'm just tired, that's all," I replied, then turned to lie on my other side, facing away from him.

Liam turned all of the screens off and joined me in bed.

# Chapter 23

At 8, Liam and I left the control room. He went to the meeting room to speak with the colonels while Ayaka and I went to the second floor to check on Lysander. The family in the cubicle next to Lysander's told us that he'd gone above to get some fresh air. I thought it wasn't a bad idea, so Ayaka and I went above too.

We found Lysander sitting on the inner wall, eating something out of an open can. When he saw us, he jumped down from the wall and greeted us.

"Sienna, I've got to tell you, after seeing this place, I've never felt wiser for choosing to stay with you guys at the vineyard. You know what they gave me for breakfast, lunch, and dinner? A cube of nutrient biscuit or whatever they call it. It tastes slightly better than lemon-flavored dirt. And everyone here just slouches in their cubicle like cattle at a farm waiting for the storm to blow over."

Those people didn't have a choice. It was better than roaming out there on an empty stomach among the undead. It didn't need to be said, so instead I asked, "What were you looking at over the other side?"

"The isolation area. Someone over there looks like she's been infected."

"Do you think you can help me get on the wall and have a look?"

Ayaka shook her head. "I don't think you should--"

"I don't see why not." Lysander easily lifted me up and set me on the wall. He then offered to give Ayaka a lift, but she could get up by herself. Lysander looked impressed by her jump. He smiled, then jumped up to join us on Ayaka's side.

On the other side of the wall, a woman was being kept by herself in some sort of steel-framed glass cube. She was tapping on the glass, her disheveled hair sticking to her sweat-dampened face. The dark circles under her eyes were visible even from here. There were many people in white lab coats standing outside, taking notes. Standing behind them was a group of armed soldiers on standby.

"She's repeatedly saying 'Help me,'" Ayaka translated from her lip movements.

The people in the white lab coats kept on observing and taking notes.

A few minutes later, the woman in the glass cube fell limp like a ragdoll. A still moment followed. A man in a white lab coat stepped forward and tapped on the glass. There was movement inside the cube. The woman on the floor was getting up to her feet again. As soon as she saw the people in white lab coats, she attacked the glass.

"She's turned?" I asked.

Lysander folded his arms in front of him and nodded. "Pretty fast, huh?"

"She still looks human."

"She won't in a few days."

Among the people in white lab coats was a man dressed in civilian clothes. He was escorted behind the cube, and two soldiers opened up the glass door to let him enter. They closed the door behind him. The noise made the undead woman turn around and launch herself at him. The man threw a quick punch and the woman's head shattered upon impact. The body still looked organic when it hit the ground, but the head that shattered all over the floor looked like broken pieces of red glass.

"Ice Punch. Nice!" Lysander complimented.

The soldiers reopened the cube to let the civilian man out while the people in the white lab coats kept on scribbling.

A few minutes ago, that headless body and those red chunks of ice on the ground were a living, breathing woman. To those researchers down there, she was just a test subject. To that civilian man, she was a demonstration. To Lysander, she was entertainment. She was somebody's daughter, probably somebody's sister, or wife, or mother. And yet, what happened to her now was just "Nice."

The value of a human life wasn't what it used to be.

To the left, Dr. Bailey was walking toward us with two armed soldiers behind her. She stood about ten feet away from the wall and looked up at us. "You three aren't supposed to be up there."

"Dr. Bailey, hi." I waved at her.

"First, you don't seem to grasp the concept of being a wife. Now it also seems to me that you haven't grasped the concept of being a mother either. Do you know what would happen to your baby if you fell from--"

"She'll be fine. I've got her," Lysander interrupted. "I got enough time to run around this base ten times over before she hits the ground."

"I don't remember seeing you before." Dr. Bailey turned to Lysander and closely observed him. "Which unit are you in?"

"I'm not with any unit. Is that a common question around here?"

"You have a special ability and yet you didn't enlist?"

"Oh." Lysander realized what she was asking, then chuckled. "Nope. Not planning to."

"You must be a new arrival. If you'll come with me, I can explain all the benefits that will be open to you if you enlist your talent."

Lysander right-out rejected her. "Not interested."

Dr. Bailey knitted her brows together, a little confused by the rejection. Then she panned over to Ayaka. "Do you have a special ability also?"

"Water generation," Ayaka replied, and then added, "I don't want to enlist."

"What about you, Sienna?"

I simply shook my head.

Dr. Bailey ignored me and said to Lysander and Ayaka, "I would strongly advise that you both reconsider. While it's true that you may be required to go on off-base missions, you will be geared with our best equipment and your compensation will be extremely rewarding. You may keep a reasonable share of the supplies we successfully retrieve. Additionally, you both will be issued your own living space for you and your immediate family. You can really help your loved ones live a more comfortable life here."

"Not interested," Lysander repeated. He looked over to Ayaka who was shaking her head at the offer.

"No, thank you," Ayaka said.

For some reason, Lysander then added, "Not interested, thank you."

Lysander didn't strike me as the type who would say "please" and "thank you" in daily conversations. At least, he hadn't up until now.

Dr. Bailey then said to Ayaka, "Water regeneration is a useful skill here on base. If you enlist, I can guarantee you won't ever need to leave."

"Didn't you hear us the first time? Quit pestering us!" Lysander sounded annoyed.

"Dr. Bailey, you're recruiting for the military?" I interrupted to prevent the situation from escalating.

Dr. Bailey's attention was distracted by my question. She gestured toward the metal pin on her white lab coat and said with much pride, "I enlisted at the very beginning and am currently the top-ranking Waker."

"Excuse me? A what?"

"Waker. It's the agreed term for people who have an awakened ability or abilities."

"Oh..." I remembered seeing on TV that the term "waker" was commonly used by normal folks to attack people with special abilities.

"It started out as a derogatory term before all of this, but we decided we liked it. We've requested to be called Wakers, and the late General Grant approved. I'm a Rank 5 Waker. One star being the lowest. But I don't suppose this information will be useful to you in any way."

There was derision in her tone of voice and the way she was looking at me. Couldn't miss it a mile away. "Dr. Bailey, I think you have a misunderstanding about me. Declan lied. He isn't--"

"I think I understand you perfectly. I can't blame you for wanting to find someone else to depend on after you got separated from your husband. You're young, you're beautiful, you think you can use it as a weapon to bend any man to do your bidding. Trust me, women like you are loitering the streets. I understand your actions, but that doesn't mean I won't judge you. I'm just surprised that a man like Liam West fell for your honey trap."

What she said wasn't exactly false. I'd heard stories during gossip hour about women who had left their husbands for someone with more resources. "Dr. Bailey, Declan isn't my husband. He lied. I lost my memory, and he lied to me about my identity."

She began to look at me as though I'd said something crazy, then her expression calmed once again. "Is that also what you told Liam West? If I had to choose to believe you or Declan--and it is not a hard choice by any stretch--I'd choose to believe Declan. You want to deny your past? Fine. Not my business, but don't slander my good friend just so you can embellish your lies. It only belittles my opinion of you even more. If you weren't pregnant with Declan's baby and if the rules on base didn't strictly forbid fights with civilians, I would have slapped you silly."

"My baby is Liam's."

Dr. Bailey cast me a derisive glare, then walked off with her two soldier guards.

"Never seen a cat fight like that before." Lysander rubbed his chin. "One cat is all fangs and claws while the other one is napping on top of the wall. Sienna, you're just going to take that?"

"I'm pregnant and her bodyguards were armed."

Lysander lowered his eyes to my belly, then nodded as though all of his questions had been answered at once.

"Angel, what are you doing up there?"

I turned around to the sound of Liam's voice and saw him walking toward us. At the foot of the wall, he raised both of his arms to me. "Come down from there. Have you forgotten that you're pregnant? Slowly, now." I turned around and tried to get down. "Easy. Careful," Liam kept on repeating until I was firmly in his arms.

"I thought you were going to a meeting?"

"Just got out," he replied as he set me firmly on my feet.

"So quick?"

"I touched base on the problems at hand first."

"Which are?"

"Rationing. Security. I also canceled all scheduled off-base missions. We can't keep trading lives for materials. It'll break what little stability we have now."

"How did that sit with the colonels?"

"Needless to say, it didn't sit well with them. They have a vision of what they want to turn this base into, and I shattered it in a few sentences. Come, Angel. Have you had breakfast yet?"

I shook my head. "I was waiting for you."

"We'll have breakfast first, and then if you're interested, you can come with me to see the demonstration."

"What demonstration?"

"Every three days, the military schedules a demonstration for the new recruits to show their abilities, and a rank is assigned from one to five based on their strengths and applications."

"I'm interested."

"Breakfast first."

After breakfast at the cafeteria, Liam led me to an open field behind the warehouse entrance. There were a few sections of small white bleachers set on the grass, facing the wide open field. There were about fifty people sitting there and about a dozen other individuals stretching on the field.

Liam and I sat at the front of the bleachers and waited for the demonstration to begin. Hiroki and Ayaka took the seats behind us. I didn't mind waiting because getting some warm sun on my skin felt nice. As we were waiting, we saw Dr. Bailey coming this way with a clipboard in her arm. Two armed soldiers followed closely behind her.

Instead of taking a seat on the bleachers, she walked up to us, specifically Liam. "Mr. West, may I speak to you in private?"

Liam was trying to find a bag of dried apricots in his backpack when Dr. Bailey called for his attention. He didn't look up until he found it and handed it over to me. Dr. Bailey wasn't talking to me, so I sat quietly and started munching on the dried apricots. I held the bag up between each apricot to share with Ayaka and Hiroki.

"The demonstration is about to start," Liam gestured toward the field, which was a polite refusal.

She glanced at her wristwatch. "It won't start for another five minutes. I think that's enough time for what I need to say."

"Dr. Bailey, if this is regarding the situation on the base, you can debrief me here or wait until the meeting scheduled at 4 this afternoon."

"It's regarding a private matter," she replied.

"We don't have private matters to talk about." Liam turned to me, his blue eyes hinted at the bag of dried apricots. I picked one out and fed it to him. He chewed a bit and then frowned. He probably tasted the bags and bags of sugar I dumped into them during the drying process.

I pretended not to notice and tried to feed him another. He shook his head in disapproval.

I'd been craving sweets like crazy recently, but Liam didn't think it was good for the baby and me, so he'd been limiting my sugar intake. Pouring sugar into the new batch of dried apricots was the only thing I could think of that would escape his attention. So much for that now.

"If you won't talk to me in private, then I have no choice but to act in your best interests as your physician and say it to you here. It's regarding your wife and the woman sitting next to you."

Liam turned back to face her, his deep blue eyes narrowed. "Where do you want to talk?"

"Come with me, Mr. West."

Liam got up and followed Dr. Bailey to an open space about a hundred feet away. Ayaka bent over close to my right ear and whispered the conversation to me.

"Mr. West, first and foremost, I'd like to tell you how deeply sorry I am about the passing of your wife. I'd met her before when she came to visit you, and she was a polite and charming woman. As hard as it is for me to tell you this, I feel that as your physician, I must address it. You are going through the five stages of grief, and I believe you are experiencing both denial and bargaining at the same time right now. That woman over there resembles the late Mrs. West a great deal, but she isn't your wife, and I think that's where it gets confusing for you. I don't know what she's told you, but her name is Sienna Howell. She's the wife of a friend of mine, Declan Howell. The baby she's carrying is--"

"All I can tell you is that you are grossly misinformed, Dr. Bailey."

Liam turned his back to her, walked back to bleachers, and reseated himself next to me. He briefly glanced at Ayaka, then smiled as he mocked me. "Nosy."

I shrugged.

Dr. Bailey followed Liam back to the bleachers. "You don't believe me, Mr. West?"

"I think I know who I married, Doctor." Then he said to me, "Look, the demonstration is about to start."

"If I can present you with conclusive proof, would you believe me then?"

"I don't know why you're wasting your time with me, Doctor, but I don't appreciate people snooping around my private life to find what you call proof. Thank you for your concern on the matter as well as with my mental health, but it is unnecessary."

Dr. Bailey's face reddened, but she was speechless. She walked off and seated herself on the small long table in front of the bleachers among four men in uniforms. On the table were pens, notes, and five rows of badges with a different number of stars on them, like the ones Dr. Bailey had on her white lab coat.

# Chapter 24

This demonstration had twenty-five enlisters, men and women, young and old lining up to demonstrate their abilities. The first demonstrator was a man who could manipulate the air pressure and create cyclones. He got a three-star badge and was very happy about it. The next seven people's abilities were circus-like in nature, like blowing smoke from their lungs, psychic spoon bending, setting a ball of tissue on fire, claiming to be a mind-reader using a deck of cards, and so on. The judges weren't very impressed. Their names were written down, but none received a badge.

"What's going to happen to the people who weren't given a badge?" I whispered to Liam.

"The military doesn't need their service right now, but they will keep a catalog of people with special abilities for future reference."

The eighth demonstrator was a middle-aged woman who could lift objects with her mind. The judge then asked her to lift a two-hundred-pound metal plate off the ground, and she did so successfully. When she was asked to lift twice that, she couldn't maintain both of the plates in the air for longer than a second. Still, the judge was impressed with her ability and gave her a four-star badge.

The ninth demonstrator was a stern-looking man whose ability was lightning generation. He immediately got a five-star badge. Unlike the first two before him, who were ecstatic to receive a badge at all, this man didn't feel either way about it. He received the badge from the judge, left the field, and took a seat on the white bleachers.

The rest of the demonstrators weren't too impressive, and only three one-star badges and one two-star badge were given out. The two-star badge went to a ten-year-old boy who could heat objects to melting point with his hands.

"How many wakers do we have on base?" I asked Liam on the assumption that he was provided this information.

"Three thousand, two hundred and forty-eight, counting this batch here. Five hundred forty-three badge holders, most of them three stars and lower. It looks like today's demonstration is a successful one. They don't run into a rank five very often."

"How many are rank five?"

"Including him, thirty-one."

"Dr. Bailey is a rank five."

"So it seems."

The demonstration ended and everyone dispersed. Liam and I were heading back inside when Colonel Lee and four soldiers came looking for us.

Behind the closed door of the conference room, Colonel Lee handed Liam a piece of paper and said, "A one-way radio message was sent here twenty minutes earlier. No one else has seen it yet except for myself and the captain who wrote it down. I came to fetch you as soon as it was reported to me."

I peeked at the note. It said, "This is Major General Grant calling base. The rescue mission did not go as planned. I have six survivors with me, and we are trapped with few provisions. Requesting a transport helicopter to the State University Hospital. I repeat, requesting a transport helicopter at State University Hospital. We will meet you on the rooftop. Over."

"What do you think?" Colonel Lee asked Liam. "Do you think this is some sort of hoax? The soldier on radio duty said the voice sounded like the general's, but I don't see how that could be."

"Both of his girls go to the state university. They lived on campus," Liam said as his deep blue eyes turned contemplative.

"You think the general went there to rescue his girls?" I inquired.

"At the start of this, my uncle sent a team to fetch his girls, but the team never reported back. Four days after the first team went missing, my uncle sent another rescue team, but we lost contact with that team too. My uncle had already assumed the worst. It'd been weeks since then. My uncle wouldn't go himself if he didn't have conclusive proof that they were still alive. Have you heard anything about this, Colonel Lee?"

Colonel Lee shook her head. "No, I haven't. I only know that after the second team went missing, myself and the other colonels tried to convince the general not to send a third team. We had other priorities at that moment. After that, the general never brought up the subject again, but I know it wasn't easy for him. We've all lost family to this scourge. If this message is really from General Grant himself, then the other colonels must have lied about the cause of his death to avoid any more rescue missions."

I tugged on Liam's arm. "If that's so, what will the other colonels do when they learn that General Grant is still alive?"

Liam stared at the note in his hand, his mind elsewhere. I had my suspicions about General Grant's death, even surmised that he might be still alive, but this radio message took me completely by surprise. I couldn't even imagine what was going on inside Liam's mind right now. From what he'd told me, General Grant was like a father to him.

I said to Colonel Lee, "Colonel, could you please give us a moment?"

Colonel Lee looked at the both of us and then nodded. She left the room and kindly closed the door behind her. The room fell into silence.

I was conflicted. My first instinct was to try and convince Liam that a rescue mission in this situation was a lost cause, that more lives would be lost in the process, but I couldn't. I didn't want him to go, and yet here I was standing in front of him and couldn't say a word to stop him.

In that quiet room, I heard Liam say to me, "If you tell me not to go, I won't."

I opened my mouth to speak but ended up closing it again. When I opened my mouth again, I heard myself say, "He was like a father to you, Liam. I couldn't ask you to do that."

"I can't leave you here alone, either."

"I know. If you fail to return in a timely manner or at all, those colonels will torture me for the passcode. It doesn't matter if I know it or not; if they think there is the smallest chance that you told me, then I'm done for. The value of a human life is not what it used to be."

"I'm sorry."

"The living and the dead are equally dangerous in this new world. Liam, you'd warned me before that there are things you must do that I wouldn't agree with, and this is as good an example as any. I think it's a suicidal mission, but I can't tell you not to go, so all I can do is support you. Besides, my ability can be especially useful on this mission."

"I have to assemble a team and leave within the hour."

"Don't waste time then."

Colonel Lee was standing outside the conference room when Liam opened the door.

"Colonel, I need a transport helicopter ready within the hour. Can you see to it?" Liam said to Colonel Lee as soon as he stepped out of the door.

"You're going on a rescue mission? Liam, you need to think about this very carefully!"

"Colonel Lee, that is an order."

Colonel Lee looked absolutely stunned by what came out of Liam's mouth. She inhaled deeply, saluted, and then went off.

Liam and I went to the control room to make an announcement requesting all rank five wakers report to the conference room within five minutes.

By the time we returned to the conference room, the room had been packed with people. Even Lysander came for some reason. Some greeted Liam as Mr. West while other people called him Chairman.

"What is this about, Mr. West?" Dr. Bailey came up to Liam and asked.

"I need volunteers for a rescue mission at the state university," Liam said to the entire room.

Every pair of eyes in the room stared at Liam as though he'd completely lost it. The state university was located inside a city with over five million undead roaming free. It was no wonder they gave him that look. No one stepped up either.

Liam continued. "Of course, with great risks come great rewards. I'm offering three hundred units of MREs and five hundred pounds of grain to anyone volunteering to go on this mission. To sweeten the deal, I am also offering one acre of farmable land inside a walled area. Of course, there are rules that you need to abide by on that land."

"Did--did you just say five hundred pounds of grain?" someone yelled out in disbelief. "Each?!"

Another person said, "What farmable land? There's no farmable land left! Nothing can be grown!"

"I have farmable land and I have the grain," Liam confirmed. "If you want to stay here on this base, you can give your acre of farmable land to your loved ones to work on or choose an additional five hundred pounds of grain instead. A 20-by-25 cabin will be provided as housing. But I'm warning you ahead of time: That acre of farmable land is located inside a small peaceful community of good, honest folks, and it comes with rules and contingencies to keep it a peaceful community of good, honest folks."

"Can you guarantee that this acre of land is farmable?"

Liam nodded. "I guarantee it."

If I remembered correctly, the survivor guide on the internet mentioned that an acre of land could produce anywhere from thirty to sixty bushels of grains, dependent on the land and the method used. Each bushel was a measurement of sixty pounds, so in a worst-case scenario, an acre of land should be able to produce close to a ton of grain per year.

"Mr. West, I'm Enzo Bryant. I don't know if you remember me, but I was a security guard at the West & West headquarters building," a man walked up to the front and said. It was that same man with the lightning ability from the demonstration this morning. "I want the land. I don't want the five hundred pounds of grain. Can I negotiate for two acres of land instead?"

Liam agreed.

"This land will be mine indefinitely?"

"As long as you do not steal, rape, or kill the residents inside my walls, yes."

"Then I volunteer to go on this mission."

"Hey, Liam, how come you didn't offer this deal to me?" Lysander complained. "If there's land in it, I want in. Two acres for me too."

In the next minute, four other people volunteered. Unlike the first man and Lysander, three took what Liam offered, and one just wanted a thousand pounds of grain plus three hundred units of MREs.

The fact that six were willing to risk their lives on this dangerous, near-suicidal mission meant the military was paying them nowhere near what Liam offered. Liam gave them exactly ten minutes to return to their rooms to take what was needed for the mission.

# Chapter 25

After everyone returned to the conference room, the ten of us left the underground base to an awaiting helicopter out in the open field. On the way there, the other five volunteers introduced themselves and their set of skills to Liam.

When Ayaka and Liam helped me board the transport helicopter, the other five people stared at me and my pregnant belly. None of them were in a great mood about me tagging along. To them, a pregnant woman would only be a burden.

"I have ESP. I can help you locate the survivors," I explained. It wasn't the truth, but it wasn't a lie either. My ability could be considered extrasensory perception.

The man named Mark-something waved a dismissive hand when he heard my explanation. "Like that psychic mumbo-jumbo bullcrap?"

"She won't be leaving the helicopter," Liam said.

The tension on the six people's faces melted away like they'd just shaken off a heavy burden.

"Mr. West, who are we rescuing?" a woman named Pan asked.

Liam handed her the note Colonel Lee had given him.

Pan read the note, then stared at Liam wide-eyed. The person next to her was curious, so he took the note from her, read it, then passed it down to the others.

"General Grant is still alive? They told us he died of a stroke!"

Liam said, "Our mission is to land on the hospital rooftop to wait for the survivors to reach us. You are recruited on this mission in the scenario that we may need to go to them."

"Let's hope it's the first one so we can all fly home right after."

The six volunteers chuckled.

"What's that?" Pan asked Hiroki, gesturing toward the long brown fabric bag Hiroki was carrying behind his back. Everyone else had a military backpack while Hiroki and Ayaka traveled light. I noticed Ayaka was wearing the same thing behind her.

"My katana," Hiroki replied.

"What's a katana?" Pan asked.

"A katana is a sword."

"Ah..." Pan said, then didn't ask any more questions.

"Hey, you've never told us what your ability is," Mark said to Hiroki.

Hiroki folded his arms in front of his chest and closed his eyes, ignoring Mark. Mark made a "tsk" sound when he saw that he was ignored and then looked away.

After we were seated and belted, the helicopter took off from the grass field and headed in the direction of the city. Less than half an hour later, we were flying over a city of five million undead.

We encountered a little problem. The noise from the helicopter was attracting quite a few undead below. They were piling on each other to follow us.

I whispered into Liam's ear to let him know. He got up and slid the helicopter door open for a view of below. The wind from the outside blew in our faces and hair.

Liam closed the door and then said to everyone, "Change of plan. The helicopter is attracting too many undead this way. If we make a landing at the hospital, the noise will attract every undead in the vicinity to the hospital, making this mission exponentially dangerous. I'm going to have the pilot drop us off at the rooftop and have him fly this helicopter around in exactly half an hour."

"Damnit!" Mark muttered but didn't object. No one else objected either.

Liam went to the front to talk to the pilot.

"Liam, let me come with you!" I said when he came back. My shouting voice could hardly be heard over the noise of the helicopter blades.

He shook his head.

"Liam, I can help!"

Liam ignored me and opened the helicopter door again. When the helicopter hovered over the hospital rooftop landing pad, he dropped the rope ladder and was the first to climb down. Hiroki and the other six followed. Against every instinct in my body, I climbed down too. Ayaka tried to pull me up, but I said if she kept it up, I might fall. She let go and had no choice but to follow me down. When the helicopter took off, Liam discovered my face among the crowd.

He wasn't happy to see me standing on that rooftop. Nobody was.

Liam walked up to me, staring down at me from his six-foot-four height with a solemn expression on his face, something he'd never done before. Only I knew how truly angry he was at my action. He took my hand and placed a gun in it. I gave it back to him and took out my Desert Eagle from my backpack.

Liam inhaled a deep, controlling breath.

"Don't look at me like I'm a disobedient child. I'm a grown woman, and more than that, I'm your wife, not your subordinate. You have your priorities and I have mine."

I ignored him and focused on the layout of the hospital. This medical facility had four buildings, the tallest one seven stories high, and they were all connected by sky bridges over streets. Only the tallest building had a helicopter landing pad, the one we were standing on. Strangely enough, there were two other groups of survivors on the first and third floor of the adjacent building. I tried to focus on General Grant's aura as I remembered him and found his group barricaded inside a room on the second floor of the diagonal building. There were more than twenty undead at the door.

I pointed to the diagonal building and whispered to Liam, "General Grant's group is inside a room on the second floor of that building over there. He's still alive, and he's in some sort of room with a lot of computer equipment. If he sent that message via the radio, then it's most likely the hospital's radio room. Six other people are with him, but one of them is hurt, possibly infected."

Liam used the military radio to reach General Grant's radio if he still had it, but there was no reply.

"Are they heading here right now?"

I shook my head. "There are about twenty undead clawing at their door. It's unlikely they could get out and come here in one piece. Liam, there are so many undead here. In every room, roaming every hallway." I glanced over at the six volunteers who were also looking this way. Off to the side, Hiroki and Ayaka were unsheathing their katanas. "Do you know how long you and your team would be here without me? How many rooms you would have to search to find the right one?"

"Angel, I want to keep you safe. There are things I feel like I must do, but not if it would endanger your life."

"My life, your life, what's the difference now? When you made that announcement, my fate was already sealed with yours."

_No, even before that,_ I corrected myself. If I was a pregnant woman all alone at the end of the world, I wasn't going to delude myself in being a strong independent heroine who could rise above it all and triumph just because I believed I could. The reality is that most people are tiny, so tiny in the grand scheme of it all. When you don't have power, when you have no one to rely on but yourself, wits and spirit can only take you so far until someone who has more power than you comes and crushes you like an ant. In this new world, the only people who had their fates in their own hands were the people who had the power to hold it.

Liam called Ayaka over. "Stay close to her."

Ayaka nodded. "I will keep her safe."

"And I'll keep you safe, doll," Lysander walked up to us and said to Ayaka.

Ayaka didn't pay any attention to him.

# Chapter 26

Hiroki handed one of the two katanas in his hands to Liam. Liam took it and walked toward the door leading to the level below. I followed behind him, and Ayaka followed behind me. There was banging on the door from the other side.

Ten feet from the door, Liam looked to me.

I said, "There are twelve of them behind this door. Probably heard the helicopter."

Liam nodded and signaled Hiroki to open the door and let them through. The two sharp blades in Liam and Hiroki's hands decapitated heads at a terrifying speed like they were cutting through grass. Their blades effortlessly and smoothly slid through flesh and bones like they weren't even flesh and bones. In no time, all twelve were in pieces on the ground. Hiroki then led the way downstairs.

I guided the group through the hallway. "The elevators are down the hall to the left. They probably don't work, but there is a stairway right next to it. We need to take it to the fourth floor and then take the sky bridge to the next building."

"Hey, Sienna, this ability of yours is pretty neat," Lysander complimented. "How do you do it?"

"Don't talk to me. I need to concentrate. I'll ask Liam to give you one of those sharp blades if he has extras, if you leave me alone."

"You have yourself a deal!" Lysander said to Ayaka right behind me, "Doll, would you teach me how to use one? Blades aren't really my style, but we'd look like a couple carrying them, don't you think?"

Ayaka still ignored him.

"Ayaka, behind us," I warned.

Ayaka jumped back and cut at the undead running at us from the third room behind us. A head went rolling. A pretty girl with a pretty face like that chopping down heads didn't sit right with me somehow.

I needed to pay closer attention to open doors.

Lysander, on the other hand, looked absolutely mesmerized. I had to give him a nudge to get him to move again, then he followed behind Ayaka and me.

"Liam, two doors down isn't closed all the way. Three in that room."

Liam cut down two undead in front of him, then pulled the door all the way closed.

"There are two very dense groups of undead on both sides of the intersection right ahead."

Liam grabbed a framed picture off the wall and tossed it at the intersection. The noise immediately brought a flood of undead to the middle of the hallway, and they promptly headed this way.

"Allow me!" Enzo rushed to the front and raised both of his hands, generating enough lightning to chain all of the undead and burn them to a crisp. "I was bored watching you guys do all the work when we're the hired ones here. Also, messy."

Liam fell back to walk beside me.

I gestured for him to lend me an ear and whispered, "There are two other groups of survivors here. Fifteen people trapped on the first floor of the building we're going to. Eight people in the third-floor cafeteria, kitchen area."

If they hadn't been in the kitchen area, I couldn't imagine how they would be able to survive all these weeks.

"How dangerous?"

"First floor is packed. The third floor is in the same condition as here."

"The helicopter won't be able to carry that many people. We can't save them all, Angel."

"I know. I don't expect you to."

"We'll save as many as we can," Liam said in his normal tone of voice.

"Save who?" Pan asked.

Liam raised his voice so the rest of the group could hear him. "There is a group of survivors on the third floor of the building we're heading to."

I helped him out and explained further. "We'll take the sky bridge, head down to the third floor real quick, then take the third-floor sky bridge to the target building."

"How many survivors?" Pan asked.

"Eight," I replied.

The team took a left, went down the stairwell to the fourth floor, and took the sky bridge to the next building. We found our way down to the third-floor cafeteria and took care of the bunch clawing at the door there. Liam then peeked through the glass of the cafeteria door. There were about thirty undead roaming the cafeteria.

"We have to funnel them out." I looked over to Enzo, who was already sweating bullets. My head was starting to spin too. Apparently, there was a limit to our abilities. Enzo was like a battery, and I couldn't actively concentrate too long. "There are two entries. Perhaps we can walk them into a trap? Ayaka can generate water and Enzo can give it a little spark to conserve energy. Will that work?" I asked Enzo.

Enzo quickly inspected the dirty floor and then nodded.

Ayaka generated a puddle of water in front of one of the two entries, and then we opened the door. Liam tossed another wall painting, and the undead charged toward it. Enzo gave the puddle a little spark, and every undead who stepped onto the water got electrocuted. We took the other entry into the cafeteria, which reeked of decaying food. Pan went to knock on the kitchen door while the rest of us stood guard with our backs to her.

"Hello? Anybody in there? We're the rescue team!"

A minute later, a male voice replied, "How do we know you're the rescue team and not survivors trying to steal our food supplies?"

"Didn't you hear a helicopter just now? That was us!" Pan said.

"That still doesn't prove anything. We're not going to open the door."

Everyone in our team was speechless, staring at each other.

"The power went out weeks ago. What food could you possibly have left in there?" Pan asked out of sheer curiosity.

I was a little curious too.

"Ah-ha!" said a woman's voice. "You're trying to get us to tell you what we have! We're not going to fall for it."

Liam turned to Lysander and said, "Take down this door. We don't have time for this."

Lysander nodded in agreement. He went in front, grabbed the metal door, and ripped it out, locks, hinges, and all. The eight people in there--five men and three women--were holding kitchen knives as weapons. They looked absolutely horrified to see Lysander holding the metal door he'd just ripped out like cardboard.

Lysander tossed the door aside and gave them a sarcastic smile. "Rescue team. Coming or not, because we're not waiting."

"If you're really the rescue team, then you should wait for us," a scrawny middle-aged man with thick glasses said.

This time, I was speechless for a moment. Then I tugged Liam's sleeve and said, "Liam, we really have to go. The undead around this area are great in number and really closing in."

Liam took my hand and led me out the door. Most of our team followed, not caring too much if the survivors followed or not, except for Pan who was still trying to convince them that we were the rescue team.

Liam turned around and said to Pan, "We're not waiting for you, either."

"Mr. West, these people are scared and confused. We should try to convince them that we're here to rescue them so they'll come with us. We're their only chance at survival."

Liam and I were already out of the cafeteria door before she finished. He meant it; he wasn't going to wait for anyone. I agreed. If they wanted to follow us, then they get to live; if they decided to stay and mend that metal door, then that was their choice. We had done what we could. There was another group of survivors on the first floor who weren't even given a choice on the matter.

Gabriel, whose ability was compressing air and launching it as deadly razors, took over leading the front.

As we reached the second sky bridge, Pan and the group of survivors caught up to us.

"Excuse me, but, the helicopter pad is in the other building," the scrawny man with the thick glasses pointed out.

"We're a search and rescue team for another group," Pan kindly explained.

"So that's why you didn't wait for us to decide!" the large woman wearing a red dress and huge pearls cried. Though large, the sagginess of her skin indicated she'd lost quite a bit of weight. "The nerves of you people! I demand to speak to your supervisor! My husband is a lieutenant colonel of the United States Air Force, I'll have you know!"

Lysander gritted his teeth and turned to the woman. "You know, Mrs. Lieutenant Colonel of the United States Air Force, we haven't helped you out of here yet, and we could change our minds at any minute, so you shut your yap right now and follow us or don't!"

I didn't care how that went, so I kept on following Liam across the sky bridge. We then went down two hallways, down a stairwell to the second floor, and rushed to the room where I sensed General Grant's group. They didn't need me to tell them which room when they found a group of undead clumped together, clawing at the door.

Enzo was spent. Gabriel was spent.

It was Pan's turn to solve our trouble. Earlier that day, she had introduced herself as an ice queen, and everyone laughed so hard, Gabriel complained his sides hurt. I didn't understand why that was so funny. Pan could breathe out a massive breath of below-freezing air. Ayaka provided the water, and in seconds, the undead in front of the door were covered in a layer of ice. They turned to charge at us, but their movement was slowed significantly.

Liam and Hiroki went in with their blades.

After that was taken care of, Liam knocked on the door. "General Grant? This is Liam. It's safe to come out now."

There was a loud racket on the other side like large items being thrown, then a loud screeching noise. The door was opened, and General Grant was standing in the flesh in front of us.

"Liam?" General Grant blinked, looking even more disbelieving than us.

"Liam, they broke through the glass doors on the first floor!" I grabbed onto his arm. "Swarms and swarms of them!"

"Angel!"

I didn't know why he was yelling my name until he held my face and wiped the area atop my lips. I looked at his thumbs and saw blood.

"I'm okay. We really need to run now."

We looked into the room and saw two young women and four men in uniforms. One of them was badly hurt, tied up, and gagged.

"What about him?" Liam asked.

"He hasn't turned yet. He's still one of us," General Grant quickly replied.

Liam motioned to Lysander. "Carry him."

Lysander picked the man up and carried him on his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Liam took off his jacket and wrapped it twice around the man's hands, securing it tight. Then he took my hand and led us back to the stairwell to go back the same way we'd come. We were moving at a much faster pace now that most of the undead on the way had been taken care off.

I felt dizzy and wobbled a little, so Liam picked me up into his arms. "Liam, they've swarmed the second floor."

"Stop using your ability, Angel! It's hurting you."

"Not until we're safely out of here. Don't worry, I know my limits."

At the sky bridge looking down, everyone could see what I saw inside my head. The hospital was surrounded by hundreds of thousands of undead. We could hear the helicopter's blades from here.

"It looks like we're late," Lysander said when he saw the helicopter flying toward the building we were heading to.

"Liam, they're starting to go up to the third floor. Soon they'll be behind us. The helicopter is going to draw more here."

"Don't worry, Angel. We'll make it."

"Now they've breached the glass door on the first floor of the tallest building."

"Shh!"

"Wait!" Pan cried out. "I hear a baby's cry!"

"There's no baby," I told her.

"I hear a baby's cry! It's coming from that room!" She ran back and turned the doorknob to the room where she'd heard the baby cry.

"No!" General Grant grabbed her and pulled her away from the door. "There's no baby!"

"I hear it too!" Mrs. Lieutenant Colonel gasped. She ran toward the door that Pan wanted to open. "There's a baby in there!"

"I'm telling you there's no baby in there! Just four zombies!" I shouted at her.

"Oh shut up! You people are just heartless! First you want to leave us, now you want to leave a helpless baby! Shame on you all!" She turned the doorknob, and no one stopped her.

I could hear the baby's cry too, but I knew there wasn't any baby in that room. "Step back," I said to Liam.

He was way ahead of me. Lysander and Hiroki both readied their weapons.

Mrs. Lieutenant Colonel turned the doorknob and pulled the door open. Four zombies flooded out of the room, she fell back from the shock, and they piled up on top of her. Lysander opened fire, but we soon realized that it took him six to eight rounds to take even one down. The loud gunshots provoked all of the undead in the rooms around us. They were slamming and clawing at every door.

After all four were down, Pan came to check on Mrs. Lieutenant Colonel. Chunks of flesh were missing from her body. She stared at us wide-eyed, but unable to speak, then her eyes rolled back. No one wanted to get near enough to check if she was still alive.

"Run! There's no time!" I shouted, snapping everyone out of it.

Lysander was the first to react. He grabbed Ayaka's hand and dragged her down the hallway with him. "Let's go, Doll!"

Ayaka tried to shake him off, but Lysander's strength could not be contested.

"We fell for it too. They can mimic the sounds of a baby's cry to lure people in," General Grant said as he was running alongside us.

"What in the hell!" Mark cussed.

Everyone ran down the hallway and up another stairwell to the fourth floor like death was trailing right behind us. We crossed another sky bridge and headed to the stairwell to get to the very top. The man on Lysander's back started making noises like that of the undead, garnering my attention. He'd turned.

Lysander noticed the change too and immediately dropped him. General Grant paused a few seconds to look at the man tied up on the floor, then continued to run with us.

"Liam, they're in the stairwell, second floor, but I think we can make it."

Everyone rushed into the stairwell and ran as fast as they could up the stairs. Looking down, I could see dozens of undead climbing the stairwell.

"Ayaka, Pan."

Ayaka generated a puddle of water on the steps behind us, and Pan froze it. As we ran up the stairwell, the undead slipped on the ice and fell.

Liam was sweating so much that his clothes felt wet. We climbed up the stairwell, all the way to the rooftop where a rope ladder awaited us. Lysander used his back to block the door as our group of survivors climbed the ladder one by one. Liam warped the both of us into the helicopter. I was afraid I might lose focus for a second and let go or something crazy like that.

The cabin soon filled up. Below, Lysander was the last one to board. He rushed to the rope ladder as the door behind him burst open with a swarm of undead. The helicopter took off while Lysander was still on the rope. He climbed on, and Liam slid the door closed.

Suddenly, Lysander laughed. Then quite a few people started laughing too.

Liam wasn't laughing. He was too busy wiping the blood that wouldn't stop flowing from my nose.

I felt light-headed. Everything darkened.

# Chapter 27

When I came to again, I was in the isolation area at the base. Liam was in the isolation room with me.

"We're back?" I asked.

"Yeah."

"Good. Has it been twelve hours yet?"

"No. You've only been out for less than an hour. I had them forgo the physical until you woke up."

"I'm up now."

"I'll take you."

"Got a scratch on you?"

Liam shook his head.

I got up from the single bed and went with Liam to the physical examination room where I would need to take off my clothes to prove that I wasn't injured so I could be readmitted into the isolation area for twelve hours. Then I would be free to return to the base.

I got in line with the other women in front of the tent where the doctors conducted the physicals. I waited for about ten minutes until it was my turn. There were three doctors inside the large tent, each conducting a physical behind a white panel. I got Dr. Bailey. She didn't look too happy to see me back, alive.

"You know the drill," Dr. Bailey said dryly.

I began taking off my clothes for the examination. After I was stripped bare, I waited for her to check me for injuries.

Dr. Bailey was sitting on her chair, jotting down something into her notebook. I waited and waited until I felt a chill and realized that she was doing this on purpose.

"Ahem, Doctor," I reminded her.

"Give me a minute."

That minute turned to five. Ayaka was done with her physical, and I was still standing naked.

"What are you still doing here? Your physical is done," I heard a woman say behind the white panel next to me.

Then came Ayaka's voice. "I'm waiting for someone."

"Well, you're in the way standing here. You can wait right outside the tent."

I didn't want to cause a scene, so I said to Ayaka, "It's okay, Ayaka. I'll be right out."

Dr. Bailey lifted her head and scanned up and down my naked body with her cold gaze. "Lift your arms and turn around."

I did as she said.

"How do you manage to go through your entire life without the tiniest scar?" Dr. Bailey asked, her tone mocking.

"I don't know. Amnesia, remember?"

"You know, I told Declan that you were all wrong for him, but he didn't listen to me. Now I don't even know if he's dead or alive and his wife is sleeping with another man while pregnant with his baby. I hate to be right sometimes."

"What did Declan tell you about me, then?"

"That you were born into wealth, sheltered and pampered all your life. Your type is all wrong for us."

"You're from the same orphanage as Declan?"

"I told him women like you don't understand people like us who had to work and struggle and fight for everything in life. I worked two jobs putting myself through medical school, worked my butt off to get to where I am today. When people called me Dr. Bailey, I felt accomplished, because I earned it."

"Can I put my clothes back on now?"

"I told him you were all wrong for him, and he didn't listen. He was bewitched by that beautiful face of yours, by this lovely body of yours, so much that he didn't listen to any of us. Liam is bewitched by you, too."

She kept on blabbering and didn't answer my question, so I reached for my clothes and put them back on.

A high-pitched shriek and the sound of metal instruments hitting the ground got both of our attentions. We got out from behind the white panel and saw a woman with dark brown hair biting a woman in a white lab coat. The woman in the white lab coat was screaming and struggling. Dr. Bailey screamed, which got the attention of the woman with dark brown hair. She turned around with a bloodied chunk of flesh in her mouth. I eyed the tent's entrance and sprinted for it just as a strong push from behind thrust me toward the infected woman.

The infected woman came at me, her strength pushing me to the ground. I struggled to fight her off, but she was unnaturally strong. I couldn't stop her from lowering her head. She was aiming for my face, but I made a quick turn of my head, and she bit the base of my neck instead, ripping a chunk of flesh out. The excruciating pain made me scream.

Then I heard gunfire in rapid succession. The woman on top of me fell to the ground. Through my blurred vision, I could see Ayaka standing by the entrance with a gun in her hand.

Liam rushed in seconds later. He scrambled to my side and put some sort of pill into my mouth. I trusted him and swallowed. He took off his jacket and covered my neck and upper body with it, then picked me up and carried me off. The next thing I knew, we were in the parking lot and Liam was carrying me into the cab of a truck.

He'd warped.

He took his jacket off of me and began inspecting the wound on my neck. The look on his face told me it was pretty bad. Liam applied some sort of white powder to my wound--I assumed it was something to stop the bleeding--then he bandaged it up.

Damnit, I wanted to curse out loud. I'd been so careful. I didn't sense any infection in that tent. I could still sense the infection all around. Why couldn't I sense any infection in the tent? What happened?

Hiroki and Ayaka rushed to the truck. Liam carried me to the passenger seat so Hiroki could take the driver's seat. Liam covered me with his jacket and told Hiroki to drive.

Ayaka tried to tend to me, but Liam harshly shrugged her away.

Hiroki ignited the engine and drove us out of the parking lot, briefly stopping at the checkpoint to wait for the guards to open the gates, and then sped down the road.

We were leaving the military base.

"Dr. Bailey pushed me toward that thing so she could escape." If I was going down, I wanted Liam to know what that bitch did to me. I didn't want her to get away with it, and, knowing Liam, he'd draw his last breath before he'd let her get away with it.

"Chairman, where are we going?" Hiroki asked.

I wanted to know that too.

Liam didn't answer. Which meant he didn't know. Now I realized that he just wanted to get me out of the military base before anyone found out I was bitten. He didn't have a plan, and it showed on his face. He was panicking. He was looking at me and panicking.

"Pull over at a safe area," Liam said.

A few minutes later, Hiroki stopped in the middle of the road.

Liam carried me out of the truck and into the back. I thought he was going to leave me in the back, so when he got in with me too, I gave him a puzzled look. He told Hiroki to close the doors and lock us in.

It was dark. Liam turned on a lantern and set it aside. I stared at him. He stared back at me. I knew the logical thing to do. I should tell him to get out and just leave me in here or tell him to just put a gun to my head, but I could do neither. I was afraid, and there was comfort in being held in his arms, to feel his warmth.

_Just a little bit longer,_ I said to myself. _Just a little longer, then I promise I 'll let him go._

I leaned my head on his shoulder. He tightened his embrace.

The thing was, the more I wanted to hold onto time, the faster it was slipping away from me. I could sense the infection spreading throughout my body. The pain was searing through my veins, especially in my abdomen.

"Liam, you should get out now," I forced myself to say.

He didn't budge.

"Liam, the infection is spreading. I don't know when it's going to happen. You should get out while I still haven't--"

He tightened his embrace even more.

I could barely breathe. Somehow, I preferred this discomfort over not being held at all. A bittersweet feeling rose up in my chest. The selfish side of me was happy he didn't want to leave me. It was telling me that it wasn't so bad if we could go out together like this.

But another side of me, a stronger side, didn't want anything to happen to him, didn't want to hurt him.

"Liam, you have to leave right now!"

"I wasn't there for you before."

"What?"

"When we got married, I was the only one who got what I wanted. I wanted to have you in my life, and you became my wife. There were still planes to catch and conferences to attend, meeting after meeting, but whenever I came home, you were there. A home felt like a home with you in it. You would welcome me back at the door, and then we'd have dinner together just like my uncle and his wife. They were the happiest couple I knew. The first time I saw you standing by the door waiting for me to come home, I finally understood why my uncle was always eager to come home. There was somebody waiting for him there. And then, there was somebody waiting for me too. It was the kind of feeling I never wanted to let go of."

"Liam..."

"I was three thousand miles away that day, nowhere near you. When I got the phone call that you had been taken to a hospital, I wanted to go to you right away, but it took me seven hours to get there. The things that were going through my head those seven hours. I realized then that I'd been away from home, away from you, much too often. The day before I would have been five hours away from you and the day after I would have been half a world away. It was the way it had always been for me. The only difference after we got married was that whenever I had the chance to come home, you were there. When I finally got to that hospital to look for you, you weren't in the emergency room, you weren't in surgery, and you weren't in a patient room waiting for me to show up. They took me directly to--"

He didn't want to say any more.

"Took you where?" I pressed on. I had a good guess in my head. When he didn't say, I helped him out. "The morgue?" I felt every muscle in his body stiffen and knew I'd guessed correctly. "I had suspected it for quite some time. Liam, you probably noticed by now that I lost more than just my memory. I'm not your shy, sweet, timid wife anymore. You lost her that day."

"Don't say that, Angel. Anyone but you."

"But it's true, and maybe it'll be easier for you now to believe it. Leave me here and go. Better yet, put a bullet through my head." I took the handgun off his belt and placed it in his hand.

He dropped the gun and used that same hand to lift my jawline up as he dove down to kiss me, a firm, punishing and possessive kiss that didn't give me an inch to back away. The thought that I was infected kept ringing inside my head, so I squirmed and fought him off, and all I got out of it was the taste of blood in my mouth. I couldn't tell if it was his blood or mine. At which point, I gave up resisting. The pain in my abdomen was becoming excruciating, coming and going every minute. I started sobbing.

Liam lifted his head and looked at me.

I reached down and discovered that my maternity dress was wet. The pain that was coming and going were contractions. I was going into labor at twenty-five weeks.

"Angel?"

"I-I'm going into labor."

Liam's gaze flew to my abdomen.

"I don't know if I have enough time to do this."

"Angel, listen to me. Colonel Lee said that people with abilities like us have stronger resistance toward the infection. Don't give up yet, Angel. For me. For our baby."

"At twenty-five weeks..." I shook my head.

"I know what you're thinking, but as long as you don't give up, there's still a chance. A chance for you and a chance for the baby. Breathe, Angel. I'm here."

There was something about Liam's "I'm here" that had always been able to calm my fears, and at the same time, give me strength and courage. It was the one thing I wanted to hear when I cried out for help.

"Angel, I'm here." He brushed my tears away with his thumb. "Don't give up."

"Liam, I need you to promise me something."

"Anything!"

"Liam, if I start showing signs of turning, you need to promise me you'll deliver the baby by C-section before I do. Maybe there's a chance the baby might live."

"Angel!" he growled at me.

"Do you have a knife on you?"

"Angel, listen to me. We make it out of this as a family, or we don't! It's all up to you."

"It's not fair!" I cried. The infection had already spread to every cell in my body. I could sense it.

The contractions came closer and closer together. I couldn't have imagined this level of pain, even after getting a chunk of flesh ripped out of me. I tried to concentrate on counting between the contractions.

"Breathe, Angel! You need to breathe!"

_Calm,_ I said to myself. _Breathe!_

Liam laid me down on the floor of the truck and rolled up the skirt of my dress.

"Aghhhhhh!" Another strong wave of contractions ripped through my abdomen. I felt the urge to push. I felt something slip out of me and the pain quickly melted away. I laid on my back, confused about what was happening. This wasn't what I'd read in the book. I waited another minute, but the contractions were gone. I looked at Liam staring into the bloodied white towel in his hands.

"Liam?"

"Are you okay?"

I nodded and slowly sat up. "Can I...can I see?"

He hesitated a moment, then handed the bundle over to me.

The baby was no bigger than my hand. A boy. He was breathing. There was no infection in him. Waves of emotion welled up inside my chest when I saw him for the first time, feelings I couldn't put into words if I lived to be a million. "He didn't even cry."

Liam said nothing.

I handed the bundle back to Liam and said, "Hold him. Keep him away from me."

He didn't do as I asked. He came to sit next to me and put an arm around me while holding the baby in the other. I saw some mucus on the baby's nose and couldn't help but reach over to wipe it off.

I suddenly noticed the infection in me was gone. At least, I couldn't sense it anymore. There was no sign of infection on this truck. Could it be true that people with abilities like us could fight off the infection?

I cautiously monitored myself for the next hour, then finally said to Liam, "I think the infection is gone."

Liam looked at me and exhaled a shaking sigh of relief.

I couldn't stand it anymore, so I asked to hold the baby again. I unbuttoned my dress and tried to breastfeed him. I tried and tried, but he didn't latch on. I started sobbing again. It had nothing to do with physical pain. I knew that chances were, he wouldn't survive the night. I looked into Liam's reddened eyes and saw that he knew it too.

I still wanted to nurse him at least once as his mother. I squeezed my swelling breast until it dripped breast milk into his slightly opened mouth. His tongue was moving, like licking or sucking. I put him near my breast again, and this time, he was latching, though barely.

I leaned on Liam's shoulder, and the three of us huddled together for the rest of the night.

# Chapter 28

I hadn't realized I fell asleep. I looked down at the baby in my arms, still tiny and fragile as I remembered him before I fell asleep, but less red and wrinkled. Warm. He was still with us.

I thought he might be hungry, so I fed him again.

Liam reached over and gently touched the baby's cheek as he was feeding.

"What should we call him?" I suddenly remembered that we hadn't given him a name. The thought hadn't even crossed my mind last night.

Liam thought for a moment, then said, "We'd agreed on Lance for a son and Angelica for a daughter."

"Angelica?"

"A little angel in your likeness. We'll keep that name saved up for the future. If we keep trying, we're bound to conceive a daughter."

"I don't plan on having another child for a while." I'd just given birth and it wasn't a good time to bring more children into a world where I didn't have the power to protect them.

"We're still young; there's still time. We'll have many children together, Angel. Count on it."

I smiled. "Lance, hmm? Liam and Lance. It would be easy to call you both at the same time."

Liam smiled back.

After I fed the baby and buttoned up properly, Liam warped out of the truck and unlocked the doors from the outside. We got out after I confirmed there was no undead nearby. We went to the front of the truck and tapped on the glass window. Hiroki and Ayaka were sleeping. The surprise on their faces when they saw us was plain.

Liam and I got into the truck, and I took a seat on the cushioned floor. Hiroki started the engine, and Ayaka stared at me unblinking with tears in her eyes.

"I was the one who told you to wait outside the tent," I said to her. I understood it wasn't how it worked in her world, but I just wanted to let her know that it was my fault.

Ayaka came to my side with a first aid kit and offered to change my bandages. I slightly turned my injured side toward her, and she began removing the old bandages. After a few minutes, I noticed Ayaka had been holding a new roll of bandages in her hands for a while. She was staring at the injury on my neck. It must have looked bad. I did lose a chunk of flesh there.

"Don't worry about it. It doesn't hurt anymore."

Liam turned back to have a look, and he too stared at the base of my neck. I felt a little insecure, so I slightly turned my body to hide my injury from his view.

Ayaka's hand reached for the base of my neck, and I felt her cool fingertips against my skin. It didn't feel right to me, so I also reached up to check the area. The place where there should have been a chunk of flesh missing felt like smooth skin.

"Mirror!"

Ayaka withdrew her hand and searched her backpack. She couldn't find anything and shook her head. I was holding the baby, so I couldn't risk standing up in a moving vehicle and losing my balance.

"Nothing at all?" I asked Ayaka.

She shook her head.

"Really?" I asked Liam.

He nodded.

_I knew I had the ability to heal, but this..._ There was supposed to be a chunk of flesh missing there, and I could feel nothing out of the ordinary now.

I didn't want to dwell on the subject, so I asked Liam, "Where are we going?"

Hiroki was taking us on the road, but I didn't know where to exactly. My best guess was back to our vineyard.

Liam thought about it for a minute, then said to Hiroki, "Bring the truck around. We're going back to the military base." Then to me, "The military base has doctors. Our baby needs a doctor."

I looked down at the tiny premature baby in my arms and felt sheer rage rising within me. It didn't have to be this way. He could have been born a healthy baby three months from now. That woman owed me big time.

Liam added, "We also have unfinished business there and some promises to make good on."

"You're right. _We_ have unfinished business there. Your half and mine."

"Leave everything to me, Angel. I'll collect everything owed to us."

But I didn't want to leave everything to him. Putting a few bullets into Dr. Bailey's head wasn't my goal. In a world turned to nightmare, we might even be doing her a favor by showing her a way out. Her life wasn't what I was after.

"I don't want her life, Liam. Her healing ability made her a great asset to the military. She's under their protection, and it simply isn't wise to touch her right now. In the grand scheme of things, she has her importance."

Liam didn't reply.

I knew he wasn't convinced, so I continued. "I had an interesting conversation with Dr. Bailey yesterday. Apparently, the reason why she despises me isn't just because she's convinced that I betrayed Declan. I have no idea what Declan told her about me, but she's also convinced that I was the type born into privilege with everything handed to me on a silver platter. She's rather conflicted about it, though. She looks down on me for my lack of accomplishments, but at the same time, she's jealous that I didn't need to achieve anything to get what I wanted from life, while an orphan like her had to 'work her butt off' to get through medical school and make something of herself. She said she felt accomplished whenever people called her Dr. Bailey. It reminded her how far she's come. And now there's a five-star badge pinned on her lab coat to remind her of her self-importance. I think she's coping at the military base rather well, considering all that happened. Better than most, I'd say."

Liam said nothing still. When our truck stopped at the checkpoint gates of the outer wall of the military base, he finally said, "We'll do things your way, Angel."

We went through the physical again and spent twelve hours in isolation. By the time we were released, it was already half past nine. General Grant still requested Liam to report to the conference room. I told Liam I'd wait for him outside the conference room, but he refused and led me into the room with him.

The room was packed with men in uniform, but there was one empty seat. When Liam and I entered, everyone stood up and saluted. Liam pulled the chair out and told me to sit. I didn't argue.

Everyone was staring at me like I wasn't supposed to be there, but no one said a word. I pretended not to notice and lowered my gaze to my baby.

General Grant began. "Liam, earlier this morning we received a satellite message from the underground Pentagon. The president and what is left of Congress has appointed a five-star general under a state of emergency. General Hall at D.C. is the new General of the Army. I have also gained two more stars on my uniform."

"Congratulations, General," Liam said.

"And twice the congratulations to you, Brigadier General West. You've become a father."

I lifted my head, aiming my confused gaze at General Grant, who was looking at Liam with a half-mischievous, half-victorious smile on his face. I turned to Liam and saw the solemn expression on his face.

"Pardon?" Liam inquired.

"I personally submitted a detailed report of your contributions in the past months as well as the location of key cards and access codes to warehouses across the country that you had provided me to the underground Pentagon. The president and Congress had promoted you to Major, Colonel, and finally, Brigadier General based on your contributions and combat merits. They have also awarded you with a Medal of Honor for your service to the country. Unfortunately, due to our current circumstances, you won't be seeing the actual physical medal for quite some time."

I raised a brow. I didn't know how the military operated, but that didn't sound right to me at all. Could they just promote someone all at once like that?

Apparently, Liam thought so too. "General Grant, you know as well as anyone in this room that I'm a civilian."

General Grant shrugged as though that little detail was inconsequential. "Consider yourself drafted."

"I'm past the age to be drafted."

"You'd be surprised how quickly they pass bills into law these days. The thing is, General West, people with special abilities come in all shapes, sizes, genders, and especially ages. Congress passed a law that dictates anyone can be drafted if their services are required by their country."

Contrary to how I imagined one would feel if a promotion like that fell out of the sky and hit them, Liam wasn't at all happy to hear about it. His mood was souring by the second. He and General Grant stared at each other, both locked in a silent battle. Unlike Liam, General Grant was in a great mood.

"General Grant, may I speak to you in private?" Liam requested.

The general agreed, and everyone began to clear the room. I thought that private conversation also excluded me, but when I tried to get up, Liam placed both of his hands on my shoulders and made me sit back down. Soon, only the three of us and the baby were in the conference room.

"Why did you do it?" Liam asked General Grant.

"You know my motivations, Liam. I've always wanted better for you, and this isn't a world where you can survive as a businessman anymore. All of your billions are worthless now."

"But do you know what this new draft law will mean for the future? Brigadier General? Your motivation is that you want better for me, but their motivation is to make the first example out of me to put this law into effect."

"That doesn't mean they didn't take into account all of your contributions. They chose you for a reason. No one can discount what you have done for your country."

"I'm not qualified."

"You went to military school. I would know because I put you in one. You came from a military family that produced three generals and you've got a master's." When Liam still didn't look convinced, General Grant put a hand on his shoulder and asked, "Liam, did you hear a peep out of those colonels earlier? A single objection?"

"That's because I may have made a few threats in your absence," Liam confessed.

"Colonel Lee told me all about that and, although I couldn't say that I agree with your method, between us, I couldn't be prouder of you for successfully seizing control of this base. Otherwise, I might still be in that hospital with my girls waiting for a rescue team that would never come. Colonel Hayley will be court-martialed for his actions and placed under house arrest indefinitely. Still, he isn't the only one to look out for. I confess wanting better for you isn't my only motivation.

"Liam, you're the son I never had, and you're the only one I can trust with my life and the lives of my girls. I couldn't let that position go to anyone else. You need to listen to me this one time, if never again. Accept this position. When you're in a position of power, you will have more control over your own fate, and in turn, you can better protect your loved ones."

"Power doesn't come from an empty title," Liam reminded the general. "We both know that the military is on the verge of completely disintegrating."

"It's a start, and I will have your back every step of the way."

"I don't make a good soldier, and you know that. I've never been particularly good at following orders. That's why I'm a simple businessman."

"You outranked everyone on this base, saved me, and can be sure that no order would come from me. I haven't forgotten that I'm the one asking for your help."

Liam didn't reply.

General Grant rounded the conference table to Liam's side and patted his shoulder. "You were born into a military family, Liam. Perhaps all roads lead to Rome."

Liam led me out of the conference room without giving the general an answer.

As we were leaving, I heard General Grant say, "Your promotion ceremony will be out in the field at 10 sharp in the morning."

On our way to the control room, which was now our bedroom, the atmosphere was especially heavy around Liam. He didn't seem like he was in the mood to talk, so I followed behind quietly.

Hiroki and Ayaka went back to their rooms.

It sounded to me like General Grant was afraid of losing control of this base before he even went on that mission to rescue his daughters, and the people at the underground Pentagon wanted to use Liam as a pawn to launch this new drafting law. A bunch of people hiding in a bunker somewhere in D.C. couldn't reach us, but they still wanted control and influence over this already-collapsed society.

Personally, I didn't like the idea one bit. I was one of those people with abilities, and I wanted nothing to do with it. I didn't want to be drafted and forced to risk my life on the military's behalf and God knows what else. Volunteering was one thing, but forcibly drafted?

What will be the consequences of those who resist the draft? And what will happen if those who resist the draft retaliate?

We already had enough on our plates with the roaming undead.

# Chapter 29

After I fed the baby, I made a little blanket nest in the middle of the bed and swaddled him in the middle. When Liam saw me doing that, he chuckled and made a soft cream bassinet appear on the bed. I picked the baby up and placed him into the bassinet, then stared at Liam, wondering what else he was carrying with him.

As though he could read my thoughts, he made a pretty little cream chest appear on the floor next to the bed. He squatted down and flipped the lid open. The chest was almost full of baby clothes. I squatted next to him to have a look. They were mostly pastels, and each piece had "Lance" or "Angelica" embroidered on it.

"You had them all personalized?" I asked.

"You made them for our baby. After we found out we were pregnant, you worked on nothing else. That bassinet was your first project, then you started sewing little clothes and knitting little booties." He picked up a pair of baby blue knitted booties, placed them in the palm of his hand, and looked at them with fondness.

I picked out the smallest articles I could find and went back to the bassinet to carefully dress the baby. Even the smallest thing I could find was too big for him. There was a sinking feeling inside my chest against. Liam came over to see how it fit on the baby and saw the same thing. The faint smile on his face died out too.

I placed the bassinet in the middle of the bed and lay on one side. Instead of going to the other side, Liam lay down behind me and pressed himself against my back. I scooted forward a little so he could have a little more room. He scooted forward and pressed himself against my back again.

"Liam, you brought a lot of things that weren't needed for survival."

"I brought a lot of things that were important to me."

"I would imagine they were painful reminders."

"My mother passed away when I was very young. If I go too long without looking at a photo album, I can't recall what she looks like. I was afraid that as the years rolled on, I'd forget the little things here and there that used to mean something to me."

"I forgot everything."

"For you, it wasn't much to remember. You didn't have a happy childhood after your mother passed away, and you weren't happy being married to me. Perhaps amnesia is a blessing in disguise. You get a fresh start, and I get a second chance."

"What are you doing differently the second time around?"

"We're talking."

"We weren't talking before?"

"You liked to keep to yourself, and I was a man of few words, only speaking when necessary. One of the many tactical lessons my paternal grandfather taught me growing up. It became a part of me, and now it's a difficult habit to get rid of."

"You're trying."

"I am."

"From what you'd told me so far, your paternal grandfather doesn't sound like the usual businessman, even back in the day."

"He wasn't always a businessman, but that's family history I wouldn't want to go into. Long, winding, and complicated."

"I don't hear Hiroki talk very often either. Sometimes you two just exchange a look and understand each other."

I felt the rumbling of his laughter on my back and heard him say, "Spend the next twenty years with me, and we'll get to that point too."

I lightly slapped him on the wrist. "You'll wake the baby!"

He quietened his laughter, lifting his head to press a kiss on my cheek. "It was a little too late today, but first thing tomorrow, I will ask General Grant to recommend us a good doctor for you and the baby."

"I feel fine."

"We should have a doctor conduct a thorough examination to make sure everything is as it should be."

I nodded.

"Go to sleep."

Liam woke me the next morning. He'd talked to General Grant and set up an appointment to see Dr. Callie at the clinic on the fifth level. I thought the name sounded familiar, and Liam informed me that Dr. Callie had been hired to be my obstetrician after we'd found out I was expecting. She was one of the best specialists in her field.

Hearing that inspired confidence.

Liam also brought back a pack of diapers for newborns, and I felt so thankful that I would have kissed him if I had brushed my teeth. It meant I didn't need to hand-wash the cloth diaper anymore.

After I washed up in the bathroom of the room we were assigned and got properly dressed, Liam carried the bassinet with the baby inside and led me to the clinic on the fifth level. Dr. Callie looked like she was in her late twenties, much younger than I'd imagined her to be for someone renowned in her field of medicine.

"Mrs. West, it's good to see you again!"

"Hello, Dr. Callie. Could you please take a look at my baby first?"

"Mr. West told me about your premature birth. I was about to ask if I could see your baby first too."

Liam placed the bassinet on the table, and Dr. Callie began examining our baby. He and I exchanged worried looks during the entire process. Any questions Dr. Callie had for us, we answered as detailed as possible. Dr. Callie examined and then re-examined him before she pulled the stethoscope out of her ears.

"Mr. West, Mrs. West, I'm amazed at how well your baby is doing considering how premature he is. Normally, a little one this small would need to be in an incubator, but he's doing everything so well by himself. I still recommend that we place him in an incubator and keep him monitored as an extra precaution."

"We need to leave him here?"

"Not here, precisely. This clinic is shared, so it's not a suitable environment for incubators. We do have a small incubation room down the hall that has working equipment, but it is unstaffed. Doctors and nurses are shorthanded on base right now."

"Dr. Callie, could I ask you to personally monitor my son?"

"As much as I want to, I can't help you, Mr. West. I get my orders from the higher-ups now. I go where they tell me to go, and I need to be where they tell me to be to earn my meal tickets. Times are hard. They assigned me, an obstetrician, to this clinic to treat people who usually come in with problems due to malnutrition."

"If it's just meal tickets, I can provide more than enough supplies for you and your entire family." Liam made a quick offer.

"That's very tempting, Mr. West, but it's not just that. I signed a four-year minimum service contract with the military. I know you were temporarily in command of the base before, but General Grant has returned now, and orders need to come from him."

I tugged on Liam's arm and looked up at him with begging eyes.

He patted my hand reassuringly, then said to Dr. Callie, "I'm Brigadier General West, second in the chain of command on this base. Dr. Callie, you are to report to the incubation room as an obstetrician, and that shall be your station for the next six months."

Dr. Callie blinked. "Mr. West, I thought you were a businessman."

"Why can't I be both?"

"Sir, yes, Sir!" Dr. Callie saluted Liam, but she got a little confused on which was the proper arm to use.

"At ease. Doctor, my previous offer still stands. I need a competent doctor like you to monitor my son at least for another six months. I'm willing to pay whatever you ask."

"I already received compensation from the military, Sir."

"That's their end, and this is my end. Consider it a bonus."

"I have four surviving family members. Due to my service to the military, they're getting double the rations as other people, but they still go to sleep hungry. I just want enough rations to keep them alive and healthy. If your offer still stands, I will do my best to look after your son day and night."

"Would five hundred units of MREs a month be sufficient?"

"Five hundred units a month?!" Dr. Callie stared at Liam wide-eyed. "That's...that's more than enough."

"If my son remains happy and healthy in the next six months, you will receive the sum of ten thousand units of MREs as compensation for your service."

"There's no need for that, Mr. West. Five hundred units a month is more than I could ask for. You're a generous employer. I will do my job properly regardless if you compensate me or not because it's my duty as a physician."

"I'm extremely familiar with your work ethic, Dr. Callie. My offer wasn't meant to be an insult to your professionalism. I have every confidence that you will do your best regardless, but please understand it from my perspective as a father--he's my only child. If there's anything, anything at all that I can do to increase his chance of survival, I would not hesitate to try."

I stepped forward and added, "Dr. Callie, you know my husband is a businessman. It's a force of habit for him to discuss terms and incentives, but deep down, we're both panicking and don't know what else to do. We just want our son to be healthy, and if you can help us keep him healthy, then we owe you a great debt. What Liam just offered you is nowhere near what we owe in gratitude."

"The both of you..." Dr. Callie sighed. "Don't panic, don't panic. Didn't I say that your son is doing surprisingly well? He most likely won't need to stay in the incubator that long. Come with me. The incubator room is just down the hallway."

Liam and I followed Dr. Callie to the incubator room to watch her place our baby inside the chamber and hook him up to the support equipment.

# Chapter 30

The both of us sat in the incubation room for a while, just gazing at the tiny baby inside the transparent chamber, until Colonel Lee came looking for us.

"Liam, the time!" She tapped on her wristwatch.

Liam glanced at his wristwatch, and I sneaked a peek too. It was fifteen to ten. Liam calmly got up from his chair and followed Colonel Lee out.

"Dr. Callie, we leave our son in your care," I said to the doctor before I followed Liam into the hallway.

Colonel Lee handed Liam a few sets of uniforms and a cap. "I couldn't find you all morning for the fitting. We're running out of time, so these will have to do. I don't know which size will fit you, so try them all on."

We navigated back to our room on the fifth level. Liam closed the door behind us and started stripping out of his clothes. He caught me watching and looked back at me with a teasing smile on his face. Colonel Lee was knocking on the door every half a minute asking if Liam was done yet. I went over to the bed and took a seat as I waited for him to change.

It didn't take long for him to change. By the time I turned around to look at him, he was already reaching for the cap sitting on a pile of folded uniforms. It was still Liam, but it felt like looking at a completely different person. The style didn't look too far off from what he usually wore--dress shirts and tailored suits--but for some reason, there was a completely different feel to him now. It could have been that he looked really good in dark blue and it matched the color of his eyes, or it could have been the military cap.

I pushed to my feet, walked to him, and reached for his cap. I took it off, looked at him, put it back on, looked at him again. Maybe it was the cap.

Colonel Lee was still knocking on the door.

"I think we should get the door before Colonel Lee has someone kick it down." I went to unlock the door to let the colonel in.

Colonel Lee entered the room and quickly swept her gaze up and down Liam's body. "It doesn't fit too bad." Then she started pinning all sorts of badges and ribbons on his jacket.

"Colonel Lee, are you just putting any random badges and ribbons on?"

She gaped at me. "Heavens no! We're very strict about what we place on our uniform. They all must be accurate and earned."

"What are those for, then?"

"These are service medals Liam earned while serving the past few months. General Grant kept a very detailed list of his achievements and submitted it to the underground Pentagon."

General Grant seemed to be the type who thought miles ahead of everyone else.

Although Liam didn't have nearly as many rows of ribbons as General Grant, he actually looked convincing as a general.

I couldn't believe how a simple change in uniform could make that much of a difference.

As soon as Colonel Lee pinned the last ribbon on, she began rushing the two of us out the door. We took the elevator to the first level, and the entire time, Colonel Lee's eyes were glued on her wristwatch as though if she stared at it, it would tick slower. There was a Hummer right outside of the first level's gates, waiting for us. It drove us up the tunnel and directly to the field where the ceremony was being held.

There were a lot more people present than I'd thought there would be. The entire field was filled with militants lining up in neat rows in the center of the field, facing the stage. Surrounding the field were rows and rows of civilians standing behind a perimeter rope.

The Hummer stopped and let us out just outside the field. Two soldiers got out and started making way for Liam and me to walk through the crowd. It wasn't much work for them since most people backed off on their own to let us through. After we got through the civilian crowd, the two soldiers escorted us to our seats in the very front. On stage, General Grant was giving a speech. Today was his big day too. As I was sitting down, I saw a familiar face in the second row behind us. She saw me the same moment I saw her.

Her complexion instantly drained of blood and went sheet pale. It didn't seem that she expected to see me again after she'd pushed me toward an infected woman.

When our eyes met, I remembered what it felt like to hate someone. Thinking back, the first time I saw my son, I remembered what it felt to love someone. I could still feel love. I could still feel hate. I felt the urge to smile and couldn't hold it in.

Liam followed my gaze to the woman sitting in the second row, only a few seats away from us.

"Hello, Dr. Bailey," I greeted her.

She looked so shocked that she couldn't even reply.

Her gaze went to Liam, then back to me again. She subtly inhaled a deep breath, regained her cool composure, and smiled at us. "Hello, Mrs. Howell. Mr. West. I didn't realize you were in service."

Liam sat without giving her a reply. I didn't correct her form of address either. Colonel Lee was directing Liam on how to make his entrance. She also handed him a white note card with what appeared to be a pre-written speech.

I began to wonder how I felt about Liam.

In the beginning, he was my door to the past I'd forgotten. Then he became my means of survival. The day before yesterday, against my every instinct, I placed myself at risk just to help him go on a near-suicidal mission to save a man who was the father figure in his life. The silliest part of all was that I could have called off the whole mission with just one sentence, and I hadn't. In the back of that truck, when I thought it was all over for me, I wanted to take him with me, and it didn't matter where to.

Perhaps because he'd caught me staring at him more than once today, he asked, "What's wrong?"

"Just wondering how I feel about you."

His deep blue eyes lit up when he heard my reply. "And?"

I wasn't quite sure what to tell him. I hadn't figured it out yet.

Colonel Lee called for his attention and give him the cue to go up on stage. General Grant had just finished making an introductory speech for Liam and was waiting for him to come up.

Liam got up and stepped on the platform, raised his hand to the general, and recited the military oath. After he recited the oath, Colonel Lee also went on stage and placed a silver star on both sides of his shoulders. And after that, an officer slowly unrolled a blue, single star flag in front of Liam.

Liam stepped to the podium to make his speech. He placed the white note card on the podium and said, "I'm not good with speeches, so thank you all for coming." Then he stepped off the platform while everyone looked stunned.

It wasn't for another half minute that General Grant shook off the stun and clapped for Liam. People started to follow suit, clapping out of politeness.

"I thought Colonel Lee wrote you a speech," I said to Liam once he reseated by my side.

He explained, "If I lack conviction in what I say, I prefer not to open my mouth."

It was true that Liam rarely said things he didn't mean.

On stage, Colonel Lee was making a closing speech. Liam and I decided to leave a little early to avoid the traffic that we would need to swim through if we stayed a few minutes longer. When we got up from our seat, the look on Dr. Bailey sitting behind us was rather interesting. She was staring at Liam, unblinking, like she was in some sort of trance.

_Interesting days ahead,_ I promised myself.

The two soldiers from earlier came to escort us out and back to the Hummer parked just outside the field.

In the back seat, without turning his head to look at me, Liam said, "Earlier, you were saying you were wondering how you felt about me. Any conclusion on that?"

I gave him an honest reply. "I don't know. I suspect it might be love. I haven't come up with a better explanation for my irrational decisions concerning you thus far."

He kept looking forward and blinked.

A long moment later, as the Hummer approached the dark tunnel, he finally turned to me and said, "Always remember what you just said to me here today." He placed a hand on the back of my neck, dove down, and claimed my lips in a deep, unrelenting kiss.

The shadow of the dark, winding tunnel sheltered us from the prying light of day.

**End of Book 1**

#  About the Author

I'm an artist and full-time bookworm, a role made possible by my supportive husband. I love to read and paint. When inspiration hits, I always write to my heart's content. I write for the love of embarking on adventures, and that's what makes writing just as addicting as reading for me. Join me on these adventures and, hopefully, they will be just as fun for you to read as they are for me to write!

####  You can connect with me on:

     https://www.pridenqueen.com/

     https://twitter.com/PridenQ

     https://www.patreon.com/Pridenqueen 

#  Also by Priden Queen

The adventure continues in the second installment...

##  My Two Generals at World's End

After securing a safe place for apocalypse survivors, billionaire-turned-General Liam West and wife Sienna "Angel" Carmichael welcome their son Lance into the world. It's a dangerous place for a newborn, but between Liam's ability to manipulate space and Sienna's power to see what others can't, they forge ahead to create an unparalleled sanctuary.

While their home takes in more people and salvaging grows perilous, Sienna's dreams take her to a strange new place where she meets an unfamiliar, distant Liam. The dream quickly fades but leaves her with a warning: She must learn to control her ability, or it will become the very thing that dooms her.

"Everything is because of you. I will fight this war. I will squeeze blood from stone. I will mold and shape this world into whatever you want it to be. I don't care how hard the battle or how long the journey, I just need you to be the home I can return to. Can you be the home I can return to, Angel?"
