From out of the hazy streets, the screams of the afflicted seeped into the night. Men, women, children.

Sam watched the two men. How long could they stand there? They had to know the authorities would show up at some point. Time was wasting, if they wanted to get out of Ashland before that happened.

Still they stood there, staring at him, pissed off and scared and pumped up on adrenaline from the chase.

If they were thinking about their getaway, then one thing must be obvious to them: leaving him alive would make it a lot harder to escape. If Sam told the Army about these two, then there would be choppers hunting them down, out there in the dark fields.

One of the men said something—a quick little sentence, softly spoken. Sam couldn’t make it out over the distance, but it sounded like, What do you think?

Before the other one could answer, Sam glanced at the nearest back yards along the subdivision’s edge. They were empty—for now.

He faced the two men again, and backed up a step, moving toward the suburb.

Then he took another, and another.

For a moment he thought they might rush him after all; there was no doubt they could see what he meant to do.

But they only stood there, their faces going blank as they watched him back away. They were either that afraid to come closer to the afflicted, or that sure he was going to die and save them the trouble. Maybe both.

Sam turned and sprinted into the smoke.

He ran until he was in past the first layer of houses, then stopped and crouched against a shrub in someone’s front yard.

The drifting smoke was much denser than it had appeared from outside the suburb. It was heavier than any fog he’d seen in his life.

That was both good and bad. The good was obvious: it helped hide him from the afflicted, especially if he stayed tucked out of sight like this. The bad was obvious, too: it was burning the hell out of his lungs already, the effect made worse by the fact that he was panting from the sprint.

He pulled his shirt up and pressed it over his mouth and nose. It helped a little.

He felt sure enough that it was just smoke—that the gas cloud from the Rigel canister had long-since blown away in the wind. The smoke was still rolling through because the crash site was still burning.

Through the haze, the barely human cries seemed to come from everywhere. Other sounds, too: the scrape of running footsteps on asphalt; the clatter of a metal trash can being knocked over; that eerie, doglike chuffing sound again, passing close to the yard where Sam crouched.

You can’t stay like this much longer. You’re not that well hidden.

He continued breathing in and out through the shirt, thinking.