by Ed Kurtz
“Who the hell is Killer Wu?” Arkansas wanted to know. As if by response, a low yowl sounded from the fire escape behind them.
“The new sifu. My old teacher, he died, and power hates a vacuum, mama. Or loves it. Depends how you look at it.”
“But what’s this got to do with Zeke?” Irma asked, anxious. The yowling grew louder, the steps of the fire escape clanged.
“Last I set foot at the Black Sun, there was this cat called Zeke. White dude, real intense. Killer Wu seemed to put a lot of stock in him.”
“You think they’re still there?” Arkansas said, retrieving her gun from her waistband and nervously jetting her eyes at the fire escape.
“I’d bet they circled their wagons, turned the school into a fortress. A lot like Jim tried to do with Bucktown. If your man Zeke was as close to Wu as it seemed to me, he’s probably still there.”
“Then what the hell are we waiting for?”
A corpse finally burst over the side of the roof, clawing and screaming, the skin sloughing off its skull like a snake’s hide. Arkansas twisted around, took aim, and put a bullet through its ear. The dead man’s head snapped back and he was gone.
“Nothing,” Arkansas said. “Let’s get moving.”
PART FOUR
THE SERPENT’S LAST STRIKE
—One—
Five Fingers of Death
In deft strokes of midnight black ink, the oaken gates of the Black Sun School presented a decidedly different variety of graffiti to the weary trio than they’d left behind at Wilson Arms.
“I don’t suppose you read Chinese,” Arkansas said, narrowing her eyes at the cryptic message.
“Enough to read this,” Bruce said, glancing it over again. “The world has ended. The Black Sun lives.”
“Cheery,” Irma said from the backseat.
They’d escaped Bucktown in a jet black Dodge Charger Bruce had stowed in a crumbling concrete carport. The paintjob had shone like obsidian when the three of them scrambled into it, but by the time Bruce had maneuvered the car out of the projects and onto the street, the furiously screaming mob of corpses had scratched and dented it all to hell. From there, Bruce drove slowly enough to scout for a place to spend the night, but fast enough to keep the dead from overtaking the Charger. At length he settled on a garage attached to a filling station on the outskirts of Chinatown, which he had to jimmy open with the tire iron in his trunk. He, Irma, and Arkansas slept in a heap in the backseat until the sun came up. Without much conversation, they set off directly for the Black Sun School.
“The sign,” Bruce grumbled, furrowing his brow.
“What’s that?” Irma asked. “What sign?”
“That goddamn son of a bitch, he took down Master’s sign.”
He pointed at the top of the gates. If indeed there had been a sign there, it was gone now. Bruce gritted his teeth, sneered. Irma and Arkansas exchanged a puzzled glance.
“In the martial arts world,” Bruce explained, his eyes remaining fixed on the empty space above the gates, “a school’s sign is a point of pride. It’s a great insult to forcibly remove it, like saying ‘your school is shit.’”
“More reason to TCB, then,” Irma said.
“Fuckin’ A well told,” Bruce snarled.
He yanked the emergency brake and pulled the key from the ignition. The Charger rumbled down to silence and he pushed open the door. Nearby, just out of sight, a corpse shrieked, its voice breaking at the highest pitch and then ratcheting down to a guttural groan.
“Walking corpses out here,” Bruce said glumly, “deadly fighters in there.”
“Deadly?” Arkansas piped up, rubbing the back of her neck. “You never said anything about deadly.”
“Killer Wu doesn’t fuck around. It was bad enough that he perfected the Serpent’s Last Strike, but he taught it to his top disciples, too.”
“Care to expand on that?” Irma asked.
“It’s a forbidden art because it’s only purpose is to kill. The Strike takes years to master, but once a fighter’s done that he can kill an opponent with a single well-placed strike to the solar plexus. The very best can do it with only one finger, looks like he’s just poking you and then—bam!—you’re dead.
“Wu would have been expelled from the martial arts world in a second for teaching that shit to his thugs, but what with the end of the world and all…”
Irma’s eyes widened as the close groan made its way back up to a scream again.
“Do you know the Serpent’s Last Strike?” she asked.
“Oh, hell no. That shit’s bad news, mama. I don’t fight to kill.”
“But what if you’ve got to?” Arkansas put in.
Bruce pursed his mouth and averted his gaze to the Chinese characters on the gates.
The world has ended.
The Black Sun lives.
“Are we gonna do this?” he asked.
Irma nodded. She and Bruce looked to Arkansas, who shrugged, then nodded too.
“All right,” Bruce said, and he banged the side of his fist against the massive gates.
From around the tall brick wall surrounding the property, the screaming dead man appeared with his hands outstretched and his head bobbing on a broken neck. Something metal groaned on the inside of the gates and the oaken wings juddered.
“Hurry up,” Irma rasped.
The corpse leaned against the wall, dragging itself along as it closed the gap between them. Its lidless eyes stared dully at nothing; its open, screeching mouth oozed rotten sludge. The gates remained still and silent. Arkansas cursed under her breath.
“Open the goddamn gates!” she roared.
Bruce stepped aside, cast a shrill yowl, and rushed headlong at the shambling corpse. The dead man swung a clawed hand at Bruce, but he fluidly countered it with a left grabbing block, forcing the arm back as he thrust his right hand at the thing’s throat.
“Dragon’s claw!” he cried.
The creature flattened against the peripheral wall as Bruce released its arm, jabbed the heel of his palm hard against the thing’s sternum, and delivered a pointed two-finger strike to the corpse’s matted eyes. The eyes burst upon impact, spattering Bruce’s hand and dribbling down the thing’s gray, mottled face. Its screaming rose in volume and intensity. Bruce’s face twisted into a mask of fury as he howled again and swept the dead man’s right leg out from under him. As the corpse started to fall backward, Bruce landed a rapid, closed-fisted punch on its chest and finished the abomination off with a right knife-edged kick to its left knee. The knee shattered and the monster collapsed into a burbling heap.
Bruce rolled his shoulders and went calmly back to the women at the gates, who stared unabashedly at him.
“Long Xing,” he said simply. “Dragon style.”
“Right on,” Arkansas said.
Irma just grinned. Then the gates groaned noisily and started to swing inward. She sucked in a long, warm breath and said, “Showtime.”
* * * * *
The gates opened to reveal a wide, open courtyard. On either side of the gates stood a stone-faced sentry, each of them decked out in black silk uniforms with white cuffs and collars, and long white frog buttons down the fronts. Standing in the dead center of the otherwise vacant courtyard was a grim-looking Asian man, dressed the same as the sentries, his arms crossed over his chest. His cheeks heavily pitted, his mouth a thin blade.
Irma whispered, “Is that Wu?”
Bruce shook his head. “No, that’s not him. I don’t know who that is.”
As soon as Bruce, Irma, and Arkansas crossed into the courtyard, the two sentries pushed the gates back into place and locked them with huge iron chains. Once this was done, they scampered off to the caramel-colored building behind the grim man, vanishing under the eaves and inside. Irma noticed how the sand that carpeted the courtyard looked well-tended, like it was recently raked over. She also noticed the sundry weapons that lined the interior walls on both sides—spears and glaives, long ax
es and swords and jointed poles. She imagined the sort of damage she could do to a horde of corpses with weapons like these.
Bruce stepped forward and met the pock-marked man’s gaze. They silently assessed one another for a moment before the other man spoke.
“You have come to learn,” he said, his voice tinged with an almost imperceptible accent. It was not a question.
“No,” Bruce replied.
The man raised his eyebrows and blinked.
“I see,” he said at length. “Then you have come for shelter, which we provide only to students of the Black Sun.”
“I don’t want shelter, either,” Bruce said.
The man smiled, his blade-mouth curling like a pirate’s dagger.
“Revenge, then,” he said.
“Yes, but not on you or your master.”
“Whom do you seek?”
“A man called—”
“It’s me who wants revenge,” Irma interrupted, stepping up beside Bruce. “I’ve come a long damn way for it, too. Broke out of prison for it.”
The man’s smile faded, but he listened.
“I hear there’s a man here called Zeke.”
“And if there was?”
“Then I’m here to kill the rotten son of a bitch.”
The smile reappeared, broader this time.
“You know wushu?” he taunted her.
Irma snorted and drew her pistol from the back of her waistband.
“I don’t need no woo-shoo,” she sneered, but she had barely finished speaking before the man let loose a wild cry and, dancing over the sand like a newspaper in the wind, kicked the gun from her hand and caught it in mid-air. No sooner had he caught the gun, he flung it over the surrounding wall to the dead-infested street outside.
“Hey!” Irma shouted.
“We do not permit the use of firearms here,” the man said angrily. “This is a school for wushu fighters, not cowboys.”
“Way I hear it,” she snarled, “this is a school for killers, not fighters.”
The man furrowed his brow and stared at Irma furiously for a moment before allowing his face to relax. He then threw his head back, grasped his midriff, and laughed uproariously as though he had just heard the funniest joke ever told. Irma and Arkansas both looked to Bruce, who was just as puzzled as they were, if not more. When at last the man regained some semblance of composure, he raised his right arm, snapped his fingers, and cried something in Cantonese.
Bruce sighed and said, “Here we go.”
Instantly a trio of uniformed fighters came scrambling from the building to the courtyard, their faces stern and fists raised in fighting positions.
“Stupid girl,” the man hissed. “Do you not know that this world has come to an end? Your grievances from the last life do not translate to this one. Here, now, there are only winners and the dead. These men here—” He swept an hand as if to formally introduce the new fighters. “—are winners. They have been trained by the great Killer Wu, whom no one has ever defeated. This world of walking dead men cannot defeat the disciples of the Black Sun.”
Irma stepped forward, undeterred.
“I mean to kill Zeke,” she snarled.
“Then you must fight these men first.”
She paused, scrutinizing them. They were all young, fresh-faced men—two Asian like the man who called them, the third blonde and blue-eyed. They watched her without emotion, awaiting their master’s command.
Irma said, “And if I win?”
The master cracked the tiniest of grins.
“You will not,” he said.
Bruce shook his head slightly, his mouth tight and jaw clenched. He appeared to be in agreement with the man’s assessment.
“What if he fights them?” Irma said suddenly, gesturing to Bruce, who looked more than a little bit perturbed.
“Irma!” he snapped.
The master chuckled.
“No—no, not him. You have already said that revenge is your aim, Irma. This fight, young woman, is yours and yours alone.”
“But…I’m not a fighter. I don’t know any damn kung fu!”
“Then my suggestion is to return to the corpses out there,” he said with derision dripping from his voice. “Here you shall find only your own death, and it will not be merciful.”
One of the fighters behind the master rolled his knuckles and they all cracked loudly. The master himself cocked his head to one side, impatient.
“Fuck this,” Bruce grunted. “I know kung fu, bitches.”
He unleashed one of his patented war cries and lunged for the closest of the three young boxers. He threw a right snap kick, aiming for his opponent’s ribs, but the fighter threw a downward block with his left while hurling a pointed right strike straight at Bruce’s throat.
“Leopard Strike!” cried the fighter.
Bruce staggered back choking, but the fighter was not yet finished with him. He followed rapidly with a second, left-handed leopard strike at Bruce’s solar plexus, knocking the wind out of him, and then another with his right that smashed Bruce’s groin. Bruce grasped his crotch, his eyes bulging with pain and shock, and with an ear-splitting shriek to rival any one of the shambling corpses outside the gates the fighter finished Bruce off with a powerful thrust kick to the chest.
“Bruce, no!” Irma cried. She made to run to him, but Arkansas held her back.
“Don’t, girl—they’ll kill you!”
“They’re killing Bruce!”
Yet even as she said it, Bruce was up on one knee, spitting blood and hoisting himself back up to his feet.
“Stay down, you dumb bastard,” Arkansas seethed.
The master laughed. “Very stubborn!” he exclaimed. “But pride is good, yes?”
Irma shot him a hateful look and Arkansas tapped her shoulder.
“He’s still in!”
Just as Arkansas said, Bruce was stepping back up to the incredulous fighter, who raised his eyebrows and gawped. Bruce simply wiped the sweat from his face and spit a red stream at the sand.
“Come on,” he jeered.
The fighter flicked his eyes to the master, who nodded soberly. Then, to Bruce, he said, “You sure?”
“We came here for Zeke,” Bruce said between gasping breaths. “You wanna stand between us and him, then I guess that’s your business.”
With a careless shrug, the young man threw an errant punch at Bruce’s chest and hollered, “Sun fist!”
Bruce caught him by the wrist in a firm trap, deflecting the strike while grasping him tautly around the throat, squeezing off the fighter’s air supply.
“Tiger’s mouth, motherfucker!”
Maintaining his grasp, Bruce pushed the young man’s head down and struck out with a short wing, driving an elbow hard against his jaw. Bone cracked audibly and the young fighter groaned with agony. Blood sprayed from his nose and mouth. Bruce straightened out his striking arm and, pushing the fighter’s other arm up and over his head, tossing him over in a cross-wing throw. Bruce’s opponent flipped ass-over-head like a paper doll caught in the breeze and landed on the back of his neck with a sickening crunch.
After that, the rest of him crumpled to the sand, which kicked up and lingered in the air around the still body like dust motes.
Bruce stood up to his full height, his chest rising and falling with heaving breaths, his fists clenched tight at his sides.
Irma whispered, “Oh, fuck.”
“I think he killed him,” Arkansas said.
Calming down from the fury of the fight, Bruce started to come to his senses. His enraged expression melted away and he regarded the unmoving fighter with evident anxiety. He then snapped his head toward the master who, to Bruce’s complete surprise, let loose another heavy peal of laughter.
“Hoh, hoh!” he bellowed, clapping his hands. “A very formidable opponent, Wan Hung-Chieh. At least, he was—not anymore, it seems. Very good! Hoh!”
“I didn’t mean to kill him,” Bruce stated sadly.
“It does not matter,” the master said, waving the sentiment away with his hand. “There are two more still to fight. Wan Hung-Chieh’s brothers shall have the opportunity to avenge his death.”
The blonde stepped up, rolling his neck and taking short, measured breaths. But before a second battle could commence, Wan Hung-Chieh stirred on the sand. His left eye popped open, rolled around in the socket. And as his broken jaw flapped open, a raspy scream ratcheted out of his throat.
Bruce shunted awkwardly aside and watched as the dead boxer planted a hand in the sand and pushed himself up. A long, viscous rope of blood spilled out of his broken mouth and hung there pendulously. His one open eye slid over to Bruce, and once again the corpse screamed in agony and rage.
The master said, “Of course, these days any man you kill, you must kill twice.”
—Two—
Master Killer
Wan Hung-Chieh staggered forward and shrieked. Even his two brothers-in-arms scrambled back and away from him, leaving Bruce to deal with the murderous corpse alone. For a moment, Bruce simply stood there, staring the horrible thing down. He did not notice how all eyes had shifted away from his second showdown with Wan Hung-Chieh, not until Irma cried, “Look!”
Bruce followed suit and gazed where everyone but the screaming corpse gazed, up at the terracotta roof of the Black Sun School dojo. There stood an imposing figure in flowing yellow and white robes, his stark white hair done up at the top of his head, his lengthy white beard and mustache fluttering in the slight breeze. Now that the figure had been spotted, he bent at the knees and leapt into the air. His body spun into a fluid flip and he landed on his feet in the courtyard without disturbing so much as a single grain of the sand beneath him. The master who had exerted his control over the proceedings thus far adopted an expression of shock and reverence; he fell into a quick bow, as did the two remaining boxers.
“Master Wu,” he stuttered.
Wu dismissed him with a sharp wave of his hand. His attention was focused on the screeching dead man. While he observed the approaching corpse, he stroked his beard and frowned.
