Amy, I am coming.

From the pilothouse, Lore was watching the viral horde through binoculars. Blockaded by the flaming wreckage, it appeared as a column of thrumming light that stretched far back onto the mainland and beyond, widening to encompass virtually all of the far shore.

She raised the radio to her mouth. "I don't want to rush you, Michael, but whatever's wrong, you have got to fix it right the fuck now."

"I'm trying here!"

Something was happening to the horde, a kind of ... rippling. A rippling but also a compacting, like the gathering action of a spring. Beginning at the rear, the motion slithered forward, gathering speed as it proceeded down the causeway toward the flames. The truck was lying lengthwise across the roadway. What was she seeing?

The head of the column crashed into the burning tanker like a battering ram. Gouts of smoke and fire shot into the sky. The tanker began to creep forward, scraping along the roadway. Burning virals peeled off into the water as more were propelled from behind into the destruction.

Lore looked down from the rail. The chains connecting the hull to the dock had been released; dozens of people were splashing helplessly in the water. At least a hundred, including some children, remained on the dock. Panicked cries knifed the air. "Get out of my way!" "Take my daughter!" "Please, I'm begging you!"

"Hollis!" she cried.

The man looked up. Lore pointed toward the isthmus. She realized her mistake: others on the dock had seen her. The mob surged forward, everyone attempting to wedge themselves onto the narrow gangway simultaneously. Blows were thrown, bodies hurled; people were trampled in the crush. From the center of the melee came the crack of a gunshot. Hollis rushed forward, arms swinging like a swimmer's, carving a path through the chaos. More shots; the crowd scattered, revealing a lone man with a pistol and two bodies on the ground. For a second the man just stood there, as if amazed by what he'd done, before he turned and charged up the gangway. Too late for him: he made it all of five steps before Hollis grabbed him by the collar, pulled him backward, placed his other hand under the man's buttocks, hoisted him over his head-the man flailing his arms and legs like an overturned turtle-and hurled him over the rail.

Lore grabbed the radio: "Michael, it's getting ugly up here!"

A froth of bobbles appeared. Rand passed Michael a three-foot length of pipe and a tub of grease. Michael wrenched the old pipe free, greased the threads of its replacement, and fitted it into place. Rand had returned to the panel.

"Switch it over!" Michael yelled.

The lights flickered; the mixers began to spin. Pressure flowed into the lines.

"Here we go!" Rand cried.

Michael wriggled free. Rand tossed him the radio.

"Lore-"

Everything died again.

She had failed; her army was gone, scattered to dust. With all her heart Amy wanted to be on that ship, to depart this place and never come back. But she could never leave, not on this boat or any other. She would stand on the dock as it sailed away.

How I wanted to have that life with you, Peter, she thought. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

The truck was racing east, Caleb at the wheel, Peter, Amy, and Greer in the cargo bed. Ahead the lights of the dock loomed; behind them, across the widening distance, Amy saw the burning tanker pivoting. The first virals appeared through the breach. Their bodies were burning. They staggered forward, man-sized wicks of flame. The gap continued to widen, opening like a door.

Amy turned to the window of the cab. "Caleb-"

He was looking through the mirror. "I see them!"

Caleb floored it; the truck shot forward, sending Amy tumbling. Her head impacted the metal floor with a clang and a burst of disorienting pain. Lying on her back, her face to the sky, Amy saw the stars. Stars by the hundreds, the thousands, and one of them was falling. It grew and grew, and she knew what this star was.

"Anthony."

Carter's aim was true; as the truck zoomed past, he landed behind it on the causeway, rolled, and came up on his feet. The virals were careening toward him. He drew himself erect.

Brothers, sisters.

He sensed their confusion. Who was this strange being who had dropped into their path?

I am Carter, Twelfth of Twelve. Kill me if you can.

"What the hell happened?"

"I don't know!"

The radio squawked: Lore. "Michael, we have got to go right now."

Rand was madly checking gauges. "It's not the charger-it has to be electrical."

Michael stood before the panel in utter desolation. It was hopeless; he was beaten. His ship, his Bergensfjord, had denied him. His paralysis became anger; his anger turned to rage. He slammed a fist against the metal. "You bitch!" He reared back, struck again. "You heartless bitch! You do this to me?" With tears of frustration brimming, he grabbed a wrench from the deck and began to slam it against the metal, again and again. "I've ... given ... you ... everything!"

A sudden rumble, like the roar of a great caged beast. Lights came on; all the gauges leapt.

"Michael," said Rand, "what the hell did you do?"

"That's got it!" Lore cried.

The sound increased in intensity, humming through the ship's plating. Rand yelled over the din: "Pressure's holding! Eight thousand rpm! Twelve! Twenty! Thirty-five!"

Michael snatched the radio from the floor. "Engage the screws!"

A groan. A shudder, deep in the bones.

The Bergensfjord began to move.

They skidded into the loading area. Amy leapt from the back of the truck before it stopped moving.

"Amy, stop!"

But the woman was already gone, racing toward the causeway. "Caleb, take Lucius and get on that boat."

Standing by the cargo bed, his son seemed stunned.

"Do it!" Peter ordered. "Don't wait!"

He took off after her. With every step he willed himself to go faster. His breath was heaving in his chest, the ground flying beneath him. The gap between them began to narrow. Twenty feet, fifteen, ten. A final burst of speed and he grabbed her around the waist, sending both of them rolling on the ground.

"Let me go!" Amy was on her knees, fighting to break free.

"We have to leave right now."

There were tears in her voice. "They'll kill him!"

Carter coiled. He flexed his fingers, claws glinting. He flexed his toes, feeling the taut wires of ligaments. Blueing moonlight doused him like a benediction.

Reaching one hand forward, Amy released a wail of pain. "Anthony!"

He charged.

They had to clear eight hundred feet.

At the rear of the vessel, a wall of foam churned up. Shouts rose from the dock: "They're leaving without us!" The last of the passengers rushed forward, shoving themselves onto the ramp, which had begun to scrape along the pier as the Bergensfjord pulled away.

Standing at the rail, Pim watched the scene unfold in silence. The bottom lip of the gangway was inching toward the edge; soon it would fall. Where was her husband? Then she saw him. Supporting Lucius, he was racing at a quickstep down the pier. She began to sign emphatically to any who might see: That's my husband! And: Stop this ship! But, of course, no one could make sense of her.

The gangway was clotted with people. Crammed between the guardrails, they squeezed forward onto the deck of the ship only one or two at a time, ejected from the squirming mass. Pim began to moan. She was not aware that she was doing this at first. The sound had emerged of its own volition, an expression of violent feeling that could not be contained-just as, twenty-one years ago, in Sara's arms, she had wailed with such ferocity that she might have been mistaken for a dying animal. As the volume increased, the sound began to form a distinctive shape altogether new in the life of Pim Jaxon: she was about to make words.

"Caaay ... leb! Ruuuuunnnn!"

The lip of the gangway halted. It had lodged against a cleat at the edge of the pier. Under the pressure of the ship's accelerating mass, it began to twist on its axis. Rivets were popping, metal buckling. Caleb and Greer were steps away. Pim was waving, shouting words she couldn't hear but felt-felt with every atom of her body.

The gangway began to fall.

Still chained to the ship, it cantilevered into the side of the hull. Bodies plunged into the water, some wordlessly, their fate accepted, others with pitiful cries. At the bottom of the ramp, Caleb had hooked an elbow through the rail while simultaneously holding on to Greer, whose feet were balanced on the lowest rung. The Bergensfjord was gathering speed, dragging a roiling whirlpool. As the stern passed by, the ones in the water were dragged under, into the propeller's froth. Perhaps a cry, a hand reaching up in vain, and they were gone.

In the bowels of the Bergensfjord, Michael was running. Deck by deck he ascended, legs flying, arms swinging, heart pumping in his mouth. With a burst he flung himself into open air. The point of the bow was passing the end of the seawall door.

They weren't going to clear it. No goddamn way.

He took the stairs to the pilothouse three at a time and charged through the door. "Lore-"

She was staring out the windscreen. "I know!"

"Give it more rudder!"

"You don't think I did that?"

The gap between the door and the ship's right flank was narrowing. Twenty yards. Ten. Five.

"Oh, shit," Lore breathed.

Peter and Amy were racing down the dock.

The ship was departing; she was gliding away. Gunfire spattered from the fantail, bullets whizzing over the heads; the virals had broken through.

A crash.

The side of the hull had collided with the end of the seawall door. A long scraping sound followed, the irresistible force of the ship's momentum meeting the immovable object of the door's weight. The hull trembled even as it failed to decelerate, thrusting forward.

The great wall of steel slid heartlessly by. In another few seconds, the Bergensfjord would be gone. There was no way to board. Peter saw something hanging off the side of the ship: the fallen gangway, still attached at the top. Two people were clinging to it.

Caleb. Greer.

With one arm crooked around the gangway rail, his son was calling to them while pointing at the end of the pier. The seawall door had been nudged away from the ship; it now stood at an acute angle to the moving hull. When the gangway passed the end of the door, the gap between them would narrow to a jumpable distance.

But she was no longer beside him; Peter was alone. He spun and saw her, standing fifty feet behind him, facing away.

"Get ready to jump!" Caleb yelled.

The virals had reached the base of the dock. Amy drew her sword and called to Peter over her shoulder. "You can make it! Get on that ship!"

"Amy, what are you doing? Come on!"

"Don't make me explain! Just go!"

Suddenly he understood: Amy did not intend to leave. Perhaps she never had.

Then he saw the girl.

Halfway down the pier, far out of his reach, she was crouched behind a giant spool of cable. Strawberry hair tied with a ribbon, scratches on her face, a stuffed animal gripped tightly to her chest with arms thin as twigs.

"Oh, no."

Amy saw her, too. She sheathed her sword and dashed toward her. The virals were racing up the dock. The little girl was frozen with terror. Amy swung her onto her hip and began to run. With her free hand she waved Peter forward. "Don't wait! I'll need you to catch us!"

He raced down the seawall door. The bottom of the gangway was thirty feet away and closing fast. Caleb yelled, "Do it now!"

Peter leapt.

For an instant it seemed he had jumped too soon; he would plunge into the roiling water. But then his hands caught the rail of the gangway. He pulled himself up, found his footing, and turned around. Amy, still holding the girl, was running down the top of the wall. The gangway was passing them by; she was never going to make it. Peter reached out as Amy took five bounding strides, each longer than the last, and flung herself over the abyss.

Peter could not remember the moment when he grabbed her hand. Only that he'd done it.

They had cleared the dock. Michael ran down from the pilothouse and dashed to the rail. He saw a deep dent, fifty feet long at least, though the wound was high above the waterline. He looked toward shore. A hundred yards aft, at the end of the dock, a mass of virals was watching the departing ship like a crowd of mourners.

"Help!"

The voice came from the stern.

"Someone's fallen!"

He raced aft. A woman, clutching an infant, was pointing over the rail.

"I didn't know she was going to jump!"

"Who? Who was it?"

"She was on a stretcher, she could barely walk. She said her name was Alicia."

A coiled rope lay on the deck. Michael pushed the button on the radio. "Lore, kill the props!"

"What?"

"Do it! Full stop!"