Ex-Heroes

by Peter Clines

  The broken giant looked up at her. “He meant something to you, eh?”

  “Yes,” growled the battlesuit.

  “Ahhh.” What was left of Rodney’s face split in an evil, cracked grin. “Sucks to be you.”

  Cerberus grabbed his skull in her steel fingers and twisted. There was the sound of a tree trunk splitting, an ice shelf cracking, and the battlesuit tore the giant’s head loose. She gouged out the one good eye, pulled back her arm, and sent the hunk of bone and flesh hurling into the sky.

  The huge, headless body toppled to the ground a dozen or so feet from Gorgon.

  And then...

  * * * *

  Things went mad.

  Screams echoed across the broad intersection as the dead turned on their former allies. Exes swarmed over the Seventeens and the gangbangers vanished under scores of teeth and grasping hands. Some were caught off guard. Others went down fighting.

  The entrance to the Mount had shifted from assault to feeding frenzy. The exes weren’t focused or guided. They were just killing. Their teeth chattered like a tap school for the insane.

  A truck lurched to a halt on the cobblestone driveway and Stealth smashed the butt of her pistol across the driver’s head. She dragged him from the cab and threw him at the gate. The guards grabbed the dazed Seventeen and dragged him through the opening. A dead man with a mohawk grabbed at his legs, but the cloaked woman shattered the ex’s skull with a baton slash.

  One of the Seventeens’ other trucks roared to life and plowed through the mob. Gangers clawed their way into the bed. More than one was pulled back by dead fingers. An old man with white hair and bloody teeth attacked a woman with dozens of braids. A gray-skinned Latina sank her teeth into a tattooed man.

  The guards drove back the dead and fought the gate shut. Bodies clogged the opening. Some were struggling to get in, others were dragging them back.

  Cerberus looked back at Gorgon’s body, twisted and sprawled on the pavement, and saw a Seventeen swinging his rifle like a club at everything that moved. The boy was sixteen at the most, alone, and he was close to breaking. He was surrounded by hungry dead things.

  Another truck turned and fled. It was all but empty. People shouted and waved and were ignored.

  Cerberus reached out and grabbed the boy, hefting him up onto her shoulders. He shrieked and flailed until he realized he was safe. The battlesuit took four steps toward the gate, batting exes aside like flies, and pulled another Seventeen from the mob.

  And then...

  * * * *

  St. George dropped out of the sky, leaving a trail of flames in the air behind him. He arced across the road until he was before the Melrose gate. The hero pushed down, forcing gravity to its knees and demanding it obey him.

  And gravity, after a brief struggle, acknowledged his superiority.

  St. George, the Mighty Dragon, hovered in mid-air over the intersection, floating above the mob. The tattered remains of his coat fluttered behind him. Smoke curled from his mouth and nose and wreathed his skull like a dark halo. Held out at arm’s length was the prize he’d plucked in mid-air.

  Rodney’s head.

  “THIS WAR IS OVER!”

  His voice echoed across the street, over the chattering, and flames sparked in his mouth. He held up the severed head for everyone to see, then threw it down into the hordes. Exes staggered after the ball of flesh and bone.

  “Anyone not wearing a green bandanna or scarf is welcome to take shelter inside the Mount,” he shouted. “I wish the rest of you the best of luck making it back to your compound.”

  Below him, the horde of living dead continued to rip and tear and claw at the Seventeens. The clacking of teeth drowned out most of their screams. Some of them fought their way into the remaining trucks. Many more were dragged back out and torn to shreds.

  Close to the wall, a bald man with a mustache smacked an ex away with a baseball bat. Then he reached up, tore the green cloth from his arm, and ran for the gate. The woman next to him did the same with the bandanna holding her dark hair.

  Guards on the wall set down covering fire where they could. Dozens of Seventeens battered their way to the gate, tearing off do-rags and patches. Cerberus knocked exes left and right as she marched across the cobblestone driveway.

  St. George drifted above the crowd until he reached the gate. He settled to the ground and hurled the walking dead away like dolls. A baker’s dozen of Seventeens stumbled past him and through the narrow gap of the gate.

  The hero slammed his fist against one last ex, a skinny man in a filthy Santa Claus suit, and sent it hurling back. He took three steps back and the gate shut with a clang. Cerberus braced a broad foot and three-fingered hand against the struts and gave Derek a quick nod. “I’ve got it,” she said. “Go find another lock-bar.”

  Stealth had over a hundred Seventeens on their knees by the guard shack, fingers laced behind their heads. Ten or twenty of them were sobbing. So were a few of the gate guards.

  Katie took a few deep breaths and looked up at St. George. “Am I wrong,” she gasped, “or did we just live through that?”

  THEN

  St. George Kills the Mighty Dragon

  The cape was tattered, but I’d gotten used to it. Having it gradually fall apart ended up working like training wheels. It was shredded but I could fly better than ever. The next time I went out I was just going to trash it. To be honest, most of my Dragon costume was ruined. Runs, pockmarks, things smeared into it that were never going to come out.

  Stealth had asked to meet me at sundown on top of the Kodak Theatre at Hollywood and Highland. It was a landmark. They held the Academy Awards here. Beneath me was a huge scrolling screen that had been blank for two and a half months. Kitty-cornered across the street, a fiberglass tyrannosaurus smashed through a building facade with a clock in its mouth. I had a certain sympathy for the thing that should’ve given up and gone extinct but kept fighting.

  This used to be one of the busiest intersections in the city. LA’s version of Times Square. Now it was the site of a seven-car pileup and the scorched wrecks of two National Guard HumVees. Highland was a vehicle graveyard as far as you could see in either direction. In at least a third of the cars things were clawing at the windshields. I could see another three hundred or so exes wandering between the metal corpses.

  You have to kill them faster than they’re killing you. That was the lesson we’d learned too late. Every person they kill comes back on their side. If they kill one and you kill one, your numbers have gone down and theirs have stayed the same. Zombies are like credit card payments. If you keep getting rid of the minimum amount, you’ll never win.

  And we weren’t winning. No other way to look at it. I was sleeping three hours a night and still wasn’t making any headway. Banzai was dead. Blockbuster was dead. Cairax was dead. Regenerator was crippled and powerless. Despite dozens of emergency bulletins and training seminars, the number of exes was still growing. It was almost inevitable.

  The sun brushed the horizon.

  “Thank you for meeting me.”

  Stealth stood a dozen or so feet behind me. As usual. God, she was hot.

  “Well, it was this or use the time to eat a meal,” I said. She didn’t laugh, so I coughed and tried to brush past it. “What’s up?”

  “You are no longer hiding your identity?”

  I looked at the black and green mask in my hand. The face of the Mighty Dragon. “Well, as I see it, it’s moot either way. I’m pretty sure you already know who I am. Probably where I live and how I voted in the past three elections. As for everyone else...” I threw another look out at the darkened metropolis and shrugged. “I don’t think there are enough people left to make a secret identity worth the effort.”

  She nodded. “I would like to discuss our options, George.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Her hips were like a beautiful pendulum beneath the camo-cloak as she walked to stand next to me. We looked out at the dying c
ity. “Los Angeles has been lost.”

  As much as I knew it, no one had said it yet. We were still fighting, still holding blocks and stations. Cerberus fought her way over the hill with half a rifle platoon of Marines and cleaned out a good length of Sunset Boulevard in the process. Gorgon was keeping the base at Hollywood and Cahuenga safe, using survivors as batteries to keep his strength up. Zzzap was still trying to split time between four different cities.

  “Yeah,” I said. “I know.”

  “With that understood,” she said, “I believe our energies are now best spent preparing for a prolonged siege. I have a secure area where we can protect a number of people. Certain preparations have already been made.”

  “Isn’t there some sort of government plan we should be following? They must have something worked out.”

  She shook her head. “The State of California and the CDC each had three possible contingency plans for a major Los Angeles viral outbreak. All six have been rendered impossible either from lack of resources or because the outbreak has spread past the established containment parameters. Under ideal circumstances, their only option at this point is sterilization.”

  It took a moment for that to sink in. “Wait... you’re talking about, what, they’re going to nuke the city or something?”

  The hooded woman nodded. “That is the CDC’s fallback position for an epidemic this virulent and dangerous. However, the disease is already too widespread. Destroying every city in the country would not eliminate it, and there are not enough pilots left to perform the number of required missions.’

  “So... what are they going to do?”

  “CDC in Atlanta stopped responding to queries seventeen hours ago. Zzzap has investigated and can see no signs of life from their command building. He believes it has been overrun or abandoned.”

  “Abandoned?”

  “Air Force One has gone to radio silence. The governor is missing and his mansion has been destroyed by rioters. We are operating on our own.”

  “Jesus.” I heard something click on the rooftop and realized I’d dropped my mask. She kept talking in the same calm voice, as if the end of the world was something she dealt with all the time.

  “There are still thousands of survivors scattered across the city. People who have endured in fortified buildings or complexes. Individuals, families, and in a few places I have seen groups of several dozen. Our first priority will be to assess these survivors and gather them to a single, secure location.”

  “What were you thinking?”

  She pointed southeast. “You are familiar with Paramount Studios?”

  “Yeah, of course.”

  “Just under thirty acres of area. Five major entrances, two minor, all easily sealed. Two underground tunnels. The walls are eight feet at their shortest point, in the northeast corner, and are topped by outward-curving spikes. It is an ideal fortress.”

  I tried to picture the big, wrought-iron gates. “Couldn’t you say that about most of the studios? I think Universal City is bigger.”

  She shook her head. “I have made several observations and believe Paramount has the best combination of existing resources, defensibility, and long-term potential.”

  “And where do we fit in?”

  “There will be rogue elements inside and out. We shall serve as protectors and wardens until some system of government can be reinstated.”

  “You and me?”

  “All of us who are left here in Los Angeles. Myself, you, Gorgon, Zzzap, Midknight, Cerber--”

  “Midknight’s dead.”

  She twitched. “What?”

  “Yesterday. You didn’t know? He was overwhelmed at one of the checkpoints near the Hollywood Bowl.” I scratched the back of my neck. “He’s already walking again.”

  “I see.”

  “Thought you didn’t make mistakes?”

  “Everyone makes mistakes. I merely make far fewer than most.”

  “To be honest, I was surprised he made it this long. His power was kind of defensive, you know? Not much good against exes.”

  “You disposed of him?”

  I shrugged and made a fist around my hair. It was getting long in the back. On the ground, my mask stared up at me. I knew I wouldn’t be picking it up. The Mighty Dragon, dead on the roof of the Kodak Theater. Another ex-hero.

  “I took him up into Griffith Park,” I told her. “That’s where I’ve been dropping our people if they turn.”

  “He is dangerous if his powers are still active.”

  “They are,” I said. “He probably is.” I looked back out over the dead metropolis and let a few streamers of smoke thread their way out of my nose.

  “George?”

  “I had to put down Blockbuster last week, you know. I was the only one strong enough to break his neck.”

  “He was doing a phenomenal amount of property damage as an ex,” she said. “He walked straight through seven blocks of Beverly Hills. Over forty-three structures were leveled.”

  The day was almost gone. The sky was burning up, and shadows stretched across the city. I hadn’t watched a sunset in over a year.

  “It’s been a very long summer,” I said. “I didn’t feel like killing anyone else I knew. If you like, I can take you up where I dropped him and you can do it. He’ll be easy to find.”

  She didn’t respond, and for a moment I thought she’d vanished again. “That will not be necessary,” she said.

  “Good.” I looked her in the face. “So, what’s your plan to save Los Angeles?”

  “You are a symbol among heroes and civilians alike. They will all accept your recommendations and follow where you lead. We can begin to contact survivors and guide them to the Mount.”

  “The Mount?”

  “A simple abbreviation. It conveys a sense of stability and defense rather than reminding them of the illusions film creates.”

  “Good point.”

  “I believe we can have the majority of the city’s survivors there in four to six weeks. With a few simple questions and reviews, we should be able to create a balanced and optimum population. Doctors, teachers, engineers, and others who will have the most long-term usefulness. I believe we can then prepare--”

  “No.”

  She twitched again. “What?”

  “No.” It was a moment of clarity. One of the first ones I’d had in several weeks of hard decisions and acceptable losses. “If we do this, if you want my help with it, it isn’t some stupid selection process where we pick and choose a few hundred who we decide are worth it. We just save everyone we can.”

  “The studio lot cannot support thousands of people.”

  “Not as it is, no. But we could adapt more of the buildings to housing, plant gardens, do things to make it work. I won’t be part of a plan that involves leaving most people outside to fend for themselves.”

  “A limited selection is our best hope for survival.”

  “If that’s our best hope then we shouldn’t survive.”

  Her head shifted ever-so-slightly. I had enough female friends to recognize the gaze I was getting.

  “Look,” I said, “this is going to sound really stupid, but you have to understand something.” I passed my hand across the red-scaled suit. It was stained and fraying but it still glimmered in the fading sunlight. “You called me a symbol, and you’re right. This suit stands for something. It isn’t me living some childhood fantasy or anything like that. It’s about hope.”

  “Hope?”

  I took in a deep breath, and smoke twisted around my head as I let it slip through my teeth. “Do you know what my favorite show was when I was a little kid?”

  The look again. “I would have no idea.”

  “Doctor Who. British sci-fi show.”

  “I am familiar with it. Christopher Eccleston, David Tennant, and Matt—“

  “No,” I said. “The new show’s great, but I grew up on the old one. The low-budget, rubber monster show with Tom Baker and Peter Davison. I wa
tched it on PBS all the time as a kid.”

  I looked out at the dark ruins of Hollywood, at the stumbling shadows dotting the streets as far as you could see. The only other living person within half a mile was standing behind me, her eyes boring into my head.

  “The Doctor didn’t have super-powers or weapons or anything like that. He was just a really smart guy who always tried to do the right thing. To help people, no matter what. That struck me when I was a kid. The idea that no matter how cold and callous and heartless the world seemed, there was somebody out there who just wanted to make life better. Not better for worlds or countries in some vague way. Just better for people trying to live their lives, even if they didn’t know about him.”

  I turned back to her and tapped my chest. “That’s what this suit’s always been about. Not scaring people like you or Gorgon do. Not some sort of pseudo-sexual roleplay or repressed emotions. I wear this thing, all these bright colors, because I want people to know someone’s trying to make their lives better. I want to give them hope.”

  She was quiet for a long time. “I see.”

  “Good. Because I won’t let you do what you’re talking about doing. I’m not going to cherry-pick people who you think will be ‘useful’ and leave everyone else to die.”

  She stared at me for a long moment. I could feel her eyes even through the mask. Then she nodded. “If you feel this is the right path, I shall trust your judgment.”

  I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding and nodded back.

  “It will require more work,” she said, “but we should be able to rescue the majority of the survivors.”

  “Thank you.”

  “As I was saying before, with your reassurances we should be able to gather the majority of the survivors to the Mount within four to six weeks. That number should hold even with the expanded scope of this venture.”

  “How can we promise them it’ll be safe?”

  “You and Cerberus can reinforce the entrances.”

  “With what?”