Beaten and battered in mind and body, the fugitives limp west, unaware that the human world is fading all around them, unaware that the last remnants of the goodness of man is being ground under the heel of evil at every turn. When confronted with that evil, fight or flight are their only choices, however, Neil's small group is hamstrung, forced to take on more refugees who come to them empty-handed, unarmed, and hungry. Neil is faced with the disturbing prospect of guiding them across 2,000 miles of zombie-plagued land, only to stumble at his first hurdle: the mighty Mississippi has become a river of death and, like the fabled River Styx, the only way to pass is to pay the river man his fee. His price: warm bodies.