Chapter 1

Elena

I remember when the bombs hit.

    Bombs destroying the cities on what had to be the bloodiest day in the history of the world isn't something anyone could forget.

    And I know I never will. 

    We were stuck in the conference room on the top floor of our building working on a homicide case. Honestly I couldn't remember the details anymore, but we were going on days with little to no sleep. The glass table had been littered with coffee cups, leftover snacks, and more papers than we could keep track of.

    Then everyone's phones started to alarm. It sounded like a storm warning or an Amber Alert, and we didn't pay much attention to it at first, being so buried in our work.

    But then the building started to shake. Thinking it was an earthquake, one of our coworkers, Grant, had finally checked his phone. After a loud curse, he yelled at everyone to take cover. My friend Skye and I didn't think; just acted, huddling under one of the tables in the room, unable to do anything but cry and cling to each other as the explosions echoed in our ears and shook the foundations of our city for hours. 

    It felt like an eternity passed under that table; in reality it was two hours, give or take, when the dust finally settled. 

    Six months later, and the ringing still echoes in my ears. 

    There's nothing but rubble left now. What was once the great city of Baltimore, Maryland is now a skeleton of its former glory; covered in dust and ash. 

    I looked at the city I used to love, visible from the porch I sat on on top of a hill. After the bombs, the survivors had fought each other, causing the city to become a warzone. People were stealing from stores and from one another, killing for supplies and generally going mad with trying to process what had happened. Some people were unable to move from shock, others cried so hysterically that they passed out, while still others snapped into some survival mode and blazened the trails in and around the city to survive.

Looking back, I supposed that's how you know the different types of people in the world.

Somehow, our entire team managed to survive the attack. Our building had generally been spared. Grant, James, Parker, Skye and I all fell into all of the above categories after the bombing stopped. James had a panic attack, Grant tried to get through to him while Parker and I tried to get everyone out of harm's way and look for survivors. Skye fell into silence, helping get James back on his feet so we could get out of the city overrun by people who were no longer themselves.

We fled to the nearest suburb, staying close enough to the city that we could get supplies when needed. The first night in the house we found shelter in was eerily quiet; surrounded by the sounds of gunshots and cries from the nearby city. Nobody said much. We sat in shocked darkness, not even bothering to light candles, for hours until the sun came up. With the rising sun we woke up, shaking our grief and shock enough to develop a plan to survive. James, free from his panic attack, had snapped into his survival mode gained from his years in the military and spearheaded our plans. It was only on day two that we decided we had to go back to the city before everything was gone.

    Things had been chaotic and loud for days. Navigating the rubble of the once-tall skyscrapers and shattered glass had been brutal, especially since so many people had been wounded. Not to mention that we hadn't yet thought to change out of our own working clothes. People lie in the streets, dead from the explosions or too injured to carry on. There was no help; there was no relief. There was only death, destruction, and chaos.

    After what I gauged to be a week or so, it was quiet again. Our band of survivors had managed to get our hands on supplies and only made necessary runs to the city. We had been at this perch on the hill ever since, taking up residence in this home who's inhabitants never returned. There was no more electricity; no more running water, but the home provided shelter. We had a roof over our heads and beds to sleep in. That was more than most survivors from what I could tell. Most of the homes around us remained vacant. There were a few that were occupied either by their original inhabitants or by people trying to survive- like us. We kept mostly to ourselves though, with an unspoken code of looking out for one another. But everybody knew resources would be scarce, and it was every man for themselves here. 

    We were in the dark for a long time about what happened that day. I still wasn't sure we'd ever know the full story, but James managed to finagle a battery-operated radio in the home we had occupied to tap into a radio broadcast from other survivors in the U.S. a month or so ago. According to them, the bombs had gone off around the world that day, and by the time they were done falling, half the world's population was gone - or at least that's what the broadcast said. We don't know how they know, but given that they're the only beacon of hope in this world...we didn't question it. Survivors were scattered across the globe, as far as they could tell, but there was no way to contact each other. We were isolated, waiting for whatever came next.

    I watched over the hill as a familiar tall form headed towards our house. We took turns going to the city - only one at a time to stay under the radar of the gangs that now resided in the rubble of the city - while someone else kept watch for them. Today I was watching for Parker, and it was his tall form that headed in stride back to the house. 

    "Bad news," he said as he jogged up the front steps to where I was sitting. His curly blonde hair was wet with sweat. "No more supplies. A group came through in the night and took anything that was left."

    I wish I had been upset by this news. I wish anything could manage to upset me, but I was numb to it all now. The shock of what had happened had unlocked some sort of defense mechanism in me, and nothing phased me anymore. I lost everything that day of the bombing; my friends, my family. I was grateful for my coworkers who had become even more of my family than they were before, but they weren't my fiance. They weren't my parents. Those people were gone. And most of who I was seemed to have gone along with them. 

    "So what now?" I asked as he sat down on the porch swing next to me. 

    "We leave," he said simply. "Head south."

    "Okay," I agreed. "We should leave today."

    He nodded, sitting back in the swing. We had been prepared to leave at any moment since we came here, knowing that supplies could run out any day. But we adjusted to life here...or whatever kind of life we could lead here. We read books, we played games, we hunted...things could have been far worse. But it felt like we were wasting time; just waiting for the shock to wear off and figure out what was next. 

    But what was next when the world was half-gone?

    "I dreamt about snapchat last night," Parker said with a laugh. "How sad is that?"

    "Given that you snapchatted every minute of your day, I'm not surprised," I replied with a laugh of my own. 

    "You loved my snap stories!"

    "I tolerated them," I argued. 

    "Mhm, don't you lie to me, E."

    I rolled my eyes. "You're right. They were what I lived for every single day."

    "That's more like it," he said with a warm smile. Out of all of us, Parker was the most optimistic and the happiest. He had always been that way; the two of us hitting it off instantly as friends so many years ago because we were both so...bubbly. Only one of us stayed that way after the bombing.

    "Elena," his voice dropped some. I never liked it when he used my full name. It meant he was being serious, and I wasn't in the mood for serious. Still, I looked at him, and his pale blue eyes were studying me with some pity. I hated that look too, and knew what was coming next. "Are you okay today?"

    "You don't have to ask me that everyday," I said, trying to keep the edge from my voice.

    "Yes," he replied seriously. "I do. Chase would never forgive me if I let anything happen to you. And I can't lose you either. None of us can."

    I shut my eyes at his name. Chase had been my fiance. We would have been married three months ago after being together for five years. He had been my everything, and I knew he was gone. He had worked as a political consultant in a building a few blocks from mine and it had taken a direct hit. Nothing remained of that building. I threw up after seeing it, and even when it's my turn to run to the city, I avoid it at all costs. It hurts too much.

    Six months wasn't nearly enough time to shake off the grief of losing your soulmate; the person you wanted to grow old in rocking chairs with and tell stories to your grandchildren about how you met. The day our wedding was meant to be, I lost it. I had been holding emotion and grief for so long and that day sent it all rushing to the surface. I was hysterical and not thinking straight when I went to the city alone without telling anyone. I went to my old building and climbed to the roof, standing on the edge and looking over the rubble of our once-great city. I knew I wasn't thinking straight, but I just wanted the pain to end. There was no point in living in this world, if you could even call it that anymore. I had no ambition left. 

    But Parker knew me better than anyone else, maybe even Chase himself. He was Chase's best friend, and the only reason I had met Chase to begin with. Parker followed me, and it was only because of him that I stepped back off that ledge. He let me break down in his arms and calmed me, listing off reasons to keep pushing and keep living. The number one being that Chase would never want me to go that way. 

    Since then, I calmed down. I wasn't suicidal, I wasn't going to give up on this life again. It was hard, some days, but Parker was right. Chase would never give up, and if our roles were reversed, he would be making the best of the situation not just for him, but for everyone. So that's why I tried to do. For him.

    "I'm okay, Parker," I finally answered him. "And I'm going to keep being okay."

    Parker had been a saint for not telling anyone else in our group about that day. It stayed between us, and only us.

    "I just have to check," He replied with a faint smile. "I'm always here if you need me, E, yeah?"

    I rested my head against Parker's shoulder and he put an arm around me comfortingly. 

    "Yeah, P. I know."