Michael Reid had spent three days tying red rags to swamp branches. Each rag marked the path back to the other survivors he wanted to gather. The plague had scattered them across Keltner Swamp, and Michael meant to lead them all to one safe house before winter. But the fog rolled in at dawn and swallowed every marker. Now he stood knee-deep in black water, and he could not see ten feet ahead. His dog pressed against his leg. The German Shepherd was scarred and mean to strangers, but it never left Michael's side. Michael checked his pack. Two days of food. Less water. If he walked in circles out here, he would die before he reunited anyone. "Which way, boy?" he whispered. The dog lifted its head and sniffed. It stared into the gray fog, ears sharp. Then it growled, low and steady, and pulled toward the left. Michael hesitated. His instinct said right. But the dog had tracked him through worse than this. He followed. The dog led him past drowned trees and mud that sucked at his boots. Michael kept one hand on the animal's back. He could not see the path, but the dog moved like it smelled something familiar. After an hour, the ground rose. The water fell away to Michael's ankles, then his soles. Solid earth. The dog stopped and barked twice. Ahead, the fog thinned. A shape rose out of it. Concrete walls, cracked and gray, wrapped in coils of barbed wire. A heavy steel door sat shut in the center. Michael knew this place. It was the shelter he had chosen for the survivors. The dog had led him home. Michael laughed once, sharp with relief. Then he heard a click. "Stop right there." A woman stepped from behind the door. Black hair hung around a face marked with dark eyeliner. Her jacket was torn, her boots caked in mud. She held a crossbow level with Michael's chest, and her hands did not shake. "This is my shelter now. Turn around." The dog snarled and lowered its head. Michael grabbed its collar. "Easy," he said. "I'm not here to fight. I built this place. I've been leading people here." "People." She spat the word. "I found it empty. Finders keepers." But her eyes flicked to the dog, then back to Michael. "Call off the animal." "He listens to me. So you should too." Michael held her stare. "There's a plague out here killing everyone alone. I'm gathering the ones who are left. You can point that thing at me, or you can be one of them." For a long moment she said nothing. The crossbow stayed up. Then she lowered it an inch. "Lillith," she said. "And this is still my door." Michael had found his shelter and his first survivor at once. Now he had to convince a woman with a crossbow to trust him.

By morning, Michael counted what they had left. Two cans of beans. Three bottles of water. He sat on the concrete floor and did the math for Lillith. "Enough for both of us four days. Maybe five." The shelter held two people. It held nothing to keep them alive. Lillith leaned against the steel door and said what he already knew. "Then we starve in here, or we go out there." Michael strapped on his pack. The dog rose with him, ears sharp. Lillith took her crossbow. "There's a stream a mile east," Michael said. "And I marked a spot with dried meat before the fog. If it's still there, it feeds us for weeks." The fog had thinned overnight. He hoped the marker held. They walked into the swamp. The dog led, nose low, past drowned trees. Michael watched the water for movement. Halfway there, the dog stopped and growled. Ahead, a shape hunched in the mud. It was a man, or had been. Gaunt. Bent double. It coughed, wet and sharp, and lifted its head. Cloudy eyes found them. It lurched forward fast. "Plague," Lillith hissed. She raised the crossbow. The zombie coughed again and broke into a run, hunched and jerking. Her bolt punched its shoulder. It did not slow. Michael grabbed her arm and pulled her back toward a stand of trees. Then a blade came down. An axe split the thing's skull from the side. It dropped in the black water. A young woman stood over it, blonde hair loose, flannel shirt torn at the elbows. She wrenched her axe free and looked at them like they were the strange ones. "You made enough noise to call every rotter in the swamp," she said. She wiped the blade on her jeans. "Aspen. You two lost?" Michael kept his hand on the dog's collar. "Michael. This is Lillith. We're not lost. We're low on food." He watched her axe, then her face. She had killed the thing without a flinch. "I built a shelter east of here. Concrete walls. I'm gathering survivors before winter." Aspen laughed once. "Survivors don't last. I've buried three." But she looked at the dead thing, then back at Michael. "You got walls?" "Walls and a plan," Michael said. "I know where meat's stored. Help us carry it, and you eat with us." Aspen thought about it. She hooked the axe on her belt. "I know that stream. There's a cellar past it. Dry goods, canned stuff. The rotter was guarding it." She nodded at the corpse. "You'd never have found it alone." They reached the cellar by noon. Aspen pried the door. Inside sat shelves of cans, sealed jars, sacks of rice. Enough to feed a dozen people through winter. Michael filled his pack until the straps strained. That night, three of them sat behind the concrete walls with full stomachs. Michael had solved his shortage. But now three mouths shared the same water. And Aspen kept eyeing the door like she might still leave.