#redherring.

" we seriously doing this? " caio   muttered   beside   him as   another   distant   explosion   rattled   the   street. " because   this   feels   like   the   beginning   of   one   of   those   documentaries   where   everybody   dies. " and despite the dire situation at every corner outside caio's apartment, every how tired and sleepless he was, salvador still laughed, still couldn't walk away from murphy, and if he had clean up one of his messes one last time then so be it. " yeah,    well...   those   documentaries   usually   need   really   attractive   corpses anyway. " but his expression dropped as soon as the comms crackled alive again. «  we've just detected horde   movement   detected   near the residential area that was just affected by karma's miracle.    repeat,    massive   horde   movement   heading   toward   the   residential   evacuation   routes. » fuck. all   the   noise.    karma's   uncontrolled   powers   ripping   buildings   apart,    car   alarms   shrieking,   people   screaming⸻ it   would've   been   like   ringing   a   dinner   bell for those fucking zombies.

it doesn't take them too long to get to halcyon's west end, especially when caio could just create decoys to distract the stray undead with their noises. but then ahead of them,  karma was long gone, but civilians   still   stumbled   through   the   streets⸻ parents   dragging   children,    bloodied   neighbors   trying   to   carry   each   other,    apartment   residents   wrapped   in   blankets   of   smoke   and   dust.    and   beyond   them,    at   the   far   end   of   the   avenue,   came   the echoes of squelching flesh and rattling bones. and they didn't have much time left before it reached the crowd of people outside, but salvador   inhaled   slowly anyway,    rolling   his   shoulders   back   despite   how   every   sore muscle   already   screamed   at   him   to   stop. " we buy them time, " salvador said in that practiced superhero voice he put on every time he gave an interview back when he was still renaissance and wanted to make everyone believe he can do anything. and   red   herring   stared   at   him   for   exactly   one   second   before   groaning   dramatically. " i   fucking   hate   when   you   do   the   hero   voice. " but caio had always been just a heroic, just as brave, already facing the civilians then giving them the order to get into the houses and buildings that were still upright. " wait till you hear my sexy voice. did an erotica narration for one of those audiobook apps once to boost my scores with the college girls demographic, " salvador half-joked, to lighten the situation up, mostly for himself, before he began to evacuate the civilians. they spent the next few minutes doing just that, most people already off the street by the time the first undead launched itself at them. and salvador   caught   it   by   the   throat,    instantly absorbing its supernatural strength and twisting the momentum   violently   as   he   slammed   it   skull-first   into   a   parked   car   hard   enough   to   crater   the   door. and not too far from him, caio's decoys snapped into existence, throwing flashbangs and grenades at the horde, not strong enough to completely incapacitate or destroy the undead, but enough for them to lose some limbs and be slower. and whenever they got close to be lethal, caio made a decoy of himself to be devoured in his place.

and for   a   while,    it   almost   worked. people   got   away. doors   were slammed   shut, and lights   disappeared. but   the   undead   just   kept   coming, too   many for the two of them to deal with. salvador's   breathing   grew   ragged and harsh,   his fists   slick   with   blackened   blood,  and his shoulder   partially   dislocated   after   an undead   crashed   into   him   hard   enough   to   send   both   of   them   through   a   bus   stop.    a few feet from him,    red   herring   was   limping   now,    the   decoys   he tried to make flickering   erratically   in and out of existence from   his own exhaustion.

then, one   undead   tackled   salvador   from   behind.    another   immediately   after.    then   three   more. he   hit   the   pavement   hard, and teeth   sank   immediately into   his   side, and another   grawed   at   his   arm. there was nothing to do but scream as filthy hands pinned him and mouths tore into his flesh like starving animals.

" salv! " caio screamed.

and salvador turned his head   just   enough   to   see   him   collapse   too, the undead digging into caio's flesh. still,    salvador   reached   for   him. hand   dragging   uselessly   across   blood-soaked   concrete,    fingers   trembling,   vision   blurring,    but trying   anyway. " i'm glad i met you, " the actual words didn't come out, but salvador mouthed it anyway with the last of his strength. and caio just smiled at him, using the last scraps of his energy with one hand reaching back at salvador while the other was reaching for the hail mary in his arsenal. their fingertips almost touched, but then caio triggered it⸻ an explosive caio had reserved for only the worst of villains. " see you in the next life, " caio said at the final moment. and maybe time was the biggest of all for now affording them enough, the explosive now used to give a quicker death and erased all of this motherfuckers.

with the two of them at the center, white-hot fire swallowed the horde, vaporizing the undead bodies and everything else in their immediate vicinity. smoke rolled upward into the endless night...