He found Kate that evening, sitting in her living room, staring into the cold, dark fireplace.

He sat down beside her, set his shotgun on the hardwood floor.

Abbies had broken in at some point. The front windows were smashed out, the interior looked vandalized, and it still smelled like those creatures—a harsh, alien stench.

“What are you doing in here?” Ethan asked.

Kate shrugged. “I guess I feel like if I wait here long enough, he’ll come walking through that door.”

Ethan put his arm around her.

She said, “But he’s not going to walk through that door ever again, is he?”

It seemed as if it was only by sheer force of will that she held the tears back.

Ethan shook his head.

“Because you found him.”

The light splintering through the busted windows was growing weaker by the moment. Soon, it would be dark in the valley.

“His group was run down in one of the tunnels,” Ethan said.

Still no tears came.

She just breathed in and out.

“I want to see him,” she said.

“Of course. We’ve been gathering up the dead all day, doing what we can to prepare them for—”

“I’m not afraid to see him torn up, Ethan. I just want to see him.”

“Okay.”

“How many did we lose?”

“We’re still recovering bodies, so right now we’re only counting survivors. Out of forty hundred sixty-one in-town residents, we’re down to a hundred and eight. Seventy-five are still unaccounted for.”

“I’m glad it was you who came with this news,” she said.

“They’re bringing all the survivors into the mountain for the next few nights.”

“I’m staying right here.”

“It’s not safe, Kate. There are still abbies in the valley. We haven’t gotten them all. There’s no power. No heat. When the sun drops, it’s going to get very dark and very cold. The abbies still inside the fence will come back into town.”

She looked at him. She said, “I don’t care.”

“You want me to sit with you for a while?”

“I want to be alone.”

Ethan rose to his feet, every inch of his body sore, bruised, done. “I’ll leave this shotgun with you,” he said, “just in case.”

He couldn’t be sure that she’d heard him.

She was utterly elsewhere.

“Is your family safe?” Kate asked.

“They are.”

She nodded.

“I’ll come back in the morning,” he said. “Take you to see Harold.” He moved toward the front door.

Kate said, “Hey.”

He looked back.

“This isn’t your fault.”

That night, Ethan lay next to Theresa in a warm, dark room, deep inside the superstructure.

Ben slept on a rollaway at the foot of their bed, the boy snoring quietly.