Discovery

“Old man you don't know what you are talking about. I won't even waste time with you. I could bend you like a pretzel or rip your head off with my bare hands.” said Ella tossing the chair leg away from here. Her eyes followed the bloody end until it struck the wall and rebounded to spin lazily, the blood calling to her, she almost started towards the club, then remembered the woman was right behind her, waiting to be devoured, she half turned, when Ruben spoke again.

“No Max, I got this one, trust me.” Max looked into the old man's eyes seeing him wink, he continued in a whisper, “Just get your lady friend out of here.”

Ella looked back to Ruben, then to Harry, who glanced surreptitiously at Aubrey who shrugged her shoulders and said, “Fuck it. What could they tell us anyway, kill them all Ella for all I care.”

This gave Ella pause, who was giving the orders here? Behind her the blood continued to pour out of the head of the police woman, she could hear the heart beat, each pump caused the stain on the floor to grow a little larger.

“You ain't afraid of an old fart like me are ya?” asked Ruben, “I got grandchildren older than you.”

“You're dead old man, you just don't know it yet.”

Ruben stepped sideways away from Max, locking Ella's eyes with his own, “We'll see.“ he put his hand on the combat knife at his belt, Max thought he saw it tremble a little. “Go Max!”

Max went, skirting Ella he rushed to Stewart's side to see if she were still alive, not even considering looking at her with his special vision.

“You think a knife is going to help you?” taunted Ella.

“I think so, yeah.”

“Well go ahead, then.” 'This old fool was slower than even the other guy was, at least the police woman was a challenge', Ella thought, 'Gramps will be dead in seconds.'

“Well since you've said to, I think I will.” Ruben pulled the knife out and pointed it at Ella, who laughed at the way it was shaking in his hands.

“You're trembling old man, be careful not to drop it.”

“I'm okay.”

'Always do the unexpected.' Ruben thought, 'she doesn't even see this coming.' Glancing at the two zombies that had stayed out of the fighting so far, 'Something tells me they might.'

Ruben stepped closer to Ella, who did not back away, but sneered at him, “Now what? You stab me?”

“Not yet.” said Ruben, taking the blade of his knife in his left hand and holding the handle out to the woman.

“You're giving the knife to me? What the fuck are you playing at?”

“If you have the knife I win.”

“The fuck you say.” said Ella ripping the knife out of Ruben's hand.

'Ice' thought Ruben, 'it's like someone put something cold on my hand, really, really cold.' His blood started flowing out of his cut hand to splatter on the floor. 'I hope this works.'

“Now I have the…” Ella began, then looked at the blood pouring form Ruben's hand, “…and you…” She was infatuated with the bleeding, every precious drop raining down in front of her, she stood still a moment, the knife forgotten. 'This was what he meant, he thought I would be infatuated with the bleeding and not be able to act. He was wrong.' Ella tilted her head up and started to laugh.

Ruben, seeing his opportunity thrust his bleeding hand over her mouth. In the flash of a second everything changed, Ella's laughter was cut off and her mouth sucked greedily at Ruben's hand. She tried to stop herself, tried to pull back, but she wanted it. She felt the old man beside her, but her focus had narrowed down to feeding. Ruben's good arm took the knife gently from Ella's unresisting fingers.

A series of shots rang out as the zombies watching the hallway fired at Bill, one bullet hit his Kevlar helmet and pushed him back around the corner, where he grinned sheepishly at Javier. Bart, crouched down by one side of the hallway, took a shot as one of the zombies moved over slightly to try and get a clear line of sight on the men.

“I'm okay, the zombies are where they were before, just toss it a little to the left, I will put mine on the two smart ones by front doors. Ready?” Bill asked.

Bart nodded and Javier said, “Let's do it.” while hefting his grenade.

Letting loose a burst of automatic fire to cover them, Bart stepped forward first, he had been hoping his lower position would give him the cover he needed, but that was a false hope as all three of the zombies shot him. He died giving Bill and Javier a chance to toss in two hand grenades, one landed spot on coming to rest near the foot of the trio of zombies just out of sight from the hallway. Bill's grenade was flung farther, but took a bad bounce and landed to the right of his intended target, coming to rest between Max and Harry, who was just starting forward to help Ella.

When he saw the grenade, Harry let out a yell and jumped backwards grabbing Aubrey and knocking them both to the ground in front of the plate glass window near the front of the building. The trio of zombies firing at Bart also scattered, jumping every which way, trying to get away from the explosive. Javier and Bill put their rifles up to their shoulders and took careful aim at the fleeing figures. Javier had agreed to shoot for the leftmost zombie, if they reacted as Bill hoped they would, Bill had a bead on the one on the right. Both of those zombies were taken out of action with controlled bursts of gunfire. The middle zombie was too busy fleeing to notice his companions being destroyed, but luck was with him and neither Bill, nor Javier's follow up shots hit him in the head.

Ruben saw the grenades land on the floor, but was not distracted from what he was doing, despite the urge to throw himself down. Ella followed his bleeding hand as he lowered it, soon enough she was on her knees in front of him. Her eyes had turned back in her head until only the white pupils were showing and she sucked the blood from his hand. Raising the knife he stabbed it straight through the top of her skull. The blade sank in to the hilt and he could not pull it free as Ella fell sideways.

“Goddamn it. Now I got no weapons.” Ruben said, looking around. He spotted the grenade still on the floor three steps away from him. It hadn't gone off. The pin was still in it. Grinning he moved forward and scooped it up, then immediately fell prone as the lone zombie with a gun fired towards him.

Max had made it to Stewart and was trying to stem the flow of blood from her head when the grenades came flying into the room. At first he didn't realize what that small black object sitting six feet away between him and Harry was. His brain prompted his sluggish body to move and he dropped himself between Stewart and the grenade, trying to shield her body from the explosion. Gunfire went off creating a deafening roar in the room that seemed to echo endlessly from the tile and marble finish. It took Max a moment to realize the grenade hadn't gone off. By the time he looked up he saw Ruben ducking down to avoid being shot by the only zombie with a gun left in the room. Glancing over he saw Bill and Javier taking cover behind the bodies laying on the floor, their opponent had better cover behind the heavy desk at the entrance. Harry and Aubrey were just getting up, when Max saw Ruben slide the hand grenade over towards them. The old fool grinned at Max, displaying a slender piece of metal wire in his hand. Max realized it was the pin from the grenade half a moment before the explosion tore through the building.

Chapter 47

Something was going on down below, Katie heard small arms fire from the Art Institute and was sure at least one bullet had crashed through one of the windows of the place out into the street.

Behind her the pounding on the door started up again. Casting a quick glance over her shoulder Katie made sure the door was still holding. Randy and her had taken a long metal pole they found and wedged it under the door's handle when they came up the stairs. They were lucky to have found anything to brace the door with, if