"Master," he inclined his head at Parker. I was baffled, wondering what Clyde was up to. He turned his glittering gaze to mine, in the light of twilight his eyes were black pools of nothingness, the gray unrevealed.

They were telling me something I couldn't know.

The cops struggled and Clyde looked at Parker. "Release the young woman your subordinate restrains." Clyde let his gaze slide to Gale, her eyes wide in her face, the zombie who held her had his forearm parked across her chest.

Parker stared and Clyde's lips thinned into a flat line.

He had never looked more dead.

He had never looked more alive.

The knuckles on his hands knobs of steel, braced to pummel.

"Caleb," Jade whispered, her voice quaking.

"I know," I said, thinking about what to do.

"Ask yourself why the cops are here, Caleb?" Parker asked like he knew the answer.

I shook my head. "I think the question that really matters is why you're here, Parker. You keep showing up and bad crap goes down. People die, disappear, whatever." I spread my hands, restating the obvious.

"They're following you Caleb. You're in danger. You and your females."

I drew Jade into the circle of my arms and Clyde saw it, his hands clenching.

"I told you to stay out of it. That means Jade too." Parker looked at her intently and I said, "Don't you look at her. Don't you ever look at her," my voice vibrating with emotion.

Clyde responded, his mouth opening in an involuntary hiss. I breathed out a relieved sigh when I saw his tongue was pink and whole in his mouth.

"Rein your zombie in, Hart. He's out of control, you know," Parker said.

"No," I said.

The zombie that held Gale tightened his grip and she whimpered. I knew how tough she was. That let me in on how hard the zombie was leaning on her. Testing her resolve.

Clyde didn't like her resolve being tested.

He swung an already clenched fist at the zombie with such force he split his skull on impact. It opened, spilling brains that looked fresh and gray over the top of Gale. The spread of it seeping and leaking onto the ground at her feet. A little made its way down her chest and began to leak into her uniform.

Clyde gave the gore a look of dreamy desire.

Then Gale's resolve broke with a scream and in a broken cry she shouted, "Clyde!"

Her fear clutched at the tether of my AFTD in a merciless and guttural pull. Clyde feeling it like a miserable vibration as if a taut string had been plucked.

He responded by unhooking the arm which still clung tenaciously across her collarbone, tearing it from the socket and flinging it.

At Parker.

He batted the arm away and with a look that stung me like a barb, sent a shuddering sword of energy toward the remaining zombie that held Garcia, the stab clean.

Death energy. I recognized it immediately and sent a spiraling command to Clyde like a tidal wave. It struck him and he flung himself on the zombie just as it wrapped its clenched hands on Garcia's neck, ready to spin his head off the column of his spine.

We couldn't have that.

Clyde snapped his arm forward and with a viscous jab at the zombie, it staggered back, releasing his hold on Garcia.

Garcia recovered quickly, ripping his gun out of its holster and leveling it at Parker.

Who had grabbed Mia.

Bry looked like he was gonna barf but it was the new girl, Randi, that saved the day. She'd let herself go to the ground and without a twitch, her body rose in ghostlike form, hovering above him. The distraction of her small body in front of him made him pause for just a moment, transfixed.

What the hell was she?

Alex and Bry leaped forward, tackling Parker and Mia was released. She fled, getting out of the way of the melee.

Clever girl.

Randi's body slid back into her physical form a few feet away, where she lay unconscious.

Jade screamed, "Caleb! Look out!"

A legion of ravens descended on the group. Called by Parker.

I flung the only command I could think of at them, scattering the power like birdseed at the flock. "Stop!" my mind bellowed.

Clyde covered his ears, getting some overflow and I instinctively pulled that thread back from him and redistributed the command at them.

They squawked, shrieking in agony as their masters fought for control. Three fell from the sky, six... then ten.

Really dead. Eyes exploded, globs of flesh and liquid splattered the soaked ground around us, the rain of yesterday making everything a mix of mud and gore. One crawled around in a circle, cawing for assistance.

"Oh God," Jade said in a sick voice, her dainty hand covering her mouth. I turned her against my chest, my eyes going to Parker.

Who was strung between Bry and Alex, Garcia's gun trained on him for good measure. I watched as Alex's eyes shifted to Randi, laying on the ground. Unprotected.

I felt him. I did.

Our eyes locked and he left Parker to go to the girl on the ground.

Parker looked at me. "Don't do this. If I get caught, they will come, and you will be unprotected."

Please. Pull my other leg and it plays jingle bells.

"Like you've been some form of protection here, Parker?" I said, not asking. "Hell! I'd love to see what you did when you didn't want to protect me!" I restrained an eye roll, Jade's head pressed to my chest, her arms wrapped around me.

Gale had been thrown to the ground when Clyde tore the zombie that'd held her apart. She was on her knees, preparing to get up when Clyde was there, his hand out to help her to her feet.

She took it.

And Parker snapped his gaze to mine. We both felt it. Clyde's connection to Gale, separate from mine.

And before we could say a word, he pulled her against him, hissing at Parker.

"You've got problems, Caleb Hart," Parker said.

Yeah, I was getting that.

I looked from him to Gale. Her eyes were wide and dazed, held in the arms of my zombie, her AFTD vibration synced with his like a tuning fork of death.

This was so out of normal I didn't have one idea in the world of what to do. K, one thing at a time.

Parker.

Then Clyde.

"You're coming with me Parker," Garcia said, whipping cuffs off a utility belt full of useful goodies. Jonesy gave the belt an appreciative look and Alex was riveted by the cuffs.

Figures.

I did roll my eyes then, taking in the mess of the crows, Gale held by Clyde and then I felt a subtle vibration in the air.

"Crap Hart!" Jonesy yelled as our hair lifted, the incoming stealth chopper lowering like a giant black bug, insect like chopper blades spinning above our heads. A Graysheet was planted on the legs of the chopper, an automatic pinned on Garcia.

He didn't say a word, twenty feet above us he didn't have to. His intent was clear. Garcia dropped the weapon.

Clyde put Gale behind him, crouching.

"No Clyde!" I yelled too late.

I watched him leap in slow motion, his hand wrapping the metal foot of the chopper, his other hand grabbing the muzzle of the gun. The Graysheet fired off a round and it plugged Clyde in the chest.

Gale screamed, like she'd felt the round, not he.

Clyde jumped like he was bitten, batting the automatic, spinning it off into the distance where it speared the water-logged ground, sticking up like a dirty baton.

Using the hand that had disarmed the Graysheet, he wrapped it around his black shitkicker and pulled. The Graysheet balanced, looking like he'd self-correct, but fell anyway, the fifteen feet of wet ground rushing to meet him. In the face.

His body broke when he hit the ground, making a sucking wet sound as it landed.

I'd never get that noise out of my head as long as I lived and after I died.

Sophie shrieked at the impact, gore spreading around his body like soup spilled.

Jonesy ran over to Sophie and pulled her to him.

Clyde swung his foot over the bar, bleeding a steady stream from a body that shouldn't have had blood. But it did. Somehow.

"No!" I screamed at him.

Enough, I thought. His hands paused.

Another Graysheet got out of the cockpit, his gun pressed on Clyde's temple.

Parker screamed, "No!"

The Graysheet stopped mid-trigger pull. I hadn't even felt it. He wasn't a Graysheet, he was a zombie.

A zombie soldier. His gun now aimed at Garcia.

"Let me go, Garcia," Parker said in a low voice. "Everything will be revealed in time. Let. Me. Go"

Garcia let out a disgusted sound, looking as frustrated as I'd ever seen him. Bry pushed Parker away, eying him up.

Parker smirked at him. "Pretty ballsy for a mundane, Weller."

Tiff said, "Why don't you go crawl back in whatever hole you live in, Parker," snap-crackle-pop with the gum. "Instead of harassing the local teens?"

He narrowed his eyes on her. "You'll come to respect us someday."

She met his eyes, her small hands planted over her neon orange hoodie. "Never you," she spit out and Bry mirrored her expression. It was then that I saw their resemblance. Not in the physical, but in their emotional framework.

Disgust rode their faces, laced with disappointment like cyanide.

"Do you want me to drop the chopper?" Jonesy asked in his how's- the weather-voice?

Hell yeah!

"Don't, Mr. Jones," Parker said.

"Yeah? Why not, ya pain-in-our-ass?" his brows raising to his hairline.

"We have a Null on board," his eyes shifted to John briefly, then back to mine.

Huh, guess they weren't such slow learners after all.

"Looks like a stalemate," John said evenly.

Yeah, that.

My eyes rose to Clyde. He understood, dropping the fifteen feet from the helicopter, his feet kissing the ground gracefully with a hop and a jog. His timepiece bumping against him as he ran the few short feet over to Gale.

Their hands reached out and twined together and as I watched the blood began to slow out of the hole caused by the bullet wound, then stopped.

The zombie kept its gun focused on Garcia. It reached behind itself, and smacked its hand on a pulse-pad. A retractable rope of nylon, bound in a sinuous green lowered. Parker backed up to it, coiling his fingers around its width.

"You may not believe it now, but I was trying to save you. I am trying to save you," his sincerity was baffling. Why couldn't he like... pulse me? Whatever.

I didn't respond, just watched him as he hugged the rope. It slithered back to its perch, a green snake encapsulated by a zombie-raiser.

Like me.

But not.

We watched the chopper take off, almost noiseless, the zombie perched on the foot of it never faltering. The gun in its hand shone in the low light of encroaching night like an oily sword. Pointed at Garcia.

Ready to defend.

When he was a dot on the horizon of our vision, he disappeared in the cockpit that opened like a gaping black mouth, then they were gone.

*

"I could have landed that sucker. Like, on its head," Jonesy said, slapping his fist into his palm.

John shook his head. "It was a no-go, dude. He had a Null, you couldn't have gotten past that."

John was right but I was looking at Clyde. And Gale. Gale and Clyde.

He had her against him again and she didn't look herself. I didn't even know what she looked like. Dazed.

Mia, Sophie and Jade looked at Gale and she sort of came back into herself. I watched as her eyes filled back up with her personality, realization striking.

She was in the arms of a zombie. A dead guy.

She backed away from him as if stung. His eyes showed the loss of her. Tightening around the edges. The fine muscles of his forearms bulging and clenching with restraint. Restraint not to take her back into his embrace, to respect the distance she had inserted between them.

There were muscles there to clench. Oh yes. I had done a dandy-ass job of raising Clyde. He came to my call like a ripple in the water. I placed a finger on the surface and he rose from the barest touch. But the connection he had now with Bobbi Gale rivaled the one we shared. I turned my attention to her.

"Here's the thing," I began, "we know you've been hanging around Clyde's grave."

Jonesy pressed his palm to the lantern that we'd hauled outside the hideaway and the orb burst to life. Garcia covered his eyes, the gloom receding from the brightness like a blanket pulled back.

"What's this, Officer Gale?" Garcia asked, looking from her to Clyde.

Wow, this was pretty awkward. I went on in the middle of it, "Clyde told me that he can... ah, feel her presence above ground."

Garcia frowned. "What does that mean? And tell me in a way that doesn't make me see cross-eyed please."

Gale twisted her hands, clenching them. "I don't know why I did," she said, looking down at her feet. I'd never seen her shy, she didn't wear it comfortably, a foreign emotion. She glanced at Clyde, his body tense like a live wire, hanging on her words, his eyes smoldering black fire.