The Infected with glinting cheekbones galloped toward me, and I swiveled to face him. One of his feet twisted backward, the toe of his boot dragging through the snow, but his wide eyes fastened on me showed no pain. Unlike Freshly-Baked, this Infected’s nerve receptors had already fried. Almost an Overcooked. 

My heart leaped in sickening thumps, and the knife quivered in my hand. If I didn’t sink this blade into his heart on the first stab, I might not get another chance. As he neared me, I sucked in a breath and steadied my hand. He launched himself toward me, and I thrust the blade into his chest. 

The metal glanced off bone, ripped through decomposing flesh…

And missed his heart.

He tottered back a step, blade still lodged between his ribs. His face twisted, skin stretching back to reveal more of his exposed cheekbones. Then he lobbed his arms at my head like swinging a stick at a ball. 

I ducked just in time, snatched one of his ankles, and tugged it toward me. Decomposing sinew squelched beneath my grip. His arms flailed, and he toppled over backward, loose skin pancaking with the force of the fall. 

When he twitched up to sitting, a streak of brown and red imprinted the crisp white behind him. His mouth stretched wide and snapped shut, teeth clacking. 

He lunged for me again.

I lifted a foot and slammed it into his chest. As he tumbled backward once more, I stomped his pelvic bone into the ground. Fingernails clawed at my legs, shredding my already destroyed pants. Fueled by blind desperation, I stomped his sternum. Ground my heel into his face. Stomp, stomp, stomp… 

Crack.

His nose retreated into his skull. Then his head burst open with a bang, and globs of pus sizzled over the snow around him, wafting putrid air. I careened sideways and doubled-over, gagging. 

Sweet Ether, wasn’t contagious cannibalism bad enough? Why did their brains have to explode upon death?

I planted a foot on his chest of the dead — re-dead? deader? — Infected. Then I grasped the hilt with both hands and wrenched the blade free, staggering back with the momentum. 

A scream dragged my attention to the other Infected, who both started with the meatier prize. Greaseball shoved back the Infected with the missing nose, but Maligg jumped on his back and wrapped her legs around his waist. Her teeth sank into his flesh just above his shoulder. With a sick rip, blood spurted from Greaseball’s neck, and he swayed to both sides before flopping over backward.

The hum of the helicopter drew nearer, and search lights swung over the ground in the distance. 

Maligg shoved the corpse off of her and flashed a smile that oozed blood. Both Infected locked eyes on me. 

The helicopter would not be in time.

Fear coursed through me in disorienting waves of hot and cold. No panicking, Zafaru, I told myself. Just stay calm and use your brain.

In response, my revered brain summoned an encouraging mantra. 

Shit, I’m fucked. Shit, I’m fucked. Shit, I’m fucked.

I whirled around and darted off through the snow.

I bolted over slopes and grasped tree branches to propel myself forward, chest burning from exertion and frigid air. My eyes scoured the trees for a branch low enough to grab, but the branches around me all loomed high overhead. I yearned for the trusty oak tree where I slept each night in a nest of branches padded with stolen blankets — the opposite direction from where I now headed.

The uneven footsteps and vocalized pants of the Infected gained on me, a crescendoing accompaniment to my blaring refrain. 

Shit, I’m fucked. Shit, I’m fucked.

In a burst of panic, I shoved off a tree to redirect my sprint toward Recluse’s Fortress.

By the time the barbed wire peeked over the horizon, the Infected pounded the ground directly behind me. And when the ground beneath my feet slanted up toward the fence, I could almost feel their breath on the back of my neck.

I scrambled up the hill and leaped.

Freezing metal wire sliced through the battered skin of my palms. Grinding my teeth, I clenched the metal harder and fumbled for a foothold. When my dilapidated boots found purchase, I began to climb.

And a bony hand snagged my ankle.

Jagged fingernails raked my skin, and I vaguely registered the trickle of blood down my leg, hot and then cold as it dampened my sock. Was that enough contact to spread the Infection? I kicked backwards, thrashing against her grip. 

The tattered boot slid off my foot, and I broke free.

I scaled the fence in practiced movements. The two Infected hurled themselves against the fence, rattling the metal, and the wire lacerated my fingers and poked through my bootless sock. Still, my breaths shuddered with relief. 

I paused at the top, readjusted my grip, and edged my feet up close to my hands. Then I lifted my shoeless foot over the top of the sharp barbed wire and eased myself onto the other side of the fence. As I neared the bottom of the fence, I pushed against the wire to spring off into a crouch. 

A wall of stone and mortar soared up from a field of glimmering white. Snow seeped through my sock and stung the skin. My gaze dipped to the cellar door wedged into a dugout near me, and my stomach seized up with hunger pangs. 

No. Not worth the risk. I would just hide away somewhere until the Infected lost interest. Then I could locate my boot and maybe even return to the firepit where I had spilled the rice.

I willed myself to turn away from the temptation.

My eyes remained locked on the cellar door.

This is the last time, I told myself as I trotted through the snow and eased down into the dugout. When I reached the door, my frozen fingers fumbled with the lock on the doorknob, scrolling to a combination now inextricably linked with food in my mind. 

There had never existed a number quite as delicious, quite as irresistible as five-two-seven.

The lock clinked open, and the metal doorknob turned. When I first broke into the cellar months ago, fresh vegetables piled on the shelf to the right and cans and bags stacked high all the way to the back on the right. Now the left side lay bare and the right side half-depleted.

Unease pinched my gut. Before I could lose my nerve, I scurried to the shelf on the right and snatched a can of beans and a sack of rice. I slipped the can into my left pocket, nestled the sack of rice into the pouch of my sweatshirt, and trudged back toward the door. 

As I pushed the door open, I imagined the taste of the beans and rice, the warmth on my tongue, the fullness in my belly. But just outside the door, something shifted beneath my feet.

Ropes snaked up from the snow with a burst of white.

And a net snapped me into the air. 

Panic seized my chest. I kicked wildly, and the rope dug into my back and tangled around my feet. Peering through the net, I followed the rope up to a metal hook protruding high above the door. On the left of the door, a gray pulley system blended with the stone wall. 

Had Recluse built this trap just for me? Where was he now? Did he know I was here? 

What would he do to me?

I forced a deep breath and reached for my switchblade. When I flipped it open, the cold metal dug into the crisscrossing gashes on my numb palm and fingers. Suppressing a whimper, I scraped the blade over the coarse rope.

The blade skidded back and forth uselessly.

I pushed harder and sawed faster. Blood welled up from the cuts and slickened the hilt, but I refused to stop. Gradually, a few strands began to snap.

Then the hilt escaped my grasp.

The blade slipped through the ropes and dropped into the snow below, vanishing with a tiny flurry of white. I pressed bloody palms to my forehead, and the mantra puffed from my numb lips and fogged the icy air before me. 

“Shit, I’m fucked.”

“Yep, you are,” an amused bass agreed.