Fringe & the Dead

by cotillion66

The Fringe team struggles to survive and find answers in the aftermath of a zombie apocalypse. Set early in season 1. AU

36. An Exodus, Part 2

Chapter 36 - An Exodus, Part 2

-August 2009

Peter's sudden announcement hung in the air.

Olivia gasped, her hunger pangs vanishing in an instant, replaced by a surge of adrenaline. "What did you say? Peter, who is it?" she said, rushing across the deck to the ladder and launching herself upward. "What are they saying?"

"I don't believe it!" Peter went on, his voice urgent. "It's a message! Someone's talking!"

"A message?" Broyles said from below. "What does it say, Peter? Can you talk back to them?"

Upon reaching the bridge she found Peter standing in front of the helm, with Gina and Ella seated in either of the leather seats. She squeezed in between Rachel and Lincoln, until she was at Peter's side. She could hear it now, a faint voice speaking slowly beneath the crackle of the radio.

"Turn it louder, Peter," Olivia said. "I can't make it out."

Peter bent over the radio, fiddling with the buttons, and suddenly the yacht's speaker system came to life. A voice spoke beneath layers of crackles of static. It had a slow careful cadence, and sounded vaguely like a woman's, though it was difficult to be certain through the interference.

...is now contaminated. I repeat, turn back. Manhattan is contaminated ground. Do not approach. This is a warning. We have retreated to our... The voice faded in and out beneath bursts of static. ...facility... Delancey Stree... ...ark... ...Jersey... The speaker emitted a garbled hiss, and then the voice resumed. ...This is a warning. Manhattan is now contaminated. I repeat, turn back. Manhattan is...

"It's on a loop," Peter said, lowering the volume. "Just repeating over and over."

"What does it mean, Peter?" Ella said.

"I don't know, but it doesn't sound good," he replied, switching the radio off altogether.

The message continued playing inside Olivia's head. "Contaminated," she said. "What do you think that means. Could it be radiation? Could they have dropped a nuke or something? That might explain the destruction." And put an end to her plan in a heartbeat.

Peter glanced away from the distant shoreline, meeting her gaze. "Not sure, but I highly doubt it was a nuke. The city's in bad shape, but not nearly bad enough for a hydrogen bomb. Even one of the lesser yield types, say a half-megaton, would flatten Lower Manhattan and all of Midtown. Even Liberty Island would have been in ashes, depending on the center of the blast zone. I think we're looking at conventional weapon damage, only really, really, big ones."

"Astute analysis, Peter," Walter called up to them. "And I agree. I'm all but certain we're seeing the effects of a large-scale bombardment by multiple high-yield warheads, similar in functionality but larger and more powerful than those employed by the United States military in the Vietnam Conflict to clear large swatches of jungle, and to strike fear and terror into the hearts of Charlie as they were simultaneously incinerated and crushed."

"Thanks for that picture, Walter," Peter muttered, but his father wasn't finished.

"You're quite welcome, Peter," Walter continued, grinning up at them. "The heat and pressure wave generated by such weaponry, while just a fraction of that of a hydrogen-type device, would still have been incredible, certainly powerful enough to destroy civilian buildings within the blast radius, and cause considerable damage even to hardened structures such as the steel construction of a skyscraper."

"Okay, then what kind of contamination could the message be referring to then?" Olivia said. "If it's not radiation, what does that leave? Some kind of chemical or biological contamination?"

"There's simply no way to know," Walter replied, "short of going there and seeing its effects on our bodies. We might then be able to reason it out. But, unless we're planning to commit mass suicide... I don't recommend we do that."

"Fuck," Olivia whispered, and smacked her fist against her thigh. She heard Ella's sharp intake of breath in response to her foul language, but couldn't manage to care. Her niece had seen and experienced far worse. It was, after all, just a simple word. Sound waves traveling through the air. It was irrelevant, just as they were going to become irrelevant if the infection was left unchecked.

"Before we make any hasty decisions, people," Broyles suggested from the lower deck, "the questions we should be asking ourselves is who left that message, and why. And if they're still there — which I can only assume they must be — what are their intentions? I don't believe I'm speaking only for myself when I say that I could do without another Doctor."

Unsurprisingly, no one disagreed with him.

#

Olivia passed a restless night, wedged into the narrow bed in their cabin beside Peter.

In the morning, she woke to blinding sunlight shining through the porthole beside the headboard. She extricated herself from Peter's arms, then pulled on her boots and slipped out of the room, careful not to disturb him. In the swanky living room, she came upon Walter, snoring on the couch in front of the TV, and a crumpled mass of blankets and a pillow on the carpeted floor in front of the bar. They had gone to bed early, while the others were still speculating on the contents of the transmission, but whoever had chosen the floor as their bed, it seemed she was not the only one to rise with the dawn.

She crept up the stairs, then out onto the lower deck. Harsh daylight greeted her, bright and painful. Seagulls shrieked in the distance, their cries echoing over the water. Shielding her eyes from the sun, she glanced about, and found Lincoln Lee with his back to her, standing in the stern and peering across the water at the ruins of the Manhattan skyline. The boat had rotated during the night, with the stern now facing northward. She cleared her throat as she approached, and he looked back, lowering a pair of binoculars.

"Hey," he said with a nod. "Good morning."

"Morning," she replied with a smile, stepping up beside Lincoln at the gunwale. Over time, he had become more comfortable with her, as if he had finally decided that she wasn't going to tear him limb from limb with her mind powers if he gave her a wrong look. "You're up early, Lincoln."

"Couldn't sleep," Lincoln shrugged. "Believe me, it wasn't my idea." He hefted the binoculars again, rolling the focus in and out for a moment before continuing. "It's funny. I was looking out at the city, and only just realized what's wrong with it. The Twin Towers are missing. Where's your World Trade Center?"

Olivia started. For a second, she'd forgotten he was from another universe. There were bound to be differences, and this must be one of them. "They were destroyed in a terrorist attack in 2001," she explained, focusing on the spot where the Twin Towers had been missing for the last eight years. "I guess that wasn't the case in your world?"

"Destroyed? Damn. No, they're fine. Or they were. The White House was destroyed in the 2001 attacks, along with the Pentagon. That didn't happen here?"

"Sort of. The White House was untouched, but they destroyed one wing of the Pentagon. The DOD rebuilt it, but the Twin Towers were gone, destroyed completely. Thousands of people were killed. You can't see it from here, we were in the middle of building a new, single tower to replace them when the world ended."

Lincoln shook his head. "Huh. This whole thing is a mind-fuck," he muttered after a moment. "The DOD on my world relocated after the 2001 attacks. To there." He nodded toward Liberty Island, now located several hundred yards off the starboard bow. "The Secretary wanted a hardened site, but one not under a mountain out in the middle of nowhere. So, they built a complex below Lady Liberty's skirts. The Secretary and most of his staff are there."

"What's the Secretary like?" she asked, curious about the man who must be similar in some ways to Peter's real father. "Is he anything like Walter?"

"Not even remotely," Lincoln said with a snort. "Sometimes I find it hard to believe they're the same man. Walter is... I dunno, kinda like your crazy old grandpa, only one with the knowledge of several mad scientists in his head. No, the Secretary is... a hard man. Imperious? Stern as hell? They say he was different before his wife died, but I find that hard to believe, too."

"And his son?" she questioned. "What is Peter like? Is he anything like mine?"

"Like yours...?" Lincoln smirked at her use of the possessive, and Olivia's cheeks began to burn. "They're remarkably similar. Both are smart as hell, and both are a pain in the ass. If anything, your Peter seems a little angrier, a little more prone to brooding, though I guess that makes sense, all things considered."

"And the other me and him, they're lovers?" she pressed him. "They're still together?"

Lincoln's gray eyes narrowed. "You're just full of questions this morning, aren't you?" he said. "Is there a particular reason you want to know? You worried about something?"

"No, I'm just... satisfying my curiosity."

He pursed his lips, then sighed. "It's an on again off again thing with them. They have a child together, but can barely have a civil conversation half the time."

"They... have a... a child?" she stammered.

"Yep. A little boy. He should be about two by now, I think. An accident, you might say. Not thinking with the right heads, those two." Lincoln shook his head, leaning forward against the railing.

Olivia studied his profile for a moment, catching something bleak in the depths of his gaze that set off a spark of intuition. He was in love with the other her. But it was a one-sided thing, with him destined to observe silently from afar. How sad, she thought, thinking of Peter.

She and Peter. Were they together in every universe? An unsettling sensation went through her at the idea, the feeling that she was little more than a puppet, with invisible strings tied to arms and legs, and around her heart, tugging her emotions this way and that. I'm my own person, she insisted inside her head, sending the thought out into the void. I make my own decisions, fall in love with who I want to.

If anything out there heard her silent plea, they gave no sign of it.

#

The sky brightened, and as it did so, it became clear that Olivia's worry the prior night was much ado about nothing. For peeking out between the gaps of shattered buildings, the Massive Dynamic building gleamed faintly through a thin fog that lay over the city.

She stood forward in the prow, studying the monolithic structure off in the distance as the yacht chugged westward toward the New Jersey shore. Massive Dynamic was there. It was still standing. Not all was lost, yet. Though with the specter of contamination hanging over the city, venturing into Manhattan itself seemed liked an extremely bad idea. At least until they knew more. And knowing more meant investigating the origin of the strange warning. They would all go, it had been decided when the others finally made their way on deck. No more fracturing of the group. No more splitting up.

Lincoln Lee guided the Coy Mistress into an open space along a wide pier jutting out into the water, idling her neatly between a capsized yacht that was even larger than theirs, and the blackened hull of a Coast Guard cutter that had run aground. The ship looked as if it had suffered a direct hit by a stray missile. The mid and lower aft decks were torn and gouged, strips of metal curling outward as if some giant creature had burst forth from below. Strewn among the wreckage, bodies wriggled and writhed, pierced by spikes of hull shrapnel. And some did not. Some were burned down to the bone, bleached white by the unforgiving sun. Perhaps two dozen infected tottered along the wharf, each in varying stages of decay, though all were long past freshness.

"Gruesome," Ella whispered as they came to a rocking stop.

Olivia glanced down at her niece, standing beside her at the gunwale. She wore a pink t-shirt with Uncanny Valley Girl written across the front in cursive lettering. Where Rachel had found the shirt, she knew not, but its connotation was rather creepy, in her opinion. Gruesome indeed. "Stay on board, Ell," she said, reaching up and sliding her sword free of its sheath. "Just until we have the area cleared. Then stay with the group."

"Aunt Liv, when can I get a sword like yours?" Ella was giving the razor-sharp blade a worshipful look.

"When you're a bit older, kiddo," Peter said, ruffling her long hair. "For now, why don't you just stick with the twenty-two."

Strapped to Ella's waist was a small handgun; a .22 caliber Beretta they'd found among the asylum's cache of weapons. Gina carried a similarly sized gun, though with more reluctance. Both girls had been practicing with them before they'd left Worcester behind, but today they were under strict orders that the guns were reserved for last resorts only, though what exactly a last resort constituted was less clear.

"You girls ready?" Olivia asked, shifting her gaze past Peter to Astrid and Claire on the other side. Her former assistant hefted the old crowbar, the crowbar Peter and she had once fought over. Beside Astrid, Claire fingered the edge of her wicked-looking machete.

Both women nodded, readying their weapons. "Ready as I'll ever be," Astrid muttered, eyeing the infected on the wharf.

Their arrival had finally been noticed. Olivia counted eight bodies stumbling toward them, with several more beyond, emerging from behind a row of plain warehouse buildings, each with low, triangular roofs. A sign on the corner of the nearest read United State Army Corps of Engineers. Heavy equipment was staggered about the pier, cranes and lifts, once used to unload Corps ships, but never again.

"Be careful, Liv," Rachel called down from the bridge beside Lincoln.

"Yes, do be careful, son," Walter added from where he stood off to one side with Broyles and Gina, wringing his hands together.

Peter grunted at this, rolling his eyes. Instead of replying, he vaulted onto the gunwale, then leapt carefully across the gap onto the dock, where he grabbed several thick ropes coiled nearby and began tossing them aboard for Broyles, who went about securing the yacht to the pier. When they were finished, he whipped his sword free, eyeing them with a grin. "You ladies coming or what?"

Astrid and Claire exchanged glances, then each made the jump from the rocking ship safely. "We can't let you have all the fun, can we, Peter?" Claire said as they joined him on the pier.

"Wait until we have the area secured," Olivia told Broyles, who nodded once in reply. "And see you soon, munchkin," she said to Ella, before making her own leap onto the dock and hurrying to Peter's side.

"I've got your back," he said softly, eyeing her sideways as the infected approached.

Olivia nodded, and they started forward to meet the undead stumbling toward them in a ragged line. "Stay together, you two," she said to Astrid and Claire as the two women separated themselves from her and Peter, giving them room to use their swords. "And don't let them surround you."

It was probably unnecessary instruction, but how long had it been since any of them had been forced into open battle with the infected? Without the asylum fence between them? Months, at least. In an unspoken agreement, their speed increased as the distance between the living and undead halved, then halved again, from a brisk walk to a slow trot, and finally to an all-out sprint, weapons raised as if they were medieval foot soldiers advancing on an enemy position. All that was missing were the shouts of rage and battle cries.

The stench of rot and decay filled the air, wafting ahead of the undead. Olivia had time to notice the tarnished badge still pinned to the nearest infected's pleated shirt, and then there was no more time for conscious thought, only for instinct, and action.

Rushing the former police officer, Olivia stepped inside its outstretched arms and rammed her sword upward into the soft flesh beneath its chin. The infected went slack, lukewarm blood gushing over the hilt and her hand as the blade appeared behind its gaping teeth. She ripped the sword free as the body fell, spinning around in time to see Peter yanking his longer blade from a dead woman's eye. Then, neatly pivoting, he lopped another's head from its shoulders with a vicious slice, dark blood spraying a path across the front of his shirt. Not again, Peter, she thought, distantly irritated. On the other side of him, Astrid and Claire were busy, cutting and stabbing their way through a small mob that was doing its best to encircle them.

She rushed to their aid, chopping through the back of the nearest's skull. The infected collapsed and she spun away with a snarl, tearing her sword free and slicing diagonally across her chest in the same motion, sinking the blade into a mop of graying hair above an ear bedecked with trinkets. Something grabbed her from behind, cold fingers closing on her neck and left shoulder. Heart leaping in her chest, she tried to shake free and saw golden eyes striated with blood, a grayish tongue squirming inside blackened teeth spreading open for the kill. Then a foot of steel flashed before her eyes, emerging from the undead's cheek below its right eye. In slow motion, she watched a thick dollop of blood drip from the sword's angled point, stretching out through the air.

Thank you, Peter, she thought catching his eye for an instant before a shadow fell across his face. Time lurched back into full speed. "Look out!" she hissed, wrenching her sword free and lashing out with her foot. She kicked the dead man's knee out, and the joint gave way with an audible snap. As it fell forward, she stabbed it through the temple, then swept her blade upward, slicing another rushing in from its chin to its eyes.

Abruptly, the space around Olivia was clear except for Peter, who was busy prying his blade free of an undead woman's jaw. Taking in a huge breath, she wheeled around, searching for another target, but there were none, only a circle of undead bodies sprawled on the pavement amid growing pools of blood. She was sure some amount of time had passed, but it felt like the melee had ended as soon as it had begun.

"Everybody okay?" Astrid said, gasping for air. Her face was speckled with blood, and bits of gore were caught in her tight curls. With a grimace, she mopped a hand across her brow, then cringed, scrubbing the blood off on her shorts.

"Good here," Claire said, bending down to wipe the blade of her machete on an infected's rags. "Thanks for saving my ass back there, honey," she added in a shy voice, eyeing Astrid. "That was a close call. I owe you one."

"Hey, anytime, sweetie," Astrid replied, grinning as she reached out and took Claire's hand. "And right back at you."

Olivia glanced at Peter, giving him a thorough once over before meeting his gaze. He was going to need yet another shirt, but that was for later. She lifted her eyebrows in a silent question. He nodded once, before mimicking Claire and wiping his sword blade clean. Doing the same, she found herself smiling at the two women's interaction. Young lovers. She and Peter had saved each other's lives so many times it was almost commonplace. A given. Thanks were no longer required or expected, nor was keeping score. There was no longer any competition between them. There was no reason. They were equal partners with equal shares in their relationship. Looking back, however, it was clear that that hadn't always been the case in her relationship with John, and almost every other relationship she'd ever been in, few as they were. She wasn't sure what that said about herself, and wasn't particularly interested in analyzing it any further.

"They're coming," Peter announced, squinting back toward the yacht.

Straightening, Olivia spotted Rachel and Lincoln leading the others toward them in a tight group with Ella and Gina at the center. "We need to find a vehicle, if we can," she said to no one in particular. "And a map. Unless one of you happens to know where Delancey Street is?"

"We'll get the map," Astrid offered, nodding toward the Army Corps building. "Seems like the kind of place where they'd keep maps on hand, don't you think? C'mon, Claire."

The two women loped off, rubbing shoulders as they went. Peter watched them for a moment, then turned to her with a smirk. "Were we ever like them?" he asked, shaking his head.

"You know we were, or worse," Olivia replied absently, glancing around the pier. Other than heavy equipment, not a single car or truck was in sight. "We need a vehicle, Peter. Or we're going to have a long walk ahead of us."

"I'll see what I can do. Meet me out front when everyone's ready, or I'll come find you first."

She nodded and a moment later he was gone also, hurrying through an open gate in the fence surrounding the Army Corps wharf. When the others arrived with all their gear, she assured them that everyone was okay, particularly Walter, who seemed especially worried for some reason. Astrid emerged with Claire from the warehouse a few minutes later, bearing a wide roll of poster paper in her fist. Her face was excited when they met her at the open gate. In the parking lot beyond, Peter was moving through the few vehicles in the lot and shaking his head as he did so, which was generally not a good sign.

"So, I think we found it, Olivia," Astrid said, unrolling the paper and spreading it wide against the fence with Claire's help. It was a detailed map of the surrounding area, extending all the way down to Staten Island to the south and Manhattan to the north, and as far east as Brooklyn, and Newark to the west. The corners were pin-cushioned with holes as if the map had been put up and taken down repeatedly. She touched a spot on the far side of Newark Bay. "Here. Delancey Street. It's in Newark, like the message said. Maybe five miles from here."

"That's on the other side of the bay," Broyles said with a frown.

"Yeah. And the only way over there from here is this bridge," Astrid said, running her finger over a dark blue line spanning the lighter blue of Newark Bay. "Unless we want to go further north into Jersey City, and that's miles out of our way. Unfortunately, it's the New Jersey Turnpike, so I can only imagine what kind of condition it's in right about now, if the bridge is still even standing. And I think we can forget about driving there across it."

"Why don't we just take the boat? Claire suggested, sweeping a finger with a chipped nail painted with purple sparkles south across the curling map. "We can just take it south into Newark Bay and skip the whole walking part altogether."

Lincoln shook his head. "I don't think so. The way into the Kill Van Kull was blocked by a crap-ton of wreckage. I saw it on the way north last night. It looked like there was some kind of blockade across the mouth of the channel, and a few idiots in container ships decided that ramming their way through was a good idea. Didn't turn out too well for them. It'd be a shame to rip the hull off of that beautiful boat, almost as much as it would be to sink, when we're this close."

Olivia leaned in close to the map. There was another line over the Newark Bay, just north of and running parallel to the Turnpike; a thin black line with perpendicular hatches. "What about this?" she said, running her finger over the line. "It's a rail line, but we should be able to cross there, also assuming it's still standing."

"That's as good a suggestion as any," Broyles said, then glanced around. "Where's Peter?"

"Trying to find us a vehicle," she replied. "I don't think he's having much luck."

It was an understatement. When they met Peter in the Army Corps parking lot, he was in a grumpy mood, usually reserved for when he'd failed at some task or another. Which, she supposed, in his eyes, he had.

"They've all got flats or they've been siphoned already," he complained, his brows drawn inward in irritation. "Or they're just too small for all of us."

"Then we'll just have to walk, Peter," Olivia said with a shrug. It was not what she wanted or had been hoping for, but when had anything come easy for them in the last year? Of course, they would have to walk. "According to Astrid's map, the street we're looking for is about five miles west of here. We can make it in a couple of hours, if we hurry."

"What about infected?" Rachel asked, glancing nervously between Ella and Gina. "What will we do about them? There's gotta be more than just those few back there around."

There was nothing they could about the infected. And her sister was certainly right to be worried. There were probably thousands, if not millions, of undead within a ten-mile radius of where they were standing. But what other choice was there? They had to find the meaning of the warning they'd heard, and the only way to do that was find whoever was broadcasting it. Assuming they were still alive, of course. That the message was on a loop was a bit worrying, but it took electricity to run a radio, didn't it? And it took people to make electricity. Olivia looked for a flaw in her logic but it seemed sound.

"We'll just have to stay away from them as best we can," she said, slinging her bag up onto her shoulder. "And above all, avoid becoming surrounded." The answer didn't seem to please her sister, but she had nothing else to offer.

#

The journey into New Jersey started out well enough, all things considered. Other than a few infected wandering out from a condominium complex across the street from the Army Corps docks — and quickly dispatched by Astrid and Claire — the narrow road leading west was surprisingly undead free.

Walking in a single-file line, Astrid led the way with the map folded into a tight square. Claire and Lincoln were just behind her, followed by Rachel and Walter and the girls, who each wore wide-brimmed hats to keep the sun away. Broyles limped along in front of Peter, and Olivia had stationed herself at the rear, watching their back trail.

The day had grown steadily hotter, until Olivia could feel the rising temperature through her boots, as if they were walking across a bed of hot coals. The air blurred ahead of them, with the blistering pavement radiating heat in waves. Some kind of head covering had become a requirement, mostly in the form of baseball hats and bandannas, or shirts wrapped about heads like turbans. Rivulets of sweat dripped from Olivia's brow, stinging the corners of her eyes on its way down to the neck of her t-shirt, where a wide ring of wetness stained her collar and then again below the ledge of her breasts. The air was still, windless. It pressed down with a kind of gritty substance that she could feel scouring away the surface of her skin. Other than the scuffing of boot heels on concrete and asphalt, or the occasional skitter of gravel squirting underfoot, there were no sounds at all. No one spoke. The birds had gone silent, the seagulls had long since ceased their endless shrieking.

After a while of this it struck her that there was no green anywhere. The weeds pushing up through the soil came into the world wilted and lifeless. What trees there were in the area had branches mostly shorn of leaves, and those few that remained curled in around the edges, were singed. It came to her that their reality was dying, all of its color bleeding out through some unimaginable wound, leaving only varying shades of browns and grays and blacks in its final death throes, in its last gasps. The silent destruction on the horizon to the north passed in and out of view, adding its silent menace to the equation.

The world is drying out, Olivia thought, gazing down upon a pathetic clump of shriveled plant life in the center of the street. It had forced its way up through a crack, only to find the world scorched and inhospitable. Not for the first time, she found herself wondering how and if such conditions would affect the life growing inside her. Trying to remain properly hydrated was all but impossible. There was only so much water to go around, and others needed it just as much as she did. So, she drank her few swallows, conserving what she could, and when Ella asked for an extra sip, how could she refuse?

When the narrow road they'd been following since the docks turned northward, Astrid led them through a gate in a fence running beside the street, then up a short hill covered in tall weeds. Beyond, at the bottom of a long incline, lay a carpet of brown grass and rolling hills with the sinuous remains of a pond at its center. Surrounding the shrinking waterline were oddly shaped flat areas and pockets of white sand. It took Olivia a moment to recognize that they were crossing over a golf course, one so overgrown that its unnaturalness was all but lost, replaced by the wildness of unrestrained nature. On the far side of one hill that formed a kind of barrier between holes, a long and wide trench was gouged down the center of a wild fairway. Crouched at one end was a back-hoe, black and yellow like a bumble bee and surrounded by a hill of dirt that might have served as its nest.

Bodies filled the trench, thousands of them. She had known it for what it was after a single glance, and was not disappointed. Some of the others were shocked and aghast, particularly Rachel, who yanked the girls away from the edge before they could so much as look inside. Unlike the last such mass grave Olivia had come across, there was no stench in the air, no reeking death boiling out in waves. The bodies inside were shriveled and desiccated, baked and dried out beneath the philistine sun. She glanced at Peter before turning away from the lip, and found his eyes distant and glassy, looking back into the past, just as she had.

They left the mass grave and the former golf course behind, crossing over a field of dried grass that had once been a soccer field, judging by the opposing goal posts at either end. Beyond was a baseball diamond with tall light poles, and then a two-lane street jammed with empty vehicles stacked up in lines that ran parallel to a highway atop a wooded embankment. They had reached the New Jersey Turnpike. The highway was in no better condition than the access road, with cars and trucks spanning every lane, north and south. Even the shoulders were packed with vehicles, creating four lanes of traffic in each direction instead of two.

Olivia wondered how far the traffic went. All the way back to the tunnel under the Hudson? And where had they been going, anyway? For those trapped in the metropolitan area of New York City, there was nowhere, not close by, at least. And certainly not with millions of others all with the same idea.

Upon reaching the median at the center of the Turnpike, they stopped for a rest, taking cover from the glaring sun in the shadow of a long tractor-trailer parked beside the concrete barrier. Bottles of water were passed around, snacks of peanut butter and crackers along with a bag of potato chips. The water was lukewarm, bordering on hot, and the potato chips stale and nearly tasteless, but no one complained. They ate and drank silently, and when it was time to go, Olivia wasn't the only one reluctant to step back out into the oppressive heat. But it had to be done.

Astrid rose first. She took a single step, then gasped, ducking down beside the front tire of green sedan. "Shh...," she hissed, at the same time motioning for them all to stay down.

"What is it, Astral?" Walter said, lifting up despite her warning and swiveling his head back and forth like an owl. He looked fairly ridiculous, with a white t-shirt draped over his head and trailing down the back of his neck. "I see nothing that warrants-"

"Shut the hell up, Walter!" Claire growled softly, jerking him down by his hand. He let out an indignant squawk as she did so, but she was having none of it, silencing him with a glare.

Now what? Olivia thought, making her way past the others with Peter just behind her. Staying low, moving along the median, until she reached Astrid's side. Like all of them, a fine sheen of sweat covered her friend's face. She opened her mouth to ask what the trouble was when she saw it herself, coming toward them through the gaps between the disorderly lines of traffic clogging the southbound lanes.

Infected, dozens of them. Previously hidden by the elongated mass of the tractor-trailer, the dead made a virtual wall across the southbound lanes. Lifting up slightly, she saw that more followed in the first group's wake. Many more.

Fuck... The thought was accompanied by a spike of fear driving into her gut.

"We should stay put," Astrid whispered. "And let them just pass by. There's no reason for them to come over here, if we stay quiet," she added, giving Walter a dark look.

There was a slight bend in the highway, and Peter rose up enough to see over the tops of the cars blocking their view of the northbound lanes. A moment later he dropped down beside her with a curse. "Not a good idea," he reported, his voice tight with a kind of strain Olivia could only interpret as panic. "They're on this side of the median too. A whole shit-load more of them."

"How many more?" Olivia whispered, as the fear became more intense, traveling up her spine. Answering her own question, she lifted up, peering northward over the tops of the vehicles on their side of the barrier. What she saw coming toward her stopped the blood in her veins. Her heart floundered, stuttering in her chest.

The infected horde coming toward them was huge, beyond belief. Easily larger than the horde that had surrounded the lab, the rotting mass of flesh stumbling toward them was at least as big as the one outside the Federal Building so many months ago, and possibly larger. They had fought their way through that one, and had just barely survived. Without children, or an elderly man, or one with a hobbled foot.

She was about to order them back, to retreat off the highway, but then she saw that retreat was impossible. They'd stumbled into the middle of a mass migration. And unfortunately for themselves, the center of the horde had been lagging behind edges, and while they had stopped to rest, those same edges had slowly surrounded their position. Dozens of silent figures were already wandering across the embankment they had just left behind, and to the front also, now, in clear view of everyone. It was a classic pincer movement, and they had walked right into it.

We're trapped, Olivia thought, swallowing down the taste of bile. Soon the center of the horde would reach them, within minutes at best. A sickly sensation swept through her at the sight of freshes waling in the undead's ranks, easily identifiable by their less rigid movements, their pale faces. Rachel let out a frightened hiss behind her, and one of the girls whimpered in terror.

"I've got a really bad feeling about this," Lincoln said, moving up beside them in a walking crouch. "We need to get the hell out of here, like now."

"No... there's no time for that," Olivia said slowly, eyeing the rotting faces as they moved closer. "It's too late. They already have us surrounded." Suddenly, in her mind's eye, she saw Charlie's face beside her, lying on his belly beneath a truck with freezing water flowing beneath as dragging footsteps shuffled past on either side. It could work.

"Then what the hell are you suggesting, Liv?" Lincoln said, gripping her forearm.

"We have to hide," she said, removing his hand from her arm while glancing at the vehicles nearby. "Quick, everyone find a car. Now. Get inside, close the doors, and they should walk right past us."

"Are you insane? What if they don't?"

"They will," she said firmly. "We don't have time for this, Lincoln. Now go!"

Following her order, there was a mad dash to find cars with unlocked doors, and she found herself sharing the interior of a dusty hatchback with Claire. Twisting around in her seat, she found Peter in a dark green minivan the next lane over, with Rachel and the girls ducking into the back row of seats. He met her gaze for a moment through the window, blue eyes burning brightly under the noontime sun, then carefully shoved the sliding side door closed.

Olivia sat back in the driver's seat, replaying the frantic scene from moments ago in her head. Everyone had found a place, hadn't they? She was certain that Astrid and Walter had scrambled into the yellow pickup truck several cars in front of their hatchback and a lane over, and fairly sure that Broyles and Lincoln had done the same with a dusty four-door sedan even further up the line. Or so she hoped. She'd lost track of them at some point, but could only assume they'd done as she'd ordered.

"Tilt your seat back," she said in a whisper. There was no way an infected could hear them, not yet, at least, but it still felt right to do so.

Claire nodded and then did as she instructed, reaching down for the lever at her side. Her face was pale and drenched in sweat, eyes bulging with mounting tension. A moment later they were both stretched out, staring up at the faded gray cloth sagging down from the interior headliner.

The first undead appeared a heartbeat later, an ancient one with gaping holes in the skin of its rotten face. The creature's mouth snapped open and closed as it shambled down the aisle, as if it was dreaming of its next meal. Another soon followed, equally disturbing to gaze upon up close. And then a pale-faced female with dark matted hair appeared in Claire's window. The fresh's gilded eyes roved about, searching.

"Stay still," Olivia mouthed, unwilling to move even a fraction lest she draw its attention.

"Not gonna be a problem," Claire replied, frozen in place, her voice a high-pitched whisper.

Then, as if it had somehow heard them, the fresh paused beside the front tire, head swiveling about. Olivia held her breath and shivered, the sudden goosebumps prickling her bare arms and legs. Blood roared in her ears as the silence stretched out, becoming razor thin.

And then the fresh sauntered on, as if it had merely stopped to take in the view, resuming its leisurely pace southward. Another infected replaced it almost at once, and then another, and another. Minutes passed by, and the streams of undead filing past on either side seemed to have no end. They shuffled slowly along, freshes and older models alike, pausing when the line grew congested, like humans moving through a ride queue at an amusement park.

The air in the cramped hatchback felt like an oven and smelled faintly of mold. Olivia grimaced at a dull ache growing in the middle of her back, where her weight rested atop her sword and backpack. There had been no time to remove either. She noticed tendons standing out on the side of Claire's neck, could feel her body shaking beside her. The woman was terrified, and justifiably so.

"Hey, it's gonna be okay," she said, taking the other woman's hand and squeezing gently. "We're gonna be fine."

"How can you know that?" Claire said softly after an interval.

Olivia considered her answer. "Because I refuse to accept anything less than that," she said finally with a shrug. "Because... we've made it this far, and, I have to believe there's a reason for that."

"A reason? For all this?" Claire's dark eyes shifted to the infected flooding past outside the car. "You really believe that?"

"I... I guess so?" she said, then shook her head, grinning. "I don't know. It sounded a lot better in my head than out loud."

Claire bit off a laugh, snorting softly. She carefully brought a hand up, wiping the corner of one brown eye. Outside their windows, the infected's migration continued, unaware of the prey in their midst. "You know, Astrid used to talk about you a lot. Back when you and Peter were missing. Around the time when I guess the Doctor had you locked in his freak show."

"Oh yeah?" Olivia said, eyeing the other woman askance. "And what'd she say?"

"That she was worried about you guys, mostly, and pissed that asshole Overbeek wouldn't let her go out and look for you. The fucker actually propositioned her — and the rest of us, I guess — to sleep with his men for favors."

Olivia grimaced. "He did?" she asked. "Rachel failed to mention that." Wait. Hadn't one of the men she'd fried with lightning been named Overbeek? If so, then good riddance. "I assume no one took him up on his offer?"

"Nobody but that bitch, Sharon. Though to be honest, I think she might have been sleeping with him long before that." The black-haired woman glanced outside at the infected. "Charlene ended up killing her on the day you escaped," she added in a downtrodden voice. "So many people have died. Christopher. Charlene. Sonia. Juliet. Everyone from my old group is gone. Hell, every single person I knew from my old life is dead. How fucked up is that?" She trailed off, then seemed to shake herself free of her sudden gloom. "Sorry. Sometimes it's just..."

"I know," Olivia said, giving her a warm smile. "Sometimes it's just... too much to comprehend. Too surreal. Like we're living inside of someone else's nightmare."

Claire nodded, leaning her head back against the rest. "It's funny, Astrid told me all about how you brought your family back, about Peter getting shot and how you rescued him. You're a lot different than the ten-foot-tall Amazon woman I pictured. You know, she really looks up to you."

Olivia's face grew hot and she looked away, shrugging uncomfortably. The two of them had never had the occasion to talk one on one before, but Amazon woman?

What the hell do I even say to something like that? All she'd ever done was what she had to to keep her family alive. And Peter also, though falling in love with him hadn't even been a glimmer in her eye back then. Or had it? It was hard to say these days, when it seemed like they were connected, like he was part of her, like they'd been together forever. More than anything, though, she'd been extremely lucky, in both cases. Both outcomes could have easily swung the other way, as it had with Charlie. And Sonia, she told herself. Don't forget Sonia. Never forget Sonia.

Thinking of Peter, she lifted up in her seat and glanced over at the green minivan, only to find him leaning forward in his seat also, in plain view of the infected outside. What the hell was he doing? She thought they were relatively safe inside their respective vehicles, but that was no reason for him to push their luck like that. Keeping her eyes on his profile, she noticed a kind of rigidness to his posture, and the way he was staring forward intently. What are you looking at, Peter? But when she followed his gaze, she found herself leaning forward also, gripping the hatchback's steering wheel hard enough to make the leather creak.

"Oh shit...," Olivia hissed, eyeing the truck where Astrid and Walter had secreted themselves.

"What?" Claire whispered, eyes widening in sudden fear. "Olivia, what's wrong?"

"We have a problem. Look!"

The other woman sat up, then gasped, face paling. "Oh my god. Fuck... Astrid!"

The pickup truck was surrounded by a crowd of undead, and more stopped to investigate by the second. Hands hooked into claws pawed at the windows, scratching, searching for a way in. Pressed close together in the center of the cab were a pair of silhouettes, heads swiveling from side to side. Olivia raked her hair back, watching the scene unfold as the migration continued on all sides. The dead were everywhere her eyes fell, moving down all lanes of traffic, across the shoulders and down the embankments. Hundreds of them. Thousands, maybe. And that was just what was visible. How many were out of sight? Their group was a tiny island in a seething ocean of undead.

Maybe they'll get bored and leave, she hoped silently, a sick feeling twisting her stomach into knots.

Or maybe they wouldn't. She noticed another detail then, one she missed before. And her heart sank.

There was a small gap above the passenger door window, enough for an infected to curl their fingers inside, enough for one of them to get a grip. Enough for them to pull. And they were pulling, she saw with burgeoning horror. The truck began to shake, ever so slightly, leaning to and fro on its suspension. How much pressure were they putting on the window? How much before it would shatter? There were answers to those questions, but she didn't want to know them.

"We gotta do something...," Claire whispered, tears brimming in her eyes. "Oh fuck, we have to help them..."

Olivia shot a glance over at the minivan where Peter was still frozen by the spectacle, eyes glued forward. Look at me, Peter! she screamed in her head. LOOK AT ME! And whether it was a coincidence, or some heretofore undiscovered ability of hers, she cared not, but a moment later Peter looked, glancing her way. He started to turn back, then stopped, jerking back and holding her gaze.

She gave him an intent look, then inclined her head toward the truck, eyes glaring wide. We have to help them, Peter. I know you don't like him right now, but we need Walter. Peter's eyes narrowed, but then he nodded and turned away, speaking to someone out of view — presumably Rachel and the girls.

"Listen to me, Claire," she said, catching her frightened eyes as several infected hobbled by outside the car. "We're getting out of here. Peter and I will help Astrid and Walter, while you help Rachel with the girls. Whatever you do, don't stop. Head west, until you hit the railroad tracks, then follow them south. Stay on them or near them. If you come to the bay before we catch up, keep going as far as you can. Just keep them safe. We'll be right behind you. You can do this, Claire. I know you can."

Claire's lips trembled and Olivia thought she might be on the verge of hyperventilating, if not entering shock outright. If she'd heard a word of the instruction, she gave no sign of it.

I don't have time for this, Olivia thought, then slapped the other woman across the face. It wasn't a very hard slap, but it was hard enough to get her attention.

Blinking, Claire brought a hand up to her face. "You... you hit me...," she said in a daze.

"Did you hear what I said? Help Rachel with the girls. Stay low, hide if you can. Find the railroad tracks to the west and then head south. Can you do that?"

The other woman drew in a long breath, and then nodded. "I can do it. I'm sorry," she said in a determined voice. "Just help Astrid."

Olivia held her gaze. "I will. Now follow me, out my side. Stay low."

She waited for an infected man to pass by, then slowly cracked open her door. The aisle was clear, for a moment, at least. It would be long enough. Reaching back for her sword, she swung out into the gap between lanes. The infected was oblivious, continuing its slow shuffle. Glancing back to make sure Claire was with her, Olivia rushed after the undead man, whipping her sword free and slicing deep into a head of stringy hair that could have been red once upon a time, but no longer. Stepping over the body, she slipped between a pair of bumpers and entered the next aisle, where another infected was approaching, golden eyes huge and starving. More followed over its shoulder, but there was a gap. Twenty seconds, she thought, eyeing the distance between the approaching infected and the next group. Maybe thirty, at the most. It would have to do. Without hesitation, she sprang forward, stepping in close and splitting the dead woman's skull before it could do more than growl. She spun away as the body slumped against a fender, racing back down the aisle past a waiting Claire to the green minivan.

Peter hopped out of the front as she drew near, and the van's slide door slid open. Rachel and the girls were crouching inside. Her sister started to speak, but Olivia cut her off before she could get a word out.

"Rach, Claire is going to help you take Ella and Gina out of here," she said, and quickly repeated the instructions she'd already given Claire. "Peter and I will catch up with Astrid and Walter. Keep moving, and don't use your guns unless you have to, unless there's a fresh. Stop and get Broyles and Lincoln on your way. They're over there somewhere," she added, motioning vaguely to the west.

"I know where they are," Claire said, reaching past her for Gina's hand, who was clearly terrified, but doing her best not to act like it. "Come on, sweetie. It's time to go."

"Are you sure about this, Liv?" Rachel asked, climbing out onto the street.

"No. Not really, but we have no choice, either way." She looked down at Ella and found her calmly studying the lay of the cars and trucks with narrowed eyes. It was a look that might have given her pause another time, but not now. Whatever change was occurring in her niece, not being scared out of her mind at that particular moment could only be an asset. "Help your mom, Ell," she said. "And you'll be fine. Okay?"

Ella looked up, her face both serious and older than it should be. "We'll see you at the railroad tracks, Aunt Liv."

And then they were off, the four of them, retracing the path she and Claire had just taken. Swallowing a lump in her throat, she watched Claire split a dead woman's head down the middle, then turned to Peter. "We have to hurry. We don't have much time."

"Don't I know it," he replied, reaching up and drawing his sword. The blade glinted like fire in the sunlight. "You know we're gonna have to run after this, right? They're gonna be on us the whole way."

"I know it," she said with a nod. Infected were moving all around them, now, and the truck was completely surrounded. Some had sensed their presence, some had not. Some were trying to reach them, working their way back slowly through the maze of cars. "Watch yourself, Peter," she whispered, capturing his eye.

"Right back at you, sweetheart," he said with a smirk that she sensed was covering up a desire to say something else, something more meaningful.

But there was no time, and no words were needed anyway. There were no more secrets between them. Except for her secret, of course, but if they were going to die together, she would rather take it to the grave than to have his last thoughts be of their unborn child whom he would never know. In any case, the time for talking, for professions of love was past.

What would come next was pure violence, and killing.

#

It was a contest, Olivia decided in the back of her mind. She wrenched her sword free of what might have been an elderly man's left eye.

A contest to see who would blink first.

She shoved the body away, and then following Peter's example in the next lane over, vaulted up onto the trunk of the car in the lane to the right of the yellow truck. A downward cut split an infected woman's skull like an overripe watermelon. She raced forward, up over the roof and down onto the hood, leaping past outstretched claws onto the trunk of the next car in line, a black Pontiac sedan. More infected surrounded it, dozens, at least, but she left them behind, clambering over the sedan's roof and leaping onto the back of a teal Mazda. A hand closed about her ankle, nearly tripping her up. With a gritted snarl, she cut the hand off at the wrist, then kicked the dead man to whom it had belonged square in the face. The infected fell back, squirting blood from a toe-sized dent in its forehead. Before another could grab her, she turned and ran, bouncing over the Mazda, then launching onto the back of the next vehicle in line, a silver Honda with an open sunroof.

Pausing on the center of the Honda's roof, she scanned across the highway for her sister and Claire and found them gathered around the sedan where Broyles and Lincoln had been hiding, and from which the two men were busy emerging. Her eyes located Ella and Gina among them, both still okay.

Olivia forced herself to look away, then started forward again. Peter was ahead of her now, stabbing and slicing bloody swatches through the infected crowding the aisle on the driver's side of the yellow truck. It was just ahead. She bounded forward, jumping over the next gap to a beige two-door that she missed the make of. She stuck the landing, finally coming abreast of the besieged pickup truck. At least a dozen or so infected were crammed into the aisle below her, straining to reach Walter — whose frightened eyes were staring out at her through the rear window.

"Agent Dunham!" Walter's muffled voice carried through the crack in the window. "Help us! We need help!"

What the hell do you think we're doing, Walter? she thought, and then got to work.

The sword she carried was a weapon of finesse, and wielding it properly, as it was intended, she could only suspect, was something of an art form. But finesse would do her no good here, only brute force would suffice, like hacking limbs from a tree.

Olivia rained blow after blow down on the infected, again and again, cutting and stabbing and slicing until her arms ached of it, until traces of fire burned through her clenched fingers, her wrists, up to her shoulders, where pain spread across her back. They were impossible to miss, yet as soon as one fell, another replaced it almost immediately. She bore down, spearing an infected woman above its left eye, and then chopped another through the back of its neck. Blood sprayed up in black froth that was the head flopped forward, rebounding off the truck bed. Another slice removed the head altogether and she continued the cut in a wide arc, burying the blade in the face of the infected beside it, shearing through its jaw and part of its nose. Yanking the blade free, she cut away a pair of hands reaching for her feet, then swung again, felling their owner with a downward slice that removed the upper half of its skull. At the same instant, the mistakable crash of shattering glass filled the air.

In the corner of her eye, she saw an infected in a filthy tank top reaching inside the cab of the truck. Walter screamed, his voice filled with fright and Astrid's cry of panic echoed in the background.

"Walter!" Peter was shouting from the other side of the truck. "Walter!"

Olivia stabbed the infected below above its ear, then scrambled to her right, onto the hood of the beige sedan. The dead man's arms and head were already in the cab. A sickly mixture of fear and adrenaline saturated her from the inside out at the sight. No! Walter!

Without thought, she lopped the head off another trying to reach into the cab, then leapt down, reversing her grip on the sword in mid-air and driving it through the center of the creature grabbing at Walter's back. Steel grated against bone until the hilt was stapled against its shirt. Landing hard on her feet, she wrenched the infected out of the cab using the sword as leverage. A chorus of hisses and bubbling rasps that sounded like death itself ensued, as if the infected sensed vulnerable prey was at hand. Operating fully on instincts, she heaved the heavy body down the aisle, shoving it forward like a battering ram into the chest of an infected woman so massive it could barely fit between the aisles. She pulled her sword free as the pair of them went down in a heap with the larger flopping on top of the smaller male, arms and legs flailing grotesquely. A single thrust stilled the dead woman's struggles, at the same time creating a barrier that she thought might or might not hold for a minute or two.

Then, in the midst of the churning chaos, Olivia found the world changing around her. Or perhaps it was herself changing, becoming aware of more than what she could see in front of her, or on the fuzzy edges of her vision. A pair of somethings were approaching behind her, one of them moving rapidly. And there was more. Much more. Now that she was consciously aware of the change, information began flowing into her brain from all quarters. There was Walter, still in the cab, and Astrid beside him. And there was Peter, on the other side of the truck, his sword a streak of silver in the air. The infected, converging from all sides. The sensation was impossible to describe. There was no word for it, no frame of reference to connect thought to feeling. The best she could come up with was that it was like remembering something that had yet to happen, remembering forward in time — but even that was only a pale shadow, still incomplete. She simply knew what she knew, as if they were a part of her, and she of them. It was like the coin. Like Jacob Fischer and his men.

She felt a second tick past.

The first of the somethings was nearly upon her. Someone was shouting her name, a frantic warning. Olivia whirled about to find a fresh wearing full body armor charging straight toward her, teeth gaping open. Her mind distantly registered the SWAT in white lettering across its chest, even as stark terror rippled beneath the surface of her thoughts.

A gunshot boomed from inside the truck, exploding the side of the fresh's neck. It kept coming.

She could feel it, feel the strange matrices of its life force. It was the same as her, yet different. Changed. Infected. The source of the corruption hung in the space behind its glowing eyes. The fresh sprang, arms outstretched.

No.

The thought was singular, all alone inside her head. She wanted it to stop.

So it did.

The fresh hung in the air, balanced on one foot as chaos flourished on all sides. But they were in the eye, the center, and all was still.

She staggered back against the truck. Maintaining her control over it was like gripping a freezing ball of ice. Her head ached. Pain pulsed at the tip of her spine. Clamping her teeth together, she forced it all aside. The fresh's eyes never blinked, never strayed from her face. It watched her watch it, straining without end. She reached out for the knot of infection behind its eyes, not with her hand but with her eye — the inner one. The one that could see what she could not touch, and touched what she could not feel.

Olivia reached out, with what she knew not, and began to squeeze, to twist.

The fresh quaked inside its skin, and then its face went slack, the light in its eyes extinguishing. A gush of bright blood burst from its ears, its nose, a crimson waterfall spilling over lips pale in undeath.

She drew in a breath, gasping. Hot air burned in her lungs. Sweat poured down her face, drenching her shirt. Her skin felt on fire. Without fully understanding how or even what she was doing, she retreated, pulling back from the stricken fresh in the same way a boxer danced away from a downed opponent. As she pulled away, so did her control over it, and the fresh dropped like a sack, falling straight onto its face. It was dead — yet she had never touched it, physically.

Looking up from the body, she found Walter watching her. Time had passed, but how much she couldn't say. Enough for him to have made his way out of the cab. His eyes were huge and full of wonder. He had seen her, and understood. She glanced down at the fresh sprawled on the pavement, at the pool of blood spreading beneath it.

I killed it — without even laying a finger on it. A shiver went through her, despite the incredible heat. What am I becoming?

Time jerked back into full speed then, and she became aware of Peter racing around the truck, with Astrid just behind him. A glance back revealed a long line of infected coming toward them down the aisle, drawing close to the huge dead woman whose bloated corpse had formed a makeshift stopper.

"Are you okay, Walter?" she heard herself asking.

"I'm fine, dear," he replied approaching her carefully, as one would a skittish horse. "That poor fellow merely took a bite out of Agent Farnsworth's crowbar. Are you okay? I believe that, is the more relevant question."

Was she okay? She took stock of herself and realized the sensations from before hadn't left her completely. The strange connectedness — it was still there, still inside her, beckoning. Why was it still there? Why wasn't it going away like it had before? Peter skidded to a stop behind his father. He was covered in blood and bits of gore. His chest heaved, and she saw with dull amazement, that he was glowing. Or not glowing, exactly, but shimmering, like she was seeing him on an old movie screen, or a hologram.

"It's because he's from the other side," Walter said. His quiet voice captured her gaze. "What you're seeing, my dear. It's because he's from the other side."

Olivia flinched. She must have been gaping, but how had he known at what? What else did he know? Clearly, he had not told her everything — a situation she would rectify if they made it out of their current predicament alive.

"Everybody okay?" Peter asked, glancing between each of them in turn, and herself last.

Their eyes met. The eerie glow around him was gone, but his heart was thumping, beating quicksilver inside his chest. She could sense each contraction, each expansion. She could feel him, all the way through. She could feel all of them — including a tiny something down low in the center of her pelvis. If it wasn't all so unnerving, she might have cried.

"We have to get out of here, now," Peter was saying. "Before they can surround us again.

Olivia came back to herself then, yet the connected feeling never quite departed. "Yes," she agreed, nodding. "While we still can." Infected who had already passed by were returning, drawn in by the sounds of battle. And she could feel more infected approaching from behind, like sparks rising from a bonfire.

Astrid lifted up on her toes, peering across the highway. 'Where's Claire?" she asked, her voice tinged with panic. "Where's everybody else? Are they okay?"

"They went on head," Peter said. "We'll have to catch up. Can you handle it, Walter? We're gonna have to move fast."

"I'll do my best, son," he said. "Thank you for... for coming to my rescue. Oh, and for Aspirin, too, of course."

"Thanks, Walter," Astrid muttered, shaking her head. "Thanks a lot."

Olivia watched Peter shrug at his father's thanks, at the way he looked away uncomfortably. In the middle of it all, he'd been shouting his father's name. He'd been worried. Another sign that perhaps not all was lost between them.

They started off, leaving the yellow pickup truck behind. Infected were all around them now, but most, thankfully, were cordoned off by interceding lanes of traffic. There were gaps, of course, but for the most part, reaching the far side of the highway was far easier than Olivia would have guessed possible, though in hindsight she should have seen it at once. Individually, the infected were relatively simple to dispatch. It was only when the undead could reach them in large numbers that they became something fearsome to behold. And as long as they kept moving, it simply wasn't possible as long as they stayed on the highway.

Had she been wrong before to overrule Lincoln's suggestion they flee? The others were gone, with only a trail of bodies as evidence of their passing. They hunkered down in the shadow of a work van parked on the outside lane of the Turnpike, surveying the way forward. Ahead the sprawling wooded area, with thickets of tall weeds interspersed throughout.

"What now?" Astrid whispered, crouched beside Peter.

"Those train tracks we saw on your map should be somewhere in those trees," he said, pointing with the tip of his sword.

"Well, that's great, Peter, but what about them?"

Olivia studied the herd of dead bodies wading through the forest, traipsing aimlessly southward, following the path of the highway. From a distance, they looked like dejected concert-goers on their way out of a canceled show. There were hundreds of them spread out all along the embankment, possibly thousands, with those that were surely hidden among the trees.

"I don't see any freshes," Peter said after a moment. "We can make it if we stick together."

Olivia met his gaze, and both of their eyes shifted to Walter for an instant. She knew what he was thinking. If it was just the three of them, she had no doubt they could make a run for it, evading the infected with their speed. But Walter? Surely, he could not, even without his bum knee. But what other choice was left? She thought some part of her had known it might always come down to this. A final marathon.

"I'll be fine," Walter said in a stiff voice, as if he'd known exactly what had passed between them. He met each of their gazes in turn. "I've made it this far. And I'm not as old and decrepit as I might appear. Don't let me be the one to hold us back now." Straightening, he took off suddenly, hurrying down the embankment toward the tree line at a slow trot, leaning hard on his walking stick.

"Walter!" Peter hissed, then hurried after him. "No. Wait! Walter!"

"Well, that settles that," Astrid said, standing up. "I guess we're going."

Olivia rose beside her, eyeing the approaching infected. "I guess so," she said quietly, reaffirming her hold on her sword's hilt. The cloth was wet and tacky against her palm, yet her grip remained firm. Now the real race begins, she added silently in her head, then started down the embankment after them.

#

Peter crashed through the tree branches ahead, inadvertently whipping them back in her face. Olivia ducked at the last moment, averting disaster.

"Hey! Watch it, Peter," she muttered, slashing the branch aside.

"Sorry...," came his reply from just head. He said something else, but his voice was muffled by the violence of their passage through the brush.

The forest was a mirage of greens and yellows and browns, of hanging vines and weeds taller than themselves, obscuring their view. She knew that Astrid and Walter were somewhere off to their left — or so she hoped, at least — despite not having seen either of them in some time. The two of them had become separated, after they'd stumbled into the path of a small horde that had been heading in the opposite direction. The fighting had been frantic, with herself and Peter ending up back to back. And when the final body had been put down, they had been alone in the clearing.

Noises echoed from where she thought they might be; a series of heavy thuds and crashing footsteps, followed by a grunt that could have been human or undead. A female voice cried out a garbled warning, followed by another voice that sounded like Walter's, calling out one of his idiotic nicknames for Astrid that seemed to change daily.

"That way!" Olivia hissed, rushing past Peter.

Taking up the chase, they crashed through the underbrush. Shadowed figures ghosted on the edges of her vision, but she ignored them. Speed was what they needed, instead of becoming bogged down killing every infected they came across. Walter's voice rang out again from somewhere in front of them. Clearly, she and Peter had both underestimated his father's fortitude. A flutter of wings erupted as she dashed beneath a massive oak tree, and indignant squawks floated down from overhead. More avian tweets and caws reverberated ahead and behind, adding an eerie ambiance to the whole affair.

She leapt over a log and nearly stumbled over a body lying in the weeds on the others side. Passing over it, she noted that part of its skull was missing, hewn off at an angle above its right eye. She kept going, and soon found another body, this one with a jagged hole off-center in its forehead. She jumped over it, plunging through a wall of hanging vegetation, and suddenly found herself out in the open. Blue sky gleamed overhead, visible through a wide gap in the trees.

Peter landed beside her a second later, chest heaving. "Which... way?" he gasped, bending over and trying to catch his breath.

The break in the forest ran north to south, and was bisected by a rusting train track atop a bed of gravel. An infected lay crumpled across the tracks to their left, and another not far beyond. Further south down the tracks, a pair of distant figures several hundred yards away were just disappearing around a bend, the taller of which had a distinct limp.

Olivia pulled in deep breaths of her own before replying, heart blaring in her ears. How the hell are they managing to stay so far ahead of us? She opened her mouth to voice the question, but something tickled the inside of her mind an instant before an infected crashed through the shroud of hanging vegetation, lunging for Peter's back. "Peter, watch out!" she cried, spinning to meet it with a whirling slash.

Her blade bit deep, shearing through hair and flesh and bone with satisfying ease. The undead — a former employee of McDonald's, she noticed dimly — spun off the blade in a splatter of blood as it collapsed, and then she found herself facing two more undead that had been following it through the underbrush. Before she could react, Peter rushed past her, thrusting his sword through the face of one of the nearest with a savage grunt. Olivia stepped forward, ducking under the other's lunging grasp, and slashed a vicious cut across its right thigh. The infected went down on one leg, then began slithering toward her, teeth bared and hissing as it clawed into the gravel bed.

Turning, she booted the creature in the face, knocking it back. "They're this way, Peter!" she said, leaping over the squirming infected and racing down the center of the track.

Walter and Astrid were gone, having rounded the bend. She shot a look back and found Peter — along with at least a dozen infected — racing down the path behind her. He let out a shout of warning, and she turned back to find two more stepping onto the tracks ahead of her. Charging between them, she slashed wildly at the one on her right, while dodging away from the other's reaching hands. Her blade bit deep into flesh and then she was past it, speeding toward the bend in the tracks.

Trees and leering faces flashed past on either side. Shortly, the trees disappeared for several moments, and she glimpsed city streets down a steep incline, with houses and businesses, all teeming with undead. And then the city was gone, and she was back in the forest. The rail line began a long sweeping curve to the west. Pounding footsteps and skittering gravel announced Peter closing in fast.

He came abreast of her, holding his sword out to the side, angled away from her. "I don't... know where they all... came from," he gasped between breaths, "...but, stopping now would be a very... bad idea."

Olivia heard panic in his voice and looked back to find a solid wall of infected clogging the gravel path behind them. A stab of fear drove into her chest as she looked forward again, renewing her speed. There were hundreds of them. Thousands. The numbers mattered not. What mattered were the plethora of pale faces at the front of the horde, the dozens of freshes sprinting after them with a kind of sickening agility, despite their ungainly and out-of-sync strides.

"Oh fuck," she gasped, icy chills racing up her spine. "Faster, Peter! Faster!"

Peter hissed something unintelligible in reply. Sweat was pouring off his face, and off her own, stinging her eyes with salt. The air seemed even hotter somehow, as if the earth had suddenly shifted closer to the sun's glare. Olivia's legs were on fire, thighs and calves burning with lactic acid. She would've killed for a drink at that moment, but her water was tucked away in her backpack, which could have been a million miles away for all the good it did her.

The tracks began to straighten out, and the single track became two as another rail curving up from the south took up a parallel route. If her memory of Astrid's map was correct, both tracks would lead them straight to Newark Bay. They pounded over another rail line, a pair of tracks beneath a narrow bridge, and then they were out of the trees and back in the open air with the sun's harsh gaze beaming down.

The New Jersey Turnpike hung in the air off to their left, elevated on wide columns of concrete several hundred feet away. The highway was jammed in both directions with abandoned vehicles, and infected — more than Olivia had ever seen at once, since the beginning of the outbreak. The horde stretched on for miles, without end, and it was at that moment that the difference in scales between New York and Boston finally struck home.

My god... she thought, there's so many of them. She tried to estimate how many, packed onto the overpass like sardines in a can, but it was impossible. The mass of infected seethed, shimmering like a mirage in the distance. How many? A hundred thousand? Half a million? And that was just those she could see. How many more were hidden from view by the forest, by the horizon? Absently, she found herself wondering how many were New Yorkers, how many had sought safety and succor outside the city? Only to find none, only to find death?

"There they are!" Peter said suddenly, his voice hoarse, laced with exhaustion.

Olivia tore her gaze from the highway. Perhaps a quarter of a mile ahead of them, a group of humans were walking on the tracks. She recognized Walter and Astrid, her sister's golden hair, and the shorter figures of Ella and Gina among them. The two girls were balancing on the rails, arms wind-milling out to either side. The others were there also, Lincoln and Broyles and Claire, all present and accounted for.

What the hell are they doing? Why aren't they running? Did they think they were safe? She glanced back and found the pack of freshes closer than before. Much closer. A brand-new surge of fear twisted her gut in a knot. The distance between them was less than half of what it had been. One of them was even closer still, far out-pacing its fellows. Close enough for her to make out its yellow-eyed stare, its leering snarl full of teeth still white enough for a dentist's cleaning. A mop of black hair was pulled back in a tight ponytail that bounced and swayed about as the fresh galloped toward them. What was it, a fucking marathon runner? How can it be so fast?

"Run!" Olivia shouted, waving her sword in the air where the others would hopefully see it. "Go! Run!"

Peter took up the call also, his shouts echoing over hers. The others looked back, stopping on the tracks. She imagined their curious faces, their confused expressions. Why weren't they listening? Why weren't they going? Couldn't they see what was happening, the danger they were all in? And then she realized they couldn't. They probably couldn't even hear their shouts clearly. Not yet, at least. But that would soon change.

She looked back again and nearly stumbled in fright. The fresh was there, right behind them, its teeth snapping at the air, less than ten yards away. Its eyes glowed with rage, with unquenchable hunger. And they were locked on Peter's back. She could sense the wrongness emanating from it, like a film of oil settling on the surface of a lake.

"Peter!" she shouted, transferring her sword to her left hand. "Loot out! It's right behind you!"

He glanced back and cursed, then yanked his pistol and began firing desperately behind him, his face a mask of alarm. Olivia tore her pistol free and fired wild blasts back at the infected, squeezing off round after round. Their guns boomed. Explosions of red peppered the undead's t-shirt, its shorts, its crotch, blowing away one of its ears in a bloody mess. Then her gun was empty, and Peter's also, making only clicking sounds. The fresh kept coming. It seemed to accelerate, homing in on Peter's back like a missile.

Olivia gasped, panic and fear blurring her vision. At the same instant, her sense of the world deepened, to the point where she could have counted the hairs on the dead woman's head, or predicted the arrangement of freckles running across its back. She could feel it; she could feel everything. Including Peter's terror as he swerved from side to side, trying to shake its pursuit to no avail. It was going to take him. It was going to take Peter. She saw it happening before it happened. Peter!

"No...!" The scream tore up her throat. The fresh dove through the air, fingers stretched into hooked claws. "Peter!"

She acted without thought, reaching out as she had before, back at the yellow pickup truck. Only instead of merely holding, she shoved with all her mental might, with every ounce of her will. Her vision doubled painfully, head ringing like a gong, and the fresh abruptly changed course, mid-flight.

Like some invisible giant had reached down and flicked it aside, the dead woman cart-wheeled silently through the air. Arm and legs pinwheeling, ponytail awhirl, it smashed into a wide tree with a stomach-turning crunch. Horribly, the body folded around the trunk like crushed origami, blood and chunks of gore spraying up and down the bark in abstract patterns. And then it was gone, vanished behind them both.

Peter's eyes bugged out of his head. For a stuttered heartbeat, Olivia thought he might stop moving altogether in the midst of his shock. But there was no time for wonder, no time for anything but to run. Holstering her pistol, she reached out and took his hand, pulling him after her.

The pack of freshes was gaining, hot on their trail, and beyond them, the massive horde roiled like a swarm of devouring locusts sweeping over the land. Ahead, the others had finally realized what was happening. Rachel's hair flashed in the sun. She and Claire and Walter ran head with the girls, racing down the flat depression between the tracks. Staying behind were Broyles and Lincoln, and Astrid, who stood over the two men when they inexplicably knelt down in the middle of the tracks.

Olivia gaped. What were they thinking? Fighting off a deep exhaustion, a ludicrous thought that they were kneeling down to pray crossed her mind. But then something shiny glinted near Lincoln's head. Glass? What was it? Binoculars? No. A scope. A rifle. And suddenly, she understood.

"Give them... a line of fire, Peter...," she gasped. Talking was difficult. Her lungs felt on fire, as if they might burst, or failing that, simply implode. "Spread out... give them room."

"Do... what...?" he wheezed, giving her a sideways glance that indicated he thought she might be losing her mind.

And maybe she was losing it. In most cases, running straight into the teeth of automatic weapon fire was an invitation for being shot dead. But that was exactly what their former boss had in mind. They were good shots, weren't they? They had better be. Following her own instructions, she swerved into the deeper gravel to her right, giving the two men a clear view of the mob behind them.

"Lincoln... had better not shoot me...," Peter panted between huge gasps of air. "Or, I swear I'll come back... and eat his brains."

Olivia snorted, holding in the sudden urge to laugh, and nearly tripping over a jutting railroad tie in the process. It was ridiculous. Only Peter Bishop could and would try and make her laugh at a time like this. He swerved away from her, leaping over the left-hand tracks and creating a wide gap between them. It would have to be enough, or they were both dead.

Yellow starbursts erupted in Broyles's fist, mirrored an instant later by Lincoln. Then the heavy thud of automatic gunfire split the air. A hail of bullets whined past, like swarms of angry gnats zooming past her ear. The effect was dizzying — and terrifying. A single miss could end her life, or Peter's. She risked a glance over her shoulder and saw freshes tumbling across their line, skidding onto their faces in the gravel, sprays of blood splattering the air. At least a dozen remained upright, however, each intent on their flesh. They were close now, perhaps twenty, thirty yards away. The gunshots grew louder, merging with their visual counterparts exploding from each rifle's tip. Astrid's frantic voice reached her ears over the conundrum, urging them to go faster, and faster.

But there was no faster. Not for her, not for Peter. Her legs burned as they never had before, her lungs starved for air. If anything, they were fading, each stride more difficult than the one before it. They had simply come too fast, too far. A part of her was impressed that Peter had managed to keep up for so long — he'd never been the runner she had been in their old lives.

Astrid's eyes bulged, the whites visible even from a distance. She raised her pistol and began firing also, adding her own deadly rhythm to the mix. Broyles stopped to reload, with Lincoln following suit a moment later. In the interim, Peter began falling back in her peripheral vision, pain and exhaustion stretching his face thin.

Olivia slowed also, staying by his side. I won't leave you, my love, she thought as the staccato gunfire resumed. Bullets whizzed past, so close she could have sworn she'd felt the wind of their passage. Another look back revealed the freshes' numbers greatly diminished. Only a few remained upright, but frighteningly near. Their eyes glittered with insane glee, teeth snapping audibly. She kept going, glancing at Peter beside her, willing him to keep up.

"Dunham, out of the way!" Broyles deep roar carried over the cacophony.

She became aware of footsteps, stomping in the gravel directly behind her. Looking back once more, she stared into the face of a fresh as it reached out, fingers only inches from grabbing hold of her hair. Overcome by panic, she dove off to her right, tumbling down a steep hill of tall razor-like weeds as fresh gunfire erupted, bullets ripping the air overhead. Something smacked hard against her head and she ended up on her back, watching in a daze as her sword flipped lazily through the air, its edge sparkling with light against the blue sky. The blade came down off to her right, stabbing downward into the earth.

"Olivia!" a voice that sounded like Peter's shouted. "Olivia!"

Feet pounded through the brush. A shadowed figure came into view, face obscured by the blinding sunlight. Olivia blinked and stared at the silhouette moving toward her, still groggy from her fall. Her face stung with tiny lashes, her thoughts clouded by fog. Peter...? She reached up, touching a spot above her ear where she found a sticky wetness. My head hurts. Voices shouted from close by.

"Bishop!"

"No! Olivia!"

The silhouette came to a stop above her. You're not Peter, she thought, and suddenly recognized the mortal danger she was in through the haze filling her mind. The silhouetted man let out a rasping hiss, and then pounced, falling toward her like an avalanche.

With a gasp, she rolled to the side, toward where she vaguely recalled seeing her sword fall. The fresh thudded onto the ground beside her, kicking up dust, carrying with it the familiar stench of rot and dead bodies from her old life. The hilt of her sword poked up through the grass not far away. She lunged for it, crawling, fingernails gouging into the hard-packed soil. But then a hand closed about her ankle like a vice, yanking her back roughly. Something clamped down on her left foot, and looking back, she found her boot between the fresh's teeth. Yellow, blood-specked eyes stared up at her. The creature made a low growling sound, like a dog tearing through a bone.

Olivia screamed as something sheared loose inside her. Other screams echoed from somewhere, voices and shouts, pounding feet. She thrashed and kicked like a cornered animal, without thought or reason, her mind a flat line of terror. Her sword, her abilities, distant memories not her own. The fresh's mad eyes blotted out every thought, erased all reason. With a shriek and some effort, she tore her foot free of its teeth, sans her left boot. She scrambled forward through weeds on all fours, her thoughts only of escape now, of survival. But the fresh followed right behind her, not content with her boot. It clawed at her ankles, then gouged its nails into her calf and hauled her back toward its waiting teeth.

Suddenly a silver streak blurred the air. The pressure on her legs relaxed and she fell forward into the grass. Gasping through panicked breaths, she rolled onto her back. Peter's form stood over her, eyes furious as he separated the fresh's head from its shoulders with a savage overhand chop, then kicked it off into the brush like a soccer ball. A fibrous cloud of dust hung in the air in the aftermath, stirred up by the scuffle.

For a moment, she lay still, frozen, chest heaving, eyes locked onto the pair of grimy hands — one wrapped about her left ankle, the other gripping he right calf. She couldn't look away. She couldn't breathe. Both of the hands were attached to a pair of forearms, one cut cleanly through above the wrist, the other below the elbow. Shuddering with revulsion, she kicked them away. They had still been alive, still been gripping with evil strength.

Then Peter was there throwing himself down on the ground beside her. His face was white, his eyes fragile and misty. He reached out carefully, examining her legs, twisting each this way and that. He was terrified. She could feel it in his touch, in the violent shake of his hands, and most of all, in his silence.

"Peter, I'm okay," Olivia said softly, sitting up with a wince. It was a half-lie, as evidenced by the pounding inside her skull, and the knot she could feel growing above her ear.

"I saw it...," he said in a breathless, trembling voice. "I saw it biting you... and I... I thought..." he trailed off, darkness and misery emanating from his blue eyes.

"I'm all right," she told him again, taking one of his hands and pressing it to her lips. His skin was callused and rough, and stank of rotten blood. But none of that mattered. "It didn't bite me. You got there in time. I'm okay, but... I don't think my boot is going to make it," she added deadpan.

"Your... boot?" Peter frowned, then burst into a fit of laughter that lit up his face like the rising sun, before falling back into the grass beside her.

Olivia found herself laughing also, and so hard that she couldn't stop. It was all so fucking ridiculous. The world had ended, they were lying in the weeds on the side of a railroad track in the middle of New Jersey. She had been in the actual jaws of death, and had somehow survived. What else was there to do but laugh? It was either that or crying, and it didn't seem like the time for tears. She crawled on top of Peter and kissed him soundly on the lips, driving her tongue into his mouth in a sudden fit of need and overpowering lust.

"What the hell are you two doing?" Broyles's brusque voice said out of the blue.

Peter went still beneath her, his hands — which had somehow already found their way down the back of her shorts — froze in their rather delicate position. The former Special Agent sounded both shocked and outraged. Olivia lifted her head and found him standing atop the incline with a rifle on his shoulder, and Lincoln Lee hunched over with hysterical laughter beside him. Astrid stood there, also, covering her mouth with her hand.

"Shit..." Peter whispered, closing his eyes with a sigh. "That's some bad timing."

"Aw, this is too much," Lincoln chuckled, shaking his head. "You two really are the same everywhere. Get a room. Seriously. And while you're at it, find one that's not about to be overrun by at least a hundred thousand flesh-eating monsters."

Olivia rolled off Peter, face burning as she retrieved her sword, then searched the weeds for her missing boot. As she pulled it on, her eyes went to the wall of infected approaching. Somehow, she had forgotten all about them, and, she realized with a sudden surge of terror, she'd forgotten all about the baby growing inside her womb.

She'd just tumbled headfirst down a hill. She'd had a fall. Pregnant women were always warned about falling, weren't they? Weren't they? What if something had happened to it? Oh, god, what if I hurt it, what if I hurt my baby? Would she turn spontaneously as Sonia had? Without even being aware that she'd used her abilities until afterward, she focused on the life growing inside of her, probing its texture with her inner eye. It was like a spark, tiny and helpless, floating in a sea of black nothingness. But it was there, just as it had been before. It seemed okay, and knowing that, relief swept through her, taking the harsh edge off her pounding headache.

You have to be more careful, Liv, she told herself, following Peter back up the incline. You have to be much, much more careful. Unfortunately, however, being careful wasn't something she was particularly good at, now, or ever. And where she was going, being careful wasn't part of the plan.

#

They hurried out of the trees, out into the open where muggy blasts of wind rushed in off the bay. Behind them, a seething mass of bodies followed, creeping over the landscape like a plague. The raised tracks passed over a rocky beach strewn with trash and debris, and, with what appeared to be hundreds of bloated dead bodies. A dank stench hovered in the air. They plowed through it and out onto the bridge where a sheer crosswind did its best to toss them off into the water, far below.

The train bridge was narrow and without handholds of any sort. Only a narrow space running between the tracks seemed safe to walk down. Just to the south, the Turnpike crossed over the water also, or had. Like most of the bridges in and out of Boston, a wide span of bridging was missing, sheared off cleanly between two columns. Yet the way ahead seemed clear, unaffected my military strikes. Just over halfway across the bay, a structure of rusting metal braces and girders seemed to block the track ahead of them.

Olivia wasn't sure what she was looking at, at first, but then its purpose came to her: it was a vertical-lift bridge, below which container ships and tankers could pass. The type of ships that had blocked off the entrance to the bay. As the structure drew closer, it became apparent that it had been left in a partially elevated position. After some debate, they decided that it had more than likely been left so on purpose, creating an effective barrier for any being incapable of climbing a ladder; of which there were two, each running up the side of massive scaffolds of interlocked structural iron on either side of the bridge. Which left the infected following them out of luck.

The others were waiting at the base of the raised section. Olivia scanned her sister and niece for injuries, but other than a new scrape across Rachel's forehead, they seemed no worse for wear. The same could be said for Walter, for Claire and Gina. They had all made it, despite enduring long odds and chaos. It came to her that the same could be said for all of them, since the very beginning of the outbreak.

"What took you guys so long?" Ella wanted to know. "We've been waiting here, forever, Aunt Liv."

"Yeah, what did take you so long?" Rachel added with a frown. "I thought you'd be here a while ago."

"We... ran into some trouble," Olivia explained, tucking her hair behind her ear while avoiding her sister's curious gaze.

"Yeah, that's one way of putting it," Lincoln muttered under his breath, but thankfully didn't elaborate.

"I was worried about you, son," Walter said, hesitantly approaching Peter. "When we became separated, I was very worried about you."

"Well, you did just kind of take off without us, Walter," Peter said. "So, you can kind of blame yourself for that. But... if you must know, I'm fine." He looked back, narrowing his gaze on the columns of infected beginning to squeeze out onto the bridge. "I don't know about you guys, but I think finishing this discussion up there..." He paused, gesturing at the elevated level of track, before continuing. "Seems like a better idea. They're not what I would call quick, but they will get here eventually."

"I couldn't agree more, Peter," Broyles said, then went about organizing the effort in his usual efficient manner.

Olivia waited, taking a sip from her last bottle of water as Lincoln and Astrid began their ascents. They were the first to go up, followed by Walter and the girls, then Rachel, and then everyone else. For herself, Olivia was content to go last, as did Peter to stay with her until the end. The elevated track was higher than it had appeared from a distance, and the whole process took longer than she'd anticipated.

She stared out across the water as they waited for their turn. The wind whipped her hair about, tearing it loose from her ponytail. After a few failed attempts, she gave up trying to fix it, letting the wind have its way. Below, miniature whitecaps surged in toward the western shore. Whitish specs of sea birds wheeled in the distance, diving down toward the water, their cries echoing distantly. She lifted her gaze to the Turnpike, to the rolling waters below the collapsed section. There was no sign of the fallen vehicles, or of the broken spans of bridge. Had they waited until the civilians were clear? Or had they repeated the atrocities they'd committed in Boston, murdering innocent people in the name of the greater good? Sometimes, she wondered if humanity even deserved to survive, if that was the best they could treat one another, if Jacob Fischer and his ilk were the norm. It was a dark thought, but didn't they all seem bent that way, lately?

"So... you did something back there," Peter said when they were alone. "You have been practicing, haven't you?"

Olivia nodded. "Yeah. I have, though, what I did back there... I still don't really know what I'm doing half the time. It's all just guesswork, and I'm just muddling my way through." She saw the fresh's body exploding against the tree, splattering like an egg, and shivered, despite the intense heat. "These abilities, Peter. They scare me," she admitted, meeting his gaze. "Sometimes I wonder what I'm becoming. Something, unnatural, I think. Like one of them." She nodded past him, to the approaching infected.

Peter took her hand, rubbing slow circles across her palm with his thumb. "Olivia, these things you can do," he said, his voice both gentle and insistent, "they don't define you. You are who you've always been. And I know what you're thinking — that you'll end up like this other one Lincoln told me about, this evil twin, this other... Olivia Dunham, who's turned to the Dark Side. She's not you, and neither is the Olivia from Lincoln's world. Whatever the circumstances that made up their lives, they aren't yours, or they would be you. The fact that you're worried about this proves that you're different."

"You two coming up, or not?" Claire called down suddenly, getting their attention. Her black hair hung forward as she leaned down from above.

Olivia lowered her eyes to Peter. Was it true? Was she her own woman? Independent of all others? She prayed it was so. She prayed that she would remain herself. "You're probably right," she said finally, squeezing his hand once before pulling away. "You ready to get out of here?"

With a grin, he motioned for her to take the lead. "Ladies first."

"Is that chivalry I detect?" she said, rolling her eyes as she pulled herself onto the ladder. "In this day and age? What, are you trying to get lucky, Bishop?"

Peter shrugged, and seemed to consider her question seriously before replying. "Maybe," he said, cobalt eyes twinkling. "Think it'll work?"

Now it was her turn to consider. She paused between rungs, staring down at him. How much time did they have left? It could all come to an end at any moment, as it nearly had for them both just a short while ago. Their lives were precarious things, balanced on the point of a needle. "You know, it just might," she told him finally, holding his gaze for a long moment before resuming the climb.

"Olivia."

Something in his voice made her heart tremor. Pausing again, she looked down at Peter's face between her boots. He was on the ladder beneath her, peering up from below. He probably had an eyeful, but it was nothing he hadn't seen already, and from the way he was looking at her, it was the farthest thing from his mind. "Yeah?"

He wet his lips before speaking. "I love you."

"I... love you, too, Peter," she replied softly.

It felt like a lie, in spite of it being the truth. A lump rose up in her throat, and she forced it down. She thought of the thing she'd been considering, of her plan, and of the secret growing inside of her. He deserved to know. He deserved to have something to fight for, like she did. Something beyond herself, beyond the two of them. But I can't. Not Yet. I'm sorry, Peter. I'm so sorry.

#

The others were waiting at the top of the ladder, and they quickly made their way across to the other end of the raised track, where they repeated the order from before. Going down the other side was slower for some reason, and the girls weren't the only ones who had a hard time with the heights and the wind and the wide-open space. When it was Olivia's turn to go, she paused on the threshold, taking in the view.

Off to the southwest was Newark Airport, with its oval-shaped concourse, its array of circular terminals just visible in the distance over the roofs of rectangular warehouse buildings, shipping and container yards arranged in grids. Closer in, on the shore of the bay, were several of the largest parking lots she'd ever seen in her life, all jammed full of cars and trucks. She blinked at the sheer quantity of automobiles present. Blackened craters marred the lots in random places, in which the vehicles were twisted and melted into unrecognizable scrap heaps. But even taking the destruction into account, the number of vehicles was staggering, beyond belief. Thousands? Hundreds of thousands? She wondered what sort of place it was, and then it came to her when she took its geographic location into account. Undoubtedly, she was looking at some pre-outbreak automobile manufacturer's import-export lot. Or several manufacturers'. Probably foreign. Japanese or Korean, maybe. Perhaps European. Making a mental note to search among them for a working vehicle, she made her way down the ladder.

At the bottom, the Newark shore seemed close enough to touch. They hurried down the center of the tracks toward the spot where the train bridge merged with a mass of greenery, mainly rows of wide bushes and evergreens atop an embankment. A train was stopped on the right-hand tracks, and its long line of connected hoppers seemed to go on forever. Beyond it, lay a massive container yard, with stacks and stacks of multicolored metal boxes. Off to their left was the first of the gigantic parking lots, with rows of vehicles that appeared in pristine shape up close. Olivia was about to mention the cars to Peter, when out of the blue voices began shouting from all sides.

"Freeze! Don't move! DON'T MOVE! Put your hands up! Drop those weapons! Do it now!"

Men in dark sunglasses and black armored jackets appeared on top of the train cars, each holding an automatic weapon. More appeared behind them, stepping out from the bushes, and to the sides and to the front, seeming to rise from the ground like specters.

Though she had no memory of drawing he weapon, Olivia found her gun in her hand, pointed straight at the head of the nearest assailant. Lincoln had his rifle against his shoulder, shouting his defiance. As was Peter, shifting his gun between at least three different men at the same time, and Broyles, and Astrid, each with hard faces. On top of it all, Rachel and Claire were screaming for everyone to stop, their faces pale and terrified, while Ella and Gina cowered in fear against her sister's hip. Oddly, Walter was the only one not out of control, and merely stood still frowning down at his hands.

It all registered in Olivia's mind in the span of several heartbeats. The shouting grew more intense by the second, each face more determined. Someone's going to pull a trigger, either on accident, or on purpose. And then it's over. They would all die. Every one of them. The strangers had them surrounded, outgunned and outnumbered, and they held the high ground. Like fools, they had walked into a trap.

Taking breath, Olivia lowered her gun. "Stop! Peter! Lincoln! Stop it, all of you! Stop it!" she shouted, moving to Peter's side and grabbing his wrist. "Stop, Peter. Lincoln. Stop it, before someone gets killed."

Peter cursed, and then lowered his pistol. After a moment, Broyles followed suit and then Astrid, and finally Lincoln, who looked ready to spit fire and chew rocks.

"You sure about this, Dunham?" Broyles said in a deadly voice.

"We don't have a choice, sir." Olivia tossed her pistol onto the dirt. When the others had all done the same, she raised her hands. "We give up!" she shouted. "Don't shoot! Please. We don't want anyone hurt."

The clearing grew quiet. She heard Peter's intakes of breath beside her in the silence, as well as low muttering coming from Walter. One of the men moved from his position on top of a coal hopper, climbing down a ladder to the ground. From the confident way he moved toward them, she assumed he was the leader. The other men kept their guns trained on them, staring silently behind their dark glasses.

"You heard our guns earlier, didn't you," she said when the man came to stop before them. "That's why you're here. Are you the one broadcasting the message?" Astrid gasped behind her.

The man said nothing in reply, inspecting each of them closely. Olivia studied him in turn. He was tall and thin, clean-shaven with pronounced cheekbones that gave him a skeletal look. Something about his stance was familiar, though she couldn't say why, exactly. She had either seen the man before, or he reminded her of someone she had seen before. Hanging from a strap on his shoulder was a sleek sub-machine gun equipped with a long and fat suppressor, and a banana-shaped magazine. He pulled a two-way radio from his pocket and spoke into it.

"I have them," he said in a voice laced with Brooklyn, then lifted the radio to his ear and listened for a moment before speaking again. "Yep. Seven and two children. No trouble at all. I don't know about the rest." The man listened again and Olivia caught whispers of a faint voice speaking. "Yes, sir. Over and out." He lowered the radio, tapping against his palm. "No one is going to be hurt," he said, addressing them for the first time. "But, I'm afraid you're all gonna have to come with me.

"Who the hell are you people?" Lincoln demanded.

The man ignored him as if he hadn't spoken. "Boss's orders. We have to take you in."

One of the men on top the coal hopper shouted suddenly. "Hey, we got incoming hostiles! Runners and walkers!"

"Do we have a location?" the unknown man called without taking his eyes from them.

"North, and south!"

"Shit. Time to go people."

"What about our weapons?" Broyles said. "We're not just going to leave them here."

"My men will grab it all. This way," he said, motioning behind him. "We don't have much time. Unwelcome guests will be arriving shortly. You all stirred up a real hornet's nest. This sector's never been properly cleared, and with what happened in Jersey City a few weeks back, the runners are everywhere again. I'm sure you've got a ton of questions, but they're gonna have to wait."

Olivia frowned. Sector? Cleared? What had happened in Jersey City? They had passed just south of Jersey City, just a few hours ago. What is this? Who are these people? Military? She glanced at Peter. He was unhappy about it, but would comply. In any case, there was nothing they could do but follow.

The man led them down a short gravel road running alongside the train tracks to a pair of plain and white dust-covered vans parked out of sight behind a row of bush. He pulled open the side door to reveal rows of bench seating, enough for their entire group and more.

"Where exactly are you taking us?" Peter said, stopping with his hand on the van's frame.

"To a place not far from here. Get in. I wasn't kidding about how much time we had."

"Peter, it'll be okay," Olivia told him with a nod. She prayed it was true. It had to be true. That they were still alive had to mean something.

After a moment, Peter sighed, and then climbed into the front row of seats. They piled into the van after him and were soon zooming down unfamiliar streets, most of which were clear of obstructions. Infected roamed down side streets, herds of them closing in, including a high percentage of freshes, which seemed odd. Runners, they had called them. So, he hadn't been lying. And despite having taken their guns, the man seemed unconcerned about their other weapons — including her and Peter's swords — which made no sense if these people truly intended them ill. She felt a ray of hope, and saw the moment when Peter realized this oddity also, when he reached up, fingering the cloth-wrapped hilt poking up over his shoulder with a furrowed brow. A glance out the rear window showed the second van, staying close to their trail.

Several minutes later, the van made a series of zigzags between a staggered line of vehicles blocking an intersection. An extremely long building appeared on the right, hugging the street. The building was several blocks long, at least, and surrounding it was a fence of thick, iron spikes, reinforced with crossbeams and by concrete at the base. The fence made the one surrounding the asylum seem laughable, paper thin, and no protection at all. The van slowed suddenly, and a section of fence began sliding open, seemingly of its own volition.

Olivia felt a dull shock. She gasped and heard others doing the same. The gate was obviously powered by an electric motor. A woman with dark hair stood inside the fence, operating the gate, which again slid smoothly closed after both vans had passed inside the perimeter. Men and women stared down from the roof above, armed with scoped rifles.

They have power, electricity, she thought, eyeing the guards, and their weapons. They seemed unalarmed and unsurprised to see them. What is this? Where are we?

Inside the gate was a wide parking lot that ran near the length of the entire facade. Off to the right were several loading docks with tall overhead doors. To the left, were a pair of glass doors, of the sort that might have been found at the main entrance of any commercial building before the outbreak. The van came to a stop in front the entrance, and the man driving them hopped out. They filed out into the parking lot, and their host — she wasn't going to refer to him as their captor, not yet, at least — led them inside, and even held the door open politely.

The blast of cold air that greeted Olivia when she stepped across the threshold drew tears from her eyes. Oh my god, they have air conditioning. Air conditioning. It felt like saw looks of wonder on the others' faces, looks she was certain mirrored her own. Their guide marched them down a long corridor lit by overhead lights in a grid, past any number of closed, nondescript doors, until they came to one that was open.

Classic rock and roll poured out into the hall. The music seemed old and out of date to her 1990s era ears, but Walter seemed to perk up at once.

He began mumbling the words, his face a vision of distant ponderings, of times gone by. "...me tell you 'bout the way she looked, the way she'd act..."

Glancing back at Broyles, Olivia nearly stumbled at the strange expression on her former boss's face. He appeared stunned, his eyes white and huge. As if he'd just come to a realization. But, how could he? What is going on here? She could only wonder. Where are we?

Their guide came to a stop in front of the open door, but did not enter. "The Lady wants to meet all of you," he said, then stepped back, motioning her inside.

The Lady? Olivia frowned, searching the man's face for some sign of his intent, but there was nothing to see. He was a professional, a blank board. A nothing. And, she thought likely, little more than a middle man. Just following his orders. She stepped through the doorway and froze.

I don't believe it. I don't fucking believe it.

Inside was a spacious office, with a wide desk facing the doorway. The woman seated the desk in a tall leather-bound chair was dressed all in black and had dark red hair cut short, but still long enough to cover her ears. She was older, perhaps as old as Walter, with a sharp jawline that gave her the vulpine look of a predator, and intense, hazel eyes. Emerging from the sleeve of her right arm was a black leather glove.

Olivia felt her eyes bulging out of their sockets, but was helpless to stop them. "It's... it's you!" she managed to gasp, grabbing hold of the door frame.

For a moment, the woman seemed just as shocked as she did, but then Nina Sharp smiled. Her chair creaked as she leaned back, pressing her hands together in a steeple below her pointed chin. "Agent Dunham," she said in that same elegant voice Olivia remembered from before, a voice that brought back a flood of memories. "I must say, you are always... something of a surprise."