The Mall Rooftop

POV AMARA

“We never planned to pass through the shopping centre, but destiny has a twisted way of serving your enemies up to you on a silver platter.”

The glass and steel skybridge vibrates gently beneath our heavy boots. Ten metres below, the elevated highway seethes with disoriented infected, stumbling blindly into overturned cars, completely unaware we stand just above their reach.

Walking beside Nikolai feels different now. That constant, sharp tension, the quiet fear that the man beside me might lose control and tear my throat out, is simply gone. Instead, our Blood Resonance hums steadily in my chest, warm and constant as a second heartbeat. When he glances toward a shadowed corner, a prickle of warning touches the back of my neck before I even see the danger myself. When I lengthen my stride, he matches it instantly without a single word exchanged between us.

“The private helipad is on the west wing, right above the cinema dome,” Nikolai says quietly, his rifle pointed safely toward the ground, disciplined and ready. “The Wilsons’ transport should be up there.”

“If it wasn’t already eaten along with everyone inside,” I reply, tightening the strap of my plasma pistol across my chest.

We round the final curve of the skybridge and step out onto the panoramic terrace that opens onto the shopping centre roof. The stench of burnt fuel and scorched rubber hits us full in the face.

And there they are.

The scene looks like something out of a cheap tragicomedy.

The Wilson family’s private helicopter, a multi-million dollar executive craft, the family crest embossed in gold across its sleek fuselage, lies crumpled on its side against a massive cooling unit. Its rotor blades hang twisted and broken like dead branches, and a thin column of grey smoke drifts upward from its shattered tail.

Thirty metres from the wreckage, right in front of the glass emergency exit doors, stands the most pathetic barricade I have ever seen. Piled haphazardly from flimsy plastic cafeteria tables, lounge chairs, and overturned cleaning carts, it wobbles even without being touched.

Huddled behind that fragile wall are the survivors.

My father, Richard Wilson, sits on the concrete with his back pressed against the wall. His expensive designer suit is soaked through with sweat and grime. His left arm hangs useless, bound tightly with a blood-darkened silk tie, and his face is ashen, drained of all colour. Beside him, his second wife paces frantically, biting her nails until they bleed, mascara streaked in dark rivers all the way down to her chin.

And right in the centre of everything, holding a small, polished silver pistol that shakes violently in her perfectly manicured hands, stands Chloe.

“Shoot them, Julian! Don’t let them get close!” Chloe screams, her voice cracking with sobs as she shoves her fiancé forward, the pampered heir my father had always been so eager to see her marry.

Julian, that same arrogant fool who sat across from me at dinner just two days ago, sneering that a bastard like me should eat with the servants, is trembling like a leaf in a storm. He squeezes the trigger of his revolver and there is nothing but a hollow, metallic snap.

Click. Click.

“I am out of bullets, damn it!” Julian wails, stumbling backward and leaving Chloe standing alone at the front of their pitiful barrier. “The helicopter did not carry extra ammunition in the storage compartment!”

On the other side of those plastic tables, nearly two dozen runners press forward in a blind, rabid frenzy. The plastic groans and creaks under their weight, the metal legs skittering wildly against the pavement, and already two infected have hauled themselves halfway over the top, their clawed hands reaching desperately toward my stepmother’s ankles.

“They are going to get us! Father, do something!” Chloe shrieks, stamping her expensive heels against the concrete.

I stop at the edge of the terrace, leaning casually against the upper steel railing that overlooks the entire helipad. I rest my forearms comfortably on the cold metal, looking down at the disaster unfolding below exactly as one might watch a terrible play from the best seat in the VIP box.

Nikolai comes to a halt beside my left shoulder. He folds his arms across his chest, the dark titanium plates on his forearms gleaming faintly in the smoky daylight, his assault rifle slung easy and ready across his back. His face is a mask of cold, unmasked disdain.

“What a touching family reunion,” Nikolai says. His voice is deep, resonant, and carries clearly enough to cut straight through the snarling and the crying below.

Chloe freezes. She snaps her head upward toward where we stand, her eyes swollen and red-rimmed from endless tears.

For a long heartbeat, disbelief leaves her completely speechless.

She stares between the two of us. I am no longer wearing that tattered, blood-soaked wedding dress they sent me out to die in. Instead, I stand here in a fitted tactical harness, my ion dagger glowing with faint blue light at my hip, looking back at her with the calm, sharp focus of someone who has just cut their way through half a city without blinking. Beside me, the “raving monster” they feared so deeply stands tall and imposing as a colossus, alive, whole, stronger than before, and infinitely more dangerous than any army they ever commanded.

“A… Amara?” Chloe stammers. The silver pistol slips from her fingers and clatters forgotten onto the concrete.

Richard Wilson lifts his head with obvious effort, his eyes widening until they bulge in his pale face. Shock almost overpowers the pain in his injured arm.

“Amara?!” my father croaks, his voice rough and breathless. “You are… you are alive?! How is that even possible?!”

Chloe does not wait for anyone to explain. Pure panic instantly burns away every cruel word she ever spoke to me. She grabs the lower railing with both hands, tears streaming freely through the ash on her cheeks, twisting her face into the most desperate, pathetic plea she can manage.

“Amara! Sister, please, save us!” she screams at the top of her lungs, while behind her the barricade shudders under the weight of five more infected scrambling up the service stairs. “I knew you couldn’t be dead! I just knew you would come for us! Tell your husband to shoot them! Please, don’t let them eat me!”

Beside her, Julian looks up at me as though I hold the keys to heaven itself. He drops to his knees, pressing his hands together in a ridiculous gesture of supplication, bowing his head as if praying before an altar.

Nikolai does not move. He glances slowly sideways at me, a dangerous, sharp glint dancing deep within his dark eyes.

“Do you hear that, my wife?” he asks, his tone laced with cutting sarcasm as his hand rests lightly over the grip of his rifle. “It seems your dear family has missed you terribly. What are your orders?”

I take one step forward, planting my boot firmly atop the lowest rail of the balustrade.

I look Chloe straight in the eyes. There is no compassion swelling in my chest. No blinding rage, no urge to cry or scream. Only a cold, absolute, and utterly calculating emptiness. They lost any claim they ever had on me the moment they drove away and left me for dead.

“I did not come here to save anyone, little sister,” I tell her, my voice clear and steady, cutting effortlessly through the screeching of the undead. “I came to see if all that money Father loved so dearly could actually buy your soul back from hell.”

The last table supporting their barricade gives way with a sharp, dry crack.

A zombie with half its face torn away lunges through the gap, snatching the hem of Chloe’s designer trousers in its rotting claws. She screams, a high, piercing sound of absolute terror, as it yanks her violently forward, sending her sprawling onto the dirty concrete, its teeth snapping inches from her face.

“They begged for a miracle, but they forgot one cruel truth , the only god standing on that roof was the very bastard they themselves had condemned to die.”