“Where’s Andy,” Clara said. She shone her headlamp around the dark loading bay, checking for danger lurking behind the dusty storage shelves. Nearby, Robert approached the exit door, pistol in hand. He was covered in sweat, his bandages had come loose and yesterday’s wounds were bleeding.

“I’m not bitten,” he said, catching her eye. She had to trust him for now.

Linton fell to his knees panting. He was holding a hatchet covered in the ashen residue of the undead. He looked at Clara, his wide, frightened eyes dug into her face as if they were searching for a handhold in the abyss.

Clara turned towards the stairwell, activating her radio. “Andy, come in.” She could hear her heartbeat in her ears as the quiet around her swept in. Clara took a step towards the stairwell. Why had he fallen behind?

“Sis.” He held his thumb on the radio. She could hear gunfire echo on the radio channel as it did above their heads. The sound was a muted patter a few rooms above their heads. That meant he was far away, back at the top of the stairs. Had he even left the restaurant?

“He’s here,” Andy said. “You run, I’ll catch up.”

“No. That’s not the plan.”

“Go.”

“What do you mean go?” Clara dropped her heavy marksman’s rifle and jogged back towards the stairwell. The rifle was empty, as was her submachine gun which was strapped to her backpack. Only her .45 pistol held a magazine left. Above her, the bursts of gunfire thudded through the floorboards like a far off mason’s hammer. “We can’t leave yet if you’re not here.”

“Don’t try coming for me,” Andy radioed between a break in the gunfire. Clara stopped in her tracks. She wasn’t sure if the pounding sound which followed was the machine gun fire or her heartbeat.

“I’ve locked the door.”

Clara stammered for the right words. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

There was a pause over the channel. “You have to go.”

“No, Andy, don’t be stupid. Stop wasting time. Get down here now.”

“I’m not arguing with you.” His voice was small, almost a whisper. She could barely hear it over the radio interference and gunshots. “I’ll see you in town.”

“Andy, please.” Tears welled in Clara’s eyes. Why was he doing this? Her breath caught in her throat. “Not like this, not now.”

The radio crackled, but Andy was silent.

“Andy?”

“It’s now,” he said. “Thanks for everything.”

The sound of heavy gunfire replaced the radio static. Clara stood statuesque, trying to process what had just happened. The scientist said something behind her, but it fell into the void with all the rest of reality. He’s here. Andy intended to fight that demon alone so that she could escape. It was the dead of night when the vampire was at its most powerful. There was no way Andy would survive. She could flee, and obey his last wish, or run upstairs, break the door down and fight alongside him, and die here, tonight, now. No more birdsong. No more sunsets. No more fresh morning breeze. No more submerging her head in a lake, warming by a campfire; the smell of woodsmoke filling their jeep the next morning. No more long drives through the silent wasteland, catching a glimpse of peace on Andy’s face while he slept. Clara choked up. She didn’t know if she could stomach the drive alone.

“What are we doing here?” Linton said behind her. Clara turned her chin, but remained facing the stairwell upwards.

“We need to leave now,” he continued. “If he’s going to stay behind and sacrifice himself, then we need to take advantage of that.”

“Take advantage?” Clara turned on him. “Who do you think you are?”

“I just mean, don’t let his sacrifice be in vain.”

“He’s up there fighting for me, not you. Not this.” She hefted the metal briefcase in his face. “What’s inside this that’s worth Andy’s life?”

Linton closed his mouth. “I won’t say.”

“You best fucking talk.” Clara put her hand on her sidearm. “Convince me.”

“No.”

“Why can’t you say? Is it a weapon, is that why? You don’t want us using it?”

Something shifted in Linton’s expression. His eyes darted to the payload, then to her, then to Robert. “Aren’t you going to say something?” he whined. “This is your mission too isn’t it? Blue Eyes hired you too.”

The merc’s face creased. His eyes flitted to the sidearm at Clara’s waist, then met hers. “This is all yours.” He opened the exit door, and a cold breeze rushed into the room. “Au revoir.”

“Consider your debt repaid,” Clara said as the door closed behind him, isolating her and Linton in the glow of her headlamp. “Open the briefcase.” Clara approached him and flipped it onto a nearby shelf, but kept a hold of the handle.

“Never.”

“You’ll open it right now.” Clara spoke in a slow, low tone.

“Or what?”

Her hand slid into place around the handle of her pistol. It would be so easy to draw. “Or you’ll die.”

“What are you going to do?” he stammered. “Kill me like your brother did Riddhi?”

“You’ll die tonight.” Clara’s own fear slipped into the threat. “In here, or out there.”

“It’s just research. Very important research.”

“Prove it.” Clara took her hand off the briefcase and stepped back, ushering him to her side. There was a coded lock on each latch. “Open it.”

Above them, the heavy gunfire ceased. Andy must be out of machine gun ammo. He was facing down the horde alone. That wasn’t right.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

Linton lowered his chin and snarled. “Blue Eyes will kill you.”

“It’s a bit late to worry about that.”

“Would you really betray him?”

Clara felt dizzy with emotion–her anxiety, fear of death, and sorrow for deserting Andy, it clouded in her mind. “Prove that this is the payload,” Clara said.

“It obviously is. I know it is.”

“Prove it! We’re not dying for it if it isn’t.”

“I know it’s the payload,” Linton said incredulously. “This is useless, you know.” He took a step towards the briefcase, the hatchet lowered at his side. “You’re in denial. It’s obvious.” He shook his head. “It’s too late to turn back. Your brother has made his decision. He’s likely already been bitten. I know it’s hard, but we must leave now.”

Clara glared at him silently. The words escaped her, reasoning spluttered in a deluge of adrenaline.

“Don’t let your brother’s sacrifice go in vain.”

Clara drew her pistol and fired. Linton ducked and screamed, clutching his face. “You shot me!”

“I shot the wall, idiot.”

The scientist dabbed a drop of blood on his cheek. “You shot me.”

“That’s shrapnel. Do you want the real thing?”

“You’re crazy.”

“That’s right.” Clara aimed the pistol at his chest. “Last chance.”

Linton shuffled towards the payload, his eyes fixed on the muzzle of her pistol. Clara shone her headlamp on the code as he tampered with the lock. There was a satisfying click, then a second. Clara jammed her pistol into Linton’s ribs, shoving him aside, and opened the lid. Her headlamp shone off a cylindrical object, nestled in the centre of thick foam padding. Circuitry ran the length of the tube, ending in nodes along its glass, much like the electronics fitted to an Augmentation Master Console. The object was definitely Bulwark technology, or heavily inspired. Clara reached for the cylinder.

“Stop,” Linton said, but she ignored him. Something about the technology was oddly familiar, like a face she had seen before in pictures and posters, but never before up close. Her eyes went wide, her heart stopped. It couldn’t be…

Linton grabbed her hand. Clara jumped as her pistol fired without her meaning to shoot it. She squeezed the handle and trigger as Linton tried to wrench it off her. Clara pulled back, but the man raised his hatchet. Like a dart, Clara threw a jab into his nose, smacking the glasses off his face. She drew him in close, wrapping her arm over his shoulder and around his bicep pinning his elbow to his ribs. The hatchet bobbed weakly beside her face, but she leaned away from the sharp edge.

“That’s not yours to take,” Linton shouted, clinging to her like a tick.

Clara wrestled with him, keeping her finger tight on the trigger, the muzzle of her pistol jammed into his hip. It would be so easy to kill him, just release and pull the trigger again. “Idiot. I’ll shoot you.”

“Fuck off.” Linton dropped his hatchet and unravelled from her grasp. He yanked on her pistol arm like a dog on a chew-toy, pulling her off balance. Clara kicked him in the knee and he buckled, but raised himself again. Steadying herself, Clara kicked him again. Her heavy boot connected behind his kneecap, tenderising his tendons. Linton crumpled, but pulled her arm down with his weight. She fell to one knee, focussed on not letting go of her pistol, but Linton released his hold and scrambled up after the payload. He slammed the lid shut and dashed for the door.

Clara tried to catch him, but he skirted past her. There was no other choice. Aiming at his legs, Clara fired. Linton screamed and slammed into the floor, dropping the payload, sending it spinning across the floor. Clara got to her feet, panting, fighting to compose herself. Beneath her, Linton clutched at his shin, curling into a ball, winning like a hurt child. The pistol weighed like lead in Clara’s hands. She holstered it and strode over to the payload.

Opening it once more, she drew the cylinder from its padding. A silver tube was capped with a red plastic lid, shaped like a nipple. There was a button on the other end. She unfastened the lid, and gasped. There were three needles beneath it, one silver, one golden, and one a metallic blue. It had to be Augmentation Serum. Linton’s research team must have figured out how to reverse engineer the technology. It was the perfect weapon, a technology designed by humanity’s best scientists to ensure the species’ survival in the end of days.

Clara brought the needles to her wrist. Her heart pounded, engorging the veins. She swallowed, throat dry, then pressed it against her skin of her wrist.

“Not there,” Linton said, shakily replacing his crooked glasses. He was watching her, white faced. Blood trickled through his fingers, clutching his wound. He shivered, but his eyes were alert. “In the elbow. The crease.”

Clara narrowed her eyes at him, but stayed her hand.

The older scientist bore his teeth. “Don’t you dare waste it.”

Clara took a breath. Could she trust him? What mattered more to the scientist, revenge, or his life’s work? She traced the cylinder over the crook of her elbow, finding a blue artery there, juicy like a worm, and plunged the needle in. Thumb on the trigger, she activated the serum.

Fire roared in her veins. Clara gripped the cylinder as it spread throughout her arm, burning through her hand, setting her fingers alight. She yelped and knelt over, clutching her arm and the serum to her chest.

“Don’t let go-” Linton continued to speak to her, but his voice was lost in the maelstrom. Clara gritted her teeth as liquid fire burned through her shoulder and poured into her chest. She arched her back in agony, each breath a cry of pain. Curling into a ball, her arm pulsated where the needle latched like a hot poker, searing her flesh. The flames spread through her hips and legs, and into her throat. Her cries cut out as suddenly, she struggled for breath. It was as though her muscles wouldn’t respond–an ability which she had taken for granted all her life suddenly ceased. Clara choked, flexing her jaw, squeezing her abdomen. The pressure swelled inside her skull, boiling her eyeballs in their sockets.

Her vision faded to black. Orange lights danced before her eyes as the flames engulfed her. There was no longer a separation. Clara was the embers, white hot to the bone. The power suffocated her as every muscle in her body contracted, her heart struggled to beat, her lungs compressed, her blood trickled to a drip.

She was somewhere else, somewhere familiar, somewhere in the beginning of things. Andy dove upon her and pushed her half under the bonnet of a truck. He stooped over her, his leather jacket opening up like the wings of a bird. Clara could smell him over the smoke and ruin–spilt whiskey lacquered his leather jacket, soaked in sweat spiced with liquor. Something snapped inside and her lungs filled with air.

The vision faded. Clara wheezed and spluttered, each breath felt like swallowing shards of ice. Rolling onto her back, limbs outstretched, Clara gulped the dusty air while her body settled. Her arms and legs spasmed, but she just lay there and let it happen. The concrete felt cold beneath her. It was dark. Slowly, her sense of self returned, like a book with splotched pages, missing words in chunks, missing meaning in time, but forming an image. As hot blood gushed pleasurably through her limbs, it cleansed the pages, clearing the splotches, reforming a narrative in her mind.

Her headlamp lay nearby. Reattaching it, she tried to rise, but the pain in her abdomen kept her down.

“Wait a moment,” Linton said. He was sitting against the wall beside the exit. “Let it take effect. You need rest.”

Clara heaved herself to her knees. She was coated in sweat. Weakly, she unslung her backpack and took a sip of water. Then put her head in her hands. She felt sick, but as the water touched her stomach, the feeling faded. Her hands and feet tingled with the sensation of pins and needles, throbbing with each beat of her heart. She clenched her fists. The sensations flowed into the centre of her hand, directed by her willpower and the strength of her grasp.

“How does it feel?” Linton asked. He could have easily killed her while she was convulsing, or bandaged his wound, or made a run for it, but instead, he just sat and observed.

“Strange.” Something emanated within her hand. A soft golden light pulsated in her fist.

“It works,” Linton gasped. “We did it.”

Clara raised her head towards the ceiling. Her body thrummed with energy as every muscle and cell vibrated to the same frequency. The hairs stood up on her arms. Her nostrils flared. She stretched her spine, feeling each of her vertebrae align like a conduit. Clara rose to her feet, no longer shaking. She retrieved her pistol where it lay on the concrete.

“What now?” he asked.

Clara turned her back on him, heading towards the stairwell at the rear.

“You can’t leave,” he stammered, too weak to yell. “You will waste it. You will die.”

“No one’s dying tonight,” Clara said to herself.

“Thief. You are my property now. You are mine. My work. My life’s work…” As Clara climbed the stairs, Linton’s sobs died to whispers.