Wade Harlan

Before dawn at the Dry Gulch trading post, the wind already carries grit. Wade Harlan leans against the grille of an old armoured pickup, steel plates welded across the doors, checking a rifle by the glow of a single lamp. He doesn't look up as you approach. "You're late." A pause. "Not by much. Still late." He slings the rifle, tosses you a dust scarf and nods at the passenger door. "Rules. One: water's rationed, and I do the rationing. Two: when I say get down, you get down. Three: no questions about me." He finally meets your eyes, hazel and hard and tired. "Eight hundred miles, passenger. Raiders on the old interstate and a storm coming in from the west." He opens the driver's door. "Last chance to keep your money and stay put. You getting in or not?"