One of the Breed happened to idly look back at the buildings.
Astonishment lined his bestial features for all of a second, until he opened his mouth and bellowed at the top of his lungs.
All of the mutations started to turn.
Blade dashed forward, letting his friends go past him. “Get inside!” he directed.
“About time you showed up, slowpoke,” Hickok muttered, running toward the store where Achilles stood framed in the window.
There was no time for Blade to reply. He clasped the Commando firmly and cut loose, sweeping the barrel from right to left, mowing the Breed down, knowing from experience how difficult they were to kill and going for the head, seeing over a dozen craniums burst as heavy slugs tore through their heads from front to rear.
Voicing a commingled roar of rage and implacable animosity, the Breed charged the giant.
Blade deliberately held his ground. Hickok and Geronimo would need precious time so they could be cut free by Achilles, then grab their guns and reload if necessary, time he intended to supply. He poured a withering fire into the mutations, raking them with a hail of lead, keeping his finger depressed, pouring out every shot in his 90-round magazine, firing and firing until the machine gun went empty.
Fifteen of the creatures were prone on the asphalt or trying to rise, even though riddled with bullets. The rest surged in a frenzied wave at the Warrior.
Blade went to grab a fresh magazine, but he realized he’d never be able to insert it and draw back the cocking handle before the mutations reached him. And retreating to the store was out of the question. They’d catch him before he covered five yards. Stuck in the open, with nowhere to take cover, he did the only thing he could; he dropped the Commando, drew his Bowies, and attacked the Breed.
A few of the creatures stopped, taken aback by the sight of the lone giant rushing toward them. Their companions never slowed.
A smile on his lips, Blade met them in a savage clash, whipping the Bowies in a glittering onslaught, slashing and hacking and stabbing in a wild abandon, his body always in motion, always slicing and cutting, spinning and whirling, because he knew if he slowed for an instant they would seize him and overpower him with their greater numbers. Nails dug into his arms, shoulders, and thighs, and he ignored the pain and the stinging sensations, focusing exclusively on slaying the creatures, his arms whirlwinds of razor-edged death, severing hands and tearing open throats and rending faces in a mad melee of elemental ferocity.
Mutations fell right and left, their bloody forms dotting the tarmacadam.
Suddenly the Breed parted, and Blade found himself face to face with their leader, Longat. The creature snarled and swung the tomahawk, and Blade parried the blow with his right Bowie. Again Longat swung, his powerful sinews driving the tomahawk in a blow that would have smashed through the defenses of any ordinary man. But Blade’s own bulging muscles were equal to the occasion, and he deflected the tomahawk. Again he warded off a swipe meant to cleave his skull, then again and again.
The mutations saw their chance. With the giant occupied, they sought to encircle him and pounce on him from behind. One of them, skirting to the right, coiled his legs and was about to spring when a shot rang out. He collapsed in his tracks. The other creatures rotated in the direction of the report.
Hickok, Geronimo, and Achilles sprinted from the store, bearing to the left, intending to lure the mass of tightly packed bear-men away from Blade, leery of firing for fear of hitting the head Warrior. They succeeded beyond their highest expectations.
Every member of the Breed except for Longat ran toward the trio, growling and screeching, venting their wrath, eager to tear the humans limb from limb.
Hickok smiled as he saw the creatures moving away from Blade. The Breed had enjoyed the advantage the last time he’d fought them. They’d jumped him in the dark, using the cloak of night to their advantage. But this time the situation was different. This time they were fighting in broad daylight. This time he could see his targets clearly. He pressed the Henry to his right shoulder and levered off every round, aiming at their heads, felling a foe with every shot. The instant the Henry was empty, he let the rifle fall and resorted to his Colts, his hands a blur as he gripped the pearl handles and cleared leather. He heard Geronimo and Achilles firing, and then he opened up with the Pythons, every shot dead center.
Nearby, Achilles fought in a blind rage, the two words Geronimo had told him in the store resounding over and over in his mind. She’s dead!
She’s dead.’ She’s dead! And these sons of bitches had killed her. He expended every round in the Bullpup, let go, and pulled the Taurus and the Amazon. A creature loomed in front of him and he shot it between the eyes, then spun to blast another mutation, Coldly, methodically, he shot one after another, slashing at those who tried to rake him with their nails, holding his own, dominated by his fury, killing, killing, killing.
Only Geronimo had a breathing space. Fewer of the Breed came after him, and those who did he downed with the FNC.
Lacking firearms, the creatures were unable to close effectively, and Geronimo regarded their deaths as a virtual slaughter. He glimpsed Blade and Longat locked in combat, and he wished he was the one fighting the leader. He wanted to repay the deviate for taking his tomahawk. A bear-man sprang at him from the right, and he pivoted, the FNC bucking, stitching a pattern of crimson holes across the mutation’s forehead. He turned and saw Blade slip on a puddle of blood.
Longat leaped forward, the tomahawk upraised, his lips curled back to expose his pointed teeth, his eyes gleaming points of ferocity.
Down on his right knee, Blade swept both knives upward to block the tomahawk. He could hear shooting, and he wanted to dispose of Longat quickly and aid his friends. To do so would require an unorthodox tactic, a move Longat wouldn’t be expecting. As his shoulders absorbed the impact from the tomahawk, in a flash he perceived a means of gaining the upper hand.
Longat started to lift the tomahawk again.
Now! Blade reversed the grip on the Bowies, angled the bloody blades downward, and lunged, spearing a knife into each of Longat’s feet, sinking both to the hilt.
The leader of the Breed stiffened and uttered a gurgling scream, then recovered and tried to swing the tomahawk, his movements awkward because his feet were pinned to the asphalt.
Blade was relentless. He straightened, his hands bunched into a single fist, and pounded the bear-man on the tip of the jaw, rocking Longat’s head backward and crunching the creature’s teeth together.
Remorselessly, Blade struck with his fists in a flurry of battering punches, hitting Longat on the face, dazing the mutation. He thought of all the innocent lives the Breed had taken, all the people the mutations had eaten, and his visage acquired a stony cast. His huge fists rained on Longat.
Rained and rained and rained.
Longat’s nose was crushed, his lips battered to a pulp, and his cheeks split. He feebly attempted to employ the tomahawk, but a sledgehammer blow to his right eyebrow caused his arms to go limp and his body to sway.
Gritting his teeth. Blade tightened his right hand into a rock-hard fist.
He slowly drew his arm back as far as he would go, then paused. “This is for the human race,” he said, and swung with all of his might.
The force of the impact lifted Longat from his feet, actually tore the Bowies out of the ground and sent the bear-man sailing for over six feet to crash onto the tarmacadam, a crumpled wreck.
Blade abruptly became aware the firing had ceased and turned.
Eight yards away were Hickok, Geronimo, and Achilles. All three were staring at him somberly. Each one was spattered with crimson. Nineteen bearish corpses lay about them.