Peter Clines - Ex-Communication

Then Cairax reached up and wrapped its spidery fingers around Freedom’s arm. The demon twisted the huge pistol up and away. The captain held on to the spike for a moment with a steel-like grip, but the demon tore him away. It pulled Freedom off its back.

Freedom dangled by his arm for a moment, then lashed out with a kick that cracked two of the demon’s teeth. He pulled his boot back and lashed out again with his heel. It connected, but the demon pulled him away, holding him at arm’s length.

Cairax’s wounds were already healing, bubbling shut. New teeth pushed up through its gums to replace the broken ones. “Tell me, bright little soul,” it said, “how does it feel to fail yet again?”

“I’m with the U.S. Army,” snarled Freedom. “We don’t know how to—”

The demon slammed the huge officer into the ground and flung him away. Freedom smashed into the charred remains of a bus and tumbled to the pavement next to the glassy crater. He didn’t move.

Then Cairax turned and glared up at Zzzap. Cold flames boiled out of its eyes. “This game bores me, little cripple. It is time to end it.”

“Oh, God,” said Madelyn as Freedom crashed into the ground.

“Get back,” St. George told her. He thrashed at his bonds again.

“Hold on,” she said. “I’m going to try cutting them with the swor—”

“No, get back!”

Madelyn looked up and saw Max racing at them with Stealth right behind him. The dead girl twisted to get behind St. George, but the sorcerer had her by the wrist. She swung around and punched Max in the nose. He snarled and wrenched her arm back behind her. Madelyn fought but he grabbed her other shoulder and dragged her around to block Stealth.

“Back off,” he snapped. His tattooed hand came up and he pressed his palm against her throat. Two of his fingers curled under his hand to touch her collarbone.

Stealth halted a few yards from him. Momentum carried her cape forward to wrap around her and swipe at Madelyn’s legs.

“I’ll break her neck,” said Max. “Internal decapitation. You’re fast, but I can sever her spine in half a dozen places before you reach me. She’ll be an undead quadriplegic.”

Madelyn tried to twist away but he pushed her arm up even farther behind her back. It was a sharp pain that made her dead nerves spike into life.

Stealth’s batons spun in her hands and collapsed. She slotted them back into their holsters. Another flick of her wrists and the Glocks were back in her hands.

Max put pressure on Madelyn’s arm and placed himself a bit more behind her. “You have no idea how desperate I am,” he said. “Don’t try anything.”

The cloaked woman’s fingers moved between her pistols and her belt as she exchanged spent magazines for fresh ones. She did each weapon one-handed. It was the quick, effortless motion of someone who’d practiced something thousands of times and then done it a thousand more. She never looked away from him.

“Let her go, Max,” shouted St. George.

“Drop the guns and step away,” the sorcerer told Stealth. “I’m counting to three, and if you haven’t I’m going to—”

Her left pistol came up and shot Madelyn three times in the chest. The dead girl’s eyes went wide. So did Max’s.

“What the hell?!” shouted St. George.

Max let go of Madelyn and staggered back. Blood stained the front of his shirt. He tried to speak and coughed up a few dark red drops.

“She was already dead,” said Stealth.

Madelyn wheezed twice and reached up to touch her chest. “Okay,” she squeaked, “that felt really weird.” Air whistled out of the holes in her shirt when she spoke. She poked a finger at one of them.

Stealth stepped past the dead girl and swept Max’s wobbly legs out from under him. He hit the pavement and coughed up more blood. She reached down, pushed his arms out of the way, and pistol-whipped him across the jaw. One of his teeth skittered across the pavement and he slumped.

The cords holding St. George turned to liquid. He hit the ground as they splashed on the street. He shook his wrists and took a few awkward steps. “You okay?”

Madelyn looked up from her bloodless wounds. “Yeah,” she beamed. “Try telling me this isn’t a superpower.”

He looked at the cloaked woman. “Kind of risky.”

“Not at all,” said Stealth. “His abilities are most likely some form of psychic projection. It stood to reason their effects would cease if he lost consciousness.”

“Yeah,” said St. George. “About that …”

The clicking of teeth rose up over the sound of Zzzap’s superheated energy bolts. Hundreds of exes shuffled across the line of Max’s barriers. Their jaws snapped open and shut as they headed toward the heroes.

CAPTAIN FREEDOM SATup and felt something flare in his side. A broken rib, maybe two. Fractured at the very least. He’d had enough of them over his career to know the feeling.

The sky flared with blue lightning and he heard the clicking of teeth beneath the rumble of thunder. Whatever had been keeping the exes off this city block had vanished, and now they were shambling toward him. Out of the corner of his eye he saw some of them stumble toward the demon. Cairax was swatting Zzzap and didn’t seem to notice.

Freedom risked a glance behind him past the glassy crater. Stealth and Madelyn had St. George free. The sorcerer was down. They were about ninety seconds from being overrun with exes themselves.

Lady Liberty had maybe five or six rounds left in her, plus one drum on his belt. He didn’t want to waste the ammunition on the undead, but he also wasn’t sure how much longer he’d need to hold off the demon.

The first of the exes closed in on him. It was a noseless man in a gore-splattered lab coat, a former doctor or scientist. Then Freedom saw the grocery store name tag and realized the dead man had been a butcher. The ex reached for him and he grabbed both its wrists in one hand. It bent its jaws to his knuckles and he cracked its forehead with one punch. He swung the withered body around and hurled it at Cairax Murrain.

The demon was still looking in his direction, even while fighting Zzzap. The knife-like talons lashed out and caught the corpse in midair, slicing it in half.

Freedom looked at the approaching wave of undead. The cracked ribs flared as he turned. His legs flexed and he hurled himself away from the crater.

As he landed a dozen exes reached the edge where he’d been. They tumbled in. The first few hit the glassy floor with the loud cracks of breaking jaws and noses. The dead made no attempt to break their fall. Some of them crawled away before the second wave fell on top of them, but not many. In a minute the pit had become a mass of undead limbs and chattering teeth.

Three other exes reached Freedom. He lashed out with his massive fists, breaking teeth and skulls and glad for his Kevlar gloves. The zombies dropped around him, but there was a small pack of six or seven headed his way. Two of them wore bloodstained police vests, even though only one was wearing a uniform.

There was another hiss of superheated air from off to his left. Cairax Murrain was saying something to Zzzap, but Freedom couldn’t understand it over the sounds of shuffling feet, clicking teeth, and sizzling pavement. He glanced right and saw St. George scoop up the sorcerer’s body.

Freedom pulled out Lady Liberty and fired off two bursts at the pack of exes, emptying the drum. He aimed low. The shells blew out knees and shattered shins. Four of the zombies collapsed, and two more fell on top of them. It gave him a few moments, but there were still more coming.