Aftermath

thunderous noise. For a second several of them thought it might be the helicopter returning, but it was quickly clear that this was something else entirely. Howard took a few steps back toward the main street, sidestepping several more cadavers, and saw that a billowing cloud of dust and smoke was rolling steadily toward them. The air felt hot and dry. Had part of the apartment building collapsed? It was impossible to tell, but the flames were spreading fast. Through the haze he could see more of the dead continuing to stagger forward, the farthest advanced of them catching fire long before they reached the burning apartments.
    Harte and Kieran came running out of the chaos toward him. “We need to get out of here,” Harte shouted, wiping tears from his stinging eyes. “The whole bloody town’s going to go up in flames.”
    He stopped speaking when he saw the expression on Howard&x2019;s face.
    “Harte…” Howard started to say.
    “What is it?” Harte demanded. He continued around the corner and saw Jas. Jas saw him too, and immediately raised the rifle and aimed it at him. And then Kieran appeared, and Harte was immediately forgotten. Jas directed the full force of his anger at him instead.
    “You sold me out, you fucker!” he screamed, charging into Kieran and sending him flying. He aimed the rifle at him and Kieran staggered back, tripping on the curb and landing on his backside.
    “You were wrong, Jas,” he said, barely able to get the words out.
    “Jesus,” Lorna shouted, “is there anyone you’re not pissed off with? Doesn’t that tell you something? Like, that you might be the one who’s got this wrong?”
    Jas glared at her, but was distracted as another random body collided with him. He recoiled, shoving the foul thing away. It continued to try and move toward him, trying to get to the fire in the distance, but Jas misinterpreted its actions as an attack. He forced the rifle up into the creatures gaping mouth and fired, splattering what was left of its brains over the pavement in a firework-like shower of dark brown gore. He spun around and saw another cadaver walking listlessly toward him, and fired again. This time he hit the cadaver in the right shoulder. It collapsed, but immediately tried to drag itself forward with its one remaining good arm. He clubbed the back of its head with the butt of his rifle.
    “Jas, stop!” Harte shouted, but his words had no effect.
    “They’re coming!” he screamed, the panic in his voice now clearly evident. The collapsing building had clearly attracted the attention of many more of the creatures, and another surge of dead flesh was now advancing toward them.
    “They might be coming,” Harte said, still trying to stop him, “but they’re not coming for you, you idiot. Haven’t you worked it out yet? The dead aren’t our enemy. They’re as scared and as lost as we are.”
    Jas spun around again. Another corpse, and another shot to the face. This time Ainsworth tried to stop him, grabbing the barrel of the rifle. In Jas’s panic and confusion, his trigger finger tightened and he fired. Ainsworth was blown backward. He collided with a corpse, then dropped to the ground, a bloody gaping hole in his chest.
    “What the hell have you done?” Lorna demanded, standing over Ainsworth’s twitching body, barely able to comprehend what had just happened. Wisps of smoke rose from around the edges of his wound. She didn’t need to get any closer to know he was dead. She looked up and saw the others moving farther away from Jas, who was reloading the rifle with another handful of shells from his pocket. “What happened to you, Jas?”
    “The last three months happened,” he replied, still looking for his next target. He aimed and fired at another cadaver, then another and another … The rest of the living scattered as he reloaded again, regrouping around the back of a garbage truc. Harte tried to call to Lorna from the truck, but she wasn’t listening. She was still crouched next to Ainsworth’s lifeless body. Jas fired at yet another cadaver.
    “The last three months have fucked us all up,” she said, “but I thought you were better than this. It didn’t have to be this way. You, me, the dead … we’re all victims, you know. It’s not about us versus them or you versus me, it’s just about us all trying to survive.”
    “I know that,” he said, lowering the rifle momentarily. “I know that better than anyone. I’ve been trying to