Chapter 640: Chapter 640: Persistence (Part 10)

Don and K-4 watched the horde surge upward with horrifying speed.

The horde crashed upward in waves, fingers punching into concrete, feet scraping against glass and exposed steel as they forced themselves higher without care for what broke beneath them.

Some slammed directly into walls hard enough to crack bone, then kept moving anyway. Others used the bodies below them as footholds, stepping on shoulders, heads, backs—anything that gave elevation.

One lost its grip entirely.

It fell three stories.

And before it even hit the street, another landed on top of it and kept climbing.

The ones inside the horde carrying abilities stood out immediately.

One scaled vertically with all four limbs moving unnaturally fast, head twitching in violent jerks while it overtook dozens beneath it.

Another leaped from one balcony to another with enough force to bend railings inward on contact.

Some simply ran faster than the others, bodies twitching with unstable bursts of movement that let them launch several floors upward at once.

Don narrowed his eyes at the sight but didn’t stop climbing.

Neither did K-4.

They had enough distance for now.

That was all that mattered.

Both became noticeably more careful about their hand placement after the earlier section collapsed.

Don adjusted Charles slightly over his shoulder while pulling himself higher with controlled bursts of strength.

Concrete edges cracked faintly under his grip, dust shaking loose around his fingers before falling away into open air.

K-4 moved differently.

Cleaner.

More measured.

Even carrying Olynk, he ascended with frightening pace, boots pressing against narrow footholds before launching him upward again.

His injured shoulder from earlier clearly bothered him, but he ignored it completely. Blood still stained part of his sleeve.

The higher they climbed and the more buildings they crossed, the stronger the wind became.

Smoke rolled across sections of the city beneath them, carried between towers in thick drifting sheets while distant explosions continued to flare across SHU.

Jets screamed overhead intermittently, their shadows flashing across glass surfaces before vanishing again.

Then finally—

They reached the rooftop of their target building.

Both men pulled themselves over the ledge almost simultaneously.

THUD—THUD!~

The rooftop belonged to a corporate tower. No helipad. No open luxury layout like Ebon Crest.

This one was functional. Large ventilation units lined sections of the roof, their metal surfaces stained by soot and rain exposure.

Thick maintenance pipes ran along raised supports near the center. Cooling systems hummed unevenly, some still active while others sparked intermittently from visible damage.

Several rows of solar panels stretched across one side, though many had shattered already, cracked glass reflecting dull gray light from above.

Emergency generator boxes sat near reinforced maintenance doors, warning labels peeling from age and heat exposure.

Loose papers and debris skittered across the rooftop under the wind.

Don immediately lowered Charles beside one of the larger ventilation units while K-4 settled Olynk down nearby with noticeably more care than before.

Olynk still hadn’t regained consciousness. Blood dried along the side of his head and neck, his breathing shallow but present.

K-4 rose immediately afterward and looked toward Don.

Then his hands moved.

Fast.

The augmented reality translated automatically across Don’s vision.

I’m sending our location. Exfil should be arriving soon.

Don gave a short nod before moving away from them and stepping toward the edge of the roof. He planted one hand against a metal support beam and looked downward.

The hordes were close now.

Too close for comfort.

He could see movement between buildings already.

Bodies flooding through intersections. Some still crashing through lower structures instead of taking direct routes upward. Others had begun scaling surrounding buildings outright.

Only a few more minutes... tops.

Maybe less.

Don’s eyes shifted upward afterward, scanning the sky.

Nothing.

No silver helicopter.

No approaching extraction.

Only smoke.

Cloud cover.

And then—

Far in the distance toward the western side of SHU—

Helicopters.

Several of them.

Dark silhouettes cutting through smoke in organized formation.

Military.

Even from this far away, he could tell immediately they weren’t coming for them.

His hearing had finally begun to return, though not fully.

At first it sounded like pressure underwater. Muffled vibrations scraping against each other without shape.

Then came a high ringing noise buried beneath it all—constant and irritating, like metal feedback trapped directly inside his skull.

Certain sounds arrived distorted.

Wind.

Movement.

The scrape of K-4’s boots against concrete.

All of it uneven.

Like his ears no longer understood distance properly.

Don grimaced faintly.

Behind him, K-4 moved quickly between opposite edges of the rooftop, checking sightlines and access points before turning back sharply toward him. His motions carried urgency now.

His hands moved again.

—Those things might reach us before exfil does. We need to get ready for them now—-

Don stared at the translated words for half a second longer than necessary.

His chest tightened slightly.

For a brief moment, his heartbeat picked up harder than before.

Not from exhaustion.

Not entirely.

This felt different.

Training with Redstar had been brutal, but there had always been structure beneath it.

A strange reassurance hidden underneath the violence. Pain had purpose there. Damage had limits.

This?

This felt uncertain.

Like the city itself wanted them dead.

Everything since entering the city had become worse with every passing minute. New mutant infected. New hordes. New variables appearing faster than anyone could adapt to them.

The pressure bore down mentally more than physically.

His body could still move.

Could still fight.

But the weight inside his head kept growing heavier.

Still—

The alternative was death.

That alone simplified things.

People always understood what needed to be done when survival became simple enough.

Execution was the difficult part.

Don looked briefly toward K-4.

The man showed no hesitation whatsoever.

No visible conflict.

Just action.

Don didn’t feel lesser because of that.

But he noticed it anyway.

The thought vanished almost immediately.

There wasn’t time to indulge it.

He then moved.

Fast.

Together, both of them began dragging rooftop equipment into rough defensive positions.

Don shoved one of the heavier maintenance carts sideways with enough force to screech metal across concrete while K-4 ripped loose a section of reinforced piping and wedged it between two ventilation units to create a chokepoint.

Solar panel frames were overturned next, angled toward likely approach paths. Generator boxes got pushed closer together to narrow movement further. Neither setup looked stable or well-planned.

It didn’t need to.

It just needed to slow the horde down for seconds.

That was all.

Below them—

Movement intensified.

The horde had reached the base of the building.

The vibrations became noticeable through the rooftop itself now.

Subtle at first.

Then stronger.

The structure trembled intermittently as hundreds of bodies collided into lower floors, climbed exterior walls, or crashed through windows and glass walls beneath them.

Neither Don nor K-4 stopped moving.

Neither slowed.

Sweat rolled down both of them despite the wind.

——-

Meanwhile...

Far above SHU—

Redstar hovered calmly in open air.

Her arms remained crossed loosely beneath her chest while the wind rolled around her without affecting her posture in the slightest.

Her body drifted only minimally, suspended several thousand feet above.

Below her—

SHU remained stained red.

Smoke columns climbed upward from dozens of buildings.

Jets screamed overhead repeatedly, launching missiles toward massive sprout formations that attempted to spread between skyscrapers across the city.

BOOM—!~

One explosion tore through an enormous vine structure climbing along a residential tower.

Burning fragments broke apart and rained downward afterward, smashing into streets already filled with bodies.

Another missile struck farther south moments later.

Fire expanded outward across several rooftops.

Redstar simply watched.

Expression unchanged.

"Such small hurdle cannot break you..." she murmured quietly to herself.

To her—

This entire situation remained manageable.

Failure was a choice.

Nothing more.

Then—

A vibration buzzed lightly against her waist.

Her phone.

It sat tucked into the waistband of her shorts, partially stained with dried blood and grime from earlier fighting.

She pulled it free with one hand before answering casually.

"Da?"

The voice on the other side spoke immediately.

"Captain Redstar, this is Central Command Oversight. UPSDF Vanguard elements are currently conducting an active classified containment operation within Santos City airspace. Unauthorized aerial observation constitutes operational interference. You are ordered to descend immediately and vacate restricted altitude zones pending completion of tactical deployment."

Redstar stared ahead for a moment.

Then scoffed softly.

"Hmph."

Without another word, her body began lowering through the air.