Shots echoed in the air as he leaped off the arch, dropped twenty feet, and drove a kick into Rodney’s head. He rode the malformed skull to the ground and it made a satisfying crack as it hit the pavement. The hero slammed his fist into the giant’s throat and followed it up with a strike to the solar plexus. He drove two-three-four more punches home, flashing the goggles on each one, before Rodney’s arm swept him away.
It was like getting hit by a speeding car. Gorgon flew across the street, knocking down a dozen exes as he went.
“Your eye-magic don’t work on me,” said the giant as he stood up. “Not so tough when you can’t make the other guy weak, are you?”
A handful of exes grabbed at Gorgon’s arms and shoulders and he felt a tiny bit of his strength simmer away as he shrugged them off. “Man enough to test that?”
Rodney roared and charged.
St. George landed at the Van Ness gate and Jarvis limped to him. “Moved past,” shouted the salt-and-pepper man. He had one arm in a sling, and pointed north with the rifle clutched in his other hand. “Heading for Lemon Grove.”
“Why didn’t you--”
“Radios are out. We sent runners.”
The hero nodded and hurled himself back up over the rooftops.
Lemon Grove had been a tiny pedestrian entrance, over a block north from Van Ness. When they’d moved into the Mount, they’d welded the rolling gate shut, jammed its drive chain, and boarded up the tiny guard shack with layers of plywood.
Two long, clawed hands gripped the top of the small gate and forced it back down its tracks.
There were six guards. On top of an office trailer, Ilya, Billie, and two others were picking off exes one by one. The Marine was shouting into her walkie. The two guards on the roof of the shack were shooting at the demon on the far side.
“Oh, thank God,” one of the shack-guards said. “I didn’t think anyone--”
“Radios are dead,” St. George interrupted. “Stop wasting ammunition!” He punctuated it with a burst of flame.
They stopped firing and the gate squealed. One of the welds snapped with a sound like a cymbal.
“The demon’s bulletproof. I’ve got him. Take care of the exes.”
St. George leaped up into the sky and arced down to land just behind Cairax. He kicked two exes away and threw a few fists and elbows that shattered skulls. Then he latched onto the demon’s tail and yanked.
The monster flew away from the gate as the hero swung it up, over, and slammed it into the crowded street. He leaped across the distorted body, dragging the tail with him, and shoved another ex away as he landed. He set his boots to the pavement and whipped the demon in a circle, swatting zombies away like flies. After two spins he hurled it across the street into the parking structure, decapitating a handful of exes on the way. The dead thing struck the concrete pillar like a wrecking ball and left a crater. It dropped to the ground in a heap of over-long limbs.
Behind the fence, the guards were cheering.
St. George waded through the exes, cracking heads and necks with each swing of his arms. Gunfire dropped the dead near him. He was halfway to Cairax when the demon lunged back up. Its head panned back and forth before something behind the twisted face focused on him and growled.
“Ahhh,” he said. “Got your attention in there, big guy?”
Cairax lunged at him and he side-stepped. The nest of teeth cracked into the pavement next to his foot. He took the moment to grab a female ex by her coat and hurl her up at the demon. He grabbed two more and swung them like clubs, battering the monster in the head three times before the exes came apart.
The dead thing swept its arms together, knocking over its brethren, but St. George was already in the air. He shot a cone of fire into Cairax’s face and the demon flinched.
“Rookie mistake,” he called out. “Dead things aren’t scared of--”
Cairax grabbed a dead man and hurled it up at the hero. The ex caught St. George in the side and he tumbled to the ground.
The demon moved like a snake, its spine rolling up and down as its head lashed out at him.
He swung a fist and caught it under the jaw. A tooth flew loose and Cairax staggered back from the impact.
The hero lunged up, dove in, and jerked back. A pair of exes held his coat. One was chewing on the leather, trying to work its teeth through a pocket flap. The other reached out with its free arm and grabbed a handful of hair.
He spun with his fist out and broke off the hair-puller’s jaw. The fist swung back and shattered its skull. He shook off the leather-eater and a bullet exploded its head as it stumbled back.
A voice shouted something between the gunfire. Billie, up on the roof of the trailer.
He turned in time to see the demon’s head lunge down again. The creature’s mouth was a Venus flytrap of tusks and fangs. St. George threw his arm up out of instinct and the dead thing’s dagger-like teeth punched through the leather sleeve.
Into his arm.
Agony, more pain than he’d felt in years, roared through him. The jaw hinged shut like a machine and one of the huge teeth scraped against bone as it pushed deeper into his flesh.