Eric Brown - Season of Rot

“No!” Michelle screamed and launched herself at the monster. It gawked in surprise as she crashed into it and sent it careening over the side of the stairs. Even before its body had crashed into the floor below, Kyle was dragging Michelle toward the hole in the wall. “Run!”

As he darted into the tunnel and saw Brook sprinting down the passageway into the distance, he dropped a time-delayed grenade onto the ground behind him. He ran on at full speed, dragging Michelle by the hand until the force of the blast hit them and sent them rolling into the dirt. When the dust cleared, they saw that the hole into the stairwell had collapsed, but they could hear the Rat King clawing at the pile of debris that separated them. Kyle got up and yanked Michelle to her feet.

“What do we do now?” she asked.

“We keep running.” Kyle smiled and sprinted after Brook.

Kyle sat at his desk. The world had ended but the paperwork went on. His superiors wanted a full report on his trip to America.

He sighed and got up, letting the work wait. He poured himself a glass of wine from the office’s bar and looked out his window into the streets of London. War raged between the military and the dead, but Britain was holding. A tank made its way down the street, surrounded by a squad of heavily armed men in black, and he watched absentmindedly, reaching up to trace the scar on his cheek that Michelle had given him. He regretted that he’d been forced to put a bullet in her skull when she’d learned of the steps he’d taken to ensure their escape from the base. He’d longed to feel her wet lips around him at least once, but Brook’s lean, tan body had charms of its own, and Brook, unlike Michelle, had been able to grasp that sometimes sacrifices needed to be made for the greater good.

And she was grateful, very grateful in fact, to have a roof over her head and a warm bed to sleep in. He smirked. His job did have its perks.

He returned to his desk and picked up his pen. He’d stood face to face with the new ruler of America and had seen him badly wounded. The demons could be hurt. They weren’t immortal like the legends had hinted at. They bled and could be taken out like any mortal foe.

There was hope in the world as long as Britain stood, and when it finished securing its borders and rose up from the ashes of the dead, it would be men like Kyle who would show the evil unleashed upon the earth that mankind could fight dirty too.

Published by Permuted Press at Smashwords.

Copyright 2009 Eric S. Brown

www.PermutedPress.com