The stairwell opened onto a maintenance balcony that ran the length of the atrium’s east wall. Zarek stayed low, using a stack of paint buckets for cover, and looked down.
The commercial plaza’s main floor spread out below him. A dead fountain sat in the center, its basin filled with trash and dark water.
Skylights above let in grey afternoon light, cut with long shadows from shattered storefronts. A sporting goods store anchored the north end - its metal shutters half-raised, the glass front punched out.
That’s where the shooting was coming from.
BANG!
Another rifle crack split the air. Zarek tracked the sound to a figure crouched behind an overturned display counter inside the store.
Small frame. Dark hair tied back.
BANG!
She fired again, working a bolt action with quick, practiced hands.
Four men were spread across the atrium floor, using planters and abandoned benches for cover. They weren’t rushing her. They were pinning her down, moving in slow from different angles.
Zarek settled onto his stomach and watched.
The girl - she couldn’t have been older than twenty - had picked her spot well. The counter gave her cover from the front, and the store’s back wall blocked anyone trying to come from behind.
She had a clear line on the main approach. But she was alone, and the men knew it.
"Last chance, sweetheart!" one of them called out. He was broad-shouldered, bald, wearing a hunting vest over a hoodie. He stood behind a concrete planter, close enough to be heard but far enough to stay out of her kill zone.
"Send the old man out and we let you walk. You got my word."
"You don’t have a word, Cole." Her voice was steady. Angry. Not afraid. "You shot him in the back."
"He was running. That’s on him."
Zarek’s eyes moved across the men. Cole, the leader, had a hunting rifle and a pistol on his hip.
The other three carried handguns and a shotgun between them. Enough firepower to take the store in a straight fight. They were dragging it out because they didn’t want to get shot doing it.
Smart. Patient. That made them dangerous.
He looked past them, into the store. Through the broken glass front, he could make out shelves still loaded with gear. Backpacks. Ropes. Camping stoves. A locked display case near the register, glass intact, with the shapes of rifles behind it.
The girl had claimed the best supply cache in the building and the men wanted it.
Zarek didn’t care who deserved what. He cared about the display case.
BANG!
Another shot rang out. The girl’s bullet sparked off the planter inches from Cole’s head. He ducked, cursed, and waved at the man on his left - a skinny guy in a denim jacket with a revolver.
"Marcus. Circle around. Get behind the counter."
Marcus nodded and broke from cover, moving along the west wall toward the store’s side entrance. He kept his head down, hugging the wall, invisible to the girl’s line of sight.
BANG!
The girl fired again and hit nothing. When she worked the bolt, the rifle gave her an empty chamber.
She ducked behind the counter to reload, her movements getting faster and sloppier. She knew she was running out of time.
Zarek watched Marcus reach the side door and slip inside. The man would come up behind her in under a minute. The fight would be over. Cole would take the store, the guns, and probably the girl too.
That was when Zarek made his decision.
He wasn’t going to save her. He wanted the rifles behind the counter, and four armed men stood between him and the display case.
Marcus separating from the others gave him an opportunity to even the odds.
One man alone was much easier to kill.
He rose from behind the paint buckets and moved along the balcony, heading for the maintenance stairs that dropped down to the west side of the atrium. His boots made no sound on the concrete. His sword stayed low.
Marcus had already disappeared into the store. Zarek came down the stairs in four long strides, crossed the open floor behind a row of dead vending machines, and reached the store’s side entrance.
Inside, the light was dim. Racks of clothing and camping gear cut the space into narrow aisles. The girl was still at the front counter, reloading. Marcus was ten feet from her, creeping along the wall, revolver raised.
Zarek came up behind him without a sound.
Marcus must have felt something - a shift in the air, a shadow, instinct. He started to turn.
Too late.
Zarek drove his sword beneath Marcus’s shoulder blade, angling the blade upward. Marcus’s mouth opened, but only a wet wheeze escaped.
His revolver clattered to the floor. Zarek caught him by the collar before he could fall, held him upright, and twisted the blade.
Marcus jerked once before his body went limp.
Zarek lowered him to the concrete. Blood spread beneath the body, dark against the grey floor.
He looked at the body something beaming into him . he felt very excited and most thing He felt good.
Better than good. This was different from the mutants. Those things were rabid animals - dangerous, but simple. Kill or be killed. No thought behind their eyes.
Marcus had thought. He’d planned. He’d crept through that door believing he was the hunter. And in the last second, when he’d felt the blade coming, he’d understood. Another person had decided he would die, and there was nothing he could do about it.
That understanding - that moment of helpless realization - was sweeter than anything Zarek had felt since the world ended.
He looked down at the body, excitement flooding through him. A grin spread across his face as the feeling settled in.
He felt good.
*Yeah. Killing humans was much better than killing those beasts.*
"Marcus?" Cole’s voice echoed from outside. "You in there? What’s taking so long?"
Zarek’s smile widened.
He bent down, picked up the revolver, and checked the cylinder. Five rounds left. He tucked it into his system space, stepped over Marcus’s body, and moved deeper into the store.
The girl was still at the counter, back to him, working the bolt on her rifle.
He could see her now - thin shoulders, hands that shook just slightly as she reloaded. She hadn’t heard him. She had no idea he was there.
Zarek stopped ten feet behind her and waited.
Outside, Cole called again. "Marcus! Answer me, damn it!"
The girl froze. Her head turned slightly, toward the side door, toward the silence where Marcus’s footsteps should have been. Her grip tightened on the rifle.
She still hadn’t seen Zarek.
He let her stay in that moment, caught between one threat and another, not knowing which way to point the gun.
Then he spoke.
"You’re welcome."
DING!
[System Notification: High-Potential Individual Detected.]
[Potential Assessment available upon request.]