Chapter 78 - Writing On The Mall

Whatever was controlling the zombies had flipped the game on me. I’d had their army out chasing me across the parking lot, and although the going was slow, it was also steady. Sue and I managed to take down dozens of the enemy troops, even after they tried to pin us between two forces.

But now they were all withdrawing. Whatever mind was in charge, it had decided it was losing too many undead and not getting any return. Sue was simply too fast. Even with the second wave of zombies, even with the scattered Harm spells from skeleton mages, it just wasn’t enough. I kept Sue healed with my magic, and if they zapped me, I Drained an enemy to heal myself.

We were winning. Slowly, but we were, and the enemy had realized that. That had to be the reason behind the withdrawal. Whoever was running this show woke up from its daytime nap, realized it was at risk of losing half its army, and withdrew rather than continuing the fight.

Ordinarily, I’d have been thrilled, but Kara and Hope were still in terrific danger.

The first thing I did was order the remainder of my undead in through the northernmost entrance. There weren’t many zombies trying to get in that way—just a small handful. My little army formed up a rank of shield-users with archers behind, and marched swiftly forward, taking out the few enemy in the way. I gave them orders to join Hope and protect Kara.

Then I pushed Sue into a sprint and the dinosaur dashed forward, spitting out a Fireball as we approached the enemy force. The fleeing zombies didn’t even notice, didn’t so much as turn back to look when the spell blew a few of their rearmost undead apart. They just kept flowing back into the Target, using every entrance, even the one Sue made by smashing through the glass wall at the corner.

We didn’t slow down as we rushed in, so Sue barreled into their ranks from behind. Zombies went flying as the dinosaur’s legs crashed into them. Sue chomped a zombie, tossing it aside. Then we were at the gap we’d made in the glass, still moving forward.

The enemy force continued to ignore us, which was just weird. I mean, we were completely surrounded. If they turned on us now and just grabbed Sue, then started climbing, I’d be in a bucket of shit. But they didn’t. The enemy undead kept moving forward like automatons, which was accurate; that’s all they were. They’d been given a command—retreat. They’d keep doing that until they completed the order, or they were killed.

For whatever reason, the enemy leader had a delayed response when it came to giving orders. My guess is whoever commanded this horde couldn’t actually see what was going on. They had a sense of what was happening, especially when their undead died. When Sue’s Fireballs started making a serious dent in their force, that was the signal which caused them to retreat.

Provided I didn’t blow up a bunch more undead, the big bad might not even be able to tell where I was. I ordered Sue to stop attacking, to focus on pushing through the mass of enemies rather than killing them. If we could avoid attracting extra attention even a little longer, that would be amazing.

We were inside. I glanced around, checking the situation—it wasn’t good.

Somehow, part of the horde managed to go off-course. Instead of moving back out into the main part of the mall, they’d climbed up the escalator. There was one zombie at the top, and another dozen climbing the steps to join it. As I watched, the one up top sprouted an arrow from its head.

Good, that had to be Kara. I wanted to shout to her, but held off. I didn’t think the enemy could hear me. My best guess is whatever controlled the horde would be hidden someplace much more secure, and dark. Somewhere deep inside the mall. I couldn’t know that for certain, though. Better to not take chances.

I’d been working to avoid killing them as we moved forward, but I couldn’t allow those zombies to keep climbing the steps. I moved Sue to the base of the escalator, blocking more from moving up, then had the dino launch another Fireball. This one torched its way through the first zombie and crashed into the next, blowing them both apart.

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I dropped another with a Drain Life.

About that time, the rest of my undead showed up. I ordered them to climb the steps, letting them slip past Sue so they could attack the enemy from behind.

With Sue keeping more zombies from ascending and my other undead moving to engage the eight zombies still climbing, I felt pretty confident Kara would be all right. That let me return my attention to the rest of the enemy army.

It flowed past us, no longer trying to climb to the next level. Instead, the zombies just raced on, quickly moving through Target and out into the mall beyond. Already, there were no more remaining outside. The last fifty or so were still in the Target, swirling around Sue’s legs as they pushed and shoved their way through the store.

I wanted to blast them so badly. I wanted to have Sue tear into them from behind, to take down as many as possible. More crystals would always be a plus, but the main reason I wanted to go back on the offensive was to do more damage to this place.

There was something dark in here, something powerful, sinister, and dangerous. I sensed it when I was outside. I could still feel it, somewhere in the distance. Whatever it was, it was strong. Maybe too strong for me, maybe not, but I could weaken it by reducing its army to dust.

For now, though? I had to sit tight. Each zombie kill gave the enemy a better fix on my location. If I started having Sue wreak havoc on the remaining zombies, it might just get their leader to send a few hundred more of the things after us. Right now, we needed a break. Needed time to consider our next moves, and hopefully tally up our winnings. With all the crystals we’d won from the fighting, both of us could grow much stronger.

“Selena, thank god!” Kara called out from above. She fired off an arrow, which killed the last zombie on the escalator.

“What, you thought I’d leave you in here?”

“Didn’t figure you’d want to, but I wasn’t sure you’d be able to fight your way in.”

“Wasn’t hard. They’re not fighting,” I told her. “They’re withdrawing, and so are we.”

“For now, right?” Kara asked.

“Yup. Just for now.”

Kara and the rest of my undead came back down the steps. She tapped each dead zombie along the way, picking up their crystals. By the time she reached the bottom, the only zombies remaining in the store were unmoving ones. Re-deaded ones? What do you call dead undead?

I glanced out into the dark mall beyond the doors. A few zombies were still over there, but not many. They were acting weird, though. I had Sue trot over so I could get a closer look.

Peering through the glass doors, I realized the zombies were lying down right in the middle of the big mall hallway. That was odd enough, but the truly strange thing was they were clearly lying down in a manner that formed letters on the floor.

As I watched, the last ones moved into position. The writing wasn’t complicated. It spelled out “Come in and die.”

A threat? An invitation? Maybe a little of both. I wasn’t sure. The whole thing felt mad ominous and sixteen levels of creepy, though. I backed Sue up through the mall and rode over to pick up Kara as she reached the bottom of the steps.

We made sure to tap the few I’d killed on the way in, and then I hauled Kara up onto Sue’s back and we all retreated the rest of the way out of the store. I filled her in on what I’d seen, and she did likewise. I was surprised to hear that she’d sensed whatever this boss monster was, too.

“You said it felt like it was watching you?” I asked.

Kara shrugged. “Maybe. I don’t think it was actually out there in the hallway. It was more like it knew I was there, not that it was actually staring at me.”

“Yeah,” I said. “That’s a lot like what I felt, too.”

“What was it?”

“I wish I knew,” I replied. “Whatever it is, it’s strong and deadly. We’re going to have our work cut out for us, fighting our way to it, let alone beating it. We might need to figure out another way of beating that horde. Something their leader isn’t going to expect, and won’t have planned for. With the numbers they have, it’s going to be a nearly impossible fight, if we just straight-up battle them.”

The more I thought about it, the more correct that idea felt. A pitched battle favored the enemy deeply here. We needed another way, but for the life of me, I couldn’t think of any brilliant plans.

Once we were back outside, I set all my undead to ‘guard mode,’ watching for any enemies that might come after us. Then we dismounted Sue.

I went right over to Hope and scritched her ear. She’d done precisely as I asked, sticking by Kara even when it got dangerous, helping to ensure her safety. “Good job, girl.”

Hope wagged her tail in reply, which made me smile.

Kara glanced at the battlefield around us. Dead zombies were stretched over a few hundred meters of parking lot. We’d fought a running battle over a lot of turf, and it showed.

“Yeah, we’re gonna have to do a bunch of walking to tap all those zombies for their crystals,” I said.

“Oh, that’s all right,” Kara replied. “I was just thinking. You know what to call a couple hundred dead zombies?”

“A good start?” I asked, laughing.

“You know it. Come on. The sooner we loot all these guys, the sooner we can tally up what we got.” Kara held up a small nylon bag and jangled it. The clink of a whole lot of crystals pinging against each other reached my ears.

That was excellent news. We needed those stones. The more of them we could get, the stronger we’d grow. Next time we hit this place, it would be with both a better plan and stronger spells at our command.