Something flashed by the window of the room to their right, there and gone in a blink.
Quinn stepped back and brought his rifle up, trying to see out the window in the room behind them. There was nothing but the long reach of dead grass, the fountain still flowing.
“Something’s wrong,” Quinn whispered.
“Always wrong, ping-pong, sing-song, come on,” the man sang in a high voice and sprinted away from them down the hall, dropping the mop to the floor with a clatter. His blue jumpsuit flashed in and out of their lights.
“Fuck,” Alice said, moving forward with Ty in tow behind her.
“Alice, let’s go,” Quinn said, snagging her arm.
She pulled away. “He knows my mother. Marie’s her middle name.” Her eyes were shining orbs in the flashlight’s glow. “I need to know.”
Quinn let her go, grimacing before jerking his head. They set after the man at a quick walk, his laughter bouncing off the tile floor and walls. He waited for them at the end of the hall, his back against the wall as he pushed off of it with his buttocks, letting himself slam against it before pushing off again.
“Stop that,” Alice said, spearing him with her light. “You gotta be quiet.”
He began to chew on his pinkie again, his upper teeth becoming red with blood.
“You said you knew where Marie was,” Quinn said in as calm of voice as he could muster, the sight of the man gnawing through his own finger making his stomach flip.
“In there, in there, always in there,” the man said, snapping his bald head toward the door on their right. “Go in, go see, go see, go see.”
They kept Ty in between them as they moved past him. As Quinn came close to him, he realized the uniform the man wore wasn’t only dirty but wet also, and the smell that came off him was palpable. He’d been soaking in what the disease had left behind.
Alice pushed the door open and stepped inside. Immediately she moved Ty to one side and stood him against the wall. When Quinn entered the room, he saw why.
A police officer lay facedown in a pool of dried blood. His face was bone white, a partial beard spattered with gore covered his cheeks. His mouth gaped open, eyes sunken and dried to crusts. His pants were pulled up above his boots and something had been at his legs, the teeth marks prominent in the bloodless flesh. Quinn ripped his eyes away from the body on the floor to the bed occupying the room that was stripped of everything but a thin sheet. A stained outline rested in its center, a pool of viscous jelly desiccating along its borders.
The man giggled behind them, and Quinn only had time to glance at the officer’s body, the empty holster on his duty belt, before he spun and brought up his rifle.
The man had the cop’s handgun trained on Ty who stood motionless against the wall, his lips moving soundlessly again, completely unaware.
“Here, we’re here, come, come, come, inside, quick!” The man yelled at the top of his lungs, glee pulling his lips back from bloodied teeth.
Quinn tried to aim, but the concussion of a shot made him flinch, his sights losing the man’s grinning head. There was a mist of red hanging in the air, and it coated his face like a spray of surf when he would climb the cliffs by the ocean. His right ear buzzed and his head felt lopsided, heavy with the deafness that plagued half of it. The man was gone from the doorway, and Ty still stood against the wall, covered in blood.
“Oh God,” Quinn said, rushing forward. He set his gun down and gripped the boy by the shoulders, beginning to wipe the blood from his face.
“Quinn?”
“Yeah, buddy. Are you hurt?”
“I don’t… don’t think so. What’s on me? Momma?”