The town was a skeleton picked clean. They had parked the van in a collapsed barn a mile out and proceeded on foot, moving through the outskirts of the quiet, empty settlement that lay in the valley. The "quiet valley" from the broadcast. It was an old mining town called Harmony Creek, a name that now felt like a cruel joke. The houses were weathered and empty, their windows like vacant eyes. There were no bodies in the streets, no signs of a major battle. It was as if the residents had simply vanished.
Quinn and Hex were scouting ahead, moving in a practiced, silent rhythm through the back alley of what used to be a general store. The air was still, the only sound the crunch of their boots on loose gravel.
"Place is too clean," Hex whispered, his shotgun held at a low ready. "I don't like it."
"Neither do I," Quinn replied, his hand resting on the grip of his pistol.
