Page 27 of Dealing With Drak

I arch an eyebrow at him. “So you’re helping me for your own gain?”

“Very much so,” he confirms shamelessly. “I enjoy your presence. Adventure is fun, zom-bay hunting is fun, and I should like to find your brothers so I may show you my planet as you have shown me yours.”

At least he’s honest.

And hell, I haven’t earned his blind devotion anyway. I shouldn’t care why he’s helping me, just that he’s helping me at all. None of the other aliens were volunteering. None of the girls either, but I wouldn’t have accepted their help even if they offered. They’d only get in the way, physically or mentally.

They can’t imagine themselves killing, and from what I know, none of them have so much as held a gun before. I’d be too worried about keeping them safe to do anything productive. So I’m grateful to Drak, even if his devotion to this search is troubling.

I’m beginning to wonder if Drak has an interest in me outside of friendship. That’s ridiculous, surely. Why would anyone, Drak of all people, intentionally seek anything romantic with me? I haven’t been anything worth pursuing, that’s for certain. Even his friendship is more than I deserve.

“Whatever floats your boat,” I sigh.

Drak bursts into a small fit of laughter. “You know many silly words, An-nana.”

Puzzled, I ask, “Which word was silly?”

“All of them together,” he answers, still snickering to himself. “Flying boats, very funny.”

“Do Aprixians have boats?”

“We have seas,” he says by way of answer. “Boats are not as common as ships, quite an old technology, but I know boats.”

“Well, you don’t know float,” I inform him. “It doesn’t mean fly, it just means how boats act on water, sitting on top of it instead of sinking.”

“It is still funny,” he tells me, giving a little shrug.

“You’re easily amused.”

Drak shakes his head. “You are just funny.”

Whatever you say, man.

On edge with nerves, I enter the store, finding three zombies immediately. Before Drak can take care of them, I do it myself. It takes five shots instead of three to put them down, only one hitting directly between their eyes the first time. I could have let Drak handle it to save ammunition, but to be honest, killing zombies is a bit of a reflex now. Besides, in the worst case scenario, Drak will give me a blaster when I run out.

The little pistols his people call blasters are essentially laser guns, and they’re very useful, but they’re also heavy. I’ve shot them before with the Aprixians, and there’s a bit of a learning curve, but I’ve managed this far.

“Very well done, Mean One,” Drak praises, smiling with delight at the zombie corpses. “I wish to look for more hu-nim weapons on our quest. I should like you to teach me more about them.”

Shrugging, I tell him, “Okay, I was planning to keep an eye out for more anyway.”

He grins happily. “Good.”

If nothing else, Drak is easily pleased.

“Come on, let’s look around.”

So far, this trip is a bust.

We haven’t spotted a single human, and any indication of human presence that we’ve found here is essentially useless. A shoe here, a broken pair of glasses there, spilled food scattered around the floor, and the water section of the store entirely empty. It’s a ghost town here, and it’s making me twitchy.

We’re looking in the gas station now, having maneuvered through the back window to get around the firetruck trapped between the front walls. There were zombies pinned underneath it for who knows how long, but they were barely living when Drak and I put them out of their misery.

Do zombies feel misery?

“What is this?”

Looking over my shoulder, I find Drak inspecting the slushie machine. The typically neon light-up sign is dead, having no power to fuel it, and the normally frozen juice is melted and sitting there, probably well-past expired.

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