In the middle of the night, Charlie Campion awakens his wife, Sally, and their baby daughter LaVon. He tells them they must leave the army base where he works immediately. A deadly virus has contaminated the facility, but he escaped before the place automatically locked itself down. The Campions get in their car and flee eastward.

The following evening, in Arnette, Texas, five men are passing the time at the local Texaco station owned by Bill Hapscomb, who is known as “Hap.” His friends are Hank Carmichael, Stu Redmond, Vic Palfrey, Norm Bruett, and Tommy Wannamaker. They watch in fascination as a late model Chevy winds down the road toward the station at 15 miles an hour before colliding with a gas pump. They pull the car’s occupants out. The woman and child are dead, and the driver is still barely alive. Identified finally as Charlie Campion, he dies on the way to the local hospital.

In Ogunquit, Maine, 21-year-old Frannie Goldsmith goes to the town dock to tell her boyfriend, Jesse Rider, that she’s pregnant. He reacts badly to the news but proposes marriage. Frannie insists that she doesn’t want to marry him, and they part angrily.