myself staring at an emergency air lock, the kind that can be slotted into place to block any standard hallway or door frame. This one was set far enough into the front hall that it left room for the three of us, and not much more than that.
There was no doggy door in the air lock. Whatever was going on, the bulldogs weren’t being allowed out either.
Mahir and Becks piled in behind me while I was still staring at the air lock in dismay. As soon as Mahir was past the door frame, the door slammed itself shut. He twisted to try the knob, eyes widening. “The bloody thing’s gone and locked on us,” he said.
“Somehow, not surprised.”
“Greetings,” said the air lock.
We all jumped.
It was Becks who collected herself first, clearing her throat before she said, “Hello, house. What do you need us to do?”
“Please remove all exterior layers of clothing and place them in the chute for sterilization.” A panel slid open at the base of the air lock, displaying a metal box.
“You want us to
“Please remove all exterior layers of clothing,” repeated the house, with the infinite patience of the mechanical. “Once all potentially contaminated materials have been placed in the chute for sterilization, blood testing can begin.”
Mahir cleared his throat. “Excuse me, but—”
“Failure to comply will result in sterilization.”
Okay, maybe not
A second panel slid open next to the first. “Please place your equipment inside,” said the house. “Anything that is not contaminated will be returned to you. All fabrics will be isolated and sterilized. Any materials that test positive for contamination will be destroyed. You have five minutes remaining in which to comply.”
“Let’s stop arguing with the creepy house and just do what it says, okay?” I slung my bag into the equipment chute before hauling my shirt off over my head and stuffing it into the clothing chute. “I don’t really feel like getting sterilized today.”
“The things I do for journalism,” muttered Mahir, and took off his shirt.
In under a minute, the three of us were standing there barefoot in our underwear, trying to look at anything but each other. Since we were crammed in like sardines, that wa’t easy. The panel in the air lock door didn’t close until the last of our clothing had been shoved through. “Please place your hands on the test panels,” said the house, voice still mechanically calm. “Your testing will commence as soon as everyone is in compliance.”
“I fucking hate talking machines,” I muttered, and slapped my palm down on the nearest panel.
Getting Mahir and Becks access to their respective panels practically required us to play a game of standing Twister in the hall. I’d never noticed how narrow the damn thing was until I was penned in it. Finally, all three of us were in skin contact with the house security system. Three sets of lights clicked on, beginning to cycle rapidly between red and green.
“We haven’t encountered any contagions between here and the gate,” said Mahir. He sounded uncertain. I didn’t blame him. I wasn’t feeling all that certain myself.
“What if that’s the problem?” asked Becks, giving voice to the one thought I was trying desperately not to have. “Maybe that’s why there was no one on the roads—why those men were all wearing masks. Maybe the virus has finally gone airborne.”
“It’s already airborne,” I said. That was true—Kellis-Amberlee is an airborne virus with a droplet-based transmission vector—but it wasn’t the point. Becks wasn’t talking about the passive, cooperative version of Kellis- Amberlee, the one that protects us all from colds and cancer. She was talking about the live version, the one that turns us into shambling zombies who’d eat our own families in order to fuel the virus powering our bodies.
“I suppose we’ll know in a moment, won’t we?” said Mahir. As if on cue, the lights started settling on green. Becks was the first, followed by Mahir’s. Mine kept flashing for a few seconds more, just long enough to start making my chest get tight. Then the light settled on green, and the air lock hissed as it unsealed.
“Thank you for your compliance,” said the house.
I directed my middle fingers at the ceiling.
Mahir and Becks pushed past me while I was distracted by telling the house to go fuck itself, stepping out of the air lock and into the living room where Maggie and Alaric were waiting. Becks ran to hug Alaric, while Mahir stepped off to one side, crossing his arms over his chest and looking self-conscious. I stepped out of the air lock, looking cautiously around.
Inside the house, it was obvious that the shades weren’t just drawn; they were locked down, reinforced with sheets of clear plastic. The floor was practically covered with diminutive bulldogs, the entire pack forced inside by whatever emergency was at hand.
Maggie walked calmly over to me, slapped me hard across one cheek, and then, while I was still staring at her in confusion, throwing her arms around my shoulders. “We thought you were dead,” she hissed, through gritted teeth. “You didn’t call, and you didn’t call, and we thought you were
“How about there’s not a next time? Can we do that, instead?” Maggie wa clothed. I essentially wasn’t, which was making this hug even more awkward than it would normally have been. I extricated myself from her embrace, looking around the room again. “I know we said to close the windows, but I didn’t mean you had to go quite this far.”
“Wait—what?” Alaric pulled away from Becks, looking utterly bemused. “What do you mean? After you told us to close the windows—don’t you know what’s going on out there?”
Maggie studied my face for a moment, horror dawning in her expression. “Oh, my God,” she whispered. “You really don’t know. You have no idea, do you?”
“No idea about what?” I shook my head. “We haven’t seen anyone since Kansas, but we thought it was just the storm keeping people inside—”
“It’s not just the storm.” Alaric walked across the room with sharp, jerky motions and grabbed the television remote, turning the TV on. He hit another button and the infomercial that had been playing disappeared, replaced by CNN.
The picture showed a flooded street, helpfully labeled “Miami—Live Footage.” A newscaster was speaking in a low, anxious tone, saying something about death tolls and tracking survivors. I didn’t really hear him. I was transfixed by the picture, my brain refusing to accept what my eyes were telling me.
As always, it was George who grasped the reality of the situation first, and her understanding allowed me to understand.
I couldn’t argue.
The street was choked with debris and abandoned cars, brown-and-white water swirling everywhere as it tried to force itself down clogged sewer drains. They should have been cleared before the flooding could get this bad, and the city had tried to clear them; that much was obvious from the number of people in fluorescent orange shirts who were shambling down the street, moving jerkily along with the rest of the mob. I had never seen that many infected in one place. I counted fifty before my brain shut down, refusing to process any more.
“—we repeat, the federal government has declared the state of Florida a hazard zone. Uninfected citizens are urged to stay in your homes and await assistance. Anyone found on the street may be shot without warning. Anyone leaving their home will be assumed infected and treated with the appropriate protocols. Please stay in your homes and await assistance. Please…” The newscaster faltered, losing the rhythm of his carefully prepared statement. The footage of the flood was silent. Even recorded moaning can bring zombies to your position.
Recovering himself, the newscaster said, “Reports of similar outbreaks are coming in from Huntsville, New Orleans, Baton Rouge, and Houston. We don’t have numbers yet, but the death tolls are estimated to be in the thousands, and are climbing steadily.” He paused again, longer this time, before saying, “Some sources are referring to the event as the second Rising. God forgive me, but I’m not so sure they’re wrong. God forgive us all.”
There was a rattling noise, like someone putting a microphone down, and then the sound of footsteps. The silent footage of the flood, and the infected, continued to play.
