The officer—lieutenant something-or-other, judging by his insignias but lack of name tag—scoffs. He shakes his head. “Nice try. You’re Hope kids. Keep your distance, go back to where you came from, and we will all pretend this never happened.”

I raise my eyebrows, because that’s wildly, ridiculously generous. But if it’s good enough for them, it’s good enough for me. They know who we are. We have to get out of here.

I reach for Hunter’s arm. “C’mon, let’s go.”

Hunter frowns, and he silently stares past the soldiers at the mountain pass. The barricade effectively blocks it from all sides, with barriers on the other side of the soldiers too. No one will get in or out of town from here.

Maverick elbows his way forward, past Hunter and me, and immediately the soldiers tense again. “Why?”

His question is backed up by several others from Hunter’s crew. “Yeah. What’s going on?”

“What are you doing here?”

“Why can’t we pass?”

It’s curiosity mixed with bravado. It’s like they’ve forgotten that we’re technically prisoners on the run.

I wait for Hunter to tell them that it doesn’t matter, that we have to go back. Because he must see what I see, feel what I feel: that cold certainty, crawling its way up from my feet to my legs to my spine. Lieutenant What’s-His-Face glances back at one of the other soldiers, and she immediately tightens her grip around her gun. Despite his forced relaxed appearance, this situation is a powder keg.

“We want to know what’s happening,” Reid demands.

I glance around. Reid stands close to us, his arms crossed, and his face pale. At the far edge, Emerson has begun to back away, while Leah and Logan cling to each other. They understand as well as I do that curiosity comes at a price.

Except Hunter still doesn’t do anything.

“That’s fair, sir,” one of the soldiers says. She’s a young woman, with kind, hazel eyes and her hair in a ponytail. She’s not much older than we are. “They have a right to know as much as anyone else does.”

We all turn around to look at them. At the officer. He squares his shoulders and tilts his chin up. I’m sure he intends to look imposing, but under the light of the barricade, with shadowed mountains flanking us, he merely looks small.

The lieutenant rubs his face, adjusts his gaiter, and after a few seconds, he comes to a decision. “Several days ago, right before Thanksgiving, there was an outbreak of a respiratory disease in several cities across the state and the country. The disease appears to be highly contagious and deadly, and since the outbreak happened as everyone was traveling, it’s been able to spread rapidly across the country. The government placed the state in total lockdown. No one can leave their houses or travel outside of the town borders without a permit.”

Oh.

“An outbreak?” Reid asks. “Like…a plague?”

The lieutenant swallows, then nods. “Exactly like that, yes.”