For a few seconds after the broadcast cut back to the studio, no one moved.
The television glowed above the bar, the anchor pale and strained, clinging to a professional cadence that no longer fit the moment.
Her words blurred, “trying to confirm… developing situation… authorities responding…” but they didn’t matter anymore. Everyone in the room had already seen enough.
The silence felt heavy. Pressurized.
Somewhere behind the bar, a glass clinked as the bartender set it down with an unsteady hand. A chair scraped softly against the floor. Someone near the back of the bar let out a nervous laugh that died halfway through.
Tony stayed seated, his body still, his mind already moving.
He scanned the room the way he’d scanned alleyways and doorframes; quick, efficient, instinctive. Faces first. Reactions. Threats. Variables.
Confusion.
Disbelief.
Fear trying to decide whether it was real yet.
His eyes moved past JoeJoe, Vic, Memo. Past the girls. Chelsey’s smile gone, Veronica rigid, Jackie gripping the table like it might steady the room.
Then Tony’s gaze stopped.
Michael.
His brother sat frozen, eyes fixed on the television, jaw slightly slack. Not panic. At least not yet. Just the dawning realization that something fundamental had shifted, that the world he understood had cracked and was threatening to spill.
For an instant, everything else fell away.
Tony saw Michael at twenty-two years old again, standing in their parents’ living room with his hands clenched into fists that couldn’t hold anything together.
Not him, Tony thought.
Not here.
I won’t let him get hurt.
The feeling hit hard and fast. Love sharpened into something fierce and protective.
Tony inhaled once, slow and controlled, then let it out.
He lifted his eyes.
Hutch was already watching him.
No words passed between them. None were needed.
Years of shared training, shared danger, shared loss condensed into a single exchange. Hutch’s expression didn’t change, but his posture did. It was subtle, immediate. Weight shifting forward. Attention narrowing. The professional switch flipping on.
We move, that look said.
Now.
Tony straightened in his chair.
“Alright,” he said – not loud, but firm enough to cut through the noise that had begun creeping back into the room. Eyes turned toward him without anyone quite realizing why.
“We’re leaving.”
JoeJoe blinked. “Now?”
“Yes,” Tony said. “Now.”
He stood decisively, the motion cutting off any further questions.
Hutch was already on his feet, moving toward the front of the tavern to give himself a clear view of the door and windows, scanning the street beyond with quick, practiced glances.
Tony continued, calm and clipped. “We don’t know how fast this is spreading or what’s happening outside this town. Standing around watching TV isn’t going to help anyone.”
Michael finally looked at him. “Tony–”
“I know,” Tony said, softer just for him. “Your friends. We’re going to go look for them.”
Tony turned to the girls. “You don’t know us very well,” he said plainly, “and you don’t owe us anything. We’re heading up to the Mountainside Campground. We have friends there. Plus, it’s higher ground, fewer people. It’s on the way to your cabin. If you want to come with us, you can.”
Chelsey didn’t hesitate. She glanced at Veronica and Jackie, then back at Tony, nodding. “We’re in.”
Veronica nodded. “Yeah, I don’t like what I just saw.”
Jackie swallowed and looked at Chelsey, “Umm… Can we talk about this?”
Tony understood the hesitation. “Of course. You guys talk it out. We have a couple of minutes. Boys, over here.” Tony motioned to an area near the front door. The men gathered quickly, their unease displayed on their faces. The girls huddled around the table and spoke quietly.
“You all saw it,” Tony said quietly to the group of men. “This thing. Whatever it is. It’s spreading. Fast. We need stick together and get somewhere defensible. Somewhere where we can survive the onset.”
Hutch was scanning out the front window of the tavern, nodding in agreement.
The girls rejoined them. Chelsey looked at Tony and spoke for the group, “We’re with you guys.”
Tony gave a short nod. “Alright. Grab your things.”
He reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet, and peeled off two crisp hundred-dollar bills. He placed them on the table, weighing them under an empty glass.
They moved quickly but without panic. Chairs pushed back, bags slung over shoulders, hands steady despite the adrenaline beginning to seep in.
Hutch took point at the door, pausing for half a second to listen before opening it.
Outside, the air felt different. Sirens echoed in the distance – not just one, but layered. An overlapping chorus of wails.
The sun was still setting peacefully, painting the sky orange and pink. The mountains stood unchanged. But somehow the color seemed a little less vibrant. A little more muted.
The group gathered in the parking lot just outside the door. The sirens were approaching.
A woman stood on the far side of the parking lot, staring at her phone like it had betrayed her. Down the street, a family was frantically loading their SUV, throwing gear in without organization. No plan, just speed.
The chorus of sirens grew louder.
An older man stood at the entrance to a motel room across the way, watching the street with the fixed stare of someone trying to understand what he was seeing.
The casual afternoon had evaporated. What remained was urgency.
Just then, two police cruisers tore past the tavern, left-to-right, lights flashing, sirens screaming. One clipped a nearby trash can, spilling debris across the street. The sound punched through everything.
Michael flinched. JoeJoe swore under his breath.
“They’re going towards the highway.” Hutch said quietly, tracking the cruisers’ movement.
But it didn’t end there.
Twenty seconds later, an ambulance and another police cruiser flew by headed in the same direction as the first two police cars.
Tony watched the emergency vehicles disappear beyond the bend and felt something tighten in his chest. This wasn’t something happening on a screen anymore.
It was here.
Down the street, the family finished loading their SUV. The father slammed the hatch and shoved everyone into the vehicle. Doors hadn’t even fully closed before he was pulling out of the driveway, tires squealing as he merged onto the road headed toward the highway.
The woman with the phone had lowered it and began walking like someone who’d made a decision.
Everyone was thinking the same thing: Leave. Get out. Find shelter.
But home was 150 miles away. Through whatever chaos was out there.
The woman with the phone made it halfway to her car when something stepped out of the alley beside the motel across the street.
It moved like a body that had been damaged but was still forced to keep going anyway. One leg dragged behind it, the foot scraping the pavement, but it didn’t slow it down. Its gait hitched and lurched in broken rhythms. Each of its steps jerked out of sync with the next, like its limbs were no longer being controlled by its brain.
It had once been a man. There was no mistaking that. The shape of him was still there beneath the grotesque. It wore a light brown sweatshirt and blue jeans, both darkened down the front with blood that had dried stiff into the fabric.
But it was the face that stopped the breath in Tony’s throat.
The eyes were wrong in a way that made Tony’s skin crawl. The pupils were clouded over and milk-white, as if something had filmed over them from the inside. Dark spiderwebbing radiated from the sockets, black and branching beneath the skin like veins full of poison.
Its face had a waxy, pale cast, slick with sweat, and more of that black webbing pulsing faintly under the surface of its throat and temples.
Then it saw her.
Its jaw began to work. Opening and closing with a hungry, mechanical twitch that showed too much teeth.
The woman didn’t scream. She just froze in terror.
When it started toward her, it moved faster than it should have, dragging one ruined leg. An inhuman, guttural sound pushed out of its mouth as it closed in on her.
“Vehicles. Now!” Tony said quietly to his group.
They didn’t hesitate. They moved toward the vehicles, staying low but purposeful.
Behind them, the woman finally moved. She ran toward her car, keys fumbling in her hands.
Tony didn’t wait to see what happened next.
Tony turned to Memo and said, “Let Hutch ride with you. JoeJoe, you ride with me.”
Tony looked at Chelsey as she was climbing into her white Jeep Cherokee. “You girls follow us.”
As Tony stepped toward his Jeep, hand already reaching for the door, one thought entered his mind: The world had changed. And they were already behind the curve.