At my apartment, I drink and I pace. No matter how much alcohol I pour down the hatch, no matter how many times I stomp my feet into the carpet, I can’t block the memory of Milla’s beating. She was covered in blood and bruises, different parts of her face swollen, her wrist bent back at an odd angle. A bone in her leg peeking through skin. I’d felt her pain, her all-consuming despair. I’d heard her thoughts. Beatings were a way of life for her and her siblings.
Whatever ill feelings I still harbored toward her died a swift death today, bludgeoned with a baseball bat, just like Milla herself. Resentment no longer clouds my thoughts, and I see the truth. She’s been hurt enough. I want to comfort her, not hurt her—never hurt her—and I want her to comfort me. I’m unmanned. And I get it now. Of course she helped Anima when her brother was threatened. He was all she had left. Her only family. Her hero.
How did we have visions of the past? Why?
I throw the bottle of whiskey against the wall, glass shattering in every direction. I stop, just stop, and sink to the floor, my back pressed against the couch.
“Dude. Miserable is so not a good look for you.”
My gaze locks on Kat, who is standing a few feet in front of me. As usual, she’s wearing the T-shirt and shorts she died in. At this point, I think I’d rather see her in a burlap sack or a Mr. Potato Head costume. “Can’t help it,” I croak.
“Well, you’re gonna have to try. You need to arm up and head to Shady Elms. Five minutes after you left the mansion, Cole started texting you. Bronx is in trouble, and all slayers have been summoned for a battle royale.”
“They’ll be fine without me.”
“Cole insisted Milla go, even though she’s—”
“Damn him!” I jump to my feet. Milla is weakened, emotional and probably easily distracted right now.
Kat watches me with sad eyes as I gather an arsenal. “I’ll be rooting for you. And of course, I’ll critique your performance later.”
“Bonus points for every kill?”
“Please. That’d be too easy. You’ll get bonus points for every un-kill. Reach a hundred, and you’ll earn a prize.”
“Right. The new ‘save ’em’ ability.”
“Yes,” she says. “Although that particular ability didn’t work for Bronx tonight.”
Well, well. I might get to kill, after all. “The prize?” I cram four extra clips into my pockets. If I have to save zombies, fine, I’ll save them, but there’s no way in hell I’ll let them bite me. I’ll disable, capture and find another way.
“The prize,” Kat says, “is that I’ll finally forgive you for riding across a rainbow with another girl on the back of your unicorn.”
“My dream-crime record finally expunged. Nice.”
“Pain is pain.”
I flash her a grin, but she’s already gone.
I rush out my front door—I’m in a T-shirt and jeans, with combat boots on my feet—and slide into my truck. Night has fallen, and shadows are thick. Stars dot the sky, but they’re smeared with dark gray rain clouds that are threatening to overflow.
I break every speed law and soon close in on Shady Elms. Lights blink up ahead—headlights? Yep. Smoke curls from the crumpled hood of a van. My friends crashed? I park and jump out. I run...only to tumble to the ground, tripped by... I don’t know what. I land, dirt and twigs filling my mouth. A bright light suddenly shines over me. Motion-activated? Or controlled by a human hand?
Human hand. Definitely. A gun is cocked. I roll out of the way just as—
Pop, pop, pop! Bullets spray the spot I just vacated.
I come up firing a gun of my own. A grunt echoes, the scent of blood saturates the air. Whoever shot at me is wounded. I stomp forward, remaining low just in case. The light is still shining and reveals the glint of another trip wire. I cut it and turn the source of the light—a lamp that’s been anchored into the ground—to illuminate the opposite direction. A man in bodily form is slumped over a rock, a deep gash in his neck.
I don’t know him. He isn’t a slayer.
Keeping my gun trained on him, I feel for a pulse. He’s dead.
Who is he? And why did he attack me?
Are there others nearby, waiting to pick off slayers when they return to their bodies? But...why not strike now?
The answer becomes clear a moment later. My friends killed the others...and a new crop of enemy soldiers has just arrived.
I hear car doors slamming in the distance. I sneak through the bushes—three black-clad men stand beside a van, checking their weapons, while a fourth gives the pre-war speech. “Kill or be killed.” There’s a wrecked sedan next to the van, four motionless bodies inside it. The people my friends killed. Go team.