The others came up and Sensei was saying, “Imagine facing a large group and one of these faster ones charging into the mix.” He searched my face for a moment.

“I’m okay, Sensei,” I said, wiping the blade.

He gestured back toward the river. “Let’s see what we can find closer to the river.”

We dispatched over a hundred by mid-afternoon and still they marched out of the woods. We’d engage the larger groups in a line and, as we cut them down, we’d slowly move back to keep them from flanking us. The sheer monotony of it finally overcame Richard’s tenseness and he started looking more like he did in the dojo, relaxed and focused, spending his energy at the right instance to accelerate his blade instead of slowing it with excess tension.

We ran into two more from the Steckles’ party, or more specifically, they ran into us. One of them carried a baseball bat, his hands hadn’t lost their cunning. It came in and swung at Sensei, like a slugger going for a fast ball, and Sensei took one step back and cut the wrists, then finished it, kesa. Richard finished the other after Lou took off its leg mid-thigh.

It was so much worse, recognizing them. Fortunately the older ones are so changed-their hair falls out and their skin is scabbed, flaked, and swollen-that even if you knew them before, your chances of recognizing them are small.

That helps. Well, it helps a little.

Sensei led us back up the hill, to where an old soccer field gave a good view in all directions. “Rest,” he said. “Eat.”

I didn’t think I’d be able to eat but I washed carefully with my alcohol rags and waved my hands through the air to dry them. I served Sensei first, of course. It was tortillas with onions, eggs, and beans and my first bite showed me I could eat. That I was really hungry. Lou barely touched hers.

“Okay,” Sensei said. Let’s get back to the gate.”

Richard protested. “Sensei, we haven’t begun to look. Diego could be holed up somewhere, starving!”

Sensei shook his head. “Perhaps. But we need the light. It gets dark early down in the bottoms. We can try again, tomorrow.”

Lou looked miserable but she didn’t say anything. I was unhappy, too.

Diego had studied with Sensei longer than any of us, since before, when our sword study was just an adjunct to the aikido. Diego had brought his little brother, Richard, to learn the sword when it had become a practical matter, after ammo became scarcer and it became clear that noise would just bring more of them.

As far as I was concerned, Diego was like a brother to me and Lou, as if we’d shared parents. In a way, we did, in Sensei.

Danny wasn’t at the gate.

Sensei shrugged. “Walking the wall, perhaps.”

Lou asked, “Is he still on duty?”

“Oh, yes,” said Sensei. “Shifts change at eight, four, and midnight. He should be on for another hour easily.”

Richard went over and pounded on the gate, three times, hard.

“Stop it!” said Sensei, but it was too late.

There was a heavy rustling in the cornfield.

I wish I’d never read that book.

Lou was mad. “Are you insane? Why don’t you just put a cowbell on and run back to the river!”

Sensei shook his head. “Spilled milk. Keep your mind focused.”

The rustling got louder. I mean really loud. They must’ve been lying among the stocks like cordwood before the pounding roused them.

“Why didn’t they come out when Daniel fired that shot this morning?” I wondered aloud.

“Maybe they weren’t here yet,” Lou said. “Maybe it was the shot that drew them here.”

Twelve walked out of the corn at once, then five more. And then I lost count.

“Sensei,” said Lou. “Maybe we could throw Rosa up onto the top of the wall, so she could open the gate.”

Sensei drew his sword. “It’ll be padlocked, remember? And I don’t think she’d make it over the razor wire.”

Another wave walked out of the corn.

Sensei pointed back along the wall, in the other direction, through the soybeans. “At a jog, Lou, lead. Look ahead. Keep your eyes open. We’ll watch behind.”

“Now, Sensei?”

“Five minutes ago.”

I left my sword undrawn and hung back with Sensei, letting Richard keep pace behind Lou. There was a recently infected, vigorous zombie further back in the cornfield and it got up a serious head of steam before it burst out of the stalks. It was across the road in seconds and ten more seconds saw it out in front of the others.

I breathed out. It wasn’t Diego.

“Sensei?” I said.

“I see it. I’ll make the first cut, you finish it.” He kept jogging but slowed slightly, drifting further back.

The zombie sped up and, just when I thought it would leap on Sensei’s back, he sidestepped and turned, so fast, the sword coming across waist high, cutting deep across the zombies abdomen. It folded over, but didn’t fall, staggering.

I pivoted and took the head.

The zombie dropped. We kept moving.

It’s three miles to the town’s west gate but there’s a deep culvert where the outflow from the city’s water treatment plant flows through a grate under the wall on its way to the river. If we went far enough away from the wall it became more shallow, but that was in the woods.

“Sensei?” Lou asked.

Sensei and I caught up to Richard and Lou, and looked down. It was steep, fifteen feet down, then back up the same on the other side. Also, there was a trio of zombies crouched in the shallow stream.

“Follow,” Sensei said, and dropped over the edge with his sword drawn.

The zombie Sensei landed on didn’t stand a chance. Neither did the one he cut as he dropped, but Sensei fell backwards into the stream, after landing, and the other zombie leaped at him.

Richard jumped. He missed with his feet but he fell over and knocked the zombie sideways, away from Sensei. He swore sharply. Sensei got up and cut the zombie down.

I looked behind. The crowd was fifty yards behind and coming steadily, some of them almost jogging if you could call a quick, step-drag, a jog.

“Go,” I told Lou. “Carefully, though. I think Richard’s broken his foot.”

She slid down the steep side in a shower of rocks and dirt, pulled Richard to his feet, and began climbing up the other side, supporting Richard. I waited until Sensei had joined them, supporting Richard from the other side, then slid down myself.

I wanted to reach the far side before them. If anything came out of the woods, they’d be handicapped as they came over the edge. I ran ten feet down the gully and scrambled up to where I could grab a root sticking out of the bank. With it, I reached the top in time to see two zombies come out of the woods. Very old zombies, probably early infected. They hardly looked human. All their clothes had rotted off and with it lots of skin. I couldn’t even tell what sex they’d been, but thank goodness they were slow ones. I had time to pull Richard over the lip before they were even close.

The one in front reached out its left arm and I just cut it off above the elbow. It staggered in the other direction, suddenly heavier on its right side. It would probably have recovered its balance in another step but the gully was right there and it went over the edge. I split the other one down through the sinuses and turned back before it fell. On the other side of the gully the first of our pursuers had jumped down into the gully and was starting to claw its way up our side.

Sensei tilted his neck side to side, stretching. His voice was calm and low. “Lou, check his leg. If it’s a sprain, bind it. Rosa, you’re with me, on the edge.”

It was a good place to make a stand. They were clumsy and, even unopposed, it took them several tries to get up the bank to the rim. Mostly we just split their heads open, letting them dislodge others as they fell.

The problem was they were still coming. I didn’t really see an end to them, and some of them were being driven down the gully into the woods where I knew they’d be able to climb out easily.