ten seconds, Poe downed five of their fifteen . It’s just like Duck Hunt, only the trigger’s better.
The calming voice gently guided her to cut the enemy into a manageable size. She hit two more before running out of bullets.
“Here,” said Georgette who handed the girl her own Springfield. “Don’t put stock in what I said before. Everyone here knows I have a nasty mouth on me.”
Poe took the rifle from the vampire and nodded grimly. Lady, if you only knew how right you are.
Crouching, she aimed and hit a few more pesky birds flying hither-thither to dodge her bullets. She allowed herself a grin when only four remained on the course.
“Go eviscerate them, sis!” Joseph yelled, dancing a jig on the roof.
“Oh no. I think I see Gruman himself,” cried Maple.
The fun ended when three fallen vamps rejoined the flock. “Um, chain mail woman, are these blessed bullets?” asked Poe.
“It’s Georgette, dear,” the older vampire shook her head. “I can’t be sure. I picked the gun up at the station ’cause it looked pretty.”
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Poe sprayed the two remaining bullets with her squirt gun, reloaded, and aimed. She hit one in the leg and another in the head.
Poe inhaled like there was poison in the air. Then she exhaled shakily, saying sayonara to the last of the bullets. “Now what, Voice? Can I get killed now?”
“Georgette, get the others ready,” Sainvire ordered. “Gruman is a good ol’ boy and hard as flint to erase.”
Sainvire gazed at the unmistakable sight of running and airborne vampires looming closer by the second in solemn search of their food source. Vampires from Sainvire’s camp climbed out from the windows to the thin rope ladders leading to the roof in expectation of the fight to come. Those assigned to guard the cattle inside the cars rechecked their weapons as the hoards gained momentum.
The train drove Poe crazy. It chugged to life then slowed down to a snail pace intermittently. A mile ahead were uprooted palm trees and tin drums filled with cement. Anyone that did not conclude that the whole situation was an ambush was either addled or cattle. The palm trees had been uprooted from far away and strategically placed to block the tracks. The approaching figures and the slowing train proved to be a real dampener and setback to the cattle robbery.
“I can’t help but think there’s a mole here somewhere,” Sainvire said dispassionately.
“The slugs are crawling in,” Joseph said with uncharacteristic vehemence as he stared down the group of runners trying to infiltrate the train. “I’m going inside.” The barefoot vampire swung his legs through a window, landing safely in the aisle and showering cattle with glass. Winking at startled humans, Joseph used his extraordinary speed to run through the three separate train cars, punching 349
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vampires that crawled in through the windows before they knew what hit them.
“They’re here! The fuckers are here!” he yelled, rallying the white bandanas to kill faster as more and more windows were shattered by the infiltrators.
“Don’t give an inch. Do not lose any cattle. Just bust their balls!”
Then it was all over.
Two purple-haired vampires landed on terrified cattle, the impact of their steel-toe shoes crushing delicate bones and eliciting the most god-awful screams from a sixty-year-old. They had two directives, to murder everyone that got in their way and overtake the train.
“Geroff my train, you lughead!” Joseph hollered, wielding a short-handled machete at a vamp halfway inside the train. With two slashes, the vamp’s lower half fell off the window.
“You split me, man!” complained the undead who resembled Brad Pitt, but shrimpier.
“Well say hi to your legs for me,” Joseph said, gleeful as he pushed the rest of the sundead out the window.
He didn’t see them coming. A nightstick whacked the machete out of Joseph’s hand, crunching bones in the process while another blow landed on his skull, the impact of which cracked his pony-tailed head. To add to the insult, the legendary grinner was hurled to the back of the train. Like Poe, Joseph narrowly missed getting dunked in the putrid toilet bowl. “Just barely,”
he muttered, quickly recovering on his feet.
He would’ve been A-okay but for a faint-happy cattle who tripped him on her way down.
“This is the infamous Joseph?” A third attacker joined the fun and howled. The mustached cop with a thick neck and cheek piercings jabbed a baton outfitted 350
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with a four-inch spearhead into Joseph’s side to keep him down. “What a Nancy! This ninety-year-old cow