Several display windows had been broken out of the building the parking lot serviced. The girl headed through one and into the darkened building of Omaha City Mall, flicking blood and gore from her spear before she stepped inside. Omaha? For a moment, Reece worried that the shuttle must have been so far off course, that they had landed in Nebraska. Then he laughed at himself as he realized the small city they were in couldn’t possibly be that Omaha. The shredded Georgian flag flying above the mall confirmed it.

After heading inside through an opening where a window should be, he waited a moment for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. Most of the windows were broken and the doors hung wide as well, letting in ambient light. He saw clothes racks lying about everywhere, with scattered clothing and broken furniture strewn all about. The two-story building sprawled out widely but had clearly been looted near the beginning of the outbreaks. The looting looked widespread and thorough, so there probably wasn’t much left worth going through.

Reece heard a crash and saw that Karina had torn the metal gate aside that separated the store from the rest of the mall. Reece hurried to catch up as she walked into the main part of the mall. Nearly every store inside looked like it had been ransacked. Karina found one that had been left alone. In fact, the metal wall-gate was still on it. It was a Theater Quality costume shop for Halloween.

“Not many people wanting costumes during the zombie apocalypse, I suppose,” commented Reece as he walked up next to the still irritated lilitu girl.

She looked at him and smiled while ripping the metal gate out of her way and disappearing within.

“Wait there,” came her commanding voice from inside the shop. The mall’s skylights lit up the main thoroughfare, but the shops were still dark, nearly pitch black. He waited outside the shop, occasionally hearing sounds from inside as the girl rifled through it. He managed to wait for several minutes before walking up to the shop and trying to see inside and spot the girl.

“Are you okay?” he called inside.

His answer came as his flight suit top came flying out and hit him right in the face. Cursing, he pulled the garment off his head. Irritated, Reece roughly put it back on. He frowned the entire time. A couple of minutes later, Karina came out dressed in a sexy little Japanese schoolgirl’s outfit. She had kept her black combat boots which somehow made the outfit even sexier with its black top, blood-red tie, and blood-red and black plaid skirt. She had a devilish grin on her face as he took in the sight of her posing subtly. Somehow, he knew it was for him.

Karina Ragnarsdottir

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he complained to the girl as she continued posing and smiling wickedly.

“Oh, no... I am not kidding. This outfit is perfect! It makes you uncomfortable to even look at me, which serves you right. And it makes you want me even more. I can tell by how fast your heart is beating,” she replied, still smiling her wicked smile.

“My heart is beating fast because I’m pissed off,” came Reece’s weak rebuttal to the girl’s explanation.

“Whatever you want to tell yourself is fine,” came the girl’s sing-song reply as she pretended to find something interesting on the ground behind her and bent over to pick ‘it’ up, flashing Reece lace pink panties she must have found somewhere in the same Theater shop.

“This is fucking unbelievable,” cursed Reece under his breath.

The girl was throwing everything but the kitchen sink at him to seduce him, so he tried to concentrate on Aika and what they had together. Unfortunately, that was still too painful. He sighed as he considered his new companion. This girl was crazy and just playing with him, he tried to tell himself. He knew she was just getting revenge on him for calling her ancient. Reece sighed again, realizing he had done this to himself. He didn’t have much of a choice but to go along with it. The alternative most likely involved her shoving that spear of hers somewhere he really didn’t want it.

“Fine, let’s go,” he surrendered to her.

“How do I look?” she asked as she cartoonishly blinked her eyes at him. She wasn’t going to let him off so easily.

“Sexy as Aphrodite, okay. Now, let’s get our asses out of here. There’s bound to be more zombies milling about in this city and I’m starving. I haven’t eaten in at least a day or two.”

Reece had no idea how long it had been since he last ate anything. Because he had been drunk unconscious by the little vixen, he had no idea how much time he’d lost. She had done it to him twice in the past couple of days, in fact. He’d been running on fear and adrenaline. His unconsciousness only lessened his fatigue.

“Okay,” she replied happily as she pranced along after him, playing the part of a ditzy schoolgirl perfectly.

“If you’re going to tease me, could you at least help find me some food? I haven’t eaten in I don’t know how long.”

Karina looked back at him for a moment, nodded, and disappeared. He couldn’t believe how incredibly fast she was. A minute later, she tossed a full canvas bag at his feet filled with candy bars, bottled water, canned meats and veggies, fork, knife, spoon, and even a can-opener.

“That should keep you for a while.”

“Thank you,” he stammered, shaking his head in disbelief as he opened a candy bar and took a bite out of it. The chocolate-covered peanut clusters tasted like pure bliss to the starving man. Examining the wrapper as he worked on another bite, he saw he was eating a Smooph. He had never had one before and the sugar rush was intense. He always maintained a strict diet and candy bars didn’t make the cut. He continued chewing happily, all the while trying not to look at her as she stretched like a cat, exposing her bare midriff just for him.

Reece picked up the canvas bag and started walking towards the clothing store they had come in through, taking another bite of his candy bar. He’d have to build a fire later and eat some real food, like the can of beef stew she had also found for him somewhere in the ransacked mall.

“Ahh, you’re no fun,” she pouted after him as she came along.

“So, you’re not mad at me anymore?” Reece asked nonchalantly.

“Oh, I’m still mad at you. Revenge is just more fun than sulking. Besides, does this look like the body of a zillion-year-old?” she laughed slyly as she came around to the front of him and posed like some starlet from an old-school pop band.

“I guess not,” amended Reece. “I’m sorry I said that. I really didn’t mean it. I was just in shock is all. Look, I’m very sorry if I offended you.”

“See, that wasn’t so hard,” she said as she grabbed one of his arms and squished her small chest into it. “I forgive you.”

The two left the mall arm in arm. Reece didn’t have enough fight left in him to make a big deal out of it. If he tried to pull his arm back to his side, he’d just upset her more. Besides, he didn’t have much of a choice. She could rip off both his arms and beat him to death with them without breaking a sweat. At least, he was pretty sure she could. The pair continued away from the mall. They picked the same route they had been taking, hopefully leading away from the direction of the Purifiers and their monstrous pets and lackeys.

The two needed to get as much distance between them and the hunting parties that were likely following them. Karina scanned the area and pointed towards the city’s water tower. It was the tallest building in the area. Reece nodded, having an idea what she was thinking. She smiled and they headed towards it together. Once they were near the base of the tall tower, Karina stopped and offered her spear to Reece.

“Could you hold this a second, I’m going to climb that tower and get our bearings?”

“Sure thing.”

As soon as she released the spear, the full weight of it almost pulled Reece off his feet.

“Jupiter’s cock!” he yelped. “This thing weighs a ton.”

It had to weigh over a hundred pounds and she carried it like it was an extra-long broomstick. He carefully turned it so most of the weight rested on the butt of the spear that he then rested on the asphalt of the street. Examining the weapon, he noted its large bladed spear-tip, sixty centimeters long at least. It was clearly designed to be deadly as both a slashing and piercing weapon. Rubbing his shoulder, he turned his attention back to the girl. Karina wasn’t so much climbing the water tower as jumping from rung to rung and platform to platform as she scaled the structure. One last ten-meter leap and she was on top of the large metal ball and he lost sight of her.

Reece shook his head and waited for a couple of minutes as he watched the edge of the water reserve. His neck was starting to cramp when he saw a small form hop off the tower and fall towards him. Before he could react, Karina had landed a meter away. Her landing created a depressed circle of spiderwebbing asphalt as she landed. She’d used her legs to cushion the fall and stood back up once the asphalt was done caving to her momentum. She casually took her spear back and gave Reece a grave look.

“They haven’t given up yet. Unless we run right now, they’ll be on us in a matter of minutes.”

“Well, then let’s go,” answered Reece. “Which way looks best?”

“Follow me... this way,” she said, as she grabbed the canvas sack and grey bag and jogged off past the water tower in the direction they had been heading.

Reece slid the katana into a couple of the leather loops stitched into the back of his flight suit and jogged after her. After a couple of hours, he was glad for the training he had endured aboard the space station and silently thanked all the astronauts that made it possible for him to be alive on the surface. Using their collective sacrifice as motivation, he put his head down and continued to run as far as his body would carry him. Luck was with them and as the minutes ticked by, they encountered no more undead monsters along the way. The two travelers had left the town behind and were following a dirt road due east when they came upon a dozen heavily armed men in mixed camo lying down in a semi-circle. All their guns were pointed at Reece. Apparently, the men thought that Karina was no threat.

“If they only knew,” thought Reece, smiling inwardly.

“That’s far enough, friend,” said a big man with an impressive handlebar mustache and an assault shotgun in his beefy hands. “Can I assume you just missed all of the signs?”

Reece had been running with his head down and pretty much missed everything for the last half-an-hour. He was sucking wind and attempting to catch his breath before he started to answer the man.

“Actually, yeah...” replied Reece before looking over at his innocent-looking companion. “Hey, Karina...did you see any signs?”

“Yes sir,” she said in her best little schoolgirl voice.

“Then why didn’t you say anything?”

The group of men watched the exchange in confusion. When the little blonde girl in a schoolgirl’s outfit finally registered with their senses, they got agitated.

“Hey, what’s with dressing your daughter up like that? You some kinda sicko?”

“Daughter?” thought Reece. “How old do I look?”

He had let his hair grow out and he had several days’ worth of scruff on his face. Plus, he was dirty and unkempt. He figured he probably looked ten years older than he was.

“Oh no,” Karina answered, cutting off Reece in her sing-song voice before he could formulate a thought on the matter. “He treats me super well. He always makes me feel really good too.”

“Son of a bitch,” grunted the big man while the entire troop cocked their weapons. “You’re a real pervert, you know that?”

Reece was too tired to argue with the men. Not that they would believe him if he did. He just shrugged his shoulders and put his hands on his head to try and not get shot. Karina ran over to him and pressed her body into his side.

“Please don’t hurt my husband!” she cried to the men, before saying under her breath, “Play along, no matter what happens.”

“Hah, just kiddin’” laughed the big man. “You’ll fit right in, provided you share.”

Reece didn’t like the way he nodded his head at Karina when he said that. He noticed then that all the other men had begun to lower their weapons and leer hungrily at what they thought was an innocent little girl.

“Name’s Randall,” said the big man. “What’s yours?”

“I’m Reece, and this is Karina. It’s nice to meet you.”

“I can tell yer good folk. Come on down to our camp. Don’t worry, it’s secure. No dumb-ass zombie’ll get in there.”

“Alright, sounds good...didn’t know there were any people left in this area,” answered Reece as he and Karina followed the men down the road.

“Well, we’re about all that’s left now. The zombies scared off all the rest, but we got ourselves a real sweet setup. Far too sweet to abandon due to a simple little zombie problem. Besides, where we gonna go? Whole world’s gone topsy-turvy.”

As the man called Randall told them all about their settlement, they continued to walk along the road as it curved to the left. Around the corner was a long chain-link fence, topped with razor wire. Beyond it was a second fence like the first, with a good three meters between them. The two gates opened as a spotter saw the group’s approach. As he passed through, Reece noticed a sign lying to the side of the gates. It was barely visible in the grass. He could only make out ‘Ge...St...Pe’ on the rusted metal. Once inside, the gates closed behind them. Reece could see another six men inside, most tending a large garden. A large grey concrete building loomed in the distance. Reece could smell cooking meat from somewhere and he noticed an old-fashioned drinking well in the center of the garden. It seemed like they did have a pretty sweet setup.

“Welcome to our New Eden,” laughed the big man from his belly, before his face suddenly got serious.

“I’m real sorry you weren’t here with us from the beginning, friend.”

“What do you mean?” asked Reece as he squinted his eyes, suddenly wary.

His katana was suddenly lifted from his back and he heard Karina yelp and drop her spear to the ground. He turned and saw a skinny man with dirty blonde hair plastered to his face grab her arms from behind.

“Stay good and still, sweetie,” said the man with an evil gleam in his eye. “We’ll take good care of you.”

Though Reece knew Karina could effortlessly break his hold, she allowed the man to think he was in control. He decided to trust her and follow her lead. When two big men grabbed him from behind and tied his hands with rope, he didn’t put up a fight. They hauled the two of them over to the large concrete structure. Now that he was closer, he noticed that all the doors and windows had bars across them. This compound was once a prison. As they rounded the corner of the building, the smell of cooking meat grew stronger. Then the other side of the prison came into view, and he could make out a prison yard. In the middle of the yard sat a spit with meat cooking on it. Nearby was a tall metal pole sticking out of the ground over two meters tall. It looked to be about ten centimeters thick.

The men brought him up to the pole and looped the rope tying his hands to a carabiner near the top. As he hung there on his tippy toes, he saw two of the men bring Karina inside the prison. He tried to stay calm by telling himself that she was more than a match for these men. He knew she could take care of herself. Angry that he was worried about her, he chastised himself for going soft. A girl like that was always trouble. As he pondered what was happening with her, he idly inspected the cooking meat over the spit. It was then that he noticed a human arm hanging from the hunk of meat which Reece now recognized as a human torso. He gagged, fighting not to throw up his candy bar. It was the only thing he had eaten, and he needed the sustenance. He wasn’t hungry enough to eat people, however.

“That’s no way to react to a homecooked meal,” smiled a greasy man in a gore-stained apron tied around his wide girth as he walked over and gave the spit a half-twist to evenly cook the human meat.

“Not that you’re going to get any,” the man continued and then laughed. “But don’t worry, you’ll be the guest of honor at our meal tomorrow night.”

“Fucking great,” Reece muttered under his breath. “The first actual humans I come across and they’re demented pedophile cannibals.”

“What’d you say?” asked the greasy man.

“I said it smells delicious,” Reece blatantly lied. “Is that Angus beef, or just Angus?”

“Whoo-hoo,” laughed the greasy man mockingly. “We’ve got ourselves a comedian here.”

A couple of other men laughed with the man, as he came toward Reece with a butcher’s cleaver.

“I love comedians,” he snickered as he ran the edge of his cleaver along Reece’s face. “Their tongues taste extra spicy...like teriyaki! Hah ha hah!”

His small audience laughed at his sick humor, goading him on. This kept up for a few minutes before the man went back to his cooking and the other two wandered off to where they had taken Karina, snickering about who was to go next.

Just then, gunfire erupted from somewhere up near the front of the prison, where they had first come in. It was soon followed by screams and more gunfire. Men were shouting all around the prison. Reece wondered if Karina had made her move, and why she had taken so long. Then he heard a loud inhuman roar followed by an explosion and more gunfire. The greasy cook ran by him, towards the sounds of the carnage. Reece used the opportunity to jump up and grab the chain that the carabiner was attached to. He used one hand to hold himself up while the other opened the carabiner and flip the rope tying his hands out of its grasp.

He let himself fall back to the ground and quickly made his way to where they had taken Karina. More explosions and the near-constant sound of gunfire continued off to the front of the prison. Within, he found a long row of cells. Inside the nearest cell were four men, bound and gagged. And right in the middle, was a young schoolgirl sitting calmly in the cell with them. All the men’s eyes seemed like they were bugging out of their heads as they struggled and mumbled incoherently into their gags.

“Okay boys, you can go now. I suggest you take your weapons with you and assist your comrades. You’ll need them both.”

With that said, she untied them and opened the cell door with the speed of a hummingbird’s wings. They all looked at her stunned and wondering if she was toying with them.

“Go,” she softly shouted at them in exasperation. “...Or you’ll make me angry.”

The men got up as one, hesitantly grabbed their weapons, and ran from the cell as fast as they could. Reece wasn’t sure if they were motivated more to get away from the scary girl or to help their buddies. He just looked questioningly at the cute lilitu as she smiled... a twinkle in her red eyes, clearly pleased with herself.

“I was just too much woman for them,” she sighed. “Where can I find a man who can satisfy me?”

“Funny,” replied Reece sarcastically. “So, what’s the plan?”

“Ahh, you’re no fun,” she pouted. “Fine, the Purifier’s hunters were right behind us. We needed a small army to help thin them out so we could finish them off.”

She spread her arms, indicating the prison and its inhabitants.

“Voilà, instant army!” she quipped, still playing the ditz.

As if to underline her statement, more explosions and gunfire erupted from the front of the concrete structure. Men screaming and monsters roaring provided the vocals to the musical rat-a-tatt-tatt of guns, with the occasional explosion to provide the beat. Karina picked up a pair of old Beretta 92FS’s that one of the men must have left behind.

“Here, take these,” said Karina as she proffered the pair of pistols to Reece from inside the prison cell.

Reece entered the cell and took the presented firearms. As soon as the weapons left her hands, Karina moved around Reece and out of the cell. Smiling, she locked the cell door behind her.

“Stay here,” she told him unnecessarily. “Our little army sounds like it is almost spent. Time to go and mop up.”

She was right. The time between the sounds of gunfire and explosions was getting more and more spread out. The lilitu winked at him and was gone in a flash. Already knowing the result, Reece tried the cell door anyways. It was locked, of course. Frustrated, he grabbed the bars of the door and shook it violently while yelling angrily. It was no use, so he gave up. He had nothing else he could do other than to sit down and wait.