Chapter 15

It never ceased to astound me, how fast the human brain can process irrelevant information when adrenaline is pumping in a raging torrent through your veins.

The first thing that struck me was all the color. It was like an insane god had taken a massive brush and smeared red all over the floors, walls, and even ceilings. The entire tile floor was one large puddle of blood, no doubt collected from the countless bodies littered across the room. Most bore similar gear to the SWAT team member I’d met earlier, at least from what little of it remained.

There wasn’t much left. Even as I watched, several zombies tore the limbs off from another corpse and began gnawing at them like dogs worrying at a bone. Ragged flaps of flesh splotched messily to the floor, accompanied by more blood which steadily dripped down the chins of the feeding zombies.

More unnamable chunks of raw flesh dotted the walls. I was grateful for that, because the few bits that were recognizable as fingers, ears, and other disembodied body parts only made the vile rising up the back of my throat surge even faster still.

That’s what I mean about perception and irrelevant information. All this overload of sensory data took only a couple seconds, and that was even though my attention wasn’t even on the zombies to begin with.

I had far more pressing concerns, after all.

Like the towering monster that had just snatched a steel door from my hands and ripped it clear off its hinges in one careless tug.

It was a grey-skinned, freakishly muscled creature resembling a massive, hairless ape. It stood well over eight feet tall, its head nearly reaching the ceiling above. This head was only vaguely humanoid and seemingly all teeth, all of them razor sharp and grotesquely overgrown to protrude several inches past its oversized mouth. No eyes were visible at all as it crouched forward toward the now-vacant doorway.

Its entire body was cabled with massively corded muscles, many of which bore signs of recent battle. Slick blood ran down in thin rivulets from countless bullet holes on its skin, no doubt fired from the many MP-5 submachine guns littered across the floor. If such wounds weakened it at all, I couldn’t tell. In fact, even as I watched, the flesh around those cavities was wriggling as though it were made of countless tiny maggots. They slowly drew together over its wounds, flesh and blood regenerating at a mind-boggling rate visible to the naked eye.

“Run.. run..”

The words snapped me out of my sick fascination. It was the voice I’d heard from the other side of the door earlier. Even now, I could barely make out the words. Looking at its source, I could finally understand why.

A burly man wearing the black tactical gear of the SWAT team tried to speak again, but spat out a mouthful of blood instead. It was a wonder that he could speak at all. The monster’s claw-like fingers held him casually in its bloody grip, like a broken doll lying forgotten in a child’s hands.

In any other circumstance, I would have taken the man for an extremely well-made Hollywood prop, complete with a meandering coil of intestines hanging limply from the empty space where his pelvis and legs should have been. His guts trailed along the floor in a bloody mess as the monster moved toward us.

“Run.. now..” the man managed weakly. It was a wonder he was still alive, let alone able to speak. There was an eerie calm in his expression as he looked at me straight in the eyes.

Then the monster tore his head clean off with a single bite. More blood fountained from the ragged stump of the man’s neck as the monster tossed its head back and chewed. The bone-crunching sounds it made as it enjoyed its meal sent incontrollable shudders down my spine.

That’s when I finally noticed that Allie’s fingers had been digging painfully into my arm for a while now. I met her eyes and was relieved to find that I wasn’t the only one who looked like I was about to shit in my pants.

“Damn it all, if it wants to get to my girl, it’ll have to get past me first!”

I began to raise my shotgun when Allie’s hand stopped me. She shook her head frantically, her eyes screaming at me in a language I couldn’t hear. The message was clear though.

Don’t you fucking dare.

My heart was drumming in my ears as Allie slowly moved one foot back, then another. Almost afraid to look, I glanced back toward the monster and found that it hadn’t reacted to her movements.

Barely daring to breathe, Allie and I noiselessly backed away. The monster didn’t seem to care or even notice us. Beyond tearing the door off and snacking on human brains, it didn’t seem interested in anything else. Maybe it only reacted to noise, which is why I was infinitely grateful for the crackling sounds it made as it chewed on that poor bastard’s skull.

Maybe, just maybe, we could still get away.

With agonizing care, we had made it almost 150 feet away, each step taken with our hearts in our throats, when inevitably, the shit had to hit the fan.

“K-Kaizer? I-Is that you? Oh, thank god we found you. You have no idea..”

The rest of it was drowned out by the furious snarl that exploded in my head as I looked over my shoulder and sought out the bastard who had just condemned us all to death.

Steve.

It was fucking Steve, the Field’s Medal-winning mathematician and his fucking world-renowned astrophysicist wife Susan. Somehow, they had survived all the carnage thus far. Of course, for all I knew, they could just as easily be drycleaners or interior designers.

I really couldn’t care less. I’d want to bash their brains out regardless, if - and that’s a very big if - we got out of this mess alive.

“Just how did these two morons survive this long?” I couldn’t help but wonder.

That’s exactly what they were - absolute morons. Even now, they stood right in the middle of the corridor leading toward the exit, about 50 feet away from us. I had been paying so much attention to the monster at my back that I hadn’t even spotted them until I was almost right on top of them. Their faces bore beaming grins as they waved their hands at us like cardboard cutouts waving a sign that read, “Dear Monster, please rip my stupid head off and chew on my million-dollar brains.”

The monster, it turned out, would only be too happy to comply.

Even as I opened my mouth to cry out a warning, a deafening roar rang out down the corridor, and I knew the game was up.

I began unslinging the shotgun from my shoulder when Allie caught my arm.

“Are you crazy? Just run!”

“We need to slow it down.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Allie said.

I began to nod, thinking about the worst ways I could kill these two retards, when I heard a click beside me.

I looked up to find Allie grimly lifting the rifle she had just taken the safety off from. She began raising it to her shoulder even as we continued to rush toward the exit, and that’s when I realized what she was going to do.

Without thinking, I slapped the rifle’s barrel down just as the muzzle blasted away. The shot pinged off from the floor below our feet.

I met Allie’s gaze for a single instant, all we could spare while we were running for our lives. In her eyes, I didn’t see a single bit of remorse for the murder she had been about to commit. That didn’t surprise me at all. I knew of the kind of ruthless determination required for a beautiful young woman to rise to the top in the shark-eat-shark world of court drama and politics.

What surprised me was the emotion I did glimpse in those azure depths. It wasn’t shame, nor even anger. Instead, there was only sorrow.

I knew better than to think she was feeling sorry for clueless Steve, who had just signed his own death warrant. In here, under these circumstances, I was the only person who could merit such emotion from her.

Before I could ask, I could already hear the heavy pounding of feet rapidly approaching from behind.

“Later,” Allie said as she loaded another bullet into the chamber and motioned me ahead.

I shook my head. “You go first, I’ll catch up.”

Allie began to protest, but I interrupted her by shoving her ahead. “You’re wasting time. Just shut up and trust me.”

“Damn it, Kai. You better be right behind me,” Allie said, tears forming in her eyes.

I didn’t reply as I turned around, because I wasn’t really sure if the crazy, half-cooked plan I had hatched up would actually turn out the way I hoped.

My shotgun clutched in a clammy grip, I ran ahead toward the incoming menace, ignoring the panicked voices behind me.

“A-Alexia? What the hell is that?”

“Move! Get out of the way!”

Zoning their voices out, I tried to properly measure my distance from the exit at my back. Satisfied, I set my feet and propped up the shotgun against my shoulder, taking careful aim. With the sheer mass of the beast filling nearly the entire corridor, it was hard to miss. Still, I needed to slow it down as much as I could. From what little of it I had managed to see, its entire body had been riddled with bullet wounds, yet none of them had done those poor bastards from the SWAT team a single bit of good.

So I did the next best thing, and methodically set about knee-capping the bastard.

It completely ignored the first shot, as well as the second. The third one finally got its attention though, as I could spy chunks of white bone underneath the hideous wound I’d opened up on its knee.

I pumped another shell and fired, trying for the same spot and actually got lucky enough to hit my target.

The beast roared as it wobbled slightly from its forward momentum, but I didn’t even slow down. Far from it, this small success only spurred me on. I finished pumping out all six shells from my shotgun in the blink of an eye. The last shot was more of a formality than anything, as I didn’t even bother aiming. I just pointed the shotgun in the monster’s general direction while turning around.

Then I ran. That was the extent of my grand plan.

Knee-cap the bastard, then high-tail it as fast as humanly possible.

There were obvious flaws in this plan, of course. I could hear death swiftly approaching from behind, and I was certain that even Usain Bolt would be royally screwed at this point.

Fortunately, I wasn’t Usain Bolt.

Hell, I was more than human.

I was better.

I was faster.

Activating my recently acquired Dash skill, I felt the intoxicating surge of power slam into me like a shot of molten steel pumped directly into my veins. This time, I was prepared for the rush of inhuman strength and there was no skidding on the floor.

My first step propelled me forward by at least 8 feet. That was only the beginning. The next step was a blur of motion so swift tears sprang to my eyes and the wind howled in my ears. I barely noticed the crash as the monster pounced upon empty air. It seemed to come from what felt like an impossibly far distance at my back. By now, I was moving so fast that my feet barely seemed to make contact against the ground but I knew better. With each step I was slamming the floor with so much power, it was a wonder bones didn’t shatter and muscles weren’t torn to shreds.

Then, just as swiftly as it had arrived, the rush was gone. Strength leaked out of my muscles like water trickling from a busted dam, my speed now a pitiful shadow of its former glory.

That was fine. By then, I had already reached the door. Barely three seconds had passed since my final shotgun blast, but in that short window I had crossed the distance it had taken Allie at least 15 seconds to cover.

Allie didn’t say a word. In fact, she didn’t even look at me. She just squeezed out another shot past me before rushing out through the exit.

“What? You just.. No, first, what’s that thing behind you?” Steve said, his face completely bloodless as he stared over my shoulder.

“Just run!” I shouted, brushing past Steve, not even bothering to look back. “Run if you want to live!”

Susan cried out as she finally spotted the abomination stalking our steps. She didn’t have the try very hard. It’s massive bulk dwarfed the corridor as it pounced forward at inhuman speeds once more. That damn healing must be insanely fast. Either that, or its body was practically invulnerable to small weapons fire.

Like that wasn’t bad enough news, past its shadow I could see a surging mass of bodies as countless zombies followed in the monster’s wake.

Fucking great, even more monsters joining the party.

“The door!” Steve cried out as we all stumbled out of the service corridor, struggling with the door’s locking mechanism.

“Don’t even bother,” I snarled, pulling him back by force and sending him reeling away. A flimsy door like this wouldn’t even slow that thing down. “Just go!”

We ran desperately while looking for any way to escape. I was heading for the nearby escalator when I heard a bell-like ringing sound over my shoulder.

“Over here!” Susan cried, rushing into the nearby elevator with her husband.

“Kai, don’t!” Allie said, but I was already inside and she could only grit her teeth and follow.

Steve frantically mashed the buttons on the elevator panel, but it felt like an eternity as we waited for the doors while idle music rang out from the cabin’s speakers. The brightly lit LED display of the elevator panel read, “Please wait for your fellow passengers..”

“W-What the hell was that thing?” Steve asked me shakily.

“I don’t know,” I replied honestly, “and I don’t want to find out ei-”

Metal howled in protest as the entire service corridor’s door exploded outwards. The ape-monster jumped out through the vacant doorway and onto the mall’s marble floor. The decapitated SWAT team member’s blood still dripped from its chin.

Susan’s terrified scream was immediately cut off by Allie’s hand as she forcibly clamped it over the woman’s mouth. The damage was already done, however. The monster roared as it located the source of the scream, then pounced straight toward us.

Hefting my shotgun, I looked around in desperation. We were surrounded by clear glass walls. There were no other exits. We were trapped in this fancy deathtrap.

Thunder roared as Allie shot the monster with her rifle through the open elevator doors. Susan again screamed shrilly at the sudden noise. Allie barely threw her a cold glance, but its biting edge was enough to send the poor woman stumbling toward the cabin’s rear wall, both hands clasped over her mouth.

Outside, the shot caught the rushing monster high in the chest. It barely even slowed it down. In fact, if anything, it only seemed to enrage it further as it sped up, covering half the 50-foot gap separating us in only a couple of strides.

Allie pulled the bolt lever back, adjusted her aim, then shot once more. I joined her with my shotgun, blasting away and praying I would score a hit.

This time, my prayers were heard. I don’t know which of us got the lucky shot, but I wasn’t in a position to quibble over the details. Most of the bullets just slammed harmlessly into its body, but suddenly blood spurted from one of its legs - likely the same one I’d blasted to hell earlier. This last shot, combined with the sheer speed of its rush, was enough to send it crashing to the floor. However, before we even had time to celebrate, it was already getting back to its feet.

Still, it earned us precious time. The elevator’s doors finally slid shut. The display read, “Next stop, parking level E.”

The elevator was finally moving and we were all panting with one collective sigh of relief when a massive claw tore through the elevator’s double doors and snapped shut just inches away from my face.

“Get away from the door!” I shouted, blasting at the hand with my shotgun.

Blood and gore splattered wetly against the clear glass walls as the blast ripped into the claw. An agonized howl filled the air from the other side of the door, but far from withdrawing the hand, it only drove its arm deeper into the gap. Pellets ricocheted from the metal door and bounced wildly inside the cabin,

“Get this thing moving!” I roared at Steve, who was mashing away at the buttons.

“I can’t, it’s stuck!”

The elevator’s display screen read, “Door obstruction detected. Emergency stop engaged. Please wait patiently while assistance arrives.”

Cursing out loud, I took up my machete and swung down at the claw as hard as I could. It pinged off the claw as though I had struck solid steel, sending a shock up my arm that almost made me lose my grip.

Detecting my presence, the monster immediately reacted by swinging its claw my way. I tried to jump back and fend it off using my machete as a shield, but it proved useless.

The blow lifted me off my feet and slammed me against the wall, sending the machete flying away from my grasp and making me black out for a moment. When I came back to my senses, the first thing I saw was the machete lying on the floor, bent at a nearly 45-degree angle.

Beyond it, Allie was firing another shot past the widening gap of the elevator doors. A howl of pain ensued, and the claw briefly withdrew while the doors slid shut once more.

“Kai!” Allie cried out immediately, turning in my direction.

“I’m fine,” I lied, shaking my head to clear my double vision. I could barely gasp out those two words past the numbing fire in my chest. I knew that meant at least a couple of busted ribs. I suppose I should be grateful. It felt like a wrecking ball had just slammed into my chest. “What’s going on?”

“We’re stuck between floors and we need to get out. The next time it comes at us, we jump out the door and into the second floor,” Allie said while reloading her rifle.

“Maybe it won’t come back,” Steve whimpered, clutching at his wrist.

The elevator’s metal doors suddenly bulged in as a massive impact shook the entire cabin, followed by another enraged roar.

“I wasn’t talking to you,” Allie said coldly, ignoring the door while gesturing meaningfully toward Steve with the rifle in her hands. “First and final warning, you stay the fuck away from us.”

“Allie,” I whispered, looking on as both Steve and Susan visibly deflated, collapsing to the floor in abject despair.

“Not now, Kai. First, we get out of this deathtrap and away from here,” Allie replied, not looking at me.

Gritting my teeth, I stood up while feeling like my legs had turned into noodles. I knew Allie was making the smart choice, but was it the right one? But we were out of options. I could barely protect the two of us, let alone Steve and his wife. They were dead weight while all of us were sinking fast. If only Allie weren’t here, if only she was safe from this nightmare. But she was right here, miles away from safety, and just that made all the difference in the world.

Wordlessly, I slid out one of my knives from its sheath at my waist and extended it to Steve. Speechless, he only looked at the knife, then back at me with a stupefied gaze.

“Take it,” I hissed in between painful gasps. “You.. you can try to defend yourselves, or at least.. At least end it quickly.”

I glanced toward Susan at that last part, who only sobbed harder when she caught the meaning of my words.

“Please, don’t leave us to die here,” Steve said, begging with tears and snot flowing down his face. “Please.”

Feeling like my heart was smoking in my chest, I could only turn away without a word, pretending to check on my shotgun. At least that had survived my clash against the beast.

I knew my conscience wouldn’t be so lucky.

“Please, I know you’re better than this. Don’t let us die!” Steve entreated again, but that’s as far as he got before two claws slammed into the gap between the double doors and pried them open.

I unloaded my shotgun almost point blank into the abomination’s face. I didn’t even wait to see the results. I just followed Allie as she nimbly slid out past the gap in the elevator’s doors and into the floor below.

“Don’t leave us!” Steve howled once more behind us, but we were already moving on. Whatever they chose to do next, it was on their own heads.

“Allie, must protect Allie at all costs,” I chanted over and over in my head like a mantra.

“Shit, escalator’s crawling with zombies!” Allie suddenly cursed, snapping me out of my useless guilt. She was turning back the way we came from with a pale face.

“More of them coming from that way!” I said, pointing down the hallway and turning away once again, but then stopped, speechless. So did Allie.

We were surrounded. All the noise had drawn every last damn zombie in the mall straight for us.

Grimly, I reloaded another shell into my shotgun, even as I heard the screams start to rise in pitch from the elevator behind our backs.

“Shit, don’t tell me they didn’t even get off..” I snarled in my head, angry at Steve for being so damn stupid; at Susan for being so loud; at Allie for being so cold-blooded; but mostly, at myself for feeling so damn useless.

I didn’t dare to turn back. I didn’t even want to look. I already knew I’d bear Steve’s last imploring stare burning into my soul for the rest of my life.

“Inside that store!” Allie said urgently, firing a round into a nearby restaurant’s shop window. The glass instantly shattered, crunching under our steps as we barrelled through.

We dashed past dimly lit tables and a luxurious wooden counter, all the way through the kitchen’s doorway. All the while, howls and movement could be heard quickly approaching from ouside.

“There’s got to be a way,” Allie said, staring fiercely at the hallways teeming with zombies as though she’d conjure a solution out of thin air with sheer willpower alone. It wouldn't be long before they caught our scent they all rushed in here. That’s if the monster didn’t chase us from the elevator by that time.

“I’ll distract them and open up a path through the crowd,” I whispered, feeling numb. “You get away, then I’ll catch up with my dash.”

I busied myself reloading my shotgun while I looked away from Allie and made to move toward the restaurant’s shattered front window, but she caught my arm.

I tried to shrug her hand away, but it was useless. Her fingers dug into my skin in a steely grip.

“Stop,” Allie said.

“It’s the only way,” I replied, still trying to brush her off without daring to meet her eyes. “I’ll catch up, I promise.”

Allie’s weight suddenly fell upon me as she placed her arms around me and hugged my back.

“Don’t,” Allie whispered.

After a moment of silence, I could only sigh past the scorched ruins of my heart. Damn, she already knew. Again.

“How do you always know when I’m lying?”

“It doesn’t matter. If it’s time to go, then we’ll do it together - to the very end,” she said fiercely, squeezing me from behind.

“Fine,” I said, clasping both her hands in mine. “Together to the end.”