Dante and I decided the best way to make up for the time we wasted was to quickly head over to the nuclear lake Jesus wanted us to go to and train over there. Luckily for us, my little outburst actually sent us closer to our destination. The nuclear lake wasn’t a lake at all—it really was a pool. A pool sitting in the middle of an abandoned hotel resort called “The Williams Vale.”

  When I really thought about it, Daemon was right to call me a glorified one trick pony. Sure, I could absorb energy and fire powerful blasts, but was that it? Was that really all I could do with this? What would happen if someone had the perfect counter for my power? Oh wait, that already happened with Dante…

  “Sooo, do I just like… put it in there?” I asked, holding Geremiah’s head near the pool. “It’s not gonna blow up or activate his ability out of nowhere, right?”

  “You scared or something?” Dante laughed condescendingly, noticeably standing way behind me. He must’ve thought those fancy looking chairs were gonna protect him in case things went south. “Want me to hold your hand?”

  I scoffed. “If you’re so fearless, why don’t you do it then? I’m only being cautious ‘cause the last time this dude used his ability, we were stuck in place for like twenty seconds. We probably would’ve been stuck like that if this guy didn’t deactivate his ability.”

  “You should be fine,” he assured. “How do you think all those green hotties with powers like KB-124 are created? We take the bodies of deceased RA users, revive their abilities with a lot of energy, and implant them into the girls. Me, Kofi, and Jason have done it a few times already in the past. Just expect some light to flash out of his eyes.”

  So all of Emmy’s kind are female? I wonder if there’s a reason for that… Besides some lonely guy’s sick fantasy.

  “Besides,” he continued. “I would be standing way farther if his ability could just go haywire like you’re describing.”

  “You’re already standing pretty far!” I shook my head in annoyance and placed the head in the water. At first, nothing happened, aside from the skin on his face beginning to twitch beneath my fingers. After several more seconds, three faint beams of green, red, and blue light shot out of the pool as a… chainsaw rose out of the water as well. It wasn’t the full machine though. Only the metal part of it.

  “What the hell is a chainsaw doing in a hotel resort?” I asked myself, pulling the head out of the water as the light dispersed. “Maybe someone’s choice of weapon before they kicked the bucket around here?”

  Putting my questions aside, I turned back my attention to the head while Dante began to walk back to where I was. Under his afro, his face and, surprisingly, his eyes looked normal. Didn’t this guy have red and blue eyes before he died? Maybe his uniqueness died with him.

  “We should do a test run to see if this guy’s still got some juice left in the tank,” I suggested, dribbling the head. “You said you just gotta put some aura into him, right?”

  “Yeah. Let me see it,” he answered, holding his hand out. I tossed the head to him and he started to inspect it. “You know, the guy was an annoying little prick, but if he had one thing going for him, it was his looks.” He snickered. “Maybe I should flaunt this in front of all his stupid fangirls. Wouldn’t that be hilarious?”

  I stood up. “You’re a real sick guy, you know that? You two had beef with each other? Y’all seemed cool when I first saw you two.”

  “We weren’t cool. My father just thought it’d be a good idea for me to team up with that asswipe after Jason went AWOL. Punishment for ‘failing a mission’.”

  “I don’t really care that much, but why would that eyepatch wearing freak of nature kill one of his own members? I mean, I didn’t see how Red Light, Green Light was gonna fix the effects of the apocalypse, but it wasn’t like he killed Jesus despite him being a literal traitor.”

  Aura engulfed Dante’s hand. “The self-proclaimed god who is now simply a head was a member of Underground Radius B in Underground City B. I’ve never personally met most of those guys before, but my father has. He doesn’t like them very much. So when one of their members such as Geremiah here decides to prolong or sabotage the mission, then he’s gonna want that person dealt with. Also, that wasn’t this guy’s only technique.”

  “What else could he do?”

  “Jerome, do you want to play tag?”

  “I would like it if you answered my question instead.”

  Dante groaned, as though I wasn’t understanding something. “Just say yes so I can show you his other techniques.”

  “Oh, you should've just led with that. Yes, I’d like to play tag.”

  “I’m It.”

  Suddenly, Dante blasted a forcefield toward me. I sidestepped with ease. “What the hell are you doing?” He wasn’t done. The forcefield twisted, reshaping itself into a missile. It locked onto me, streaking forward—until I absorbed it. Before he could react, I rocketed toward him and slammed him to the ground.

  “Jerome Hunter wins!”

  The mysterious voice in the air caught my attention as I jumped off of the groaning Dante. “Ah, I see. So his power is basically to make certain games a reality.”

  “Childhood games specifically,” Dante replied, gripping his gut. “Nooow, here comes the shitty part.”

  “Jerome, you may now choose your punishment for Dante Williams!”

  “Oooo, that sounds interesting,” I said excitedly, sliding my hands together. “How about your punishment is… to call me ‘Master Jerome’ for the rest of the day.”

  Dante sucked his teeth, smoothing out his hair. “There is no way in hell I’m calling you that, Master Jerome… No! It actually worked.”

  A huge laugh left my system, taking in the satisfaction of my win. “Since we’re already having some fun, let’s have some more fun with you teaching me that energy shapeshifting thing you do.”

  “How about you teach yourself how to shut that dirty mouth of yours, you… Master Jerome. Damn it!” He got on his feet and spat on the floor next to me. “I’ll show you how once I get done with some very important business.”

  I folded my arms. “This better have something to do with the head or I’ll drag you back from whatever nonsense you’re gonna do.”

  “God, do you really need to know the ins and outs of my private business,” he growled, stuffing his hands in his pocket. “Unlike you, Master Jerome, I’m still a human who needs to go number one and two. Right now, I have to do both.”

  “Fine. Don’t use up all the time you could be training me to relieve yourself though,” I said, watching him walk to the exit.

  He gave Geremiah’s head to me. “I think I’ll take as long as I need to. I know you wouldn’t understand these issues since you’re a zombie without a d-”

  I gave him a nice kick to the back before he could finish that insult, sending him rolling through the door. “Just hurry up and go.”

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  Ignoring Dante’s yelling, I turned back to look at the floating chainsaw one more time. It was weird that something heavy like that wasn’t sinking by now. In fact, it emerged out of the water the second those light beams shot out too. That thing was… suspicious.

  I aimed a finger gun at the machine and fired an energy bullet, destroying the metal entirely. Somehow, the base of the chainsaw was still floating. I would’ve gone and checked in the water myself if it weren’t for my fears of becoming an oozy puddle.

  Rainwater wasn’t the only type of water zombies were weak to, after all. Any kind would probably do me in.

  “Seriously though… What kind of chainsaw is that?”

  ******

  “Alright, do you at least get the gist of it?” asked Dante, creating a human skull-sized bubble over his palm. “Remember, don’t think about blasting or shooting or any of that other jazz. Just keep it stationary like this.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I get it already,” I groaned, gesturing for him to send the orb my way. He sighed, allowing me to absorb the energy into my body. “If you and Sunshine can do it, then it shouldn’t be hard for me.”

  Dante formed a forcefield around himself and stepped back a couple feet. “Well, you’re a zombie, so your control of aura and energy is going to be shitty at first. Make sure not to put a damn bullet in my head while you’re doing it. I don’t feel like dying with you being the last person I talk to.”

  “If this backfires,” I said, holding my hand out, energy gathering in my palm. “Then just do the same thing you did last time.”

  I put all my focus into releasing the energy out of my hand as a ball. I wanted it to be similar to how I begin the activation of my Fatherly Beam, except I wouldn’t be firing it. I needed to hold it and help the ball remain firm. As someone who was prone to using my ability bombastically, constant reminders to not blast it were the one of the two things helping me.

  The other thing was my strength. I’ve never said this often, but the energy I absorb can be pretty damn heavy depending on the quantity of what I take in, turning my body into a living… un-living weight. Having the energy out like this might've felt even heavier, so consistently using this power for weeks helped a lot.

  “That… was surprisingly not that hard,” I said, the ball slowly growing. I didn’t know why its size was still increasing, though I assumed it would stop shortly.

  Dante’s eyebrows raised. “Ok, you don’t have to show off, Master Jerome. You can stop growing that thing now.”

  My arm was about to collapse to the floor, but I was able to keep it up using my other hand. “I’m not trying to grow it. It’s doing it on its own.”

  “What are you waiting for? Get rid of that thing before it blows the hell up!” shouted Dante, flying into the sky.

  I would’ve already done that if it weren’t for the fact that this massive orb wouldn’t leave my damn hand. I mean, I did my usual thing—squeeze and release—and yet it never shot upwards no matter how much I wanted it to.

  As more seconds passed, it felt like I was holding an elephant, and my knees buckled beneath me. Green lines streamed from the pool, feeding into my energy ball and making it grow even larger. The only solution I could think of was to absorb not just the water’s energy, but the energy from the ball itself. I had never absorbed an attack I’d already released before, so this was a first.

  My inexperience in doing it would cause my plan to backfire as the ball started to convulse and stretch erratically like someone was trapped inside and trying their hardest to escape.

  Then, the ball detonated, unleashing a burst of bullets that raged through the area. I bolted away from my position, though a bullet was fast enough to catch my hip. I fell to the ground in pain, water splashing onto me. In the midst of the chaos, something crashed back down which sounded like Dante’s forcefield. His screams were proof of that.

  Thankfully, the attacks finally ceased, and yet my pain didn't. “Oh God, is this how people I shoot feel? This is horrible.” While parts of my body melting didn’t hurt, the hole in my hip decided it wanted to be special.

  “Ten… Nine… Eight,” chuckled Dante, counting on his fingers. “Seven… Six…”

  “Stop counting and heal me already, asshole!”

  He snickered. “After I’m done counting. This is payback for kicking me in the back and nearly killing me ten seconds ago.”

  “If that’s a countdown to your impending demise, then I would prefer if you counted faster than that. My teeth grow tired of waiting, dude.”

  Dante’s eye widened and my mouth gaped. When we turned our heads, we were shocked to see that the voice came from a shark—a tall, meaty, humanoid shark. It licked its sharp teeth, which gleamed like emeralds embedded in its mouth. As if the sight wasn’t already absurd, the shark was also wearing a black trench coat and blue swim shorts with a flame design in the same color.

  The two-face trapped the shark in a forcefield, though it didn’t seem to be fazed by it. “And I thought that talking rabbit was a freak. Big boy over here takes the cake.”

  The shark tilted its head, its beady black eyes drilling holes into both of us. “Boy, I know you’re not talking about freak when half of your face looks like a bloody raisin.”

  Dante’s fist shook. “Huh!? Care to repeat that, all teeth and no brains?”

  The shark had this surfer, skateboarder vibe to his voice. At least, that's what I thought those kinds of guys sounded like–chill and laid back.

  “Listen, I know your type, dude. You hate looking at yourself in the mirror every day because you look like that, so you take out your anger on others who may or may not have it worse than you. It’s your way of insulting yourself without actually insulting yourself. Be better, dude.”

  “I’ve acted like this since before I got this new face job, so what do you say to that, asswipe!?”

  The shark rubbed its head awkwardly. “Then you got problems that go way past what I just said, dude. I’d recommend you a therapist, but I’m a… well, you already know.”

  It was pretty nice to see Dante get verbally brutalized like this, but at the end of the day, this was some anthropomorphic shark that just threatened our lives. Plus, there was another thing I was worried about…

  “Dante, heal me already!” I yelled, waving my melting arms in the air.

  “Would you shut up so I can think!” He finally did what I asked him to, and I was finally able to regenerate my body.

  “There’s no need to think,” I argued, going into a fighter’s stance. “We find out why this thing wants to kill us, and then we beat his ass. Simple.”

  “Beating me isn’t gonna be so easy for you dudes,” said the shark, doing what I assumed to be the equivalent of a scowl… or smile? “Especially when you’ve made me this angry.”

  At that moment, Dante’s forcefield was… absorbed. It wasn’t me. I would’ve felt it happening. The energy was sucked into the shark’s mouth upon it being opened, freeing the animal from its green prison.

  “Shit,” I muttered to Dante. “This thing has power. How the hell do we even counter my power? Especially when I have all this ooze on my body. He could actually kill me.” I waited for the guy to respond, but he was just standing there with gritted teeth. “Hey, Dante. Dante!”

  Dante jumped in shock and glanced at me. “Huh? What the hell were you saying? I wasn’t listening.”

  “Are you blind, you idiot? I said this guy has my p-”

  The shark zoomed at me, the sound of whirring metal accompanying the monster. I backed away from where I was standing, and that piece of the floor was quickly sliced through right after. The animal stood there with its human-like hands, the blade that every chainsaw needed to cut sticking out of its forearms. Except this beast wasn’t out here to cut trees. In fact, it sent out a flurry of slashes around the area, cutting up every piece of furniture as I dodged its attempts to hit me.

  The shark’s movements weren’t that fancy, though it made up for that with its speed. It nearly took all of my strength to not only dodge the attacks, but its energy absorbing body as well. I didn’t actually know if it could use all of its body to absorb me. I didn’t want to risk it finding out. It went for one more strike, this time a chainsaw popping out of its nose.

  Somehow, the shark missed my head despite how close he was to me. Using that chance, I countered with a large blast near its feet, the explosion sending it into the pool. Unfortunately, that counterattack didn’t deter the animal as it quickly shot out of the pool and landed on the ground.

  “Chainpool!”

  The moment the monster shouted those words, a large amount of wind gathered at the chainsaws. Even though I knew it would just eat my attacks, I still fired a barrage of energy bullets at the chainsaw user. As I expected, the shark absorbed it. What I didn’t expect was for the water from the pool to encase his weapons.

  Damn… Of course the chainsaw shark could also utilize water…

  As if to taunt me, the shark smiled and repeatedly slammed the spinning metal together, the metallic roars echoing across the resort. Energy erupted from my feet, and I flew away before the first water infused slash could hit me.

  “Fatherly Gatling!”

  With each punch I threw downwards, energy shaped like my fists emerged. They rained down on the place, targeting everything from the shark, to the pool, to… Dante!?

  Without hesitation, I rocketed toward him, barely slipping past an energy fist as it tore through the air. I slammed into him, shoving him out of the way. We spiraled wildly, weightless for a moment, until a fence shattered our momentum.

  “What do you think you're doing just standing there, half man half dried raisin,” I asked, lifting him up by his collar. He still had that shocked expression from before and it was pissing me off. “Put a forcefield around yourself at least so I don't have to look out for you. Oh yeah, and put one around me too!”

  “You don't have to worry about him, Type Two,” the shark said from behind me. “I only plan on eating you to quell my humongous fury. You see, I don't devour ugly dudes.”

  Upon hearing that, Dante pushed me off and regained his footing. “Who the fuck do you think you're talking about.”

  The shark put his hands up mockingly. “Woooah, chill out, man. It's only a fact. Sometimes I get really angry, and you two made me really angry when you messed up my hangout spot, destroyed my favorite chainsaw, and nearly killed me when I was sleeping earlier. Only way I can get rid of that kind of anger is to eat the most radical, bodacious fems and guys.” He pointed to Dante. “You’re not in that category so I’ll let you leave with a warning.”

  Dante gritted his teeth, brows furrowing.

  I stood up. “I'm gonna assume that you eat children too?”

  The shark gasped. “Dude, what kind of shark do you think I am? I don't get down like that. That is totally not rad.”

  “Oh, ok th-”

  “You see, I used to eat children.”

  “Yeah, we’re taking you out.” I shook Dante’s shoulder and whispered, “Any counter plans for this guy?”

  “We’re going to decide on a coin toss on who’s going to be the one who'll turn this motherfucker into fish food,” growled Dante, his voice growing deeper.

  “A coin toss? Are you stupid? I’m not doing that.”

  “You weren’t in the we that we were talking about.” He pulled out a quarter from his pocket. “Heads we kill him. Tails you kill him, Master Jerome.”

  He flipped the coin and it landed on heads, getting a crazed smile out of him.

  “Heads…”