Episode One

Episode One: The World to Come
The World to Come is the pilot episode for Winter's War, and it establishes the central characters and locations for the first trilogy. It introduces the world in which the series is set in, along with the moral affiliations of each character.

Synopsis:
Set in the aftermath of a devastating nuclear war, the world has fallen into a state of decay. A harsh Nuclear Winter scours the wasteland, and scattered survivors must use all they can to stay alive.

The episode opens with Jack Harkin, also known as The Wanderer, roaming the desolate Wild Lands in a scavaging  hunt for supplies. Noticing a track of footprints, Jack follows them to their source and observes a couple, Emily Freeman and Luke Roberts, being held at gunpoint by two armed raiders. The raiders forcibly take the couple's supplies, and one of the raider forces Luke to give up his watch, a family heirloom. After a tense stand off, despite getting what they wanted, the raiders prepare to kill the couple, but Jack intervenes and neutralizes the raiders. Luke gruesomly dies during the firefight. Emily, wary of Jack, holds a gun at his approach. Jack is about to depart with the stolen supplies, but Emily threateningly shoots past Jack, diverting his attention. Emily reveals she is carrying a child, and that Luke had a plan to take them to the Neutral Zone, a mysterious settlement that's whispered to be a pacifistic heaven.   She bargins to have Jack take her to the rumored settlement, to which Jack reluctantly agrees, but soley on the promise of supplies and a vehicle. The duo is then ambushed by a mysterious raider, Shaun Maher, who reveals himself to be an old nemesis of Jack, and is seeking revenge for Jack abandoning him. However, when he notices that Jack has taken Emily under his protection, Shuan decides to make Emily his target, as a means to violently show Jack that his moral compassion is his weakness. The episode ends in a black out with the trio locked in a stand-off.