“Cool. Make sure we get a copy. Oh, and also, that documentation you said you had, the stuff that related to Georgia’s research? I’ll expect copies, since we couldn’t, y’know, go over it together. I guess if I don’t get it, I’m going to have to assume you’ve got something to hide.” I turned, still smiling, and started for the visitor parking area.

“Wait—where are you going?”

I turned back to Director Swenson long enough to flash him the biggest shit-eating grin I could muster. It felt more like I was baring my teeth. Maybe it looked that way, too; he took an involuntary step backward, eyes going wide. “We’re going to do what we’re paid to do,” I said. “We’re going to go and tell everybody the news.” I waved to the rest of the survivors of the Portland CDC and kept on walking, with Becks following close behind me. Neither one of us looked back as we got to the bike, stowed our gear, put on our helmets, and drove away.

Fuck you all. If that’s the way you want to play things… If that’s the way you want things to go… Then fuck you all. You have no idea what you’re dealing with. You have no idea what I’m capable of. And you have no idea how little I have left to lose.

You’re about to be sorrier than you could possibly believe, and I am going to laugh while I’m pissing on your grave.

—From Adaptive Immunities, the blog of Shaun Mason, April 18, 2041. Unpublished.

Fourteen

According to the bike’s GPS, the drive from the Portland CDC to Maggie’s place should have taken a little over five hours on the main highway. It actually took us closer to eight. Since the chances that we were being tracked by the CDC had just gone way, way up, we stuck to the back roads, keeping our cameras off and avoiding checkpoints whenever we could. I won’t say we drove through the ass-end of nowhere, exactly, but we had to stop twice to gun down the zombie deer trying to chew their way through the fence between the road and the undeveloped land around us.

“I wish to God I could post this,” bemoaned Becks, shooting another infected herbivore squarely between the antlers.

“Yeah, well, I wish to God I had a cup of coffee,” I replied, and gunned the bike’s engine. “Come on.”