A knock at the door. Alex sits up in bed. It is late; darkness pressing against the windows. His cell phone displays the time: 2:39 a.m. Had he really heard it? Maybe the sound had come from a dream. He waits in silence, the darkness of his bedroom hovering over him like a stalking predator.

Alex swings his legs over the side of the bed, pressing the soles of his bare feet into the cool carpet, seeking a familiar sense of reality. He waits…then hears the knock again. This is not a dream. Footsteps downstairs in the foyer. The front door opens and his mother cries out. Alex jumps from his bed and rushes to the top of the stairs.

Standing on the porch, flanked by two uniformed officers is Alex’s father. The boy’s heart thumps with apprehension. He wants desperately to bolt down the stairs and embrace his father but is frozen by fear. Mr. Dash looks different than the last time Alex saw him. He has been missing for two days.

In his own blue police uniform, Alex’s father seems tired and broken. Hollow, somehow. There is a pause as Mrs. Dash stands in the foyer, staring through the doorway. Emotionally overwhelmed, she drops her cell phone and it crashes to the floor. She rushes into her husband’s arms and weeps.

As they embrace, Alex watches, rooted to his place atop the staircase. Mr. Dash looks over his wife’s shoulder at the boy and motions for Alex to come down.

With watery eyes, the boy gingerly descends, as if his father might suddenly disappear again if he rushes his approach. It seems a silly idea, but it holds him hostage, nonetheless.

Mr. Dash is crying. The sight of his father’s tears encourages Alex to spill his own. The father turns, opening his arms. “Hello, son.”

Alex embraces his father and sobs. He is fifteen years old.

*********

"Not too far Annabelle," Alex called to his sister, stirred from his reverie. She skipped along the interstate with Henry running after her, darting in and out of the broken white lines along the asphalt. Alex had stopped the pickup to search some abandoned cars for any supplies. Potential threats loomed around each corner, concealed within the silken depths of every shadow, and still the children somehow found the will to play.

Alex sometimes allowed them to do so, albeit quietly; they did not want to draw the attention of anyone that happened to be nearby. He placed his index finger against his lips, motioning for them to keep quiet and they both nodded.

Not just anyone, Alex reminded himself. You do not want to draw the attention of anything, either.

Any…thing.

The first car, a silver Volkswagen, yielded nothing but an empty medicine bottle. The next vehicle was a dark green Chevy Silverado. Inside the cab, Alex found a small knife, the blade still sharp. No food, though. The pickup’s bed held an old, deflated tire, the remnants of a wet carboard box that had nearly disintegrated and a few empty cans of Mountain Dew.

Alex recalled his father and how different he was after returning to them. He became preoccupied with “prepping,” by stockpiling rations of non-perishable goods. Often, he would spend weekends depositing hidden caches in the region around the family’s house. Sometimes he would take Alex with him and on more than one occasion, they drove hours from home. By the time Alex was sixteen years old, his father had taught him how to deal death. A hunting rifle, equipped with a scope, had been his birthday present. Mr. Dash feverishly taught his son the techniques of a hunter: how to lure prey, track them down and how to kill them, then how to field dress that kill. He explained everything Alex would need to survive on his own and the boy eagerly digested the knowledge. In little time, Alex was targeting deer, stalking them through the forest greenery. And then came time for Alex to pull the trigger. And he did it. His father had been proud.

His father had said to him, “I’m showing you this Alex, not because this is what it means to be a man…but because this will prepare you for the end of the world.”

Clutching the rifle, Alex listened as the echo of his father’s words floated across the dark, still void of his mind until at last, they were gone. What had happened to his father? Had he survived? Was he out there somewhere, searching for his children?

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Henry chased Annabelle in a tight circle, and she giggled. Alex looked up and discovered that he was smiling and indulged in a bit of optimism. The children’s joy was contagious, and he sometimes wondered if it was the only thing keeping him from giving up. Giving up would be easy, he knew. He wished to just lay down here and take a rest, let the children have their fun. He was tired and weak from improper nutrition.

His father’s voice came to him again. Easy Alex, don’t let your guard down. Danger is everywhere.

"Freeze!" Alex yelled, louder than he should have. The twins stopped in their tracks and looked back at their brother. Alex motioned for them to come closer. When they were beside him, he raised the rifle and through the scope scanned the road ahead.

"What?" asked Annabelle.

"Overpass."

"Oh," she said.

"Let's race!" said Henry, taking a step.

"Hey, get over here! Stay put!" Alex scolded as quietly as possible.

Henry's posture slumped. "Alex, why do we have to stop at every overpass?"

"You tell me. Why is it important to be careful around them?"

Henry shrugged.

With raised eyebrows, Alex said, "You know why, you're just being stubborn."

"What's stubborn?" asked Henry.

Alex swept the scope left to right. There were places to take shelter everywhere in the landscape around them, but especially around man-made structures – like overpasses. Places for things to hide. "It means even though you know the answer to the question I asked, you won't tell me."

"Oh," he said.

Annabelle stretched her arm toward the sky and waved it back and forth. "I know why."

Henry frowned. "Why what?"

Annabelle sighed. "Why we have to be careful near an overpass."

"Oh," said Henry. "Me too. But I'm stubborn." He laughed. Annabelle shot him a disapproving look, but he didn't seem to notice.

Focusing on the tall grass to the right of the overpass, Alex found nothing unusual besides an abandoned car, half submerged in shadow. There were two cars, one SUV on this side of the overpass, more beyond it. To the left, across the wide grass median, the oncoming lane featured several more vehicles. The road was flanked by a vast field of grass dotted with vivid yellow flowers which gave way to woodlands.

Vehicles littered the highway. They were everywhere. Unfortunately, very few provided anything of real value.

Annabelle made a straining sound as she stretched her arm even higher.

"Go ahead Annabelle," Alex said.

"We have to be careful near overpasses cause there might be others."

"Right. And we have to be cautious around others." Turning to Henry, he continued. "Why is that?"

Removing a finger from his nose, Henry replied, "Um, because they might be bad people?"

"Correct. Don't pick your nose. It's disgusting."

"And bad people are everywhere," added Annabelle, removing a bottle of hand sanitizer from her coat pocket. Henry chuckled as she squeezed a dollop onto his palm. “Rub it in,” she ordered, and Henry obeyed.

“We’ll have to see if the vehicles are really empty or not. Sometimes people live in them,” said Alex.

“I don’t like that part,” replied Annabelle.

“Mean either,” added Henry, waving his arm for emphasis.

“It’s me neither,” corrected Annabelle.

Alex watched as the children discovered a cluster of dandelion stems and blew the seed heads into the air. As the breeze carried them away, Alex imagined the floating debris to be the essence of their childhood. Annabelle waived goodbye to the departing innocence and Henry followed her lead.

Returning to the rifle, Alex concentrated on the median, studying the swaying grass. Satisfied that it was only the wind that moved the dry stalks, he aimed the scope toward the shadows beneath the overpass again, scrutinizing every ounce of the darkness. "Who do we trust?"

"No one," the twins shouted.

"Shhh! Yes, but too loud guys. We must be quieter." The twins nodded.

Realizing that they had been stationary for a couple of minutes now, Alex’s adrenaline spiked. If there was anyone hiding in the shadows of the overpass or in one of the vehicles, the three of them would stick out like a sore thumb. They moved to the shoulder of the road.

While the children sat quietly, Alex rummaged through a sliver Cadillac SUV, finding empty water bottles and discarded fast-food containers. The smell of putrefaction wafted into the cab from the rear compartment, and he gagged. He looked into the dark space and found a crumpled form bound in a tarp, surrounded by a swarm of flies and jumped from the vehicle, gulping fresh air.

Alex shooed the children away from the SUV. “Keep back. Something’s dead inside.” The twins hurried in the opposite direction.

Keeping to the road provided advantages such as flat ground - which meant quicker progress when compared to following trails through the wooded regions - and it offered farther views. However, it provided those same means to others too. The trick was moving about in the open without advertising yourself.

Movement beckoned Alex to raise the rifle’s scope toward the overpass once more and this time he saw something: a patch of brown fur moving through the tall grass. The thing was a good fifty yards from them, but Alex moved his finger to the trigger and waited for it to emerge. When a fawn raised its head and glanced around, he sighed with relief.

He lowered the rife and motioned for the twins to come closer. “You guys want to see a deer?”

Their eyes brightened and they nodded. “Annabelle, look through here,” said Alex, pointing to the scope. He then jabbed his finger at the trigger. “But don’t put your finger here.”

“Okay,” chirped Annabelle. She took the rifle and peered at the magnified fawn. “Aw, he’s so cute.”

“Let me see,” Henry whined.

To the right of the road the land rose sharply to a hill. Alex’s gut tightened and fluttered as he realized their current location was not a wise one. Low ground was a disadvantage in a conflict. Alex had a bad feeling, a hunch that he wasn't the only one searching. He was drawn to the top of the ledge to the right. Something was up there. They were being watched.