Chapter 32: This was different. This was wrong.
The silence Nate left behind was a physical weight, pressing Skylar down into the grimy bookstore floor. But for him, the moment he slipped into the alley, the world narrowed to a tunnel of lethal focus. The kiss, the promise, it was all fuel now, converted into pure, cold purpose. He had lied. The clinic hadn't been a complete success.
He moved not like a man, but like a phantom, his boots making no sound on the cracked asphalt. The memory of the clinic's pharmacy drawer was burned into his mind. Next to the contraceptives, he'd seen a box of Ciprofloxacin, a powerful broad-spectrum antibiotic. And he needed it.
Three weeks ago, scavenging a derelict ambulance, a rusted stretcher bar had gouged a deep furrow into his calf. He'd cleaned it, stitched it himself, thought it was healing. But for the last four days, a deep, radiating heat had been building around the wound. The flesh was swollen, tight and angry. It wasn't just a cut anymore; it was a ticking clock. An infection like that, without the right tools, was a slow, feverish death sentence. He couldn't tell her. Showing weakness, even to her now, was a risk he couldn't calculate. It would shatter the image of the invincible protector, the one thing that kept her compliant and him in control.
He reached the clinic in minutes, slipping through the broken window with the silence of a shadow. He went straight to the pharmacy, ignoring the scattered pills and the ransacked shelves. He dropped to his knees and pulled the bottom drawer completely out, dumping its contents onto the floor. There, among the paper clutter, was the box. He snatched it, shoving it into a deep pocket on his tactical vest. A wave of visceral relief, so powerful it felt like weakness, washed over him. The immediate threat was mitigated.
But he didn't turn back. Not yet.
The real gamble, the true reason he'd risked this entire run, was still out there. He wasn't just a handyman; he was a man who understood systems. And this plague was a broken system. He needed to understand it.
His target was the town's high school. Specifically, the science lab. What he needed was chemicals and equipment.
He moved northeast, away from the bookstore, away from Skylar. The town seemed to be waking up, the moans and shuffles growing more frequent. He ducked into a doorway as a pack of four Rippers shambled past, their heads swiveling mindlessly. He held his breath, the M4 a cold comfort. Engaging them would be suicide. He waited until their sounds faded, then burst from cover, sprinting across a wide street and into the relative cover of a residential neighborhood.
The houses gave way to a large, open football field. On the other side stood Cedar Bend High, a low, brick-and-concrete structure with wide, smashed windows. The flagpole was bent at a forty-five-degree angle. This was the place.
The main entrance was a chokepoint of collapsed lockers and debris. He circled around back, finding a metal door marked "BOILER ROOM" that was slightly ajar, forced open by some past violence. He slipped inside, into the oppressive heat and hum of a dead boiler.
The hallway beyond was a tomb. Faded posters for a long-forgotten dance. A skeleton in a letterman jacket slumped against a wall, a dark stain fanning out behind it. Nate moved with his rifle raised, clearing each classroom doorway with a swift, professional pie-slice motion. History. English. Math.
Then he found it. Room 114. BIOLOGY.
The door was locked. He didn't hesitate. He reversed the M4 and drove the stock into the small window reinforced with wire mesh. The glass shattered inward with a crash that echoed like a gunshot in the silent hall. He reached through, ignoring the sharp edges that tore at his sleeve, and unlocked the door from the inside.
The lab was a time capsule of the outbreak. The air smelled of formaldehyde and dust. Student desks were neatly arranged, notebooks open to half-finished diagrams of mitochondria. But it was the teacher's domain at the front that held his interest. The storage closets.
The first was filled with glassware and Bunsen burners. He packed the glassware. The second was locked with a sturdy padlock. Nate set his rifle down, pulled a multi-tool from his belt, and went to work on the hasp. The metal groaned, then snapped with a satisfying ping.
Inside was a treasure trove. Microscopes. Boxes of pristine glass slides. Packets of disposable scalpels. On a shelf were rows and rows of chemicals, some he didn't recognize but he started packing them into close lit containers and into his pack. And on anothere high shelf, several heavy, white binders. He pulled one down, blowing dust from its cover. It was a lab manual, but handwritten notes were stuffed inside, pages filled with complex chemical formulas and frantic, scrawled observations.
He flipped it open, his eyes scanning the technical jargon. His own practical knowledge from a thousand repair jobs and his time as an OG allowed him to grasp the basics. This wasn't just a high school curriculum. The teacher had been a hobbyist, a prepper of a different sort, obsessed with virology and epidemiology.
Nate's heart hammered against his ribs. He found a page titled, "Projected Neuro-Degenerative Cascade - Model 7." And there, highlighted in yellow, was a single, chilling sentence:
"The prion-like agent demonstrates a pronounced susceptibility to extreme ionic disruption in an aqueous environment. A sustained, high-concentration saline solution (≥12%) appears to denature the catalytic proteins on contact in vitro."
He didn't understand all the words, but he understood the meaning. Prion-like. Susceptible. Saline solution. It wasn't a cure. It was a flaw. A weakness.
He was so engrossed he almost missed the sound. A soft, scraping shuffle at the classroom door.
He looked up.
Standing in the doorway was the biology teacher. Or what was left of him. He wore a tattered lab coat, spattered with old, dark stains. One milky eye was magnified grotesquely by a cracked pair of glasses hanging from his face. In his hand, he wasn't clutching or clawing. He was holding a steel dissection probe, its sharp point aimed forward, like a weapon.
The creature didn't snarl. It didn't lunge. It took a slow, deliberate step into the room, its head tilting, as if observing a fascinating new specimen.
Nate's blood ran cold. This was different. This was wrong. He'd never seen one grasp a tool.
He brought the M4 up, the sight lining up on the center of the thing's forehead. But he didn't fire. The crashing glass had been bad enough. A gunshot in this enclosed space would bring the entire school down on him.
The Ripper-teacher took another step, the probe held with a terrible, mocking precision.
Nate had seconds. He made a decision. He slung the rifle, grabbed the heavy lab manual and a handful of slide packets, and shoved them into his pack. He then grabbed a glass beaker from the counter.
As the creature let out a low, inquisitive gurgle and lunged with surprising speed, Nate sidestepped and brought the beaker down hard on its temple. The glass shattered. The Ripper-teacher stumbled, black fluid welling from the cut, but it didn't go down. It turned, more annoyed than injured, and swiped the probe at him.
Nate didn't wait. He bolted for the broken window he'd entered, diving through it headfirst, ignoring the glass tearing at his clothes. He hit the grass outside, rolled, and came up running. He didn't look back. He could hear the thing now, finally emitting a proper, rage-filled shriek, and the answering calls from deeper within the school.
He had the medicine. He had the equipment, the chemicals. He had the knowledge. And he had a new, terrifying understanding of what they were facing. He ran, not just for his life, but for hers, the image of the Ripper holding that probe seared into his mind. The game had just changed, and the rules had become infinitely more terrifying.