The highway unfurled before them like a gray scar through autumn-painted hills Jimmy kept the Suburban at a steady fifty-five, the Duramax humming beneath them, a mechanical heartbeat in the silence. Twenty miles behind them, the city burned. They could see the smoke smeared across the sky, a dark bruise on the horizon.
No one had spoken in an hour.
Ashley sat in the passenger seat, her knees drawn up, her arms wrapped around them. She'd stopped crying somewhere around the county line, but her face was still pale, her eyes still hollow. Every few miles, she'd glance in the side mirror, watching the smoke shrink, and then look away. Her pale blue scrubs were wrinkled and stained, dark patches of blood dried stiff in places. The fabric clung to her in ways that outlined the curve of her chest, and where it sagged from being wet, a hint of cleavage was visible above the v-neck. She didn't seem to notice or care.
Nick was in the back, surrounded by supplies, his shotgun across his lap. He'd been cleaning it obsessively since they left the shop, breaking it down, checking the action, loading shells, repeating the process. A nervous habit. A way to keep his hands busy while his mind tried to process what they'd seen.
Jimmy's hands were steady on the wheel. They had to be. If he let himself think about the little girl, about the way her filmed eyes stared into his, about the strength in those small gray hands... he'd lose it. So he didn't think. He drove.
The first sign of trouble came forty miles out.
A tractor-trailer had jack-knifed across both southbound lanes, its cab crumpled against the median, its trailer split open like a tin can. Cargo littered the asphalt. Boxes of electronics, household goods, a thousand useless things scattered in the wind.
Beyond the wreck, a dozen cars sat abandoned. Doors open. Some still running, their exhaust plumes rising thin and white into the cold air.
And among the cars, figures moved. Slow circuits. Aimless wandering. Heads turning in unison as the Suburban approached.
"Shit," Nick muttered.
Jimmy was already slowing, scanning for options. The shoulder was narrow, rocks on one side, a steep drop on the other. Going around meant leaving the road, and the Suburban could handle it, but the terrain was unknown.
The figures were turning now, those dead eyes fixed on the truck. One of them, a man in a bloodstained flannel shirt, started walking toward them. Then another. Then more.
"Jim," Ashley said.
"I see them."
He made a decision. The shoulder. It had to be the shoulder.
He cranked the wheel, and the Suburban lurched off the pavement, tires spitting gravel. The terrain was rough with scrub brush and loose rock, but passable. He pushed the speed up, fighting the wheel as the truck bounced and slid.
In the rearview, the figures reached the edge of the road. Some kept coming, stumbling down the embankment after them. Others stood at the edge, watching, those dead eyes tracking the retreating vehicle.
One of them, the man in flannel, was faster than the others. His gait shifted from shuffle to run, his arms pumping, his dead face never changing. He closed the distance, gaining on the Suburban's rear bumper.
"Faster," Nick said. "Faster, faster, faster."
Jimmy floored it. The Duramax roared. The running figure fell back, then dropped to his knees, then disappeared from view.
Ashley let out a breath she'd been holding. "What the fuck was that? Why was he faster?"
"I don't know." Jimmy's knuckles were white on the wheel. "Maybe they're changing. Evolving. Getting worse."
"How much worse can they get?"
He didn't answer. He didn't know.
They found a gas station an hour later, a small two pump operation at a crossroads deep in rural country. No cars in the lot. No figures in sight. Just the pump and a small convenience store with grimy windows and a faded sign advertising cigarettes and lottery tickets.
Jimmy killed the engine and listened. Nothing. Just wind and birds and the distant hum of nothing.
"I need to check it out," he said. "See if the pumps are working. Grab supplies if the store's got anything."
"I'm coming with you," Nick said.
"No. Stay with Ash. Keep the engine running. If anything moves, anything at all, you honk and you drive. I'll find my way back."
Nick didn't argue. He just nodded and racked a shell into the shotgun.
Jimmy grabbed the 9mm and stepped out. The air was cold and clean, smelling of pine and gasoline and something else... something faintly sweet and foul, like meat left too long in the sun.
He moved toward the pumps, his footsteps soft on the cracked concrete. The digital displays were dark. No power. But the manual pump handles were still there, still connected to tanks buried underground. He grabbed the diesel nozzle, squeezed.
Nothing.
He tried the other pump. Nothing.
"Fuck," he muttered.
The store's door hung open, swaying slightly in the breeze. He approached it carefully, weapon raised, eyes scanning the shadows inside.
The smell hit him first. The same sweet-foul stench, stronger here. Then the sight.
A body lay behind the counter. A man in a store apron, his throat torn open, his chest cavity hollowed out. His eyes, wide, human eyes, dead, stared at the ceiling. Flies crawled across his face.
Jimmy forced himself to breathe through his mouth. He stepped over the body and started grabbing anything that would last. Canned goods, bottled water, energy bars, batteries. He stuffed it all into a plastic bag and moved toward the door.
That's when he heard it.
A wet, rhythmic sound. Chewing.
Coming from the back room.
He froze. Listened. The chewing continued, accompanied by low, animalistic grunts.
He had a choice. Investigate or leave. The smart move was to leave.
He left.
Back at the Suburban, he tossed the supplies in the cargo area and climbed behind the wheel. "Pumps are dead. Store's got a... one of them, in the back. We need to find another station."
"How far?" Nick asked.
"Next town's twenty miles. Maybe they've got power."
They drove.
The next town was called Millbrook. Population 800, according to the sign. It looked like a ghost town from an old western movie. Empty streets, closed businesses, dust blowing across the pavement.
But it wasn't empty.
Figures stood in doorways, sat on curbs, wandering in slow circles. Some in work clothes. Some in pajamas. They turned as the Suburban approached, their heads tilting at that unnatural angle, their mouths opening in wet, rattling moans.
Ashley pressed closer to the door, her breath fogging the glass. Jimmy kept driving, weaving around the figures, heading for the gas station at the far end of town. This one had cars at the pumps. Abandoned cars, doors open, engines dead. But the pumps themselves... the digital displays were still flickering.
"Power's on," Nick said. "At least for now."
Jimmy pulled up to the nearest pump, killed the engine. "Same drill. Stay here. I'll be fast."
He was out the door before anyone would argue.
The pump worked. Diesel flowed. Jimmy stood there, watching the numbers crawl, watching the figures converge, feeling the seconds tick by like hours. One of them, a woman in a tattered dress, was closer than the others, her gray face fixed on him, her hands reaching.
The pump clicked off. The tank was full.
Jimmy yanked the nozzle out, threw it aside, and dove back into the Suburban. He fired it up and floored it before the door was even closed.
The woman lunged. She bounced off the grille, and tumbled under the wheels. In the rearview, Jimmy watched her rise, watched her turn, watched her start running after them, her gray body streaked with blood from the impact.
Running. The faster kind.
"They're changing," Nick said. "They're all changing."
They drove through the afternoon, through small towns and empty stretches of highway, past abandoned cars and bodies and things that moved in the tree line. By late afternoon, they'd put a hundred miles between themselves and the city.
Jimmy pulled off onto a narrow track that led deep into the woods. A quarter mile in, they found a clearing with an old hunting cabin, weathered but solid, with a padlock on the door.
Nick shot the lock off with the shotgun. They cleared the cabin room by room. It was dusty, musty, but empty. No bodies. No blood. Just an abandoned shelter waiting for someone to need it.
They moved the Suburban into the trees, covering it with branches, and settled into the cabin as darkness fell.
Ashley found a can of soup in the supplies and heated it over a camp stove. They ate in silence, huddled around the small flame, listening to the wind and the creak of trees and the distant, mournful moans that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere.
After dinner, Nick took first watch by the window. Ashley curled up on a dusty cot, her eyes closed but her breathing too fast for sleep. The dried blood on her scrubs had darkened to rust, and the fabric still clung to her in ways that made her look smaller, more vulnerable.
Jimmy sat against the wall, the 9mm in his lap, staring at nothing.
"Jim," Ashley whispered. "Are we going to make it?"
He wanted to say yes. He wanted to lie to her, to give her hope, to make her believe that everything would be okay.
But he'd spent too many years preparing for this moment to lie now.
"I don't know," he said. "But we're going to try."
She didn't answer. After a while, her breathing slowed, and she slept.
Jimmy stayed awake, watching the door, listening to the night.
The moans grew louder. Closer. But they didn't come.
Not tonight.