"Dammit," Alex swore. "Fuel tank must've caught a stray round in all that shooting." He fretted for a moment, but he'd look pretty damn stupid if he stopped being the iron-jawed take-charge streetwise Hercules he had been building himself up as for these two beautiful women. No way he'd score with the older one if he made a vital misstep. Dammit indeed.

"Alright," he said, grabbing up his hockey stick and giving it an affectionate pat. "Sophia, you stay with the car, keep broadcasting. The more people we get here the better. Katelyn," he said with a smile to the younger girl, "I got a special job for you, shawty, alright? This is a military car, I'm sure it's got plenty of good stuff in it. Maybe a toolkit, or some rations. Probably at least some flares. Start looking through, see what you can find, alright? I'm gonna look through these abandoned cars," he said, gesturing up the embankment to the thousands of wrecks sitting on I-5.

Hockey stick in hand, he started the steep climb up to the roadway, batting aside the knee-high grass. "I can't believe I'm doing this," he muttered to himself.