The Infection

A man with a bleeding ear shouts, “ARE YOU FROM THE FEMA CAMP?”

“I don’t know of any FEMA camp, sir.”

“WHAT?”

“If it’s not on this road, where is it?” the woman says, her voice edged in panic.

A small crowd is gathering. The people stare at her with a mixture of hope and resentment and shock, shivering in the heat. The man who shouted stumbles, briefly disoriented, and then shouts again, “THERE’S NO HELP AHEAD? WE’RE ON OUR OWN?”

“I don’t know of any rescue station or FEMA camp anywhere. I’m not here in any official capacity. I’m with another group of people leaving the city after the fire.”

“We lost everything,” the woman pleads. “We have no food. Some guys with guns back there on the road took the last drop of water I had. Where am I supposed to go?”

“Where were you cops when those monsters were ripping my family apart?” a woman says, her eyes glazed with fever. Most of her hair and eyebrows have been burned off and the right side of her face is covered by a filthy, bulky bandage. “That’s what I want to know. I called 911 and nobody came. Nobody came and now Edward is dead. Edward and Billy and Zoe and little Paul. Now you show up and try to tell us what to do? Where the hell were you, lady?”

The crowd presses in, angry, its slim hopes dashed and its resentments stoked.

“I’m sorry,” Wendy says. She wants to explain her situation—that her precinct was overrun, that she is on her own, that she cannot help them—but these people do not care. She is a symbol to them. They look at her with hungry, feral eyes gleaming from the folds of bundles of rags tied around their heads. They cough into their fists loudly, struggling for enough air to scream.

“Give me something,” a woman hisses, reaching out for Wendy’s face.

Wendy takes a step backward and places her hand over her pepper spray dispenser. She senses a dangerous line forming—knows it is there because it is about to be crossed. The crowd closes in, muttering.

A man wearing a cowboy hat and carrying a walking stick marches past and yells, “Hey, now! What are you bugging that girl for? There ain’t no rescue coming and there ain’t no police. She ain’t no cop. Get over it.”

Wendy bristles, but before she can say anything, she hears the echoes of gunshots back in the smoky haze. All of them turn toward the noise, flinching. A moment ago they were menacing her but the fact is they are terrified and running on fumes.

“There you go, officer,” the man says, still walking. “There are a couple of guys back there with a truck robbing people and shooting anybody who fights back. You want to be a cop? Do something about it.”

♦

Ethan follows Sarge past the Bradley and pauses with his mouth hanging open in awe. The rig looks like it lost a brick fight. The welded aluminum armor is pockmarked with dents and scratches. Several plates on its side are missing.

Sarge turns and sees him lagging behind.

“You sure you’re okay?”

“I could use a drink of water.”

“I’ll get you water after we do this thing, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Anne can be a little rough.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Ethan says, meaning it. The truth is he feels completely numb. He does not feel pain. He does not feel anything. “What happened to your tank?”

“Those plates are explosive reactive armor,” Sarge tells him. “It protects the vehicle by exploding outward when something comes at it trying to explode inward, canceling it out.”

What could have hit the Bradley with that much force?

“What happened last night?” Ethan says.

“There was a fire,” Sarge tells him. “See all the ash starting to rain down on us? That’s what’s left of Pittsburgh—west of the Monongahela and the Ohio, anyhow.”

“What happened to the vehicle?”

“The gates of hell opened. If we hadn’t dropped smoke, I don’t think we would have made it. That thing was kicking the shit out of my rig. Come on.”

Ethan shakes his head in amazement. That thing, Sarge said. This was not the average Infected and probably not a worm either. The commander obviously had no idea what he had been fighting in the dark. As Ethan suspected, there are other children of Infection, probably an entire family of monstrosities. If there is something out there that can take on an American armored fighting vehicle, Ethan believes, the human race might have to give up its claim on the planet.

He has often speculated about what could have caused the pandemic. As an educated man, he refuses to believe the cause is supernatural. Infection is spread by a virus, but a virus does not explain these bizarre mutations. In the days following the Screaming, scientists were speculating about a nanotech weapon that escaped the lab. Could nanotechnology create such monsters?