Mira Grant - Deadline

“I never said I was the smart one. Thoughts?”

“These places are designed as kill chutes—they’re supposed to herd you deeper, so the infected can be picked off easily and the uninfected will stand a chance in hell at getting themselves to safety.” I gestured back toward the conference room with my pistol, keeping my flashlight pointed down. “We walk this way and hope we trip over a maintenance guy.”

“And if we don’t?”

“Then we hope we trip over an exit.”

“This plan sucks.”

“I know.”

We started back down the hall, me leading, Becks so close behind that her shoulders brushed mine every time she turned to do another sweep behind us. George had gone silent again. That was good; that let me narrow my focus until there was nothing that mattered but the sound of our slow progress. Field training involves learning how to step lightly and breathe slowly, so as to reduce your auditory impact on the environment. Viral amplification doesn’t give zombies superpowers, but it makes them really focused. Consequentially, they’re occasionally capable of feats of tracking that seem to border on the unnatural. They’re not. They’re just incredibly good at homing in on the little things. The little things are what get people killed.

We hit the first corner. I spun around it, raising my flashlight to light up the entire hallway ahead. What it cost us in night vision was more than balanced by its effectiveness as a defensive weapon: The retinal condition that kept George behind prescription sunglasses for most of her life is universal among the infected. They can adjust to going out during the day, but they always prefer to stay in the dark when possible, and having a flashlight shine directly into their eyes is never fun.

An empty hall greeted my sweep. I lowered the flashlight. “Clear,” I said, and we walked on, following the gently herding design of the CDC building. We were walking into a kill chute. Sadly, it was the smartest thing we could do. Going the other way would just take us farther from any help that might be waiting for us—assuming there was any help to be had.

We repeated the same procedure at the next three corners we reached. Each time, I spun around to blind any lurking infected with my flashlight, while Becks watched my back and got ready to start shooting. Each time, the light revealed nothing but featureless, utterly empty hallway. The white walls glimmered like ghosts through the dimness as we walked. My skin crawled, claustrophobia and paranoia beginning to speed my heart rate. Not enough to put me in danger of panic, but enough that I could feel it rising. From the way Becks’s breath was starting to hitch—just a little, every third inhale—she was in a similar state. It’s not the action that kills you. It’s the waiting .>

At the very next corner, the waiting ended.

It started out like the turns before it: Becks braced to shoot, while I stepped around the corner and swept my flashlight over the hall. Only this time, the hall in front of us extended for only about five feet before splitting into a T-junction… and this time, something up ahead and to the left responded to the light with a moan. It was still out of sight around the turn, but that didn’t matter; once you’ve heard the moaning of the infected, you never forget it. It’s the sort of sound that hardwires itself into your primitive monkey brain, and the message it sends is simple: run.

I took a hasty step backward, keeping my flashlight pointed in the direction of the moan. It wouldn’t ward off the infected—nothing stops a hungry zombie once it has an idea of where a free lunch can be found—but the pain would slow them down. “Becks?”

“Yeah?”

“Is the other direction clear?”

“I think so.”

“Good. Becks?”

“Yeah?”

“Run.”

There was no grace or artistry in our flight. Becks was running almost before the word was out of my mouth, waiting only for the confirmation that I didn’t have a better idea, and I was only half a heartbeat behind. We ran as fast as we could, our footfalls echoing off the walls around us and making it impossible to tell whether we were running for safety or into the arms of another mob. The moaning started behind us, distant at first, but growing louder with bone-chilling speed. That’s one thing the old movies got wrong. Real zombies—especially the freshly infected kind—can run .

Call for help!

“What?” I gasped, still running. Becks shot me a look. I shook my head, and she returned her attention to the serious business of running for her goddamn life.

You have a phone! Think, Shaun!

It was hard to focus on running and think about what George was trying to tell me at the same time. She was always the smart one, and that’s held true even now that she’s nothing but a ghost in my machine. I struggled to make sense of her words, and nearly stumbled as it hit me.

“Oh, mother fuck, ” I said, causing Becks to shoot me another sharp look. “Becks, I need you to buy us some time. Don’t worry about the interest rates.”

“Got it,” she said, obedience winning out over confusion. She turned to face the direction of the moaning, still pacing me down the hall. If she tripped, it was all over, but that didn’t seem to bother her. Her hands were steady as she pulled a ball-shaped object from her belt. The motion was followed by the distinctive sound of a pin being pulled, and then she flung the grenade in the direction of the moaning. She whipped around as soon as she let go, grabbing me by the arm. It was her turn to haul me down the hall, and she did it wne-chillindmirable force. “Run!”

I ran.

The grenade Becks had thrown exploded about six seconds later. It wasn’t a big enough boom to come with a back draft but it was big enough to fill the hall briefly with light. I risked a glance back over my shoulder. The walls were burning. That should be enough to slow the infected for at least a little while. “Cover me,” I said.

Becks nodded, slowing enough to let me pull a few feet in front of her before speeding up again, holding a position about a foot and a half behind me. I felt like a total shit putting her between me and the danger we knew, but I needed the breathing space. It might be the one thing that could save us.

Fumbling an ear cuff from my jacket pocket without dropping my flashlight wasn’t easy, especially not at a dead run. Somehow, I managed. I slammed the ear cuff into place, pressing the Call button as I snapped, “Secure connection, command line ‘Hi, honey, I’m home,’ open channel to Alaric Kwong.”

The ear cuff beeped. For a long, undying moment, the only sounds were footsteps, harsh, exhausted breathing, the distant moans of the infected, and the overstrained beating of my heart. We couldn’t run forever. Eventually, the kill chute was going to close, and if we were in the wrong place when that happened…

The ear cuff beeped again as Alaric came on the line: “Secure connection confirmed, please verify your identity before I hang up on you.”

“Fuck you, Alaric, I don’t have the time to remember some stupid code word.” That was a lie: “some stupid code word” was the current call sign. If the CDC was recording, which they probably were, this might make them think our security wasn’t as good as it really was. I could hope, anyway. “We’re in a little bit of trouble here. Is the Doc there?”

“Shaun? Why are you breathing like that? What’s—”

“I need you to put the Doc on the line right fucking now, Alaric, or you’re getting a goddamn field promotion! Am I making myself clear, here, or do I need to get footage of the zombies trying to eat our asses?”