"They hunt men,” he said, and tucked his chin into his coat.

***

The streets of Blackfoot were dirty and empty. The whole place was so silent that not even the wind dared make a sound. Despite the fact that Justin was probably talking crap, I still found myself scanning the windows of the buildings and looking out of the corners of my eyes to see if anyone was watching us. Hunters of men. What a load of bollocks. I'd lived in the wilds long enough to know that men did whatever it took to survive, which sometimes meant killing others. But there certainly wasn’t a group out there making a game of it.

We walked as quickly as we could without making any noise, and I had Justin walk close to me to keep an eye on him. Like it or not, after we got a few miles out of the village I was going to need him, because from then on I didn't know the way to the farm. As soon as we got within spitting distance of it, though, he could do whatever the hell he wanted.

 There was a rotten smell in the air, and somewhere in the distance I heard a feral dog bark. I reached to my belt for my knife and gave the handle a tap. Dogs were a problem whenever you got into a village or town. They ran in packs, five or six beta dogs subservient to an alpha, and they were ridiculously aggressive against anything that moved. Who thought that man's best friend would turn on him so easily?

"How far do we need to go?" asked Justin. He stared straight ahead, oblivious to any danger, whereas I jerked my head from left to right trying to scan every conceivable place an infected could be lurking.

"Through the high street and straight on out of town. That way, we make a detour that cuts out half the terrain that the motorway can't avoid."

"And what about them?" he said, nodding to the infected that were in front of us.

Two of them stood in our path, and when they saw us approaching them they turned and moaned. I tried to make out what they had once looked like, but fifteen years after infection it was tough to see any humanity in them. Their faces were full of sharp edges from where their bones pressed against their skin, and their scraggly hair tumbled to their shoulders. They stretched out their arms, and at the ends of their fingers long, dirty fingernails pointed at us. That was one of the more disgusting things about the infected; the fact that their hair and fingernails carried on growing after death.

"Is this one of the times we ignore them?" asked Justin.

I reached for my knife, took hold of the handle and pulled it out. I turned to the kid. "Think about it. Which direction do we need to go?"

"Straight on."

"And where are they?"

"Straight on."

I pointed my knife at them. "Then this isn't one of the times we ignore them. You take the smaller one on the left - he looks your height. "

I walked forward, poised and alert. Justin kept pace with me, and when we got closer he pulled out his knife. He held it at an awkward angle, almost at his waist, which meant that he had more work to do to stab the infected in the head. I held mine at head height and tensed my arm. Set on earning their meal, the infected let out guttural moans and stumbled toward us. They were only metres away now, and I could feel my pulse quicken in anticipation. I steadied my legs and got ready to stab.

My infected launched at me clumsily, hoping to grab onto some part of me with its outstretched arms. It was tall and its belly was bloated, and it wore a ragged football shirt. I stepped to the side and let it stumble past me. I reached forward and grabbed the back of its collar, but the material was so rotted that it tore clean out of my grasp.

To my left, Justin cried out. I snapped my eyes on him and saw that he had lodged his knife in the smaller infected's chest just below the collar bone, and he was trying to push the straining monster away. I took three strides toward him, raised my knife in the air and then planted it in the top of the infected's head, caving in its skull a meringue. I let it drop to the floor.

Justin sank to the ground, his eyes wide and his face a deathly white.

The infected to my right growled. I turned toward it but it was already in my face, so close to me that when it snapped its teeth I could hear the sound of them clacking together. I took hold of it by the neck with my left hand, raised my right and then brought my knife down into its skull. As the dead body fell to the floor, I let a long breath escape my lungs. After a few seconds, I got myself together.

"Did it bite you?" I asked him.

He shook his head. His face was pale and I could see that his hands were shaking. This was the first time that I had ever seen the kid scared - he hadn't even blinked when I'd strangled him back in the shack. I knew I should ask him if he was alright, show a little concern, but I didn’t have time for that.

"Pull yourself together," I said. "There will be more."

Sure enough, behind us at the bottom of the high street a couple of infected had gathered and were slowly picking up our trail. More would appear before long, I knew, and soon we'd have a crowd of them chasing us. The chase itself wasn't a problem, because they could never pick up enough speed to catch you. The problem was that they were relentless. Once they got on your trail - that was it. They wouldn't stop and rest, they wouldn’t sleep. They were driven by only one basic impulse, and they would stop at nothing to get it.

"Pick up your pace." I said.

We moved quicker down the high street. I looked behind me and saw that the two infected were now six. Ahead of us, the street twisted round a corner. I knew that round it there was another short walk and then we were out of Blackfoot. I couldn’t wait to leave.

I looked behind us again. Now there were ten of them. Where the hell were they coming from?

"Just round this corner then we're home free. Come on, speed it up. And don't look back."

As soon as he heard me say the words, Justin looked back. "Shit," he said.

We were moving just short of a jog now. We travelled through the high-street and turned the corner, after which we would be golden.

As soon as we turned the corner though, I froze.

"Oh, fuck," said Justin.

I would have scolded the kid for his language, but his sentiment was right, because in front of us was a giant makeshift barricade that completely blocked the exit to the village. It stretched twenty metres from either side and was made of various items of scrap metal - steel sheets, kitchen sinks, shopping trolleys - that were arranged like a madman's game of Tetris. There was no way through it, and there was sure as hell no way to move it.

Behind us, a couple of hundred metres and closing, fifteen or so infected chased us.

"Now what?" said Justin.

"Give me a minute," I said, and put my hand to my forehead.

Justin stared at the makeshift barricade that blocked us in. His eyes seemed to light up, and a little of the colour came back to his cheeks. "There's a way through," he said.

I looked at the barricade again. It might not have been air tight - there were gaps in it here and there - but there sure as hell wasn't enough room for a person to fit through.

"Don’t be stupid," I said.

He looked at me with a wounded look on his face. "I'm telling you, Kyle. There's a way. Stop being so stubborn and listen to me." He walked over to the barricade. "Lemme go first then, and prove it."

I was going to tell him to shut up and let me think, but before I could say anything he moved a shopping trolley as much as he could to one side to work enough room to squeeze into. With that, he squirmed his way through the barricade. I looked at the hole that he had left, and there was no way I was going to fit my frame through it. I was considerably bigger than Justin, and I was nowhere near as agile. The kid was like a rat.