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“Just go. I’ll keep up. What about Gitsh and Marcus?”

“Dead,” Clarence said. “And Dan took a round in the head. He’s gone.”

They skirted cars and ran into the half-empty parking lot ringed with trees growing up through the asphalt. On the far side, they hopped a smaller fence and found themselves on a cobblestone street, old bricks b.u.mping under the soles of their thick biohazard boots. Two blocks straight ahead, across yet more tree-dotted, wreckage-strewn vacant lots, she saw an abandoned three-story brick building. Faded white letters on faded blue paint at the top of the building spelled out GLOBE TRADING COMPANY. She started toward it, then stopped when Clarence again grabbed her.

“No, don’t,” he said. “Look at the bottom there, by the corner.”

She did and saw two men in army uniforms running out of the building. A second later, two more.

“They have men stationed in there,” Clarence said. “That’s their f.u.c.king headquarters for all we know. We gotta get out of here. Come on!”

People ran in all directions. It wasn’t the screaming sprint of a monster movie, but rather silent running, people moving fast in a half-crouch, looking every which way for the next threat. Margaret and Clarence must have appeared to be such a threat, because one glance at them sent people running the opposite way.

Margaret and Clarence ran left down the old brick road, putting the abandoned lot and the Globe building beyond it on their right. She heard gunfire behind her again—the men who’d killed Gitsh, Marcus, and Dr. Dan, they were giving chase. s.h.i.+t-s.h.i.+t-s.h.i.+t, was this how her life would end? A bullet in the back?

The road changed from b.u.mpy brick to b.u.mpy pavement. On their right a red brick building, one story, loading-dock doors open. Clarence aimed for it.

Margaret was already exhausted. “Where are we going?”

“Away from the bullets.” Clarence stopped at the loading dock, lifted her by her waist and set her on the ledge, then hopped up behind her.

“Just run, Margo. We have to find a place to hide or we’re dead.”

12:38 P.M.: Corporal Cope’s Big Day Out

The convoy roared down I-75. Three Humvees, followed by two M939 five-ton troop trucks, followed by two more Humvees. With that much heavy vehicle ripping along at ninety miles an hour, cars just got the h.e.l.l out of the left lane and let the convoy roar by. Farmland spread out on either side, snow covering the broken remnants of last year’s crops. Beyond the fields, rows of trees, at least a quarter mile from the highway. Beautiful scenery.

Corporal Cope rode in the third Hummer, feeling his connection with G.o.d. Soon they would see the glorious gateway and, G.o.d willing, would be there when the angels came through.

G.o.d, it seemed, was not willing.

The lead Humvee suddenly morphed from a hardy piece of military gear into an orange blossom of fire, spewing bits of metal and body parts all over the highway. The explosion engulfed a slow-moving VW Beetle in the right lane, and sent part of a rear axle through the winds.h.i.+eld of the Ford Explorer directly behind it.

The second Humvee swerved to the right, around both the suddenly tumbling Explorer and the newly burning Beetle. The Hummer driver showed amazing reaction time, but at ninety miles an hour the heavy vehicle quickly lost traction. Its rear end fishtailed, making it almost perpendicular with the road when the wheels dug in and it flipped violently, barrel-rolling into the ditch. Cope saw a freeze-frame image of a man thrown free, already missing an arm and part of a leg.

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