"Saw the strangest thing today, sir. One of the infected turned and ran away, almost like she still had a mind of her own."
"Don't let wishful thinking get in the way of shooting them all on sight. You heard the brass. There's nothing in there."
–Colonel Tom Murray. Reno, Nevada. 14 Days After.
* * *
Well, this day had taken a turn.
Leah had returned to her beach again, only to discover a crashed raft that'd never been there before, along with a set of footprints. A few hours later and she had tracked the prints to their owner, killed another crew of Hunters, and found a live human – the one she'd dreamed about. Who would have ever thought that such a day would come?
Liam Fenix. That's what the human called himself. Leah never quite understood why they had three names, but only ever used two. What was the point of the third, and what would happen if he ran into another "Liam Fenix"? At least there weren't enough rezzers in the world for Leah to worry about coming across another "Leah". Then again, she supposed that there were even less living, breathing humans around these days.
"Please," Liam Fenix said between steps, his throat heavy. "For Christ's sake, slow down."
Leah slackened her pace, but kept her eyes fixed forth. She needed to think. What the fuck had she done!? This wasn't like stealing a dreg or hacking off a limb during a turf war. Hell, this was worse than Hunting another Hunter. Leah had purged Spike's entire crew. Three full deaths at once, well within the boundaries of outer Pandemonium, all over a capture that wasn't even hers. This one wouldn't pass without reprisal.
But then again, what choice had she had? With the way they were talking, the human wouldn't have survived five minutes in their hands. Spike was a meathead who could barely contain himself, let alone his crew. Could she really have let him just waltz off with a find this significant? Hunters' honor only went so far when the stakes were this high.
Leah dug her nails into her palms. Shouldn't have let him get away. Spike was the real mistake. Limping his way back to Pandemonium would drain him hard, but there was no telling if it'd be enough, or if Hades wouldn't be able to put the pieces back together anyway. Whatever leverage Leah might have gained here would be lost the moment that knowledge of her attack trickled its way back to him.
There was no way out of it. For better or worse, Leah had made her decision. All she could do now was prepare for what came next.
"Doesn't that hurt?" Liam Fenix asked.
Leah looked to her shoulder and remembered that she'd been shot. Blood still leaked from the wound, staining her sheepskin jacket in a darker shade of black. She'd have to remember to get the jacket cleaned and stitched. It had been a bitch to come by.
"No," she said.
"You sure? That's a lot of, um... Whatever-that-is coming out."
Leah supposed that she should check. She gave her injured fist a squeeze. The movement was sluggish. Must've nicked a nerve ending. No wonder she'd missed the kill shot on Spike, though she could be thankful that her Rez wouldn't be touched by this one. Too little damage.
"Doesn't matter," Leah said. "It'll be fine."
He sighed. "If you insist."
What was it with the living and their voices? Liam Fenix sounded as though he'd inhaled a tank of helium. It was so soft and nasally. There was also his appearance. His skin had that even, beige sheen characteristic of his kind, and he had those dark chestnut eyes without a drop of red. His brown hair might have been long and unkempt, but it was still greasy and full. Add that to the flask thrown over his shoulder and torn bag filled with canned food, and he might have looked like a savage by human standards, but that still put him worlds apart from anyone they'd run into in Pandemonium. And all of this came before the smell. Leah's tongue salivated to the mere sense of his presence. It'd been ages since she'd experienced the Hunger like this, and she wouldn't be alone. Another problem. Another worry. How the hell was Leah going to keep this under wraps?
"At least tell me where we're going," Liam Fenix asked.
"Somewhere safe," she said.
"Where's that?"
"Close."
He paused. "So that's it? You're really not going to tell me anything else? What is the plan here?"
Leah said nothing. I'll tell you when I figure it out.
* * *
The two reached her current hideout, and not a second too soon. Liam Fenix collapsed into a wall for air. Whoops. She'd forgotten how much difficulty the living had with long distances. At this rate, they'd never get anywhere.
Leah scanned up and down the street. She had chosen well for their current camp, at least, using a three-story townhouse, with only the roof of the uppermost floor partially caved in, and a balcony with an intact railing. The sandstone walls had plenty of holes to peer through, and with the extra height, they were able to see anyone else coming for miles.
"Alright," Liam Fenix said. "I've indulged your silence enough. What are we doing here?"
"Meeting some friends," Leah said.
She went for the door and knocked, timing her beat to match the code she'd come up with. After an irritating pause, the door opened a crack and a pair of tinted orange shades stared out.
"What's the password, sweetheart?" Buttercup asked.
Leah sighed. "Open the door or I'll shove a grenade up your ass and pull the pin. Seriously, we've got company."
He raised an eyebrow at the sight of Liam Fenix standing behind, then unfastened the locks. As the final latch came free, Leah kicked the door open and went straight upstairs with Buttercup and Liam Fenix struggling to keep pace. Getting everyone up to speed was going to be an uphill battle, especially given the bombshells she'd be dropping.
"Is everyone here?" Leah asked.
Buttercup nodded. "Yeah. Mastermind's reading in the study and Kurt's recasing ammo in the kitchen."
"Good. Get them all together."
Leah marched into the living room and went for a closet. With any luck, they might still have some relics from the past. Light washed over as she crossed the cracks where it leaked through the walls, reminding her that the sun had crossed its apex and there was now less daylight coming than had already passed. She was definitely on the clock with this one. Traveling at night under these constraints was foolish at best, and she dared not wait until tomorrow to act.
When Leah had collected enough scraps of history, everyone had already gathered. Her crew surrounded Liam Fenix, each talking over each other as they studied the aberration she'd brought back. Well, that's one problem solved. Mastermind seemed to have deduced the truth of the human's existence fast enough, though that was no surprise.
Liam Fenix stood in the middle of it all, dumbstruck. Unlike Leah, neither Mastermind nor Kurt went to lengths to cover their Marks, and with their bright red irises focused onto his, he was no doubt going through whatever emotions that humans went through when their world was turned upside down.
Then he noticed Leah standing in front, silent as ever. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words came free.
"Everyone, quiet!" Leah ordered. She held out her hand and tossed the papers she'd collected. Dust puffed out where they landed. "You want answers, Liam Fenix? You'll find them in here."
He rifled through the newspapers. "Aeon Warns of Deadly Contamination Leaked" one said. "East Coast Nuked; Government Still Silent" another said. He began to scan the articles more erratically as the collapse of his world became more and more apparent. He barely looked at "The Dead Rise?" or "CDC Memo Leaked: More Nukes Coming?" but did fixate on "Signs of Contagion Now in 20 Countries".
"Ever hear of a zombie apocalypse?" Leah asked. "Your civilization was all about glorifying it, whether through your books or TV shows or games. You all dreamed of a world where the dead rose to feast on the flesh of the living in the hopes that you could find personal glory there. Well, that's what the Hollowing was – an undead pandemic, the likes of which this world had never seen."
Liam Fenix shuffled the pages in front of him, as if they had some hidden meaning he could not crack. "They would've fought it. Contained it. Surely, someone would've figured something out?"
Leah leaned in. "The sad truth is that none of you ever stood a chance. Sure, it's easy to sit around and imagine how much of a badass you'd be, but most of you ended up dying before you even knew it was happening. The very networks of globalization that had connected you only hastened your demise. The Hollowing spread like wildfire, and within the first few months alone, not even one in a hundred of you were still alive. The majority had either gone hollow or been killed by your governments, if not both. It was only a matter of time before the rest of you went too."
He still stared at the newspapers, but he was no longer bothering to read.
Leah tapped her gloved hands on the table, her eyes locked into his. "But I'm not telling you anything you hadn't figured out already, am I? Humanity and its world-encompassing civilization is gone, and only the undead remain.
"What your kind never imagined in all your visions of an apocalyptic, zombie-infested world was that humanity's demise wouldn't be where the story ended. Not all hollows stayed the empty husks they'd turned into. Some of them regained their intelligence. Their souls began to fill back up, even if their old lives were gone forever."
To that, he looked at her. "What are you?"
"Don't play stupid. You know the answer, even if you can't bring yourself to say the words. We are the hollows who didn't stay empty. We are the ones who came back."
Only then did Liam Fenix seem to notice the others again. "You're telling me that you're a group of zombies? That the only ones left are all undead?"
Leah smiled below her scarf. "We call ourselves 'Rezzers'."
He sat and stared at her for a moment, but then his throat clogged up and he started to gag.
Leah raised an eyebrow when she realized what was about to happen. "Best you take that outside."
In a flash, the human lurched from his seat and ran for the balcony. Vomit spewed forth as he leaned over the railing. All things considered, not the worst reaction to have. Kurt waddled over to bring him a towel, but Leah waved him back.
"Give him a minute," she said before again looking to her own crew. "We've got our own things to clear up, huh?"
"Leave this puzzle to me, comrades," Mastermind said, stroking his tiny chin to accentuate the point. "It would appear that this living legacy has just come to learn of the Hollowing that felled his kindred. But how could that be? Humans were social by their very nature. So much time has passed for him to be merely oblivious." He grinned. "Well, is this not an obvious deduction? Our friend must have been isolated before the outbreak with no means of return, perhaps marooned on an uninhabited island?" His red eyes beamed. "Is that the solution, mum?"
"That's what he told me," Leah acknowledged.
Of course Mastermind would crack this open without a second thought. Though he'd only been a child when he'd hollowed and therefore had a little boy's body to match, his Rez was brimming with Mensa-level intellect, the kind that most old world PhD holders never got to obtain.
Mastermind tittered and rubbed his little tufts of black hair. "How marvelous! What an incredible find you've gotten for us."
"Doesn't look like this one came for free," Kurt said. He gave Leah's wounded shoulder a poke with his meaty hand. "Who did this?"
Where Mastermind was sized too small, a case could be made that Kurt had hollowed too big. Well over six feet tall and two hundred fifty pounds in weight, there weren't many that could survive a blow from his sledgehammer, not without getting cleaved in half. It was a shame that the hollows had given him so many Marks. Between his torso and face, he had more than a dozen, with one even claiming an eye, though he wrapped cloth around his bald head to cover the wound.
Leah grimaced. "It was Spike. I'll explain more later, but let's just say that he's doing worse than me."
Buttercup laughed. "Can't say I ever liked the asshole."
Sometimes Leah could swear that Buttercup was secretly human. He'd found a leopard-print to go with the cream fedora he'd started wearing, and between the tanner he put into his skin and product for his hair and mustache, he'd pass more easily as one than even Liam Fenix. Were it not for his burgundy eyes or the Mark he kept hidden below his shirt, she might never know for certain.
"What the hell are you wearing this time?" Leah asked.
He gleamed. "I keep telling you, I'm pretty sure that I was a porn star in my living days. You know how many of these things fit like they were custom-tailored for me?"
Too many, that's for sure. "Change. We're heading out soon."
"Oh, come on, Leah. I've barely broken the fucker in and you already want me to toss it in a roller like its old pair of shoes?"
"I'll burn it if I have to. We've got more important things to worry about."
Mastermind cut in. "Speaking of, my friends... I believe the human will cease his retching soon. This begs a question best answered candidly while he remains out of our company. What are we to do with him next?" He looked to Leah.
"Fair enough," Buttercup said. "You know I was just playing, right? Of course you're calling the shots here, Leah."
"Yeah, boss," Kurt echoed. "You're the one who found him. You'll have our backs."
Kurt, Mastermind, Buttercup. Leah's crew. She'd picked them up at one point or other over the years, and they'd been inseparable ever since. But for all her prowess and expertise, there were some problems she'd never been prepared for, or even considered as anything other than a passing fantasy. To say that finding a living human was one of those moments was the understatement of the century. Everyone was looking to her for answers, and she had none to give.
Oh, how leadership sucked.
Liam Fenix walked back into the room, his beard caked in vomit, and eyes still watered. "I'm sorry. I know that you saved my life, but this is a lot." He laughed bitterly. "I always knew that the world would've changed, but let's just say that I never expected this. I want to thank you for saving me but... There's something else I need to know." The newspapers rustled as he picked one up. "You see... This is dated two days after my plane went down. An odd coincidence, yeah? It makes me wonder..." He paused. "How long?"
Leah stared him in the eyes. "Twelve years have passed since the Hollowing. No one's seen a living human for the past seven."
He fell silent as he considered the reality of his return. At least Leah could answer this honestly. She was among the oldest rezzers around, and perhaps one of the first to ever be reincarnated. Twelve years of her existence had passed since then. Twelve long years of survival, with none of them easy, as she had been forced to do the unspeakable just to keep her Rez stable a few days more.
"I understand," Liam Fenix said with a tone that would not be challenged.
Is that so? Leah was expecting him to scream, or cry again, or attempt to take his own life on the spot. Humans were like that. They valued their own existence less than the world they'd known before. How many had she seen go that way?
But Liam Fenix was different. He'd heard that civilization had been destroyed, and that all he'd come to love was no more, and that this new world was nothing but hostile for this kind. And yet, none of this seemed to deter him. If anything, he looked ready to face the challenge.
"So what do we do now?" he asked, his head held high.
Here it was. Her moment to choose. All eyes were on Leah, and she needed to have an answer. Dare she risk it all?
"We're returning to Pandemonium," she decided, "and we need you to come with us. This world is still dying, and you're the only one who can save us."
"Me? What can I do?"
Leah clenched her fists, her own spirit buoyed. "A nation built by corpses can only ever produce more corpses, but life can endure forever. Make no mistake, Liam Fenix. You might be the last man to walk this earth..." She paused.
"But that makes you the most important one who's ever lived."