“I am well aware of that,” he said. “And I sincerely hope that this all turns out to be an elaborate hoax that everyone can laugh about in a few days. But I do not think so. If you have any other questions...”
“Just one: Are you going to release any photographic or video proof of these creatures?”
He nodded. “Yes, but only that which does not contain the Paladins. Again, I would like to keep their identifies private. That media should be uploaded to the main Necessarius site shortly, along with a copy of this announcement.”
“And thank you very much indeed for that announcement, Mister Butler.” As Butler rose to leave—very slowly, Adam noted, with heavy support form his cane—the anchorwoman turned to the camera again. “That was Artemis Butler, head of Necessarius, giving us a much-needed public service announcement. We will shortly transfer to a panel of disease experts, who will be theorizing on how this pathogen could be combated. But first, I would like to reiterate one of Butler's first points: Do not panic. Everything is under control.”
As promised, the show switched to a number of older men and women sitting around a table, who started talking about disease vectors and so on. Oddly, many of these did have cosmos.
“Mother of fire,” Lily muttered under her breath. “A real zombie apocalypse. With superpowers.” She shook her head. “I'm not sure the 'sarians can handle this one alone.” She led us away from the storefront.
“Lily,” Adam asked slowly, “what do you make of all this?”
She was quiet for a moment before speaking. “Butler knows what he's doing. Appearing personally makes it clear that this isn't a hoax—or at least if it is, he's being fooled too. He also did a wonderful job of reassuring the populace. Giving concrete details like that lets people know how much they need to panic. Hopefully, very little.”
“So you trust these... Necessarians.”
“Only as far as I can throw them,” she said with a laugh. “But let's get off this depressing topic. I want to talk about you more.”
“Well...” Now that Adam was used to her fangs, they were quite cute. It was hard to resist that smile. “What do you want to know?”
“Where'd you grow up? What's your family like? Your girlfriend? Just whatever you like, I want to hear about.”
Adam knew where this was heading, and he smiled. “I don't have a girlfriend.”
She smiled back, even more broadly than before. “See? I've already learned something good.”
Chapter 11: CONPEDIS
The COMPOSER
The subject was chained down and screaming. The Composer didn't really know why. The subject hadn't even been really tortured yet, but she was already weeping and begging for her life. Seriously, the Composer was almost glad that there wouldn't be a chance to torture her. Took all the fun out of it.
“Please, just let me go, I just want to go home...”
It was ever so tempting to flay her alive—only a little bit, she'd live—but the Composer resisted. Because of willpower. That was the secret to success, really. Prioritize what you needed over what you wanted.
Instead, the Composer whispered a song in the girl's ear. Her weeping slowed, then ceased, as she was caught up in the beauty of the music. After a moment, the Composer stopped singing, but the girl didn't start crying again. The Composer unlocked the chains with a wave of a hand.
The Composer snapped fingers in front of the subject's face and she followed the sound, though she didn't come out of the trance. The Composer carefully waved fingers in front of her face, back and forth, in a simple pattern.
“None of this happened,” the Composer said to her in a gentle voice. “You woke up and decided to go for a walk.”
“I woke up and decided to go for a walk.”
“That's right. Now leave this place and forget it ever existed.”
The new conductor did as she was ordered, leaving my little lair without so much as a word.
The Composer sighed, this time with pleasure. The chorus were the most obvious of the “zombies,” but far from the real threat. Butler and his little gang would chase them around, while the conductors kept everything under control. Until the time was right for the good guys to win, of course. And the Composer had pieces already in play for just that occasion.
Five directors running around, ready to stop a zombie apocalypse. Well, four directors and that idiot Adam. He'd die soon and get replaced by the fifth director. What was she doing? The others had to have contacted her by now. There couldn't have been a mistake...
Bah. It would be easier to just kill them all and start over with a fresh batch, but the Composer had already invested too much effort in these. If only the goal was easier, all this frustrating planning would be unnecessary.
What the Composer needed was to kill something. Run off into the night like a chorus, screaming like a banshee, and just rip through a cafe or something. But that would skew all the results. The directors would hear the screaming, they'd come investigate, so on and so forth. The Composer couldn't risk playing a hand so early in the game. So annoying.
But, such was the curse of responsibility. Greater good and all that.
Heh. Greater good. That wasn't the Composer's goal. Killing things was enough. But, it had been pointed out more than once that killing everything would eventually result in running out of things to kill. So it was better to wait, bide time.
The Composer glanced at the clock. It was five in the morning. The Composer grinned. It was a little ahead of schedule, but why not give those fools a nice wake-up call?
With a finger snap, another conductor that had been created a few days earlier lost all conscious control of her body and began to sing. There weren't that many people around her, but there were a few, and they stopped to listen to the hauntingly beautiful music.
And then, one by one, the song wormed its way into their minds. It became a part of them, carrying with it power and some extra commands. They became chorus, and they began to scream, an endless, emotionless cry that shook the soul.
Five people sleeping soundly in their beds woke up with a jolt.
The Composer grinned.
“And... here... we... go.”
Chapter 12: MORSUS
LING
Ling woke up instantly when she heard the screaming.
One might not have been enough to jolt her out of bed, but it sounded like there were a dozen or more. She couldn't really tell how far away they were, but they were north of AU. Probably still within the campus itself somewhere.
“Akane, wake up.”
“I'm up already,” she said snappishly. Ling guessed she wasn't a morning person. “What time is it?”
“It's...” Ling glanced at the clock glowing over Akane's bed—she couldn't see her own from the angle. “Five in the morning.”
Akane cursed. Loudly.
It only took us a few minutes to get dressed, during which time Laura managed to text that she'd meet them downstairs. Akane chose a pair of really short cut-off jeans that didn't even reach her knees. She probably found it easier to move like that. Ling was just getting her boots on when there was a knock at the door.
Akane was busy putting her hair into a ponytail, fastened with what looked like a strip of leather holding a bunch of white beads. Ling hopped over to the door and opened it to reveal Derek, already dressed and ready to go. He was wearing some kind of leather jacket, probably for extra protection. It looked... good.
“C'mon, we have to hurry,” he said. “I called MC. She said the Necessarians are there, but the screamers are infecting people as we speak.”
Listening closer, he was right—it did sound like there were more than before. That wasn't good.
“Where's Adam?” Ling asked as she headed for the door. She didn't particularly like the guy, but he had guns now.
Derek shook his head. “No idea. While I was in the shower, he left a note saying he was going for a walk, but he never came back. That was before I went to bed.”
“I don't know. All his guns are still here, so I hope he wouldn't be stupid.”
“Laura's waiting for us downstairs,” Ling said before things could get awkward. “Let's shut these guys up so we can get back to sleep.” At least school didn't start 'til Monday.
When the three of them exited the elevator, Laura was already waiting for them, her hair in a ponytail and her gun ready. She was wearing pretty much the same as the rest of them, jeans and a jacket. She tucked away that necklace of hers as they walked up, and they headed off without a word. Once they were actually outside the dorm, they just started running. There were no cabs in AU, so they didn't really have any other choice.
Luckily for them, there wasn't far to go. They found the screamers just outside the Springfield wall, at the northernmost corner of the campus. It quickly became clear that they weren't very good at judging how many there were just by how many they could hear.
There were nearly a hundred.
The Necessarians were trying to keep them contained at this one corner, but they were fighting a losing battle. There were only a couple dozen officers, armed with handguns, and they had to cover the three streets the screamers could flee through. The creatures weren't making any efforts to leave, however. They were focusing their attacks on the shops and cars trapped with them. Sooner or later, they'd run out of victims and start spreading out.
“They're afraid of the guns,” Laura said. “Good. That will keep them contained for the moment. First, we need intel.”
Derek looked around and found the nearest 'sarian who wasn't actually firing her gun at the moment. “Officer, status report.”
She was a vampire with a 'sarian band on her arm. She had a fixer on her left arm, so Ling guessed he figured she had to be relatively clear-headed. The name stitched into the rank patch embroidered onto her left sleeve was 'Drakela Sanguinas,' which was the vampire equivalent of Jane Smith.
She frowned. “Blood and shadow, who are you?”
“Reinforcements. Call MC if you want. Now I need a status report. What can you tell me?”
Sanguinas glanced around. “Look, I'm sure someone else can—”
But Derek wasn't in the mood to pussy-foot around. So he used the tried and true method of getting a soldier to take you seriously. “ATTEN-SHUN!”
“Sir!” She saluted instantly. She caught herself quickly and scowled. “I mean...” She sighed and relaxed a little. “Just under a hundred hostiles. Seem to be screamers, as reported, and show no signs of weapons.”
“What are their powers?”
“I don't know about powers, but they've got huge jaws—I mean like shark big. Most full-anthro kemos don't have jaws like this. And they're using 'em pretty well. Anyone who survives turns into one of them.”
“Ingenious,” Laura said. “The other ones didn't bite unless they had no other choice, limiting how fast the disease spread. But if their power requires biting, then it will force them to use it more often, spreading the virus like wildfire.” She looked up. “If we don't contain this, it will quickly become an epidemic.”
Derek nodded grimly. “Agreed. Laura, stay with the 'sarians, coordinate them. Keep the screamers contained. Ling, Akane and I will go in.” He turned to them. “I'm on point. Ling, rearguard.”
“Wait, hang on,” Ling said. “I'm not willing to just blindly follow your orders—”
“Then stay here,” Akane said bluntly as she followed Derek into the fight.
Ling turned to Laura, and she shrugged. “He probably knows what he's doing.”
Ling sighed and followed Akane.
The 'sarians let up their fire for a few moments, long enough for them to get to the biggest of the shops, a small grocery store. Derek ducked inside first, then waved Akane and Ling through.
“Remember, no killing unless absolutely necessary.”
Akane immediately sheathed her sword, but looked him square in the eye. “Derek, we're outnumbered thirty to one. We can't afford to pull punches.”
He returned her gaze levelly. “These are people—almost certainly curable.”
“We have no proof of that. If you tell me not to kill anyone, I won't, but I don't think we'll survive this fight.”
There was a long, long pause, during which Ling became acutely aware that there was a screamer only ten feet away, behind one of the shelves and out of sight. At least the damn things were loud.
Finally, Derek looked away. “Fine. But we should take at least one alive for Butler and Clarke.”
Akane drew her sword again. “Agreed. Now, what's the plan?”
“First, Ling needs to block the door.”
Ling started. She had been kinda focused on the screamers searching for them. “With what? A cart of fruit?”
“With your powers.”
Oh. Right. Those. She ignored the pointed looks they gave her and concentrated on the entrance. With effort, she could feel the glass of the doors, the metal frames, and even the linoleum tiles. Several tiles were ripped and torn, exposing bare concrete, something she could actually control. She closed her eyes, touched the concrete with one hand, and with a great grunt of effort, lifted it.
It broke through the tiles quickly, flowing upwards like a tree growing at lightning speed. The doors shattered almost instantly, and the frames screeched as they were pushed aside. She finally stopped when the wall kissed the ceiling.
She nearly collapsed. She was completely exhausted, like she had just run a marathon. The wall was half a foot thick, ten feet wide and about as tall. She could already feel her reservoir replenishing, but that would take a minute.
That was when the screamers struck.
She should have expected it. They were loud, but even if they didn't hear it, her little display shook the entire building. The two dozen or so in the store swarmed in like a flash flood.
The vampire's words about the screamers having shark jaws proved to be inaccurate. Their jaws were huge, yes, absolutely massive. But they were also clearly human, just heavily exaggerated. Human teeth and jaws triple their normal size, but Ling could still identify molars and incisors and all those others she forgot the names for. There were more than a few fangs too, of course. The vampires who forgot to get their shopping done before daybreak were turned as well.
Shark, human, vampire or mosquito—it didn't matter. They were coming in a rush, and she was unarmed.
But Derek quickly threw himself in front of her, bolstering the defense with a large half-dome, like a big blue plastic shield leaking glowing azure mist. She couldn't see Akane at first, but then one of the screamers collapsed as its head was severed from its body. Akane reappeared nearby, breathing heavily as she waited for her own reservoir to fill.
Another screamer leaped at her, but she was hardly defenseless. She slashed it vertically, causing it to scream in pain and flinch back, before taking advantage of the opening to remove its head. Blood fountained from the wound, dousing her in red.
“Akane!” Derek shouted. He expanded his shield suddenly, pushing the screamers back, before letting it fade and rushing to her side while they were disoriented. Ling followed.
“I'm fine, I'm not turning,” Akane said. “We need to move.”
They fled as quietly as we could—not that it mattered, with those things screaming—to the opposite corner of the store, dodging zombies as much as possible. They ended up in the frozen food section, behind the meat counter, which somehow felt safe.
“Don't let them bite you,” Derek said. “We still don't know if we're immune.”
Akane looked down at herself, soaked nearly head to toe in blood. “Uh...”
“He was technically dead before the blood touched you, so that's not quite proof.” Before they could argue, he held up his hands in a placating gesture. “I know, I know, it's probably fine, but we need to be cautious. Ling, are you ready?”
She placed her hands on
the ground and took a deep breath. She felt the concrete again, and with a grunt of concentration pulled it up, shaping it around her hands and forearms like boxing gloves. They were heavy, about two pounds each, but she could use my ability to help lift them. Besides, she had a few buffs and some training, so she was strong for my size.
She nodded to Derek. “I'm ready.”
“All right then. Akane, you go right. Ling, you go left. Neutralize them all.” Akane gave him a level stare. Derek glared right back. “Neutralize them all. If you have to kill them to do it, then fine.” Ling didn't say anything, but she knew she didn't have the skills to fight these things and hold back. “I'm going to try and capture one.”
He pulled something out of his waistband—a long rope, wrapped around his waist. He uncoiled it quickly.
“Where'd you get that?” Ling asked. It looked like silk.
“Last night I called MC for it,” he said. “A 'sarian courier was already delivering some ammo for Adam, so it was no big deal.” He paused. “Which reminds me: There's a chance Adam is here, infected. Don't kill him. Go.”
Akane sprung forward, and Ling followed only a heartbeat behind. She heard the screams from Akane's direction change pitch, going from an emotionless background noise to the true cries of rage and fear.
But Ling didn't have time for her. She had her own things to worry about.
She wasn't as experienced a fighter as Akane or Derek, so she had to just go all out. She punched one of the screamers full in the face, with all the weight of the stone behind it, which worked pretty well. Its face imploded with a sickening crunch.
She wasn't ready for the next one. It leaped past her kill before she had a chance to recover from her swing, and tried to strike from her left side.
Ling brought up her hand to block, but it just bit down with its giant maw. Bit down on a stone glove. It took out a huge chunk, and she could feel air on her fingers.
She yelped and stepped back, but nearly tripped on some spilled cans. How did you fight something that could bite through stone?
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