Ashes

What Came Before

The unthinkable has happened.

Using an extensive network of specially equipped shipping containers, Project Eden has unleashed the Sage Flu upon the world, intent on wiping out over ninety-nine percent of the human population.

Despite its best efforts, the group known as the Resistance was unable to stop this horrific act from happening, and found itself under attack by a squad of Project Eden commandos.

Caught outside the Resistance’s hideaway, Brandon Ash raced through the woods in search of safety. But all he found was a woman dealing with her own demons, and he was forced to move farther and farther away from his friends.

Twenty-four-hour curfews spread around the globe as people everywhere did what they could to keep themselves and their families safe.

Martina Gable and her family headed for a cabin in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in the high desert of California, desperately trying to isolate themselves from those who might be carrying the disease.

In India, after Sanjay inoculated Kusum, the girl he loved, he reluctantly took her back to her family in Mumbai. He then went in search of more vaccine, while Kusum led the others out of the city. Once Sanjay found what he was after, he, too, went back to the country, where, after a panicked night apart, he found Kusum again.

And then there was Project Eden itself. Its leadership apparently dead, a new principal director emerges, one who has no intention of ever conceding the job to anyone else.

In a desperate race back to the Resistance headquarters from where he’d witnessed the destruction of Bluebird — Project Eden’s base above the Arctic Circle — Captain Daniel Ash arrived only to find his son missing. Out searching for Brandon, he came across a house in the wilderness that Brandon had visited earlier. But while his son had been able to get away from the woman who lived there, Ash was caught in the explosion that destroyed her house. He was rushed back to the Ranch, barely clinging to life.

Meanwhile, throughout the world, the sound of coughing grows louder and louder…