Rebirth in the Apocalypse: Third Time's a Charm



"Kill them all," said Wang Chao and me at the same time. Raising his voice, Wang Chao repeated his statement; "Kill them all!"

The other three men looked at him for confirmation before letting out a roar of their own and sprinting to the zombies still showing their throats.  There was a panicked sound coming from the middle of the horde before the zombies straightened their necks and dropped back their heads, showing off their teeth.

"What do we do?" asked the Rear Admiral again, looking around at the chaos.  Our men, not the military but the ones that traveled across the country with us, rushed into the thick of things, swinging their swords, and taking off heads as fast as they could.

I released my fire, combining the pink flame and the blue flame in order to create the hotter purple flame, and allowed countless balls to hang over the heads of the fighters, ready to attack when needed. "We fight," I replied, taking my own sword and narrowing my eyes on the opponents in front of me. "Remember, take the heads, the flames will do the rest," I reassured him as the first zombie approached me with the unnatural speed that only their kind possessed.

Swinging my sword, I managed to take the head in a single blow and then allowed the flames to consume the rest of the body. As I felt the purple flames taking more and more energy from me, I froze.  "Regroup!" I screamed, willing our men to return to our side.  Confused, they obeyed without question, forming a single line by the gates.  "Guns!" I called. I knew the guns were useless, but I needed the projectile to allow my flames to consume the zombie from the inside out.

Only by taking out their flames could I gain more and more power.

"What are you doing?" yelled Zhou Gang Jia as he looked at me.  My white parka was taking on a lavender tone to it as I called all of my flames back and surrounded myself with their warmth.  What could I say? I was good at multitasking. Not only was I using my flame to kill the zombies, but I was also using it to keep me warm.  Next time I was going with the snow pants option, no matter what.

"Fire!" shouted Liu Wei, looking at me. As the bombardment of bullets rained down on the zombies, I followed each one with a small purple flame, willing it into the zombie and watching as it consume each one of their own flames.  I could feel the huge influx of power, and I had an epiphany; unlike any other fire user, the zombies made me more powerful, not less.  I looked over at Liu Yu Zeng and opened my eyes in an unspoken question.  He nodded and released his black mist, allowing it to flow up and consume the zombie in front of him.

"Stronger," he said in a clipped tone. I nodded my head in agreement. "Same."  Both of our powers allowed us to consume the flame within the zombie and kill them without the need to burn their bodies to ashes. 

"The rest need to practice," snapped Chen Zi Han as he looked back and forth between us. I nodded and Wang Chao called an end to the barrage of gunfire. 

The men stepped forward when the possibility of friendly fire was no longer an option and I allowed my purple flames to consume the dead bodies. It was a much slower process and used up a lot more of my power, but Chen Zi Han was correct, the others needed to use this opportunity to practice.

"What is going on?" asked Liu Wei as he looked back and forth between his brother and me. 

"Each zombie has a candle, a flame inside it," I said, trying to describe what I saw to the men around me.  The only sound we could hear was the battle going on in front of us, but not a word was spoken within our group. Even Zhou Gang Jia had stopped asking questions.

"It drains my power to fight them this way," I said, a wave of my hand indicating the flames suspended in mid-air waiting until they were needed. "But if I can somehow get my flame inside of them, then I can absorb their fire, strengthening my own." 

"It is the same for me," admitted Liu Yu Zeng. "My poison engulfs them, snuffing out the light inside of them, killing them instantly. I also get a power rush."

"Is it just you two?" asked Liu Wei.

"No idea, but I think it is connected to your most powerful… power," I said, not sure how to describe it. 

Liu Wei took a step in front, bombarding the zombie not paying attention to us with air and water, but nothing happened. "I don't feel anything like that," he confessed looking at his hands in disappointment.

"But those two aren't your only powers," I said, reminding him. "You are also a power user, a fighter."

Thinking things through for a second, Liu Wei rushed up to the closest zombie and wrapped his hand around its neck.  The zombie struggled for a few seconds before it simply slumped down… dead.  "I could feel it," said Liu Wei in awe as he returned to the group. Looking first at his hands and then up at me, he continued, "I could feel it, as if when I grabbed the neck, I was grabbing the flame instead. As I squeezed the neck, the flame flickered and then went out."

"So you literally have the hands of death," joked Liu Yu Zeng, adding some levity to the whole somber situation. Liu Wei cuffed him upside the head before returning his attention back to the group. 

"Is this normal?" he asked.

"I have never heard of it before," I admitted, not liking the fact that there was something I did not know.  I was the one responsible for their safety and if I didn't know something, then how could I help them survive in this world?

"Let me try," said Wang Chao as he stepped forward next, a zombie already in his eyesight. Raising his hand as if he was trying to touch the zombie, he stared at it before clenching his fist.  The zombie, still several feet away, fell dead. "Spirit," he said as he looked at his right hand that was still in a fist. "I pictured a candle in the darkness and then me crushing it."

"Okay," I said smiling. "So, we are all badasses," I joked, not knowing what else to do.  No one had been able to kill the zombies in such a way in the past. In fact, at the time of my death, the zombies had very much won the war against humans and there was no coming back from it.

"None of my individual powers work," said a very subdued Chen Zi Han as he started at one zombie in particular that was dealing with an onslaught of earth, fire, and water. 

I thought about it for a second. "I have a suggestion, but I don't know if it can be done. I don't know anyone that had three powers, but maybe, you are going about it the wrong way."

Chen Zi Han turned his head away from the zombie that kept regenerating and looked at me.  "At this point, I am willing to try anything," he admitted and I saw what it was costing him to admit that he was not as powerful as the other three men.

"You are using your powers one at a time, what happens if you try combining them all together?" I said cautiously. "I mean, I wouldn't even know how to go about doing it, but if you think about it, earth, water, and fire, combined bring forth life, right? I mean, you can't grow food without the ground, the sun, and water… what if it was the same with your powers?"

"I am not exactly trying to make a bigger zombie," he said, rolling his eyes, trying not to snap at me out of pure frustration.

"I don't mean that, I mean, if you combine everything together, it might be stronger than if you did them all separately. Anyways, it was a dumb idea," I admitted. But a part of me knew that I was on the right track. "Famine," I whispered.

"What?" said Chen Zi Han, snapping his head around to look at me like the idea of a famine spoke to him.

"If the three can cause something to grow, then can't the three combined also take away?" I said, trying to explain my thought process.  I loved growing things, but I also knew that too much of any of those elements would be disastrous for my crops.

"Famine," he whispered to himself as he turned his attention back to the zombie that was rushing towards us now that we had his attention.

Raising his hand in a similar fashion to the other three men, his eyes turned pitched black and I saw swirls of green, red, and blue where his irises should be. Shaking my head, I dismissed his eyes to turn my attention back to the zombie he was experimenting on.