Contagious

So where had they gone?

The tent flap opened. A soldier walked in, shirtless, wearing boots, fatigues and a white bandage around his left shoulder. In his right hand, he carried his M4.

“Speak of the devil,” Corporal Cope said. “Dustin, how you feeling?”

“Fine,” Dustin said. “I’m here to see the colonel.”

Ogden put down his coffee mug. “You’re wounded, son, and you’re out of uniform. I told Doc Harper I’d come see you.”

“That’s okay, Colonel,” Dustin said. “I came for you. You’re the one we need.”

“You get your a.s.s back to bed, Private Climer,” Ogden said. “I’ll talk to you there. I don’t want you out of Doc Harper’s sight, understood?”

Climer stood tall and gave an exaggerated salute. “Sir, yes sir! Doc Harper is right outside, sir!”

The kid was acting strange. Painkillers? Climer walked closer to Corporal Cope. The tent flap opened again and two men entered: Doc Harper and Nurse Brad. Doc Harper’s nose was broken, white bone jutting up from a red gash. And yet he was smiling. Nurse Brad was smiling as well, his mouth hanging open at a strange angle. Drool dripped from his jaw, swinging in a long, glistening strand when he moved.

“Sir!” Climer screamed. “We are here on a recruiting trip, sir! We want you to be all you can be!”

It all clicked home. How could he have been so stupid? Roznowski had let Climer live. The gunshot to the shoulder had just been camouflage to keep Climer under the radar as the disease took him over. That meant the disease was now contagious.

Charlie Ogden reached for his sidearm.

Nurse Brad and Doc Harper rushed forward.

Dustin Climer whipped his M4 in a horizontal arc, catching the slow-reacting Corporal Cope in the throat. Cope fell off his stool, coughing.

Ogden fired two shots. The first one went wide. The second one hit Doc Harper right in the forehead just as Brad connected with a flying tackle. Nurse Brad was a big, strong, young soldier, and the hit rattled Ogden’s middle-aged body. As they crashed to the ground, Ogden heard Climer rushing toward them. Ogden tried to bring the gun around, but Brad grabbed his wrist with both hands. With his free hand, Ogden jammed his thumb into Brad’s right eye. The eyeball popped, spilling clear fluid onto Ogden’s hand.

Nurse Brad didn’t let go.

He didn’t stop drooling.

He didn’t even stop smiling.

Another hand tore the gun free and pinned Ogden’s arm to the ground. Something slammed into his stomach, and he suddenly found himself unable to draw a breath. Ogden tried to kick, tried to pull, but he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t fight against the two young soldiers pinning him down.

Climer’s face seemed to float over his own, backlit by the tent’s lights.

“Sir, yes sir!” Climer said. “I want you to get your mind right, sir!”

Ogden felt hands on the sides of his head, holding it so he couldn’t turn in either direction. Climer straddled his chest. His right hand held Ogden’s forehead, pinning his head to the ground. Climer’s other hand grabbed his chin—hard—and pulled his mouth open.

Then Climer leaned forward, leaned close.

Ogden would have said, What the f.u.c.k are you doing? if he could have breathed, if he could have moved his mouth, but he couldn’t do either. All he could do was growl from deep in his throat.

Colonel Charlie Ogden saw Climer’s tongue. Swollen. Covered in blue sores.

Triangular blue sores.

Climer’s lips closed around his own, and Climer’s tongue dove into his mouth. Wide-eyed in shock and confusion, Ogden tried again to get away. He tried to bite down but could not—Climer’s strong hand held his lower jaw open.

Ogden felt the hot wetness of Climer’s tongue fishing around inside his mouth. He felt the sting of a hundred needles.

Then he felt the burning.

Climer sat up, looked down at him, wiped his lips with the back of his hand and smiled.

Ogden’s mouth was on fire.

“It won’t be long now, sir,” Climer said. “Not long at all.”

WELCOME TO DETROIT

“Mister Jenkins, are we there yet?”

“I think we’re close, Chelsea,” Mr. Jenkins said.

Chelsea was tired of driving. She followed along on the map. The long trip from g.a.y.l.o.r.d, then driving all over the city, looking for just the right place. The Winnebago rolled down an empty St. Aubin Street. Headlights played off abandoned buildings and lit up broken pavement. A light wind blew wisps of snow, invisible until they crossed in front of the headlights, then invisible again as they swept past. Even with a couple of inches of snow, they saw trash everywhere: newspapers, Doritos bags, chunks of broken wood, piles of broken bricks speckled with bits of mortar like ocean rocks dotted with barnacles.

“You wanted a secret place,” Mr. Jenkins said. “I think this area will do. This is the kind of Detroit we’ve been looking for.”

“There’s no one down here,” Mommy said. “It’s like a ghost town. You’d think there would at least be homeless, squatters.”

“Winter is hard on them,” Mr. Jenkins said. “Looks like these buildings don’t have electricity, so no heat unless they build a fire.”

“What about gangs?” Mommy asked. “Will we be safe here?”

Mr. Jenkins shrugged. “Pretty much. Look around you. What are the gangs going to do here? Freeze their a.s.ses off, that’s what. If we get out of sight and stay out of sight, we should be okay. It’s like most cities, I bet—you don’t f.u.c.k with people, people don’t f.u.c.k with you.”

“There’s that naughty word again, Mister Jenkins,” Chelsea said.

Mr. Jenkins hung his head. “I’m sorry, Chelsea.”

The Winnebago turned right on At.w.a.ter Street. On their left was a small, mostly empty marina opening onto the Detroit River. Ahead on the right, they saw a lone three-story brick building surrounded by vacant lots filled with rubble, broken fences and tall gra.s.s weighed down by snow. A faded blue band ringed the top of the building, flecked with reddish-tan where spots of original brick showed through. The words GLOBE TRADING COMPANY were painted on the blue in faded white letters.