There was a flash of purple, and then Vanguard XIV Marcus Verr started looking around him. Training took over; he dropped to one knee for stability, raised the rifle to his shoulder, and scanned around him. Carol Nest, two seconds before him, was already doing the same.

  There was nothing moving, nothing to immediately trigger action, as he would have expected since Carol wasn’t already shooting, but Marcus did not relax even one second. Insertion was not the most dangerous moment of a Dungeon raid, but it came a close second. The most dangerous, of course, was usually extraction.

  In a corner of his vision, a blue box flashed. 56:20, it said, and the last number was slowly counting down. Back on Earth, Control had set the stability limit for the Portal to this particular Dungeon at 57 minutes. Until the countdown reached zero, the Portal would remain there. After that, it’d be like an atom disintegrating, a Dungeon-sized Schr?dinger cat box experiment, with five people from Earth in it to live or die. At any point past those 57 minutes, the Portal and its attendant Dungeon might go poof, even if Control didn’t want to release it.

  So, they had almost an hour now to go, find the Core that was their target, snatch it, and run away.

  His peripheral vision noticed movement, but as he turned reflexively, he already knew it was the third member of their squad coming out of the portal.

  Breacher XVII Jory “JJ” Josephus was also scanning the surroundings. The fourth and fifth members of the squad joined them at two-second intervals, following insertion protocol.

  “Clear.”

  “Let’s go before the locals get riled up,” Ronald Volker ordered.

  “I hate zombies,” Herbert West complained.

  “Then, let’s be quick.”

  Both Vanguards stood and started moving ahead. Marcus kept scanning around, covering the left side while Carol was dedicated to the right one.

  Their starting location was a terrace overlooking adobe buildings and dusty streets. Strips of decaying cloth made faded awnings or what remained of those.

  So far, nothing moved, and no noise came out.

  “We’ve got a latch on a Spatial Core, tier 3,” Third Raid Commander Alexander Arlov began the briefing.

  The five members of Raid Team 28 were paying close attention. There wasn’t enough data for a proper briefing. There was never enough data. Portal Raiding was a question of time, and you rotated destinations as fast as possible. Locate a Core, bring up the appropriate Dungeon, pre-plan, and go, all that in hours.

  “Baseline is ranked Tech8/Mage2, expected Metal/Light affinities. Theme is a dead urban zone.”

  Marcus Verr frowned. Not the best setup for the team, which was mostly proficient with the use of Magica. Although Metal and Light might help, as a last resort, it would be mostly modern weaponry for this Dungeon. It was not awful – or they’d have called for another team instead – but not the best.

  “Dead as spirits or?…” the squad leader, Tactician XIX Volker asked.

  “All indications are parasite-based neuroanimative.”

  “Zombies it is. And shit,” Herbert complained.

  “Don’t complain, West. Even if you somehow get infected, crossing the portal back will kill the parasites,” Carol said.

  “Should. Assuming I’m not taken over before.”

  “Local civilization will be absent,” Arlov continued, ignoring the Extractor XVII’s antics.

  “The theme analysis indicates a scenario time of several months after the outbreak, so all that will remain are contaminated and possible fortified pockets of survivors. Keep watch for them, but they can’t be a major factor.”

  “Standard loadout for Tech?” Volker asked.

  “Not enough ambient mana for operating significant artifacts. Standard M4 issue, reinforced padding against enemy… ‘zombies’ and headlamps for buildings, assuming the Core is located in one.”

  “It will be. Cores on the outside are rare already and certainly not at tier 3,” Volker noted.

  Colonel Arlov consulted his smart pad.

  “Insertion window opens in 21 minutes. Get loaded.”

  Marcus stopped at the edge of the terraced roof, looking down. So far, nothing seemed off. Except for the obviously deserted status of the town or city, or wherever they were, and the decay slowly starting, you could think of being in any Mediterranean or near-eastern place. A picturesque tourist setting, probably a bazaar somewhere, ancient buildings to visit to immerse in history.

  In most other situations, the comforting sensations of Dungeon energies diffusing into his being would bring some comfort. But Magica was almost non-existent, and Qi entirely lacking. They would have to do with whatever reserves they had. Metal Magica was not easy to gather and at that density level…

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  “Core southwest, slightly down,” Herbert interrupted.

  Marcus looked briefly, noting the direction their Extractor was pointing to, based on his Core Instincts, and immediately started checking for overland access. Carol pointed at the street and the next terrace. They could easily jump over it, even Jory at Earth Constitution.

  They ran toward the edge and pushed themselves. They rose in a parabola above the street below and landed, already moving. Carol and Marcus moved to the edge of that terrace, checking everything under, but as nothing moved, they jumped over it again.

  51:02, the clock ticked.

  “Down,” Herbert announced.

  Marcus acknowledged the direction and opened the trapdoor on the roof, looking down. The ladder down was looking robust enough. He exchanged a quick look with Carol and dropped down, not bothering with the ladder itself. He landed on the floor, immediately scanning the corridor. He pumped his fist and started advancing.

  He spotted a shape in a side room and immediately aimed his rifle.

  “Bleh,” Carol commented as she joined him.

  “It’s all desiccated. Almost mummified.”

  “And nobody ate his brains,” Herbert commented.

  “We don’t have time to check,” Ronald reminded them.

  Marcus slowly climbed down the flight of stairs, checking. Still nothing at all. He reflexively checked the clock, at 39:44.

  “Core’s still down. Basement, certainly.”

  “Surprise, surprise. Want to bet?” Herbert West.

  “No bet. Stay worried, ‘Reanimator’.”

  Carol pointed to a door, half ripped away. That was the first sign of some violence. The rest of the abandoned city could have suffered any form of mishap, but that one indication hinted at more.

  A Zombie Apocalypse scenario.

  Marcus turned on his headlamp, followed by the rest of the squad. He slowly stepped down, descending the stairsteps one by one.

  The basement had been a simple affair. A long room, roofed with brick arches. The light of the headlamps projected shadows everywhere, with broken shelves and other things strewn everywhere. There had been violence there some time ago.

  “There,” Herbert pointed.

  In the middle of the ruined basement, there was what would have looked like a bowling ball in other circumstances. A sphere of deep blue color, probably fourteen inches wide. Marcus approached the Core location, looking beyond for any threat hidden in the basement. He nodded at Carol, who turned and started climbing back the stairs to cover the exit.

  Herbert dropped the backpack, opening it wide next to the Core, before his eyes briefly flicked, checking the clock.

  34:11

  Herbert settled in to wait. They had time.

  The next twenty minutes were tense but ultimately uneventful. Marcus did not allow himself to relax, watching. In the low light conditions, his Nightwolf Eyes worked much better than the rest of the squad, although they now bled Qi, slowly depleting his rank 2 Earth Dantian. He was not worried about it. They’d be gone before that started to become a problem.

  Then, as the clock reached 12:00, Herbert raised his first in warning, and everyone tensed. The Extractor placed his hand next to the Core, flexed his fingers, and then pulled the sphere rolling into the backpack. In almost the same gesture, flowing moves from practice, the pack’s straps went over one, then the other shoulder, and he rose and started sprinting toward the exit to the base floor.

  Until then, the city had been silent. But a buzz started rising, a kind of unnatural low-level bass sound that bypassed ears. The warning siren of a Core being pulled.

  Jory and Ronald rushed up, and Marcus followed, closing the ranks. By the time he came out of the basement, the three were already on the stairs going up.

  Marcus spotted a movement and, this time, did not wait. A three-burst went, and a vaguely human shape stumbled. Thankfully, Tech8 zombies were not truly undead; they were more like puppets animated by biological parasites, and sufficient damage would neutralize them.

  He ran backward, trusting his Space Instincts to guide him to the exit. Another shape appeared at the end of the corridor, coming from outside the house, and he fired another mini-burst as he vanished into the floor above.

  He jumped up, grasping the top of the ladder, and hoisted himself up, not bothering to place his feet on it. He vaulted over the opened trapdoor and reflexively slammed it. Any delay was a good delay.

  A burst of fire, then a second, made him look. Carol was shooting at a pair of brown, desiccated, almost mummified figures that had climbed to the roof of the next building.

  07:15

  He jumped over the street, briefly checking. The squad rushed, jumping from roof to roof. He reflexively shot at a movement to the side, not bothering to check what he hit.

  Four minutes later, he caught up with the squad. Despite all his athletic qualities, Jory ran a bit more slowly due to his rank 1 Constitution, and the squad matched up with his slowest member. Marcus slowed then. His job was to cover the retreat, after all.

  The Portal, at the edge of one of the city’s buildings, was clearly visible now. A vertical swirl of purplish fluid, circled by a finger-wide actinic white border.

  02:30

  Carol landed on the last roof, followed by the squad. They all ran toward the Portal, then turned, raised their rifles, and started firing bursts. Something like thirty zombies were visible all over the place, with more showing up. Most ran over their roof’s border, falling down in the streets below, but Marcus knew that was just a delay. They’d climb somehow back onto the next roof, running in a straight line toward their target.

  The Core.

  Herbert plunged into the Portal with his prize on his back as the rest of the squad kept firing.

  01:40

  Until the timer ran out, the Portal would not – could not be – closed. The Dungeon would remain stable around the Portal feeding it its weird energies. Their job was now to keep the locals out until the last instant. There was a suppression force on the other side, but anything that crossed would increase the risk for Earth. A kill zone for zombies might be a nice idea, but each breached zombie was a danger. Most lifeforms failed badly when out of their Dungeon, but sometimes, things survived, changed and adapted.

  The last thing they wanted was another Armageddon on Earth.

  Carol swapped a new magazine and resumed firing.

  Fire. Fire. Fire. Each time, a zombie fell out, but there were more and more coming from all corners of the fallen city.

  00:59

  They slowly contracted the perimeter until they were less than three feet from the Portal, covering all four directions.

  Fire. Fire. Fire. Four zombies pulled out of the street in front of Marcus, yards away, and he switched from burst to auto, firing away in a spray.

  00:30

  A breaking sound as a trapdoor to the root finally gave, and two zombies almost jumped out, pushed from under. Marcus fired, then kept firing manual bursts as zombies poured out of the building onto their roof.

  00:05

  “Go,” Ronald said.

  Marcus moved backward one, two, three steps… and purple flashed.