“All right, Magdalene,” said the house. Its tone was blandly pleasant as always.

“Thank you, house.” Maggie looked over her shoulder to me. “I warned Alex we might need to go, and that we’d need it to be as quiet as possible. He’s been waiting for my word.”

“And the house will let us out?” asked Becks.

“If the security crew outside says that we’re opening the isolation lock, even for a few minutes, the house won’t have a choice. My security logs are only uploaded if there’s an unapproved breach, so unless the infected take the house, no one will know for sure that we’re gone.” Maggie wiped her eyes again. “I hate this.”

“I know,” I said, quietly.

The house speaker crackled as someone switched to manual, and a man’s voice came through, asking, “Ms. Garcia? Are you sure this is what you want to do?”

Maggie smiled unsteadily at a point just above the door—probably the location of a hidden security camera. “No. But I’m sure it’s what I have to do. Please let us out, Alex.”

“Your father—”

“Sig your checks, but you work for me, remember? That was always the deal. Now please, just give us ten minutes to get out of here, and you can lock the place down again.”

He sighed heavily. “If anything happens to you, your father will have all our asses. You understand that, right?”

“I do.”

“Just checking. You have ten minutes. Now please, try not to make me regret this.”

The speaker crackled again as he hung up his end, and the house said, sounding almost perplexed, “The isolation order has been rescinded. Thank you for your patience. You are now free to leave the premises if you so choose.”

“Grab your gear, folks,” I said, picking up a duffel bag with one hand and my helmet with the other. “We need to get rolling.”

“On it,” said Alaric, grabbing the wireless booster.

Becks didn’t say anything. She just picked up a box filled with dry cereal and cans of soda and kicked the garage door open.

The van was inside, which was good. The bike was outside, which was not good. Working in tight tandem, the five of us were able to load the van in just under five minutes, cramming boxes and bags into every inch of available space. I didn’t question the amount of stuff that we were bringing. Since the odds of us coming back were pretty damn slim, we needed to take everything that was even potentially useful and assume that it was easier to throw shit away than it would be to find it once we were on the road.

We were halfway through the packing process when Alaric realized there wasn’t going to be room for everyone. “Wait,” he said. “We need to leave some of this. We’re filling the backseat.”