Page 29 of The Black Rider
We couldn’t leave until we killed all the Rage Heads and moved all the human corpses to a pyre that was built so we could burn both. No one buried the dead anymore. The soil was bad enough after the war, and it wasn’t like there were coffins or lumber to spare to make them. Everywhere I’d gone so far had some sort of pit to burn things in. Unless you were on a scavenging mission, Rage Heads were burned too, so their mutation didn’t cause further contamination if it got into the soil or water.
Leif didn’t seem to enjoy killing as much as Aeron, but he managed to pull a sword out his ass too.
From what I could remember about the Book of Revelations, Leif was supposed to have a pair of scales, not a sword. We were both standing over our own Rage Head when I asked that.
“Where are your scales, Pestilence?”
“Never had them—writer embellishment. Aeron, Dice, and I have swords. Asher has a bow. Someone decided there were too many swords and wrote me as having scales.”
“Tell me about your built-in angel pockets,” I said, bashing a zombie's head. “It’s a little unfair women don’t get pockets at all, and you have them when you are totally naked.”
Leif just laughed and rammed his sword into a corpse head.
“We don’t have pockets in our asses, Ariel. We can reach through time and space and pull things.”
My mouth fell open.
“Aeron pulled a condom through time and space?”
“No, Aeronstoleone of my condoms last night, reaching through time and space. I don’t have some massive supply like a huge pervert who stocked up on condoms because I thought the apocalypse was an excellent time to get laid.”
“Sorry,” I said sheepishly.
“There’s other birth control here. There was a factory here that makes the implant. That’s what most women here who don’t want to have babies use.”
“Can I get one of those?”
“Preparing for our orgy in the Oval Office?”
I pointed my blood-covered bat at him.
“Watch it, buddy.”
“Gross, don’t fling that shit at me.”
“Care to join us in the showers since I’ve been apparently invading the men’s shower room?”
Leif looked surprised.
“You want me to see you naked?”
“Maybe I want to check out that hot ass of yours naked, Leif.”
“Thanks, Ariel. I thought you preferred Aeron since you met him first and didn’t remember me.”
I smashed in the face of a Rage Head that looked like he used to be a car salesman. His shirt still had the name of the dealership, and he had a bloodstained name tag on that said Ted. Rest in peace, Ted.
“I remember enough, Leif, and I like what I know so far. I’m not saying I’m ready for a sex free for all, but we all need to shower, and I never said I didn’t find you sexy in your lab coat and goggles.”
Leif yanked his sword out a skull, and black blood went spurting everywhere.
“Tell me I’m sexy again when we aren’t covered in gore.”
“I’m sure I’ll blurt something out in the shower. It’ll probably be totally offensive. I hope you’re not sensitive, cupcake.”
“Get as nasty as you want when you are checking me out, Speedy. I’m not one of those prudish angels.”
Smurfette was covered in Ted’s brains and a lot of other gore. I could hardly tell she was baby blue. Maybe I was fucked up. I probably was, but there was something titillating about trading barbs with Leif while bashing in brains, even if the smell was just God awful.
