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Rebecca watched as Billy stalked out of the train car, feeling i He didn&039;t even look back, as though she wasn&039;t worth worrying about
And apparently I&039; She hadn&039;t expected hi, muscular, with dark steely eyes and an intricate tribal tattoo covering his entire right arh, and after her terrifying run-in with the walking near-dead, she hadn&039;t been up to the task of taking hiot the drop on you She&039;d found a lone corpse at the front of the car, one of the train workers, and had seen what looked like a key grasped in one cold hand Since the only other door out of the car was locked, she&039;d had to try for it--it was that, or go back through the passenger car She&039;d been so involved in trying to retrieve the key without snapping the stiff fingers that she hadn&039;t heard the convict approach, not until it was too late Now, as she walked back to the front of the car, she saw that the locked door used a card reader, anyway Great So far, she was doing just great
She turned and reached for her radio, ready to adh, they&039;d handle Billy More ie that so a convicted killer was suddenly lower on the list of priorities
Bam! Bam!
Before she&039;d even touched the transmitter button, she heard two rounds fired in the next car, the direction Billy had gone She hesitated, not sure what to do--and in that instant, aexploded behind her
She spun, shards of glass flying, and saw a hu to the floor
"Edward!"
The mechanic didn&039;t respond Rebecca rushed to her tea his condition
Besides a ray with shock, his gaze bleary and unfocused Every exposed part of his body was covered with contusions and abrasions
"Are you all right?" she asked, ripping her auze patch She tore the package apart, applied it to his shoulder, realizing with a sinking sensation that it ood; fro his shirt, his subclavian had likely been severed She was astounded that he was still alive, let alone that he&039;d had the strength to juh a"What happened?"
Edward rolled his head towards her, blinking slowly His voice was taut with pain "Worse thanWe can&039;t"
She held the bandage firh He needed a hospital, ASAP, or he wasn&039;t going toweaker "You must be careful, Rebecca," he slurred " forest is full of zombiesand monsters "
She started to tell hilass exploded, slivers of it raining over theiant dark shapes leaped through the broken pane, one disappearing around a jag in the corridor, the other turning in their direction Zo she&039;d ever seen before Itteeth at her, flaps of skin andfrom its haunches, she realized that it, too, had been infected by whatever disease had struck the train&039;s passengers It didn&039;t just look dead, it looked destroyed, its eyes filmed with red, its body like some mad patchwork quilt of wet fur and bloody tissue
Edouldn&039;t be able to protect hi h she couldn&039;t re farther along the corridor, out of sight
She ai the true horror of the disease, whatever it was, for the first tiers had been terrible, but so shocking she&039;d hardly had ti at the stiff-legged,into a hellish whine of hunger, she rey black lab mix named Donner, remembered how much she&039;d loved him--and understood that this had probably been someone&039;s pet, once, too Just as those people she&039;d shot had once been huhed and cried and come from families that would miss them, that would be destroyed by their loss Disease, chemical spill, or attack, whatever had caused all this, it was an aboh hertensed its shredded flanks, preparing to leap at her, and Rebecca squeezed the trigger, the nine- in the s at the bit of corridor she could see, waiting for the second to appear She didn&039;t have to wait long
With a snarl, the animal leaped around the corner, its jaide Rebecca fired, the shot hitting its chest, staggering the dog back with a high whine of pain--but it was still on its feet It shook itself as though shaking off water, growling, readying to coain even as dark, ichorous blood poured from its wound
Should have killed it, that should have knocked it flat!
Just like the people in the passenger car, it seemed that only a head shot would take it down She raised her ai the center of its bullet-shaped skull The dog fell, spasmed once, and went still There could betoward the broken s and trying to see through the darkness and rain, straining to hear anything besides the storain, reaching into her pack for a fresh bandage--
--and stopped, staring at her teammate The steady pump of blood from his shoulder wound was no more She quickly felt for a pulse below his left ear, felt nothing at all Edward gazed at the floor with half open eyes, dead
"I&039; back on her heels It seeone, that he&039;d died in the short tiuilt swept over her If she&039;d been faster, if she&039;d packed his wound better
But you didn&039;t, and the longer you sit here feeling bad about it, thehiuilt at the insensitive thought, but a glance at the open s got her on her feet She&039;d have to assess her culpability later, when it was safe to do so
Her radio beeped She grabbed it, backing away from the s, from poor Edward
Reception was bad, but she could tell it was Enrico She held the speaker to her ear, hugely relieved to hear the captain&039;s strong voice in between bursts of static "you copy?more information onCoen"
Rebecca reluctantly stepped closer to the s, hoping to hear better, but the static barely lifted
"institutionalizedkilled at least twenty-three peoplecareful"
What? Rebecca pressed the transmit button "Enrico, this is Rebecca! Do you read me? Over"
A wave of static
"Captain! STARS Bravo, do you copy?"
Long seconds of nal Rebecca put the radio back on her belt She had to get to the &039;copter, tell the others about Edward, about Billy and the train and the terrible danger they were all facing She changed clips for the nine- a moment to reload the half spent one With a final sorrowful look at her fallen tea her best to avoid slipping in the pool of blood surrounding it, and started back toward the passenger car
Although she knew she should be eager to run across theconvict, to arrest hiain Edward&039;s death, the dogs She felt unsteady, incapable of taking charge And twenty-three people? She shuddered, amazed that he hadn&039;t killed her when he&039;d had the chance
In the passenger car, she saw the result of the two shots she&039;d heard earlier The disease victiht had moved, but hadn&039;t been sure about It seemed he&039;d been alive, after all He one after her She paused at the door back to the car she&039;d originally co over the decayed bodies of the people she&039;d killed If Edas right, if the woods were full of these things, she was going to have to move fast--
--and maybe Billy didn&039;t kill those marines
Rebecca blinked It hadn&039;t occurred to her earlier, but the jeephim to run, in fact It seemed likely The two dead s could have done it
She shook her head It didn&039;t matter He was a killer, either way, and if she wasn&039;t up to the job of apprehending hiet someone who could As serious as the unknown sickness was, they couldn&039;t just let Coen run
She left the passenger car behind, hurrying through the e that the others were all back at the helicopter, safe She reached for the handle, lifted it She wasn&039;t sure how to break the news about Edward, that was going to be rough--
Rebecca frowned, pushing at the sliding door, which was refusing to slide She tried the handle again, then againand then kicked the door, cursing silently It was stuck--or Billy had locked it,hi that key in the dead worker&039;s hand She hadn&039;t otten about it after her run-in with Billy, not to sBut then, who needed keys? She could just as easily crawl out through one of the broken s, no big deal--
She heard a sound, a door closing, and looked to her left, toward the back of the train So around in the next car over Another sick passenger, probably Or perhaps Billy was still on board Either way, she was ready to get off, and she had her choice of s to exit
Unless it&039;s someone else back there Someone who needs help
It could even be another of the STARS, and now that she&039;d thought of it, she felt duty-bound to take a look, sensible or not She walked quickly to the end of the e herself for whatever would co weirder could happen tonight--but then, most of what had already happened didn&039;t see
She opened the door to the next car and took it in with a sweep of the nine-millimeter, vastly relieved to find it e up on the left, a door straight ahead That
And now it opened, and out walked Billy Coen
Billy stopped, stared at the girl, at the weapon in her hand--and was glad That she was still alive, that she had a gun and apparently kne to use it After what he&039;d just learned, having a partner ht be his only chance to survive
"This is bad," he said, and could see that she kneasn&039;t referring to the gun in his face She didn&039;t answer, only watched hi, and he raised his hands, understanding that ga handcuff slapped his wrist
"Those people--the ones you had to kill--they were sick," he said "One of them tried to bite me I shot him, and found a notebook in his jacket May I--?"
He started to lower one of his hands, to reach for his back pocket
"No! Keep your hands up!" she said, jerking the weapon She still seemed scared, but was apparently prepared to arrest hiht back pocket"
"You&039;re kidding, right? I&039;hed "It&039;s important, some kind of a diary It doesn&039;t ation into a lab that&039;s been abandoned or destroyed--but it also talks about a bunch of murders that have happened around here, and the possibility that a virus has been released So called T-virus"