Page 58 of Rebirth

“She will die.”

I sense he tilts his head. “Affirmative.”

I take another deep breath, leveling my gun at a male who is at the front of the group. He looks right past the weapon, almost as if it isn’t there.

“These people,” I say, forcing my breaths to steady. “They aren’t human anymore, are they.”

Not a question, a statement, and for a moment, I don’t expect He’rox to respond.

“Their humanity,” he finally says, “has been destroyed from within.” Hearing him say it, the finality of it, sends a wave of hopelessness through me. “They are simply vessels now.”

I nod, looking down the barrel of my gun straight at the male in front. If I fire, it will go right through the center of his head.

He doesn’t seem to care. Advancing anyway.

“Stop,” I warn him. “Don’t come any closer.”

He opens his mouth to snarl at me, eyes wide with something wild and dangerous, mouth filled with thick black fluid that covers his teeth.

“Stop right there!” I shout as he advances still.

He’s not going to stop.

He’s not going to.

In one sudden movement, he lunges my way and my fingers move automatically. The trigger depresses and his entire body is thrown backward, head first.

Fuck.

My hand trembles as my eyes widen.

That’s the second person I’ve killed in a matter of minutes and my heart hates it. My whole being hates it. Hunting deer is one thing. Cutting down people is another.

But I have to remind myself these aren’t people anymore. They’ve been taken over by another entity much more powerful than themselves. More powerful than any of us.

And I’m given an exact picture of just how much that’s true when the man I just shot in the head staggers to his feet. Blood runs down his face from the hole in his head as his gaze locks on me again.

I pull the trigger. No thinking.

Once. Twice. Three times I shoot. The bullets hit him in the chest, throwing him backward, yet he continues as if pushed forward by something bigger than himself. Something that doesn’t care about his survival but only what it wants.

“What do they want? I don’t know what they want!”

He’rox’s steady voice manages to cut through the chaos rising in my mind.

“I do,” he says, moving to stand before me. “They want your essence,” he says. “Your lifeblood.”

My world stops at his words at the same time that he launches himself into the air, taking the approaching male with him.

Something seems to snap then. As if a cord’s been broken, the marionettes suddenly given another assignment. As He’rox slams the male into the ground and twists his neck, every single person advancing on us screeches.

The sound is enough to make me slam my hands over my ears at the same time that they charge all at once.

“He’rox! Look out!”

I fire, hitting more than one of them while very aware that I’ll be out of bullets soon.

They’re going to kill us. But as I use one hand to shoot, running as I reach into my pack, hand digging into the side pocket for a fresh set of bullets, I realize one thing. They’re Corrupted and they aren’t trying to kill us.

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