“Jinx,” the voice says.

Shit. Jinx of all fucking people.

I eye the stacked bodies. Some are still twitching, others leaking out the last of whatever made them human. I don’t particularly want to dig him out.

“You alone?” I ask, even though I already know the answer.

Jinx coughs, rough and wet. “Yeah. Sampson and his goon left me.”

Trip and I exchange a look.

We don’t have time for this.

Sampson’s with Faith.

Fuck.

Sampson isn’t someone to fuck with. He’d kill her just to piss me off.

“Sampson’s with Faith,” I say, already moving. I don’t have the patience for Jinx’s usual bullshit. “Trip—”

Trip doesn’t hesitate. He yanks a body aside and tosses it.

I join him, working just as fast. Once we’ve moved enough of them, Jinx crawls his lanky ass over the pile. He looks more strung-out than usual, eyes darting, fingers twitching.

“I was almost out of ammo,” he says. “Found this on a dead one.”

He holds up a gun.

I don’t trust him. No fucking way.

I take it from him without a word and slip it in my waistband. “You’re not taking that.”

His mouth opens like he wants to argue, but he doesn’t.

“We’re going after Sampson,” I say. “Once we clear the roof, you stay put.”

Jinx nods. He won’t fight me on that, not when he knows it means he doesn’t have to be out here with whatever the fuck the doc turned these things into.

Faith is up there. And Sampson is with her.

I roll my shoulders, grip tightening around my gun.

I don’t give a fuck how many things I have to kill. I’m getting to her.

We move fast, retracing our steps through the halls we cleared. Nothing stirs. Anything that had twitched on our way in has long since gone still. Trip and I made sure of that.

Jinx stays too close, his breathing ragged, footsteps uneven, making more noise than a fucking motorcycle engine. He’s jittery, nerves shot to hell. I don’t know if it’s the situation or whatever he’s been riding in his bloodstream for the last decade, but I don’t care.

The moment we reach a corridor we hadn’t passed through before, I tense. The air is thick with rot, the chemical stink of gunpowder, and the sharp, metallic tang of blood. It’s darker here, the overhead fluorescents flickering like dying fireflies. If anything is still hungry and lurking, Jinx is practically ringing the dinner bell.

“Move fast,” I say, but it’s meant for Trip, not Jinx. Trip gets it. We don’t have time for slow and careful, not with this fucker fumbling behind us like he’s never moved in a straight line before.

Faith. Sampson. That’s all that matters.

We race through the corridor. No moving bodies. Good. Probably means anything mobile already ran for the noise at Jinx’s door. I stab a corpse on the floor, just to be sure. Quick. Efficient. Move on.

Trip works the same way, our knives slicing down without hesitation. We’re at the stairs in no time.