THEN
The bakery had been Arjun's sanctuary.
He'd inherited it from his father, who'd inherited it from his father before him. Three generations of Bakshi men kneading dough before dawn, watching the sunrise through flour-dusted windows, keeping the same hours their grandfathers had kept.
The building was simple. Two connected spaces sharing a wall. The bakery on the right, their apartment on the left. A door between them meant Arjun could walk from his kitchen to his ovens without stepping outside. The ovens were temperamental—the left one ran hot, the right one needed coaxing. The ceiling leaked when it rained. The ancient cash register stuck every third transaction and had to be smacked on the side to work properly.
But it was his.
The smell of fresh bread and cardamom had seeped into the walls over decades. Into his clothes. Into his bones. He couldn't imagine doing anything else. Didn't want to.
That last morning had started like every other.
Arjun arrived at the shop at four-thirty. Still dark outside. Still quiet except for the street sweepers and the early delivery trucks. Meena was asleep in their apartment next door, the wall between them thin enough that he could hear her gentle snoring if he listened.
He fired up the ovens. Started the first batch of dough. Settled into the rhythm he'd known his entire adult life.
By eight-thirty, the morning rush was starting. Office workers grabbing chai and samosas on their way to work. Students buying biscuits before school. The regulars who came every day at the same time like clockwork.
Reyan Sharma walked in around then.
Good customer. Good man. Always polite. Always asked about Meena's health, about business, about nothing important in that comfortable way people did when they'd known each other for years."Morning, Reyan!" Arjun grinned from behind the counter, dusting flour off his arms. "The usual?"
"Yeah. And a few extras," Reyan said. "Office morale, you know?"
"Lucky them. You've got good taste." Arjun leaned closer. "Between us, I steal one when you're not looking."
Reyan laughed. "Save me one next time, thief."
That was the last normal moment Arjun could remember.
By mid-AFTERNOON, the shop was busy. Mrs. Patel buying her two loaves of wheat bread—she came every Tuesday and Friday, had for fifteen years. The construction workers from the site down the street grabbing food before their shift. A group of college students arguing about philosophy while drinking chai.
Normal. Routine. Safe.
Then, at five-fourty five—Arjun would remember the exact time because he'd just told a customer their order would be ready in fifteen minutes—the screaming started outside.
At first, he thought it was a fight. Street arguments weren't uncommon in Niraya's crowded neighborhoods. The customers glanced toward the window nervously but kept shopping. Arjun kept working, sliding fresh naan from the oven, half-listening to the commotion escalate from shouting to something else.
Something worse.
The screams weren't angry. They were terrified.
And they were getting closer.
Then Mrs. Patel burst back through the door.
She'd left maybe five minutes ago with her shopping bag full of bread. Now she was back, the bag forgotten somewhere. Blood covered her blouse—not her blood, Arjun would realize later. Her eyes were wild. Panicked.
"Close the door!" she screamed. Her voice was raw. Desperate. "CLOSE IT! THEY'RE COMING!"
The other customers froze. Someone dropped their chai. The cup shattered on the floor, the sound loud in the sudden silence.
Mrs. Patel took two steps into the shop and collapsed.
Not fainted. Collapsed. Her whole body went rigid, then started seizing violently. Foam bubbled from her mouth. Her eyes rolled back.
Arjun ran around the counter. Years of first aid training from his youth kicked in automatically. Check airways. Check pulse. Call for help.
That's when he saw it.
The bite mark on her shoulder. Deep. Ragged. Still bleeding freely, soaking through her blouse.
"Mrs. Patel?" He reached for her wrist to check her pulse.
Her eyes snapped open.
White. Completely white. The pupils were gone, swallowed by milky film that looked like cataracts but spread too fast, too wrong.
She lunged.
The movement was impossibly quick. Inhuman. Her teeth were bared, jaw opening wider than it should, and a sound came from her throat that no person should be able to make.
The shop erupted.
Customers screamed. Stampeded for the door. Bodies crashed into each other. Someone went down hard. Others trampled over them in their panic to escape.
Arjun stumbled backward. His hip hit the display case. Glass cracked. His hand scrabbled for purchase and found the bread knife—sixteen inches of serrated steel he'd sharpened just yesterday morning.
Mrs. Patel—the thing that used to be Mrs. Patel—kept coming. Moving with jerky, puppet-like motions. Joints bending at wrong angles.
When she lunged again, instinct took over.
The knife found her chest.
Once.
She didn't stop. Didn't slow. Just kept reaching for him with clawed hands.
Twice.
Still coming.
Three times.
Four.
Then the knife found her brain.
Arjun stood there, chest heaving, covered in blood that steamed in the cool air. The knife shook in his hand. Around him, the shop was empty. The customers had fled. The door hung open. Outside, he could hear screaming. So much screaming.
He looked down at Mrs. Patel's body.
Fifteen years she'd been buying bread from him. Every Tuesday and Friday without fail. She'd been at his wedding. Had brought him sweets when his father died. Had asked about Meena's health just last week.
Now she was dead on his floor. Killed by his hand.
His mind couldn't process it. The world had tilted sideways and nothing made sense anymore.
Then he heard them outside.
Dozens of voices. Hundreds maybe. The groaning. The shuffling feet. The wet sounds. The screams of people being caught.
And he remembered.
Meena.
The apartment. Connected by that door. Where she was probably making lunch, humming to herself, completely unaware that the world was ending.
"Meena," he whispered.
He ran.
Burst through the connecting door into their living room, screaming her name.
"Arjun?" She appeared from the kitchen, wiping her hands on a towel. Her face was confused. Concerned. "What's all that noise outside? Is someone hurt? Why are you covered in—" Her eyes went wide. "Is that blood?"
"We have to go." He grabbed her arm. His hand left a red print on her sleeve. "Now. Right now. Something's happening. People are attacking each other. Mrs. Patel, she—"
The bakery's front window exploded.
Glass sprayed everywhere, glittering in the air like diamonds. One of them crashed through the display case. Hit the floor of the shop. Rolled. Came up already reaching for them through the connecting door.
Behind it, Arjun could see more pouring into his bakery. Drawn by the noise. By movement. By prey.
He slammed the connecting door shut. Threw the bolt with shaking hands.
"Out the back!" He grabbed Meena's hand. "NOW!"
They ran through their small apartment. Past the kitchen where lunch was still cooking on the stove. Past their bedroom where the bed was still unmade from this morning. Out the back door that opened into the alley.
The alley wasn't safe.
Bodies everywhere. Some still. Some moving in ways that made his brain hurt trying to process. The infected shambled and lurched and ran.
"The car," Arjun said. Their old Maruti was parked three buildings down. "We get to the car, we drive, we—"
Meena screamed.
One of them had come up behind her. Young man, maybe twenty. Wearing a delivery uniform. His teeth sank into her shoulder.
For a second, Arjun froze.
This wasn't how attacks happened. There was no warning, no struggle—just teeth, flesh, and a wet, animal sound that didn't belong in the middle of their street.
"NO!"
The knife was already in his hand. He didn't remember raising it. He didn't remember aiming. He just swung.
The blade struck the thing in the side of the head. The impact jarred his arm, sending a dull shock up to his shoulder. The young man collapsed without a sound, hitting the pavement hard and wrong.
Arjun dropped beside Meena as she stumbled, catching her before she fell.
"Meena—Meena, I've got you—"
She was breathing hard. Too hard. Her hand clutched his jacket like she was afraid the ground itself might swallow her.
"It burns," she said.
"What?"
She pressed her palm to her shoulder. When she pulled it back, her fingers were red, shaking. "It's… hot. Like fire. Like something's spreading."
"Okay," Arjun said quickly. Too quickly. "That's adrenaline. That's shock. That happens. It doesn't mean anything."
She nodded, like she wanted to believe him.
For a moment, she even stood straighter.
"I'm okay," she said, though her voice wavered. "I think I'm okay. I can still move."
Relief slammed into him so hard his knees almost gave out.
"See?" he said, forcing a smile that didn't feel real. "You're fine. We're fine. We just need to move. Slowly. No noise."
They didn't run.
They walked.
Every step felt wrong.
A minute passed. Then another.
Meena's grip tightened on his arm.
"It's still burning," she whispered. "It's worse now. Like it's crawling."
Arjun swallowed. "Don't think about it."
"I can't not think about it."
They stopped in the shadow of a parked bus. Sirens wailed somewhere far away. Too far.
Meena leaned against the metal, closing her eyes.
"How long do you think it's been?" she asked.
"Since what?"
"Since he bit me."
Arjun checked his watch without meaning to. His hands shook. "A few minutes. That's all."
She nodded again. Slower this time.
"Arjun," she said quietly, "promise me something."
His chest tightened. "Don't."
"Promise me you won't lie."
He didn't answer.
She opened her eyes and looked at him. Really looked.
"It's not stopping," she said. "Whatever this is… it's not stopping."
"No," he said, voice cracking. "You don't know that."
Her breathing had changed. Not frantic. Controlled. Like she was bracing herself.
He looked down.
Her fingers were trembling, just barely.
Five minutes.
Maybe more.
Her skin felt too warm when he touched her. Fever-warm.
"I love you," she said suddenly.
The words hit him harder than the scream had.
"Meena—"
"I need you to listen." Her voice was steady, even as her eyes started to glass over. Not white yet. Just… unfocused. "If I stop making sense, if I say something wrong—"
"You won't."
"If I try to follow you," she continued, tears finally spilling, "you don't let me."
His vision blurred. "I'm not leaving you."
She smiled. Small. Sad. Familiar.
"You already know you will."
Another minute passed.
Her breathing slowed.
Then she flinched.
"Arjun," she whispered. "I don't feel my shoulder anymore."
Panic finally broke through her calm. "I don't feel it."
He pulled her into his arms, holding her tight, like pressure alone could keep her here.
"I'm here," he sobbed. "I'm here."
She clung to him for a few seconds.
Then she pushed him away.
"Run," she said.
"No."
"Please." Her voice cracked. "It's getting hard to think."
Her pupils were dilating now. The whites just beginning to dull—not fully changed, but wrong enough to terrify him.
"I don't want you to see it," she said. "I don't want to hurt you."
"Meena—"
"RUN!"
She shoved him with what strength she had left.
He stumbled back.
By the time he looked up again, her gaze had gone unfocused, her jaw slackening, breath coming in shallow pulls.
Not turned yet.
But close enough.
Arjun ran.
He didn't remember much after that.
Just pieces. Flashes of memory that didn't connect properly.
Hiding in a dumpster while they shuffled past. The smell of rotting garbage mixing with the smell of death. His hand clamped over his mouth to keep from gagging, from making any sound at all.
Drinking rainwater that had pooled in a gutter. It tasted like metal and dirt but his throat was so dry he didn't care.
Finding the collapsed storefront. The furniture store with its broken windows and overturned displays. Barricading himself inside with whatever he could move. A couch. A bookshelf. Anything heavy.
Days blurring together. No way to tell time except by the light coming through the cracks. Morning. Afternoon. Night. Morning again.
Hunger. Constant, gnawing hunger.
Thirst that made his tongue stick to the roof of his mouth.
The groans outside. Always outside. Never stopping.
Arjun blinked.
Pulled himself back to the present. Back to the cramped back room of the gas station convenience store where they'd taken shelter for the night.
It was dark now. Properly dark. The kind of darkness that felt heavy.
Around him, people were sleeping. Or trying to. Quiet breathing. Someone shifting position. The rustle of fabric.
His hand instinctively went to the knife in his belt. The same kitchen knife he'd grabbed that morning in the bakery. The same one he'd used to kill Mrs. Patel. The same one he'd used to try to save Meena.
It hadn't saved her.
But maybe it would help him survive long enough to matter again.
Arjun looked around at these people who'd stopped for him. Who'd saved him when they could have just kept driving. When stopping meant risk and delay and danger.
Tomorrow they were going after Samir's sister. Into danger. Maybe into death.
And Arjun would help them.
Because they'd helped him. Because that's what you did. Because in this new world where everything was broken and wrong, maybe the only thing that mattered was helping each other survive.
It was the least he could do.
He closed his eyes and tried to sleep.
But all he could see was Meena's face. The moment her eyes went white. The moment she stopped being his wife and became something else.
The moment he'd run and left her behind.
He'd carry that with him forever.
However long forever lasted now.
e heard engines.
Cars. Multiple cars. The sound of civilization. Of living people.
He'd burst from his hiding spot without thinking. Didn't weigh the risks. Didn't calculate the odds. Just ran toward the sound like a drowning man reaching for air.
The runner had come out of nowhere. Fast. So fast.
The gunshot had been like thunder.
Then Reyan's face appearing through the car window. Like a miracle. Like salvation.