I’m so used to fighting melee with a weapon.

  I guess I need to learn throwing skills.

  Make sure the thing you're throwing is aerodynamic and deadly. Don't get caught trying to throw a throw pillow at zombie.

  ---

  Gail tossed me a pistol like it was a hot potato and I was the designated kitchen fire.

  “Silencer attached,” he said, not even looking at me. “Don’t waste ammo.”

  I caught it. It was heavier than expected. Sleek. Quiet. The kind of weapon that said "I do wet work in the shadows, and I haven’t spoken to my mom in five years."

  Alex got one too. She twirled it in her hand, grinning. “Oooh, this is way cooler than my pistol.”

  “I question everything about this scenario,” I muttered, examining the gun. “Where’d you even get these?”

  Gail, who had been casually assembling a scope on a rifle like he was brushing his teeth, didn’t answer.

  I didn’t push. Mostly because his arms looked like they could fold me into a burrito and mail me to hell.

  We spent the day in an abandoned parking lot turned shooting range. Gail lined up targets—cans, glass bottles, zombie heads on spikes (don’t ask)—and ran us through shooting drills.

  Alex took to it fast. Too fast.

  Pew. Bottle shattered.

  Pew. Can flipped.

  Pew. She turned and nailed a target behind her using a rear-view mirror.

  “Okay, now you’re just showing off,” I said, missing my third shot.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  She shrugged. “I watch a lot of movies.”

  Gail didn’t say much. Just corrected stances, handed out ammo, and occasionally did things like toss an axe into a tree trunk from thirty feet. Or snipe a zombie in a building with just a throwing knife.

  “Did he just—”

  “Yup.”

  “Okay.”

  I didn’t like it. Not just the uncanny aim—though yeah, that too. It was the vibe. The calm, stormy, I sleep with one eye open and a claymore under my pillow energy. He wasn’t just good. He was… unnervingly practiced.

  And then he smiled at Alex, just a little, and she lit up like a busted circuit board. Great.

  ---

  That night, we were supposed to head back early. But Gail spotted something and made us detour through a back alley. “We’ll test your progress,” he said, which was ex-marine for "you might die, but it builds character."

  Of course, that’s when the zombie gang hit us.

  Six of them. Two biters. Three limpers. And a leader leading the charge, its half-melted face twitching like it remembered being a gym coach once.

  They came at me while Alex was checking a locked door.

  I drew my silenced pistol. Pew. Pew. Two down.

  The leader screeched, raised an arm, and the other two zombies flanked me. Flanked me. Like, tactics. That shouldn’t be legal.

  I elbowed one, spun into a trash can (very cool, totally planned), and kneed the third one in the gut.

  Then I heard the whistle.

  Thunk.

  A knife embedded itself into a zombie’s skull two inches from my head.

  I didn’t see Gail.

  But I knew.

  Alex didn’t wait. She charged—sprinting past me, pipe wrench in hand, and rammed it into the Leader's t’s knee. Then the throat. Then the knee again. For good measure.

  The leader screeched once more—then fell, twitching.

  The remaining two zombies looked at each other, looked at us, and just… ran.

  “Wait, what?” I said.

  “They ran?” Alex echoed, panting.

  “That’s… not in the manual,” I muttered, slowly lowering my pistol. “They don’t run. They lunge. They toddle. They skitter. But running implies survival instinct.”

  Alex wiped her forehead. “Do we chase them?”

  “Hell no,” I said. “Chasing zombies is like asking for a sequel.”

  ---

  After the dust settled, Gail appeared from a rooftop. I kid you not—he literally hopped down from the roof like Batman. Landed, didn’t stumble, didn’t grunt. Just landed.

  “How’d I do?” Alex asked, bouncing on her heels.

  “Good,” he said. “A little messy. But effective.”

  She beamed.

  I watched him walk off and turned to her. “Okay, are we gonna talk about the fact that he saved my life with a knife… from a roof… while I was moving… and he didn’t even flinch?”

  She shrugged. “He’s military. Maybe it’s training?”

  “I have seen training. I was in training. What he does is… is…”

  “Art?”

  “No. Witchcraft.”

  Alex laughed. “You’re just jealous.”

  “I’m not jealous. I’m… cautious. There’s a difference.”

  I turned the knife over in my hands. It was perfectly balanced. Like, perfectly. Like, “I used to be a circus performer who doubled as a murder magician” perfect.

  Whatever Gail was, I couldn’t deny he was useful. Effective. Efficient.

  And exactly the kind of person I did not trust to keep me alive longer than he needed to.