"There's a fucking helicopter!" Emily shouted.

Frank was scrambling to get some guns and ammo together to go after Jane. He thought Emily had said alligator. It was difficult to hear with all the noise and wind which, in the panic of the moment, hadn't registered as odd.

"What the fuck are you talking about? There aren't any alli-"

"Freeze," someone said. "Drop your weapon!" It was a gruff, male voice.

Frank looked up and saw a man dressed in what appeared to be military fatigues standing at the doorway to the lobby—his gun trained on Frank. As though materializing from the walls, several more uniform-clad soldiers appeared with guns at the ready.

"I said drop your fucking weapon!" The first soldier shouted.

Frank did as he was told and raised his hands by his ears, thoroughly confused and unable to process what was happening. Tristen started going into a coughing fit and plugged his inhaler back into his mouth, shaking, his eyes darting back and forth from soldier to soldier.

"What the fuck is going on?" Emily blurted.

"Quiet," barked a soldier as he pulled out a small tactical knife and grabbed Emily's hand, jabbing the tip of the blade into her palm.

"Ow, what the fuck?" she bleated.

The soldier smeared the dot of blood with his thumb. "Clear," he said. He moved on before Emily got a chance to smack him. The soldier did the same thing to Tristen, who was too busy having an asthma/anxiety attack to protest. "Clear," he said again.

Frank offered no resistance as the soldier approached. He held out his palm obediently. The whole situation was such a shock, his body seemed to have given over to autopilot.

"Clear," the man said after Frank flinched at the pain. "Is that everyone?" he asked Frank.

"What?"

"Is there anyone else here?"

"No... but... out there," he pointed out the shattered window.

"It's already being taken care of," the man said.

"How about some fucking explanations up in here!" Emily was rampaging and consequently restrained by one of the other soldiers.

"Did you just say, up in here?" the one with the knife asked. "Well, DMX, we spotted the smoke from that burning vehicle and moved in to investigate."

"Where'd you guys... come from?" Frank asked, still reeling, thumbing the new spot of blood on his hand.

Another soldier stepped into view. He looked more official, striding in with his hands behind his back, looking confident, strong and in charge. He raised a hand by his hip and nodded to the knife soldier, indicating he'd field the question. "We've got an outpost a few clicks to the Southwest," he said genially. "We perform regular sweeps of the area and on occasion we'll see smoke. It's usually some generator blowing up or a zombie starting an electrical fire somehow—but no matter the cause, we check it out on the off chance we'd find some survivors. We were just a few miles from here when we heard the explosion, so we moved in. Usually, we don't find anything but hey—this time we got lucky. And by the looks of it, you guys did too." The new soldier looked around. "Where are the others?"

"They're out there. We need to go get them!" Emily pleaded.

"As private Rader mentioned, it's already being handled," he said coolly, offering a reassuring smile. "I just want to be absolutely certain there's no one else in here." He looked to Tristen who was sprawled on the ground, struggling for breath. He shook his inhaler futilely, his eyes pleading. "What's with him?"

"He needs medicine," Emily said. "Let me help him!"

The officer in charge nodded to the soldier restraining her. Emily broke free and rushed to Tristen's bunk where she yanked open a duffle bag on the ground and pulled out another inhaler cartridge. She slid over to Tristen, put the cartridge in and gave it to him. He breathed in hungrily, his face gaining a little color as he heaved. He nodded at Emily, his eyes watering.

"Asthma," Frank said. "This is a research center for chronic asthma. It's actually what kept the kids from turning. They had to wear respirator masks all the time." Frank was a little taken aback hearing his own casual tone. He felt drugged and helplessly paralytic. The soldiers exuded authority, making him feel pitiful and small.

"Really? Lucky kids. I mean, apart from the asthma," the officer said. "And what's your story?"

Frank was staring at the blood pooling up in his palm. He wished he could put it in a cup for Jane. "We just, actually, we..." He looked up, steeling his resolve, clicking the autopilot off and taking the controls. He needed to get to Jane. "Look, there're some zombies out there trying to kill us. They've got guns and... a girl. One of ours."

"And five... uh... four other kids," Emily said.

"Living?"

Frank nodded hoping his eyes didn't belie the truth.

The guy popped a walkie from his belt and keyed it. "Ramirez, Captain Dahmer here." He covered the walkie with one hand and said to Frank, "Unfortunate name, I know." Then back to the radio. "What's your position?"

"Situation secured, sir."

"Any living?"

"Yes sir. One kid is still-" Frank heard a gunshot over the walkie. "No sir."

"What happened?" Dahmer asked.

"Zombies attacked three live kids on our approach. Two had their brains destroyed. The last just turned. He was... not functional. We put him down."

"Copy that." He turned to Frank. "I'm sorry, looks like she didn't make it."

"Are they killing them? The zombies, I mean. Are they killing the zombies?" Frank asked in desperation.

He keyed his radio again. "What's our baggage?"

"We've got six on the line, sir."

"Copy that." He snapped the walkie back on his belt and addressed Frank. "We've captured six."

"Any women?"

Dahmer rolled his eyes and grabbed his walkie again. "Any slits in the take?"

"Yes sir, one slit, five dicks."

"Beautiful," Emily said, struggling to calm Tristen after he'd lapsed into more sob-induced convulsions having heard the other kids were gone. "Jesus, who are the fucking monsters again?"

"Calm down, Miss. It's just protocol," Dahmer said.

Frank noticed the helicopter in the field, the blades swinging around slowly, creating hellish spirals of the black smoke pluming from the Suburban. Three or four soldiers were motioning to each other with hand signals. He strained his eyes trying to see beyond the activity, to the tree line. Jane had just made it past the immolated SUV when everything started going haywire, but now, she was nowhere in sight.

He wasn't entirely sure Roy hadn't brought any zombie women with him but knowing that Jane could be out there still gave him a glimmer of hope.

He looked around the dorm and saw the soldiers helping a completely broken Tristen to his feet and struggling with Emily as she squirmed out of a soldier's grip, cursing and snarling. She managed to get away long enough to go back to Tristen's bunk and assemble a pile of inhaler cartridges, mumbling obscenities under her breath the whole time. Dahmer beckoned to Frank, motioning him to follow the group out of the building.

"Where are we going?" Frank asked.

"To a safe place," Dahmer replied with a smile.