I built my suit to deflect punches and kicks, and in the course of my criminal career, it's also turned out to be great at absorbing energy blasts. Laser blast, sonic blasts, poison blasts, my multi-layered suit just takes the beating without too much wear and tear. My body, on the other hand, looks like a roadmap of the Carpathian Mountains afterwards, but codeine-laced Tylenol's cheaper than having to stitch up my suit every time.

Still, my ass hit the ground when I saw that pump-action Remington aimed in my general direction. Lasers and plasma is one thing, but bullets HURT. I can shrug off a laser blast without too much pain, but a bullet'll rip through my suit like a knife through butter. Rhino just stood there, one hand raised to protect his face, as the clerk pumped a round into the chamber and took aim at the front door. I covered my head, expecting to catch a stray pellet or two amidst a bunch of falling glass...

"What are you doing?" Rising from next to the clerk, an older Latino man shoved the barrel of the shotgun into the air, towards the ceiling and away from the two of us. Luckily, the weapon didn't go off, but I was careful not to make any sudden moves as I raised back to my feet. "You're gonna shoot the door open and let those things in!"

The clerk kept the shotgun pointed at the ceiling, and motioned towards the two of us with a free hand. "Dude, they're trying to break in! I ain't gonna let them come in here!"

"Son, that's the Rhino. If it wants to come in here, he's gonna come in," the Latino responded with a raised voice, "and that peashooter you got ain't going to stop him, either."

"Actually..." Rhino raised a hand at this point, speaking loudly so he could be heard through the glass. "...we're here to rescue you guys."

Silence for a second. The only sound, aside from the traffic copter, were the moans of the dead. The yelling had agitated them and when I glanced over my shoulder, I felt a little more concerned as they shifted from Mach 0.000001 to Mach 0.000002 in terms of ground speed.

"Pull the other one, Rhino," the clerk said, beginning to lower the shotgun...

"Hey, if we wanted a damn Pepsi, there were plenty of other places to get one along the way!" I got closer to the glass, hoping that, even with my voice amplifier, I could be heard clearly. "We saw you were in trouble on TV and came to rescue you!"

In the defense of the incredulous looking clerk, if I had heard myself saying that to myself, I would have thought it ridiculous too. If it had come from, say, Boomerang or Speed Demon, it would have been downright unbelievable. So I saw where he was coming from, but with the hordes of Hell getting closer, I was not about to argue with this guy. I was going to save him whether or not he wanted it.

Don't tell anyone, but in that moment, I gained a small measure of respect for Spider-Man. If this was the stuff he went through in the course of being a hero and saving the day, I'd take having to put up with the likes of the Trapster or the Wingless Wizard over it in a heartbeat.

"Wasn't there a blonde with you?" So engrossed on the two guys arguing over whether or not to plug me, I had totally forgotten about the blonde until Rhino mentioned it. So yeah, chalk up that it takes being threatened with a shotgun to blank out about the girl. From behind the display, slowly, a young girl peeked over the boxes of cereal, blonde hair set back in a ponytail. "Is that all of you?" Rhino asked.

"Yeah...so how are you going to get us out of here," the Latino asked.

"Simple. We'll open the front doors and we'll clear a path..." That's all I got out before the clerk started to aim his shotgun at me again.

"Screw that, holmes. My ass ain't going outside for anything. I ain't gonna get eaten by one of those things!"

"Look, we cleared a path, and we didn't see a single one of those things until we got here! It's clear down to the West Side Highway." I turned, and thumped my friend on the chest. "We can handle anything that comes our way, but man, we gotta go now!"

The Latino stepped out from behind the display case. I felt a little apprehensive, since he was within 'stop the barrel from pointing at the Shocker' range, but he was moving towards us, and I'd take that one little victory. "Do you have a safe place to hole up, Shocker?"

"Yeah, four blocks away down in a wareh..."

Behind the Latino gentleman, the back door to the 7-11 suddenly flew open. It swung open quickly, and as I watched, two zombies spilled inside, crashing onto the floor. Behind them, two more of the undead stumbled into the store, nearly tripping over their fallen comrades. A high pitched scream came from the blonde, now standing upright, as the ghouls started to move towards her. The clerk, to his credit, spun the shotgun around. He knew how to use it too, setting the stock against his shoulder before opening fire. The head of the zombie bringing up the rear exploded as the buckshot ripped through his skull. But that still left three more...and another one that walked through the now-open door, ready to join the party.

Aleksei reacted at the sound of gunfire. "GET DOWN," the Rhino roared, his voice echoing down the streets and off the glass. Both hands reached out and grabbed the handles to the locked doors. Realizing what my friend was about to do, I stepped out of the way, to the side, as, gritting his teeth, he simply ripped both doors away, metal shrieking as it torn from the frame. Without pausing, Rhino turned around to dispose of the doors...

They had closed the distance fast. Maybe the commotion had agitated them, and the sound of the shotgun had been the final nail in the coffin. One of them, wearing blue surgeon scrubs that bore a long tear down the side, was five feet away from my friend. Never one to get fancy, Rhino got out of danger by bringing one of the doors down over its head. I covered my face as, with a one-handed swing, the glass shattered, driving shards deep into the brain of zombie. It dropped to its knees, the bottom half of the door hanging around his neck like a twisted necklace. Pulling his arm back, Rhino turned and sent the other door through the air down the sidewalk. It clipped one zombie in the shoulder, sending both the ghoul and the door spinning. The wayward metal and glass knocked down two more zombies before finally impacting on the sidewalk.

On my side of the street, the ghoul who had been blocking our path earlier was still taking his time getting to us. I sent a level-two his way, though, and the window of the flower shop cracked from the vibrations. As the zombie fell motionless to the ground, behind me Rhino was shoving the makeshift barricade out of the way, trying to force his way into the store. The Latino gentleman grabbed the girl and moved her towards the barricade, skidding to the side once Rhino began to shove his way through. The clerk stood his ground, unloading another barrage into the oncoming storm. This shot took two of them in the chest, sending them backwards...but another zombie stumbled into the convenience store, four "live" ones and the headless one on the ground.

"Rhino, I'll cover the outside, get them out of there!" The now-doorless entryway was big enough for Aleksei to fit inside, and with a sharp cry, he finished getting the rest of the barricade out of the way. As he went inside to collect the rescueees, I stepped behind him, facing outside, my gloves side-by-side, at the ready to blow away any ghoul who tried to get close. The helicopter's focus had shifted again, and now the bright spotlight focused on me

There I was, alone on the sidewalk, with a parked car flanking me on both sides and Aleksei handling the back. I counted fifteen dark forms shuffling towards me. Their combined moans were audible over the prop wash of the traffic copter, building on each other. If Hell had a choir, this would be what their warm-ups would have sounded like. I brought my gauntlets up, extending my right arm and aiming at the closest ghoul. One blast, and it shuddered slightly before falling to the street. Automatically, I swung around, locking onto the next target. The vibration sent several pearls from its necklace flying as the zombie tumbled backwards. She knocked into another ghoul, which I elected to quickly finish off while it was distracted. Three down, twelve to go.

I had this.

Behind me, I could hear Rhino taking care of business, a roaring cacophony that left damn little to the imagination. The shotgun went off one more time, before being replaced by the sounds of heavy display cases being flung around with ease and reckless abandon. Shattered glass, the rattle of plastic bottles, the crunch of potato chips being stepped upon. I saw it all going down in my mind, along with one cry of "get him off me" coming from the clerk. Part of me wanted to turn around and watch Aleksei, even for a second, be the proverbial bull in the proverbial china shop. I quickly squashed that urge by sending a couple more level twos in the horde.

"Herman, we're clear!" Instead of turning around, I took a couple of steps backwards, to let Aleksei stand in front now. Next to him, the clerk still cradled his shotgun, and the blonde (early twenties, definitely a looker) was being held by the Latino man. The three looked out at the advancing horde, with the Latino muttering a small blasphemy under his breath in Spanish.

"You got them all, Aleksei?" My friend smirked, and waved a grey fist at the 7-11. One look at the wrecked convenience store confirmed to me that, for the moment, our rear was covered. "Fantastic. Alright, no need to hang around here anymore. Come on," I said, "it's about four blocks to my place. It's secure, we can hole up and catch our breath."

Again, my plan didn't survive five feet.

I took the lead, putting the three civilians between myself and Rhino, and I hadn't even taken two damn steps before something whizzed past my face. An arrow quivered in the doorframe of the flower shop, just inches from having embedded in my body.

"Alright, Shocker, let the hostages go." Crouched on one of the parked cars, a young girl in a purple-and-black skin-hugging outfit notched another arrow. "That was the only time I'm going to ask," she told me as she pulled back the string on her compound bow.

X

The thick quilted fabric of my mask would obscure the sound, but I was holding my breath, back flat against the brick wall, as the lone ghoul wandered to the top of the escalators…

Ok, I can hear the screaming out there, wondering why the hell I'm switching scenes so abruptly. There I was, spinning a tale of thrilling heroics and chills, and just when the plot thickens and there's the possibility of a major throw down where our dashing main character and his trusty sidekick are falsely accused by a cape…instead, there he is, hiding from one single, solitary zombie when only seconds before in our story he was mowing them down like wheat before a scythe.

My reasoning is this…my damn story, I'll tell it the way I want to tell it. I'm an engineer, not a bard. Call it a cliffhanger, call it creative storytelling, call it 'the Shocker pissing us off.' I'm spinning this web…oh, damn it, now I made a Spider-Man pun. Someone shoot me. No, wait, that happens later on.

Anyway, Marie, me, Houston Street Station, zombie. I'm rock still, doing my best impersonation of a granite statue, watching this staggering form in the convex security mirror hanging on the wall. It moved with jerky steps, shoving one foot down before swinging its other leg around to join it. One arm seemed stuck in a bent position, clutching at its chest, while the other moved freely, batting around the air with each motion it made. I couldn't tell which way the damn thing was looking, and its steps took it perpendicular to the escalators. Slowly, it crossed the station entrance, taking its sweet time. It wasn't looking down here, but something drew it to this subway stop. Maybe this was on the guy's commute uptown every day, or he lived around here. I had noticed, when they weren't…agitated is the word Boomerang used. When they weren't agitated, the ghouls seemed to default to what had been their normal, everyday lives. They hung out around their apartments, their places of work, or where they died, whatever was "important" to them. The good news was, Lower Manhattan…people worked there. After 9/11, a lot of people left the area, forgoing it as a place to live. So, after hours and after the zombie apocalypse, this section of Manhattan was pretty clear. Now, Jersey on the other hand…the joke about 'Hell on Earth' was probably fact out in the dense suburbs. So I just had one zombie to deal with at the moment, and its was taking its time, like there wasn't a care in the world beyond ripping into someone's intestines. I had to bite back the urge to mumble "c'mon, c'mon." Any small noise would risk grabbing its attention…

I looked back over my shoulder. Marie was peeking out from behind the Metrocard machine. I carefully held out my hand, doing my best to convey a 'stay still and be quiet' aura. To my surprise, she nodded, and pulled back into the small alcove while I put my attention back onto the zombie.

Several seconds, minutes, a New York minute, whatever, it passed slowly to me. My body wasn't used to standing this still, especially in the frantic moments of the past few days. But, in the end, I'm a living human being, and it was a dumb corpse. It wandered off as quietly as it had shown up, just a small moan echoing down the stairs towards me. I counted to sixty, making damn sure it or any of its friends weren't going to come back, before sliding away from the wall. Moving as quickly as I could, as quietly as I could, I made my way to the Metrocard machines. Marie's blue eyes peeked out as me as I put a finger to my lips, and took her by the wrist. "Move," I told the Frenchwoman, "we're almost there."

Even taking pains to be quiet, I winced at every noise our feet made as our shoes slapped against the stone floor of Houston Street Station. For a born and bred New Yorker, being in an empty subway station…even late at night, and I'm talking 'past last call' late…you could find a homeless guy on a bench. Or a transit cop calmly walking his beat. Or a newspaper stand owner getting set for the morning rush hour. To me, Houston Street was a concrete tomb, and Marie and I were doing our best not to disturb the dead.

We made our way around a kiosk, towards the Second Avenue platform on the south side of the station. At the far end, near the front of the subway car parked on the rails, Rhino's face broke into a grin as we approached my friend and the group of survivors around him. His massive gray form creaked slightly as he stood up. "Herman," he said softly, "I'm glad you made it."

"Glad I made it too," I replied as I went to clasp his hand…

"You don't want to do that," my friend responded. I cocked my head quizzically at him. To answer me, he simply lifted one of his hands. The "skin" covering his fist was streaked with red, and a few gray flakes stood out in the long swaths.

I knew what it was without having to ask. Before I inquired with Rhino as to how he came about to have blood and bone all over his hands, I turned to the survivors. Two of them, a young man in a Nets cap and a older woman wearing a blouse stained with dirt (and worse) were sitting on one of the nearby benches, side-by-side. Two other survivors, a middle-aged couple we had picked up just outside a T-Mobile store, were having a quiet conversation near one of the pillars. They used soft words, as opposed to harsh whispers. Whispers carried further then muted discussion. That fact brought to you by Kraven the Hunter, who I had the…pleasure…of working with just before he offed himself. The guy might have preached "The Most Dangerous Game" as his Bible, but that didn't mean a schlub like me couldn't learn something about urban stealth once I shut up and listened. Decent guy, code of honor, and I'd have more respect for him if he hadn't shot himself in order to get the last word in with Spider-Man. I hated Spider-Man as much as the next guy, but not enough to commit suicide just to get one over on the wall-crawler.

The fifth member of the "I survived 'Night of the Living Dead LARP'" club came forward. "Found yourself another wayward citizen, Shocker," Father Mark Jacobson said as he hobbled towards Marie and myself. "Hello, child," he said, extending a hand towards Marie. "Mark Jacobson, at your service," he introduced himself with a quiet voice.

She hesitantly took his offered hand. "Marie Jaloux," the Frenchwoman replied. "Is…is this a rescue station?"

The good Father shook his head. "No, Marie. It's a way station on the way to one, however. We've just been waiting for you to arrive before we moved on."

"How's the leg, Father?" His left thigh was tied tightly with strips from a white t-shirt taken from a kiosk up the street. A few drops of blood were evident against the color-free cloth.

"I'll manage," Father Jacobson replied. "Thank the Lord it was just jagged metal and not jagged teeth."

The Lord, Yaweh, Allah, Vishnu, Reggie Jackson, whoever. "Father, could you take Marie and explain to her what's going on and where we're heading? We'll be moving out in a few minutes."

"Of course, Shocker. Come, Marie, I'll introduce you to everyone." She was a bit wide-eyed as Marie took the priest's arm. Jacobson led her over to the couple, and I watched the four of them begin to go through the motions of introduction.

"Alright, Aleksei," I quietly said once I was sure Marie was distracted, "what happened?"

Aleksei leaned close to me. "One of those things came up from the tracks. Sarah," he said, nodding towards the woman quietly sitting on the bench, "saw it and almost screamed. She made enough noise, though, two more of them showed up." He looked down at his hands, opening one up to show me the dark stained palm. "I got two of them, but the third managed to crawl up on the platform. I had to…" Rhino held his hands out and slowly moved them together. "He was too close to punch, and anything else would have been too loud. I tried to clean the gunk off, but…"

The thought of my friend squashing a zombie's head like a grape made me wince, especially as I (involuntarily) imagined the sound. "Any others show up," I asked once the shiver had finished running down my spine, "or was it just the three of them?"

"Just those three, Herman." Rhino glanced over at the tracks. The subway train had come to a stop at the platform and left about four feet of clearance at the southern end, the end we were going to use to move everyone back to TriBeCa. "I don't like that. They've never been in the subways before. They weren't transit guys, either, at least they weren't dressed like them."

"Great. That would be the last damn thing we need," I sighed. "The food was all up top. If they figured out that the food's all down here now, then…"

Rhino finished my thought. "…then this time should be our last time we stick our necks out of the warehouse, Herman. Unless we want to try hotwiring a big truck or something."

"That'll attract too much attention," I replied. "And I'd like to keep the number of ghouls pounding on our doors to the smallest amount possible." My mind worked for a few seconds before I continued. "Ok. There was a Walgreen's up the road. I'm gonna grab some stuff from there and then head back to the warehouse. If this is our last trip out, I want to make sure we're good on a couple of things in case they take their sweet time coming to get us."

Rhino, looking down at me, shook his head in disagreement. "I ain't a fan of waiting here much longer, Herman…"

I reached out and squeezed his stone shoulder. "You're not going to wait. I want you to take everyone and start walking. Get everyone back to the warehouse as quickly as you can, before more of those things start showing up in the subway." I watched my friend's face take on an argumentative look, and quickly cut him off to avoid a long discussion. "Hey, Aleksei, I'll be fine. We need more insulin and a couple of other things anyway, and I can get it quietly and quickly if I'm by myself. Smash and grab, no screwing around, I'll hotwire a car and get back to TriBeCa before you know it."

"Herman, you just said getting a truck…"

"A car, Aleksei. A small car, little noise, lots of speed, and I'll get in through the sewers." My hand was still on his shoulder as I looked at him through my mask. "We won't get a shot at this again. But we need to get these survivors back to the warehouse before too many of those things figure out we're using the subway as the Underground Railroad for the living."

I knew my friend still wanted to argue. During the past four days, anytime I had gone off solo, Rhino had worried and shown concern. Hell, it was reassuring to know he cared and didn't want me to kick the proverbial bucket. But right now, in case of cannibalistic humanoid underground dead, Rhino was the man to handle them. The third rail was still hot, and that meant any fights or struggles would be in close quarters so no one still living got hurt. That meant Rhino, pun intended, would have to lead that charge, since one vibration from me could risk a tunnel collapse. Plus, the big guy could survive a step or two on the third rail. I knew it…and he knew it. He just didn't have to like it.

"I don't like it," he said, reading my mind, "but if you think it's the right thing to do, Herman, I'll do it."

"My man." I slapped him good naturedly on his upper arm. "You want anything from the drug store? Hershey's bar or something?"

"Just get your ass back in one piece," Rhino requested. He stepped away, and made his way over to where Marie, Father Jacobson, and the married couple had been getting to know one another. "Hey, we're gonna head out," I heard him inform them. As he explained the situation, I moved away from them. Leaning against one of the iron girders supporting the ceiling, I reached up and unsnapped my mask. The stale air of the empty station felt wonderful on my skin as I pulled my mask off. Everything I saw, heard, breathed, smelled, and tasted was filtered through my mask and the dazzling array of electronics I managed to cram inside the quilted fabric. SHIELD databases, audio enhancers, night-vision, all wired into my outfit. Wonderful and incredible and really handy, but sometimes, I needed fresh, clean air. Down here in the subway station, the smell of the decaying, burning city was absent. The sweat on my skin evaporated as the cooler air touched my face. My hair was matted down and soaked. I hadn't had a shower in four days, and probably smelled pretty damn ripe. But that had been Boomerang's idea…ahead of myself, sorry. I'll come back to that point later in the tale.

My head was leaned back, against the steel pillar, as I lost myself in thought for a moment. I really didn't want to head back up, to be honest. By this point, any thoughts of being a hero or being a Boy Scout had drifted into the realm of involuntary action rationalized with a heavy dose of sarcasm. In a way, I was relieved that this would be the last time I (and Rhino) risked the streets of Manhattan. The risk vs. reward factor had gotten too skewed against us. Too many zombies, not enough citizens in need of rescue. And luck was going to turn against us at some point…

"Mr. Shocker?"

I opened my weary eyes. Next to me, Marie stood, hands held in front of her. She spoke in a low voice. "We're leaving now. You...are not coming with us?"

Sighing, I pushed away from the girder, stretching my arms behind me to loosen the tense muscles in my back. "No. There are still some things I need to get done while I'm here. Aleksei will see you back safe."

She smiled quietly at that statement. "He is so big, like an elephant! I know he will keep me safe, like you did." What she did next took me a bit by surprise, as she leaned forward and gently kissed me on my cheek. Cool lips felt refreshing against my grimy, sweat-soaked skin. And if any of you out there are imagining that I was blushing...well, I wouldn't have put up too much of an argument. "Thank you, my hero, for savings me from those horrible creatures," Marie said as she pulled back. "Be...careful and safe on the streets."

I replied with a nod, and a smile on my own. She turned and made her way to the end of the subway platform. Rhino was already standing on the track, and all I could make out was a gray fist gently helping the survivors down onto the rails. The good Father was second-to-last, as Maria assisted Rhino from the platform. Finally, Marie gently sat down, legs hanging over the side, and two hands took her by the waist, and with a lift, Rhino took her out of sight and on the way back to the warehouse in TriBeCa.

Game face. I pulled my mask back on, and activated the magnetic clasps with a thought. Thirty seconds. That was how much "head start" I'd give Rhino and the other five before heading back up to Houston Street proper, in case some ghoul got curious about a dapper-looking man in brown-and-yellow emerging from the subway steps and decided to see what the underground attraction was.

Now, I know some of you out there, probably the same guys who didn't care for my use of literary technique earlier, are a few seconds away from tearing my head off (verbally, not cannibalisticly) about using the New York Port Authority's tax-supported tunnels as a transit port. "It's dark! It's cramped! You'd be sitting ducks if a bunch of zombies decided to take the Seventh Avenue Line uptown!"

And my response would be...you're right.

Now, Rhino's a New York boy, much like myself. He may be from Eastern Europe, but the big guy picked up the Big Apple's tricks pretty damn quick. That includes figuring out the subway system. For years, us bad guys used the subway to get around without catching too much attention. Just showing up on the streets dressed in our gear was a sign for some superhero to show up and collar us, especially in Rhino's case, where his gear didn't come with a "removable" option.

There are so many warrens and tunnels under Manhattan...how else could a guy like the Mole Man could stay on the lam for so man years? Just carry a compass, keep track of whether you were moving uptown or downtown, and you could get anywhere on the island without attracting the attention of a guy like Daredevil or the boys in Code Blue.

So we have the means of travel, but what about the flesh eaters trying to get a piece of yours truly? Surely the subway system would attract some of their ilk, especially the bunch that seemed to enjoy leaping out of dark places, hands outstretched. Any sane person would avoid the subway unless they absolutely had to. For the first day or two, that was my train of thought. Keep to the open spaces, where my vibro-blasts won't take down walls and have enough room to spread out and put down as many zombies as they could catch. And avoid the tight, cramped, closed quarters, where one-on-one fights could quickly turn into seven-on-one fights.

It took the non-stop news cycle to change my way of thinking. 24 hours of the chaos and murder that was sweeping the globe. The official term was "epidemic," because, according to Dr. Reed Richards, the brains were looking at the situation from the point of view of a virus, a bug that brought the dead back to life. The things that got up, from hospital beds, from pools of blood on the street, and staggered out of the houses and apartments of America, they all had several things in common. One, they craved flesh. No matter what kind of heavy artillery was thrown their way, no matter how thick the door was between them and their snack, they never, ever, ever gave up. Blow three limbs off and they'll hop on their fourth. Lop a head off, and it'll sit on the ground, snapping its teeth at you. As Rhino pointed out, you needed a shot to the head, be it a bullet, a blast, or a blow, something to damage the brain and put the bastard back into the grave. Anything else, and they'll still come to get you.

Which led me to point two. They'll come to get you. They'll go to where the food is.

Notice how I've been doing my best to be stealthy and tactful this lovely fall evening? Not exactly my normal operating mode. These things...they're dumb, but they know when a human's around. Zombies can't work a car, or fire a gun, or work an elevator. But we can. And the second a zombie hears a car going down the street...or a voice over a bullhorn...they know there's a source of food nearby, and they'll let every other thing in a block now about it by moaning. I'm not a zoologist, but the term "predator pack" comes to mind. Remember Central Park? Right now, that place is the biggest rescue station on Manhattan. It's big, square, it's easily blocked off, and the Avengers and every other cape in New York City is there trying to get people to the camp, and from there, off the island. About 7,000 people there, last I heard.

And probably five times that many times zombies pushing at the barricades, trying to get inside. They know what waits for them, if somehow they force their way inside.

They go where the food is. By the Law of Inverses...they don't go where the food ISN'T.

Remember the reasons I listed above, about how sane people avoided the subway system? That meant that there wasn't any food down in the stations and tunnels. So, aside from a few ghouls acting on some spark of memory from when they breathed, the tunnels were pretty free of zombies. Which meant the small number we came across got easily dealt with before they could alert more of their friends.

With that in mind, Rhino and I were able to move across Manhattan without too much difficulty. More importantly, anyone we convinced to join our merry band of brave idiots...some of them freaked, and I can't blame them. But after a bit, being out of sight...and out of earshot...of the Manhattan horde reassured them. Having a seven-foot tall tank on point helped as well. I was surprised, the first time we had to go underground after a dust-up with Captain Marvel (this one was the black woman with energy based powers), at how well Rhino knew the tunnels. The tunnels were big enough that my friend could move about comfortably without getting penned in, and aside from hitting the occasional train during rush hour...well, the trains would usually hit HIM...he used them to great effect. Taught me a trick or two as well.

The subway got shut down on the first night by the New York Port Authority. The outbreak had started during the tail end of rush hour, when most people had either been home or close to home. In New York City, though, that still meant a lot of passengers on the subway or the PATH trains. After the massacre at Penn Station, and with the city trying to keep a lid on the panic, for the first time that I could remember, the New York City Subway system went off-line. Blizzards, hurricanes, blackouts, and even 9/11, there was always someone in the subway getting people to where they needed to go, even if it wasn't by train. The train operators and station personnel and transit cops were just as eager to get back to their loved ones, and aside from the usual union squawking, no one really complained too loudly. Down here in Lower Manhattan, after the panic of that first night, the system has been empty. The stations emptied so far, a couple of them, like Houston Street, didn't get locked up. Good news for myself and Aleksei...

Crap. It's been longer then thirty seconds. You know, one of the problems with being a bad guy is our tendency to monologue. Superheroes have it, too, but us bad guys, in the time it takes US to ramble, the good guy's broken free and ready to kick the snot out of us. When good guys ramble, it's to rub their superiority in our face. Unless you're Mysterio. I don't know how he pulls it off, but I've seen the guy give full-blown dramatic monologues in the middle of fighting Spider-Man.

No yelling or commotion from the tunnel that Rhino, Marie, the Reverend, and everyone else left on. I'll take that as a good sign. Suit integrity's complete. Gloves are charged. The Walgreen's I'm thinking of is three blocks away, and there should be...

They pounce on me as I turn the corner. One's hands explode away from my shoulder, while the other brushes against my chest before the contact plates go off. I shove the two of them away, knocking them to the ground, and raise a glove for a quick level-one to their skulls when movement up ahead catches my eye.

About seven zombies are stumbling down the escalators towards the heart of the station. In the middle of the pack, holding on to the rail to keep upright, one of them drags a broken leg behind it. Odds are it's the one I saw in the mirror earlier. Maybe it came back and heard something, or something fired in its slow-to-necrotize brain, or probably it's just the universe throwing dumb luck its way so the bastards could come rain on my parade.

Alright. Nine zombies total. I could just run past them, and they'd follow me like good little lemmings. But if anyone of them don't...the odds of them making it to the platform, jumping down onto the tracks, and managing enough speed to come up behind Aleksei and the survivors before they reach safety is ridiculously low.

Which is why my next action is to raise my fists and simultaneously fire a level-one blast into each zombie at my feet. I've been in the game long enough to know that when the long odds are against you, that's when they pay off. As they both slump motionless to the tile floor, I'm stepping forward. The seven remaining ghouls are spread out enough that I can take them down one at a time...

Two minutes later, I'm climbing back onto Houston Street. Nine dead zombies are laid out below me in the subway station, tiny trickles of dark blood from their ears and nose pooling on the floor. It's three blocks to the Walgreen's. There's a couple of ghouls staggering about the surface. One or two are heading towards the subway station, and when I arrive on the scene, they raise their arms and stagger towards me. After taking care of both of them, I start walking. I'm not in too much of a hurry, and I'm not making that much effort to remain stealthy this time out. Let the idiots see me walking. I'm not too keen on using myself as bait, but a ghoul following after me is one less ghoul stumbling down in the subway.