“Run,” Clay said.

  Colt didn’t argue. They bolted.

  Colt’s boots pounded dirt. He looked back once. The horde shambled after them, slow but steady. Arms reaching. Mouths hanging open.

  Clay pulled ahead. Colt kept pace beside him.

  They hit the end of the street and cut left between two buildings. The gap was narrow, just wide enough for their shoulders. Colt’s sleeve caught on a broken board and ripped. He didn’t slow down.

  They burst out into another street and kept running.

  Colt risked another look back. The horde was still there, still coming, but they were falling behind. Too slow. The gap widened with every step.

  Clay slowed to a jog, then stopped. He leaned forward with his hands on his knees, breathing hard.

  Colt stopped beside him and turned around.

  The horde shambled out from between the buildings. They didn’t run. They didn’t speed up. They just kept coming.

  “They ain’t fast,” Clay said between breaths. “But they sure as hell don’t quit.”

  Colt nodded. His chest burned and his legs felt heavy.

  The horde was maybe forty yards back now. Close enough to see their faces. The violet glow in their eyes. The way their jaws hung slack.

  “We need to keep movin’,” Clay said. “Find another way around. Get the Puha somewhere else.”

  A high, desperate scream cut through the air.

  It came from somewhere to their right, past the buildings. Then it cut off.

  Colt’s head snapped toward the sound.

  Clay grabbed his arm. “Don’t.”

  “Somebody’s alive,” Colt said.

  “Yeah, and there’s a hundred of those things between us and whoever that is,” Clay said. “We barely got away from a dozen.”

  “Barely got away?” Colt pointed at the shamblers that were chasing them. They were slowing down, some were even walking a different direction now.

  Colt pulled his arm free. “I ain’t leavin’ somebody to die.”

  “Colt—”

  “What if that was Ma out there?” Colt said. “What if it was somebody you knew? You’d just leave ’em?”

  Clay stared at him. His jaw worked. “Damn it.”

  Colt never knew Ma.

  But he knew what she meant to Clay.

  And whoever was screaming meant something to someone, too.

  Colt turned and started walking toward where the scream had come from.

  Clay swore under his breath, then followed.

  They moved quiet, keeping to the sides of buildings. Some of the horde behind them kept shambling their direction, but they were slow. Colt had time.

  He reached the corner of a building and stopped. Peered around it.

  A wider street opened up ahead. More buildings on both sides. And in the middle of it, packed tight around a two-story house, was the horde.

  Dozens of them. Maybe more. All pressed together, arms reaching up toward the roof.

  Colt followed their gaze.

  A woman stood on a balcony. Young, maybe twenty. Dark hair pulled back. She held onto the railing with both hands. A man stood beside her, older, maybe her father. He was leaning over the edge, shouting something Colt couldn’t hear.

  The balcony creaked under their weight.

  “There,” Colt whispered.

  Clay looked. “We can’t get through that many.”

  “We don’t have to,” Colt said. “We just gotta get their attention. Draw ’em off.”

  “And then what?”

  “Then we run again.”

  Clay shook his head. “This is the dumbest thing you’ve done yet.”

  The man on the balcony had a knife in his hand. He stabbed down at the arms reaching up through the railing. One zombie fell back. Then another.

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  The woman was climbing. She tried pulling herself up onto the roof overhang above the balcony.

  The man turned to help her. He grabbed her ankle and pushed, lifting her higher.

  More zombies pushed through the door behind him. Three of them. Four. They poured out onto the balcony.

  The man spun and stabbed one in the face. It dropped. He kicked another back.

  Too many. They grabbed his arms. His shoulders.

  The woman reached the roof and rolled over the edge. She turned back, reaching down for him.

  The balcony groaned. Wood cracked loud.

  The man looked up at her. His mouth moved but Colt couldn’t hear the words.

  The balcony gave way.

  It collapsed in a crash of splintering wood. The man and the zombies fell together into the horde below. The screaming lasted a second, maybe two.

  The woman lay flat on the roof, sobbing. Her hand still reaching down where the balcony had been.

  She looked up.

  Her eyes locked on Colt’s.

  She looked desperate. She yelled something but Colt couldn’t hear.

  Colt stared back. Forty yards between them. A hundred zombies in the way.

  Colt pulled his revolver.

  SIDEARM EQUIPPED:

  Colt Single Action Army— .45

  6/6

  “Colt, what are you—”

  Colt aimed at the sky and fired.

  BOOM.

  5/6

  The shot cracked loud and echoed off the buildings.

  Every head in the horde turned toward them.

  Violet eyes locked on Colt.

  “Oh hell,” Clay breathed.

  The horde started moving their direction.

  Clay took a step back. “We gotta go.”

  “Wait,” Colt said.

  “Wait? Are you—”

  “Just stay behind me,” Colt said. “Walk slow. Don’t run.”

  “Colt—”

  “Trust me.”

  Colt started backing up. Slow steps. He kept his eyes on the horde.

  They followed. The tight pack around the house loosened as they shambled toward him. The woman on the balcony watched, frozen.

  Clay moved with him, just behind his shoulder. “This is insane.”

  “Yeah,” Colt said.

  They backed down the street. The horde followed, spread out now. The front ones moved faster than the back ones, creating gaps.

  Colt checked behind him. Clear street. No obstacles.

  “How far we goin’?” Clay said.

  “Till they’re spread out enough,” Colt said.

  “Enough for what?”

  “To kill ’em.”

  Clay’s head snapped toward him. “You wanna fight all of ’em?”

  “Not all at once,” Colt said. “A few at a time. Look.”

  The horde had stretched into a loose line now. The fastest ones were ten yards ahead of the slowest. Gaps opened between them.

  Colt stopped backing up.

  The front zombie was fifteen feet away. Arms out, mouth open, violet eyes locked on him.

  Colt pulled the Conduit Dagger with his left hand. Holstered his revolver with his right.

  MELEE WEAPON EQUIPPED

  CONDUIT DAGGER

  “We can do this,” Colt said.

  Clay stared at him. “You’re out of your damn mind.”

  The closest zombie shambled forward.

  Colt didn’t move.

  “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.” Clay pulled his Bowie free.

  Colt stepped in.

  The shambler’s arms reached for him. Colt drove the Conduit Dagger up through its jaw. The blade punched through bone and into the skull.

  Violet pulsed. Flashed white. The energy pulled into the blade.

  PROJECT: LAST STAND v1.11

  Puha: 63.8

  Colt yanked the blade free and the body dropped.

  He moved to the next one.

  Five feet to his left. Mouth hanging open. Arms out.

  Colt stabbed it through the eye socket.

  PROJECT: LAST STAND v1.11

  Puha: 65.8

  Clay ran up beside him and drove his bowie into a shambler’s temple. It went down hard.

  “Just watch my back,” Colt said. “Don’t let us get circled.”

  “What?”

  “I’ll kill ’em,” Colt said. “You keep ’em off me.”

  Clay swore but moved behind him.

  Colt kept going.

  The horde had spread into a loose line. Easy pickings now. He stepped to the next zombie. Stabbed it in the skull. Moved to the next. Stabbed again.

  PROJECT: LAST STAND v1.11

  Puha: 69.8

  The rhythm settled in. Step. Stab. Pull. Move.

  His boots kicked up dust. The dagger dripped dark fluid. His arm burned but he didn’t slow down.

  Behind him, Clay circled. Keeping the stragglers from bunching up. Kicking one back when it got too close. Stabbing another when it reached for Colt.

  Colt killed another. Then another.

  PROJECT: LAST STAND v1.11

  Puha: 77.8

  He glanced up at the house in the distance. The woman was on the roof still, but she was moving. She climbed down the side, dropping onto a lower section, then to the ground.

  She ran.

  North. Past the buildings. Toward what looked like an open field beyond the town.

  Colt tracked her direction, then turned back to the horde.

  More zombies shambled toward him. He met the first one. Stabbed it through the temple. Moved to the next.

  PROJECT: LAST STAND v1.11

  Puha: 81.8

  His shoulder ached. His fingers were slick on the dagger grip. He wiped his hand on his pants and kept moving.

  Step. Stab. Pull. Move.

  PROJECT: LAST STAND v1.11

  Puha: 89.8

  Sweat ran into his eyes. He blinked it away.

  Clay kicked a zombie back. It stumbled into another one behind it. Both went down in a tangle.

  “How many more?” Clay shouted.

  Colt looked. Maybe a dozen left in this group. Spread out. Manageable.

  “Not many,” Colt said.

  He killed two more. The bodies hit the dirt.

  PROJECT: LAST STAND v1.11

  Puha: 93.8

  Then three more in quick succession. His arm moved automatic now. Find the skull. Drive the blade. Pull free.

  PROJECT: LAST STAND v1.11

  Puha: 99.8

  Clay grabbed his shoulder. “Colt.”

  “What?”

  “Behind us.”

  Colt turned.

  The original horde. The one they’d run from at the start. It had caught up.

  Dozens of them shambling down the street toward them. Violet eyes glowing. Arms reaching.

  And they were close. Maybe thirty yards.

  “Shit,” Colt breathed.

  He looked at the zombies in front of him. Five left. Maybe six.

  Clay pulled him back. “We gotta go. Now.”

  Colt killed one more on the way past. Stabbed it in the back of the head as it turned.

  PROJECT: LAST STAND v1.11

  Puha: 101.8

  Then they ran.

  Violet eyes filled the street behind them. Hands reached but fell short.

  They cut between two buildings and came out on another street. Empty. No zombies.

  They kept running.

  Two blocks down, Colt slowed. Clay slowed beside him.

  Colt looked back. The hordes were still there, but distant now. Shambling. Not fast enough to catch them.

  Clay leaned against a wall, breathing hard. “We got enough. Let’s get outta here.”

  Colt wiped the dagger on his pants. “We got like forty Puha in ten minutes.”

  “Yeah,” Clay said. “So let’s go. Get back to the HUB before we push our luck.”

  Colt looked north. Where the woman had run.

  “What if there’s more people out here?” Colt said. “That woman ran somewhere. Maybe there’s others.”

  Clay stared at him. “You serious?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Colt, we almost just got swarmed by two hordes.”

  “But we didn’t,” Colt said. “And if there’s people alive, they need help. Or maybe they can help us.”

  Clay pushed off the wall. His jaw was tight. “You’re gonna get us killed.”

  He started walking north.

  Clay stood there a second, then swore under his breath and followed.