The iron gate rattled again.
This time, the hinge gave a dry crack.
Son looked at the wooden cabinet blocking the gate. It was already old, with one leg propped up by a broken brick. If the people outside kept pounding, they had only a few minutes left—maybe less.
“We can’t stay here forever,” Vy said. The moment she finished speaking, her phone vibrated again. The screen filled with overlapping notifications: hospitals were overwhelmed, multiple roads had been placed under lockdown, and residents were being told to find shelter and wait for official guidance.
Long peered through the gap in the gate. “What guidance? They’ve gone completely silent.”
No one answered.
Inside Grandma Nam’s house, the injured woman lay on a folding cot. Vy had temporarily wrapped a strip of cloth around her arm. The bite wound wasn’t deep, but the woman kept trembling and asking over and over where her husband was.
My sat down beside her. “What’s your name, ma’am?”
“Aunt Hanh.” The woman grabbed My’s hand. “My husband… someone bumped into him. Then all of a sudden, he started biting people. My son is at Cho Ray Hospital. I have to go find him.”
Vy and Son exchanged a look.
Cho Ray Hospital was toward the city center. If they wanted to know what was happening, it might be the place with the most information. It might also be the most dangerous place in the city right now.
“We have to get to the center,” Vy said.
Long whipped around. “Are you serious? There are tons of people out there… who don’t look human anymore.”
“It’s about to become unsafe here, too.” Vy pointed at the gate. “If we just sit around and wait, we won’t know what’s happening or where to go next.”
Son tightened his grip around the broom that had been broken in half. “I’m going.”
My stood up right after him. “I’m going, too.”
Long sighed and rummaged through his pocket for his key ring. “I knew this day would come—when you three dragged me into something suicidal.”
“Then stay here,” Son said.
Long looked at him. “And who knows the way?”
The question silenced the whole group. Long had delivered orders all over the city’s districts. He remembered the alleys that led to the main road, the detours around traffic jams, and even the parking lot behind an electronics store near the overpass.
They prepared in silence. Vy took antiseptic, bandages, and several bottles of water from Grandma Nam’s cabinet. My gathered bread, batteries, and an old radio. Long found two metal pipes in the phone repair shop next door. Son checked that the motorbike still had enough gas, then removed the delivery backpack from its seat.
Grandma Nam handed Vy the key to the storage room behind the house.
“There’s a passage leading to the back alley route,” she said. “Back then, you kids used to hide from the adults that way.”
Long gave a humorless laugh. “Back then, we were hiding because we broke a flowerpot. Now we’re hiding from zombies.”
No one laughed with him.
The back alley route was even narrower than the lane in front of the house. They had to go single file. Son led the way, a metal pipe in hand. Vy brought up the rear with Aunt Hanh. My hugged the radio to her chest, while Long kept looking up at the balconies and corrugated metal roofs overhead.
There was no one at the mouth of the alley.
The silence was more frightening than screaming.
They wheeled the motorbike onto a small road that connected to the main road. A light drizzle began to fall. Storefront signs flickered, their reflections wavering across the wet pavement. A bus sat blocking the intersection, its doors hanging wide open. There was no one inside, only long trails of blood leading down from the steps.
My stopped.
“Don’t look,” Son said.
“Is anyone still alive?”
Vy stepped up to the bus door and studied it for a long moment. “I don’t know. But we can’t stay here.”
A scraping sound came from behind the bus, claws dragging across metal.
A figure crawled out from underneath it.
Son immediately shoved My back. The man wore a driver’s uniform, his face caked in blood. One leg had been crushed, but both hands still clawed at the pavement. Behind him, three more people staggered off the bus.
“Run!” Son shouted.
The group charged toward the alley across the street. Long led them around a row of houses, then shoved open the iron door of a photocopy shop. They rushed inside and slammed the door shut just as hands began pounding against it from outside.
But the pounding didn’t stop. A hand suddenly thrust through the gap where the door had been forced open, grabbed Long by the shoulder, and yanked him outside.
“Long!” My screamed.
Son lunged forward and seized his friend’s hand. Vy used all her strength to pull Long back inside, but a zombie’s fingernails had already torn through his shirt. Long was trapped between the door and the crowd pressing in from outside.
Aunt Hanh suddenly sprang to her feet. Her face was pale, but the fear had vanished from her eyes.
“Aunt Hanh, what are you doing?” Vy cried.
She didn’t answer. She snatched up the metal pipe from the floor, opened the side door of the shop, and charged outside. Metal clanged through the rain. The zombies immediately turned toward her.
“Close the door!” she shouted. “Take Long with you! Run!”
“No! Aunt Hanh!” My burst into tears.
Son and Vy pulled Long inside. The iron door crashed down. Through the gap, they watched Aunt Hanh slowly retreat toward the end of the alley, striking at the zombies as she tried to draw them away from the photocopy shop.
She turned and looked back at them one last time.
“Don’t come back!”
A figure lunged at her. Aunt Hanh vanished behind the curtain of rain and the flailing arms.
Long slammed his hand against the door. “Open it! I have to save her!”
Son held his friend firmly by the shoulders. “She saved you so you could live. Don’t make her sacrifice meaningless.”
Long looked at his arm, where blood was slowly seeping out. He clenched his teeth, tears mingling with the rain on his face.
My hugged Aunt Hanh from a distance, as if she could still hold her back. Vy crouched down to examine the scratches on Long’s arm. Fortunately, the claws had only cut through his shirt. The wound was shallow and didn’t look like a bite.
“Aunt Hanh saved us,” Vy said softly. “We have to keep living. And we have to find her son.”
Long didn’t answer. He only tightened his grip on the metal pipe.
After a while, the sounds outside grew sporadic. The group followed the back exit of the photocopy shop, looped through several narrow alleys, and continued on foot. They left the motorbike by the roadside; it didn’t have enough gas to risk riding through streets crowded with zombies.
When they neared the center, the city appeared before them in an unfamiliar guise. Ambulance sirens wailed, then cut off abruptly. Black smoke curled up behind the high-rises. The familiar streets were filled with abandoned vehicles, shattered glass, and flickering signs.
My switched on the radio. The broadcaster’s voice crackled in and out:
“…residents should not move toward the central area… hospitals… infection levels… authorities are currently…”
The signal cut out completely.
Long looked toward the buildings ahead. “So this is it.”
Son looked at his three friends. Aunt Hanh was no longer with them, but her final words still echoed in his mind: Don’t come back.
“Keep going,” Son said.
Vy gripped the backpack tightly. My hugged the radio to her chest. Long stepped forward, though his arm still burned with pain.
At the end of the road, a huge explosion rang out. A flash of red fire lit up the gray sky.
The four of them looked at one another.
Then they entered the center of Ho Chi Minh City—where the answers awaited them, in a city that had already begun to die.