extreme level, that you’re already fast and dexterous and you just downed six cans for your first energy hit. I felt like I was going to explode but in a good way.
Anyway, ‘bang!’
The eventuality of the car giving out happened, the bonnet nearly flew off. There were at least twenty zombies around, “Give me the bag.” I unzipped the bag and my hands wrapped around a wooden handle, I pulled it out and found the fully loaded magnum, “Where'd you find this?”
I tossed it to him before putting the zipped up bag over my shoulder, “It was under the seat.”
A new friend, a new gun, “It's yours now, I'll show you how to take care of it at some point. You ready?” He nodded. I popped my door open and was off.
“Where to!?” Harry shouted.
I had the duffel strap over my shoulder, “Straight, if the horde gets too thick we'll head into any nearby structure, hold off.” I jumped onto a nearby car and turned to check if Harry was keeping up. I couldn't see him, just packs of the undead running down the road, “Harry!”
I felt a tap on my shoulder, I turned to see him perched just behind me, “How did yo-”
He fired past me and got launched onto the ground, “Woah, that's got a kick. We should keep going.”
I was still flabbergasted, “What...? Whatever, yeah, let's go.” I jumped down, pulled him back up and we ran. Dodging dozens of zeds, who each begin to chase us.
We were nearly at the Valley in all its hipster glory, before a group of around two hundred began shambling across our path and caught our scent. I looked around, at least forty were already chasing us,
“Window! Right side!” I looked to where Harry called and spotted it, a single open window on the second floor.
“Got it!” I darted over, planted my back against the wall and cupped my hands together, “Go!”
He ran and jumped, his foot planting in my hands while I brought them up. Causing him to shoot up, grab the windowsill and pull himself in. The massive horde was closing in, I took a few steps back ‘You can do this, nice and easy’
I ran for the wall, my first foot hitting the bricks as I began to run straight up. Foot over foot, the bag dragging me down somewhat but I still couldn't believe what I was doing. Harry's hand shot out as if to remind me that wall running was not the goal. I grabbed his blood covered hand and he pulled me in somewhat ungracefully.
We were in someone's kitchen, but they'd left, recently. Bowls of food on the floor, cupboards flung open, they'd left in a hurry and the smallest part of me had hoped they had made it. “Harry, make sure the door is closed.”
He nodded, “Already done, the place is empty.”
Good, he was truly capable, although... “What was with that running stuff back there?”
Harry plopped down next to me, “I spent some time in Spain, learned parkour. Good fun.”
I slid the gun bag off and threw it onto the floor. “So, what's the plan from here?”
Harry looked at me like I'd suggested he fly, “How should I know, you're plan man!”
I yawned and stretched, “Not today, today I'm nap man. Last plan I made got me surrounded by hordes of the undead and made me lose my team.”
I wasn't really tired, but I wasn't going to do any more thinking. I was wet, cold, sad and lonely. I just wanted Kate and the guys back, yeah Harry was a good asset. But at that moment he just looked like a flappy hipster to me. I closed my eyes and let his words wash over me.
A few seconds had passed before he kicked me in the ribs, “Hey! What th-” His hand shot to my mouth and when I opened my eyes it was night. I must have passed out, seconds had definitely passed, hours worth of them.
Harry hissed at me, “Shhh... a few got inside the building, there's one banging on the door.”
I shot up, “How's the street?”
The banging was becoming more insistent, “Packed, at least four hundred, they know we're in here, I don't think there's much more 'food' left.” More hands had joined the banging, plan John, any plan. Anything to get out of here.
Groans and roars were now joining the slams of fists, “Alcohol! Have you checked the place?”
He looked at me with a confused expression through the darkness, “Yeah, couple of bottles of vodka and rum.”
I clapped my hands together, “Go get them, Molotov time.”
His teeth glinted in the moonlight, “See, this is why you're plan man.”
He ran over to one of the kitchen cupboards as I pulled a sheet that was sitting on the bar-stool in front of me. This was actually a nice place, it was kind of hard to see in the dark. But I could make out that they had a nice couch and a large, wooden kitchen table. It made me a bit sad, thinking of all these people’s lives completely uprooted. Anyway, I tore up the sheet, “I've got the bottles!”
A hand smashed through the door, “Well... this is going to get interesting. You pick, shooter or thrower?”
He looked at the bottles in his hands then the door now getting torn down, “Thrower, the street?”
I nodded as I gave him the sheet, unzipped my jacket and pulled out my pistols from their holsters.
The door came down, three immediately in view. I saw the bright light of the newly lit flame behind me flash against their blood soaked and torn faces. ‘Click’, ‘Bang!’ Shooting felt different, like I had more control.
The zed dropped, more were pushing their way into the room. I fired my second pistol, another head shot. I heard a bottle smash in the streets below, the roars of the zombies now engulfed in the crackling flames. Harry lit another as I fired three more times, dropping each of the monsters. “Do you think they can feel the fire!?”
They were now shoving past each other trying to get near us, me dropping them before they could get close, “I don't know, maybe, why!?”
Another smash, “I feel kind of guilty that I could be hurting these people is all!”
My left pistol clicked, empty, I slid it back into the holster and kept firing with my right, “Don't! I don't know if these things can feel pain but I'm sure as Hell that I can! Screw getting eaten!” My right pistol clicked empty and they were still coming. I slid it into my other holster, “How are you doing for Molotov’s?”
He lit another, “Last one.” I turned around and snatched the bottle before he could throw it and sent it at the doorway, “That's our only way out! Are you crazy!?”
I grabbed the duffel and slung it over my shoulder, and smiled at him, “More or less,” I grabbed the bar stool, “We're leaving. Stay close would you?” I ran for the door, stool brought up in front of me as I slammed into the flaming corpses. Sending them flying back and snapping my make-shift shield. I discarded it and bounced down the hall, Harry in tow.
It all forced me back to that first night when the team came to pick me up, “Which way?”
I laughed a little as I smashed another zed into the wall, “Not up. Up is bad.”
Aboard the Yuik
The gigantic clear orb that was the multi-layered command centre of the star-ship Yuik had been emptied by commander Neysor after the catastrophe of the gassing.
He stood at his post, gazing down at the planet through the open ports at the base of his ship and felt only broken. The white pony-tail that normally ran from the front of his scalp to halfway down his back was resting over his shoulder. While his grey-white face was buried in his strong hands, cradling his flat nose as he breathed heavily in an attempt to hold back tears.
A failure of this magnitude almost guaranteed the death of his species, a failure that was only made worse by the reports and updates that had been flooding his console all day, proving that this was not an isolated event due to a malfunction of the misting system of his ship.
The gas had had the same result on over eight billion of the planet's denizens and the small percentage that remained healthy were struggling against the infected. Neysor released a sigh as he ran his weary fingertips over a console, closing the ports and
sealing him in the false, flickering white light of Yuik's simulated Sun which filtered almost everything but the necessary vitamins from the ultraviolet radiation.
Neysor chuckled sarcastically at himself and his ship as he adjusted the black collar of his mostly red and white skin-tight commander's uniform, “Another thing to be fixed.”
While making his way toward the sad grey steel mesh door, he realised that a smile was still sitting on his face and remedied it. Straightening his posture and opening the doors to see several young female faces staring at him in fear. “Nothing is to be done about this, return to your posts and resume monitoring of the planet, alert me if anything alters in the situation.” Scattered nods appeared amongst the few of the remaining ranking officers.
An answer wasn't what Neysor wanted anyway, he just wanted to get off of that depressing bridge and find Shenim. This ship had travelled long before Neysor and the brotherhood of nine's time, fighting in great battles, destroying fleet upon fleet of insurgents. Now it was Neysor's to do with as he pleased, a gift from his three remaining brothers. He had turned it into a beautiful scientific craft during the four hundred year journey, aiding in the discovery of the cure, the hope for a species rebirth through the humans after Neysor had foolishly pushed for the original.
A whisper escaped Neysor's mind and left through his lips as he heard hits connecting with one of his crew. “Forty seven percent.” Forty seven percent was when the once noble and widespread Gralari race