[ STATUS

  TIME: Day 2, 7:59 PM

  CUSTOMERS: 521/1162

  ODDBOTZ: 432/521 ]

  SkullGirl33 7:59 PM

  Yes! We did it!

  WillT 7:59 PM

  We? Did you leave the safe zone?

  SkullGirl33 7:59 PM

  Relax! I fired one shot to get credit and Vaughn's guys protected me.

  We're hanging out now!

  The other survivors were regrouping near us. Some of them were bloody, or limping, or supporting a buddy. One poor bastard was slumped against a tree with a mortal injury no soda was strong enough to fix, fading away as his party tried to revive him.

  There'd been a few deaths and a few more Death Discounts, but there hadn't been an undead cascade yet. We were getting better at this.

  "Has everyone levelled up?" I asked.

  "Should've," Chaz said. "If they haven't, it's too late n—"

  Eight o'clock arrived.

  A distant explosion echoed through the car park. The following silence was cut through by Zeddie's jingle before it had time to settle.

  "Good evening, shoppers!" he cried, popping into existence in the trees. He was wearing a party hat. "I'm incredibly pleased to announce that only two customers were too lazy to make their numbers go up. Get a job, am I right? But seriously folks, let's have a moment of silence for the fallen."

  Zeddie paused. This time the moment was ruined by the dying man.

  [ Schlock Rotation! Customer 250/J, who died with a Death Discount, has revived as a COOL GHOUL! ]

  The man's skin turned pale and grey. His hands sprouted claws. Spectral blue flames burned away his outfit and coalesced into jeans, a jacket, a backwards baseball cap, and sunglasses—

  I telescoped my arm across the tiles and slammed a blood orange into his face hard enough to knock him to the floor. The ghoul roared, then exploded. Juice, blood, and denim rained down.

  "Close enough," Zeddie said cheerfully. "It's now eight PM TMT, which means it's time for the final round of OddBotz Selection! You know what to do."

  Silence again. Vaughn's cargo shorts guys were upstairs, but nobody was taking the deal.

  Zeddie tilted his head and shrugged with his hands. "Suit yourself! No more OddBotz will be issued, but I'm sure you knew the risks when you signed up. In that case, what you do tonight is up to you. Clear out the final Lair, have a party, jump off a balcony. Make a day of it!"

  I raised a hand.

  "Yes, valued customer?"

  "Just checking, do we need to do anything else to avoid exploding?"

  "Not at all! You've passed my tests. All that's left is to prove you can survive the full fourty-eight hours. There'll be a boss battle tomorrow, of course, but I'm sure you'll do fine."

  "Uh, could you tell us about—"

  "All in good time, valued customer," Zeddie said with a wink. "Don't think about it! The fights will be calibrated to your current survivor count, and I'll explain all the rules tomorrow morning at nine AM. You'll do fine."

  Chaz nudged Lex.

  "Uh, thank you for telling us all this," Lex said. "Sir."

  "Thank you, valued customer!" Zeddie said, bestowing the title upon the final member of our group. "Now, I need to get some 'shuttered eye', as our Earth customers say. Until next time, remember: ZETTAMALL?: Shop Til You Drop!"

  Zeddie vanished.

  "Hey, bro," Manaia said behind us. "Before we go out there... you eat these guys for powers or something, right?"

  He was carrying the Lair's miniboss, a mutated Rad with a viking helmet, greenish skin, four arms, and a lot of tubes sticking out of his neck. Most of them were severed.

  "I don't have a free slot," I said. "And I'm not sure I can absorb a guy I didn't fight..."

  "As long as it's fresh," Khan said.

  I checked anyway, in case there was a Rad essence worth sticking in my lunch box. Skullboyz offered exceptional hearing, Burnboyz and girlz had that fire bolt attack, and Warghouls boosted my Health and strength. I passed on all of those. The miniboss...

  < Essence: Radz Supermute [Mini] >

  +4 Adaptation, +4 Bone Density, +4 Radiation Resistance, [+4 Free], Power: Flesh Bastard ]

  [ Power: Flesh Bastard

  Consume the flesh of another customer of the same species to gain— ]

  I tossed it without reading further. "Nope. Thanks anyway."

  "Uh, guys?" Chaz called out. He'd taken his flashlight to the car park exit for a closer look. "I think we have a problem..."

  I hate the car park.

  It just sucks. It's an endless sprawl of confusing turns, traffic jams, and structurally unsound concrete. Take one wrong turn in there and by the time you come out it's yesterday and everyone speaks Polish.

  Okay, without the exaggeration: the car park is the result of decades of extensions with little change to the surrounding roads. Most of the entrances were placed in awkward positions that warped the nearby aisles. An exit ramp stretched out of the structure, over an intersection, and onto the other side of a six-lane road. The floors were tilted in one section and nowhere else. It was a confusing mess, an argument for public transport funding, and that was before we left a shoplin lair in there for over a day.

  Now Chaz's light was illuminating a racetrack. It was like someone had cut the building into pieces, stretched them out, and dropped a road in the gaps.

  "Looks like this Lair got weird too," he said.

  "Matt didn't mention this," I said. Cars were still strewn everywhere, so I couldn't see far in. "Do they just keep getting weirder?"

  "We might find out if we don't go now," Lex said.

  I checked behind us. The rest of the group seemed ready to go. "Okay, let's—"

  "Go out there and scout it out," Troy said smoothly, sliding in beside us like he'd been there all along.

  I rolled my eyes. "Where have you been?"

  "Supervising," he said. "Thanks for the gloves, by the way."

  Before I could reply, Buy-Lo's manager patted me on the shoulder.

  "That's enough chatter," he said in what I assumed was his manager voice. "Troy's idea is good. Go now."

  Lex spoke first. "I'm sorry, who is this?"

  Sidus looked her up and down before deciding to answer. "I'm Mr Sidus, the manager."

  "Damn, Troy," I said. "I thought you were gonna pretend Jerry left you in charge until we got out of here."

  "Jerry's obviously dead, Will," Troy scoffed.

  Sidus nodded. "That's enough stalling, now."

  I turned to Sidus. I could just ignore Troy, but two Troys? Screw that.

  "You hid in your store like a little baby bird until three minutes ago, you have no power here," I said. "Anyone who wants to come, stick behind us. Or don't. I'm not your dad."

  Sidus glared daggers at me as I stalked into the darkness.

  This place was still strewn with vehicles, and we stuck close to them in case a shoplin tried to ram us. The other survivors moved in packs behind us, spaced out a little in hopes of drawing less attention. Since we had to bring our own lights into this darkness though, it was only a matter of time. Shoplin whoops and engine revs echoed from upstairs.

  "There's no Expired down here," I noted. "They could have set up a trap too."

  "Or the worgs ate the bodies," Chaz said helpfully.

  "Let's go find out," Lex said, partly to pump herself up. "Sounds like they're upstairs?"

  "Maybe we can see outside if we do," I said. "Let's check the middle and find a ramp..."

  We ran into a couple worgs on the way, and some more approached the other packs, but we didn't have too much trouble. The trouble waited until we got upstairs.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  We found a set of escalators by the central plaza entrance and climbed up. It was dark up here too. A digital screen on the landing that normally advertised to humans coming into the mall was now displaying a drawing of a tire with a fanged maw under the name HROGGAKRUPP.

  I checked for shoplins before stepping onto the landing, skates popping out just in case. "Okay, I think the coast is clear—"

  Headlights scythed through the darkness. An engine revved.

  I darted back towards the escalator. "Never mind!"

  Lex threw up a shield as a go-kart made of stolen car parts raced towards us. The shoplin behind the wheel wore a weirdly burned jumpsuit, a trucker hat, and shades that seemed deeply inappropriate for the amount of light we were getting. He skidded to a stop at the landing and stared at us.

  [ ENGINETHRASHER HELGROK, DRIVER OF HROGGAKRUPP

  MINIBOSS (SUPERVISOR) ]

  We stared back.

  He revved his engine. Vrum, vrumm.

  I blinked. "Wait, is he—"

  [ You've found a hidden mission!

  ENGINETHRASHER HELGROK has challenged you to defeat him in a race. Any customer in the mall can try.

  SUCCEED: HELGROK will take his people and leave.

  FAILURE: HELGROK's Lair will receive three boosts. ]

  "...Huh."

  VVVVVV 8:11 PM

  Just got a quest. What the hell are you doing up there?

  WillT 8:11 PM

  Racing a shoplin, maybe?

  baaaaaaz 8:11 PM

  Accept it. Do it.

  GeorgeSidus 8:11 PM

  Report back to us and we'll discuss it.

  Chaz shrugged. "I think this sounds rad, but it's your call, bro."

  "Nope, we're doing it out of spite now," I said, then turned to Helgrok. "I accept. Do I just say the words, or..."

  Every light in the car park snapped on.

  The vehicles up here were covered in graffiti. Grinning shoplins were perched on their roofs, dressed like racers who'd just fought a dragon. Some had chains wrapped around their limbs, or carried wrenches and other tools like weapons.

  They began to chant.

  "KRAA! KRAA! KRAA!"

  Helgrok lifted his shades, nodded, and beckoned us to follow him to the start line.

  I followed. "He took the shades off when the lights went on? Actually, I don't care. Let's go!"

  I stood at the start line.

  We'd gone up one more level. The track here looped around the shoplin Lair, an expanse of concrete surrounded by wheel-less cars on concrete blocks. Some of the space was dedicated to the shoplin's kart workshop—they'd stolen Boris's tool van, among others—and the rest had been used to host a drinking party, using stacks of stolen tires as furniture. Shoplins were watching us from the edges, drinking and hooting.

  It all looked very silly, but we'd passed a lot of cars with dead Radz and Porcs chained to them on the way here. I didn't let my guard down.

  Helgrok sat beside me, idly thumbing a button on his gearstick. More shoplins brought up the rear, some in karts and some on worgs. There were even a few Expired sitting in karts in the back. I decided not to question that.

  A few of the others had accepted just to see what would happen. The shoplins had let them choose between a shoplin kart or a stolen scooter. Baz flanked Helgrok atop their scooter, Rozinante the Third. Chaz, Val, Harmony's party, Sidus, and some other guys I didn't recognise were lined up behind us. Those who weren't racing watched from the sides, ready to fight if they had to.

  I stuck with my skates. Khan and my essences combined gave me +11 Speed, and while I wasn't clear on what the numbers meant, it definitely made me the fastest runner in this mall. My new skates stacked on even more, and they handled amazingly. I could definitely keep up with a shoplin kart. Probably.

  "You guys sure you're okay with this?" I asked.

  "Are you kidding?" Chaz waved at his kart. "This is awesome!"

  "Agreed," Val said. "Let's fuckin' go!"

  "I don't back down from a challenge," Sidus said firmly. "Are you going to be fine on those little wheels?"

  "We'll see who gets there first," I said.

  Helgrok beeped to get our attention. Ahead of us, a mogged shoplin held up what looked like a stolen traffic light hooked up to a car battery...

  Red. Engines revved.

  Yellow. Engines roared.

  GREEN.

  Helgrok's tires squealed. My wheels spun. The race was on.

  The pecking order was established quickly: Helgrok, Baz and I were jockeying for the lead, the other humans and the shoplins in karts were behind us, and the worgs and Expired were clearly just there to fill out the race because they were last. The worgs didn't even have all their wheels.

  Helgrok grinned and started trying to ram Baz. "Kree-ah!"

  Baz growled. "Hey!"

  "Thou hast seen nothing yet, knave!" Rozinante cried, and they started ramming Helgrok right back. Udon Quixote wasn't going down that easily.

  I took the opportunity to race ahead. The first part was pretty straightforward, a mostly-straight car-lined path across the car park. Holographic arrows on the side of the road lit the way, in between ads for various brands.

  The path led to the west end, where a series of ramps wound down to the ground level. Arrows guided me down. The outer walls here weren't plated over...

  I hit the ramp.

  I saw outside.

  An expanse of metal panels under a starry sky. More malls, exits sealed, rooftops walled. Trucks and drones moving between them. Some cracked, or burning, or being dismantled with robots and lasers. On the next panel over, a regiment of birdlike aliens in Roman armour marched out of a Pantheon-shaped tank and into a stolen megamall.

  It goes on forever...

  I couldn't help but slow down and stare, which was probably why Helgrok clipped me with his kart.

  I bounced off the wall and tumbled down the ramp. "Shit!"

  [ Health: 14/17 ]

  "Get up!" Baz screamed as they raced past.

  I started skating again. The other racers flowed around me as I got off the ramp.

  Things were going to shit back here. The shoplins had gone straight to violence—some were ramming humans, others were relying on their riders to spear them. A survivor behind me took a spear to the shoulder, screamed, and accidentally rammed Reg off the road.

  "Avenge me, cuz!" he shouted as he spun out in a definitely non-fatal way.

  Harmony turned and aimed her fire breath at the culprit's driver, sending him crashing out next. "GET WRECKED!"

  "Eyes on the road, bro!" Chaz shouted, pulling up beside me to block another would-be rammer. "We'll take care of these guys!"

  "Thanks!" I pumped my legs, trying to squeeze as much speed out of my skates as possible. We were crossing the length of the car park again, but now Expired were wandering the track ahead of us. Mobile speed bumps. Well, okay.

  Helgrok and Baz had already blasted straight through some of them, and the rest were too slow to get me. Weaving between them still slowed me down a little, though.

  baaaaaaz 8:23 PM

  I need backup!

  WillT 8:23 PM

  Coming!

  VKlerk87 8:23 PM

  We've been studying the track and we think there are shortcuts!

  It's like a video game, right? Look for other paths!

  I looked around. Nothing in the immediate area. Shit.

  Another kart pulled up beside me. Chaz had probably caught up again.

  "Chaz, try to find a—"

  Sidus clipped me on purpose as we hit a corner.

  I crashed hard, bouncing off a car on the side of the track and scraping across the concrete. Sidus smirked and drove away.

  "AAAH!"

  Something bounced off my head. A shoplin spectator had thrown a can of Slurp Nurse at me. The other karts were rushing past me. I was in the worg zone now.

  "Kree hee hee!"

  My knees were bloody. My right hand had tried to stop my fall and it didn't feel right.

  I wobbled to my feet, gripped the can—

  Hold on.

  [ 10/17 ]

  I held on to the can for now, started skating as best as I could with fucked-up knees, and held up my left hand. I shifted it into Khan's metal claws.

  "Now," Khan began, "before you attempt the plan you've clearly developed, I should warn you that—"

  I clawed myself in the side. "Guh!"

  [ 9/17 ]

  The track looped around and started winding back toward the ramps again, with more bends this time. I punched my wounds. A worg-riding shoplin who had been rushing into bite range looked weirded-out and started avoiding me.

  "Gah!" Come on!

  [ 8/17 ]

  [ Your Series Lambda Emergency Axe has activated! Speed bonuses doubled! ]

  There we go.

  My wheels blurred. I began to accelerate. My knees screamed at me, but I didn't care.

  I caught up with the other racers. I weaved between Val and a shoplin as they rammed each other, blasted one Harmony had been battling, dodged another as Manaia punched him straight off his kart (damn, nice.)

  Two shoplins lined up their karts to block my way. Ahead of them Chaz saw us, grinned, and hit the brakes.

  "WILL!" he yelled, as the unlucky shoplin behind him got a free trip through the air with an in-flight lesson in the laws of physics. "GET IN THERE!"

  Both karts were totaled. He'd sacrificed himself for me, so I could win this race. He was totally fine, but still. I couldn't let it be in vain.

  I blazed down the next ramp. We were back on the bottom level. The track was much more complicated now, with complicated splits and turns. Baz, Sidus, and Helgrok were jockeying for first place up ahead, and Sidus seemed determined to take out both of them...

  I drew closer. Skipped a hairpin turn by skating straight through a gap in some cars. Closer.

  I could see the end. We would cross the car park one last time, loop around the wall into the final stretch, and reach the finish line just as we returned to the central area. I couldn't see a way to get there faster...

  Shortcut. Cars had been carefully repositioned to create an alley that would let me skip the loop. An Expired had wandered in there and given its location away. Was that on purpose?

  Didn't care. I blasted through.

  Helgrok executed a brilliant slide around the loop and was stunned to see me appear ahead of him.

  "Kreek?!"

  "What the hell?" Sidus shouted, but his hesitation had cost him a place in the top three. Baz pulled ahead.

  My knees wobbled. I felt like I was about to fall apart. But I kept pushing. The finish line was up ahead, but they were right behind me.

  Helgrok pulled up beside me...

  I raised my hand cannon.

  Gotcha.

  I blasted Helgrok. He screeched and wrenched his steering wheel to dodge it, costing him precious seconds he didn't have.

  I crossed the finish line.

  Shoplin spectators ahead. I managed to skid to a halt in front of them before my legs gave out.

  The shoplins stared. They turned to Helgrok as he earned second place, hit the brakes, came to a stop in front of me...

  Helgrok hopped to his feet in the car and screamed in delight. "KREEE-YAAAAA!"

  The shoplins cheered.

  [ MISSION CLEAR ]

  [ LAIR CLEAR ]

  Baz pulled up next. "You okay?"

  I gave her a thumbs-up and checked the Slurp Nurse can. Uncalibrated. That little shit.

  I drank it anyway. "Urp... oh, here we go... ugh..."

  Baz relaxed. "Good thing you found that shortcut."

  "Yeah, that was... huh."

  I trailed off.

  Holy shit.

  I finally realised what had been bugging me all day.

  "Baz. Did... urp... did any of Vaughn's crew come into the car park with us?"

  "I don't think so. Aren't they with Kara?"

  I sighed.

  "Dammit. I think we need to punch him."

  some people weren't "traumatised by their experiences" we could have had a cool race sooner. Sheesh.