<strong>Alana</strong><br/><br/>The redhead was doing her best to keep it together, and it looked like she had been doing a lot of crying. Judging from the bruise on her forehead and the blood that had been hastily wiped from the side of her face, she had definitely been in the accident.<br/><br/>"We crashed trying to get out of town," the woman said. "We can't get out. No one can. I don't know what the fuck is going on. Nearly everyone's gone. There's this fucking, invisible wall. Even the animals are gone! Except for a terrier, there's a terrier." It was hard to tell if the girl knew what she was talking about or was just rambling at this point.<br/><br/>Thanks to pain killers, the man had settled down, and Alana felt assured that he was out of the woods, at least as far as bleeding to death or contracting an infection. He would need a surgeon, though, eventually to take care of the leg.<br/><br/><br/><br/><strong>Sandy</strong><br/><br/>Sandy blasts her summons on the bullhorn, listening to her own voice echo back. She does this for several minutes, without a return response.<br/><br/>The wind kicks up and the sunlight dims suddenly. She looks up to see dark clouds roiling in the sky, as though stirred by a storm that didn't reach the ground. When she returned her attention back to the streets, she was surprised to see a man standing in the intersection up the block. He was garbed in black, his features lost in shadow. He appeared to be standing there, watching her, and Sandy felt a chill creep along her spine.<br/><br/>Before she could call out to him, a dog suddenly barked at her. She screamed and turned, to see a massive, black hound standing alongside the truck. He bared his teeth at her viciously, and barked again. His fur was matted as though the thing had just clawed its way out of a vat of tar.<br/><br/>Sandy's heart beat hard, the dog radiating a palpable hatred for her. Its eyes were red, and she realized that they weren't just colored red but actually glowed. The thing barked again and rushed the truck, making Sandy cry out and stumble a step back. She nearly fell, grasping at the roof of the cab to keep from going down.<br/><br/>She expected to see the beast leap into the truck to tear her to shreds, but when she gained her footing and looked, it was gone. A glance showed her that the man up the street had also disappeared and even the dark clouds above her gone, having returned to the clear sky of a few minutes before.<br/><br/>Sandy's heart was hammering; that was real enough.