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ACROSS THE FAYETTE COUNTY LINE, PENNSYLVANIA
They moved across the quarantine zone alone and in packs. In the ragged, bloody, and fire-blackened clothes of farmers and tourists, travelers and news reporters. A few wore National Guard BDUs. They moved together, weeping, crying out in unending pain from bites that had torn through skin and muscle, or from blistered burns that bubbled on skin that had been touched by the hellish heat.
They staggered away from the flaming pit where the Starbucks had been, and away from the blackened shells of their cars. They left behind friends and family members.
Those that could run, did.
The rest limped and shambled and crawled.
Away from the bombs and the bullets and the things that bit.
None of them had a plan, or a direction. They simply fled.
And the dead followed after.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO
STEBBINS LITTLE SCHOOL
STEBBINS, PENNSYLVANIA
Trout and Dez sat in the principal’s office. Mrs. Madison had found a blanket and wrapped it around Dez’s shoulders, but rainwater dripped from her clothes and pooled on the floor beneath her chair. Trout pulled his chair close and sat with his hand on her knee. He thought she’d object to that, but after a while she squeezed his hand.
Mrs. Madison sat across from her. Uriah Piper and Jenny DeGroot were in the office as well. No one else.
“It was Gerry Dunphries,” said Jenny.
Dez looked at her. “What?”
“He was supposed to be helping in the kitchen, cutting open cereal boxes, but when I looked up he was gone. I figured he went to the bathroom, or…”
“Or what?” asked Trout.
“Or needed to find a quiet place to cry.”
Everyone tried not to look at Dez, but one by one they did, and it made Trout winced.
Mrs. Madison tried to console her, “Please don’t think you’re in any responsible for what Mr. Dunphries did. He was deeply distraught by everything that’s happened and—”
“Fuck him,” Dez said quietly.
Mrs. Madison blinked. “Pardon?”
“Fuck Gerry Dunphries and fuck his being ‘distraught.’”
“That’s—”
“And fuck you for whatever you’re about to say,” she said. “I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want to hear any bullshit from anyone. Dunphries opened that window and he got three kids killed. End of story and may he burn in hell.”
“That’s hardly fair,” said Piper.
“It’s unrealistic,” agreed Mrs. Madison. “Shock can induce many different degrees of psychosis.”
“Since when are you a psychologist?” sneered Dez.
“Since I got my MA in psychotherapy and child counseling before you were born.”
“Yeah? Well fuck your MA, too.”
