Coldbrook

Ohio, with tendrils stretching into neighbouring states three hundred miles or more from Coldbrook. But beyond this were those other spots of infection, satellite stains that were spreading as quickly as the original, flickering on the screen with the promise of fresh growth. From New Orleans in the south to Philadelphia and New York in the east, to Detroit in the north, and even as far afield as San Francisco and Seattle in the west, the infection now spanned the country.

‘Shit,’ Vic muttered. ‘Aircraft, you think?’

‘Yeah,’ Marc said. ‘Public and private aircraft, zombie stuck in the cargo hold. And don’t discount the speed of spread along roads. Drive for ten hours straight with your foot down, and you can get from Atlanta to Dallas. One car or truck doing that with one of those fuckers trapped on board. .’

‘So what the hell do we do now?’ Vic asked. A feeling of unreality descended, distancing him from events. If he thought about this too much, he’d go insane. It was not a conscious defence, but right then he welcomed whatever instinct was striving to protect him. He looked up at Marc, and at Gary where he sat with his feet propped against a desk across the room.

‘I did consider getting back to Coldbrook,’ Marc said. ‘The first disease vector came through there, which might help me examine the disease source. And if it meant me going through the breach to find out more. .’ He shrugged.

‘Coldbrook’s locked down,’ Vic said.

‘You got out, you can get us back in,’ Gary said.

‘But still no contact from Jonah?’

‘No. But we can’t assume that he’s dead.’

Back to Coldbrook. Vic had done everything in his power to flee that place, and in doing so. . He closed his eyes and shook his head, that sense of distance buffering him once more against the truth. It would have got out anyway, he was sure. Something like this couldn’t be confined.

‘But now. .’ Marc said. ‘Now, I don’t know if it’s even worth trying. Just. . don’t know.’

‘Not worth trying?’ Vic asked. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’

Gary strode across the room and leaned on his shoulder, tapping at the keyboard. ‘As we said, there have been developments.’

Vic looked away from Marc and back at the screen. He’s scared. It was the first time he’d really seen that in him.

There was a new screen open on the laptop. It displayed a world map. There were red dots outside the USA.

‘You’re fucking kidding,’ Vic said.

Mexico.

‘It was easy to expand the program to include foreign media,’ Marc said.

Cuba, Haiti.

‘But this could be a glitch? Are these confirmed?’

Guatemala, Belize, Costa Rica.

‘Not as definite as our own map,’ Marc said. ‘I’ve got no tap into any foreign military, for a start.’

Canada, Alaska, Greenland, Iceland.

‘This is just so shit,’ Gary said.

As Vic watched the screen, Lima grew its own red spot.

Feeling aimless and hopeless, Vic returned to their small room. Lucy had turned the small TV away from her daughter’s bed — Olivia lay there with her headphones on, playing on her Nintendo DS — and lay across the blankets with the remote control in one hand, ready to click it off the minute Olivia came to see. She knows I lied about the TV being broken, Vic thought, and he felt a sudden surge of love for his daughter.

‘Seen this?’ Lucy asked without turning to him. A man was being interviewed in a smart studio in Washington. He wore a suit and tie, and beneath his name on the screen was written Government Spokesperson. She had the sound turned down too quietly to hear but Vic could guess what the man was saying: Stay calm, help is coming, we’re working on the problem, and soon. .

‘Then there’s this.’ She flicked to another news channel, this one cable. The live report was coming from Atlanta, the reporter apparently on top of a high building somewhere, and behind her the city was burning. All semblance of impartial reporting was gone. This woman was terrified, and shocked.

As Lucy nudged up the volume, the woman’s voice faded in. ‘. . toll is catastrophic, the number of infected beyond counting. What you can see behind me is the result of aerial bombardment, and further north there are many people trapped in their homes, a few of them broadcasting by radio. The military won’t comment, and-’

Lucy turned the TV off. Olivia glanced up at her, smiled at Vic, then went back to her DS screen.

‘It’s the end, isn’t it?’ his wife asked. Vic sat beside her on the bed.

Vic thought of lying, but Lucy was too sharp for that. And he had already lied too much. ‘It might be. It’s beyond our shores now. Marc says there’s no way to stop the spread, and the only hope lies in a cure.’

‘They shouldn’t show that stuff on TV.’

‘I think we’re beyond niceties,’ Vic said. ‘But we’re safe here.’

‘How do you figure that?’ Lucy kept her voice low, but he could see the tension in her face.

‘They can’t get in.’

‘And how much food do we have? How much water?’

‘Lucy-’

‘Enough water for a year, Vic?’

‘Mommy,’ Olivia said. She’d dropped the DS and pulled out her headphones, and she glanced back and forth between Vic and Lucy. ‘Mommy, why do we need so much water?’

Lucy’s face crumpled, but she did not move.

‘Please,’ Vic whispered as he moved past her, sweeping their daughter into his arms and pressing her head to his chest, wishing she could unhear and Lucy could unsay, and wishing with every atom in his body that he could undo.

7

Before they saw land beneath them, the other passengers made two attempts to get at Jayne. The first time Sean ushered her back into one of the toilets and closed the door, and she heard the shouting and screaming, threats and promises, and then the loud gunshot that silenced them all. A few moments later Sean opened the door and brought her out, never taking his attention from the aisle and the next compartment, curtained off once again. Jayne emerged expecting to see a body on the floor, but Sean had pointed his gun into the kitchen area. He’d fired into one of the food trolleys.

The second time, two men rushed them, hunkered down behind another food trolley. Sean crouched down in a shooting stance, but then the trolley caught a chair’s arm and jarred to a halt, and the men had been thwarted. They retreated back along the aisle, one of them dabbing a bloodied nose.

And now they were over the USA again, and their worries were starting all over again.

‘Why Baltimore?’ Sean asked. The stewardess had come to talk, informing them where they were and that they’d been instructed to land.

‘Closest airport. We’ll be flying on fuel fumes when we land.’ The woman’s stare kept flickering to Jayne, and Jayne offered her a smile. She’d taken some horse-strength painkillers and now the churu aches were more manageable.

‘Why can’t they just leave us be?’ Jayne asked. ‘Not as if I’ve tried to eat any of them.’

‘Most of them are scared,’ the stewardess said. ‘But there are a few who want to feel that they’re doing something.’

‘By killing an innocent woman?’ Sean asked.

‘I’m sorry,’ the stewardess said. ‘We’ll be landing in twenty minutes.’ She turned and walked back along the aisle.