Chapter 36: Decay

His breath fogged up against the window as he leaned in close to peer through the rain of soot. The uppermost part of it ajar, so as to let him shoot without obstruction. 

I pressed my cheek against the wand and magnified my vision. His patchwork grin came into view, most of his figure was obscured by the blowing curtain, but I immediately recognised him. 

It was the cook. 

Good cooking was the only amenity missing in the amphitheatre. It hurt to know that the traitors were eating good food. I would much have preferred staying blissfully unaware, just assuming he died in the ambush. 

Just the thought of the traitorous bastards muching away at great food while we made do with what little remained of a society long dead made me boil inside. Thankfully this gave me an opportunity to rectify fate’s misstep. 

No matter. You will burn just the same as a man who can’t cook, I mused and gritted my teeth. 

His eyes were glued to the can drowning the streets in a dark cloud. Only when the booming explosion of my wand rang out did his eyes widen in understanding. Through the magnification it felt as if he stared straight into my eyes. 

The flames engulfed him just as he understood what was happening. His pained scream rolled across the city like a tidal wave. He burst through the window with thrashing arms, his upper body entangled in the large, blue curtain. 

He clawed to get it off, but fell to the ground before he could, smoke seeping out from under the cloth. The layer of soot sailed down to the ground and painted the scene black, like the outlines of a body on a crime scene. 

Below, the woman threw away all notions of sneaking. She thundered forth, still obscured by the thin roof. 

I holstered the wand and grabbed the misericord in a reversed grip, trying as best as I could to ascertain exactly where she was. The more I moved, the more she would know. 

She still doesn’t know where I am exactly. I have the upper hand if I just wait for her to approach. Now I just need to figure out how the fuck to strike her down with the roof separating us.

I subconsciously held my breath. With a loud rip, the sharp blade of a rusty axe tore through the sheet metal as if it was paper. The woman accompanied the ripping noise with a high pitched scream. “You squander his gifts!”

I stepped back for good measure. The blade was metres away from me, she wouldn’t be hurting me like this, but I had no way of hurting her either. My dagger wasn’t nearly long enough. And the bullets didn’t penetrate surfaces. 

Out the corner of my eye, the figure of the cook crept up to his hands and knees. I clicked my tongue and unholstered the wand, loaded it, and fired another shot at him. The woman’s scream grew into a frantic wail as she tore through the roof. She was getting closer, but still far away. 

The curtain roared ablaze, the cook’s masked figure shuddered inside, then slowly fell back to the ground. This time he wouldn’t be getting up, he couldn’t. I grit my teeth. The sour taste of slaying your own never quite washed away. At least I hadn’t needed to get in close. I feared what I would feel if I had to stab another human.

The woman squealed and banged against the roof. “I’ll make you suffer!” 

“Oh, will you now?” I scoffed and slid my feet away. Distancing myself from her haphazard cuts. 

“I knew there was something off about you from the start, you fucking mutt!” 

What’s with this mutt talk?! I’ll have you know I’m from a good family! Apparently much better than I ever gave them credit for.

She silently kept beating against the roof, it dented and bent wherever she went, creating small holes that let me peer inside. Sadly none presented me with the gift of seeing her face. 

“You think that’s going to scare me?” I sneered.

She chuckled. “I do not.” 

As my lips parted to ask why she kept banging then, something clattered to my side. I whirled around with my wand at the ready, muzzle pointing toward the noise.

Is that a fucking…? 

In the split second before the little ball turned into a large ball of exploding flames, the arms adorning my armour pulled me into a tight, constricting embrace. My breathing grew laboured and rough. The explosion sent my body barrelling through the air, bouncing against the roof, leaving deep indentations wherever I smashed. The polished stone of a chimney cracked as I slammed into it.

I panted. “A fucking grenade...” 

On the bright side, I got to test out Skin stitching for the first time. Although I had no idea what had warranted the change. I sure as shit hadn’t injected it with magic. It must have been Sera. 

I glanced down at my body. I was bleeding, sharp splinters of the metallic casing riddled the unarmored parts of my body with small holes. I groaned and climbed to my feet, shoulders sagging, wand held in one hand with the other pressed against the chimney that stopped my flight. Pain wracked my body, the sensation grew more familiar with each day. Soon I feared it would be the same as having my morning coffee. I really didn’t want to turn into a masochist, but man was a beast of habit.

“You still alive?” the woman shouted, her voice seeping through the small holes in the roof. 

I clicked my tongue, not loud enough for her to hear. As if. 

The arms around me loosened, and let me regain my mobility once more. 

“Pay attention,” Sera whispered. I don’t know where her voice came from, I didn’t really care enough to look around. She must have been the reason the armour constricted, I was thankful for it, but I had more pressing matters at hand.

“Any idea where they could be?” I whispered back. 

“No. Keep focusing. Listen.” 

That’s all I’ve been fucking doing. 

Below, the noisy woman kept banging her weapon against the floor. “Helloo? That didn’t kill you, did it?” she twittered, trying to provoke me, but I stayed silent. 

The smell of burnt flesh still wafted up from the street below. I didn’t even have to look to conclude that the cook was burned to a crisp. 

With steps light as a feather I crept toward the blast zone of the grenade. The blast left a hole there, large enough to squeeze inside the building. I glanced inside. There was no one below. No matter how I tried to angle myself I couldn’t seem to catch a glimpse of the woman. If I wanted to have a shot at her, I would have to go inside. 

But that came with its own set of problems. Namely that I’d be forced to fight in close range. 

After weighing my options, I nodded to myself. That sure as shit beats the alternative of suffering through another explosion.

“Fuck it,” I whispered. “We live and we die.”

I lowered the dagger down to the floor with a string. The crystal’s light shone through the hole onto it, revealing Sera’s exaggerated nod. She was telling me to come on down. I hugged the wand tight to my body, like a pharaoh, and jumped down. 

The sound of my feet striking against the floor bounced against the walls like a ping pong ball. I picked up the dagger, and tried to take in the surroundings. 

“Well, well, well,” the woman theatrically said. “Awfully brave of you, Mutt.” 

The sound of her weapon dragging against the wall screamed through the hall, drowning out even her voice. There was no way of telling where she was. 

Open doors lined both sides of the corridor. I pressed my back to the wall in the far end and aimed my wand down the length of the corridor. 

“Seeing as you wouldn’t come to greet me I figured this would be best,” I snarked in hopes of evoking a response. The sound of my voice died.

She said nothing. 

The scratching sound of metal against stone faded, leaving only the sound of my wildly beating heart to accompany me.

I nervously glanced inside the doors to both sides of me, swallowed, and snuck inside the one to the right. Inside, crude hospital beds stood lined up in neat rows, with curtains creating small rectangles of false privacy. 

The room smelled awfully sweet and stuffy, forcing me to fight down a rush of bile, but I held it in. A 

I held the wand with one hand, and the dagger with the other. The barrel swayed unsteadily in front of me. Normally accuracy meant everything with my limited ammunition. But here and now I didn’t need accuracy, I needed options, and the dagger gave me just that. 

As I pulled the curtain of the closest cubicle to the side, a horrid smell washed over me. The reason for the smell suddenly apparent. 

A decomposed body lay on the bed, one arm hanging toward the ground. Its skin was blackened, pieces of it oozed with yellow pus. I thanked whoever put it there that they left a towel to cover its face.

“What the fuck,” I muttered and jerked back with my sleeve covering my mouth. The sour taste of stomach acid rushed against my palate. I pressed it back inside with tear filled eyes and breathed.

Then her steps sounded out again—close. 

Get your fucking head in the game, Cal! 

I whipped around, just in time to see her shadow flitter past the door I just came through. With a dash, I burst out into the corridor. 

It was empty. 

I sucked my teeth. She was playing cat and mouse with me. I’d come inside to hunt her, yet I was the one being hunted. Another cruel twist of fate. I had no one but myself to blame for it. There was no time for me to go meandering around, looking inside the cubicles. This was a fight to the death, and I was losing.

I ground my teeth, “Come out you fucking bitch.”

To my side, movement rustled. She pounced at me from the same door I just burst through, her axe swinging through the air with a sharp whistle. 

I threw myself to the ground just in time to avoid the blade. It sang with a high pitched scream as it cleaved through the air above me. A few strands of my hair sailed leisurely through the air above as the axe sank deep into the concrete wall.

With hands clammy from sweat I pointed the wand at her and fired. Her eyes were fixed to mine, the same flames of madness as the stumblers’ burning within. She was too busy trying to dislodge the axe to shield herself. Still, she wore a wicked smile on her lips.

Her hair fluttered as she tilted her head, letting the bullet swish past without so much as leaving a scratch. It smashed into the ceiling burst into flames, setting the top of her head aflame. I fumbled the dagger and stabbed at her just as the axe dislodged. She hissed and bounced away, leaving my dagger to strike nothing but air. 

I scrambled to my feet, breath ragged. “You like that?! I’ve got plenty more where that’s from.” The sound of her footsteps grew quiet. I swallowed dryly.

The wand clicked satisfyingly as I loaded another shell. The sound of ammunition being chambered made me calm. All threats seemed lesser when you had a loaded rifle at your side.

The smell of burnt hair intermixed with the sweet smell of decaying bodies. I raised the wand in one hand and walked through the next door. Things were much like they had been in the first room, except here all the curtains were pulled shut. 

Fuck me… That’s a lot of hiding places. 

I steeled myself and began clearing the cubicles much like I had the first one. I used the barrel of my wand to pull the curtains aside, one by one. It was a happy surprise that there wasn’t a dead body in every bed—only most. 

I pulled a curtain to the side, another body lay within. The sight of them was nothing I’d ever forget. Decomposing, oozing with pus and smelly. I swallowed a rush of bile and noticed a small detail. This one had the towel over its face uncovered. Its eyes were scooped out. 

I shuddered, then grew stiff. 

They’re decomposing? This place was supposed to have been empty for years on end. All bodies should have decomposed long ago. I glanced back at the closest corpse. There wasn’t much to go on, his chest was bare, and his pants so soaked in blood that I couldn’t make out the material. But the shoes. The shoes were unmistakably sneakers from earth.