Chapter 1246: Story 1246: The Car Crash Pact
The city was burning behind them.
Juno and Shade ran across the overpass, smoke curling up from the morgue like black vines. The Siblings had found them—or been led to them. There was no way to tell anymore.
“We can’t keep running,” Shade said, breathing hard. “We need to disappear.”
Juno glanced over the side of the bridge. Wreckage everywhere. Abandoned vehicles, twisted guardrails, the skeletal remains of a convoy that never made it out. It was the Dead Belt—the border between safe zones and infected territories.
“Down there,” she said. “We might find a working car.”
They climbed down, stepping carefully over charred tal and brittle bones. The silence down here was deceptive. No Siblings, no Infected… yet. Just the weight of bad mories.
Then they saw it.
A black armored vehicle, half-buried in rubble. Mostly intact.
“Could run,” Shade said. “If we can power it.”
Juno climbed in and checked the dashboard. The ignition was shot. Battery, dead. But the core interface was intact—powered by a portable fusion coil buried in the back.
“We need another source,” she muttered.
Shade pointed at a wrecked ambulance nearby. “Old field unit. Might still have a defib battery. Enough juice to kickstart the coil.”
They scavenged in silence. Every movent echoed across the broken vehicles like a whisper traveling through steel.
Shade returned with the battery.
Juno hooked it into the fusion panel. The coil humd, and lights inside the vehicle flickered to life.
Suddenly—radio static.
Then voices.
“…This is Command Unit 13… requesting imdiate evac… coordinates unlisted…”
It was old. A ghost transmission.
Juno and Shade looked at each other.
Then the radio spoke again.
“You’re not alone.”
But it wasn’t the recording anymore.
The voice had changed. Cold. Familiar.
“You’ve been seen. The crash was never random.”
Suddenly, headlights burst to life in the wrecks around them.
Engines coughed back to life—on their own.
Cars twisted as if being pulled by invisible strings, forming a barricade around them. Like tal puppets awakening.
Juno grabbed Shade. “Drive. Now!”
The fusion coil surged. The armored vehicle roared to life. They peeled out from the trap, crashing through a semi that lurched sideways to block them.
As they sped down the fractured highway, cars chased them—driverless, yet perfectly controlled. Like a swarm.
“Why are they after us?” Shade shouted.
“Not us,” Juno growled. “The signal. They want to keep it in the city.”
A control hub blinked on the dashboard—VIREX encryption.
“This thing has a black box,” she realized. “A recording of every ergency signal… since Day One.”
They had proof.
The car swerved as another vehicle slamd into their flank.
Juno turned to Shade, breath shallow.
“If we don’t make it—crash this thing into the signal tower. Deal?”
Shade nodded.
The Car Crash Pact.
If they couldn’t outrun the truth… they’d bury it in flas.
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