The echo of the gunshot still clung to the cul-de-sac. Smoke drifted faint from the barrel of Mark's pistol, now lying useless in the dirt beside him.
Michael stayed crouched, Sarah pressed into his chest, her small body trembling. His heartbeat was a hammer in his ears. He forced his breathing steady, slow, because if he lost control, they all would.
When the silence finally settled, it was heavier than the explosion had been.
Lena broke first. Her sobs came raw, shaking her frame as she leaned against the fence. "He just he just did it. God, Michael, he just"
"I know." Michael's voice was low, flat, but not unkind. He pulled Sarah back slightly so he could look her in the eyes. "Don't carry that image, you hear me? You hold on to something else. Anything else."
Sarah wiped her face with her sleeve, smearing dirt and tears. She was pale, her eyes red, but there was a flicker of steel beneath the grief. "He couldn't do it without them." Her voice cracked. "He didn't want to."
Michael studied her for a beat, then nodded once. "That's right. And that's why we have to want to. For them. For the people who couldn't keep going."
The words tasted bitter. He'd given speeches like that to broken men overseas, soldiers cracked by the weight of war. Some had listened. Some hadn't. Mark hadn't.
Lena slid down to the curb, clutching her knees. "How long has it even been? Feels like forever since it started."
Michael leaned back against the fence, scanning the horizon with eyes that never stopped working. "Eleven days."
Sarah blinked up at him. "That's all?"
"Yeah," he said, almost bitter. "Eleven days since the world flipped. Feels like years, I know."
He remembered the first night vividly the sirens, the neighbor tearing his wife's throat out, Joel firing that pistol. Eleven days ago, he'd been a man with a bed, a phone, and a future he didn't question. Now he was a commander again, whether he liked it or not, with a child leaning on him like he was the last wall between her and the dark.
"Scientists were on TV at first," Lena muttered, voice thin. "Talking about cordyceps, about quarantine zones. They said it was contained." She let out a hollow laugh. "They said a lot of things."
Michael's jaw tightened. "Containment never works when panic sets in. Too many people moving, too many mistakes. The fungus doesn't care about borders."
Sarah hugged her knees, voice small. "So… no one's fixing it?"
Michael hesitated. He thought about the system's quiet hum at the edge of his vision, about the knowledge it fed him when no one was watching. He thought about what he'd seen already the speed of the infection, the sheer will of it to spread.
"They'll try," he said finally. "But this thing doesn't play fair. Don't count on anyone saving us but ourselves."
The words hung heavy, but Sarah nodded, as if she understood. Or maybe she just trusted him enough not to ask for lies.
That was when Lena's old radio, left sitting on the porch, crackled to life. At first it was just static, a broken hiss that made Michael's hand snap to his rifle. Then a voice cut through, warped but clear enough:
"…this is U.S. Army command. Quarantine zones have been established. Survivors are to head toward designated safe routes. Closest operational zone is Houston. Repeat, closest operational zone is Houston…"
Sarah's head shot up. "Did you hear that? They're there's somewhere safe!"
Lena's hands shook as she gripped the radio tighter. "They're still out there. The army's still fighting." Her eyes darted to Michael. "We could… we could actually make it."
Michael didn't answer right away. He watched the mist curling over the rooftops, the faint smoke trails from the explosion earlier. He'd been in warzones where command broadcasted hope long after the line had already collapsed. But he couldn't ignore what the message gave Sarah and Lena: direction.
"Pack light," he said at last. His tone was clipped, steady. "We move toward Houston. Slowly, carefully. No guarantees, but sitting here waiting to die isn't an option."
Sarah's lips trembled, but for the first time since Mark's death, she nodded with something close to determination.
They couldn't stay in the cul-de-sac. Not with the smell of blood already drawing scavengers human and infected alike. Michael rose, adjusted the rifle strap across his shoulder, and looked at the two girls.
"We move. Quiet and fast. Grab what we can carry. We'll find shelter closer to the highway."
Lena pushed herself up slowly, her face streaked with tears, but she followed. Sarah stood, pipe in hand, her grip firmer than it had been that morning.
They didn't look back at Mark. Michael had told her not to, and she listened.
As they slipped out of the cul-de-sac, the weight of the day pressed down on all of them. Eleven days in, and already they were learning the first, hardest lesson of the new world.
Survival wasn't just about fighting the infected. It was about carrying the weight of those who couldn't make it and not letting it crush you next.
Michael walked at the front again, Sarah at his side, Lena behind. Every step carried them further from the ashes of what had been, and deeper into the fire of what was coming.
And somewhere ahead, in the shadow of a promised quarantine zone, waited either salvation or one more lie to survive through.