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Colt waited for the house to settle, for the sound of breaking wood to cease. He cleared the dust away with his free hand and tried to assess the damage.

The bottom half of the stairs was gone. Oddly enough, the upside-down car had made a path through the rubble. He could hear the little girl yelling outside.

“Oh no!” she said. “Grandma!”

Colt took the grandmother in both arms again. With a few smooth hops, he made it out through the gaping hole in the front of the house.

The girl came running.

Colt rested the woman on the ground.

“I saw an ambulance down the street!” said the girl. “We gotta take her to it!”

“No,” said Colt. “We shouldn’t move her any more than necessary. Listen, I’ve gotta go help someone else now, so you have to run over there and tell the people in uniforms about your grandma.”

“Ah--okay!”

“Make sure they hear you. Bite their ankles, if you have to. Got that?”

“Got it!” She ran off toward the flashing lights.

‘I’m not so sure about that last piece of advice.’

“Eh, she’ll do fine.”

He returned to his car and checked on the twins. They both stared at him quietly from their rear-facing car seats when he poked his head through the back door. He squinted at them, uncertain. He was glad they didn’t seem terribly stressed by the situation, but at the same time, he was beginning to wonder why they looked so calm. They hadn’t made much of a fuss about getting into the car, either.

‘We don’t have time to linger,’ said Bohwanox.

Colt popped the trunk and grabbed the new rifle there. The man at the gun store hadn’t been so keen about letting him leave with it immediately, but Colt had been rather insistent. He needed something with more range and a scope.

Before he could even take a step, however, another cry for help caught his ear.