The next few days fell into a routine, a strange new version of domestic life in the middle of the apocalypse. The apartment building became their fortress. Quinn, with his infantryman's focus on physical security, and Hex, with his technician's mind for systems and traps, worked together to improve their defenses.
They dragged more furniture into the lobby, reinforcing the main barricade. Quinn taught Hex how to create chokepoints in the stairwells, narrow passages where they could face a threat one at a time. Hex, in turn, rigged up a series of crude but effective warning systems—tripwires made from fishing line connected to tin cans on the lower floors. Their military training, one from the ground and one from the air, sometimes clashed in methodology, but their shared goal of survival made them an effective team.
One afternoon, Hex walked Quinn through his communications setup. The desk was a chaotic nest of wires, circuit boards, and scavenged electronics.
"I've boosted the antenna's range using parts from three different satellite dishes," Hex explained, his fingers flying across a keyboard. "I can listen to almost any frequency. Military, civilian, emergency services, you name it."
He turned a dial, and the room filled with a hiss of static. "This is the national guard channel. For the first day, it was chaos. Orders, counter-orders, whole units reporting they were being overrun." He switched the frequency. A garbled scream, cut short by static, filled the air for a second before Hex silenced it.
"That was the last thing I heard on the police band two days ago," he said, his face grim. "Now, it's all like this." He swept the dial across a dozen more frequencies. They were all the same. Dead air. Hissing static. The ghost of a scream. "There's no command structure left to reach, Quinn. We're on our own. For real."
The finality of it was a heavy weight. Quinn had held onto a sliver of hope that somewhere, some part of the government, of the military, had survived and was organizing. Hex's wall of static was the definitive answer.
In the small pockets of downtime, a fragile sense of normalcy began to emerge. Lily, slowly coming out of her shell of silent shock, started to interact with Hex. At first, she would just watch him from a distance as he tinkered with his electronics. Then, one day, she timidly approached him as he was trying to repair a small, handheld radio.
"Is that a treasure?" she asked, her voice small.
Hex looked up, surprised. His initial gruffness softened as he looked at her. "Yeah, I guess it is," he said. "If I can get it to work, we might be able to hear other people." He showed her the inside of the radio, pointing out the different colored wires. "See this? It's like a puzzle."
From then on, Lily would often sit quietly near his desk, drawing or watching him work. Hex, for his part, never seemed to mind. Quinn would watch them, and for the first time in a long time, he felt a flicker of something other than grief or rage. He saw the gruff technician absently hand Lily a piece of jerky from his own rations, or stop his work to admire a drawing she had made. The soldier who had called her a liability was now, in his own quiet way, one of her protectors.
Their supplies were dwindling. The scavenged cans and crackers were almost gone. Hex had a small generator in the building's maintenance room, but they had no fuel for it.
"We have to go out," Hex said one evening, looking at their last two bottles of water. "A real run. We need food, water, medical supplies. And fuel. I've pinpointed a gas station and a small clinic about ten blocks from here. It's a risk, but we don't have a choice."
They planned the run meticulously, studying a map of the area Hex had on his laptop. They identified choke points, potential ambush sites, and escape routes. The next morning, they set out, leaving Lily locked safely in the apartment with a promise they would be back soon.
The streets felt more dangerous in the daylight. The infected were more active. As they neared the clinic, they encountered the largest group they had yet seen—at least fifteen of them, clustered around the entrance to an office building.
"We can't fight them all," Hex whispered, pulling Quinn behind a large bus stop shelter.
"We don't have to," Quinn said. "We just have to get past them. I'll draw their attention. You make a run for the clinic."
"Not a chance," Hex countered. "We do this together." He pointed to a narrow alleyway that ran behind the office building. "We go around. Quiet and slow."
Their teamwork was tested as they navigated the tight space. An infected they had not seen lunged from an open dumpster. Hex, who was in the lead, shoved it back with the butt of his shotgun, while Quinn dispatched it with a swift, silent blow from his poker. They moved like a well-oiled machine, covering each other's backs, communicating with hand signals.
The clinic was a treasure trove. While Quinn stood guard, Hex raided the pharmacy, grabbing antibiotics, bandages, pain killers—anything he could find. Quinn found a locked supply closet and, using the pry bar he'd found, forced it open. Inside, he found his weapon upgrade. It was a fire axe. Heavy, perfectly balanced, with a sharp, wicked blade. He left the poker behind without a second thought.
The gas station was more difficult. The noise of forcing open the pumps would attract attention. Hex, using his technical skills, managed to hot-wire the station's electronic pump system, allowing them to fill several large canisters with fuel in relative silence. While he worked, Quinn secured the perimeter, taking down two shambling infected with the silent, brutal efficiency of the axe.
They returned to the apartment building as the sun was setting, their backpacks heavy with supplies and fuel. They were exhausted but successful.
Later that night, after they had secured their haul and checked on a sleeping Lily, Quinn and Hex stood by one of the blacked-out windows, looking out at the dark, dead city. The generator was running in the basement, providing a low, steady hum and powering a single lamp in the apartment. It felt like an impossible luxury.
"You know," Hex said, his voice low. "For weeks, I sat here, listening to the world die, thinking I was the last man on Earth." He looked over at Quinn. "Looks like it's just us, Marine."
Quinn nodded, gripping the smooth, worn handle of his new axe. "It's just us," he agreed.
They were two soldiers and one little girl, a tiny island of light and life in an ocean of darkness and death. It was not much. But for now, it was enough.