The yoga-mom zombie that had chased Dia earlier was instantly converted into paste against the reinforced grille.
Adrian was laughing.
It was a deep, resonant, slightly maniacal laugh belonging to a man who had just cheated death.
He swerved slightly, purposely clipping a massive, bloated Tier-2 mutant attempting to block the road.
The creature went spinning violently into a brick wall, exploding like a blood-filled water balloon.
Thump-thump!
Crunch!
The massive off-road tires effortlessly rolled over skulls and ribcages, the SUV’s suspension eating up the impacts.
A particularly agile zombie leapt onto the hood.
Its decaying face slammed against the windshield directly in front of Dia, leaving a thick, black smear of rotting blood across the glass.
The creature began clawing furiously at the reinforced window.
Adrian didn’t even flinch.
He casually reached over and flicked the windshield-wiper stalk.
Squeak, squeak.
Swish.
The heavy-duty wipers activated, ruthlessly smacking the zombie directly across the face while spraying it with soapy blue fluid.
The creature hissed in confusion.
It lost its grip on the slick glass and tumbled beneath the roaring tires with a wet—
Crunch.
Dia watched the entire process.
Then she nodded solemnly.
"Good wipers."
Adrian laughed.
"You haven’t seen anything yet."
He jerked the steering wheel to the right.
The SUV drifted heavily, the back end swinging out and violently clotheslining an entire row of zombies against a rusted city bus.
Adrian straightened out.
The engine screamed as he merged onto the main highway leading out of Sector 4.
Dia leaned back into her makeshift booster seat.
Her little hands rested neatly in her lap.
For the first time since waking up in this strange new world, she wasn’t afraid.
She had food.
She had strawberry milk.
She had a very big car.
And, apparently, she had an Uncle.
Dia looked at Adrian.
"Uncle Adrian?"
"Yeah?"
"Can we get more strawberry milk?"
Adrian’s grin became downright terrifying.
"Kiddo, we’re going to get you a whole truck."
***
The highway was a graveyard of abandoned cars, but the tank-like SUV bulldozed through the gaps, clipping bumpers and sending debris flying. With every crushed skull and shattered zombie, Adrian felt a massive weight lifting off his shoulders.
The lingering sting of betrayal, the physical trauma of the neurotoxin, all of it was being pulverized beneath his tires.
He felt utterly, completely refreshed.
Dia sat quietly in her flak-jacket booster seat, her large eyes tracking the chaotic geometry of the flying bodies.
’Kinetic energy transfer is optimal,’ she calculated silently. ’The biological transport unit possesses excellent spatial awareness and psychopathic driving tendencies. My survival parameters have officially increased by 400%.’
[SYSTEM ALERT!]
[Hidden Quest: ’Joyride of Doom’ completed! You bonded with your Guardian through the magic of vehicular manslaughter! +50 Guardian Affection Points!]
Dia mentally swiped the notification away.
"Next left up ahead," Adrian called over the roar of the engine, his knuckles white on the steering wheel. "We’re going home, Dia. And someone is going to be very, very surprised to see me."
While the Thunder God and his tiny overlord were turning the zombie horde into roadkill on the highway, a vastly different scene was playing out ten miles away at the heavily fortified Military Base.
The command tent was a massive, tension-filled canvas structure situated in the center of the sprawling military encampment.
Inside, the air was thick with the smell of cheap tobacco, sweat, and impending mutiny.
In the center of the room, kneeling on the tactical map table and clutching a shattered, blood-stained military radio, was Lieutenant Marcus.
And Marcus was putting on the performance of a lifetime.
"He... he fought to the very end!" Marcus wailed, his voice cracking with pitch-perfect, agonizing grief. He buried his face in his hands, his shoulders heaving with manufactured sobs. "There were so many of them! A Tier-4 Sovereign... and a horde! He told me to run! He told me to save the intelligence logs and leave him behind!"
Marcus peeked through his fingers, scanning the faces of the officers surrounding him.
He had practiced this exact monologue in the mirror for three weeks. He had even rubbed the juice of a crushed wild onion on his collar to ensure his eyes watered realistically.
It was flawless.
The blood on his uniform was a mix of a dead mutant’s and his own, self-inflicted shallow cuts.
"The Commander is gone!" Marcus declared, throwing his head back in a theatrical display of agony. "Adrian Pendelton is dead!"
A heavy, suffocating silence fell over the command tent.
The Military Base was the most powerful faction in the region, built entirely upon the terrifying strength and tactical genius of Adrian Pendelton.
To hear that he was dead, torn apart in an abandoned garage was like being told the sun had suddenly exploded.
"I don’t believe you."
The voice cut through Marcus’s sobbing like a sniper’s bullet.
Stepping out from the shadows of the tent was Elias, the Vanguard’s head scout and Adrian’s most trusted shadow.
Elias was a lean, dangerously quiet man with a sniper rifle slung over his shoulder and eyes that burned with a cold, terrifying intensity.
Marcus internally cursed but maintained his sobbing act. "Elias... I saw it with my own eyes. His chest was ripped open. There was nothing I could do."
"The Commander," Elias said slowly, taking a step closer to the map table, his hand resting casually on the hilt of his combat knife, "survived a direct hit from a tank shell last month. He wrestled a mutated grizzly bear to death with his bare hands for stealing his rations. And you expect me to believe he was taken down in a basic scouting mission in Sector 4?"
"It was an ambush!" Marcus cried, slamming his fist onto the table, trying to inject righteous anger into his performance. "Are you calling me a liar, Elias? I am your superior officer! With the Commander gone, chain of command dictates—"
"Chain of command doesn’t mean squat if the Commander isn’t dead," a second voice boomed.