The Night Before Dawn

GOOGLE Search TWKAN

At exactly eight that night.

At the survival base built by more than a dozen people around the ranger housing complex in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Outside the buildings, in an open area about thirty meters from the cabins.

Liana had just finished her call with the New York Council.

Her eyes filled with boundless longing, Liana returned the handset to the radio. Then, unable to stop herself, she raised her head and looked at the moon, clearly visible overhead and countless times clearer than it had been before the apocalypse. She took a deep breath.

Beside her, her deputy Dalton took a breath as well, then said with an unreadable expression.

"Congratulations, boss. By tomorrow morning, probably before ten, you'll be reunited with your lover—"

As he spoke, Dalton seemed to think of something. He could not help turning his head aside, looking with inexplicable melancholy toward the machine-gun sentry post roughly twelve meters away.

Noticing Dalton's gaze, the sentry lying beside the machine-gun post grinned and spoke.

"Aha, Dalton, I see there's one more heartbroken man beneath tonight's moonlight~"

"Shut your mouth, Chiles. I don't want to beat you up, at least not tonight!"

Dalton snapped irritably at the sentry.

As he cursed the sentry, Jonathan fiddled with the small campfire before him, making the flames burn hotter. At the same time, he looked up at Liana and said.

"Liana, Dalton obviously likes you. That makes him kind of pitiful."

"Who the hell would've thought that after you'd been separated from your husband for nearly half a year, you'd somehow be reunited?"

"But seriously, I'm curious. During the months you two knew each other, did you never sleep together?"

"If you did—aha, then Dalton is even more pitiful. You're both pitiful~"

"Shut up, Jonathan!"