I sighed as I turned to see Vern standing there aiming his shotgun as me. Further back Rill was beginning to turn around from where she had been standing watch at the door after we cleared the room. Only for her to let out a shrill yell as Brody pushed her out of the door hard enough to nearly flatten her against the far wall. Giving him just enough time to pull the doors shut and flip the lock.

"Curse you sudden but inevitable betrayal."

Vern narrowed his eyes at me. "Don't tell me you really expected this? Why would you even have let me join this little trip if you did? Now drop your weapon."

I shrugged at him. "We needed warm bodies to make this work, and I wanted at least a few of them to be people I wouldn't miss all that much. Nothing personal. You just seemed like you were going to be constant headache."

He waved his gun at me. "Well you aren't going to have to worry about that for much longer. Now drop it."

I shook my head. "You want to keep wasting all our time, or are you going to pull the trigger already?"

Vern shook his head slowly. "You don't even want to hear why I'm doing this?"

Again, I shrugged "I'm guessing it some kind of powerplay. But really I don't care, just get on with it."

The older man was breathing heavily now, I wondered if he would even be able to shoot me at all. What the heck was I supposed to do with him if he didn't. Finally he raised his gun and pulled the trigger..

Not at me, but at Tok.

The interior of the gun lit up with blue lights as he tried to shoot the her. But he found the trigger wasn't moving for him. Even after he switched over to aim at me the gun just wouldn't shoot. "What the Hell?"

I felt the Rite trigger on me again. The feeling of being empowered had ended just as soon as Brody as slammed the doors shut, isolating us from the dangers from outside. But it had only taken a whisper to put it back on myself, and the attempt, even a failed one, to harm me to activate it.

I pointed over to Tok "Sanctuary"

Tok nodded at me then spoke up. "I added a safety feature since you seemed unsafe with your tool. It won't fire when it's pointed at anything with a heartbeat."

Vern glanced down at his gun and whispered. "Shit."

With a quick glance as a confused looking Brody, he yelled, "Take them down!" and tried to rush me. The big teen just yelled, "Screw you..." Then he turned to open the doors behind him. Good boy, you get to explain yourself.

The older man lifted his shotgun to bring the stock down on my head, in return I shoved the sharp end of my weapon right into his stomach. As I had been trained to do so for the last two days.

The point of the sharp side of a branch cutter sort of curves up a bit, so it's not the best weapon for stabbing. But it still went in a several inches, all the way to the handle, and a lot of blood came out with the blade as I yanked it back out.

Vern just sort of froze in place, looking down on his wound, then lowering his gun as Rill came running in with only a glare at Brody before going right past him.

As Vern stumbled back a step, the lizard girl slowed down and just watched him as he lowered himself into a seat, and began laughing. "Looks like you win boy. But at least I bet everything on my last roll."

I stepped back in case he planned on jumping at me for one last try to kill me. Looking over at the door, I asked the teen. "What did he tell you?"

Brody whipped his head to me from his horrified gaze that had been locked onto the dying man. "He said he could make you transfer your holy ground to him. Then he going to let you take all the aliens with you when he made you leave. He didn't say anything about killing you."

I gave the idiot a long cold stare until he began to twitch, and then began to look scared as Rill started to head his way. I warned him, "Okay, but for future reference. It's my class skill, I can't transfer it to anyone."

He flinched back as Rill began to walk pass him, then took a quick step his way and held her hook up against the bottom of his throat. "One day, if you are allowed to stay, you will be considered a adult. On that day you will pay for laying hands on me."

Then she stepped back outside.

It would have been a totally badass moment if she didn't stop right outside the door and then book it back into the room, slamming both doors behind her. "Lock it, lock it now! Tok seal it."

I kept a eye on Vern as Tok headed toward the door. Behind which I could hear a steady series of thump sounds as the zombies, now freed to act on their instincts, began to impact against the doors.

For some reason they all seemed to be coming here even if the Demon had been driven off by my taking of the chapel. "What the hell?"

Rill turned to glance back at me before she wiggled aside to let Tok get in to the middle of the doors between her and Brody. "The dead, they are all rushing this way."

First thought. Yeah, I got that part. I guess we should have reinforced the barricade at the top of the stairs. Second thought as I glanced as the grinning idiot sitting in the front pew bleeding to death. Was blood. They must be able to smell it and are all heading this way like sharks in a feeding frenzy.

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You know, just like in the movies.

Tok's Branch tool began to shoot off some sparks as she welded the door shut. The lock may have been enough to hold them out, but considering the door was to a room on the top of the ship, I'm guessing they didn't make that much of a effort to make it all that strong. It wasn't like it had to hold back ocean water flooding a lower deck.

Vern was looking a little pale as he tried to get a little attention as he died. "They made me a offer, promised to send me back home. Never did believe them."

I didn't bother to even look at him. More concerned about the horde of fleshed eating zombies outside. I did give him a grunt however. "Uh-huh."

Which appeared to be enough to keep him talking. "So I made a new deal, they stay away. Right up until they killed off everyone else, only then would they come at me. Figured it was the best I could do to keep them from jumping me every time I tried to leave your protected zone."

I gave him another grunt as Tok finished sealing the door and the other two hesitantly moved away from the door, which now only shook a little bit in response to now firmly packed crowd out side. The pounding of their fists, while just as ineffectual, was annoying.

"Didn't care about the non humans, I just saw that as a way to keep thing tense. Opportunity in chaos. Are you listening to be son?"

I finally looked over at him. He was now looking very pale as a pool of blood was beginning to gather at the bottom of his blood stained pants. "Not really. Like I said, I don't care. But go ahead and say you piece. I got nothing better to do then listen to you at the moment."

Vern smiled a bit, "I just wanted to make sure you knew. I won't be the last one they tempt, and I will pissed as hell if someone else offs you when I failed. Watch your back."

He sort of passed out then. I'm not sure when he finally died, but no one, not even once, suggested doing anything about his wound.

I looked around the room, making eye contact with everyone, but ending with Brody. "If we get the chance to toss him overboard. Then we tell everyone he got taken by the zombies while holding the hallway outside those doors to give us enough time to close them."

Rill, and Tok after a moment, nodded. Brody just stared at me blankly. "Why not tell the truth? He was out to wreck everything for us, why make him some sort of hero?"

I glared at the kid. "If everyone knows I killed him, then I'm the guy who claims he had a reason to kill the guy who kept objecting to me being in charge."

Brody thought that over and then started to speak, Rill stopped him by tapping her hook against the door. "And if we tell everyone what he was up too, then we also have to tell everyone that you were in on his plan."

The teen started to shake his head and deny having agreed to any plan to kill me off. But Rill just swept her hook to the side and took a position that everyone who had participated in the combat training, or who had even just watched it, would recognized as preparing to sink her blade into someone's soft underbelly.

The teen gave her a long hesitant look and then began nodding, "Yeah, zombies got him."

The sunrise chapel did have a few other exits, one to a bathroom, another to a balcony that was not quite over the water below.

As the sea serpents began leaping up again to grab at the undead working they way up to the open decks, it occurred to me that Vern didn't need to make it all the to the water for me to get rid of him.

"Big boy?"

=Yes Holy one=

"Catch."

Thus ended Vernon Name that I forgot. Rest in peace. Thanks for the shotgun.

What? It still had five shots. Waste now, you know.

I'm not sure what all happened over the next hour or so. I was just sitting in the front pew, the one not covered in blood, sort of staring straight forward, shakings, not thinking about much.

Tok came over and held me for a bit, the warmth was nice, as was her not trying to get me to talk.

Later I found out that Rill got the bridge crew, by way of Big boy to make a lot of noise to get the zombies to clear out of the short hall outside the chapels doors. Once out there Big boy at least could reach them, but he let Rill and Brody begin to clean them out, with the bridge crew hitting the ones in back as the two of them ran for safety in the chapel. Then as the horde crowded up there, then the crew would hit that group from behind until it was their turn to run away.

At some point Chloe switched with Tok. She never had a problem hugging guys, just with having guys laying their hands on her.

When I finally glanced over at her, she asked the one question that was able to wake me out of whatever state of mind I had been stuck in.

"Did you check your notices.'

So, the message system doesn't hit you with information when you're focused in on something, like delicate work, or fighting for you life. It even holds up your messages until you're in some sort of shape to deal with them.

Congratulations

You have defeated a demon

You receive 1 fate point

Director- Clear the ship of the remaining undead, and I will give everyone involved another point.

You're welcome

I blinked for a moment, then looked up at Chloe. "Did I just get a personal message from the Director?"

She blinked back at me. "I don't know, did you? What did he say?"

"Well, if we clear the ship of undead, everyone involved gets a bonus Grace point."

Chloe perked up, jumped up, and ran to the door of the chapel to yell out to someone or ones outside. "They're doing quests now! Clear the ship for a one point reward!"

I stood up. I could mope later, right now I wanted another sweet Grace point. And if their was enough people on board the ship who were willing to become inhabitants. I had another points coming to me for raising the population.

Which would take me to third level.

I headed outside and began making my rounds, Sanctuarying every one in sight. I had found out that my range was ten feet, but it took a little focus to lock it on. But people took better to some guy pointing at them and then getting a notice of something, then some guy trying to get up close and poke then with his finger.

Once the bridge crew could see that the sea serpents had moved off, they were more then happy to not only join up to clear the ship but to take the lead. They had been a little hesitant at the start since they had a great view from the bridge of the sea serpents reaching up to the open decks and ripping parts off the zombie.

As I had expected I didn't get another chance to fight, not that I really wanted to at the moment. Instead I was stuck hanging around in the middle of each deck a it was cleared. Renewing the Rite on people as they lost it by attacking first or just going too long in a secure area.

I did insist on chopping one up to make sure I counted as a participant, but they only me at one that already had it's arms and legs cut off.

By nightfall Big boy was able to relay to the people in the bell tower that the ship had been cleared. Strangely enough we didn't get a alert, but every once still received their promised Grace point.

Not feeling like a swim, I was overjoyed that the newly promoted Captain Oats had one of the service crew use a mechanical key to open up several rooms that had remained zombie free for everyone from the boarding party to crash in.

The showers still worked and we had grabbed clean cloths from the ship's store. So I got to sleep in a clean bed with no one waiting on me to wake up so they could have a turn.

By morning the nine hundred and thirteen people aboard the ship, passengers and crew had been added to the population.