Harry Potter and the Dawn of the Dead

by Erised Burning

HPBuffyRE crossover. Feeling trapped by the prophecy, Harry ditches the Order and Privet Drive, only to find himself searching for kidnapped slayers in Raccoon City.

4. Raccoon City

Chapter Four

Raccoon City

Jill Valentine twitched uncomfortably in her bed. It was the middle of the night, and moonlight was slanting in through the bedroom window of her third floor, single-room apartment. It had been three months since her narrow escape from the mansion, and she was still having nightmares. She had seen a lot of shitty things in her time as a STARS member, and had, at least prior to the events in May, believed she had developed a thick skin against the gruesome carnage that humans could inflict on one another. Twirling babies on bayonets couldn't compare to the horror that was the Umbrella corporation.

Whenever she caught sight of something that was the same colour of the viscous, corrosive pus that oozed out of the mouths of animated corpses, she had to fight down an instinctive gag response. Whenever she saw the glazed look in someone's eyes, she thought of the walking dead. Limps, cuts, bruises, and malformed shadows came together to torment her one second at a time. And that was when she was awake.

Jill bolted upright, her damp comforters pooled about her like a feeble shield, sweat glistening on her cheek, catching the rays of moonlight. A minute passed and her breath slowed, her heartbeat returned to normal, and, not five minutes after that, she was plodding to the kitchen to get a glass of water. Goddammit, girl, she admonished, get a hold of yourself. You're not going to do anybody any good like this. You're tougher than that.

Not a week after the mess had ended, she had thrown herself full force into a torrid and ultimately doomed love affair with Redfield, who had suffered similarly through the events at the mansion. They had been together in mind and spirit as they fought to expose Umbrella, as they fought desperately to warn the world and the inhabitants of Raccoon City. But, as always, no one wanted to listen. It hadn't taken long before they both realized that they were seriously fucked up, and that communing with one another wasn't exactly proving to be very therapeutic. Funny that the only thing holding their relationship together had been a nightmare memory of flesh-eating zombies. Was it any wonder that Chris had gone ahead and taken a flagrant bribe from Umbrella to disappear overseas? Jill pursed her lips at the memory. Truth be told, she wasn't very angry with him; more that she was simply forlorn that they hadn't given her the same offer. She probably would have taken it, if they had. Now, she was just tired, and had been thankful that she had been slapped with a desk job, despite how both heavy and empty it made her feel.

Worse yet, she was broke and the recent smear campaign against her made her job prospects outside her department bleak. Lacking any moral fortitude and being fundamentally risk-averse, she found herself muddling along one day after the next, while simply waiting for the eventual outbreak of the G-virus. No doubt it would be the day she died ignominiously at the hands of a zombie horde. She couldn't say the prospect was all that appealing, but she really didn't have the energy to pick herself up by the bootstraps and take off. Damnable inertia.

Raccoon City was a city of many contradictions. On the one hand, it was a resort town that blended rugged mountain terrain, lush, alpine forests and a flat desert plateau. On the other hand, it boasted all the standard amenities, including a vibrant nightlife, rife with a seedy side and an elegant one. It was jazzy and soulful and vacant. It had its clean parts but there was a grime lurking underneath. It was free and simple and always under the control of Umbrella, the corporation that supplied nearly half the residents' jobs directly and all of their jobs indirectly. It was a resort town of sorts, and yet it got few visitors. Raccoon City residents prided themselves on their privacy. It was a place of blissful ignorance.

Many of the people who worked and lived there regarded it as something of an oasis. Rent and housing would be extraordinarily high if it weren't for the fact that Umbrella tried to keep Raccoon City's existence as low key as possible. To its inhabitants, the affordable housing was just another bonus to living there. It was a place that had no downside risks, as far as anyone could tell.

Old man Marshall was just polishing the dark mahogany bars and tables in his out of the way little pub just on the Northern tip of Raccoon City's outer limits. He had lived there his entire life and had inherited the pub, which was named, "The Bear's Lie in," from his father, who had ran it for thirty odd years before passing it down to his son. Marshall liked to go hunting in the summers. He liked cars, trucks, guns and making love to his exotic, Swedish wife, Ilsa, who knew only enough English to get by, and was very doting. The day was coming on eleven o'clock in the morning and he was just getting ready to open up shop. The Bradley sisters, both of whom were meaty, but still nice to look at, would be coming in to help with the usual lunchtime crowd. He liked a woman with a good sampling of flesh. Not too much, mind you, but just enough to pack the curves in all the right places.

Old man Marshall sure liked his life. It was simple and clean and full of the good, wholesome things that God invented for man's enjoyment. The way he figured it, as long as he did the work and kept on trucking and providing for his wife, good things would simply keep coming to him.

"Oy, Suze," he called as the first of the Bradley sisters walked into the pub. "You're early."

"Just a wee, boss," she said cheerfully. "Mary'll be in, in a bit."

"I don't doubt it."

Suze went directly to the back and began working on setting up the kitchen and the till.

It was not long before the first customer of the day entered.

"Ben, you're early!" exclaimed Marshall, taking in the sight of his longtime fishing buddy, Ben McConnell. It did not take a doctor to figure out that Ben was unwell. "Oy, Ben, you look a bit peaky," said old man Marshall. "Whatcha been gettin' yerself upto last night?"

Ben merely grunted and approached, one arm bent in an unnatural way, a deadness in his eyes that had never been there before. When Ben was only ten feet away, Marshall began to realize that something was amiss. Ben's skin was grey and flaked, and... was that blood? He also seemed to be drooling something that looked like urine. All the while he moaned in a toneless sort of way that made the hairs on the back of Marshall's neck prickle uncomfortably. "Listen, Ben, I think you'd best be gettin' over to yer doctor. You know, toute suite, as they say. You're in need of some penicillin or something, I reckon."

Ben, however, did not seem to be listening. He instead chose to amble forward with a drunken gait. He had stopped moaning, though Marshall wasn't sure whether that was a good thing. Ben came right up to the bar, stumbling stupidly over the stools, which he absently pushed out of his way. Marshall took a calculated step back, making sure that Ben wasn't within reaching distance. "Ben, listen. You'd best be going, or it'll be the police station where we'll be sorting this mess out." The usual sternness and conviction with which Marshall spoke had ebbed away. Even he knew that his words were simply not registering in Ben's brain. What happened to you, old friend? Marshall wondered.

Just then, Suzanne Bradley came out from the back room to find out what was going on, and whether there would be food needing to be served in the imminent future. Seeing only his profile from the side and seeing him leaning over the bar, obviously in amiable chatter with her boss and longtime mentor, Suzanne approached good old, trusty rusty Ben McConnell. In retrospect, she could have pinpointed the exact moment when Marshall realized her approach and contemplated the all too likely scenario that she was going to get mauled, and, decided not to do anything about it. Whether he chose not to warn her, because he was too dumbfounded to speak, or whether he was just plain curious what would happen when somebody got close to the caricature of Ben that had entered his bar, Suze would never know. She cheerfully slapped Ben on the back, effectively grabbing his attention. "Aren't ya even gonna say hi?" she asked. "Shame on you!"

Marshall stood fascinated by the events that were transpiring before him. He could see the look of unbridled hunger that Ben expressed in his dark eyes, and he could see it being shifted from him to Suze. "Aren't you even going to say hi?" Marshall heard her say.

Ben swiveled his head to look directly at her, and for a brief instant, a frown crossed Suze's features. "Eh, what's wrong with you?" she asked, peering at his skin, which was the colour of microwaved meat. "Boss?" she asked, turning to face old man Marshall, who could not even begin to comprehend how to answer her question. Not that there was really time for it.

Ben leaned in close to Suze's shoulder, and pushed his face into her throat, where he promptly took a large bite of her soft, pink flesh. It was not a love bite, or a nibble of affection. No, it was a great big, honking gouge that sprayed blood all over Suze's sunshine yellow tank top and the freshly polished mahogany bar.

"Gah!" Suze shrieked, stumbling backward as she pushed against Ben to separate herself from him. Luckily, she managed not to fall over, but before she could really start getting away, she felt Ben's strong hands wrap themselves around her waist. "Ben!" she cried out. "Stop! Marshall, help!"

Tears blurred Suze's vision as she spied around. Before too long, however, she felt Ben's strong jaws rip into her left breast. Displaying desperate strength she never knew she had, Suze broke out of Ben's iron grip and staggered away, instinctively clutching at her breast, only to flinch away from the contact with the mutilated flesh.

She staggered to the ground and fell over, gurgling blood. She tried to drag herself away, but Ben crawled awkwardly on top of her and began licking the back of her neck, which only caused Suze to begin making a muling sound spliced in with please of mercy. "Ben, stop, please. It hurts, Ben. Please."

But Ben did not stop. He dug his fingers into the soft tissue on her sides and began ripping her apart, blood and gastro-intestinal juices sloshing about the otherwise immaculate floor. Ben grinned delightedly, blood all over his lips and chin. He stuffed handfuls of Suze's meat into his face, chewing hungrily like a man possessed.

Sadly for Ben, it would be the last bite he ever took. There was a deafening report of a gun being fired. A shotgun, to be exact. The shotgun round partially vapourized the back of Ben's head, leaving his brains to ooze wetly out of his skull and thud uselessly to the floor.

Marshall stared down at the mess that was his best friend and the girl he spent countless days leering at. "Jesus H. Christ," he muttered. "What the fuck happened to you, Ben?"

Just then, Mary walked into the pub. "Hiya-" she stopped in mid-salutation as she spied the carnage that lay between them. After a minute of observation, Mary's mouth working soundlessly as she went through a range of emotions, she finally asked, "Boss?"

"I'm sorry, Mary," Marshall said, lowering his weapon.

"Sis?" Mary repeated, more to herself, it seemed.

Marshall, satisfied that Ben wasn't getting up anytime soon, turned his back to the nightmare and dialed the police station. It could be said that Marshall had little reason over the course of his life to actually require the services of the Raccoon City police department. Still, he was man enough to admit to being just the least bit discomfited by the response of a busy signal. Don't they have upwards of fifty lines to handle emergency situations? There was a gurgling sound behind him, and a cry that was abruptly cut off. Marshall, still riding his thrill of energy from having fired his shotgun at a live target - something he hadn't been able to do since the ban on bear hunting came down - simply dismissed it as the stressed ramblings of Mary, who was most likely inspecting her dead sister. Marshall tried the RCPD again. However, before he managed to complete the three digit code for emergency police response, he heard a distinctive moaning sound. Except this time, it was female.

Unnerved for the first time that day, Marshall gently lowered the receiver onto the hook and turned slowly around. Next to him stood Suze, tendrils of Mary's flesh hanging loosely from her mouth. It did not go unnoticed that Suze's shirt had been torn to rags and, for the first time in his life, old man Marshall was getting the clearest and fullest view of Suze's ample breasts. He found himself getting a hard on.

Marshall whipped the gun to one side in a skillful attempt to bash Suze's head in. He almost thought he had gotten away with it too, as the butt of the shotgun approached her head. However, he was sadly mistaken. Without moving a limb, Suze effectively incapacitated old man Marshall. She spat a gob of acidic pus into Marshall's face, causing him to instinctively flinch, and, once the pain receptors came to life, futilely claw at his face to stop the searing pain. Suze casually pushed him backwards, the gun forgotten, his arms flailing about as he landed squarely on his butt. Suze then proceeded to crawl on top of him and begin feeling around for a hunk of tasty meat. To her dismay, Marshall was a particularly lean man. Fortunately for her, she found his still erect penis, and after massaging it for a few minutes, she determined that it was pretty much flesh all the way. Kneeling down and bending forward she got into position, ripped off his pants and swallowed his penis whole.

Raccoon City would never quite be the same again.

All day, reports rolled in through the media and on the phones. People were trying to make sense of the horror and give names to the chaos that infected Raccoon City. Jill could only think of one name fitting enough for it all. Umbrella. The bitter, angry, rejected part of her wanted to run outside and scream, "I told you so, motherfuckers! I told you, and you pea-brained small-town rejects just couldn't get a fucking clue! And now look at you! You're zombies!" Fortunately, she exercised enough self-restraint not to go down and do that, which certainly would have cost her life. No, instead, she just sighed and gazed out at the wreckage from her window. How quickly things turn to dogshit, she mused, seeing a police cruiser crash into a desperate cyclist. Who the fuck needs zombies when you've got the RCPD in all their world-renowned glory? The officer got out of the cruiser and hastily put a bullet in the cyclist's head, before turning to the lone zombie that was tracking its way across the street towards the law enforcement agent. Trevor's his name, she thought, recalling seeing him around the department. She remembered him giving her both ogling looks and pitying ones after the incident at the mansion, which news reporters had dubbed "the Unfortunate Umbrella Affair".

Trevor fired his entire remaining clip into the zombie's chest and, in his desperate attempt to finish the zombie, simply continued to pull the trigger, more sweat breaking on his skin as each time the gun merely reported a click.

Idiot, she thought irritably. Aim for the head. Figured you'd get at least that right. Trevor turned tail and ran away. He's so going to get eaten alive, she thought, turning from the window.

"Well, Jill, old girl," she said aloud in the deepening twilight gloom of her silent apartment. "It's time for you to make a decision. Are you going to sit around here like dead weight just waiting for the end to come, or are you going to go out there and kick some ass?" She still wasn't sure whether she planned to actually try and survive or simply go out zombie hunting until she got picked off. Neither avenue seemed appealing, somehow. "Ah, what the fuck. May as well do the whole try and survive thing. Fuck, it's so cliché," she said, lighting a cigarette and taking a puff, silently thanking Brad for getting her hooked on nicotine. Fuck, yeah.

Jill donned snug fitting pants and a tank top, because clearly it was suitable zombie-fighting attire. She then loaded her standard issue .38 and left her apartment.

Dawn and Xander had taken to wandering aimlessly through the streets of Raccoon City, often illicitly posting WANTED signs with Buffy's and Willow's faces plastered across them. It was a rather pathetic effort, even they had to admit. Still, it was all they had, as they waited for Faith and her sidekick to show up and save the day.

"We're so useless," Dawn whined pitifully.

Xander took a seat next to her on the steps of a large Umbrella corporation building. "Normally, this is where I'd step in and dissuade you from entering a negative mood spiral, and after sharing experiences that are meant to be cathartic, I would then summon example after example illustrating just what unique and worthwhile contributions you bring to this endeavour."

"And?" Dawn asked hopefully.

Xander shrugged. "I just don't have the energy to be that creative with the lies right now. Come back later, maybe."

"Has anyone ever told you that you're an ass?" Dawn inquired.

Xander cocked his head and thought about it. "Not exactly. Does Anya telling me she likes my ass count?"

"Er, no."

Xander just shrugged and proceeded to eat his Oh Henry bar. Chocolate had to serve as their lunches, because they were on the cusp of poverty.

"I just don't understand it," Dawn said, kicking a loose pebble. "There's some mighty military giant out there with vast resources that's hunting us down. You'd think we'd be able to deduce at least something about what it is they're all about. You know, a name, at least. We've always been able to do that."

Xander tossed his chocolate bar wrapper into the wind, where it fluttered in a breeze for a moment, before being carried off to whack against a "WELCOME TO UMBRELLA" sign. "We just never get a break. That's all there is to it," replied Xander, staring wistfully off in the direction of a brunette in a low-cut yellow tank top. For a moment, he remained oblivious to Dawn's intense, scrutinizing gaze. Eventually he cottoned on to her preoccupation and followed her line of sight to the Oh Henry bar wrapper and the large sign that it was now plastered to.

"Umbrella," Xander said thoughtfully before looking down at the small print underneath the sign. It read: MAKERS OF THE WORLD'S MOST ADVANCED INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTS AND LEADERS IN THE FIELD OF BIOTECHNOLOGY.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" asked Dawn slowly.

"Does it involve whipped cream and chocolate syrup?" he replied rhetorically, before saying, "I think it's time we open up a can of whoop ass."

"Yeah," Dawn agreed, turning around to face the lone sky scraper that marked the center of Raccoon City's downtown core. She gazed up at the monster building, which, from the front steps, loomed past the clouds and to infinity. "And we're going to do it with guns. Lots of guns."

Xander nodded. "Guns are nice."

With that, the duo headed to the nearest sporting goods store.

With Harry's altered appendages, Faith had discovered that he was a smidgeon heavier than he would have otherwise been. Not that it was a bother to her, given her super strength. She was just thankful that she didn't run across any obstacles on her trip down the mountainside. She had briefly considered holing up in the mountains for a few days and waiting for Harry to come around, but, after an hour of agonized self-questioning, she finally decided that the only thing she was good for was doing stuff, and nobody could fault her for simply acting. Harry had said that wizards would swoop in if cases like him ever showed up, and so she simply had to trust that, when she got him to a hospital, the magical alarm bells would start ringing. Maybe then she could ditch him and focus on the task of finding her compatriots. You're better solo, anyway, she affirmed to herself. None of this having a sidekick crap. It's too Chuck Norris.

Faith reached Raccoon City's center by about 2 in the afternoon. Just a couple hours after old man Marshall had his penis eaten. There was a surprising flurry of activity, which Faith duly noted. Moreover, the air had a palpable, frantic quality to it. She probably wouldn't have noticed it, except that she had gotten used to the feel in the final days before Sunnydale's destruction, when the town had experienced a mass exodus. Only now, it didn't seem like people were leaving so much as they were running around like chickens with their heads cut off. Like they were simply waiting to die.

It made her shiver just a little bit, and she decided as a matter of instinct that she would perhaps hole Harry up somewhere and then do a little investigating. Couldn't hurt to be too careful, after all.

"Come on, squirt," she said, shifting Harry's bulk to her other shoulder and making her way to one of the less reputable looking motels. "Need a room," she said to the desk clerk, flicking a gold Visa card onto the counter, compliments of the Watcher's Council. She had to admit, after all these years, they were actually good for something.

"Did you want that by the hour?" the man asked, eyeing Faith's bundle.

"The day," Faith replied.

The man acceded and Faith quickly took her charge to an upstairs suite, where she deposited her charge. "All right," she said, staring down at the pitiful bundle of flesh and feathers. "I'm going to go to a hospital and see if I can't manhandle a doctor into coming out this way.

"Faith," Harry wheezed, his eyes fluttering.

"You're awake," she said, surprised. "Harry?"

"Yeah," he managed, though it was clear he was having to struggle. "Wha' happen'd?"

"Er," she said, not having expected to have to answer that question so soon, or possibly at all. Oh, just come clean with it. If he protests, you can chloroform his ass. "I tried to kill you. Do you remember that?"

Harry just smiled with something that lookd like fondness.

Okay, weird, she thought, before continuing. "Well, you sort of, er, transformed..

Transformed? he mouthed, though no actual sound came out.

"Well, yeah," she said, as if to confirm the clearly ludicrous statement. "You know, as in like, changing from one thing to another."

"I know," he wheezed. "Wha- transformation?"

"Well, Harry," she said, taking a deep breath and steeling her nerves. "I don't know how to quite tell you this, but you've got wings. And one of your arms and one leg looks like that of a horse. And you've got some sort of cone thing sticking out of your head. It's really freaky looking."

Harry scrunched up his face in concentration as he digested her words. And then, after a moment, he smiled again and nodded. "Cool."

"Cool?" Faith echoed disbelievingly. "That's your big response? Cool? Please tell me you know what the fuck's going on."

"Didn't expect the wings," he mused. "Can't really feel them."

Faith bit down on the urge to snap the little blighter's neck right then and there.

Harry, mercifully oblivious, just continued, "It's my animal form. I thought I was a unicorn, but I don't think unicorns have wings. Must be something related."

"A winged unicorn?" she asked blankly. "You can turn into that?"

"Harry nodded. "I was looking into it before we left, but I didn't know how to do it. It's very complicated and dangerous to learn without supervision. You could hurt yourself."

"No shit," she said, raking over his body for the thousandth time with her gaze. "No shit, indeed."

"I'll be all right," he said. "Just need some rest. And some food. Thirsty."

"Right, of course," Faith replied. "You and me both. I'll just pop downstairs and see what I can rustle up. You - don't go anywhere."

Faith, relieved, exited the modest one bedroom she had rented. For some reason she couldn't understand, talking to Harry creeped her out. The things he said, the way he acted... it was as though he belonged to a completely different world. Sure, she had seen her fair share of strange things. She herself had mystical powers, but there was something about Harry that was different. Putting her inarticulable unease to the side, Faith made her way towards the nearest convenience store she could find. Now that Harry was conscious and talking, and since he didn't seem too worried about his situation, she decided that maybe she would stick to her original plan and just let him work it out with his magic. There was really no need getting doctors involved. She could just pick up a few basic supplies, some food, some basic first aid and then retreat to their room for the rest of the day. Now that things were coming together and settling down, she felt the weariness of the last twenty-four hours work its way through her muscles.

Harry was just about to settle into a doze after Faith left when he heard the distinct sound of a thump against the door. It sounded as though somebody had thrown a large, rotten watermelon at it. Was somebody knocking? Harry wondered, easing his way into more of a sitting position in order to study the door more closely. He briefly considered calling out to see if anyone was beyond the door, but decided not to. It would probably be safer to just pretend that it didn't mean anything.

Except that, after a few seconds had passed, there was another thump. Two of them, in rapid succession, as a matter of fact.

Damn, Harry thought irritably. Deciding he'd better be forceful, he called out, "Who's there?" Harry had half-expected Faith to call back to him, which is why he was distinctly unnerved by the eerie silence that followed his question. "Listen," he said, calling out to the still air, "I'm armed, so you'd better-"

A large crack formed in the center of the door, accompanied by the sound of another thump. This one much louder.

"Oh fuck, Harry thought, staring at the door. Who the fuck's out there?

"Faith!" he called out, praying to whatever deity was listening that Faith could somehow hear him. "Faith! Help! Somebody!" Another hard thwack against the door and this time, the wood split apart completely, letting a head partway through the door. Harry's first thought was, Jesus, somebody's headbutting my door to pieces. And his second was, Jesus, how fucking weird is that?

After a moment of study, Harry saw that there was something distinctly wrong with the person that was climbing through his doorway. First of all, the person lumbered cumbersomely. The second, their skin was the colour of microwaved meat. The third was that the young adult male had half his face missing, and the wound appeared to be pretty fresh.

Oh my God, Harry thought, awestruck and horrified. It's a zombie. Harry had heard of inferi, which Voldemort was using to wreak havoc upon the world. From what he understood, they were animated corpses. Could this being in front of him, be such an example of a creature? For some reason, Harry thought not. It didn't exactly make sense, given his location. He was in the USA, for God's sake, and Harry knew for a fact that Voldemort had little pull across the Atlantic. No, this was something else, he decided.

Not that it mattered, since Harry had fuck all to defend himself. The creature meandered toward him, moaning in a way that was most disturbing.

"Er, is there something I can help you with?" Harry asked in as pleasant a tone as possible, while trying to hide the nervous quiver in his voice. He scooted over to the far side of the bed.

The zombie fixed its one good eye on him for a moment before coming closer, its arms outstretched comically.

"Okay, stay back,' Harry said, nearly falling off the other side of the bed in his haste to get away.

The zombie just moaned.

Harry, not taking his eyes off the creature, fumbled around for an object with which he could defend himself. Silently, he cursed Faith for breaking his wand. The ruddy zombie wouldn't have a prayer if he were armed.

Unfortunately, all he managed to get his hands on was a pen, which he held onto for dear life. The zombie crawled onto the bed, oblivious of Harry's pitiful, makeshift weapon.

"BACK!" Harry said shrilly, making pathetic little stabbing motions with his pen. The zombie just swatted his one good arm away and proceeded to crawl on top of Harry.

"GAH!" Harry cried out as the zombie dug into his torso. "NO, GET AWAY!" Harry beat feebly against its body with one hand. The creature just leered lewdly at him and bent its head down to rip out a hunk of Harry's cheek, Harry all the while twisting his head back and forth and crying out. "NO! PLEASE DON'T! PLEASE! GOD HELP ME! PLEASE, OH GOD!"

As the zombie pressed its teeth down against Harry's skin, Harry cried let out an ear-piercing shriek that was accompanied by a bright flash of light and a surge of magic that shredded the other half of the zombie's face. The creature reeled back drunkenly and touched its now mutilated skin as if trying to understand what exactly had happened to it. Harry paused and looked fearfully at the creature, only to gaze upon the now truly hideous visage before him. The zombie's face was little more than a skull with blood-encrusted strips of flesh hanging from it. One eyeball hung out of its socket and was dangling by a string of greyish jelly.

"GAH!" Harry wailed feebly kneeing the creature in the chest. The zombie bent down and bit into Harry's thigh, causing him to scream out again, this time, another display of accidental magic propelling the zombie off his body and causing it to roll off the bed. Through the burst of magic and the sharp sting of the bite and now flowing blood, Harry felt distinctly woozy.

Through the descending haze on his mind, Harry knew that the creature was not dead. He knew that whatever he had done to it was simply not enough, and that, while his magic had protected him thus far, it would not continue to do so. Eventually, the zombie would push past his natural magical barriers and begin consuming him.

You can't even bloody walk, Potter, he scolded himself. Look at you. You need to fix this animagus business, and you need to do it fast. Harry focused on his human leg and began massaging it, taking care to be gentle around the zombie bite. He closed his eyes and focused his mind on the mental image of a unicorn. Relax, he told himself in a soothing tone, even as he heard the zombie moaning in the background. Do not think about that. Focus, relax.

Harry dragged himself into a trance, despite his pounding heart and the wounds and the stiffness and the hunger. He blotted out thoughts of Faith and of his friends and of Voldemort and of the zombie that was trying to eat him. Seeking out that part of his magic that he was just starting to learn how to feel, he tried pushing magic down through his leg in order to cause it to transform. Keeping his eyes closed and his hand on the leg, he slowly felt the transformation take place, hairs growing where there were none before, the joint shifting, his foot softening and reshaping into a hoof. He sighed contentedly, before snapping his eyes open and staring at the zombie, its rancid breath tickling his nose.

The zombie moaned, and Harry just closed his eyes once more, pushing that much harder to blot out the sense of imminent peril that was trying to demand his attention. He felt the zombie take a swipe at his face, but Harry just let it strike him. He had more important things to do, like completing the transformation. It took only a second to transform his other arm, now effectively rendering him useless.

The creature bit down on his unicorn leg calf, but Harry ignored it, instead simply using occlumancy to blot out the pain as he mentally pictured unicorns jumping over a fence. Focus and relax. He blotted out the flow of silvery-red blood dripping onto the bed, and the sounds of the creature chewing, and the push to expedite the process.

Instead, Harry just lay back and let the warmth of his magic spread through his torso and his neck and head, until when he finally opened his eyes, he saw the world in a completely different light.

It was unlike anything he had ever seen before.

The first thing that struck him as odd was that he was colour blind. Everything appeared to exist in various shades of light and dark. However, it was not quite as simple as that. Each object seemed to emit its own light, some even having a halo of energy around it. He measured things by assessing the degree of luminosity. Even the zombie was made up of patches of glowing energy. Hell, even the air currents sometimes shimmered. It was as though everything in the world that had mass or speed had an associated brightness.

Finding that his magic had positioned his limbs properly, Harry limped out of the bed and onto the floor, missing a step as he adjusted to his new form and also having to compensate for his broken leg. He tried to steady himself, but still couldn't quite manage to keep the quiver from his remaining three legs. He was no longer looking at the zombie, but, nevertheless, he could feel it moving towards him, the same way a person could feel the rays of sunshine on their back.

It was amazing. It was like sonar, only so much more precise and informative. Harry experimentally crouched down in order to brace himself. Yes, it seemed that the zombie did not discriminate between humans and animals. It would try and eat him regardless. He made a kicking gesture with his back leg and discovered that he had in fact caught the zombie in the chest, effectively sending it sprawling to the ground with a broken rib. He had no illusions that a broken rib would not slow the creature one bit. Harry, as such, carefully turned himself around, finding it extremely difficult to do so given that he was new to the form, and that his leg was broken and that there was little room for him to maneuver. The zombie was getting back up, but Harry did not intend to let it complete that task. He dragged himself forward at what was a snail's pace, and managed to butt the zombie in the chest with the side of his head, sending it sprawling to the floor a second time. Harry then proceeded to step on the creature's various joints, like its knees, and then working its way to the zombie's head. Harry once reaching its head and managing to ignore the gashes the creature was inflicting with its hands as it tried to claw out Harry's flesh, Harry pressed his horn into the zombie's eye socket and pushed all the way down into the brain matter. He held his horn there for a good few seconds, after which he felt the zombie's energy dissipate.

It was dead.

Harry let out a long whinny that was his attempt at a sigh.

When he looked up, he saw Faith standing there in the doorway, a bag of sandwiches and crisps and soft drinks in her hand, her mouth agape. Harry just snorted and whinnied a second time before trudging past the zombie and collapsing on the wood floor. After a moment of feeling around with his magic, he managed to transform, albeit slowly, back into his human self. He let out a piteous moan and just lay there. "Faith," he said weakly.

In a moment, he felt himself being lifted onto the bed, Faith ripping away the blood-soaked part of the covers. "Tell me everything that happened," she commanded.

Harry did not have the heart to argue, so instead simply laid it out as simply and as concisely as he could manage. "Not two minutes after you left," he said, propping himself up and vaguely aware that he hadn't managed to retract his wings, all the while biting greedily into his ham and cheese sandwich, "there was a thumping on the door. I called out your name, but no one responded. Then, this guy's head-" Harry pointed to the zombie accusingly. "That guy's head just came crashing through the door, followed by the rest of him. I told him to stay back, but there was nothing for it. You know, I actually think he might have been a zombie. His skin colour was grey and he tried to eat me, while I was alive. My magic fried off his face and he totally didn't care. He also wasn't bothered by the broken rib I gave him. Having no defense-" he gave her an accusing glance before continuing, "I completed my transformation and managed to stamp on his kneecaps and then impale him through the eye socket with my unicorn horn."

Faith just sat there stunned. "Whoa," she said thoughtfully. "That's fucked up." Then she peered closely at his skin and said in a thoughtful tone. "You know, I think I've seen a few more of these guys running around the city."

"You mean they're locals?" Harry asked incredulously.

Faith shook her head. "No, I don't. I think there's something seriously wrong with this town." She scratched her head. "I just can't quite figure out what it is."

Just then, they heard the sounds of gunfire in the distance, punctuated by a shrill cry that was abruptly cut off.

"Fucking Hell," Harry muttered in the ensuing silence.

"I do believe we have some serious problems," Faith sighed, staring out the window. "And until we can find somebody to give us some answers, all we're going to end up doing is running around like chickens with our heads cut off."

"Where do you suppose we should head next?" he asked.

Faith shrugged. "I reckon the police station'd be a good place to start. Possibly the news." Faith reached over and plucked the remote control off the nightstand and casually flicked on the TV, surfing until she reached a local news station. "Christ, it's not like we're going anywhere with that leg of yours. And clearly I can't leave you lying around. You're bloody useless."

"If someone hadn't snapped my wand," Harry began venomously.

Faith just burst out with a laugh. "Your wand? That stupid piece of wood. Yeah, fat fucking lot of good it did you, didn't it, squirt? You and your little potions and trinkets and shit. Ain't worth a damn against the real deal. Ain't worth a damn against me, and ain't worth a damn against the shit that's out there, that's for sure."

"You don't know what you're talking about," Harry replied, still seething, his gaze travelling down to her forearm, where the scars from his shield had impacted with her skin. He eyed them greedily, fantasies of inflicting more pain on her dancing through his mind's eye. Faith seemed to sense where his thoughts were going, for she narrowed her eyes.

The pair of them were oblivious to the narration of the news anchor, who was describing the rising carnage in the city, the wave of destruction. Faith shot out a hand and gripped Harry's wrist painfully. "The only reason you're alive, you little shit, is because-"

Faith did not get a chance to finish her statement, for Harry flexed one of his wings, which, despite its feathery softness and delicate beauty, also had the power to pack a punch like a rampaging hippogriff. Faith was whacked in the face so hard she was sent sprawling off the bed and onto the wood floors. "If I remember correctly," Harry said in clipped tones, "I knocked you a good ten feet without my little trinkets, didn't I? Besides, you wouldn't have gotten within a foot of me if you hadn't sucker punched me from the side. Don't expect me to fall for the same trick twice. I'm warning you." I won't be so easy to break, even without my wand."

Faith had gotten to her feet and was sporting a very visible bruise on her cheek. Harry could see that she was fighting to hold down her anger. Wanting to rub salt into the wounds, he just went on, "It appears the brute can keep her cool once in a while," he said mockingly. "Wouldn't want you freaking out and getting yourself hurt."

"The volume of calls being recorded coming into the local police station have increased ten fold since the first ones this morning at around 10:30 am. Local sources have reported that the STARS team has been mobilized." Meanwhile, Nemesis rampaged across the street and smashed up a car somewhere behind the field reporter.

"Jack! Fuck! Are you getting a feed of that?" asked the reporter, who whirled around and stared in awe at the sight of the carnage. Nemesis lifted up a human body with one hand and hurled his victim fifteen feet so that the body came crashing down on top of Rosalind, the reporter. "Gah!" she cried out. "Jack!"

However, Jack didn't seem to be faring any better as gunshots were fired somewhere to the side and his head was partly caved in by a zombie. Moaning sounds were coming in through the television and Jack let out a momentary gurgle, his hand flailing uselessly in front of the camera before going limp. Blood spurted across the camera lens, appearing on the screen just before the feed was cut out, returning to the anchorman sitting behind a desk in a news studio somewhere. The anchorman looked rather discombobulated, and took a moment to begin speaking. "Er, well, as you can see, the situation has been degenerating throughout the day..."

"Why you little!" Faith lunged at Harry, who simply apparated from where he sat, coming to crouch artfully near the television screen. Faith, not having expected that, had overbalanced and went crashing to the floor on the other side of the bed. "YOU BASTARD!" she cried out, climbing to her feet and looking wildly about for her prey. In her fury, she grabbed the remote control and hurled it at Harry, who simply apparated right next to her, the remote control impacting against the television screen and shattering the glass in a fit of sparks. He batted her with both his wings, and sent her tumbling back onto the bed, from which she sprang up and sent a vicious punch at Harry's head, only to miss as he apparated yet again.

"As exciting as this is," Harry said from the other side of the bed, "It's really not getting us anywhere. And all this apparating is getting hard on my leg."

"Well why don't you stop for a moment, then?" Faith growled, hurling herself at Harry, who simply apparated yet again.

"Not too bright, are you?" he asked, smirking.

Faith paused to appraise Harry for the first time. She took a deep breath and exhaled in a tai chi type attempt at meditation, before scrutinizing him. Finally, she asked, "What do you want?"

He stopped to consider the question, his gaze never leaving her. He cocked his head and said, "When I was fifteen months old, my parents were murdered by a dark wizard. A very evil dark wizard who called himself a Lord. He tried to kill me, but failed and instead, he was stripped of a body for a very long time. I was sent to live with my aunt and uncle. They thought I was a freak for being magical and ritually abused me for the last fifteen years of my life. They told me my parents were drunks who died in a car crash." Harry paused to collect his next few words. "A year ago, this dark wizard... this Lord came back. He murdered a classmate of mine right in front of my eyes and he tried to kill me. It was only by sheer luck, and my mother's love that saved me that night. And just a couple of months ago, one of his soldiers murdered my godfather. I came out here, because I need to learn to fight. I need to know that there's things worth fighting for in this world. I need to be able to stand on my own two feet, because, one day, I'm going to have to deal with this dark wizard once and for all. He'll never stop coming for me. I know that now. He'll hunt me down. He'll torture and kill everyone I care about. I don't really want that to happen." Harry paused a second time to gather his thoughts yet again. Eventually, he looked straight into Faith's eyes and said with a steely resolve, "You think you're better than me. You think you're tough. That you've been through worse, that you've handled more. Maybe that's true, but then again, maybe it isn't. I don't really care. If you don't want me hanging around, that's fine. I'll go my own way. You can do your thing, I'll do mine. But that doesn't mean I'm going to just take off and run home to England. Giles assigned me a task, and I'm here to see it through to the end. If you can't handle me being a part of it, then you and I will simply have to have a parting of the ways. I'm fine with that. At this point, I could care less either way. You've cost me enough with your posturing." Harry pointed to his leg.

Silence ensued, in which Faith spent a long time looking hard at the Boy-Who-Lived. Harry fully expected her to blow him off without really thinking about it, but she surprised him. Eventually, she said, "I'll admit, you're good to have in a fight. That disappearing trick can come in handy. I don't know nothing about you, and maybe I've assumed the worst. Still, I'd like to make this work. I'd hate to disappoint Giles."

Harry decided that that was the closest thing to an apology he was going to get for having been twice assaulted. He nodded. "Fair enough. I think it's time we make a plan."

Faith nodded. "Fine, but I don't know how you plan to get around with that leg of yours. The teleporting trick's cute and all, but even I can see that it's taking its toll."

Harry simply agreed. "Yes, you're right. And if I had my wand, I could fix it in a matter of seconds." Harry apparated back onto the bed, where he stretched out his legs and grabbed his rucksack, which he had charmed to be feather-light. He was just thankful he had decided to practice the interior expansion charm as opposed to the shrinking charm.

"What are you doing?" Faith asked curiously, as Harry reached his arm into his pack and pulled out a vial of a turquoise looking liquid.

Absently, he responded, "Witches and wizards have a magical core. It's a part of us. The wand is just a focus for us to express our magic. As you're no doubt aware, there's a number of things we can do without the aid of a wand. When we are agitated, often suffering from extreme emotional stress, like anger or panic, our magic will go wild and lash out in an attempt to satisfy our needs. Normally, we can't harness this power." Harry then held up the liquid so it caught the light of the sunrays slanting in through the window. "This here is a potion that expresses the deepest rage of the person who drinks it. By drinking it, it will, by extension, cause my magic to flare up in response and I will be able to command my magic wandlessly."

"Cool," Faith said. "How long does it last?"

"Five minutes."

"That's it?"

Harry uncorked the bottle and downed the substance. When he was done, he continued his explanation. "This potion is restricted and borderline illegal. The Ministry doesn't exactly want to deal with super-charged, hyper-angry wizards running around satiating their aggressive urges. Besides, prolonged use causes dementia and severe emotional trauma. Your body will start to think that you need to be constantly angry and will adapt by driving you to violent episodes." As an afterthought, Harry added, "It also can permanently endow you with wandless capabilities, since you'd become angry all the time. I have a suspicion the Dark Lord has either taken this potion to achieve that end or has drugged some of his servants with it. Bellatrix is practically insane, after all, and Voldemort has always been a bit of a nutter."

"So, er, aren't you going to, like, freak out, then?" Faith asked, suddenly a tad nervous. "I mean, if you're going to be all rageful and stuff, then maybe I ought to come back later."

Harry dismissed her worries with a wave of his hand. "Not a problem. I have studied a mind art called occlumancy and can compartmentalize my emotions sufficiently to work with the potion. I have only been using it to see whether I have any aptitude in wandless magic naturally. I've been using it to try and get a feel for how wandless magic works. Some wizards have the ability to do it somewhat. My skill with it is rather minor, sadly. I will stop speaking now. I need to focus and the potion is taking effect. Please do not talk to me for at least ten minutes."

"No problem," Faith said, turning to the television screen only to discover that snow was the only thing appearing. "Fucking sluts," she muttered irritably. "The whole Goddamned town's going to hell in a handbasket."

She waited a minute before her gaze finally fell on Harry. To her surprise, a blue glow was emanating around his leg, and she could see it visibly changing to become whole again. "Huh," she said, impressed. "Never saw Willow do anything that cool before."

"Is there anything you would like?" Harry inquired, startling her. When Faith turned to face him, she was distinctly unnerved by the electric glow that permeated his eyes.

"Er, like what?" she asked.

To demonstrate, Harry wandlessly conjured a razor-sharp scimitar, its long, curved blade glinting ominously. Harry then conjured a ruby and set it in the pommel. He then conjured a sheath and guided the blade into it. Once he was done, he moved the blade to Faith and rested it before her.

"Consider it a gift," he said smirking. "I could have conjured you a bouquet of roses, but the rage in me is bent on focusing my intentions towards violent things."

"Wow," Faith said, drawing out the scimitar. "Wicked. This thing for real?" She swished it around experimentally.

"Be careful," Harry said. "I enchanted it to be magically sharp."

Faith's only response was a dazzling smile; possibly the first genuine moment of happiness she expressed since his time with her. It made Harry pleased.

"I do believe, Mr. Potter, that it's time we do a bit of hunting."

By the time the potion had worn off, they were all set to begin their foray into the seedy underbelly of Raccoon City.

It had not taken Dawn and Xander long to locate a sporting goods store. Half the town seemed to be flocking to any place that could supply them with firearms. Spending some time in the presence of so many jittery people, Dawn and Xander came to learn that more and more deaths were occurring in the mountains. Maulings, they said. Humans being found torn up, ripped apart, their limbs scattered as far as fifty feet from their bodies.

It did not bear thinking about, since the two of them had actually spent a fair bit of time in the last week or so traipsing about those very same mountains.

They had actually expected that they would have had to have stolen the guns, but, given the palpable, overwhelming fear that permeated the city, the store owner, a greying overweight fellow in his fifties waived all the registration and precautionary requirements. It didn't hurt that a pair of women, upon exiting the shop, were promptly attacked and eaten before the very eyes of all the inhabitants.

It was Xander who articulated the thing that now stalked the streets of Raccoon City. It was he who gave name to the horror. "Zombies."

It hadn't hurt that he had actually tangled with the undead once previously, when they had attacked Buffy's house searching for some old mystical artifact.

It was a testament to the confusion that everyone in the store accepted his assertion.

Before Dawn and Xander made it to the front of the cue, zombies crashed through the floor-to-ceiling plate glass windows that lined the front of the store. Everybody screamed, and, in the resulting pandemonium, sweat and limbs oozing up out of the chaos, the zombies were able to draw first blood. Mounds of flesh of all kinds were feasted upon, before the frightened civilians organized enough for a few to begin firing back.

Dawn, horrorstruck, cringed and clung to Xander, who was already getting his bearings straight after seeing a zombie fling himself at an older gentleman with white hair and a polo shirt and shove its thumbs into the man's eye sockets, before biting into his jaw and ripping up tendons and muscle. The zombie then bashed its head against the man's skull with enough force to crack it open like a coconut, and then began drinking the fluids that dripped out and chewing on the brain meat.

Dawn stared in paralyzed terror, her body reacting autonomically to the jostling of bodies around her. It took her a moment to realize that Xander was no longer at her side, and instantly, she whirled around in search of him. For more than a while now, Dawn had come to see Xander as a source of comfort. Even more so than Buffy, her sister, in some ways. She could talk to Xander, like an equal. They were both outcasts, and Dawn could trust in that. There was kinship in their shared inferiority.

"Xander?' she asked aloud, her voice cut apart by the chaotic vectors of the background noise.

As two bodies disentangled themselves, Dawn caught a glimpse of his dark hair and his wrinkled plaid shirt towards the back of the shop, behind the counter. Xander was blatantly loading weapons, and Jenkins, the store manager, could hardly care less, instead aiming a rifle at the oncoming horde of zombies.

Dawn pushed her way towards the back, which was difficult, because most people were trying to go in that direction to get away from the massacre. Being smaller, she managed to pierce the shroud of humans and climb over the counter top to land next to Xander. Wordlessly, he handed her a .22.

"I've never fired a gun before," Dawn admitted sheepishly.

"Without taking his eyes off the rifle he was checking, he just said, "You're going to learn, Dawn. Real fast."

By now, the shop was filled with the deafening reports of gunfire, which momentarily drowned out the cries and the please and the whimpers of the shop's patrons. Dawn watched as Jenkins fired a rifle shot, which punched cleanly into the left shoulder joint of an oncoming zombie. The creature, whose face was already torn up by gunfire, staggered momentarily before continuing to advance. Jenkins was about to fire another shot, when Xander called out, "Aim for the head!"

Whether Jenkins was already planning to or whether he adjusted his aim on account of Xander's instructions, Dawn did not know. The rifle shot hit Donna Stewart right between the eyes, effectively halting her advance. Dawn watched, fascinated as Stewart's eyes rolled into the back of her head before she toppled over sideways.

"How'd you know that?' Dawn asked, as Xander was throwing a pistol to a nearby customer and grabbing another one off the rack.

"I've dealt with zombies before," he said simply.

"Can I help?" Dawn asked.

Xander stopped loading the .357 and looked at her sternly. "yes," he said. "Go kill a zombie. Find a suitable one that you can practice on."

Dawn scowled. "You can't be serious."

"Yes actually. We can't have you hesitating or forgetting how to take the safety off later on. I get the feeling this town's going to be overrun, which means that in about five hours, when it gets dark, we're going to be in a world of hurt, if we can't defend ourselves."

Dawn pursed her lips. Finally, she nodded and turned away to permit Xander to finish loading weapons and to go find a test zombie.

The trouble with the sporting goods store was that there were too many people still writhing about to get a clear shot, and Dawn wasn't prepared to chance hitting a 'normal' as she was starting to think of them. Staying behind the counter, she moved up next to Jenkins and peered out at one of the mauled victims. To her dismay, the victim began twitching, and, within a moment, was rising to its feet. Dawn had initially suspected that magic was at work, but, seeing this, her mind started screaming, PATHOGEN!

It was a disease. Not magical. Biological.

Dawn aimed her pistol, thumbed the safety as she had seen her childhood idol, Clint Eastwood do so many times in the movies, and then fired a round. The bullet missed completely, and Dawn almost lost her grip on the weapon as the recoil, which was admittedly rather minor for a .22, caught her off guard. The zombie seemed to understand that it had been targeted by Dawn, because it began shuffling towards her. There was something in its demeanor, in the dullness in its eyes that creeped her out. Dawn had seen all kinds of monsters before, and none of them could be called human. Vampires were notorious for having no souls, but they, despite all that, were still alive. These creatures, these zombies, on the other hand, lacked that basic level of cognition. It manifested itself in their ungainly limp, in the drool, in the way it moaned. Dawn fired another shot, and this time, she managed to catch the zombie right in the throat. She lowered her weapon fractionally, relatively confident that the pool of blood burbling out of its neck was a sure sign of its imminent collapse. The tang of copper assaulted her senses for the first time, despite the omnipresence of blood from other corpses. Perhaps it was because this was blood she had drawn. Her mind gave it special significance.

And the zombie kept coming. Dawn fired another shot, this one plunging into the soft flesh of its intestines, perforating its duodenum and exiting through one of its spinal discs. The creature stumbled but did not fall. It was at the counter now. Dawn took a nervous step back and fired again, this time at point blank range, right at the creature's face. Her entire body trembled as she pulled the trigger. The bullet caved in its nose and sinus cavities, but did not damage the brain sufficiently. Dawn fired another shot, and this one buried itself into the zombie's forehead. Again, it did not do enough damage. She fired again and again until the zombie finally collapsed. Dawn was shaking all over; her exposed skin covered in gooseflesh, her palms sweaty. She just stared at the creature, which was still twitching, but whose strength was clearly leaving it.

In the aftermath of her shots, Dawn realized that the store was eerily quiet. She looked around and saw that, out of the two dozen or so that had been in the shop previously, only five remained, not including herself and Xander. Jenkins had come from behind the counter and was surveying the litter of bodies with a critical eye. Dawn wondered if he had been a soldier at one time. The coldness, the calculation, the strange sort of professionalism in his eye seemed to suggest that he had been inured to the horrors of mutilated bodies.

"Boys," Jenkins said, glancing at his four compatriots. "I reckon it's time we go do a bit of hunting."

The others nodded, and Dawn recognized the steely determination in their eyes. No doubt they had lost loved ones here today. Possibly they had to put them down themselves.

"You kids best run along," one of them said, looking at Dawn and Xander, who had sidled up next to her.

"Yeah," Xander agreed. "I reckon we will."

"The end of the world is nigh, and all we can do is go but for the grace of God."

Armed to the teeth, the five men departed to go hunt zombies.

"How long do you reckon they'll last?" Dawn asked in the ensuing quietude.

"As long as they've got ammunition, I figure," Xander replied. "They're not the soft types."

"And us?" Dawn asked, glancing down at the zombie she had killed.

"That depends," Xander inquired. "Do you think you can handle something bigger than the .22?"

Dawn stared at the weapon in her hand. The instrument of death. She had grown accustomed to fighting with swords and axes and crossbows, and stakes. She couldn't claim to be that good at it, but she was competent enough. She had a fifteen percent chance of surviving an encounter with a vampire, and that was pretty good for a lay person. But guns were a whole other ball game. She didn't know the first thing about them. They felt funny in her hands, and her fingers already felt cramped from the recoil. Not that it mattered. Pain was a good thing in Raccoon City. It meant you were still alive. "I think I ought to take a .38," she said finally, looking up to fix her gaze on Xander.

He nodded and handed her a dual holster. "Hold onto the .22 as well, just in case." He also handed her a rifle, which she slung over her shoulder, while he himself took a fully automatic assault rifle, a .44 and more shells than they knew what to do with. They also then proceeded to fill their packs with ammunition, before heading out to find a restaurant, where they could pillage some food before returning to Umbrella's headquarters.

Harry and Faith made their way down the main street of Raccoon City. They didn't exactly have a specific direction in mind. Mostly, they just wanted to find some people they could talk to and from whom they could get some answers.

"Is it just me or is everything disturbingly quiet around here?" Faith asked, scouring about, idly making slashing motions with her new toy. She marvelled at its perfect beauty, for the first time truly appreciating the power that Harry wielded. The blade was long, but not too much so. It was light but incredibly sturdy and well-balanced. It was lethal with even a gentle stroke, and shone brilliantly in the golden firelight light of the setting sun. And it would never break, Harry had said, and it would never go dull. When he had told her these things, she had been incredibly skeptical.

"Oh yeah?" she had asked incredulously, and then, smirking, decided to test Harry's assertions. She took the blade and began sawing through the cement sidewalk, pouring as much of her strength into the slashes as she could muster without jeopardizing her control of the dangerous weapon. And, after ten minutes of hacking away at asphalt and cement and concrete, she had come to the conclusion that the blade was basically indestructible.

"But how?" she had asked, still in awe of the weapon.

It was Harry's time to smirk. "Magic, obviously, or haven't you been listening?"

faith just gave him a withering look.

Deciding to take pity on her, he began, "Look, I know it seems a bit weird. And to tell you the truth, I wasn't entirely sure the enchantments would work. I've yet to delve into the area. Mostly I was just experimenting."

"but if you can create weapons like these, who could possibly stop you?" she asked curiously, wanting to know more about Harry's supposedly fucked up world. "I mean, you can do anything!"

Harry just smiled wanly, the humour never quite managing to reach his eyes. "You forget, Faith. So can they."

At that proclamation, Faith went quiet, unconsciously shivering at the image of people far more powerful than Harry. "You could take over the world, couldn't you?"

Harry shrugged. "Probably, but to what end? Most of us can conjure whatever we want. There's no limit to the luxuries we can draw up for ourselves, provided we have the skill and the energy. Even the poorest wizard would never be driven to despondency. Their magic simply wouldn't let them. It's actually very hard to kill a witch or wizard. Our magic comes out at the most primal moments, flaring up to protect us. Even fatal injuries can be healed with relative ease. I can't tell you how many times I've had smashed up bones, or damaged organs or God only knows what else. And yet I'm perfectly fine, physically speaking. The only time you can really damage a wizard permanently is when you use dark magic. It's nature is to destroy, and when it hits, it stains you in a way that prevents even magic from healing you."

"Dark magic, eh?" Faith asked, curious about it. "I'd reckon that all magic's the same. Isn't it just the intent? I mean, sure you've got this killing curse thing, that you've been talking about, but how's it any worse than levitating somebody off a bridge?"

Harry nodded. "That's actually a very good question," he replied. "And, if you'd asked me last year, I wouldn't have been able to give you an answer." Harry paused for a moment, collecting himself and considering his answer. "Bellatrix Lestrange murdered my godfather a couple of months ago. I told you about this."

faith nodded. "Yeah."

"Well, I was very angry. I knew it was partly my fault that Sirius was dead. I had stupidly put him in danger. And I knew that if I had only been stronger, or faster or more collected, then maybe I could have done something to be more helpful. I mean, all I could do was stun the death eaters, and that was practically useless, since their associates would just continue to revive them. Not to mention the fact that some of them were really fast spellcasters, and had good aim. Well, one of them, this Bellatrix character, kept taunting me. She knew I wasn't really a match for her. She was just toying with me, telling me how weak and pathetic I was. She told me I wasn't going to get anywhere with her unless I used a real spell. A dark one. The darkest, in fact. It's known as the Cruciatus." Harry stopped walking and, now immersed in memories of that fateful evening at the DOM, just stood in the middle of the street staring off into the distance.

"What happened?" Faith prompted.

"The Cruciatus, is a pain curse, Faith. It causes the most horrible pain you've ever felt to go through you. I know, because I've been hit with it. It feels like a thousand hot knives cutting into you all at once, and it only gets worse with each passing second that you're exposed to it. Prolonged exposure would drive you permanently insane. It would fuck up your brain and nerves until you couldn't remember your own family or even talk properly. You would just twitch uselessly."

Faith took a moment to process Harry's words before continuing. In some sick part of her mind, she welcomed the prospect of taking a hit from this so-called dark curse. She wondered if it were really as bad as Harry claimed it was.

"You cast it on her?"

"I tried to," Harry admitted. "I wanted her to hurt the way I was hurting. The spell contacted with her, but it didn't really take hold. She told me it was because righteous anger didn't work. You couldn't fuel the spell with anything other than true malice." Harry then fixed his attention on Faith. "Dark magic eats away at you. It's like a drug. Dark spells are based on galvanizing yourself to feel negative emotions. It's dark because of what it requires to ignite the curse in the first place. Only the truly cruel people of the world can cast them. You can't cast the killing curse out of self-defense, or because you want to save a loved one from an evil person."

Faith nodded. Strangely enough, she understood. She had been dark too, after all. She had killed somebody, a human, had taken his life, and it had felt good. She had discovered, for all intents and purposes, dark magic. It had made her feel powerful. Again, she shivered.

The duo found themselves just outside the convenience store where Faith had procured their sandwiches. The sterile, antiseptic order that had defined the place earlier was now gone. Many of the shelves had collapsed, bottles cracked and plastic wrappers torn to shreds and drifting about in the aisles. There was a blood splatter across the till, and a criss-crossing of cracks in the glass wall.

"That looks shitty," Faith said, staring into the store.

From somewhere behind them, they heard the sound of a mournful moan, which immediately made Harry's hairs stand on end. He whirled around, his wings instinctively flexing about his body in order to act like a cocoon. For the thousandth time, he cursed not having a wand.

There in front of him were two zombies lumbering toward them. Their eyes were glassy and they looked hardly capable of standing on their own two feet, yet they plodded onward, swaying gently as though to some unknown breeze.

"Nhhhhh!" one of them moaned again.

Harry braced himself for attack, all the while looking around to see if anyone else was going to show up. Faith just shrugged and swung her sword into action. "I guess I'll take care of these thugs," she said, and deploying the powers bestowed upon her as the slayer, she went into overdrive. With one fluid upward stroke, she slashed the first zombie's outstretched hands off at the wrists. Blood spurted outward and splattered against the cracked asphalt. Though Faith had heard an account of a zombie from Harry and though she had dealt with a hunter in the mountains, she was still a bit unnerved by the lack of response that the loss of its hands caused the creature. Not even vampires were so mindless.

Going with the classic decapitation routine, Faith pivoted on one foot and roundhoused the first zombie in the chest while simultaneously cleaving its head with one swift stroke, the momentum sending the zombie's head clean into the head of its partner, causing the second one to stumble.

Harry could not help but admire Faith's skill, and was briefly disappointed that she was being pitted against such unworthy adversaries.

Out of curiosity, Faith took her blade and used its gentle curve like a hook to gut the second zombie. It's innards splashed uselessly around the roadway, and Harry noticed a partially digested mushroom. Fucker must've been turned while he was eating, Harry mused.

To Faith's dismay, the zombie seemed to slow but not stop. Deciding not to toy with it, she took its head off. and left it for dead.

"Ugh," she said, staring at the grossness on the ground.

"You're telling me," he agreed. "Is that gross or what?"

Just then, they saw a collection of a dozen or so ooze out from the shadows, their dull eyes orienting the zombies to Faith and Harry. Faith glanced to either side, searching for an exit, while Harry did the same. Both of them backed up against the convenience store as they were surrounded. Another five or so zombies seemed to materialize. "Fuck, there's like twenty of them," Faith breathed. "I'm not so sure about my odds with those numbers."

"Maybe we should get inside," he muttered. Just then, however, they heard the glass from the convenience store shatter, causing both of them to whirl around and spy another half dozen zombies, a couple of them picking themselves off the ground - the ones that had charged the plate glass window and had used their bodies to smash through it.

"I always did love a challenge," Faith said, bracing herself for the assault.

"No!" Harry said fiercely, his mind spinning to find an answer. "Not like this. You don't know if you'll survive." And then, in a burst of inspiration, Harry latched onto an idea. It was crazy and he had no clue where it came from, but he decided it might be worth a try. "Hop on," he commanded, catching Faith whirling her blade expertly and catching a zombie in the throat. Another one charged ahead and spat some sort of acid, which Faith instinctively ducked to one side rolling across the ground and slicing the zombie's legs off at the knees. However, she came too close to three zombies and, while parrying one and dodging the other, she fell directly into the line of the third, which clawed at her face. It didn't quite manage to gouge her, but it did make claw marks on her otherwise smooth skin.

"AARGH!" she cried out, swinging her blade and cutting the zombie in half. She managed to maim another one before she found herself being bitten in the ankle by the one whose legs she cut off. Forcing back the revulsion at seeing the creature crawling about on its elbows, she cut off its head while staggering back to avoid another blow, by yet another zombie, while, at the same time, cleaving a third one's arms off. She tripped over a corpse and came crashing to the ground wide-eyed. She could take four or five or even ten on at once, but twenty and being pincered was simply impossible. They were already cornering her, cutting off her room to move.

Vaguely, she heard the sound of something deep running through the cement, and she briefly wondered, "Hooves?"

Just then, she saw the white, iridescent form of the winged unicorn appear before her, its large body cutting an imposing figure against the zombies. It impaled one through the head with its horn before backing up and delivering a kick to a zombie behind him.

"Harry," she breathed, awed by the sight of him. Seeing him in full force while she herself was on the ground, made him look nothing short of impressive.

He paused for a moment to look down at her, his electric green eyes silently willing her to do something.

"Hop on," she mouthed, recalling Harry's last command. He batted a zombie that was leaning over her with one wing, sending it crashing into another one. Clearly, he could hold his own in his animagus form. At least for awhile. However, He was not able to kill the zombies properly with the exception of his horn, and they were still managing to close in, almost forming a kind of stalemate. One she was sure she and Harry would lose eventually. It didn't help that the four zombies she had killed had been replaced by still more.

Coming to her senses, Faith sprang to her feet, blade in hand and mounted the unicorn while delivering what would have been a lethal blow to a living being to the nearest zombie. Stop thinking of them as humans, she scolded herself. Cut them off at the neck, or don't bother at all. Gripping the unicorn's hair with one hand and readying her blade with another, she commanded, "Go, Ivory!"

The unicorn tried to turn its head around to give her an incredulous stare. Ivory? it asked silently.

Faith just shrugged. "Kind of fits, don't you think?"

Ivory returned its attention to the zombies, and then bucked, whinnied and charged forward, tucking its wings close to its body so that Faith could clear a path with her sword. The zombies tried to grasp at Ivory's body, and at Faith's legs, but the unicorn was notoriously fast, far faster than a horse, and broke through their ranks, stumbling only occasionally as its innate danger sense fused with Harry's uncanny reflexes to maneuver them through the growing crowd of zombies. Once breaking free, Ivory continued bolting as fast as he could, despite Faith's protest to slow down. He wasn't exactly sure where he was going, except that he suddenly longed for the rush of the wind, the feel of freedom under him. And, with that wish, Ivory instinctively unfolded his wings and beat a powerful downward stroke that lifted him a good four feet into the air, Ivory beating hard to maintain that sense of flight. After a couple minutes of gliding, Ivory gently descended back to the pavement, where he instinctively touched down with his hooves and slowed from a gallop to a canter to a trot.

"Whoa," Faith said, jumping off the unicorn before he came to a complete stop. "Wicked."

Harry transformed and stretched out the kinks in his back. "Jeez, lose a few pounds, why don't you?" he whined, not quite able to work out the soreness from where Faith had been sitting.

"Huh," she said, still eyeing Harry appraisingly. "And here I thought you were useless."

Harry shrugged. "I got a few tricks up my sleeve."

"Apparently."

Harry glanced around, wondering where exactly his mad flight had landed them.

"Seems to be the seedier part of town," Faith observed, following Harry's gaze.

The shops in the area had a decidedly run-down look. The asphalt was even less well-kept here, and all the buildings sported either grime, rust, broken glass, peeling paint or graffiti. "It would probably be best if we found cover," Harry said quietly in the descending dark. "We don't really want to be caught out here without any protection."

"Yeah," Faith agreed.. "I reckon we could try the police station. They've the best chance for surviving. We could maybe pilfer a pistol or two while we're at it."

Harry nodded. "These things don't seem to do too well with doors, either. If we could barricade certain points, we could maybe fortify an area. You know, create a safehaven."

"Yeah," Faith agreed. "That makes sense. Let's head to the cop shop and if we find something that looks like it would be good to turn into a fort, we'll investigate."

And with that tentative plan in place, the pair picked their way down the main street, all the while scanning their environment on all sides in search of threats.

Jill couldn't say she was surprised by the swift and efficient transformation of her once beloved hometown to the cesspool of re-animated corpses that it now was. The transformation couldn't have taken more than ten hours, she reckoned, and now, there was most likely less than one percent of the population still alive. And even those dwindling few would be cut off by morning. No doubt Umbrella was monitoring the entire situation via satellite. Probably with guards posted at all the major exits. There was a reason why the corporation chose a town beset by mountains to settle in. It limited the avenues of escape for their progeny.

Jill deftly picked her way through the back alleys and other dark, seedy places of Raccoon City. Not only was she a trained soldier, she was also experienced in zombie psychology and physiology. She had dealt with the fuckers before, after all, and it made her uniquely suited to survive in the extremely hostile environment. Maintaining a preternatural silence and keeping to the shadows, she crept down the darker areas of the town, where the paths were narrower, and where there were scalable pipes and various objects she could use for short-term barricades. The narrow alleys kept her from being overrun and if she found herself in a tight spot, she knew from experience that the best way to escape a zombie is to simply go up, or possibly just lock a sturdy door. There were plenty of those around as well. Most of all though, she knew that zombies tended to move towards where the action was, and since most people would be trying to use their cars and the main roads to escape, the zombies would naturally be drawn to those areas.

Damn, I wish I had a chain gun, she thought morosely. Or a rocket launcher. Ah, well, maybe I'll find one lying around.

If she were lucky, she would make it all the way to the police station, which was her destination. She figured that if there were any place that were safe, it would be there. Besides, she knew that place like the back of her hand, and she could already think of a number of good block off points to ward off intruders, not the least of which was the front door, which was made of reinforced steel. Most of all, she knew there was a grenade launcher stashed away, among other things, and the prospect of having one of those enticed her. As confident as she was about surviving zombies, she could not say the same if she ran across another one of Umbrella's more unusual experiments. Like the Tyrant. The mere memory of the bionic creature made her shiver. If it hadn't been for Brad... Well, Jill just tried not to think about that. She wondered how her fellow STARS members were carrying on in the middle of this crisis.

Had Barry made it out? Brad? Chris, of course, was enjoying slutting it up with Umbrella's money somewhere tropical, no doubt. Fucker.

Spying a gaggle of zombies up ahead, their grey, meaty, blood-stained faces illuminated by the harsh light of an incandescent, Jill immediately pressed herself into the shadows lining the wall of the brick building. She hoped it would be enough. It seemed so, for they did not target her. She took a moment to breathe and contemplate her situation. There was nothing immediately useful around her that she could use to dispatch or circumnavigate them. If her geography were correct, she was pressed up against Marshall's bar. She remembered it being a decent enough establishment, and, more importantly, she remembered that the guy had a shotgun. If anyone were going to come out of this nightmare unscathed, it would be him. Jill silently debated with herself over whether to go in and hunt down the weapon. It would be immensely helpful, she knew. The only problem was regarding what she would have to do to get it, or whether it was even there. Marshall would no doubt have taken it when he ran, assuming he got away. And if he didn't, then it stood to reason that there were zombies in the building.

Jill pursed her lips in frustration. Just go for it, girl, she told herself. It's not like you don't got a death wish, anyway. You know you can always pop a cap in your head before you go down. What's life without a little risk?

Jill waited patiently for a good minute to see if the more rational part of her mind would object. Apparently, it was taking a vacation, because no rebuttal came forward. Shrugging, Jill muttered, "What the fuck. Why not?"

She edged toward the back entrance and once there, gently tugged at the door. Usually, these things were locked up at night, but she doubted anyone would have the presence of mind to do that after the day's arduous events. She was in luck. The door unlatched and she edged it open ever so carefully. One eye scanning the alley, one eye peering into the hazy gloom of the kitchen. Seeing nothing, Jill skipped inside, letting the door shut ever so gently and whirling to check all her blind spots.

An electric bulb fizzled quietly at the far end of the room.

Nothing.

Jill let out a sigh and began inching toward the front of the pub. There were two things that were really important to understand about zombies. One, they were noisy fuckers. They did a lot of shuffling and moaning, and as such, with a little patience, you could almost always tell whether one was hiding around a corner. Second, they were slow as snail shit, and therefore, you almost never had to actually take one down, so long as you had the sense not to get pincered. Frankly, with

the whole town turned, she simply didn't have the firepower to mow them down.

A zombie appeared at the entrance to the kitchen. From the look of it, Jill could tell she must have been one of the servers. The creature had part of her face missing, as though she had been in the process of being eaten when she awoke. She lumbered forward, acidic drool dribbling down her chin, her arms outstretched as she lumbered toward Jill, who calmly led her around a large table. Once safely placing the table between them, Jill gave the table a mighty push. The table scraped against the ground slowly but surely, and the zombie was too stupid to understand what was going on. Eventually, before the zombie could fully process what was happening, an impossible task anyway, Jill had pressed the zombie into the pantry, its exit now blocked off by the large metal table. The zombie, of course, did not have the presence of mind to jump on top of the table or to simply crawl underneath. Jill, deciding it was an easy kill, grabbed a butcher knife and climbed over the table, inching her way forward so that she was tantalizingly close to her quarry. The creature began to flail her arms out more frantically as though that would somehow improve her chances of grabbing at Jill's flesh.

Jill just smiled. "You poor little thing," she mock cooed. "All dead and partially eaten. You must be in dire need of some rest. Here, let me help with that."

Jill took a vicious swipe with the butcher knife, effectively maiming one of its outstretched hands. The zombie recoiled just a little before pressing forward once more. Jill mangled its other hand, with the same fluid ease. Now, nearly defenseless, Jill reached forward and slashed its throat with her knife. The creature's eyes bugged out as it gurgled up blood. Clearly they didn't need to breathe, however, since the creature continued forward, now trying to gnaw at Jill futilely, even though blood was burbling out of its mouth. With a deft, forceful jab, Jill implanted the knife into the zombie's head with a downward, stabbing stroke. Its eyes rolled into the back of its head before it collapsed dead.

"Take that, you little freak," Jill said, satisfied. She crawled off the table and waited silently for the sounds of any other zombies. There were none, thankfully, and she proceeded to the main area, where, through the large front windows, she could see zombies milling idly about. Jill ducked below the counter to keep from being seen. Glancing about, she saw Marshall's mutilated corpse lying still on the ground. A great pool of blood had coagulated between its legs. And right there, next to it, was the infamous shotgun. Jill, forcing herself to remain mindful of the dangers, crept forward, her eyes always scanning, always searching for signs of movement. Was Marshall dead? Would he spring up at the last minute in a startling attempt to consume her flesh?

Apparently not. Jill retrieved the shotgun and a box of shells without incident. She made her way to the back alley once more, and continued along her way in pursuit of the police station.

Ada peered into the compound microscope, her mind half on the startling things she was seeing on the slide, and half on John, the brilliant, if somewhat reclusive scientist that had managed to steal her heart.

"How goes it?" John asked, coming up from behind and enfolding Ada in his arms.

"Mmm," she responded noncommittally.

"I'm sure you have more to say than that," he replied, puffing gently on the back of her neck. "I've seen those slides too. They're amazing."

"What are these people?" she asked. "It's like they're superhuman. The virus doesn't last five minutes in the bloodstream before its completely eradicated." Ada pulled her head back from the microscope and turned around to face her lover. "I mean, every other subject dies within hours. These people are immune to every known pathogen in existence."

"I'm sure you've noticed the flickers," John prodded.

Ada hesitated.

"You know what it is, don't you?"

Ada still did not respond.

John just sighed.

"It's just so preposterous! It defies everything we know of biology and chemistry and physics!"

John just nodded and twinkled his eyes infuriatingly. "Indeed, it does. And we're the ones who get to study it. I've been reading through the transcripts from the interrogation. The subjects indicate that they can teleport from location to location instantaneously. They call it apparation. I believe it's the same phenomenon we're observing at a cellular level. The blood cells are trying to apparate back to their masters."

Ada just shook her head. "There's so much to learn and we've only touched the iceberg, John. Until we amass more data - lots of it - we simply won't have any idea how to build a theory for this stuff."

John gently stroked her auburn hair. "We'll build a theory the same way Bacon and Pasteur and others who came before us did. We'll do it one little bit at a time."

"I can't even begin to count the number of scientific revolutions this will cause. We could be on the cusp of solving every major world problem there is. Hunger, war, natural disaster, disease..." Ada's voice just trailed off into nothingness, her fervor dissipating, as if even she couldn't quite bring herself to believe her own words. Because, as they both knew, somewhere in the back of their minds, the price of belonging to the elite cadre of scientists and researchers that were funded by the most powerful industrial military cartel on the planet meant that their work would be geared for one purpose and one purpose alone: killing things. Their willful ignorance, their complicity, was a sin that would, one day, catch up to them.

However, that day was not today, and they just continued about their business.