History Literature / Infected

* InfantImmortality: Averted.

This novel provides examples of:

* WasItReallyWorthIt - All the main characters when [[spoiler: they get the order from the president to let the Triangles hatch out of a woman, letting her die in the process, to let Perry talk to the Triangles and find out where their new gate is being made.]]

* {{Badass}} - Perry, and in the sequel Dew Phillips officially earns this title after he [[spoiler: beats Perry, the hulking 200+ pound 26 year old so badly he ends up lying in the fetal position begging for it to stop...with a table leg. Did we mention Dew is a Vietnam Vet in his later fifties?]]

* JerkWithAHeartofGold: Murray Longworth. He's extremely rude and dismissive but also determined to protect the U.S. and the human race at large from the invasion. He even gets some pretty sympathetic moments in the third book.

* TookALevelinBadass - Dr. Tim Feely starts out as a cowardly, selfish jerkass blatantly trying to get in Margaret's pants in front of her husband. Then the infection hits the Navy task force. While escaping from the sinking biohazard ship, he helps perform battlefield surgery on a wounded Navy SEAL. Then, during the mission to Chicago, he beats an infected to death [[spoiler: to save Cooper Mitchell]. He ends the book as the new director of Special Threats [[spoiler: after Murray Longworth retires.]]

* DangerouslyGenreSavvy: The Orbital is designed to be this. It doesn't approach Earth until it's sure that it can't be detected, uses probes to learn about the locals, and keeps a watch on potential threats from air bases and satellite defenses. The different strains of infection are modified after each failure to learn from the mistakes of previous ones.

* AntiHero - [[spoiler:While Perry is able to beat back the Infection, in the sequel, he constantly kills Infected who could give the agents information and is a prick. He fully believes in his abusive father, too.]]

* CoolBoat: The USS ''Coronado'' in Pandemic.

* JerkWithaHeartofGold: Murray Longworth. He's extremely rude and dismissive but also determined to protect the U.S. and the human race at large from the invasion. He even gets some pretty sympathetic moments in the third book.

* TookaLevelinBadass - Dr. Tim Feely starts out as a cowardly, selfish jerkass blatantly trying to get in Margaret's pants in front of her husband. Then the infection hits the Navy task force. While escaping from the sinking biohazard ship, he helps perform battlefield surgery on a wounded Navy SEAL. Then, during the mission to Chicago, he beats an infected to death [[spoiler: to save Cooper Mitchell]. He ends the book as the new director of Special Threats [[spoiler: after Murray Longworth retires.]]

* Bait-and-SwitchTyrant - President Sandra Blackmon initially seems like nothing more than an incompetent Bible thumper but once the chips are down she proves to be extremely capable at making tough choices and leading the nation during mankind's darkest hour. [[spoiler: Too bad she doesn't survive.]]

* BodyHorror - Infected love to mutilate themselves. And then each other.
** That doesn't even begin to cover what the infection does to the human body. If a human being is infected but their body can't handle the conversion process then it begins to decompose while they're still alive.

* CombatPragmatist - Averted at first with Perry in the second book. He'll use anything he can get his hands on to kill infected...except guns. Not without reason considering he fears the lingering effects of the Triangles will try to get him to commit suicide. Dew Phillips helps him get over it.

* DangerouslyGenreSavvy - The Orbital is designed to be this. It doesn't approach Earth until it's sure that it can't be detected, uses probes to learn about the locals, and keeps a watch on potential threats from air bases and satellite defenses. The different strains of infection are modified after each failure to learn from the mistakes of previous ones.
* DespairEventHorizon - Margaret Montoya crosses it over the course of Contagious. Having repeatedly failing to save infected victims, losing her best friend, and being ultimately responsible for [[spoiler: Detroit getting nuked]] she's all but used up emotionally. The third book in the series opens with her having lost the will to live.

* HeterosexualLifePartners: Perry and Bill. At least...for a while.

* HonestyIstheBestPolicy - Played with throughout the series. At some points the extreme secrecy surrounding the infection helps the government contain outbreaks without causing major panics. At other times, letting the public know what was going on would have helped.
** After [[spoiler: Detroit gets nuked at the end of Contagious]] President Gutierrez reveals the existence of the infection to the public and provides proof. His reward was to be voted out of office in a landslide. His successor, President Blackmon, suffers a similar problem later on when anti-vaccination citizens don't believe her when says the infection is back. For the most part, however, the footage of infected destroying the Navy task force is enough to convince most of the nation to take the yeast vaccine.

* KillItwithFire - After the Navy task force that had been searching for the remains of the Orbital becomes overrun with infected, Murray Longworth has it sunk with a massive firebomb to prevent the infection from spreading to the mainland. [[spoiler: It doesn't work.]]

* OnlySaneMan - Surprisingly enough, Murray. After [[spoiler: President Blackmon is killed on Air Force One]] he becomes the only person in the Situation Room who doesn't immediately want to start nuking China to prevent them from nuking the U.S. or Russia. He even manages to talk down the Russian president from forcing the U.S. into launching a first strike.

* SequelHook - Contagious ends with [[spoiler: the Orbital being shot down and turned into a million little pieces.]] However, we soon [[spoiler: find out that the last remaining pod the Orbital had was able to float to the bottom of a harbor, intact and unharmed. This is just after the Orbital was able to make one last calculation that would, apparently, be the one to KillAllHumans.]]

* BodyHorror - Infected love to mutilate themselves. And then each other.

* WouldntHurtAChild: Despite being treated as nothing more than a PsychoForHire, Perry doesn't cause any harm to Tad when he comes across him in the beginning of the second book. [[spoiler: Tad's little infected brother, however...]]

* BaitandSwitchTyrant - President Sandra Blackmon initially seems like nothing more than an incompetent Bible thumper but once the chips are down she proves to be extremely capable at making tough choices and leading the nation during mankind's darkest hour. [[spoiler: Too bad she doesn't survive.]]

* MyNameIsNotDurwood - Murray calling Dew Phillips by the name of [[spoiler: Top, his old Vietnam War name.]]
** Dew Phillips getting back at Murray by calling him [[spoiler: L.T., ''his'' old Vietnam war name.]]

* InfantImmortality: Averted. Hard.