Anna releases her death grip on Matt’s arm as we move past them. I follow the girl into the study, stopping by the couch as Anna hovers near the doorway. Matt stands behind her, halfway in the hallway still staring down into the living room. I can hear the boards on the front door groaning.

“What’s the plan?” Matt asks quietly. I swipe the hat off my head as I run a hand through my hair. There’s a growing ache at the back of my neck, and I rub it roughly as I try to think of something. I don’t know what the hell she was thinking going down there. Maybe that guy’s death has completely unhinged her, or maybe she was reckless to begin with. I don’t know, but it’s clear she’s a liability and it's only a matter of time before that door is breached now.

We’ll have to run. Probably the kitchen door would be clear enough, especially since they’ve all been drawn to the porch. But who knows how many were drawn in from other directions with those shots. Anna walks to the desk and zips up her pack, drawing my attention, but then I see the girl moving across the room.

I slip the hat back on my head and watch her carefully, wondering what else she could possibly do to make this situation worse. She seems to be looking for something, rifling through a bag and pulling out knives, small boxes, and what looks like soccer shin guards, tossing them onto the couch one by one. I try to remember the roads we took yesterday while keeping an eye on her. Going forward is a big unknown, but we could backtrack, maybe work our way around the outskirts of town.

When she's emptied the last few things from the bag and tosses that on the couch too, she pauses with her hands on her hips. She stares at the pile for a moment before her head swivels around the room. Her gaze lands on something to her left, near the desk.

Matt shifts his weight and glances down the stairs, but then his eyes go back to the girl too. All three of us are watching her, I realize. She pulls off the lid off a green tote on the far side of the desk and tosses out some dark clothing— it looks like motorcycle or dirtbike gear— and then quickly snatches something from the bottom of the tote.

She comes back toward the door. Not knowing what she’s doing now, I shift to block her path and she looks up at me with a glare.

“Grenades?” Anna blurts out. I look at the girl’s hands and see she’s carrying three black cylinders, each with a pin and handle like a grenade, but bigger I think. I eye the rest of the totes in the room, wondering what else she has in here. I throw a look over my shoulder at Matt and he moves closer.

“Stun grenades,” Matt corrects after a moment studying the things. He looks up at the girl, and she nods.

“We can’t use those,” I say, dismissing the idea. “They wouldn’t even kill them.” I’ve never seen one in real life— and I’m not even sure how Matt recognized them— but if movies and video games are any kind of accurate stun grenades are just bright and loud. They’re not designed to be lethal, so how much effect could they even have on something that’s already dead. Matt holds his hand out, though, and after a brief hesitation she places one in his hand.

“You want to draw them off the porch?” Matt asks slowly. The girl nods again, and Matt looks to me for a decision. I consider it, wondering if it’s worth the risk. If we set these things off, we could just make this whole mess worse and be in even more trouble than we are now.

“Won’t that just bring more?” Anna asks. She clutches the straps of her backpack, looking between Matt and I.

“Probably,” I agree, leaning toward rejecting the idea altogether. I’d rather cut our losses and get out of here before it’s too late.

“It will get them away from the door,” the girl says firmly. “And eventually they’ll wander away, or we can get past them after dark,” she adds. She seems adamant, clutching the other two grenades to her stomach. Her face is stern, and there’s no sign of the emotional breakdown I suspected downstairs.

“That’s risky,” I say slowly. I hold my hand out to the girl and she passes me one of the stun grenades, without hesitation this time. I roll it back and forth between my palms, still not sure I want to trust her plan.

“Is there a window that faces the street?” I finally ask. She nods to the hall. Matt and I head toward the only other room at the front of the house on this floor. I pause by the stairs, staring down at the groaning front door, but Matt calls my name from inside the other room.

There’s a big bed frame dominating most of the room, and on either side are two windows. There’s not a lot else in here – no piles of totes and stuff like the room across the hall. I glance back, realizing the girls are still in the study, but Matt’s already sliding the closer window open. I step closer and look out the window, cringing at the loud growls and snarls. There’s more than a dozen figures shambling out on the road, most of them angling toward the house. Matt carefully pops the screen out and props it against the wall as I finish my count.

“Seventeen.” Matt’s eyes scan the crowd too and his hand tightens on the window sill. I pat his shoulder twice and then skirt around the bed.

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This window is further from the porch, giving a better view of the onslaught at the front door— where the writhing, shifting bodies make it too hard to get a good count. But it’s way more than that door will be able to hold out against, even with the added fortifications. I flip the latch to unlock the window and push it open.

I pull out the screen and am about to drop it on the bed when I see the girl walk into the room. She has one hand at her shoulder, clutching the rifle hanging from her shoulder. I glance back at Matt, but he still has my rifle with him. A different gun, then? She swings it into her hands as she walks around the bed toward me, and I see that it has a scope and suppressor.

“What the hell?” I mutter. If I’d realized she had all these weapons in the study, I never would have left Anna alone with her in there. The girl glances at me briefly before focusing on the porch. The barrel is pointed at the floor, but the way she’s fingering the trigger guard makes me nervous. She looks anxious, but determined. I stare at her for a second before shaking my head. I don’t get it. That guy was dangerous— and an alcoholic based on the whiskey bottle and everything in the kitchen. He was ready to shoot her, or at the very least would have gotten them both killed. What could he possibly have done that outweighs that?

Looking to the right, I see Matt has slung a leg over the windowsill, and Anna stands close behind him. As I watch he ducks under the top window with one hand on the frame. I clench my jaw, hoping this isn’t a huge mistake. Either way, we do have to clear the porch off, and if it doesn’t work we can still leave. I run a hand through my hair and let my hat fall to the floor.

I sling my own leg over the windowsill on this side. It’s a straight drop to the ground here. I grip the window frame with one hand, the other clasped tightly around the metal cylinder. Leaning slightly out, I see that most of the figures on the porch are facing the house. I weigh the grenade in my hand, calculating angles and force needed. I decide to aim across the street, hoping to draw them off the porch like Matt said.

“Ready?” I ask Matt. I have to raise my voice to be heard over the noise below, but I see him nod. I pull the pin and quickly chuck the cylinder as hard as I can, not really knowing if it’s a timer or impact that sets it off. As soon as it leaves my hand I tumble ungracefully back into the room. The girl slams the window down just as the first explosive detonates. The second explosion comes a moment later.

Even with both windows closed, it’s a hell of a blast. I lean against the wall by the window, my ears ringing. After only a few moments, though, the girl kneels in front of the window beside me. She winces as her injured right leg hits the bare wood floor and shifts to the other knee as she pushes the window back up.

As the ringing in my ears ebbs away, I hear Anna say that the crowd is moving off the porch. I push off the floor to see for myself. The girl has her rifle leaning across the windowsill, her grip on it tight but she’s not in a firing position. I’m careful not to bump her or the rifle as she scans the crowd.

Matt leaves the other window closed and we all stand there watching the porch clear. The relief feels almost palpable, draining from the room, but that’s not what I see when I glance down at the girl’s face. There's plenty of targets to shoot at now but she still isn’t looking through the scope yet. She’s scanning the crowd while biting her lip, and I realize there’s only one target down there that matters to her.

I watch as she inspects each rotting face and wonder about that man. He had to have been at least twice her age, and he outweighed me by fifty pounds at least. If he hadn’t been completely drunk, I’m not sure I would have had a chance. All those years of football and wrestling didn’t hurt either.

But they definitely knew each other. No one would go this far for a stranger. Relatives? I think. I can feel the guilt settle in my stomach as I study her, looking for any resemblance.

She suddenly shifts, finally lining up a shot. The silencer cuts back on the noise a bit, but it’s still loud enough to make Anna gasp. I blink and turn my attention back to the street to see what’s left of that guy drop to the sidewalk.

There are still plenty of others out there, though, milling around. A few turn back around toward the house awkwardly. I wonder if she’s going to keep shooting and clear them out. If that magazine is full she’d probably have enough ammo to at least cut their numbers in half, but she just leans to the right, nearly knocking into my leg. I move behind her at her annoyed glance and then she fires a round down the street, in the opposite direction of the porch.

Immediately the shriek of a car alarm starts up. I wince at the piercing noise. Without a word, the girl ejects the bullet casing, stands up, and slides the window down, muffling the wail of the alarm. I watch as she unloads the rifle and sets it all on the bed. She pulls the last stun grenade from her pocket then and holds it out to me.

“If that doesn’t work,” she says with a nod to the window. I take it, and she immediately steps around me to leave the room.

I expect her to head back into the study across the hall, but she turns right — away from the stairs, thankfully— and disappears down the hall. The click of a door latching is just loud enough to be heard over the muffled car alarm.

“What now?” Anna asks, staring after the girl. She pulls her gaze to me when I don’t answer and raises her eyebrows expectantly.

“It’ll be a while before they thin out,” I say with a shrug. Hopefully they wander off and we’ll be able to get away from this place before dark. I never had any intention of staying more than one night in this town. We’ve managed so far by never staying in one place for long.

“Depends on how long that alarm keeps up,” I add. Anna nods in agreement while Matt gets up and rounds the bed toward me. I start to wonder how long a car battery can last, but just as Matt gets to the window, the alarm cuts off. Matt grabs the rifle from the bed, pushes the window up a bit, and crouches to look through the scope in the direction of the girl’s last shot.

“Only one nice car on this street,” he observes quietly. After another moment, he backs up and sets the rifle back on the bed.

“Newer cars have timers on the alarms,” I remember. Hours spent in our dad’s shop weren’t for nothing, I guess.

“And it looks like she knew it,” he adds.

“What do you mean?” Anna asks. Matt pushes the window shut again.

“There were six other bullet holes in that car.”