They Call Me Daring

Chapter 25

"Neurological samples." I read aloud. I looked up from the paper, squinting into the sun, trying to gauge the time. The wind howled through the empty streets around me like a giant pan-flute. It was sometime before noon. But that didn't matter.
My days were endless.
I wondered absently whether I would age at all. Would I just live forever? Of course it was impossible to tell then. It had been... what, six days? Not even a week. I sighed, and put my hands behind my neck, breathing deep and looking around the hollow street.
I must have been miles out. I wasn't worried about finding my way back. All I had to do was get up on the roof and find the tower, and navigate my way from there.
I knew I would have to go into a hive. It wasn't like I was going to find one of them out here in the daylight, wandering the streets. I took a deep breath, and reminded myself that it didn't hurt that bad. In fact, it almost seemed to be getting better. The light wasn't burning, stinging as much as usual. Perhaps my mind-over-metal method was working after all.
Or perhaps the Doc was right.
Crap.
And then I was knocked flat on my face.
It happened too quickly for me to even react. One second I was standing, just beginning to pick up the rapid footsteps coming up behind me. The next, I was sprawled face-first on the ground, and the hissing, writhing creature was on top of me.
I broke out of my stunned paralysis, rolling out from under the creature, facing the rotting, fanged thing. It hissed at me. I hissed back.
And then we were locked in a bare-handed wrestling match. I kicked into overdrive, whirling and punching and ducking and spinning, striking out at the thin air to pull back a second later.
It was an evenly matched fight. The first I'd had in a long time. Before I'd changed, I'd been beaten up by every human in a fist fight. I'd had an unfair advantage over every zombie I'd ever killed, because I had a gun. And in the past week, nobody had been able to come close to threatening me, armed or bare-handed. But now, locked in a whirling vortex of fists and feet and fangs, white limbs and red glowing eyes, I felt exhilarated, because finally, I felt challenged. I did have one advantage, though.
I wasn't controlled by a mindless hunger for human flesh.
Every move it made was targeted to get to my neck and rip me apart. Consequently, dodging wasn't much of a concern for it.
Within a minute of harsh breathing and rapid heart-pounding, I landed a good solid blow in it's chest. My clenched fist flew hit hard as I spun all of my momentum into the blow- and went through.
The rotting flesh like flaking paper crackled away, and bones dissolved like rotting wood. I grimaced in disgust and yanked my slimy hand out of it's chest- and it threw another swipe at me.
I leapt back just in time, the talons catching and ripping the front of my shirt. That was when the full realization hit me. I wasn't going to rot. Not now. Not yet. My shoulder throbbed where the bullet had nicked me, and I remembered the pain, the blood, the breaking of my flesh. And over and over I saw my hand tearing apart that thing's chest, watched it keep coming.
And I realized I was still truly human.
I threw myself away, tucked and rolled. Get up, spin around, duck beneath the swipe, it over-swings and exposes it's back, I leaped up and brought both feet down hard on it's back. Bone shattered and it hit the ground, and I jumped up and stomped down on it's skull before it could stir. The skull crunched under my sneakers, and the brain oozed out onto the pavement.
It didn't move again.
Panting, I pulled the little plastic vial from my pocket, silently thanking Meg for jamming it in my pocket at the last minute. I tried not to throw up as I held the vial to the trickling grey brain juices, telling myself it was necessary. Either that, or the Doc was trying to make me puke.
That was one item crossed off on the list. The next: skin sample. I grimaced, looking down at the shriveled pale creature lying on the ground. This was going to be a sucky day, I thought, drawing my knife and gritting my teeth.