The concrete trucks had come and gone, leaving a gray expanse of reinforced flooring curing under the Georgia sun. With the heavy basement vault poured and the initial frame of the country house securely underway, Marcus decided it was time to shift the line of
deployment. The countryside was their shield, but the town was their radar.
They stood by the pickup truck at the edge of the dirt road, the morning air cool before the heat of the day took over.
"We need to divide and conquer now," Marcus said, his voice flat and practical. "Elias and I will stay here to oversee Bill's crew and lay down the iron drainage culverts we promised
Hershel. You need to get into the town center, Sam. Set up the apartment, listen to the locals, and watch the police frequencies."
"I'm on it," Sam said, tossing his small duffel bag into the cab of the truck. He looked clean-shaved, wearing an ordinary polo shirt that made him look like a local college kid on break. "The lease is already signed. Third floor, right on the main strip. I'll start checking the
grocery distributors and hardware shops for extra dry goods today."
"Keep your eyes open for any strange behavior," Elias added, leaning against the truck frame with a fresh lollipop stick between his teeth. His dark eyes were fixed on the tree line. "The news from Columbus isn't getting better, even if the radio stations are trying to
downplay it. People are getting sick, and they aren't staying down."
"I'll keep my ears to the ground," Sam said, sliding into the driver's seat. "If the sheriff's office starts moving extra deputies around, you'll be the first to know."
Marcus nodded once. "Go. We have eighty-two days."
The drive into town took twenty minutes. The small municipal center was quiet, consisting of a few brick storefronts, a single traffic light, and a town square anchored by an old stone courthouse. To the average eye, it was a peaceful, slow-moving southern community. But
as Sam drove down the main street, he noticed little things. A police cruiser parked outside the clinic with its lights off. Two older men standing outside the hardware store, talking in
hushed tones with tight faces. The shadow of the sickness was lengthening, creeping out from the major cities into the rural counties.
Sam parked the truck behind a two-story brick building that housed a hardware shop on the ground floor and three small apartments above it. The location was chosen
intentionally. It was directly across the street from a small independent bakery, giving him a clear view of the most frequented morning spot in town.
He spent the next three hours carrying small boxes up the narrow wooden stairs to his new home. The apartment was simple: a small living room with a squeaky hardwood floor, a compact kitchen with a yellowing refrigerator, and a bedroom that overlooked the street.
Instead of decorating, Sam set to work on his setup. He placed a commercial-grade radio scanner on the kitchen counter, plugging it into the wall and running a thin wire antenna along the window frame. He turned the dial, tuning it to the county sheriff's primary
frequency. For a few minutes, there was only static, followed by a deputy confirming a routine traffic stop near the highway.
Next, he opened his interdimensional storage space. With a subtle flick of his hand, three heavy wooden crates of canned goods, a high-frequency shortwave radio, and four cases of bottled water appeared on the floor, looking as though they had been there all along. He spent an hour packing the pantry tight, ensuring that if he had to lock the door and stay
inside for weeks, he wouldn't need to step out for a single meal.
By late afternoon, the heat inside the room had grown heavy. Sam opened the window to let the breeze in, listening to the distant rattle of an old tractor down the road and the
occasional murmur of people walking on the sidewalk below. He sat at the small wooden table, a notebook open in front of him, tracking the names of the local businesses he
needed to visit.
He needed a footprint in this town. He needed to be a familiar face so that when he started buying bulk fuel and extra grain, people would think he was just a quirky rich kid stocking up for a long hunting season, rather than someone preparing for the end of the world.
A sharp, rhythmic knock on the front door broke the silence.
Sam froze for a fraction of a second, his eyes sliding toward the small drawer where a loaded pistol was hidden. He relaxed his shoulders, let his easygoing, charming smile settle onto his face, and walked over to pull the door open.
Standing in the dim hallway was a young woman. She was holding a thick stack of colored paper flyers against her apron. Her brown hair was pinned up loosely with a plastic clip, a few stray strands falling around her face, which was slightly flushed from climbing the stairs. She smelled faintly of sweet vanilla and warm yeast.
It was Kate Mercer.
"Oh, hi," Kate said, blinking in surprise as she looked at Sam. She took a half-step back, clearly not expecting a new face in the building. "Sorry to bother you. I didn't know anyone had moved into old Mr. Miller's place yet."
"Just finished carrying the last box up today," Sam said, his tone perfectly light and welcoming. He leaned against the doorframe, looking like an ordinary neighbor. "I'm Samuel. Samuel Daystar."
"Kate," she said, offering a small, tired smile as she held out one of the flyers. "Kate Mercer. I run the bakery right across the street. Mercer's Sweet Provisions. I was just coming through the building to drop these off for the tenants. We're doing a morning special for the locals starting tomorrow—coffee and a pastry for three bucks if you bring the flyer."
Sam took the paper, his fingers lightly brushing hers. Her hand was small and warm, rough around the knuckles from working with heavy dough and hot ovens. "Three dollars? You're going to ruin my budget, Kate. I have a terrible weakness for anything with sugar in it."
Kate let out a soft laugh, her shoulders dropping slightly as the tension of her long day
seemed to ease. "Well, I won't apologize for that. The business needs the push. Things have been a little slow this week. Everyone seems to be staying home or hoarding their grocery money for some reason."
Sam's interest flared at the comment, but his face remained a mask of casual curiosity. "Really? Why's that? It seems like a pretty quiet town."
"It usually is," Kate said, sighing as she leaned against the hallway wall, looking glad to have a moment to rest her feet. "But people are getting weird. My uncle works over at the grain
silo, and he said three different families down the lane canceled their regular bread orders this morning. Said they were stocking up on flour and lard instead. Everyone's acting like a storm is coming, but the weather channel says it's clear skies for two weeks."
"People get strange during a hot summer," Sam said smoothly, guiding her thought process away from suspicion. "Probably just a local rumor getting out of hand. But hey, their loss is my gain. I'll definitely be over there tomorrow morning to try a cinnamon roll."
"They're fresh at six," Kate said, her smile returning, looking brighter now. She looked past him into the sparse apartment, noticing the lack of furniture. "You don't have much stuff, do you?"
"My brothers have the rest of it out at our property by the ridge," Sam explained, laughing easily. "They're building a family cabin out there, and they stuck me in town to handle the utility hookups and the local permits. I'm basically their errand boy for the summer."
"The ridge property?" Kate's eyes widened slightly. "Oh, you're the family Hershel Greene
was talking about. He stopped by the bakery yesterday to buy some pie for his girls. He said the new neighbors were surprisingly decent fellas. Said you let him keep using the water."
"Hershel's a good man," Sam said. "We don't want to cause trouble. We just want to enjoy the country."
"Well, you picked a good spot," Kate said, straightening up and tapping the stack of flyers against her hip. "Though if you're looking for permits, the clerk at the town hall is usually out for lunch from eleven until two, so don't bother going during those hours. She'll just make you wait on the bench."
"That is an incredibly valuable piece of insider information," Sam said, bowing his head slightly in mock gratitude. "Thank you, Kate."
"Just doing my neighborly duty," she said, turning toward the stairs. "I'll see you tomorrow morning for that coffee, Samuel."
"Call me Sam," he called out as she started down the steps.
"Sam it is," she replied, her voice echoing in the wooden stairwell before the heavy entrance door clicked shut downstairs.
Sam closed his apartment door and locked it. The easy, friendly smile left his face,
replaced by a cold, calculating expression. He walked back to the kitchen counter, looking down at the pink flyer in his hand. Mercer's Sweet Provisions.
He looked out the window, watching Kate cross the sun-baked asphalt of the street and slip back into the side door of her bakery. She was sweet, hardworking, and completely
oblivious to the rot that was currently multiplying in the blood of people just two counties over. She was an urban resource—not just for food, but for the information that flowed through her shop every morning as the locals gathered to gossip.
Suddenly, the radio scanner on the counter crackled to life with a burst of static.
"Unit four, we have a disturbance down at the pharmacy on Elm," a woman's voice said, her tone clipped and unusually tense. "An elderly male is refusing to leave the premises. The caller states he is aggressive and biting at the counter staff. Use caution on approach."
"Copy that, dispatch," a male voice replied. "Unit four en route."
Sam walked over to the counter, his dark eyes fixed on the speaker as the static returned. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a notepad, and wrote down the time. 4:12 PM. First local violent incident.
He looked back out the window at the peaceful street. The dual life had officially begun. Ten miles away, Marcus and Elias were pouring concrete and setting steel posts to build a fortress against the coming dark. And here in the town, Sam was settling into the shadow of the old world, weaving himself into the life of a baker girl, waiting for the exact moment the fabric of society would rip wide open.