Page 11

Dax

I’m halfway to the building, my mind already on Faith, when I hear Wilkes shout.

“Dax!” There’s something strange in his tone. Not just urgency, he’s shaken.

I turn, already bracing for whatever fresh hell this place is throwing at me, and freeze.

One of the bodies is sitting up.

One of the fucking bodies we just made sure was dead.

I stop cold. My gun is up, aimed at the thing. I don’t blink. I don’t breathe.

Its throat is torn to shreds, the flesh hanging loose, and its guts are smeared across the dirt like someone spilled a bucket of slop.

I didn’t touch it, but I know what dead looks like. This? This isn’t supposed to happen.

“Dax!” Wilkes shouts again, his voice cracking.

Another body starts to shift, then sits up too, its jerky, unnatural movements setting my teeth on edge.

I swallow hard, my brain scrambling for something that makes sense. This can’t be real. It can’t.

But it is.

The sitting corpse, fuck it, zombie , turns its dead, cloudy eyes toward me. Its mouth opens, a low, guttural growl scraping from its throat like it’s chewing on gravel.

I don’t let myself think about who it was. Don’t let myself remember. I pull the trigger, and the shot cracks through the air, loud and final.

The bullet rips through its forehead, the back of its skull bursting open as it drops like a stone.

Wilkes fires a second later, taking out the other one.

“Shit,” I mutter, scanning the ground. My pulse pounds in my ears, but I force myself to focus. My mind runs the numbers, fast and sharp. How many of these corpses were DOA and didn’t take a headshot? How many bullets do I have left?

“You got rounds left?” I bark at Wilkes.

The corpse closest to me twitches, its fingers curling against the dirt as it struggles to push itself up.

Wilkes doesn’t answer right away, too busy putting another bullet into a twitching body.

“Wilkes!” I shout again, louder.

“Yeah!” he yells, his voice shaking.

I don’t wait. I race forward, taking no chances as I put bullets into the heads of the corpses still sprawled across the yard. One by one, I make sure they’re down for good.

Wilkes follows close behind, doing the same. The gunfire echoes off the walls, sharp and deafening in the night.

When it’s over, we’re standing amid the dead. For now, they’re still. Blood and bits of brain soak the dirt, and the metallic stench of it all sticks in my nose like it’s burned there.

I glare at Wilkes, my chest heaving. “How many of those things did Doc make?” My voice comes out harsh, rougher than I mean, but I don’t care.

Wilkes shakes his head, his rifle still clutched tight in his hands. “I don’t ask questions,” he says, his tone bitter. “You know that’d get you killed, no matter what side of this little experiment you’re on.”

My teeth grind. I don’t have time for this. My mind snaps to the only thing that matters right now.

Faith.

“I gotta get to her,” I say, already turning toward the building. “Tell the rest of the guards, head shots only. Don’t waste a bullet on anything else. You hear me?”

Wilkes nods, but he doesn’t move right away.

“Enforce curfew,” I add, though my tone makes it clear it’s not a request. “Until we get a grip on what the hell we’re looking at, nobody moves.”

I barely wait for his nod before turning back toward the building, my feet already moving. My mind churns through worst-case scenarios, my chest tightening with every step.

Then I hear it.

A scream.

High-pitched, desperate, and unmistakably female.

It cuts through me like a goddamn blade, curling around my reason and twisting it to pieces.

I break into a run, my boots pounding against the dirt.

“Faith!” I shout, my voice raw and frantic. If one of those things, if one of those things…

“Faith!”

My heart slams against my ribs as the scream echoes again.

A group of inmates moves toward the sound, their movements sharp and quick. Too quick.

I skid to a halt, my gun snapping up, my finger hovering over the trigger. My vision narrows as I aim, but I can’t pull the trigger. Not yet. I can’t see where she is.

“Faith!” I shout again, louder this time. “Wilkes! Make some noise with me!”

He’s at my side instantly, his voice joining mine in a desperate shout.

“Faith!”

The inmates hesitate, their heads turning toward us, but I’m already moving, my eyes scanning the shadows for any sign of her.

“Don’t fire unless you can hit your target!” I snap at Wilkes, my voice sharp and controlled even as chaos swirls around us.

The zombies change direction, their movements erratic and jerky. My pulse pounds as time seems to slow. I measure the distance, calculating how close I can let them get without risking her being in the line of fire.

Her next scream orients me, sharpens my focus.

I pop off a round, the crack of the shot barely registering in my ears. One of the zombies jerks back, then another darts toward the sound of her voice.

Shit.

My attention splits as they move closer to her scream. One lunges toward her.

Wilkes fires. I fire.

Two bodies hit the ground, crumpling in awkward heaps.

Then there’s another. Shit. Three.

I take aim again, steadying my hand as I fire. The last one drops, the echo of my shot cutting through the madness.

I push forward, closing the gap between us and the thrashing, wrestling bodies.

And then they go still. All of them.

My heart fucking stops.

“Faith,” I shout, my voice raw. “Faith! Fuck.”

I shove my gun into my waistband and drop to my knees, yanking a creature off her with one rough pull and tossing it aside like garbage.

Wilkes has his gun trained on it, his eyes sharp, but it doesn’t move. A knife juts from its mouth, the hilt glinting in the low light.

“Dax,” she says, her soft voice a balm.

It almost brings tears to my eyes.

She’s here, on the ground, bloodied but alive. A zombie, dead, lies beside her, its face frozen in a snarl.

I can’t think straight. I snatch her off the ground, pulling her tight against my chest as if I could shield her from all of this. “Inside,” I bark at Wilkes, my voice like gravel.

Faith clings to me, her breath warm against my neck. “What the hell are they on?” she whispers, her voice shaking.

I grit my teeth, the relief of having her alive clashing with my fury. “I said stay in that fucking room, didn’t I?” My voice is harsher than I mean it to be, but I can’t stop it. The fear clawing at me comes out like anger.

Inside, I set her down, my eyes immediately scanning her for injuries. “Do you hear me? Stay in the goddamn room.”

“One of them busted the door down!” she fires back, her voice just as sharp, her eyes blazing with defiance. “What the hell was I supposed to do? Wait to die?”

If I wasn’t so angry, if the fucking zombies weren’t still out there, I’d throw her against the wall and— focus, Dax.

Then I see it. Blood.

“Shit.” My hand goes to her side, where her shirt is torn. Blood streaks her skin. “Did it, did it scratch you? Bite you?” My voice drops, hoarse and desperate. “Faith, answer me.”

Her face twists in anger, and suddenly her hands slam against my chest.

“Don’t you ever talk to me like that!” she shouts, her voice rising, raw with fury. She pounds her fists against me, the blows light but relentless. “Don’t you dare stand there and tell me how to behave when you left me! You left me! ”

My chest tightens as she shoves at me again, her eyes brimming with tears.

“Do you know how hard it is to fight a goddamn maniac with a knife? Or to climb into a fucking air vent from a bed while the door is being bashed in?” Her voice breaks, but she keeps going, her words hitting like punches. “Or to fall from a rusted fire escape straight into this mess?”

She’s trembling now, tears spilling over as she pounds my chest one last time.

“And,” she bites out, her voice cracking, “What the hell are they on? ”

Wilkes lets out a low chuckle from the corner, shaking his head. “She’s yours, all right,” he mutters under his breath.

I ignore him, my focus locked on her as I pull her against me. She resists for a moment, but I hold her tighter, pressing my hand to the back of her head.

“We’re going to see the doc,” I say, my voice low but firm. “To answer all those questions. But first, are you sure? Did it get its teeth in you?”

She pulls back just enough to meet my eyes, her face pale but steady.

“No bites,” she says softly. “Just scratches from the vent and stairs and falling.”

I exhale, the weight on my chest easing just slightly.

Zombies. The word sounds insane, but what the hell else do you call it? Dead people eating not-dead people. And if they bite you, you’re done.

As crazy as it sounds, I know what this means.

And I know one thing for sure. If they’d gotten their teeth in her, I wouldn’t be standing here right now. I’d have burned the world to the fucking ground.