Rot & Ruin

The Hammer laughed, and so did the other men. “Or what?” He sneered. “You’re outnumbered and outgunned, Tom. What the hell do you think you’re gonna do?”

“Me?” Tom looked faintly amused. “Hell, I’m not going to do anything. But you will let her go.”

“Says who?”

“Says me!” A voice snarled out of the darkness, and there was a heavy whoosh as a long metal pole cut through the air, and a flash of silver as a wickedly sharp bayonet blade cut through the back of the Motor City Hammer’s left leg. His Achilles tendon parted with an explosion of blood, and he screamed-as high and shrill as a little girl-and fell. He literally threw Nix from him, and she staggered toward Benny, who rushed to catch her.

Everyone turned as a pale figure jumped forward into the firelight, her snow-white hair swirling as she landed and pivoted and slashed again with her spear. The air was suddenly filled with a new rainfall, but these drops were a red so dark that it was almost black. The Hammer clamped both of his hands around his throat. His eyes went wide and were instantly filled with the dreadful certainty that no matter who won this night’s conflict-Charlie Pink- eye or Tom Imura-he, Marion Hammer, would own no piece of either victory or defeat, and that he would play no part in whatever future was being written here. He tried to speak, to say something, to articulate the terror and need in his heart, but that bull throat of his was no longer constructed for speech.

He toppled slowly forward, like a great building finally yielding to years of corruption and decay, and then he fell into the mud.

The Lost Girl stood over him, her hazel eyes as cold as all the hatred and loss in the world, and then she spat on the unmoving back of the man who had chased her sister into the rain and then left her body in the mud, as if it was garbage.

“God,” Nix breathed, massaging her bruised throat.

Charlie Matthias stared at his fallen friend, his mouth open, disbelief painted on his features. Benny could only imagine what was going on in the big man’s mind. Benny had heard all of the stories of Charlie and the Hammer. He’d sat in Lafferty’s General Store on far too many afternoons and listened as they recounted their adventures. Always their adventures. Always together, a pair of devils, drawing power from each other, enabling and supporting each other. The right and left fist of violence out here in the great Rot and Ruin.

And now the Hammer was dead.

In a few minutes he would reanimate as a zom. As one of them, as one of the things that Charlie and the Hammer hated and humiliated and debased for fun and profit.

As Benny watched, Charlie’s face changed. His eyes went from wide shock to narrow slits filled with lethal intent, and his mouth tightened into a grimace of bloodlust.

“I’m going to rip you apart, girl,” he said. “I should have done it five years ago, and now I’m going to make sure it’s done and done right. By God you are going to scream all the way to hell!”

Lilah raised her spear, and the bounty hunters raised their guns. Benny and Nix stepped up to flank her, the three of them ready to make a stand against Charlie Pink-eye.

Tom stepped between Charlie and them.

“A long time ago I gave you a chance,” said Tom. “Your goons here don’t know it, but I had you down and bleeding when you tried to invade Sunset Hollow. Your life was in my hands, Charlie, and you begged me- begged me-to give you another chance. You swore to me that you’d change, that things would be different. I didn’t know then that you were the one who was behind everything bad that goes on out here. That you started Gameland and that you were the one who kept it going. Back then I thought you were just a hired gun, working for someone else. Now I know different, Charlie. Now I know the truth, and every day for the rest of my life I’m going to feel sick, knowing that I let you live when I should have just switched you off. I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought I was being merciful. Never kill a helpless enemy.” Benny saw Tom’s face darken with self-loathing. “I’ve got five years of blood on my hands, Charlie. How many lives is that? How many men, women, and children whose futures were ruined? How many people tortured or murdered?”

Charlie was not impressed. “Yeah, you suckered me once and got the upper hand, big friggin’ deal. You think that makes you tougher than me? You think that makes you anything? You ain’t nothing but a sad footnote in an old history book, Tom. You’re not a cop and you’re not a samurai. You’re not even a good bounty hunter. You don’t have the guts for it. You’re nothing but a fool and a coward.”

Benny stepped forward and punched Charlie in the face. He put every ounce of outrage and almost fourteen years worth of inner conflict into that punch, and it caught Charlie on the point of the jaw and spun him halfway around.

“My brother is not a coward!” he bellowed.

Time seemed to grind to a halt.

Charlie turned slowly back to face them. There was a purple knot forming on his jaw, but if the punch had done him any real harm, then it didn’t show on his face. His eyes danced with humor, and he wore an ugly butcher’s smile.

“You throw a good punch for a little pup,” he said. “How’s the hand?”

Benny said nothing. In fact, he had to clamp his mouth shut, because he was pretty sure that he had just broken his hand. Every one of the thousands of nerve endings in his fist was sending white hot flashes of pain to his brain, and his knuckles were swelling like balloons. He tried to block out the pain, tried not to let his eyes fill with tears. He concentrated on hating Charlie and tried to figure out a way to save Nix. The rain started falling again, and the wind was moaning louder than ever in the trees.

Charlie pointed to him. “I’m going to save you for last. After I kick your brother’s ass, I’m going to take the Lost Girl and see how she does in a zombie pit without any weapons. That goes for your redheaded friend, too. Think that’ll be fun? Afterward, I’m going to feed you to the zoms, one finger at a time.”

Nix made a lunge at Charlie, but Tom grabbed her shoulder and held her back.

“No, sweetie,” he murmured, “this animal is mine.”

Charlie gave him “a come and get it” gesture with both hands, then called to his men. “What kind of drugs are you taking, Tom? You’re frigging well surrounded and outnumbered. We’re not going to duke it out. This isn’t a fair fight. You’re just going to die. I don’t know how you escaped them zoms back on the highway, but you should never have come back here. Not alone.”

“No,” Tom agreed, “it isn’t a fair fight. And just so you know… I’m not alone.”

Charlie looked momentarily perplexed. A few of the bounty hunters exchanged looks and then everyone turned slowly around. The rain was falling steadily now, but the moaning in the forest had nothing to do with the wind.

The entire camp was surrounded by hundreds of the living dead.

Tom Imura looked at Lilah, and they both smiled.

55

THE ZOMS SHAMBLED INTO THE CAMP, AND THE MOAN THEY LET LOOSE was an unrelenting cry of hunger that now had the promise of being satisfied. The bounty hunters screamed and backed away, colliding with one another. Everyone who had a gun began firing.

“Benny!” cried Nix, and shoved him out of the way as a zom lurched toward him. She ducked under the zombie’s arms and kicked it savagely in the knee, but as it toppled, she shoved it into the arms of one of the bounty hunters. The man shrieked as the crippled zom bore him to the ground and clamped its rotting teeth onto his shoulder.

Lilah used the butt end of her spear to jab several of the zoms in the chest, knocking them away as she retreated. “With me!” she called, and Benny and Nix clustered next to her. Neither of them had a weapon. “Gun!” Lilah barked, but Benny looked around, expecting to see someone trying to shoot him. Nix, however, caught Lilah’s meaning and reached for the pistol in the Lost Girl’s holster. It was an automatic, and Nix racked the slide and took the gun in a firm two-handed shooter’s grip as the three of them kept backing toward the wagons.