then—
—my neck scratch—
—Michael did understand.
“Oh my garsh, what a shame,” Jopek said softly.
“Stay,” said Michael. The gun slipped in Michael’s grip. His fingers were suddenly jellied with sweat.
“Naw, I ain’t your puppy dog.” Jopek grinned. “Not no more.” And took a stride closer.
“Stop,” Michael said, finding the trigger.
Patrick slid closer, asking, “What’s a-matter?”
“Holly—Holly, tell Jopek.”
“What?” she replied. Her voice was soft and quivering.
“Tell him, tell him the truth, tell him my scratch looked fine.” But his stomach iced. “A little inflamed,” he remembered her saying.
Jopek took another stride closer. Michael double-checked the safety.
“Captain, wait,” Holly said, obviously torn. “He’s—he’s probably fine. . . .”
“Probably?” Michael sputtered. “Scratches can’t do anything to people!”
Michael was very very very aware of his pulse beating in his neck.
“But like the lady said, Mikey: the virus is changin’.”
“B-bull! If anything was going to happen to me, it already would have.”
“Took Cady a month to come back,” Jopek said. “It could be the same for you. ’Course, with the virus changin’ it could happen right now, couldn’t it, Holly? Yes indeedy.”
“What could happen right now?” said Patrick, confused.
“Holly,” Michael said.
But there was silence, except for Jopek’s clocking, snake-patient approach.
Jopek saw the weakness on his face, and lunged. Michael made his own move without thought: he aimed the gun above Jopek’s head, a warning shot. He pulled on the trigger.
Holly screamed. Jopek’s eyes widened and he tensed to flee.
Click, the gun went.
Michael, dreamlike, blinked at his weapon. His hand floated out to the gun’s slide. He pulled on the slide to feed new bullets from the magazine. And fired again.
Click. Empty.
Patrick realized something was wrong, and shouted, surprised, “OOOOOHHH!”
Michael said, “Please don’t—”
But Jopek lunged again, saying absurdly, “Ha!” and Michael hurled the empty weapon at him and was down the hall, was racing down the marble stairs that circled the rotunda, when the captain grabbed a pistol from Hank’s corpse.
“NO!” Michael heard Holly cry out. “HE’S NOT CHANGING, CAPTAIN, DON’T SHOOT H—”
Marble chips exploded to Michael’s right as he reached the bottom stair.
He flinched, screamed, and in between the first shot and the second he had time to pivot toward a tour information booth, had time to think, Where am I? The second shot rang, and something like a high-speed needle tugged the shoulder of his coat and he shouted again and spun reflexively. Don’t lose control of yourself, don’t, don’t! He saw a pair of shadowed governor statues ahead and ran toward them. He had smiled at them two days ago and thought this zone was the safe End; now Michael thought, Where the hell am I going to?! just as a third bullet hit a mark not two inches wide of his ankle. TURRRRN! his mind screamed, TURRRN!, and his whole skull felt soaked with terror and his vision pinholed and shimmered, and he tried to feel his blood and instead tripped on his own frantic feet and splayed face-first and struck his jaw on ice-cold marble. So this is what it feels like to lose control. Michael scrambled desperately up and into a hallway to the left of the statues just as Jopek’s fourth shot struck the statue’s hand like some unthinkable stigmata. Michael cast one last look back up at the ring of the rotunda above, over the railing of which Captain Jopek smiled like a portrait painted on a ceiling of a cathedral, like a man having the time of his life. Michael wasn’t dead, only because Captain Jopek didn’t want him dead. Not yet.
Michael dashed blind into the dark hall.
Where am I going to turn into a Bellow?
This isn’t happening, he thought. I was too careful! I played too well for this to happen! Seriously, it’s wrong, Holly was wrong, I don’t even know if I’m infected!
But an image came to Michael’s mind: the Bellow that had scratched him, the Bellow in the miner’s suit.
One crumpled eyeball hanging from the monster’s socket when it attacked him. As if the Bellow had already undergone the mutation that instructed the Bellows to tear out their eyes; yes, as if the virus within that miner-Bellow was already changing into something more dangerous.
Michael’s mind, shrieking like a disaster siren: Infeeeeeect! Infeeeeeect!
He thought: ruined everything, oh I hate myself, I hate myself, so freaking stupid—
He thought: Patrick!
“Mike! Hey, c’mon back, Mike!” Captain Jopek’s voice chased through the echoing black. He sounded friendly enough: he was even laughing. “Where you runnin’? Where’s there to run, fella?”
Jopek won.
I’m infected, and I’m running away from Patrick. I’m infected and