Page 75 of Glass Rose
“You sure about that?” Gavin asks.
“Marcus.” The name feels heavy on my tongue. “He turned after being shot. Not bitten, not infected through normal transmission. Just… dead, then not.”
“Could have been infected before,” John says.
I shake my head. “The symptoms are unmistakable. Fever, aggression, disorientation. We were with him constantly. He wasn’t sick.”
“So we’re all infected,” John says. “All of us. And when we die…”
“We come back.” I take a bottle of water from the shelf. “Unless the brain is destroyed.”
No peaceful deaths. No chance to say goodbye. Just the certainty that every corpse is a ticking time bomb, waiting to reanimate and attack the living.
“That’s why the military response failed so quickly,” Gavin says. “Heart attacks, strokes, accidents—any death created new infected.”
“And in crisis situations, people die all the time,” I add. “Especially in hospitals full of the already sick and injured.”
John shifts on his elbows, wincing. “So what you’re saying is, we’re all fucked.”
“Pretty much.” I hand him antibiotics and the bottle of water. “Take these. They might help with the infection. The normal kind, at least.”
He downs the pills, grimacing at the taste. “What’s the plan? Keep running until we drop? It’s just delaying the inevitable.”
“Everything’s always been delaying the inevitable.” I remove his blood from my hands with an antiseptic wipe. The coppery smell clings to my skin despite my efforts. “We were all going to die someday. This just… changes what happens after.”
Gavin returns his attention to the outside. “I havesomewhere we can go. An island compound about fifty miles north of here. Defensible, stocked with supplies.”
“Your team?”
He nods. “If they followed protocol, they’d have retreated there. Solar power, rainwater collection. It’s designed for long-term sustainability.”
“An island,” John repeats. “Water barrier against the infected.”
“Assuming they can’t swim,” I mutter.
John attempts to stand but immediately sways, face draining of what little color remains.
“Hey.” I catch him before he can fall, easing him back onto the counter. “You’ve lost a lot of blood. You need rest.”
“Rest is a luxury we don’t have, sweetheart.” But he doesn’t fight me, which tells me just how weak he really is.
Gavin moves away from the window, coming to examine John’s condition for himself. “How long before he can travel?”
“I don’t—Ideally? Days.” I meet his gaze. “Realistically? Hours. Maybe.”
“We need to move before Green’s men pick up our trail again.” Gavin checks his watch. “Give him an hour. Then we go.”
John closes his eyes. “Wake me when it’s time.”
His breathing evens out almost immediately, exhaustion and blood loss pulling him under. I check his pulse—rapid but steady—and adjust the bandage one last time.
It worked. He’s not dying.
I huff out a breath, closing my own eyes.
Marcus’s eyes appear instantly, turning milky. Alex pointing a gun at us. Min-ji’s face with tears drying on her cheeks. The sound of my father’s skin giving under my knife.
Everything keeps piling up.
