Even as she ran across the bridge, Jane could feel her desire to flee slipping away.

Her legs didn’t want it, that was for sure. The long walk out of the forest and then through the city had worn down her strength to nearly nothing. If Walker hadn’t been pulling her along, his hand tight on her elbow, practically holding her up, she might’ve just stopped right there.

And her heart didn’t want it either. Ever since she had learned that her poor judgment and selfishness had undermined everything that she had sacrificed for the sake of her family’s prosperity, she had wanted to slide into a drunken hole and die. It had been Walker who had insisted that they flee, Walker who had demanded that the family stay together at all costs. Her shame was of no consequence to him; she would have to live with it, he had said.

She could imagine herself breaking Walker’s grip and sinking to her knees on the stone-paved bridge as he and Ryan continued on. There would be gratitude in her muscles and bones, and resignation in her heart. The creatures, distracted by her sacrifice, would lose sight of her husband and son, and as they fell on her, to beat her to death or tear her to shreds, she would watch as Walker and Ryan disappeared into the heart of Bern. In her last moments of life, she would pray for their safety. She would feel for an instant that she had somehow made up for the mistake that had brought them there.

Her chest heaving, her head swimming, Jane watched as Ryan took a moment to peer over the edge at the river below. When he turned to look at her, she tried to read his emotions, seeing a little bit of everything there: fear, determination, confusion, heartache, love. It was the full complexity of life, still alive in her son, while her own feelings had been whittled down to a desire for tragic redemption. It was somehow encouraging. When she saw that Ryan seemed concerned about her, and that he was about to speak, she cut him off.

“I’m okay, honey,” she said weakly. “I’m okay.”

On the other side, Walker motioned for them to stop, and together they turned their heads. There was no way back, that was for sure. The creatures had made it halfway across the bridge, the numberless horde filling its width.

The way forward presented them with several choices. Directly in front of them was the main road, that led up and then curved out of sight to the left. Where it began, two smaller roads split off, each seeming to also run upward, parallel to the main road on either side of it. Two routes led down, presumably to the river. One was a covered staircase; the other yet one more road, this one appearing to curve back under the bridge.

All of the streets in this area were paved with stones, large, uniform and rectangular, yet not quite what Jane would’ve called bricks. The closely-packed buildings were just three or four stories tall, with stone façades, shuttered windows, and sloping red-tiled roofs. Everything was so old, so thoroughly uncontemporary. Were it not for the countless parked cars, Jane might’ve concluded that — on top of everything else — she and her family had been transported back in time.

“We can’t go down,” Walker was saying to Ryan, his back to his wife. “We’re looking for high ground.”

Jane knew that Walker had long ago decided that she was unworthy of consultation, and she would’ve been unable to make a convincing case that he was wrong. Each step of the way, with each challenge they had confronted, she’d found herself unable to do more than follow her husband’s lead. Furthermore, Walker had been the target of her fear and frustration. This was unfair, she knew, but she had to release her despair somehow, and she knew that he could take it. He was strong; she wasn’t. It was that simple.

Ignored by her son and husband, she turned around and monitored the slow progress of the creatures across the bridge. She hated, yet was also fascinated by, the way they looked at her, the madness in their eyes that seemed connected to just one thought: satisfying their hunger.

“Do you see anything?” she heard Walker ask Ryan. “Any movement? Check the shadows.”

“I don’t see anything,” Ryan said after a moment.

Jane singled out one creature — a woman in an olive green rain jacket, dark blue jean and sneakers, a brown purse still somehow slung over her shoulder — and wondered what it would take to bring her down. She recalled what Ryan had said, that he’d hit one in the head with a heavy stick, yet the creature had resumed its attack. What would it take?

“We’ll follow one of the smaller roads,” Walker decided, and now he turned to Jane. “Come on,” he said, once again grabbing her arm and pulling her forward.

They moved quickly off the main road to their right, then turned onto a narrow road that proceeded upward at an even grade. The façades on the right were lit up by the sun, a narrow covered sidewalk running underneath them. The road itself was immersed in shadow and appeared clear as far as the eye could see. The creatures that had pursued them across the bridge were now out of sight. Jane felt thankful for the creatures’ slowness, for this moment of peace.

“To the sidewalk,” Walker ordered. “We’ll be able to conceal ourselves.”

The covered sidewalk was cool and quiet. Where columns stood to support the structure above, the ceiling was low and arched. The windows and doors of the shops they passed were intact; apparently there had been no looting. Occasionally a passage appeared to one side, extending perpendicularly to the sidewalk to the next road over. They approached these passages cautiously, but each one was empty, and there were no sounds coming to them from the other end. Behind them it was also quiet; evidently they had left their pursuers behind.

Eventually, the road narrowed further, and the covered sidewalk ended. Up ahead was a wide street that they would have to cross if they were to continue in this direction; its surface was asphalt, into which narrow rails had been laid. Across the street, beyond a wide archway in the ground floor of a tall building, the road they were on continued.

Arriving at the street, they stood with their backs to the wall and peered around the corner in both directions. To the left the street rose slightly then disappeared around a curve; on the right was a bridge, significantly longer and higher than the one they’d crossed.

“Do you hear that?” Walker asked, his gaze shifting upward.

Jane and Ryan watched him, their ears alert. She couldn’t hear anything, and from his expression it appeared that Ryan couldn’t either. But then the sound of a distant motor reached her, not the sound of a car or plane, but the familiar machine gun thudding of a helicopter. As they stood there, the sound grew louder, the helicopter approaching.

“It must be the army,” Walker said, searching the skies.

Instinctively, Jane turned and peered down the road they’d just walked up, her eyes searching the shadows and doorways. Then there it was, standing half obscured behind one of the columns along the covered sidewalk. This one was a man with short hair, middle-aged, dressed in the long-sleeved shirt and thigh-length shorts of a cyclist. His eyes were trained on the sky.

Jane shuddered. Surely they had walked right past him. Had he been hiding, like the ones by the bridge? If so, then what had prevented him also realizing that they were no threat? Why hadn’t he gone after them too? Perhaps seeing them in the dimly-lit covered sidewalk, he simply hadn’t been sure.

“There’s one behind us,” Jane said softly.

Walker turned and looked, and nodded.

“Keep your eye on him,” he said. “We need to wait for this helicopter.”

“What if he’s not the only one?” Jane asked, a little bit louder.

“Just watch him,” Walker said sternly.

“What if there are more–?”

Jane yelped, cut off in midsentence as Walker reached out and grabbed her by the back of the neck. His fingernails dug into her skin as he pulled her toward him. From behind he wrapped his arm around her throat, his forearm crushing her larynx. Then he leaned in, his lips just an inch from her ear.

“Jane,” he whispered angrily. “I need you to shut up.”

They couldn’t see it, but from the sound of it, the helicopter seemed to be hovering somewhere nearby. In her husband’s grip, Jane kept her eyes on the cyclist. He still hadn’t noticed them, or perhaps for the moment he was more concerned about the copter.

The cyclist’s skin was less green that the others’, his eyes less cloudy. Had it not been for the stoned look on his face, the dull and inhuman concentration, she might not have known for sure that he was one of them.

Then there was automatic gunfire, bullets raining down from the sky, and Jane watched as a trail of wounds made their way up the cyclist’s body, perforating him from crotch to forehead. He remained standing, his body jerking violently, until the head shot brought him down.

How had they known? Jane wondered, her mind racing. How had they known for sure?

Ryan looked up at his father, panic in his eyes.

“Dad–”

“They’re clearing the streets,” Walker said. “We need to move.”

He released Jane’s neck and grabbed her arm, and before she could protest they were moving across the street. On the other side, as they traversed the unusually wide sidewalk between them and the safety of the archway, Jane risked a glance behind them. The helicopter was drifting slowly over the rooftops toward the road they’d just evacuated. In seconds it would be hanging over the spot where they’d been standing.

In the archway, Jane collapsed to her knees, Walker’s hand still on her arm.

“We need to keep moving,” Walker insisted.

“We’re safe here,” Jane said, breathing heavily. “In the road, we’ll be out in the open.”

Walker grabbed Jane by both shoulders and roughly lifted her to her feet. He stood with his face just inches from hers.

“I will leave you here,” he threatened. “I will take Ryan and leave you here to die.”

In an instant, it all flashed through Jane’s mind.

The cautious approach at the art museum, the charm and easy smile that had drawn her in; the first date, a picnic at Volunteer Park; the first kiss she’d waited weeks for; the tour of the school where he’d worked, the classroom full of young people who seemed to adore him; the promotion at her firm that they’d celebrated with dinner on the waterfront; the proposal of marriage that she’d been hoping for but that had still taken her by surprise; the long engagement, wedding plans that felt like they would never be realized; the wedding itself, splendid and strange; the speech at the wedding dinner, a startling proclamation of love and dedication in front of a hundred guests that had left her sobbing.

Another promotion with a raise that had allowed him to quit teaching and open his bookstore; Ryan’s birth, and the house she’d bought in which to raise him; the long work days, sometimes even on the weekends; the growing sense of isolation from her own family; the feeling that when they were all together she was watching them from a distance, that she was sacrificing her happiness for theirs; the affair with Glenn; the guilt and self-loathing that she had projected back on them as resentment; the affair with Adam; the drinking that had snuck up on her, until waking up without at least a slight hangover was a noteworthy event; the affair with Matt; the fabricated resume; the confession; the police visit.

It had all been leading to this moment and these words:

I will leave you here to die.

Jane pushed Walker away. His hands slipped off her shoulders. Her throat tightened. She thought she might retch. She glared at her husband, her eyes narrow slits. She licked her lips.

“I love you too, Walker,” she said.

A wave of noise and wind filled the archway as the army copter dropped down into the street they had just crossed, hanging in the air just a few feet off the pavement. The side door was open, and a soldier sat there, one leg out on the skid, a rifle held firmly in both hands. Seeing them, the soldier spoke urgently into a microphone under his chin. In the cockpit, the pilot nodded, and the tip of the soldier’s rifle began to ascend.

They didn’t wait to see what would happen next. Emerging from the other side of the archway in a sprint, they found themselves on a road without covered sidewalks, fully exposed. Up ahead was a large clearing, beyond which the road narrowed and the covered sidewalks resumed. They had some time before the helicopter would be above them again, before it could clear the building above the archway and continue its pursuit. Perhaps not enough time — perhaps just seconds — but they were committed now. They would have to take the chance.

The clearing was a giant marketplace, the size of two football fields end to end, which appeared to stretch across the width of the city. On some days it would’ve undoubtedly been filled with stalls, occupied by merchants selling regional meats and cheeses and arts and crafts, but today it was open and empty. At one end loomed a large, magisterial building, which Jane took to be the building that housed Switzerland’s government. In the middle distance stood a Starbucks, an incongruous sight in a setting otherwise awash in antique authenticity.

They were running in a line, Walker in front, Ryan in the middle, Jane at the rear. Behind them, the sound of the helicopter became clear and unmuffled. Jane didn’t need to look over her shoulder to know that it had dropped down into the street behind them, and that the soldier with the rifle now had an unobstructed bead on their backs. They could only hope that he would wait until he was closer to open fire, which might give them the time they needed to duck into the covered sidewalk ahead. Or maybe he would even realize that they weren’t creatures but humans, and his conscience would prevent him from gunning them down.

The first bullet struck the ground just inches from Jane’s foot. She felt a sharp sting as tiny shards of pavement struck her calves. As two more bullets hit the ground in front of her, she fought the urge to drape herself over her son and pull them both to the ground, knowing that it would be futile, that she would be sacrificing them both. Their only chance remained the covered sidewalk.

Then, as she watched, Walker’s shoulder popped open, and a cloud of scarlet appeared in the air in front of her and Ryan, spattering them. Somehow he managed to stay on his feet, although his pace slowed, and as the helicopter roared over them, first strafing them with its enormous shadow, then immersing them in the din of its engine and rotors, Jane saw an opportunity to reach safety. For the moment the gunman was facing away from them. He wouldn’t have another clear shot at them until the helicopter was able to pivot around. If they could just make it to the covered sidewalk they’d be safe. The road ahead was too narrow for the helicopter to follow.

Jane wiped Walker’s blood away from her eyes and grabbed Ryan by the collar of his jacket.

“Help me with your father!” she yelled.

Oddly the boy didn’t seem frightened, or perhaps the level of fear he was experiencing was so new and overwhelming his face didn’t know how to register it. He nodded quickly and they rushed to Walker, who was staggering, dazed, across the marketplace, his eyes wet with tears, his features frozen in shock. Jane grabbed one of his arms and Ryan grabbed the other, and together they pulled him forward. The tail of the helicopter swung around over their heads, the strong draft of its rotor nearly knocking them off their feet.

They entered the covered sidewalk, moved along it for several yards, then turned into the opening of a passage that led through the block to the next road. They lowered Walker to the ground, his back against a wall.

“Go watch,” Jane told her son. “Let me know if it lands.”

Ryan nodded, moved to the end of the passage, and peered around the corner.

Jane took a moment to examine Walker’s wound. There was a hole in the front as well, just under his collarbone. The bullet had passed through, which she thought was good, but he was losing a lot of blood. She slipped off her backpack, opened it, and pulled out a T-shirt, which she ripped along the seam, forming a long strip of fabric.

“You’re going to have to lift your arm,” she told Walker.

He looked at her through heavy-lidded eyes, with no sign of comprehension.

“Ryan?!” she called out, her own voice barely audible over the noise of the helicopter, still lurking somewhere nearby.

“He’s still in the air!” Ryan reported.

“Come here!”

In seconds the boy was at her side.

“I need to tie off your father’s wound,” she said, “or he’s going to bleed to death. Can you lift his arm?”

Ryan responded by grabbing Walker’s wrist and pulling his arm roughly into the air. As Walker howled in pain, his eyes suddenly wide, Jane slipped the torn T-shirt under his arm and brought the ends up over his shoulder, repeating the motion until his wound was tightly wrapped. Then she tied the ends together, and Ryan released his arm.

Jane hunkered down in front of her husband.

“Walker?”

His eyes were closed, his face clenched. He didn’t seem to hear her.

“Walker?” she said again, this time louder. “Walker, we can’t stay here. I need you to get up.”

Still he didn’t seem to hear. The pain was too intense, the shock all-consuming.

I will leave you here, she wanted to tell him.

The sound of the helicopter was fading, but not because it was moving away. The thwack of its rotor blades was slowing, the roar of its engine diminishing. She looked up at Ryan and saw that he heard it too. His eyes were wide and focused on the light at the end of the passage, the corner around which he’d just been peering. She thought she knew what had happened, but she needed confirmation.

“Go look,” she told Ryan.

Instantly he moved away to investigate.

“Walker, you need to get up,” she said to her husband, her voice angry and urgent. “Get up!”

“They’ve landed!” Ryan exclaimed in a loud whisper.

She could imagine what he was seeing: the helicopter parked on the marketplace, the soldier with the rifle stepping down onto the pavement, cautiously surveying the scene before advancing.

“Walker!” she barked at her husband.

Still he didn’t seem to hear, and there was no way that she and Ryan could carry him to safety.

I will take Ryan and leave you here to die.

No, she wouldn’t. As horribly as he’d been treating her, as contentious as their relationship had become, he had done everything he could to keep them together. She was the reason they had fled. She wouldn’t leave him behind. She couldn’t.

She looked at the T-shirt wrapped around his shoulder, at the spot of blood just below his collarbone. Then she balled up her fist and drove it as hard as she could into his exit wound.

His eyes went wide, and his body tensed. He opened his mouth, about to scream, but she silenced him with the palm of her hand. With her free hand, she grabbed him under his uninjured shoulder and pulled him upward. He leapt to his feet as if his body was loaded with springs.

“Come on!” she called to Ryan.

In a split second, her son was on Walker’s other side, and together they rushed deeper into the passage. Only then did Jane discover that they’d been sharing the passage with other fearful forms — not humans, but creatures huddled against walls and in doorways. In the dim light, she caught flashes of green skin and grey eyes, lips caked with a dark substance that could’ve only been blood. These were the former residents of Bern, the instincts they had once possessed now slowly seeping back into their diseased brains. Now they knew to hide. Soon they would learn to flee. Eventually they would learn to fight back. And then what?

When the gunman behind them opened fire, they were already almost halfway through, and Jane began to wonder if there was a drink somewhere at the end of all this. Maybe, she thought, as bullets crashed against concrete, sparked on metal, and shattered glass, they’d have a moment for some looting, and she’d find a bottle of wine. As the din of the gunfire tore at her ears, she imagined herself standing in front of shelves laden with dark bottles. And as she readied herself for the sting of a bullet piercing her skin, she picked out the most expensive bottle she could find.

She would open it and pour it into a wide-brimmed glass. She would swirl it around and take a sniff, and smile. The she would take a sip, just a sip, letting fragrance mingle with flavor, deciding if she should move forward with this bottle or put it back. When she finally took a full drink, she would close her eyes as the alcohol tingled her taste buds, and tilt her head back, and swallow.

It would, after all this, be the first drink in years that she had truly deserved.