Chapter IV: Berserk
It had been more than twenty blocks with no sign of trouble, but with each passing step Axl became more and more tense. He moved rapidly down the middle of the street, remembering from the map the route leading to where they believed Rebecca was being held, but didn't expect so easy a passage. He went as silently as he was able; the only sounds audible were his breathing and the click of his guns together on his back.
"Sheesh, everything has a freaky Andy Griffith' or a warped Leave it to Beaver' feel to itI hope this town gets more interesting soon or I'll die from boredom! Then again, if things get interesting I may die of something else" Axl tried talking out loud to quell any apprehension welling inside him, but he couldn't shake that bad feeling again.
The streets now were lined with dead trees, despite the fact it was well into spring. It was a sharp contrast to the green lawns of the homes, and the timber worked only to obscure some of his vision of the silent houses down the way.
His loss of being able to see where a monster could be hiding added to Axl's growing anxiety; his focus dedicated to finding any disturbance in the stoic scenery. Everything was so intact, as if everyone had left the town, never to come back, leaving everything like a frozen picture in time. Something had to happen, anything! It was just too quiet! He then slowed to a stop, taking a look around.
"I have to sit down for a minute, I need a breather." said Axl, closing his eyes tightly as he pressed his palm over them and sat down by one of the dead trees on the right side of the street. The hike was getting to him. Axl had remembered a fellow Viral Hunter who had become deranged during a mission in the desert after driving for God knows how many hours in blank desert scenery and was found a week later dehydrated and wandering the Sierra Nevada. The dead view of this town was having the same affect on him.
He shook his head. "Aww man! Usually I'm dropped in a war zone or something, but everything here is just so still! There isn't even a breeze for Christ's sake!" Axl looked up and down the street, seeing nothing. He leaned against the tree, taking a deep breath. As he exhaled, the sun's rays refracting off a metallic surface in the corner of his eye caught his attention: a bright red truck that had crashed into a house in reverse a few homes down lay isolated, and there seemed to be a figure inside.
Axl sprang to his feet, running up to the truck. He looked within, and inside sat a lone corpse, seated with its safety belt on. The key had been snapped off in the on position in the ignition, and from the looks of it, the truck had run out of fuel days ago. The belt held the body firmly to the seat as the decaying form's head hung limply over its right shoulder, the mouth gaping wide. Axl stepped back, closing his eyes and turning his head away.
Then suddenly the sound of glass breaking echoed in the street as zombies climbed from their former homes at the smell of human flesh. All down the street, monsters of unspeakable appearance in human form crawled from windows and through broken doors, or walked on their decaying legs toward the Colonel. The corpse in the truck came to life and struggled to break free, banging its head against the side window with ferocity. The moans of the damned filled the air, resounding in Axl's head as his eyes opened wide.
Axl continued to walk backward, remaining in a state of disbelief to what he was seeing. He had gone through many missions where he encountered situations like this, but
Something happened within Axl's mind as he remembered. A demon that had haunted him since childhood came back to life before his very eyes as he looked around him. His heart pumped, his adrenaline levels rose, his hair stood on end. The image he saw before him was exactly the way it was so long ago! Of all the missions, of all the settings, of all the monsters, this triggered it! He could not bear this memory reanimated. For the first time in his life as a Hunter, he had lost control.
His eyes flashed with a rage under his hat and he roared a bloody battlecry as he drew his broad longsword from its sheath. His fighting instinct took over as he ran to the nearest viral monster — the one trapped inside the vehicle — at blinding speed, carrying the Bolt Sword in his right hand. He gave another yell, even louder than the first, and with one swipe he slashed his sword through the top of the windshield of the truck, shattering it as he crashed his blade down through the driver's seat and out the bottom, cutting the zombie inside cleanly in half. He turned from the truck, the same look still in his eyes.
Axl kept mumbling to himself as he crouched, holding his sword with both hands, "II must save them"
He dashed over to a group of zombies and passed his blade through all of them in one large slash from left to right, their blood staining his sword, filling the crevices that created the image of the serpents.
"save them from this damned existence"
He jumped back, twirling his blade and driving it through another infected human behind him, the blade passing through. He pulled it out and dashed forward toward the hoard of zombies gathered in the street before him.
"from a fate worse than death"
He jumped high into the air, his sword raised above his head. He brought it down with both hands halfway into the one in front and continued forward, stabbing the one behind it through the head. He kicked them off the sword and killed another beside him with a harsh upward slash as the others crowded around him. He jumped backward to create more room.
"Die!" He yelled, lunging forward. He could not stop; he would kill them all and set them free.
-
Axl's blade glided easily through the last zombie's neck, decapitating it without a shred of difficulty. The body fell limp to the ground, its head beside it. Axl's berserk had died down progressively throughout the fight, but his heart still raced at this point. He took a few deep breaths and fell to his hands and knees, the fatigue of battle catching up to him. A few beads of sweat dropped onto the concrete beneath him.
"ZombiesI really hate zombies." he said between breaths. "That was a scary memoryIt had never been sobad before." He tried to force his breath to steady. "I'd never lost myself in a battle like that in the past, I always had power over it."
Axl moved to a seated position on his spot in the middle of the road, facing the path he had just cut his way through. The trail of zombies strewn over the road went for close to 200 feet. He closed his eyes, finally easing his heavy breathing, and reopened them. He brought his gaze on the sword that he still clutched in his right hand. The outline of the twin serpents battling on its surface was bright red, holding the blood of the slain in the small grooves to liven its artwork. It had been a special feature he thought of years ago when he asked it to be made.
Axl looked back up, the breeze finally blowing. The sun was beating down much harsher than he'd noticed before, but his hat still shaded his eyes from the light. After several seconds of looking back, he burst into laughter.
"WOO! That was FUN! At least things aren't so dull anymore!" He jumped to his feet, his energy renewed instantly. He spun his sword once and slid it back into its sheath and brushed the dirt off his shirt and pants.
"Come on, Axl! You can't let every fight slow you down, you've got people to save!" He was now smiling, ready to just forget his bloody fight from mere moments ago and willing to press on with his task. However, there was one problem as he looked up and down the road again. He hadn't seen that intersection before.
"Which way was I going?" Axl said aloud. "Aha! The truck!" Axl looked down one side of the street and when he saw nothing, he ran to the other side and found the same.
This killed his mood quickly as he sneered, "Well damn it, I must have run onto a different street during all the fighting." he growled. "I'm so stupid, how could I have let myself lose focus like that? Great job, moron!"
He tried to think of another way to find his route, but after looking around he found no moss to indicate north growing on any of the trees and the time was, inconveniently, noon, eliminating the idea that he could tell east from west. Even the background was the same, with heavy forests and mountains in the distance. The oddest thing was the condition of the street signs, which were missing. Axl didn't think twice about it.
"Of all the damned luck I could run into! I could lose precious hours wandering before I get back on track!" Axl punched a tree, managing only to hurt his fist. "AH! Damn it! Freakin' tree!" Just as he was rubbing his hand and getting ready to curse the tree further, he heard another sound. It was a faint banging noise, followed by wood snapping.
He whispered, "What in the heck"
He heard a loud growl, and instantly identified what it was.
"Lickers"
Axl moved quickly between two homes, slipping through shrubs and over a wall stealthily in the direction the noises came from. Across the street he saw about a dozen pinkish zombies missing patches of skin encircling a home not surrounded by any structures but by a semi-large garden.
Axl removed his shotgun from his back as he realized why they had gathered around the house. Someone inside was still alive.
