The metal door gave way on the third push, lock snapping as I shoved it off its hinges with a grunt.

  Night air hit me instantly, cold and sharp, and I took in a deep breath, feeling the rush of it fill my lungs, the crispness clearing the stale air that hung like a cloying gas inside the mall.

  I may not have needed to breathe anymore, but damn if it wasn’t good to do it. If only to bloat my lungs with something fresh. Something other than the reek of mildew, rot and bodily fluids in various states of decay.

  The scent of open air, damp and bitter, mixed with the faint smell of smoke and city grit. Closest thing to a proper breath of fresh air I’d had in hours, maybe more, and for a moment, it lifted the weight of exhaustion pressing on my mind.

  A small relief, but welcome.

  The sky stretched above, clear and cloudless, gibbous moon hanging like a watchful eye, casting its eerie teal glow over the barren rooftop.

  Barren, save for a single figure.

  Two dozen feet away, on the far side of the concrete floor, Bill lay leaning like a wet rag against the inside of the roof's low wall, the steady thumping of his beating heart, a clarion call audible to my ears even over distance separating us.

  I walked towards him, steps sure and steady, Benjamin’s switchblade already in my clenched fist, a malevolent sneer tugging at the edges of my lips, the black blood in my veins beginning to roil and boil as memories played like a spreadsheet through my mind.

  Years worth of abuse. All the beatings, the insults, shooting me, landing me in a sea of cannibal corpses.

  And now? Finally. A smorgasbord of “just desserts”.

  Blood.

  Catharsis.

  Revenge.

  Bloody damned karmic retribution.

  Five steps away from my quarry, I opened my mouth to speak.

  And the stench hit the back of my throat, cutting the words short.

  The rank stench of piss, shit and gangrenous infection. He had soiled himself long before I’d reached the roof. His clothes and skin were cloyed with a sheen of sweat despite the cold night air, and the breath in his lungs was ragged, laced with phlegm and pus.

  My nose twitched as the sweet-meat tang of rot overwhelmed every other smell, and my eyes fell to the swollen, red and ruptured lump of his shoulder.

  The spot where the Goblin Hound had bitten him no more than two hours ago.

  Those yellow, froth-covered teeth.

  I’d assumed their bite carried disease, but given it little thought. To me it meant nothing.

  But to a human?

  It meant death by virulent infection. The motherfucker was already dying of sepsis.

  My jaw clenched like a bear’s trap and the switchblade squealed in my hand as I squeezed, a vein on my temple pulsing like a piston, hate welling in my gut like an acrid, venomous thing.

  No. No. This isn’t fair.

  Fate, like the vindictive bitch she was, was denying me even the catharsis of a petty revenge?

  One step away from him, Bill twitched his head up and made a feeble attempt of raising a flip-knife in a trembling hand.

  “Come to kill me finally, you undead shits? I ain't…. done…. yet…” he spat through bouts of wet coughing, looking at me through glazed, cataract covered eyes.

  He couldn't even see properly anymore. Barely even reason, thinking I was just a herd of rotbloods.

  In a sharp jab I lashed my hand across his limp wrist and sent the knife end over end across the concrete.

  “So this is how it's gonna go then? I get denied even a proper revenge?” I muttered slowly sinking into a crouch in front of him.

  “Tim… gopher?.... that you, you wispy little shi… cough cough.... haha… came back tail tucked in between your legs, huh?.... ahaha…. I knew you would…. ahahaha… haa…” he stammered out, laughter lost in a fit of blood-laced coughs.

  “.......I’m… glad…. you came back…. I’m…..scared……. man.”

  It seemed like he thought I was Tim.

  Fever, delirium, sight and hearing impaired to the point of inutility and he looked like he could barely hold his head up, let alone move or walk. The man was dying of septic shock, and it had taken little more than two hours for it to happen.

  A part of me couldn’t help but wonder just what sort of rot had been in those Hounds drool to provoke such a rapidly spreading infection. But it was inconsequential compared to the absolute livid rage I was experiencing.

  This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.

  It was supposed to go different.

  It was supposed to be my hands around his throat, slowly throttling him as I listed off every vile, unjust and evil thing he had done to me over the years, culminating with the bastard having tried to kill me.

  It was supposed to be me against him, man-to-man, a proper fight and execution that made amends for all the beatings, insults and ridicule I had endured from him and his ilk.

  It was supposed to be karmic justice.

  It was supposed to be my catharsis.

  “I told you…. man….. you weren’t gonna save Jon… I told you…. not to go… look for him…. no way he could’ve escaped those dead-heads… no way… no way….” Bill mumbled on, head lolling to the side, unable to even muster up the strength needed to keep it straight.

  It hit me like a spear through the chest. So that's why Tim had been in that god forsaken restaurant. He was trying to help me. He thought I was wounded and was trying to find me.

  Wispy, buck and half soaking wet, one hamstring down, skinny little moron… had died trying to rescue me.

  And with that final little tidbit of knowledge, it all collapsed.

  Like one big avalanche, the weight of everything that had happened in the past 24 hours, all the mental exhaustion, all the fighting, all the frustrations slammed on my shoulders and bore me down.

  All I wanted was a small break.

  A few minutes without SOMETHING happening.

  Five minutes. Just five goddamned minutes.

  And I could keep going.

  I moved from my crouch and slid down the half wall in a sitting position beside Bill, dipping my hand into his jacket pocket and fishing out his pack of cigarillos and the lighter.

  That first intake of smoke-laden breath, the way it scratched at my throat, filled my lungs, and the acrid taste of tar and burning paper, filling my mouth, all culminated with an exhale that was more sigh than anything else. I felt as my body expelled everything, the smoke, the tar, the toxins, leaving it as pristine as if I hadn’t smoked in the first place.

  And I took another drag. Then another. Then one more. Just staring at nothing in particular while doing it.

  Bill fell into a fit of blood-laced coughing beside me and I slowly turned my gaze to look at him. It should have been different. I should have gotten my revenge.

  This was the part where the bad guys got what they deserved and the hero got the retribution he damn well deserved.

  Except, I wasn’t the hero, was I?

  Just some asshole.

  “Why’d you do it? Why’d you shoot?” I murmured.

  “I…. got scared…. I told….y-you… Tim” Bill began, puss stained tears cradling his face.

  “I…. thought… the dead… were going t-to… climb after…. us….. I…. panicked…. t-thought if they had some…. bait… we could e-escape….. I’m s-sorry J-Jon…. I didn’t mean to….. I w-was… sc-scared….” he ended, mumbled words lost in outright bawling.

  I watched him cry, the grimace on my face deepening. Was it real remorse? Or just the influx of emotion and regret people feel when they’re at death’s door?

  Did it even matter? No. Of course it didn’t. A few tears weren’t gonna change a damn thing.

  But I still hated this.

  This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.

  Bill was supposed to be a manifestation of all the injustice I had suffered. An evil, spiteful little thing. A target for all my accumulated frustration and fury.

  Not this.

  Not a human being, lying in his own filth, bawling through half-blind eyes, scared and cold.

  “Even this. You're gonna ruin even this for me, ain’t you? You damned asshole” I hissed, taking another drag out of the cigarillo.

  Bill’s shiver had grown into an uncontrollable tremor. This close I could feel the heat radiating off him, like a stove, the fever of his own body cooking him from the inside out. I could hear his heart beating a mile a minute, a chorus of drums, thumping with such ferocious speed it was liable to tear itself to pieces any minute now. I could smell the blood, jetted into his stream by hypertension with enough pressure that it was bursting capillaries.

  “Mamaaa….. It hurts….. I’m scared…..”

  The bastard coughed up another mouthful of blood.

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  “I… don’t wanna die… alone…… gopher?…. Tim?.... I’m scared…. you still there….?” Bill stammered out, trying to move his head and look around.

  Too late.

  He couldn’t even lift his head and his eyes were covered by an opaque white film. His hands were twitching and spasming. The infection had spread enough that his fine motor skills were shot.

  “....Tim…… please?....” he spasmed out again, hands twitching, trying to reach out, to grab for everything, to feel… anything. In the face of death, all the poor bastard wanted was some human contact. To not be alone at the moment of his death.

  I could deny him that. There was some petty vengeance there. Petty and evil. Just sit in silence, pretend not to be here and watch him die, alone and scared. I was going to kill him in the first place, so what was the difference?

  “It would be no less than he deserves” the Animal purred in the back of my head. I ignored it. Completely. Was simply too tired to engage.

  But there was a difference.

  I’d never been a “good” man. Just a bastard with a few rules. At least if I had killed him, I’d have made it quick. It would have been justice. Retribution. This? This wouldn’t be justice. Not even vengeance. Just cruelty, for the cruelty’s sake. Nothing more.

  I reached out and grabbed hold of his wrist in a gentle grip, wrapping my other arm around his shoulders, letting it rest around his neck.

  “Thank… you…. thankyou……thankyouthankyouthankyou…..” Bill repeated in a delirious slur as his hand grasped for my forearm, like a drowning man clutching at a rope. All the dying man wanted was some human contact. To not be alone. And for the life of me, I couldn't deny him.

  I gave him the only thing I was willing to offer this bastard that had made the past three years of my life into a living hell.

  I gave him mercy.

  A sharp tug of my arm and I snapped Bill’s neck. No more fever. No more infection. No more suffering. A quick death.

  This wasn’t my catharsis, or my revenge.

  It was just mercy.

  “Tim deserved better. You deserved worse. And I deserved my revenge” I murmured, letting his body fall bonelessly against my side, taking another long, deep drag of the cigarillo.

  “Seems no one gets what they deserve tonight, huh?”

  I don't know exactly how long I just sat there, smoking that cheap, acrid stick of tobacco leaf, zoned out and staring into nothing, but only when the sharp pain of burning reached my knuckles did I look down to realize I’d smoked it into a stump.

  “Are we done with this charade?” The Animal growled and I immediately snarled back.

  “Shut it. I just needed a minute”.

  “Yes. And we got it. So, we ask again. Are. We. Done. Here?”

  I took one last drag out of the stump and flicked it.

  “Yeah. I'm done”.

  “What next?”

  “I get up and get back to it. There's an apocalypse to survive”.

  The Animal gave an approving growl.

  “Good”.

  I reached out and grabbed hold of the dead man's arm, pulling it towards my face and splitting it open with Benjamin’s switchblade. Blood, ruby red and intoxicating seeped out of the wound like a crimson cascade.

  I took a whiff and scrunched my nose at the infection lacing it. It smelled of rotting food left out in the summer sun, cutting through the perfume of vitality that should have permeated it. But as much as the smell repulsed me, that same instinct that I'd come to know as the Animal, told me that the infection was insignificant. My body would purge it without me needing to do anything.

  I needed to feed, and the dead had no more need of their blood.

  My jaw opened and my canines popped out from their sheaths, curved and thumb long, cutting through Bill's soft, still warm flesh like hot knives through butter.

  Ecstasy.

  Bliss.

  Satisfaction beyond what words can describe.

  My mind went blank as the first cascade of blood, still warm and fresh, hit the back of my throat and I let myself go, lost in the act of feeding. No more doubts, questions and hesitation. All became blood, and blood became everything once more.

  I gulped down mouthful after mouthful until nothing more could be drawn from the arm, then I switched to the throat, ripping into the jugular, going so far as to push the open palm of my hand onto the corpse’s chest if only to pump more of the red elixir up through the arteries.

  When even that well dried up I grabbed the dead man wholesale and rose it above my head, teeth still lodged and gnawing at Bill’s throat, if only to get those last few drops by sheer gravity alone.

  It was a show of grotesquery and monstrousness, but I didn’t care.

  Not now.

  Now, I feed, therefore I am. Everything else is inconsequential.

  As soon as the last drop fell on my tongue I let the corpse fall to the floor, head thrown back, eyes closed, riding the blood-high as it began to subside, slowly coming back to my senses.

  “Finally, succor. Blood. And here we half expected that you, our weaker self, would choose to abstain once again, lest you… desecrate the corpse” the Animal said, spitting out the last three words with mockery and derision.

  I didn’t answer immediately, still letting myself ride out the high, letting the new intake of fresh blood heal the last of my wounds, ridding my flesh even of the scar tissue.

  “Shut it! Desecrating a corpse? That’s exactly what I just did.

  But I don’t have the luxury to choose my victims here, and as far as I’m concerned, I stayed with Bill as he died so I get to drink his blood now that he’s left this mortal coil. Tit for tat”.

  The Animal laughed its low, guttural growl in the back of my head.

  “Justify it all you want, hypocrite. We both know how much we enjoyed it…”

  I opened my eyes, both of them, my left eye healed to perfection by this fresh infusion of blood and hissed through a mouth still half-opened by elongated teeth.

  “Quiet!”

  The Animal drew back to its perch in the deepest reaches of my subconsciousness, growling it's morbid laugh, but not before giving one last snipe.

  “We should brace ourselves”

  “What do you mean…” I began only to stop as the ball of blood in my gut began to swirl and boil. Before I could even wonder what was happening, something like a fist reached up from my stomach and filled my mouth with a liquid so sour and rotten that I didn't spit it, so much as I projectile vomited it.

  Half-a-cup’s worth of an opaque, green-hued liquid splattered on the concrete and I just sat there mouth wide open, ferociously wiping at my tongue and the inside of my cheeks with the sleeve of my jacket, trying and failing to wipe out the taste.

  So that’s how my body discarded the infection in Bill’s blood. It had quite literally isolated every virus and bacteria and regurgitated it out, like an oversized wad of phlegm.

  Not for the first time I cussed the fact that vampirism was not at all like the movies had made it out to be. In a movie, the infection would have simply disappeared inside my body, or some other borderline magical nonsense like that.

  This was way too anatomically accurate and I hated it.

  I lit another cigarillo, the acrid taste of ash and tar cutting through the air, doing just enough to mask the lingering flavor of decay that clung to my mouth. It wasn’t the finest smoke, but it was familiar. I’d enjoyed a few of these back in my mortal days, though I’d never been rich enough to make a habit out of it.

  As the smoke curled from my lungs, I could feel that familiar burn, the bitter scratch of it, working its way through my chest and throat. And then, nothing. As soon as I’d exhale, even the smallest molecule of smoke, tar or toxin would leave my body, leaving my insides pristine. Hell, I could chain-smoke ten packs a day, and not even the faintest cough would ever dare find its way up my throat.

  For all the complaints I had about "anatomical correctness," there was no denying it—vampirism came with a damn lot of perks. Immunity to disease was one of them.

  Puffing out another cloud of smoke, I reached down and straightened Bill’s corpse into a position less… disrespectful, crossing his arms over his chest.

  One short, whispered prayer later, I got up and crushed the dead man’s skull, doing for him as I had for Tim, making sure that none of those damned albino flies could take over the body.

  Sliding back against the half-wall to enjoy my smoke, I popped the walkie-talkie out of my back pocket and looked at it for a long second. I heavily considered just letting it all be. No point in contacting the girls.

  They wanted nothing to do with me and the feeling was mutual.

  But there was only one thing I had to pass on to them, if only to show proper respect to those who had passed. And make sure them two didn’t get the hair-brained idea of trying to go out, looking for Tim.

  But I was going to keep it short. Even if it was a bit of an asshole move on my part. Enough time had been wasted. More than enough.

  Clicking the power button on, I exhaled another plume of smoke and spoke.

  “Tina? Mina? You two read me?”

  Static, followed by the beep of someone speaking on their own device.

  “Jon?” Tina’s voice came.

  “Tim is dead. Found him in a restaurant on the third floor. Zombies” I interrupted, tone flat and dry.

  “... damn it. Shit. Jon, I’m sorry, Tim was a good gu-”

  “You two survive out there. Jon, over and out” I cut her off, clicking the power button and shutting the walkie-talkie down before she could answer back, drag me back into a conversation. Or ask something of me.

  It had been enough. All of it.

  A final drag out of the cigarillo, and I put the half-spent tobacco stick out against the half-wall’s surface, pushing myself back up.

  The break had been good. Necessary.

  But the night wasn’t growing any younger, and it was time to get myself outfitted for the slog that collecting 100 Aether Stones would be.

  And I knew exactly where to begin my search.

  The mall’s hardware store.