Hollow Metal

 by Eric S. Brown

The pack of dead men and women swarmed over their prey. There was over a dozen of them all clawing and biting at the man who lay sleeping by the edge of the lake. Some almost supernatural sense told them that he was alive but their fingernails broke off and were mangled as they scratched at his skin and their yellow teeth shattered when they tried to bite into his flesh.

Danny woke up staring into the toothless, bloody maw of a rotting teenager who'd been trying to gnaw at his throat. He brushed the dead off of him as if they were flies and got to his feet. The organic metal of his body gleamed in the hot, summer sun. He didn't feel the heat anymore than he felt the bites of the dead too stubborn or mindless to give up on him and seek another meal.

The creatures were pitiful but Danny was too angered to feel anything other than hatred for them. He flew into a rage smashing and crushing their skulls with his bare hands until only one remained. He effortlessly lifted the last of the dead and threw her out into the middle of the lake he'd fallen asleep by. He watched her dead air arms flapping wildly in the air until she struck the center of the water with a splash and sunk below its surface.

He hadn't ask for this. He'd never wanted his power. Even before the dead had risen from their graves, his deformity, for all the strength it gave him, had brought him nothing but pain. Now his power kept him alive when everyone he'd loved or cared about had long been sent to hell by the decaying monsters who roamed the Earth like animals with no greater propose than looking for their next meal of warm flesh.

Danny watched the lake's water lap at the shore for a moment before turning and heading towards town. His feet leaving deep imprints in the ground behind him as he walked.

More of the dead were waiting on him as he neared the outskirts of Franklin. It was a small town and once had been home to a few hundred souls. Ten times that number of rotting bodies stunk up the place today as he entered it. He could only assume they'd come for him somehow sensing he still walked these streets. He'd grown up in Franklin and had never ventured far away from its valleys and trees.

He'd thought about what to do for a long time and at last he felt like he finally had the courage. He moved towards old man Farmer's gas station dragging one of the dead who'd attached its self to his leg. He could hear the sucking noises as the toothless creature fought to get at his blood. Several cars were parked, abandoned, around the pumps. He sat himself in the middle of them reaching out a steel hand to tear open the concrete cover of the underground main tank below the pumps. He fished a lighter from the pockets of the tattered remains of the swim shorts he wore. He tried to flick it to life but his grip snapped it in half. The spark of its breaking was enough though for what he intended. The station erupted like a mushroom cloud as the gas fumes caught. The cars were tossed aside like toys from the force of the blast becoming secondary explosions themselves as flames and shrapnel flew everywhere. The closest of the dead were almost entirely incinerated by the blast and the more distant dead on the road caught fire staggering around as the fire danced over their bodies.

As the smoke cleared and the sun began to sink beneath the surrounding mountains, Danny sat like a statue in the charred remnants of the pumps weeping at the fact that his plan had failed. He was still alive.