BZRK: Reloaded (BZRK 2)

Five were still alive. But one of those had been wounded by “friendly fire,” and was pumping his life out through a hole in his thigh.

BZRK Washington was dead. All dead. It was down to Billy and four fake cops who all aimed their weapons at him.

He dived around the corner.

Two of the cops chased him. It was a mistake on their part because damn, this is part of every first-person shooter game ever, as they rushed he popped out and BAM! and a split second later, BAM! and that was two plexi visors with neat little holes and blood gushing out beneath.

With that Billy turned finally and ran. Out the back door.

He climbed, scrabbled, rolled over the wooden fence into the backyard of whoever the hell lived back there. The back door was locked but not so locked that a nine-millimeter round through the door handle and a hard kick wouldn’t open it.

Through a strange, unoccupied home with a startled kitty on the back of the couch. Out onto Sixth street.

He stood there, panting. They weren’t pursuing him. No one was after him. He was covered in blood. There were no sirens. People figured it was the cops, so what are you going to do, call the cops and tell them cops are shooting up a house?

He couldn’t go anywhere covered in blood. So he jogged on nervous energy to Independence Avenue, which, if you follow it far enough, will take you all the way down to the Capitol and beyond to the Mall and the Washington Monument and all of that. Except Billy didn’t go that way. He turned left and trotted back to Fifth Street SE and saw the very official-looking SWAT van and trotted on to the house, and came in through the shattered front door and saw one of the fake cops weeping and shot him in the spine where he had no body armor and another turned and opened fire, very undisciplined, and shot the wall and the clock and Billy put one right in his t

hroat.

One more came rushing down the stairs yelling, “Aaaarrrgh!” to keep his courage up and Billy couldn’t see his visor so he shot him in the knee and finished him off when the cop tumbled down the landing.

That last one was a shock. He had thought he only had two left. What was the count? Was there anyone else?

Billy climbed the stairs. The grazing bullet wound in his side was burning like fire.

He found the last AmericaStrong fake cop behind one of the beds in a bedroom. The man had removed his helmet. He had lost his gun in the madness. Defenseless.

The man was young. He had very, very pale skin. He had very, very large brown eyes. He stared at Billy the Kid. He was shaking.

“Don’t,” the man said.

“You started it,” Billy said.

“I’m sorry about …about . . .” the man said, and waved in the direction of downstairs.

Billy thought he seemed okay. “You smell,” Billy said.

“I pooped.” The man laughed. It was a short, sharp sound.

Billy’s sights were leveled at the man’s face.

“Who did this?” Billy asked.

The man shrugged, but he couldn’t hold it together well enough to lie. “I’m just, look, I used to work for AmericaStrong, now I’m ETA.”

“ETA? Estimated Time of Arrival?”

“Emerging Technologies Agency,” the man said weakly, as though he didn’t expect to be believed. Or that he would be alive another thirty seconds. “My name is Joey. Joey Lamb. I …I didn’t …I don’t … Don’t shoot me, kid.”

“Billy. Billy the Kid.”

“Okay.”

“Look, it’s game over, right? I won. So just, I don’t know, run away.”

Joey Lamb stood shakily. He had pooped all right.

“Okay, now, just leave,” Billy said. “And don’t call anyone. And don’t come back.”