She knew before it happened what it would do.

It grabbed her hair and began to yank.

She managed to hook her feet on the edge of the hatch and held onto the edge of the roof.

“Gawddammit, Ed,” Bill shouted from inside the bus.

Jenni pushed back from the edge of the bus with her hands, the pain from her hair being pulled making her gasp. She tried hard to wrestle free, but the zombie was holding tight.

She heard a window slide open beneath her, then a shout, followed by two gunshots. Her hair came free and she fell back onto the roof of the bus. Grabbing up her rifle, she steadied herself as the bus came to a stop. She immediately aimed at the other zombies heading toward them.

More gunfire from those within the bus chorused with her shots.

One by one, the zombies fell to the ground. A few persistent ones kept jumping up and down, reaching up toward the branches of the tree.

Now that they were close enough, Jenni saw an emaciated young woman and a boy hardly older than Jason clinging to the high branches.

Jenni efficiently took out the zombies at the base of the tree and then looked down into the bus. “We need to move fast.” She blinked as she saw blood splatter all over one side of the interior of the bus, then saw the body of a woman whose name she kept forgetting. She had been shot in the head. It took Jenni another moment to realize the woman’s hand was bitten. It was more like a graze, but it looked like a zombie bite.

“She was trying to shoot the one that had your hair through the window. She fell against the grill and it bit her,” Bill answered her unspoken question.

In this world, a bite was an instant death sentence. They all knew it, but it didn't make it any easier to deal with. Besides Ashley in the hotel, the fort had witnessed two other people turn into zombies before actual death. No one was sure why this sometimes happened, but they could take no chances.

Jenni blinked back tears, then nodded. “We need to get the kids out of the tree.”

Ed pulled the bus up close to the tree, trying not to get cornered up against the trailer or the trees. The boy scrambled out onto a limb, clutching precariously to it.

“Jump down!” Jenni motioned to him.

“They got my sister and mom,” he yelled down to her.

“The zombies?”

“No, some guys! They came and kicked in our door and grabbed my Mom and sister. I was in the back room with Annie and we went through the window.”

“Jump down!”

The boy motioned to his sister, who shook her head, still clinging to the trunk of the tree.

“Annie, c’mon,” the boy said.

She shook her head again.

“Jump down,” Jenni ordered.

“Annie, please come with me,” the boy insisted.

The girl once more shook her head, terror in her eyes.

Jenni fastened her gaze on the girl and felt sick to her stomach. Was this the way she looked when Katie had first seen her, shell-shocked and dazed? If so, too damn bad. “Annie, get your fuckin' ass down here now! Otherwise, you’re gonna have to sit in that damn tree until the zombies figure out how to climb or you get so weak and fall. Now, if you want to die that way, be my guest, but I am taking your brother and we’re getting the hell outta here.”

Annie blinked, then began to cry. Trembling, she slowly crawled out onto the thick limb to her brother. With infinite care, her younger sibling helped lower her down to the top of the bus, then dropped down beside her.

Jenni blinked at the utter reek of them, but shoved that out of her mind. “The men who came here…why did they leave you in the tree?”

The girl disappeared through the hatch into the bus, Bill carefully lifting her down.

The boy rubbed his nose and shook his head. “I don’t know. They kept trying to get us down, saying all sorts of sick shit. But we kept climbing higher. I knew we couldn’t make a run for it with the zombies around. Anyway, they were even telling me stuff…about… you know…doing me in the…” The boy took a breath. “Anyway, one of the guys in a truck started yelling about a gun store and they all just went crazy. They told me and Annie that they would come back for us later if the zombies didn’t get us first.”

“Shit,” Jenni whispered. “Bill, did you hear?”

“I heard,” Bill answered, gazing up at them through the hatch.

Jenni and the boy scooted down into the bus as the back door slammed shut. The woman who had tried to save her now lay with the zombies on the cold, muddied ground.

“How many trucks?” Bill asked.

“Four,” the boy answered. “And those guys were really fucking sick and scary.”

His sister sat in a seat nearby, wrapped in a light blanket, shaking uncontrollably. “You need to get our Mom and sister.”

“Ed, call it in,” Bill ordered. “Nerit was right. It’s going down today.”

Jenni sighed. They had come up back roads to this place deliberately. In all likelihood, they had just missed the bandits on the main roads.

“How long ago did they leave?” Bill asked.

“Thirty minutes ago maybe,” the boy answered.

“Let them know, Ed,” Bill said.

“Taking care of it,” Ed answered, turning the bus around and heading back down the road.

Jenni held tight to the pole near the front door and took a deep breath.

It was time.

2. Four, Three

Nerit's eyes narrowed when the first report came in from Ken. He was part of the team at her old hunting store. The sound of his voice made her go cold inside as she tucked away all her emotions.

“Everything going as planned here at the gun store. But, you know, you can't help but feel the ghosts,” his voice said.

Katarina lifted an eyebrow.

“You know what to do,” Nerit said.

Katarina nodded and strode out of the communication hub.

Peggy chewed on her bottom lip, her hands trembling.

Thirty minutes later…

“We reached our target and all is quiet except for the undead.

They're making some noise. We have two missing. Maybe carried off by the baddies. Two remaining, but lunch meat. We saw four zombies running on down the road. I swear one of them had a shopping bag,”

Ed's voice said.

Curtis looked up. He was seated in the corner, listening to the reports coming in.

“Nerit?”

“The bandits got two of the people we were rescuing. We rescued two others and four of the bandits’ vehicles are heading toward Katie and Travis,” Nerit translated.

“Can we do this?”

“Of course,” Nerit answered.

There was a coldness in her voice that terrified Curtis. She could see it in his eyes. Sometimes, she wondered if he understood what it meant to protect the fort. Certain things had to be done that not everyone would agree with, but opinions did not matter. Safety did; the protection of the all. The individual be damned.

“Peggy, make sure everyone is in position,” Nerit said firmly.

“Nerit? Old Man Watson wants a gun. He says, and I quote, he fought in WW2 and that if he took out the Japs, he can take out some punks.” She sounded annoyed and amused at the same time.

“Give him one then. Put him on the third floor,” Nerit answered.

“Nerit, he's an old guy,” Curtis said in protest. “You can't expect him-”

“Why not?” Nerit looked at him intently. “I'm no spring chicken.”

Curtis broke down with a weary laugh. “Yeah, true, but-”

“Give him a gun and plenty of ammunition, Curtis. Make sure he understands to stay behind the curtains.”

Nerit gave him a look that silenced his protests and only reinforced his fear of her.

Good.

He needed to be afraid.

She briskly walked out of the room, ignoring her hip. The dull ache was bothersome, but she wouldn't let it slow her down. She could be extraordinarily strong when she had to be. It wasn't uncommon for her to ignore all her pain and push her body to get things done. Only later would she let her body hurt, once she was done and behind closed doors.

Calhoun emerged from the shadows, flipping on his video camera and aiming it at her face. The tiny red light blinked at her.

“The queen of the amazons is in full battle mode. There is a look of death in her eyes and she is…” he faltered as she stared into the camera.

Nerit tilted her head.

“…kinda hot.”

Nerit burst out laughing and patted Calhoun's shoulder as she passed him.

“…and she walks confidently to amass the defenders of this illegally built fort. The mayor has yet to explain himself and release an accurate accounting of how much of the taxpayer money was used in its construction. Meanwhile…”

Nerit turned and gave Calhoun a look. He stared, silenced by her look.

“Yes, your majesty?”

“It's time for you to turn off the camera and do what you're supposed to,” Nerit said.

Calhoun dramatically sighed, then tucked it away in his backpack.

“You're a mean old bitch.”

“I haven't pitched you over the wall yet,” Nerit reminded him.