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me.
    “Hell.” I mutter, not liking his odds.
    It shouldn’t bother me, but it does. I shouldn’t care if he makes it or not, but I do.
    For the second time today I play the reluctant hero.
    I step away from the wall and take a huge swing at the zombie closest to me. He goes down quickly, the side of his face soundly bashed in and turned quickly to gray mush. I ignore the other one who’s on me and I hurry to Ryan. My back is exposed and I feel naked in the cold night air, rain falling over me, matting my hair to my face. I take a quick, hard swing at the kneecap on one of Ryan’s zombies. It drops to the ground, unable to hold its weight on the badly broken leg. They don’t feel pain, but a broken leg is still a problem for them. It’s like chopping off a hand. Whether they feel it or not, that limb is now useless.
    I do the same to another zombie, a young boy, only this time I take out his leg at the shin. The bone pops out through his skin, spraying his black tar blood over the sidewalk. He topples over. I want to say it bothers me brutalizing a child, but it doesn’t. Live in this world long enough and the dead are just that – dead. It doesn’t walk like a child or talk like a child so it’s pretty easy to accept that it’s no longer a child. Moral qualms put to rest. If you’re uncomfortable with that, go join the Colonies.
    “Joss, your six!” Ryan calls out as he stabs the sharp end of the iron straight into a Risen’s eye. It slides in smoothly and the zombie crumples, slipping slowly off the steel.
    “I know.” I growl.
    I’m aware of it, have been the whole time. It’s about three paces behind me and closing. I spin quickly, bringing up the ASP and making contact on its face. I make sure to close my eyes and mouth when I hit it because sometimes you get exploders. Like a rotten pumpkin that blows up when you toss it against the pavement or kick it in. Dead and dusty as it may look, sometimes it retains some of its juices. This one sure does. I feel the spray hit me in the face and I immediately use the inside of my coat to wipe it clear. I’m not worried about infection, not really. Mostly it’s just gross.
    When I turn around, Ryan has taken out the crawlers I created and is working on the last of the standing. He rears back, then slams the sharp end of the tire iron into the Risen’s mouth. It crunches when it hits bone in the back of the skull and Ryan immediately jerks down hard on his end, letting out an angry shout. It pries the zombies jaw off the hinges and I’m pretty sure it snaps the spinal cord. Either way, the dead get deader.
    “You okay?” Ryan asks, breathing heavy.
    His hair is soaked by the rain like mine and he runs his hand through it, spiking it up off his forehead. His eyes are big and excited from the adrenaline of the kill. I imagine that despite my bad attitude I probably look about the same. You never learn to like it, this life, but eventually you do learn to enjoy the highs. Being outnumbered by Risen and coming out unscathed, that’s a high. A big one.
    “Yeah, I’m great.” I say, almost meaning it.
    He glances around at our handiwork. “Let’s pull them into the building, stow them in an empty room.”
    “Why bother?”
    “Because that way no one will see them, not unless they’re already in the building. The rain will wash away most of this.” He gestures to the pooling black mess pouring out of the zombies onto the pavement.
    “I’m leaving anyway.”
    “But this could buy you some time. You don’t have to leave so soon.”
    “I have to leave when you leave.”
    He shakes his head and runs his hand over his hair again, clearly frustrated. “Let’s just do this, let’s take care of this problem and we can sort any others out later.”
    “Fine, okay.” I agree, stowing my ASP and pushing my wet mass of hair out of my face. “Let’s pull them inside and get out of this rain. As much as I want a shower, I’m getting