The End Is Now

It broke the spell of stillness.

It broke something in his chest.

Tom’s next word was not calm. Might not actually have been a word. It started out as “No,” but it changed, warped, splintered, and tore his throat ragged on the way out. A long wail, as unending as the moans of his neighbors. Higher, though, not a monotone. Not a simple statement of need. This was pure denial and he screamed it at them as they came toward him, pawing the air. For him. For Benny. For anything warm, anything alive.

For meat.

Tom felt himself turn but didn’t know how he managed it. His mind was frozen. His scream kept rising and rising. But his body turned.

And ran.

And ran.

God, he ran.

They, however, were everywhere.

The darkness pulsed with the red and blue of police lights; the banshee wail of sirens tore apart the shadows of the California night, but no police came for him. No help came for them.

The little boy in his arms screamed and screamed and screamed.

Pale shapes lurched toward him from the shadows. Some of them were victims—their wounds still bleeding—still able to bleed; their eyes wide with shock and incomprehension. Others were more of them.

The things.

The monsters.

Whatever they were.

Tom’s car was parked under a street lamp, washed by the orange glow of the sodium vapor light. He’d come home from the academy and all of his gear was in the trunk. His pistol—which cadets weren’t even allowed to carry until after tomorrow’s graduation—and his stuff from the dojo. His sword, some fighting sticks.

He slowed, casting around to see if that was the best way to go.

Should he risk it? Could he risk it?

The car was at the end of the block. He had the keys, but the streets were clogged with empty emergency vehicles. Even if he got his gear, could he find a way to drive out?

Yes.

No.

Maybe.

Houses were on fire one block over. Fire trucks and crashed cars were like a wall.

But the weapons.

His weapons.

They were right there in the trunk.

Benny screamed. The monsters shambled after him.

“Go!” Mom had said. “Take Benny . . . keep him safe. Go!”

Just . . . go.

He ran to the parked car. Benny was struggling in his arms, hitting him, fighting to try and get free.

Tom held him with one arm—an arm that already ached from carrying his brother—and fished in his pocket for the keys. Found them. Found the lock. Opened the door, popped the trunk.

Gun in the glove compartment. Ammunition in the trunk. Sword, too.

Shapes moved toward him. He could hear their moans. So close. So close.

Tom turned a wild eye toward one as it reached for the child he carried.

He lashed out with a savage kick, driving the thing back. It fell, but it was not hurt. Not in any real sense of being hurt. As soon as it crashed down, it began to crawl toward him.

And in his mind Tom realized that he had thought of it as an it. Not a him.Not a person.

He was already that far gone into this. That’s what this had come to.

He and Benny and them.

Each of them was an it now.

The world was that broken.

It was unreal. Tom understood that this thing was dead. He knew him, too. It was Mr. Harrison from three doors down and it was also a dead thing.

A monster.

An actual monster.

This was the real world, and there were monsters in it.

Benny kept screaming.

Tom lifted the trunk hood and shoved Benny inside. Then he grabbed his sword. There was no time to remove the trigger lock on the gun. They were coming.

They were here.

Tom slammed the hood, trapping the screaming Benny inside the trunk even as he ripped the sword from its sheath.

All those hands reached for him.

And for the second time, a part of Tom’s mind stepped out of the moment and struck a contemplative pose, studying himself, walking around him, observing and forming opinions.

Tom had studied jujutsu and karate since he was little. Kendo, too. He could fight with his hands and feet. He could grapple and wrestle.

He could use a sword.

Twice in his life he’d been in fights. Once in the seventh grade with a kid who was just being a punk. Once in twelfth grade when one of the kids on the hockey team mouthed off to a girl Tom liked. Both fights had been brief. Some shoves, a couple of punches. The other guy went down both times. Not down and out, just down. Nothing big. No real damage.

Never once in his twenty years had Tom Imura fought for his life. Never once had he done serious harm to another person. The drills in the police academy, even the live-fire exercises, were no different than the dojo. It was all a dance. All practice and simulation. No real blood, no genuine intent.

All those years, all those black belts, they in no way prepared him for this moment.

To use a sword on a person. To cut flesh. To draw blood.

To kill.

There is no greater taboo. Only a psychopath disregards it without flinching. Tom was not a psychopath. He was a twenty year old Japanese-American police academy cadet. A son. A stepson. A half-brother. He was barely a man. He couldn’t even legally buy a beer.