Kyle darted back towards him, knocking away the oncoming Zs. Mr. Muscle, without a sound or scream of pain, pushed up with his giant arms and pulled himself toward the opening in the fence, leaving his foot and a trail of blood across the floor.
The horde was fully upon us. There was no stopping it. They poured around Kyle, and began exiting the Arena through the broken fence. Kyle, who was standing above the broken man below him, twisted his arm back and brought it sideways, knocking two of the creatures down to the floor. Extending a hand down to Mr. Muscle, he winced back and stopped in his tracks. The distinct red eyes had set in.
Kyle turned, stepping away from the creature crawling towards him and pulled his club back up to his shoulder. Surrounded by the Zs, he was clearly outnumbered, but not going down without a fight. He would soon fall, like so many others before him.
This world had gone to shit. Humanity went straight with it. However, I still wasn’t willing throw in the towel just yet, and there was no way I was giving up on Kyle.
Diving into the mix, I drilled my shoulder into a creature clambering on Kyle’s arm. Moving into position, we both went berserk, back to back, swinging at anything that moved, and in some cases, things that were not. My eyes and face were blood-soaked from the gore that we had created. I hit a point where I couldn’t see a thing. I could feel Kyle to my back. Our grunts of exertion could hardly be heard over the moans from the surrounding creatures.
This was it. This was the end. I thought that despite everything, I was at least going down fighting alongside my friend. Just when I started to panic, knowing that we would be taken down and turned into those foul, wretched creatures, we heard gunshots. Red and pink mist shot up all around us. Only when they had all dropped to the ground and the gunshots had stopped, did I realize I was screaming. Through my muffled cries, I heard someone calling to us.
“This way! Come this way!”
I wiped my eyes clear with my filthy sleeve, and squinted through the mayhem. It was Jarvis standing by the broken fence with an extended hand. He had a small group of armed commoner’s with him, lighting up the Zs around us with automatic weapons. Contraband I thought, weapons that had been pulled from the dead fingers of fallen troopers. Kyle grabbed at my arm, and we pulled each other toward the gaping hole in the chain link fence.
Standing behind the line of gunmen, free of the zombies, Kyle and I gasped for much needed oxygen. The place was indeed coming down around us. I could see a woman, her breasts fully exposed, holding a machine gun. She was aiming up at the balcony, taking out anybody in a white toga. The place was on fire with destruction. The Elites created very visible targets as they tried to escape.
There were dozens of Troopers who had been killed. They had gotten back up and were chasing down the Commoners and the Elites alike. In the end, everybody was equal in the eyes of the dead.
Jarvis stepped back behind the line while his gunners were mowing down the approaching creatures.
“Told you, boys, if you survived the fight, there would be opportunity. No time to explain now.” He lifted his gun between Kyle and me and pulled the trigger. I spun around to see one of the Elite, in a blood drenched toga, just as the bullet tore through his throbbing red eye.
“Just know you helped us with a huge distraction. The Arena is the only time the commoners and the Elites ever come together. We have you to thank for giving your fellow gladiators the time to take the place apart.”
Kyle and I stood there with our mouths hanging open, stunned. This rebellion was planned. This is what their quiet, secretive nods and sideways glances were all about.
Looking back on the whole thing, it was only a matter of time. How could Gordon expect to continue along the way this group had been without them staging a revolt? Unbeknownst to us, we had simply helped them do it.
“You boys have been all the help you can be. We’ve got it from here.” He shot us a halfcocked, approving smile before turning back to join the fight.
Kyle and I carried each other to the back of the room. My shoulder was still pouring blood, and Kyle’s shirt was split open from a gash running down the length of his chest.
We were alive. That was what mattered, and at the moment, we intended to stay that way. Avalon was far from secure. Now, we needed to get the hell out of there.
Chapter 27
In this world, some people simply don’t deserve to be helped.
A sea of death flooded the great hall. Between us and the door that led to the communication room, Zs, troopers, togas and the rebels littered the floor. Gunshots echoed through the arena, muting the screams and moans from both the alive and the dead.
Kyle reached down and pulled a machine gun from the grip of a fallen trooper, who had thankfully been struck down by a blow to his head. I watched as he ejected the cartridge, checked how many bullets remained, reloaded, and then raised the weapon. Two Zs, dressed in commoner clothing, violently jerked backward as he squeezed the trigger, placing precisely aimed shots through their foreheads, dropping them to the gore covered floor mere feet from the two of us.
We started to push our way through the insanity, trading the blood of Zs for every inch of floor. Methodically navigating across the hall, we sidestepped past the crippled remains of creatures unable to stand, reaching up with their mangled grips to snap at the flesh of our legs. The wooden mallet was still firmly in my grasp, providing the security needed to keep going.
Just as I reached the door, I looked back at the chaos. I could see a group of the commoners lift Gordon up above their heads. Aside from his inaudible screams, it looked as if he was crowd surfing as they paraded him through the hall. Even from the distance, I could see the inexplicable look of “I’m fucked” across his face. The troopers were all dead or had escaped the melee. We had no idea what the commoners were going to do with him, and sure as hell weren’t going to stick around to find out.
Kyle and I jumped through the door, and raced down the hallway. There were a few of the dead lingering between the Comms room and us. We didn’t pause, knocking them across their skulls, dropping the zombies with the ease of hitting a whiffle ball off a child’s baseball tee.
The light in the hallway was out. There was a body lying on the tile, and blood had splattered across one of the LED clocks. With each rhythmic blip of the clock, the hall glowed pale pink. The door to the room was wide open. Kyle motioned for me to stop as he eased to the doorway. Taking a moment to listen, he glanced back and with the jerk of his head, motioned for me to enter.
Turning back toward the heavy door, I was able to quietly shut and lock it securely. We did a quick sweep of the room, looking behind all of the equipment, which appeared to have been installed in the seventies, to make sure that we were alone.
There were giant box computers with big rolls of cinema-like film hanging from them. Red and blue lights flickered in the darkness, reminding me of the old science fiction movies that I’d seen with my father as a kid.
There was a glass window facing the hallway. While we could see anything that passed, we were also fully exposed to any prying eyes from out there. Despite it being locked, Kyle stood by the door with his club in one hand and his machine gun in the other.