The images began to resolve in Peter’s mind, forming a pattern. The smallness of the bodies. The stuffed animals and toys clutched by tiny hands of leathered bone. As Peter stepped forward, he felt and heard the crunch of plastic. A syringe. There were dozens of them, scattered over the floor.

The meaning hit him like a fist.

“Theo, this is … these are … ” The word stopped in his throat.

His brother was already headed to the stairs. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

They didn’t stop until they were outside. They stood on the front stoop, breathing in great gulps of fresh air. In the distance, Peter could see Caleb standing on the roof of the filling station, still scanning the scene with the binoculars.

“They must have known what was happening,” Alicia said quietly. “Decided it was better this way.”

Theo slung his rifle and took a long drink of water. His face was ashen; Peter saw that his brother’s hands were trembling. “Goddamn Zander,” Theo said. “Why the fuck would he come here?”

“There’s a second flight of stairs at the back,” Alicia said. “We should check it.”

Theo spat and shook his head, hard.

“Let it go, Lish,” Peter said.

“What’s the point of checking the building if we don’t check the whole thing?”

Theo turned sharply. “I don’t want to spend another second in this place.” He was resolved, his words would be final. “We torch it. No discussion.”

They pulled books from the shelves and fashioned a pile near the front desk. The paper caught swiftly, flames leaping from book to book. They retreated through the door and stood back fifty meters to watch the building burn. Peter took a drink from his canteen, but nothing would wash away the taste in his mouth; the taste of bodies, of death. He knew his eyes had beheld something that would stay with him for all the days of his life. Zander had come here, but not just for books. He’d come to see the children.

And that was when the drifted sand at the base of the building began to move.

Alicia, standing beside him, saw this first.

“Peter … ”

The sand collapsed; the virals poured forth, clawing from the sand where it had covered the basement windows. A pod of six, chased into the blazing light of midday by the flames.

They screamed. A great, high-pitched wail that shattered the air with pain and fury.

The library was fully engulfed now. Peter raised his rifle and fumbled for the trigger. His movements felt vague, without focus. Everything about the scene seemed only half real, his mind finding no traction on any of it. More virals were emerging through the heavy black smoke that roiled from the upper windows, the glass exploding in a glittering rain of shards, their flesh blazing, trailing liquid fronds of flame. It seemed that whole stretches of time had passed since he’d lifted his rifle, intending to fire. The first group had taken refuge in a pocket of shade where the library steps rose from the sand, a single huddled mass, their faces pressed to the ground like Littles in a game of hide-and-seek.