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  Erika, taken.

  A great gaping ache of loss swelled in his belly. He locked the door with the key Adam had given him, slumped against it, and slid down to sit dejectedly on the floor. Mark was standing nearby, awkward, unsure what to do or say. The wan light from his flashlight barely held off the darkness. Johnny was elsewhere. He’d walked off once the screaming had begun, knowing what it meant. He didn’t want to come and see for himself what was happening. He wanted to be alone. Paul knew how he felt.

  “Is it bad?” Mark asked.

  Paul could only nod. The science block, lost. The fact that the electricity had died meant that Adam hadn’t made it to the generator room. Likely he’d already joined the army of the enemy.

  That left Paul and Mark and Johnny. Three left, against the world.

  I failed, Paul thought. It’s over.

  He was supposed to lead them. Wasn’t that the task he’d taken on? He’d persuaded them to trust him, to put their safety in his hands. And look at them now.

  All those kids. His responsibility. Damn it, he should have known. He should have known not to care about them. At least when he was alone, nothing could hurt him like this.

  The Infected kid in the car was shrieking. An endless, maddening wail, echoing from the blackness beyond the flashlight beams.

  “Shut up!” he screamed at it. “Shut your bloody mouth!”

  It ignored him and carried on. Mark stared at him, wide-eyed, frightened.

  “What are we gonna do?” he asked.

  “What are you asking me for?” Paul cried. “Who do you think got us into this?”

  Mark recoiled from him, wounded by the anger in his voice. “I just … I thought …,” he stammered. Then he hung his head. Tears gathered in his eyes.

  Paul hadn’t realized it was possible to feel worse than he already did. He bit his lip and grimaced at himself.

  “Sorry,” he muttered.

  “S’alright,” Mark muttered back.

  They were silent for a time, listening to the screeches from outside and inside. He could hear Johnny shuffling on the lower level, his shoes scuffing concrete as he wandered aimlessly, disconsolate. After a short while, Mark sat down next to Paul, his back to the metal door.

  “What are we gonna do?” he said again.

  “Stay here, I suppose,” said Paul. “Wait.”

  “Wait for what?”

  Paul shrugged.

  Mark looked at him. “Are you giving up?”

  Paul shrugged again.

  Mark stared ahead into the middle distance. Suddenly he sniffed, and began to cry.

  “I don’t want to die,” he whispered hoarsely.

  Paul felt tears prickle at his own eyes. “Neither do I,” he said. “I was only just working out how to live.”

  Mark sniffed again. “It’s not fair.”

  “What ever is?”

  Paul would have liked to offer him some kind of comfort, but he didn’t have any to give. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair that he’d done his best and failed. It wasn’t fair that Erika had gone out of the world. It wasn’t fair that his parents had died. It wasn’t fair that the world was going to end because a bunch of scientists built a weapon they couldn’t control, all so the government might win another one-sided war. A lot of things weren’t fair.

  But you kept going anyway.

  He felt a small flicker of defiance ignite inside him. He knew this feeling, this despair, this black damp shroud settling on his soul. He’d felt it before, a year ago, when he picked up the phone and heard a voice from South America asking how to get in touch with his aunt. He’d hugged the darkness to him like a blanket then, he’d burrowed into it and hid until it set solid around him, a scabbed shield to protect him from the world.

  But he knew now that the darkness was no friend to him. It didn’t want to protect him, it wanted to keep him to itself. And just when he’d begun to fight free of it, it came at him again, hoping to drag him back.

  No. No, he wouldn’t. What was that whole speech he made on the roof about, if not this? If he caved in now, how spectacularly hollow those words would sound. He remembered how he’d felt when he’d spoken them. They’d come easily because they felt right, they felt true. Because he hadn’t really been speaking to his audience at all. He’d been speaking to himself.

  We have to look out for one another, he thought. Well, there were still two kids here to look out for. He listened to Mark’s sobs and felt ashamed, and he took strength from that shame. Johnny might be able to stand on his own, but Mark wouldn’t make it out there without help. Mark needed him. They needed each other.

  And what about Adam? Adam, whom he’d sent down to the basement, where the janitor might still be lurking. Didn’t he owe it to Adam to at least go looking? Even if the thought of going down there turned his guts to water, shouldn’t he try?

  And suddenly it hit him. The janitor. A memory flashed into his mind, of the janitor leading him through a long hall on their way to the basement. A hall with seven glass display cases. The Osbourne Gallery, they called it, though it was more popularly known as the Hall of Show-Offs. It was where the work of the academy’s most famous former students was displayed. He remembered a model of a molecule, he remembered a book …

  And he remembered an engine.

  “Hey,” he said, and hit Mark’s arm with the back of his hand. Mark jerked out of his sorrow. “What about that engine they’ve got in the Hall of Show-Offs?”

  Mark looked bewildered for a moment, and then his face cleared. “It’s a light aircraft engine.”

  “Well? Isn’t that closer to a helicopter’s engine than a car’s?”

  Mark seemed confused by the sudden note of encouragement in Paul’s voice. “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying that engine might have the kind of spark plugs we need!”

  Mark wiped his nose with the back of his hand. “But we don’t have a pilot.”

  “We don’t know that. I told Erika, I said, ‘Whatever happens, you’ve got to get that pilot to the chopper.’”

  “But she’s gone … they’re all gone. How could anyone get out?”

  “I don’t know. But she’s smart, isn’t she? Why do you think I left her in charge? If anyone could do it, she could.”

  Paul wasn’t entirely sure he believed his own words, but just saying them made it all seem possible. Maybe she was out there somewhere.

  “I dunno …,” said Mark, unconvinced.

  “Well, either way it’s better than staying here till our flashlights die out,” Paul said, getting to his feet. “Honestly, I’m gonna go nuts if I have to sit here listening to that thing in the car screeching for much longer.”

  Mark cracked a faint smile at that. “Are you totally crazy?”

  “What else have you got to do right now?”

  “We could wait,” Mark suggested.

  “Wait for what?”

  Mark chuckled ruefully as he heard his own words thrown back at him. “Yeah, I suppose you’re right,” he said. “Nobody’s coming, are they?”

  “You heard Radley. Everyone’s gonna be way too busy to worry about us.”

  Mark sighed. The shadows were deep on his face in the glow of the flashlight. He held out his hand. Paul grabbed it and pulled him to his feet.

  “What makes you think Erika even did what you said? I mean, she might have just run for it.”

  Paul thought about that for a moment. “I guess I just trust her,” he said. Then he turned away and hollered into the dark. “Hey, Johnny! Get over here! We’ve got a plan!”

  Erika didn’t dare to move.

  The Infected were close, so close. She could hear them prowling nearby. Sometimes she caught a glimpse of them through a gap in the bushes. They slunk along the lawn, or dropped from the walls of the burning science block and thumped away down the path. The air reeked of smoke and the stench of chemicals. Her throat tickled and she wanted to cough, but she swallowed hard and held it down.
/>   The attackers were deserting the building now, climbing through the windows and hurrying away. Some were carrying bundles: children, newly infected and clumsy, who would otherwise perish in the flames before their change was complete. They treated their burdens with appalling tenderness, like mothers with their young.

  Even monsters care for their own. The thought came clearly through the paralyzing haze of fright that trapped her, trembling, where she hid.

  Carson was crammed up under the bushes alongside her, close enough that she could smell his musty flight suit and the sour tang of dried sweat. His eyes darted about and he started at every movement. He was as scared as she was, though he was doing his best not to show it.

  She reached out and grasped his hand. She wanted to comfort him, and she needed comforting herself. His rough, calloused fingers closed over hers, and their eyes met.

  How are we going to get out of this?

  Terrifying as their situation was, she could think more clearly now than when the Infected had first attacked. She’d become accustomed to the fear, and now it sharpened her thoughts instead of muddling them. Survival instinct had taken over.

  Come on, Erika. You’re supposed to be so smart. Figure it out.

  Leaving the bushes was out of the question at the moment — there were still too many Infected nearby — but if the opportunity came, she had to be ready. She peered out between the leaves.

  Now that the lights were out, the campus was much darker than before. Could the Infected see in the dark any better than humans? She didn’t know. The moonlight was too strong to offer much concealment anyway.

  But the moon cast a shadow like the sun.

  She shifted her head so she could see out across the narrow lawn to the wall. The moon was above and behind it somewhere, throwing shadow toward them. Between the smoke-haze and the darkness, the area at the base of the wall was as black as pitch.

  “Carson,” she whispered. She nodded toward the wall. Carson looked across and saw what she meant. “Carson, I have to get you to the sports hall, to the chopper. That’s what Paul asked me to do if anything went wrong.”

  “I can’t run,” he said.

  “Then you can lean on me.”

  Carson suppressed a cough. They were too near the burning building; Erika could feel the heat of it on her skin. They couldn’t stay here much longer, and Carson knew it. She saw it on his face.

  Finally, he nodded. “Alright,” he muttered. “When?”

  When indeed. She judged that most of the Infected had left the science block by now, as she hadn’t seen any pass their hiding place in a while. But her view was restricted by the leaves. There could be an Infected lurking nearby and she wouldn’t see it until she emerged.

  “Hey,” said Carson, tilting his head attentively. “Listen.”

  She listened, and she heard. It was a familiar sound in the Lake District during the day. A sound like gathering thunder, slow-motion explosions in the sky.

  Jets.

  Hope surged inside her. Jets! The air force had scrambled! At last, someone had alerted the armed forces. Now, surely, rescue must come. The army would be here soon, and the Infected would be driven back, and —

  The look on Carson’s face stemmed her excitement. Why wasn’t he excited? He looked grimmer than ever.

  The jets roared closer, passed overhead and went south, off down the valley.

  “They must have seen the fire!” she whispered. “They must ha —”

  She was interrupted by an enormous detonation, a great deep wave of sound that rolled along the valley from the south. As one, the Infected screeched, a deafening buzz-saw cacophony, shrill with feedback. Erika clapped her hands over her ears. The sound of their outrage was unbearable.

  “Come on,” said Carson, tugging her. “If there’s any time, it’s now.”

  They scrambled out from under the bushes, onto the raised lawn at the back of the science block. Mercifully there were no Infected close by. Twenty yards separated them from the wall, ten of them in shadow so deep it was like ink. Carson threw his arm over Erika’s shoulder and they hurried across the lawn and pressed themselves against the bricks.

  Now she could see what had caused the commotion. Down the valley, high up on a ridge, flames rose into the night. The weather station — no, the biological weapons facility — had been obliterated.

  There could have been people in there. People like Carson and Radley.

  And then she knew why Carson had looked so grim at the sound of the jets. The infection was far too dangerous to risk a rescue at ground level. This was how they’d handle it: purge it, destroy everything, and hope that nothing got out.

  “And that’s why we didn’t call for help on the chopper radio,” Carson muttered. “Best hope they don’t come back to ‘rescue’ us.”

  There would be no help from the armed forces. No help from anyone. If they were getting out, they’d have to do it themselves.

  The Infected that she could see beyond the science block were in a frenzy. They all ran in one direction: south, toward the main gate, toward the weather station. There must have been plenty of Infected still inside when the missiles hit. Enough that their deaths were felt even this far away.

  Good, she thought bitterly. See how it feels.

  She pulled on Carson and they got moving, hurrying along the base of the wall, sticking to the deep shadow. The sports hall was not far, and it backed up against the wall in the same way the science block did. The Infected all had their eyes fixed on the burning weather station, and they howled and screeched and ran like mad things. None of them saw two furtive figures heading in the other direction, hugging the wall like mice scampering along a baseboard. None of them saw those figures slip out of the shadow and climb into the sports hall through the same window Paul had smashed a short while earlier.

  There were a hundred of them out there, but none of them saw.

  None of them, except one.

  “Go!” said Paul, and they ran.

  The night screeched and sawed with the jagged cries of the Infected. The creatures lurched and leaped, blue eyes fixed on the flaming ruin of the weather station high on the ridge in the distance.

  Paul didn’t know the source of their distress. He’d been inside when the jets had done their work, and even now the parking garage blocked his view of the south end of the campus, where the Infected were gathering to rage and lament. All he knew was that there were none to be seen on the short run between the garage and the school building, and it was a chance he wasn’t about to pass up.

  Johnny and Mark ran with him, flash bombs and Molotovs ready. Some distance away they saw a half dozen Infected, but they were all heading south, and none so much as turned their heads. Paul heard a long howl from somewhere near the lake, and with a chill he knew it must have come from the monstrous dog that had taken Mr. Sutton.

  They’d come out ready for a fight. The idea was to throw down flash bombs and escape into the school while the enemy was paralyzed. To their amazement, they didn’t need to. The Infected were so distracted that they reached the school unseen.

  The heavy main doors hung ajar. Something large had ripped them open at some point during the night. They slipped inside and into the foyer, where they leaned against the wall and caught their breath.

  “What’s happened out there?” Johnny whispered.

  “Whatever it was, it really stirred them up,” said Mark.

  “I thought they were machines? Machines don’t get angry.”

  “They’re not just machines. They started as humans, remember?”

  “Yeah,” said Johnny. “Been trying to forget that.”

  Paul slipped across the foyer and peered carefully down a corridor. In contrast to the bare and modern interior of the science block, the school was old, with arched doorways and groined ceilings and stone molding on the walls. With only the moonlight through the windows to see by, it was cloaked thick with shadows.

  “This way,” he whi
spered.

  They crept down the corridor. From outside they could hear the shrieks of the Infected, where once there would have been the shouts of kids playing at lunch break. From within, they heard nothing.

  “You think the Infected are all outside?” Mark asked as they passed a doorway into yet another empty classroom.

  Paul didn’t reply. He remembered the last time the Infected had all seemed to disappear. Then, they’d simply been waiting for the right time to attack. He wouldn’t underestimate them again.

  They stopped at every corner, every doorway, to check for signs of the Infected. All they found was a ripped blazer, a discarded shoe, an overturned chair. The Infected had been through here, but apparently they hadn’t stayed.

  “I really don’t like this,” Johnny muttered. “I’d almost rather we saw a couple of them. At least we’d know where they were, then.”

  Paul knew the feeling. The tension was agonizing. He kept a flash bomb in one hand and a gas lighter in the other, waiting for the moment when he’d hear a screech and something awful would lunge from the shadows.

  That moment had still not come by the time they reached the Hall of Show-Offs.

  The long hallway stretched away from them, seven glass display cases evenly spaced down the center. Paul saw the engine immediately, but he stopped and checked again before he entered. This whole thing still didn’t feel right.

  They gathered around the engine in the gloom. It had been kept in pristine condition, every part polished and looking new. Paul read the plaque by moonlight.

  XR-300 Engine for Light Aircraft. A revolutionary design offering fuel efficiency 9% greater than other models of the time. Designed by J. Harvey Ostermann.

  “Well, J. Harvey Ostermann,” Paul muttered. “I hope you used the right sort of spark plug.”

  Mark was examining the glass case. There was a lock securing it to the base. “How do we get in?”

  “Stand back,” said Johnny, pulling out the iron bar from his belt and raising it, ready to swing. When they stared at him in amazement, he said, “What? Anyone got a better idea?”