The Boulder Free Zone hummed with the quiet determination of a world rebuilding itself. Streets once abandoned were now lined with scavenged lights, flickering like uncertain stars against the darkening sky. People moved through the town with purpose — patching roofs, fortifying homes, organizing what little law and order they had left. The air smelled of wood smoke and the sharp tang of sweat, a sign of honest work, of survival. But beneath the surface, there was an unease, a collective awareness that what they had built could crumble just as easily as the world that came before it. An unease brought by the dark man. The mountains loomed in the distance, steady and indifferent.

Stu Redman carried that weight in his bones. He had never asked to lead, never wanted to be anyone's symbol of hope, but here he was, in the town that had become both sanctuary and battlefield. There was a deep weariness in him, a knowledge that peace was never permanent, that something darker still waited beyond those peaks. But there was also something else, a stubborn ember, a belief that maybe, just maybe, they could make this work. That the Boulder Free Zone, for all its flaws, might be the beginning of something new.