Zeke sighed in relief at my acceptance. He’d clearly been worried that I would refuse. He gestured to the jug, offering a drink, and I accepted with a nod. Paula just clutched her steel shovel and shook her head, unwilling to release her grip on the makeshift weapon. I stepped up to the back of the truck, then stuck my head under the jug’s spout and drank deeply. When I pulled my head back up, I found Zeke digging into the back of the other truck. After he rooted around briefly, he grunted and pulled out a massive sledgehammer with a solid hickory shaft. He spun the heavy tool easily and smacked the haft into his palm as he held it in front of him, then nodded confidently.
Meanwhile, Adam had wandered to the police cruiser and opened the trunk. By the time I finished drinking water from the jug, the scrawny youth had returned carrying the officer’s AR-15. Several magazines were stuffed into the front pockets of his reflective neon safety vest.
I suspected that the young man may not be the most steady person to trust at my back with a firearm, but with the white-knuckled grip he had on the gun, I wasn’t going to voice my opinion now.
“West then,” said Paula nervously.
I nodded, leading the way west down the straight but cluttered stretch of Forbes Avenue, leaving behind the splattered flesh and blood of both monsters and those who had fallen to them.
Chapter 6
We had nearly reached the heart of the Squirrel Hill neighborhood before we were attacked again.
Residential homes had given way to commercial storefronts, and we had just passed a local bank branch. Ahead, the second-floor windows of the Squirrel Hill branch of the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh gleamed in the mid-morning light over the intersection of Forbes and Murray Avenues.
Even with the heightened awareness provided by my Keen Senses, the first warning I had from the next danger was the sound of panicked firing behind me as Adam opened up with the police issue AR. I turned back toward the sound and instinctively raised my shotgun to point at a potential threat.
Far behind us, a small herd of deer were running down the street in our direction. The half-dozen animals bounded up, over, and around the vehicles in the street. Unlike most of the animals I had encountered so far this morning, these seemed to be normally sized. The deer moved quickly though, and none of them seemed to be taking damage from the rapidly firing rifle.
Adam was a poor marksman.
“Stop shooting,” I commanded. “Wait until they get closer or you’re just wasting ammo.”
Adam looked chagrined, but he complied with my instruction and ceased his ineffectual fire.
The herd rushed closer, and I watched as several pedestrians hurried out of the animals’ path. One individual, too far away for me to determine whether it was a man or woman, moved too slowly, and a deer on the outer edge of the throng casually swung closer to the fleeing figure. Still moving at speed, the deer flicked its head sideways to catch the individual on its multi-tined antlers. The antlers seemed to pass through the fleeing figure with no resistance, and a cloud of viscera erupted from the person as their torso was shredded, and the body was thrown away to impact limply against the nearest building.
Zeke and Paula traded nervous glances.
I looked at the bank and had an idea.
“Get behind the columns,” I shouted as I pointed at the bank beside us. “Adam, give them cover. Zeke and Paula, smash any of them that get close.”
My instructions shook the group into action, and they moved to follow my hasty plan. Instead of joining them, I moved to the opposite side of the street and crawled into the bed of a full-sized pickup truck that sat empty with the cab doors open.
“What are you doing?” I heard the concern in Zeke’s deep voice.
“Splitting them up.” I looked at the approaching deer that were almost within range now. “Hopefully,” I muttered to myself.
The much closer herd of deer had spread out slightly by the time they reached us, dodging around the abandoned vehicles in the street. The first couple deer seemed fixated on me, so I prepared myself to meet them.
As the first deer reached my truck, it jumped and lowered its head to impale me with its antlers. I activated Hinder, and the deer seemed to hang in the air as it was slowed by the Class Skill. I fired at the airborne creature, then I jumped backward onto the cab of the truck as I pumped the shotgun slide to chamber a new shell. The second deer ran around the side of the truck, keeping its head turned toward me as it passed.
The use of Hinder and the impact of my close-range shot had killed some of the first deer’s momentum, which kept it from landing completely in the truck bed, but the shot hadn’t done as much damage as I hoped. The deer scrambled to pull itself up, and I fired again. This time the impact seemed to stun the deer, and I jumped off the cab to fire again at a much closer range. The third shot ripped away most of the flesh from the creature’s skull, leaving bone and ragged muscle exposed.
The deer swiped its antlers at me and the tines glittered with metallic sharpness, but I easily avoided the weakened movement and pumped the shotgun as I stepped forward again. I placed the barrel against the exposed bone of the deer’s head and pulled the trigger. The fourth shot shattered the creature’s skull, and the beast dropped to hang halfway over the side of the truck bed.
Somehow the deer still attempted to scramble to its feet, so I pulled my combat knife and dropped the shotgun to hang from its sling. I grabbed the deer by the base of its antlers and held the beast still as I repeatedly stabbed my knife into the head wound.
When the deer finally stopped moving, I sheathed my knife and pulled the last handful of spare shells from the pouch on my belt. I pushed them one at a time into the Remington’s mag tube.
A clattering from behind me pulled my attention away from my kill as the truck shook under my feet. The second deer had circled the vehicle and leaped onto the hood while I fought the first creature. It clambered awkwardly over the cab as it rushed toward me.
A quick pump of the shotgun’s slide chambered a new shell, and I activated Hinder on my new target as I fired. The deer took the damage in stride and jumped down into the bed, lunging toward me with its antlers flashing. I dodged and found that I moved faster than the nimble deer with my ability active on it.
Now alongside the deer’s flank in the narrow truck bed, I jammed my shoulder into the deer. I pushed off the side of the truck bed for leverage as the creature attempted to spin, but my actions threw the deer off balance and caused it to stumble sideways. If it had more room, it may have recovered, but its lower legs caught on the far side of the truck bed, and it tilted precariously without the space to balance itself.
With no more room to sidestep, I heaved harder and the deer tripped over the side of the truck bed, falling to land twisted on the street below. On its back, the deer flailed its legs to right itself as I racked the shotgun slide and fired into the underside of the prone beast. It took several shots that each tore deeper into the creature’s vulnerable underbelly before the beast’s flailing legs flopped over to lay still.
Too intently focused on finishing off the second deer, I missed the approach of the third.
It lunged at me from behind the truck, and I reacted too late to completely avoid injury. Even as I twisted away, I found out how razor-sharp the antlers were. The tines ripped easily through the flesh of my left forearm and sliced down to the bone. The attack severed the tendons that held my grip on the shotgun slide. Agony raced up my left arm as my hand flopped open, and the weapon slipped free from my lifeless hand as blood spurted freely from the deep gashes.
With my teeth gritted in pain and unable to chamber a new round quickly with only one arm, I released the shotgun and let the sling pull it out of the way. I clutched my wounded arm tightly to my chest as I drew my Colt pistol with my uninjured right hand.
The deer that had wounded me had spun around after running past the truck and now leaped up as it slashed its antlers at me again over the edge of the truck bed. I saw it coming
and activated Hinder in time to easily dodge the slowed creature.
I absently noted that my Stamina bar was nearly empty now, and though it gradually recovered, it was far too depleted to activate the ability anymore. I hoped I wouldn’t need it again and resolved to better manage my abilities in future fights.
Though my stamina was low, Hinder remained in effect even as the deer landed. I had the Colt leveled and opened fire. The semi-automatic pistol thundered with each trigger pull, and the deer staggered as each round impacted it just behind the shoulder. Each shot hammered into the same spot, punching deeper into the animal’s chest cavity as I aimed for the deer’s heart and lungs.
After my third shot, the deer stumbled and fell to the ground with blood spraying out of its mouth with every breath. I fired yet again into the same spot and the wounded animal shuddered and went still.
I looked around for more threats and saw none close to me.
Two deer were still up though, and they menaced the other members of my group where they huddled between the marble columns of the bank entrance. A third deer had fallen some distance down the street. It looked as though Adam had gotten some lucky shots into it.
Behind the columns, Paula was seated with her back up against the bank wall and a pool of blood beneath her. Zeke swung his sledgehammer back and forth, the long handle of the weapon keeping the last two deer at bay. Adam appeared to have run out of ammo though, and he knelt between Paula and Zeke, pulling a magazine from the front of his vest and fumbling as he tried to reload the rifle.
My left arm still hurt and trickled blood, but it no longer spurted as it had when the wound first occurred. I still couldn’t move my left hand though.
I jumped down from the truck and moved toward where the others fought. Adam still struggled to seat the magazine into the AR’s receiver, so I kept moving sideways as I shifted my position to ensure that any shots I fired wouldn’t hit the group. Once I was sure that I wouldn’t hit the others, I fired into the side of the closest deer.
My attack surprised the creatures, and Zeke took advantage of their hesitation. While my shots injured the deer nearest to me, he took a wild overhead swing at the one on the far side. The heavy head of the sledgehammer crushed the deer’s skull, and it dropped instantly.
I kept shooting at my target until the slide locked back. I holstered the empty pistol, unwilling to risk a reload with my wounded arm and unmoving hand. Instead, I reached behind me and ripped the survival axe free from the straps on the side of my pack.
My shots had injured the deer but hadn’t done enough damage to kill it. It limped backward on three legs as I moved closer, swinging its razor-sharp antlers toward me. I targeted the deer with Hinder as I reached it, only for nothing to happen as my depleted Stamina blinked in warning.
Without the help of my Class Skill, I had to rely on more conventional means.
I circled the deer, forcing it to spin on its wounded front leg as it tried to keep those sharpened antlers pointed at me. Since it had one injured leg, I moved faster than it could turn and I lunged forward, hacking my axe into the back of the deer’s neck. I pulled the axe free and jumped back as the deer swung its head, slashing antlers through the space I had vacated. I continued circling and waiting for the opportunity to strike once again.
Hooves scraped across the asphalt as the wounded animal spun in an attempt to keep me in front of it. Blood trickled from the torn flesh on the back of the deer’s neck, the rivulets dripping down around the neck and onto the animal’s chest. With each panicked motion, crimson drops arced away from the creature to splash onto the pavement beneath it and the tang of blood filled the air.
My nostrils flared at the scent and saliva flooded my mouth. I swallowed and breathed deeply, pushing down the bloodlust as I circled my prey. The tempo of the fight now firmly in my control, I kept the animal off balance with feints and an ever-increasing pace. Each time the deer failed to turn fast enough, I darted in for another chop.
Wounded and bleeding heavily, the deer faltered and turned even slower after every successful assault. Finally, when the creature had nearly exhausted itself, I sprang in for the kill shot. The powerful blow to the back of the deer’s spine severed it with a sharp snap, and the beast crumpled to the ground. I stepped up to the dying beast and finished it with another heavy stroke of my axe that dug deeply into the back of its head.
With all the creatures now dealt with, I turned back to the group. Zeke and Adam were helping Paula to her feet. The woman’s right thigh was a shredded mass of flesh where it had been gashed by one of the deer. Below that point, her jeans were soaked red with blood. The worst of the bleeding seemed to have stopped though, just as the bleeding had now stopped from my own gravely injured arm.
Apparently, we all healed far more quickly in this new world, and anything that didn’t kill you right away left the chance for survival.
Seeing my compatriots out of immediate danger, I cleaned the blade of the axe on the deer’s fur and strapped it back onto my pack. Then I looted the deer I had killed while I acknowledged the experience notifications that blinked at the edge of my vision.
Deer pelts, raw venison, and razorhorn antlers made up the majority of the items I pulled into my Inventory, and I wished yet again that I had a way of knowing the value of the items I carried. I also looted a few razorhorn hooves, razorhorn bones, and some random organs.
When I looked at my inventory, I noticed that the grid was filling up with animal parts. I hoped that at some point in the near future, the space available to me would increase. Otherwise, I would soon be forced into leaving loot behind.
After my looting spree, I met back up with the others in the middle of the road.
“You okay?” I asked Paula.
The woman had one arm over the shoulders of Adam and Zeke, though the taller Zeke was hunched over slightly to keep level with Adam. Paula looked at her leg, then up again for a second before her gaze drew distant.
“I think so,” she said hesitantly. “My health points are climbing back up slowly.”
A voice from down the road interrupted our conversation. “Yinz all right?”
I looked up to see a young man dressed in business casual holding the library door open and leaning out slightly to look at us, as if unwilling to actually step outside of the building. Without waiting for us to answer, the young man jerked his head from side to side as he looked around before he beckoned us over with a gesture.
“You should get over here, this is a Safe Zone,” the man said.
I heard the capitalization in his words and looked at the others. They all looked back at me, clearly waiting for my opinion. I turned toward the man in the door.
“Okay, we’ll be right there,” I said, matching action to words as I headed in that direction.
Chapter 7
As we passed from the sidewalk through the doorway into the library, a new message popped up over my vision.
You Have Entered a Safe Zone (Carnegie Public Library of Pittsburgh, Squirrel Hill Branch)
Mana flows in this area are stabilized. No monster spawning will happen.
This Safe Space includes:
A Library (+10% Research Progression)
“A Safe Zone?” asked Zeke, clearly having received the same notification.
“Yes,” the young man replied. “It’s a Safe Zone because of the children in the daycare program.”
He nodded toward the center of the library. I looked in the direction he indicated and saw an older, gray-haired woman seated in a red plastic chair and reading aloud from a brightly colored book to a group of young children who sat circled around her. Somehow, the old woman seemed imperceptibly more frail than everyone around her.
I considered a moment before realization sank in.
“She did something, didn’t she?” I said softly.
The young man nodded sadly. “The System offered Mrs. Lynne a unique Basic class. She turned it down in order to make this place safe and u
sed her Perks too. Now she’s only got something very Basic.” Then the young man’s eyes grew hard as he looked at us. “You’re not going to give us any trouble, are you?”
I shook my head. “I wasn’t planning on it.”
I looked at the others, who were also shaking their heads.
“GOOD,” stated a robotic voice from the shadows.
The whine of machinery echoed through the library entrance as a large mecha stepped forward. The mechanized contraption had two arms and two legs. Seated in an elevated control chair that looked very much as if it had once been a motorized wheelchair was a spindly young man with a goggled hood completely covering his head. A mass of wires and tubes ran back from the hood to the machinery behind him. The legs of the mecha extended from hips that were placed just outside the wheels of the motorized chair. The long arms each ended in a rotor saw and had a nozzle just outside the blade that looked like a flamethrower. The whole thing gave the impression of a cross between something a cosplay group would do for charity to decorate a child’s wheelchair for a parade and a lethal war machine from the grim darkness of the far future.
“Woah,” said Adam as the mecha took a thundering stride toward us that vibrated the floor beneath our feet.
“I WOULD HATE TO BE FORCED TO DISASSEMBLE YOU IF YOU BECAME A PROBLEM,” stated the robotic voice, coming from a grille on the hooded head. The saw blades whirled for a single rotation to emphasize the threat.
“I would hate that too,” Paula said, wide-eyed.
“We weren’t planning on staying long,” I added.
“We’re headed west,” said Zeke. “I need to get to my kids.”
“WEST,” the mecha stated. “THERE IS A SHOP TO THE WEST. YOU SHOULD HEAD THERE FIRST AND PURCHASE SYSTEM WEAPONS AND UPGRADES. YOU WILL NEED THEM.”
“A shop?” I asked.
“A SYSTEM SHOP IS LOCATED IN THE CATHEDRAL OF LEARNING.”
“Thank you,” I said politely, unsure of what exactly a shop meant. I liked the sound of upgrades though.
Fist Full of Credits: A New Apocalyptic LitRPG Series (System Apocalypse - Relentless Book 1) Page 5
