Stabbing another zombie through the temple, Abe tried to calculate a rough idea of the position below the hanging crate.

He glanced back over his shoulder. The pile of zombies that had formed over his finger hadn’t been big enough for his plan.

I’m going to regret this, aren’t I?

He pressed the stiletto against his wrist and gritted his teeth—not against pain, but the thought of it.

Who needs a left hand?

He forced the razor-sharp blade down. Cutting through his wrist might have been hard as a human, but between the sharpness of the blade and his enhanced strength, it slid through with relative ease.

Falling to the heap of zombies at his feet, Abe hurriedly took the stiletto between his teeth and lunged down to quickly snatch it up.

He readied like a pitcher, bringing the hand to his shoulder.

If this isn’t the dumbest fucking idea I’ve ever had.

He glanced down the mound of bodies and selected a path.

I guess it's now or never.

He bounced down the mound, almost losing his footing a few times as the surface he picked to step upon was softer than expected—resulting in an errant step getting lodged between bodies several times.

Luckily, the zombies weren’t particularly fast. Even the unfed ghouls were more challenging foes than these mindless bodies.

Landing on the ground, he dodged them as they lunged for him, skidding past several until her was within a safe range of the spot he had chosen, and then adjusted and threw the hand underarm.

The severed hand passed through the crowd, on target. But his lips stopped, just short of forming a smile as the hand clipped the side of one of the zombies, bouncing to the right.

No no no. No fucking way.

He shook his head as he bounced back to dodge another zombie.

The zombies standing around where his hand had landed already had their attention peaked, glaring down at it.

The first dropped, reaching for the hand. Another followed, landing atop the first.

Shit!

Within seconds the pile had formed, a few zombies even climbing atop. But the severed hand wasn’t as interesting as he was.

Shaking his head and taking the dagger back into his hand, Abe darted through the crowd of zombies toward the small pile of bodies, jumping up it in seconds.

The distance was still far, but with him atop the pile, more mindless dead marched toward him.

“Yeah, you want my meat? Come on then, you fuckers!”

Bodies slammed against the growing mound of groaning cadavers, hands outstretched and reaching for Abe.

“Fresh meat, come and get it you dumb fucks!” He spat, kicking at the closet hands.

More zombies piled in, creating a bridge of whaling bodies as Abe shouted in the direction of the crate.

It was slow, and zombies were now climbing up and toward him. The closest he simply stabbed, and kicked into position—occasionally dodging a charging zombie that managed to make it atop the pile.

“Here, right here!” he stomped down, trying to direct more where he needed them.

The pile had grown, but without him under it, it fanned out.

“Ah, fuck it,” he shook his head and regripped the dagger in his mouth.

There was still some distance between the crate, but his plan seemed to be petering out and he was worried that the pile might start to pull itself apart.

Taking a couple of steps back, he stopped, firmed his stance, and charged. Flailing arms lined his runway of bodies, and he kicked with everything he had just before its end, propelling himself up and into the air.

It was only a finger, but he did it. Dangling in the air he hung from that finger—jammed into the chain.

I did it, I fucking did it! You dumb bastards!

He pulled himself up, sliding his boots against the crate once they were within reach and then heaving his upper body up. In one quick motion, he slipped his finger free and took hold of the chain.

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Safe, he sighed.

It would have been near impossible for a human, but he quite effortlessly held his weight now and was able to shimmy himself the rest of the way up without any issue.

“Hey, you fuckers, looks like your meal got away from you!” He taunted from atop the crate.

A chain loosened and he felt weightlessness for a second and the crate fell towards the ground. His hand flung out and snatched out of a chain, but momentum sent him sliding down along it until he managed to tighten his grip enough to stop his dissent.

There were only a few inches of chain left past his grip, and a few feet between him and the sea of hands stretching out for his feet.

“Not today,” he murmured, pulling himself back up the chain.

Reaching the top, he dragged himself up and onto the crane’s arm proper.

Shaking his head, Abe began to shuffle along it, aiming for the ledge where the machine’s body sat.

His eyes widened.

Beside the crane was the man, tentacles waving about his frame. He shook his head.

“Was that you, you fucking bastard?” Abe gritted his teeth and continued to shuffle closer.

There were several crates along the platform where the crane was and a roller door behind it. Nonchalantly, the tentacle man turned, pulled up the roller door, and passed through.

“Oh, so you’re leaving now, scared?” Abe muttered as he shuffled closer to the platform, though, he was honestly glad it had left. He wanted to feel his feet on solid ground that wasn’t the cavern floor and get a feel for his surroundings before he had to worry about that thing again.

Shaking his head in relief, Abe stood atop the platform. The metal roller door was closed now with no sign of the strange, tentacle zombie. He turned to his right and sighed when he saw the steel door closed, and the valve ripped from the wall.

“Yeah, that’s not good,” he straightened, turning to the roller door—there was a control panel beside it, and the metal had been bent around where that thing had pulled it up.

The rot of a thousand zombies clouded his nostrils too much, but he could sense that thing beyond the doors. It was waiting for him.

Come on, there has to be another way out of here.

Perhaps he could move the crane in a way to get back across, or just wait for Elissa.

But would Elissa come for him? He couldn’t be sure, but she hadn’t stabbed him in the back so far, and they seemed to be on the same side. Even if she was a cunt about it.

Sighing, Abe leaned against the wall and slid down. He certainly wasn’t about to just charge into a fight with that big, tentacle asshole.

An hour passed as he tapped the back of his head against the wall.

“Seriously, Elissa, what could you possibly be doing?”

The cavern shook, debris loosening and falling, and then again.

“What the?” Abe rose to his feet.

He heard the muffled echoes of what sounded like explosions, but they couldn’t have been anywhere nearby.

The cavern shook again, and this time a section of rock several meters across fell from the ceiling and crushed dozens of zombies below.

“Of shit,” Abe mouthed as he watched their forms pulverized into ground meat.

It shook again and more debris fell.

“This place is going to fucking collapse,” he turned to the control panel, grimacing at the thought of going through the roller doors.

I suppose it can be any worse than dying.

Abe shook his head and made for the console. There was a big red button beside a few smaller controls and with a shrug he tapped it. A moment later, the roller door began to slide up, beeping as it did.

A cave lay beyond, tunneling into the dark.

Another world-shaking moment later, and debris falling only a few feet from him—he entered.

Within a minute the rumbling had subsided, replaced only by cold, eerie quiet.

****

Weren’t humans supposed to care about self-preservation? Elissa shook her head.

What the fuck were these people doing here? Slayers within the Mistress’s domain. If the villagers had betrayed them, she would gladly dish out an eternity of suffering upon them.

She had watched one of them disregard their safety and blow out the supporting beams. It didn’t make a lot of sense. Why would whoever was responsible for this lair, destroy it?

She growled. It didn’t matter. They had no right to attack her in this place. It was beyond insulting.

Where did you little rats come from? Someone had to bring you here.

She watched the figure disappear into an adjoining tunnel as another of the explosions disintegrated a supporting beam, forcing Elissa to take another exit.

“If you survive this, I will kill you,” she muttered as another section of the roof turned to rubble and fell around her.

She knew war would come eventually, that was a near certainty. But the last thing she had expected was slayers in Strigov. Then again, there were endless souls for hire across the domains.

That didn’t explain the townsfolk working with them, though. Pulling that off would require a certain degree of cunning and conniving.

It was perhaps that was the work of that foreigner Emil spoke of. Anyone able to cross the warp was worth keeping an eye on, especially if they fearlessly entered a domain ruled by a vampire lord.

However, she couldn’t risk leaving this mess for the Mistress to clean up. At least not until confirming who was behind it. If it turned out they were within her station to deal with, it would be a disgrace upon her.

Elissa sneered. The Mistress already looked at Abe with eyes she had never seen cast upon anybody else. She knew she was only one fuck up away from demotion. And there was no way she would let some barely toothed fledgling get ahead of her already. Even if he was likely destined to do so anyway.

It was only a few years ago she had hoped to overtake Kearn as Miss Nia’s number one, but he was always one step ahead. And now Abe?

The thought of falling further behind to a fledgling sickened her. All that effort, and for what?

She would die before this mission was failed.

Elissa imagined ripping the heads off of those meddling humans as she leaped away, clinging to a higher ledge as the last sections of the lower cavern collapsed behind her.

She would kill everyone who dared challenge her leader. The Mistress and her Barony were indivisible, and any who wished to challenge that would suffer true death.

Her thoughts drifted back to Abe. She couldn’t be blamed if he got himself killed, he was responsible for his evolution, after all. But it couldn’t be seen as a result of her failure, that wouldn’t be good. Especially not for one as clearly favored as him.

Damn it, fledgling. Keep yourself alive, at least for now.