I fled the city after the ordeal I experienced at my former home while Jae gracefully dispatched the city's last remnants of the zombie horde. As terrifying as all of this is for me, killing zombies seems to hold just as much excitement to Jae as pruning weeds from a garden.

 

We stayed in the area for one more night since he insisted on eliminating all of the remaining monsters in the city. As much as my mind wanted us to flee in terror, I felt a calming sense of safety whenever I was around Jae.

 

He is a master of his sword craft. Carrying a sword as tall as he is, Jae still manages to wield it with god-like speed.  He would often sever the heads of a group of five or more walkers and I would only see him draw his sword once.

 

We walked through desolate streets as we headed towards the city's central square. I was struck by the still quietness of my surroundings as it used to be quite hard to imagine the streets of this formerly bustling metropolis to be this quiet. Then again, the city looked quite different now as various debris filled the streets and the sight of overturned cars can be seen in the distance seemingly used as makeshift barricades. Graffiti marked the sides of buildings urging passersby to "Get out now!" or more mysteriously, "Beware of the gray cloaks". We came across an abandoned schoolbus in the middle of the town square. I sincerely hoped that any kids that had been riding it got out in time.

 

"You're staying in here", he said as he shoved me into the schoolbus and locked the door behind him. To my horror, he then proceeded to set off the alarms of every car around us.

 

"What are you doing?! Are you crazy?! We need to get out of here!" I exclaimed at him as panic started to creep up my throat while I banged on the schoolbus door.

 

"You're safer in there", he assured me. "It will be easier to protect you if I know where you are at all times."

 

I was about to protest when I noticed the first few zombies turn the corner as they were attracted by all the commotion. But what started as a trickle became a flood as dozens then hundreds appeared as they all slowly shambled towards us from all directions. Soon, the streets were filled as far as the eye can see.

 

Jae unsheathed his sword and lopped off three heads at once all in the same swing. It was too wicked fast to see and he never slowed his killing spree. Using the momentum from his first swing, he pivoted around to slice through the monsters behind him. It didn't seem to matter if there were arms, steel posts, or any other inanimate objects in the way, his sword always seemed to glide through everything as if it were passing through a vacuum unhindered. He never slowed as he allowed to let his momentum carry him from one zombie cluster to another.

 

After a bit, the other zombies also started to notice that I was in the bus.

 

"You might want to make sure that all your windows are closed", he calmly reminded me.

 

My eye widened. I was so enamored by the agile beauty of the fluidity of his attacks that I had forgotten to secure my own safety. Hurriedly, I ran through the bus aisle checking the windows row by row ensuring that every window was closed and locked. Luckily, the bus was too tall for most zombies to reach the windows anyway.

 

To my dismay, I noticed that one of the windows in the farthest row was slightly open and the zombies had resorted to jumping just to reach the small gap. Not wanting to take any chances, I rushed to the window and managed to close it in time. Relieved, I turned around only to see a body lying in the row of seats across from me that I failed to notice in my rush. It was the bus driver! Or what remained of him anyway. With a spasm, the body shook and slowly rose to sit and stare at me with a strange sense of curiosity. To my credit, I stared right back at it admittedly more so from shock than from any sense of bravery.

 

The creature rose slowly and emitted a horrible gurgling noise from the back of its torn throat which jarred me to my senses. I screamed and ran to the front of the bus.

 

"Jae! There's one of them in here with me! Help!"

 

"I gave you a gun didn't I?" he responds back nonchalantly without a hint of worry.

 

Reminded of the gun he gave me, I quickly fumbled for it in the backpack I was carrying as I crazily entertained fantasies of shooting Jae with it. That guy may be my only chance of survival and may very well be the last live man on Earth but by God, he is maddeningly irritating.

 

I found the gun and quickly pointed it towards the zombie who was already only a few feet away from me. Was he really that fast or was I fumbling around too long? Time slowed. I pulled the trigger then... nothing.

 

"You might want to try disengaging the safety. It's on the right side of the gun." Jae said as he parried two zombies that lunged at him from his side at the same time.

 

I flicked the safety off and frantically fired at the approaching zombie. I don't know how many I fired but the bullets hit it in its chest and pushed the walker about three steps back. Yet the creature only momentarily paused then continued again on its course towards me.

 

"When you're done wasting bullets, you may want to try aiming for his head next", Jae chimed in as he beheaded another zombie adding yet another body to his pile of corpses.

 

"I'm definitely shooting him next", I muttered under my breath. At that point, I was more angry at him than scared. Strangely enough, the anger helped me focus my mind on the task at hand and I aimed the gun sights at the creature's forehead which was already disturbingly close to my own.

 

I squeezed the trigger and a hole the size of a quarter materialized into the center of the creature's forehead. It immediately crumpled to the floor.

 

I fell to one of the bus seats feeling relieved. As the adrenaline faded away, I started to feel faint. I stole a glance at Jae as he was fighting a seemingly endless horde outside with a newfound respect. How can he continue to face and fight so many monsters seemingly without fear when I was ready to soil myself from just the one?

 

He took that moment to look my way presumably to check in on me. Was that a smirk I just saw? That quickly reminded me that I still wanted to shoot him.

 

As I started to pass out from the rigors of my own battle, I noticed the empty barrel of my gun. I had just used my last bullet on my final shot to save myself. Instead of dwelling on how close I had come to being zombie food though, all my exhausted mind could think of was "it's a good thing I aimed then" before I drifted off to sleep.

 

I groggily awoke on Jae's back as he carried me in a fireman's carry while we slowly walked away from the city. I opened my eyes in time to see a staggering mountain of corpses in flames that could only have been set ablaze by Jae. Nothing else moved in what was left of the city I called home for many years.

 

I let Jae carry me until we reached a huge, dark horse dutifully waiting for us on top of a hill in the city outskirts. He put me down and beckoned the horse to come closer. Jae mounted first and reached out for me to help me sit behind him.

 

"I didn't know you had a horse", I said genuinely surprised as I plopped on the saddle while quickly locking my arms around Jae's waist to steady myself.

 

"To be fair, you don't know a lot of things", he said in his usual nonchalant manner.

 

Feeling myself getting angry again, I was readying a worthy retort when the horse suddenly galloped at breakneck speed. The trees and shrubbery became a blur as we sped to wherever Jae was taking us to next. "Do horses normally go this fast?" I thought to myself. I shut my eyes as I feared getting thrown off but the events of the day proved too much for me as I felt myself drift off to sleep. As sleep's embrace started to claim me once again, I remembered Jae's look as he saw me kill that zombie in the bus. That wasn't a smirk, I realized. That was a look of relief. I smiled as sleep took me again for a second time.