Ashes and Dust by Jeremy Bishop, David McAfee

hand. “What happened?”
    She just shook her head, arms crossed.
    “Is everyone—”
    “Dead,” she said. “All of them. Even Jillian.”
    “Who?”
    She pointed toward the retreating pastor with her thumb. “Sally Field. Her real name was Jillian. She was an abused woman Dodge was helping.”
    Griffin shook his head. He felt horrible that the woman had died, but also for doubting the pastor’s intentions with her.
    “But...” She looked him in the eyes. “It wasn’t just the lizards hunting us.”
    Griffin hadn’t seen anything else in town, but if Frost and the others had been beyond the border... “What was it?”
    “Who,” she said. “ Who was it?” She leaned into the vehicle and pulled out a foot-long, silver baton. She then took his hand and positioned it so his thumb was on top. “Hold this.” She held out the baton.
    He took it. “I don’t understand. What is—” The baton sprang to life, rapidly expanding into a five foot long, double ended javelin. “The hell? How—”
    “Dodge and I both tried to open it,” she said. “But I’m pretty sure it only works for you.”
    “For...” He looked in her eyes again. Saw the fear. “Oh my God, it was me?”
    “Not you,” she said. “Not really. But, yes. This world had a Refuge. Had a you, and a me. But from what I could see, you were the only one left alive, living among those things.”
    Cash stepped up behind Griffin and said, “You should have seen the way this guy handled those assholes. He was a savage.”
    Frost seemed to notice Griffin’s torso for the first time, her eyes widening at the sight of lizard gore and his own blood. The fear crept back into her eyes until Cash added, “Those kids wouldn’t have made it without you, man.”
    With that, Cash was off to reconnect with the other still living townspeople.
    “It wasn’t me,” Griffin said. “Whatever happened in that world... I’m not him. I never will be.”
    Frost nodded, snapped out of her fear and lifted Griffin’s shirt. “How did this happen?”
    “Hugged a giant lizard,” Griffin said, and he was glad to see Frost smile. “Helena... What happened to the other me? Did you...”
    “Almost,” she said. “One of the lizards bit his arm. Burned it pretty good. He stabbed it in the head and took off running.”
    Griffin looked down at his own arm, where an arc of small puncture wounds revealed he’d nearly met a similar fate. He held it up for Frost to see.
    She traced her fingers around the wounds. Despite the stinging, her touch felt electric. “Do you think there’s hope for us? We lose more people with every shift. Everyone is dying.”
    Griffin wanted to give her a positive answer. He was desperate, too. The sound of a parking car pulled his eyes up, and he found his answer. “Not everyone.” He pointed to the car. The passenger’s side door opened and Carol Herman got out.
    Winslow let out a shout of joy, burst from the gathered crowd and embraced his wife, weeping loudly, uncaring about who witnessed his unabashed adoration. Carol squeezed him back, burying her face in his shoulder.
    Kyle Gardner got out of the driver’s side looking a little bewildered. When he saw Griffin and Frost, he approached. “Geez. What’d we miss?”
    “Fire-breathing Gila monsters,” Griffin said.
    “Shit...” Kyle said with a smile, but then glanced at Frost and saw her still sad eyes. “It was bad?”
    Griffin stepped aside, allowing Kyle a view of the gore-covered park and the still smoldering monster truck.
    Kyle paled. “Are we any closer to finding an answer?”
    “Actually,” Griffin said, searching the crowd for Jennifer Turkette. But she was nowhere to be seen. “We don’t have a clue.”
    “That might not necessarily be true,” Frost said.
    When Griffin turned to her, she was holding up a document safe with a hole in it—a hole that matched the size of the spear still in his hand. He handed the spear to Kyle. It shrank back to a baton the