Free Children of the After: The Complete Series: A Young Adult Postapocalyptic Action and Adventure series by Jeremy Laszlo

building’s ruins. All around them the sparkling blackened wasteland stood as if frozen in death, but ahead they could hear the sound growing. Waiting several moments she was able to slow her breathing and listen, as they all did, angling their heads and necks to pick up the sounds. The longer they waited the more distinct the sounds became, and Sam knew that something was moving.
    In pairs the crunches came in rapid succession, sort of like a beating heart, but it was accompanied by a growling and grinding sound that raised the hairs on the back of her neck and arms. Whatever it was, it was big. Just when she thought she had located the direction of the sound, another heart-like beat hammered through the crushed glass of a nearby road at a much faster rhythm, moving from a different direction as if to intercept the first and then, like all the sounds had begun, they went silent.
    “I think we should check it out,” Jack whispered, causing her to jump.
    “We don’t know what it is,” Sam said, fear welling up in her stomach.
    “Exactly. We need to know what is out here. We need to know what happened. You guys want to know, right?” Jack replied.
    Sam nodded in reply and noted that Will did as well. Letting Jack take the lead, she reached out and took Will’s hand as they moved slowly across the crumbling face of the building beside them. Reaching the next corner they cautiously looked out in all directions, before turning right down the narrow intersecting street in the direction of the now absent sounds. It was two blocks in the new direction before they heard another sound, though it did not have the same rhythm as the previous. Even so, they used it to again change direction, turning left, back in the original direction they had been traveling for the majority of the day.
    Painstakingly slow they crept along, and Sam silently cursed every crunch of glass beneath her feet. Moving amongst the shadows of the buildings, it was two more blocks when Jack stopped abruptly. Then, unexpectedly, a voice sounded from somewhere ahead, and looking back at her, Jack pointed to the intersection just a dozen or more yards ahead and they began to move once more, only more slowly and more carefully than before. With each step she could hear the voice more clearly, though it was faint and she couldn’t make out the words, but it was a voice. The implications were astronomical. They weren’t the only people alive anymore. And then the voice yelled.
    Still she had not understood the words it yelled, but the rhythmic thrumming of glass and asphalt sounded once more, only for a second or two and then both the yelling and the pounding stopped. Had whatever made the growl-like sound attacked the man? Shivers lanced down her spine.
    Step after tedious step they crept to the corner, and Jack peered around it cautiously before waving for each of them to join him. Peeking around the corner with her brothers, Sam saw something she had not expected at all. There, perhaps three and a half blocks further down the road to their left sat a man on horseback. He wore an odd hat and a long duster jacket like in western movies, and behind him was another horse and wagon, guided by yet another man dressed similarly. Though their words could not be heard from here, it was plain enough to see that they were talking, and seconds later they began to advance down the street towards Sam and her brothers.
    Watching their slow advance, Sam labeled each of the strange sounds they had heard before. The beating hearts were the horses’ hooves upon the ground and the growling or grinding sound was the cart’s wooden wheels cutting a trail through the glass shards upon the road. People. People and horses. Not everyone was dead.
    Watching further, the man on horseback turned a corner, steering away from her concealed location, and Sam watched as the horse-drawn cart disappeared around the corner behind him.
    “Well, that answers a lot of questions,” Jack said,