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failed to come.
    “ Would one of you answer us,” a customer shouted.
    She faced the voice to see the two men standing in the light at the end of one of the aisles, followed by the silhouette of a third man dressed in a fisherman’s vest, waders, and fatigue hat. He stepped into view behind the two customers, walking out of a display of set-up camping equipment. Lost in shadow, the person’s face hid within an ovoid patch of darkness.
    But there was no one else in the store . Which means—
    “ Look out,” Bird shouted, voicing the words already screaming in Penelope’s mind.
    The men stopped, unaware that the figure had just lifted a double-bladed ax from a wall-mounted hanger.
    “ Run,” Bird hollered at the men. He lunged in front of Penelope and opened fire with the handgun. Dark chunks exploded off the assailant’s upper body, but the wounds didn’t stop him. He raised the ax over his head.
    The tool came down on the skull of the closest man—
    Thwack!
    — spraying gore, driving him to the floor.
    The second man threw himself away from the gunfire, ducking behind a display barrel of foil-wrapped Glow Sticks. Bird ejected the spent cartridges and the man scrambled to find better shelter. Trapped between Bird and the ax-wielding maniac, he clambered up the six-foot-high steel shelves dividing his aisle and the next. The sheet metal bent under his weight, spilling an avalanche of merchandise, but didn’t slow his ascent.
    He reached the top when the first tent stake hit him.
    They came out of nowhere. A dozen of them.
    Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud!
    One after the other they plunged into his back like arrows fired from the shadows. Three more caught him in the head, casting him off the shelves and over the other side.
    Bird cursed, thumbing fresh rounds into the revolver.
    Penelope stood paralyzed by the sight. The shape at the end of the aisle advance toward her, moving with purpose. Bird grabbed her arm and hauled her after him.
    “ Come on!” He pulled her through the main doors, into the humid summer night. “My truck’s on the side of the building,” he said, locking the handgun’s cylinder in place. “It’s the blue one. The doors are—”
    He fell to his knees with a shout, taking Penelope down with him. Three medium size knives jutted from his hip and side.
    “ Oh, shit, no,” she shrieked, trying to help him up.
    She wrapped her arms around his midsection, struggling to lift his bulk. He gained one leg. Then the other. And five more knives jabbed into his shoulder and back, causing him to howl in pain. He collapsed.
    Penelope pulled at his shirt, tears streaming down her face. “Get up.”
    She looked to the store. The figure emerged from the doorway.
    “ Get up, Bird. Get up. He’s coming!”
    The man had fallen silent, but his grip tightened on her arm. Pulling himself to a half-kneeling position, he pressed the handgun and truck keys into her hands. “Go. Hurry … Go.”
    The words were still fresh from his lips when two more blades sunk into his flesh, entering his neck and the side of his head. His heavy body went slack and slipped out of her grasp.
    Penelope staggered backwards, her gaze locked on the dead Indian. Five minutes ago he’d been an average guy doing his job. Now he was gone. She’d only known him by part of his name, but he’d helped her. Hell, he’d saved her life a moment ago. He didn’t deserve it, she thought. None of them deserved it.
    Screaming, tears spilling down her face, Penelope pivoted away from Bird’s lifeless body.
    She raised the revolver and opened fire on his killer.
    Each shot jarred her arms to the bone. The recoil threatened to send the gun flying from her grasp, but she tensed her muscles and forced herself to hold the weapon level. At such close range—less than twenty feet away—the bullets pierced the killer’s body and punched into the walls of the building behind him.
    Then, in a horrifying moment of heightened perception, she saw several