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Once Liv and Ravi—and Clive, too, unable to let his partner go into danger without him—were safely on their way to Atlanta, Major went back to work. It beat watching the clock and chewing his fingernails … and someone had to keep the city running for as long as it took them to get there and get the tainted Utopium and come back.
A massacre had broken out at a memorial service for Sloane Mills, and the trouble was all over the news. As usual. The ghouls who reported the worst people could do to each other had plenty of fodder in New Seattle. Lucky them. A TV reporter's wildest dream.
A number of the Fillmore Graves soldiers on the security detail had been among the fallen. Major had thought himself numb to tragedy by this point, but this, out of the blue … It had been so unnecessary, shooting up a funeral. Hadn't Sloane Mills suffered enough?
"A memorial service for a zombie who killed a bunch of humans didn't seem like an opportunity to unite everyone," Major said somberly to Hobbs, who was watching the coverage with him. He wished he hadn't had to be the one to kill Sloane. Not when she ODed and he made her a zombie; not when she was Romerified and he had to put her down. He wished, in fact, that he had never heard of Sloane Mills. He continued, "You know, when I told you to send a security detail, I thought maybe there'd be some protests."
"Yes. It went a bit further than that."
"Do we know who's responsible?"
"Looks like it was Dead Enders. They came in shooting with full auto weapons. Our guys didn't stand a chance."
Great. They were as well armed now as Fillmore Graves, or so it seemed. Just what everyone needed.
"Any survivors?" Major hadn't heard of any, but he hoped against hope that there had been some, anyway.
Hobbs was quick to disabuse him of that hope. "No. I'm afraid not, sir."
Major looked back at the report in his hand. "Where the hell did they get that kind of firepower?"
Before Hobbs could answer—or not answer, since neither of them knew—a soldier marched into Major's office. "Sir? We're getting reports of zombies rioting in the streets. Windows broken at Warmbloods."
One day. One day without killing each other or hating each other or trying to give the United States an excuse to nuke them all to smithereens. Just one day. That's all Major needed. And he wasn't going to get it. Not today, at least. "Perfect. Just what they wanted." He got to his feet, making a sudden decision. He was going to lock this down today. No one else was going to die—not with the chance of a cure practically in their pockets. "I want everyone geared up. I want a team on the scene securing order; I want to double our patrols. They want to start a war. Let's not give them the satisfaction."
He led the other two from the room, thinking about Liv and Ravi and hoping to hell they were going to get back before he lost whatever tenuous hold he had on this city.
Once they were in the Humvee, Major started laying out the plan. "So the entire block from Fifth Avenue to Spring Street is a war zone right now. We take the perimeter, apprehend anyone armed."
Across from him, a soldier closed his eyes and shook his head. It could have been sorrow that they were back here again, but it looked to Major a lot like insubordination.
"Something you want to say, Ames?"
"All due respect, sir … but our people have a right to be angry."
"Our mission isn't to take sides," Major reminded him. "Lives are at stake here—humans and zombies alike. Stay focused."
He had barely gotten the words out when there was a deafening roar and everything went black.
Slowly, it turned white, and then he began to see colors. His ears were ringing, but over the sound he could dimly hear shots being fired. In the distance? Maybe.
Painfully, he managed to sit up. The Humvee was wrecked. Several bodies were inside. Major's ears were still ringing as he groped his way to the open doors. Three soldiers were outside, on their feet, shooting back at … someone. As Major let himself out of the Humvee, one of them was taken out.
Looking down, he saw a gun at his feet and picked it up, then he aimed around the side of the vehicle and shot someone across the street. Automatically. His training superseding his beliefs, his hopes.
He fired a few more rounds, taking stock of the situation, counting the people on the other side. Too many, he concluded. As a bullet pinged off the vehicle next to him, he turned to his men. "Get to cover!"
They moved, quickly, and Major aimed around the corner and took down another of the enemy.
Behind their opposition, a pickup pulled up, brakes squealing, doors already open. Men, one of them with hair of pure zombie white, poured out of it, approaching the enemy with guns drawn. "Hands up! You're surrounded."
Most of the opposition put their hands up. "Don't shoot! Don't shoot!"
Somebody called out "Zombie bastards!" And another one "We got it. Let's go!"
The zombies herded the humans in Major's direction. A Fillmore Graves vehicle zoomed past them and pulled up in front of him. Men climbed out with guns drawn—men Major recognized as people he had frozen. And from the back: Enzo.
Major and his men leveled their weapons at Enzo's men, and they all stood facing each other. Former teammates, now foes.
Well. Apparently every dog had his day … and this was not Major's.