“Come get it, you undead fucks!” I bellowed over their dull roar.
They swarmed around me.
I swung the axehead wildly. It buried itself in someone’s neck on the first swing. I yanked it free and jammed it into the nearest body, then nearly lost it when the ghoul yanked himself away from me. I threw an elbow, caught a face, and had the pleasure of undead blood come oozing down my arm. I ripped the axe free and went for another head, heaving all my weight and strength behind each swing.
The spray of bullets jerked me briefly out of my rage. Someone was trying to fish me out of the horde. Maybe a few someones, by the sound of it.
We knocked down the foremost runners, and moved further into the fray.
Someone clumped against my shoulder. Tony shoved another gun at me, along with a new magazine. “Compliments of the general,” he said.
I shifted the axe to my left hand. This new rifle was insanely light—too light, really. I started shooting it with only my right hand and over-corrected almost immediately.
But I soon got the hang of it, and mowed through them, ignoring the spray of cold blood on my face and the body parts that went flying when I missed the head.
I dropped the axe.
People came and went around me. Tony moved on, sprinting ahead into death or glory or whatever he thought he was going to find in the shambling masses. I caught sight of Dax picking his shots, skipping from one ghoul to another. Behind me, I heard Gloria and Vijay yelling to each other. Aside from Poltava’s handful of real soldiers, we were a sorry offensive force. The world deserved better.
But hey, you take what you can get.
I crashed forward, swept up in a group of them. This gun did not get hot in my hands, though I did feel it sputter as it ran through the last of its ammunition. I lifted the magazine Tony had given me, only to realize it wasn’t intended for this new gun at all—he’d shoved something for the STG at me along with the newer, now-empty weapon.
I twisted my arm behind me and pulled the STG forward, doing my best to eject the old magazine one-handed. The others had the dead occupied, if only for a few seconds. That’s all I needed, a few seconds— And then I found myself face to face with a dead man in military fatigues.
His eyes all but glittered. This was no braindead cannibal: this one was looking at me, searching for weakness.
“You were one of Jacoby’s tests,” I said.
His lips curled into a snarl.
I hurled the empty new gun at him. The son of a bitch caught it, his wizened, rotten hands closing over the stock. I could swear he was searching for the fucking trigger.
“It’s empty, dude,” I said.
I swung at him with the STG.
He lifted the gun up, and my old rifle clattered against it.
Shit. Okay, maybe I shouldn’t have given him something to defend himself with.
He looked at our crossed guns and looked at me, and the smile grew wider.
God, his blackened gums stank.
“You can go,” I said. “If you want. I didn’t see you, you didn’t see me.”
He stepped back, lifted the gun, and brought it down toward my head.
I dodged away, the air whistling as the big weapon came down where I had stood. I swung the STG at him once more, and he got the gun in the way again. Either I was getting slower or he was fast and could think on his feet. I couldn’t tell.
“Retreat!”
What?
“I said retreat!”
Retreat? What’s that?
Wait. That was Durkee. We were supposed to blow something up.
I gathered what remained of my energy and flung myself at him, heedless of his stench. He toppled off-balance, and I swung the STG at his head as hard as I could.
It didn’t have the same effect as the axe. Holy shit, I wanted that axe back.
I lifted the rifle overhead again. If all else failed, I would just brain him the old-fashioned way.
Or would have, if a swarm of his buddies hadn’t come right toward me.
Okay, braining them all was out of the question. I started fumbling with the STG’s magazine again, and finally succeeded in ejecting the old one and letting it fall to the ground.
The new magazine clicked home, but before I could start unleashing it, someone stepped in front of me.
He’d obviously taken a beating in between his misadventure at the park and joining me here. Blood streamed from a dozen cuts, and I was fairly certain a huge stain on his side indicated a gunshot wound rather than a bite. But here he was, standing in front of me, his eyes almost as empty as a dead man’s.
“Go,” Logan said. “Durkee says to go. They’re gonna blast the overpass.”
“Where have you been?” Stupid question, I know. He was here, and he’d held up his end of the deal. Who cared where he’d been?
He glanced at the oncoming brigade of the undead, who seemed to swirl around us, avoiding actually laying into us. “Been around,” he said. “Maybe I’ll stay awhile.”
Dead. He’s dead.
Or dying.
Either one.
His gaze landed on my waist. “Can I have your pistol? In case I run out.”
I pulled the pistol from my belt and held it out.
He took it, tucked it into his own.