Adam's fingers drummed against the steering wheel as he scanned the road for survivors, creatures, or any other threat. The streets had been empty since they'd left The Pagegrinder, but the quiet hadn’t made him feel any better. A sense of foreboding pressed in, like he'd just said goodbye to Natalie and Samantha for the last time. If something inevitably went wrong, he might never see them again.

  Hector sat beside him in sullen silence, his pack clutched in his lap. Adam thought about making conversation, but decided against it. After essentially dragging the man along for Samantha's safety, it seemed better to leave him with whatever peace he still had.

  "I would have helped if you'd asked," Hector said suddenly, breaking the silence as Adam eased the car around the charred remains of a wreck.

  "I believe you," Adam replied, feeling worse than he had a moment ago. Not only did he have to be an asshole, he had to do it to someone who didn't deserve it. Just one more thing to carry.

  "Can I ask you something, then?" Now that the silence was broken, he figured he might as well.

  "Okay," Hector replied.

  "Natalie asked if everyone has abilities now. We haven't seen anyone else since that first day, but it's strange that all four of us do." Adam flicked his gaze toward Hector.

  "It makes sense to me," Hector said, looking at him out of the side of his eye. Something in his expression made Adam's unease return. The man's whole demeanor had changed since being dragged into this, and while Adam couldn't blame him, that didn't make him feel any better.

  "Maybe everyone has them? Or maybe if they don't, they didn't make it." Hector's voice had an edge Adam couldn't place.

  "Honestly, with everything going on... I hadn't thought of that," Adam said, considering the implications of not only being trapped in the Post-Announcement World, but being stuck in it without abilities.

  "But where is everyone?" Hector asked, almost to himself, gesturing toward the empty streets. “Where are the bodies?"

  They fell back into silence as Adam's mind slipped into autopilot, the familiar streets rolling by.

  The longer they went without signs of life, the more his anxiety deepened. The emptiness felt deliberate, like something was coming, always just around the corner but never quite showing its face.

  The top of the hospital rose above the surrounding buildings and Adam felt a glimmer of hope. He eased into the hospital access road, but misjudged the corner. One of the tires clipped the curb, and Hector shot him a withering look.

  Without warning, Adam slammed the brake and the car skidded to a stop with only the barest protest from the tires. He silently prayed the sound hadn't drawn attention as he stared ahead.

  A wall of smell hit them through the broken windows, thick and rancid, like sunbaked roadkill. Hector coughed violently, the sound quickly turning into dry heaves. Adam's eyes watered and he gagged, covering his mouth with his hand.

  "What is that?" Hector managed, choking between coughs, nearly doubled over.

  Adam didn't answer. He pointed forward, face pale with nausea and terror. His mind buckled under the weight of what he was seeing. Some deeper, primal instinct screamed at him to run, run and hide, but the sickness in his gut rooted him in place.

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  The thing in the road was a living mound of decay. It pulsed and shuddered as it crawled forward, half-rolling, half-dragging itself across a field of corpses. Sluggish gray arms groped at the bodies, lifting and inspecting them like cuts of meat at a butcher's shop. Every few moments it would tear off a leg, a head, an arm and press it into its own quivering bulk. The rest it tossed into a gaping maw, chewing with slow, wet snaps.

  Adam's skin tried to crawl off of his body, prickling and twitching as he watched. The sheer wrongness of the thing made him feel infected by it, as if watching made him a party to its vile meal.

  And yet, he couldn't look away.

  After several moments, the torn-off limbs and heads began to writhe where the creature had placed them on its flesh, moving again.

  "It's.... reanimating them," he whispered, still trying not to cough. The smell had dulled from incapacitating to merely revolting.

  "What?" Hector croaked, his voice raw from retching. He wiped his eyes and squinted through the grime. When he finally saw it his breath caught.

  "No," Hector said, his voice too calm, too flat. He looked away, eyes fixed on anything but the shuffling nightmare in front of them.

  Adam shifted into reverse and slowly backed the car down the street. The creature seemed more interested in grazing than in them, and he prayed it stayed that way. He parked a block away, forcing his hands to stop shaking as he turned off the engine and unbuckled his seatbelt.

  "Where are you going?!" Hector half-shrieked, his shrill tone more disbelief than question.

  "To the hospital."

  Adam swallowed hard. "This doesn't change anything. If I don't go, Samantha dies."

  "You're crazy," Hector said.

  Second time today I've been told that, he thought, but couldn't think of a reason to disagree.

  "It didn't seem interested in us. Maybe it only goes after carrion. It might not even care about anything living." He managed to convince himself just long enough to open the door and commit to getting out.

  "Everything dead was once alive. So, what killed those people?" Hector asked, planted in the passenger seat, staring at him as he stepped out of the car.

  "That's... a good point,” Adam admitted, compulsively checking his pocket for the list of supplies. He grabbed his pack and shrugged it on before tightening the straps. "But it doesn't matter."

  He wondered if he'd ever felt this brave before, or this reckless.

  "You can stay in the car, but I could still use your help," Adam said, scanning the area for movement. The abomination continued its sluggish pacing back and forth across the parking lot, but showed no sign of interest in them.

  "I can't make you come. You might even be safer here, if you can make yourself invisible."

  Hector seemed to weigh his options, then opened the door and stepped out. His mouth was a hard line, and he stole several glances at the thing before meeting Adam's eyes.

  "Lead the way. At least then I can run while it eats you."

  "Gee, thanks." Adam grinned. "Notice how the smell didn't follow us?"

  Hector sniffed experimentally, frowned then nodded. "Very strange."

  "One more reason to keep our distance."

  Adam peeked around the corner of the small building and motioned for Hector to follow, remembering his lesson from the zombie that morning.

  Had it really only been this morning? The day flashed through his mind, the feral corpses, the encroaching forest, the ambush, and now this. He knew he should feel exhausted, but the fresh spike of adrenaline coursing through his veins left him feeling wired, almost overcharged with energy.

  They took the second corner with the same caution, pausing to look around before stepping into the open. The parking lot was mostly empty, littered with a few scattered cars and plenty of corpses.

  Adam glanced back at the creature, still busy with its gruesome feast.

  He stepped between a pair of bodies that showed no apparent wounds. Their skin was mottled gray and bloated from decomposition. It was hard to say how long they'd been dead, days at least. The smell of rot clung to the air, but it was a far cry from the overwhelming stench of the abomination.

  Hector stepped beside him, eyes still on the monstrosity, before glancing down at the pair of corpses.

  "What killed them?" he asked, whispering a little too loudly.

  "No idea."

  Adam nudged one of the bodies with the toe of his boot, gently prodding the side of the corpse. The man wore a stained dress shirt, slacks, and a single shoe. His pinky toe poked through the hole in the sock like a bloated worm, and Adam wrinkled his nose in disgust.

  "Adam!"

  Hector's voice had gone tight, almost choked.

  A faint, reedy whistle reached Adam's ears, high and climbing higher. He tore his gaze away from the corpse and saw Hector's eyes locked onto something behind him.

  Adam turned.

  The creature now faced them directly, its patchwork of scavenged arms outstretched in their direction as the whistling grew louder.