A grasshopper demon took hold of the limp arm resting on my back and began to tug. I was alone in the middle of them, but not helpless. I slowly moved one hand to Abomination’s grip. I’d take as many of them with me as possible.

Please let Julie escape. That’s all I ask.

There were demons everywhere.

So this is how I die…

“Not yet, Z. You don’t get off that easy.”

My radio was off, but I’d heard the familiar voice as clear as day.

It can’t be. He’s dead. Ray Shackleford killed him. I was fading in and out of reality. I was injured worse than I thought. Now I was hearing voices from my past.

But…Was that Copenhagen chewing tobacco that I was smelling?

“You’re not in the real world anymore, Z. You’ve all been shanghaied into a place between worlds. He’s killing you with things from your own pasts, things that are already dead and gone. Well, me and the other guys are sick of that shit, and here we can do something about it. This evil son of a bitch isn’t the only one that can cheat.”

A demonic claw wrapped around my boot and I was pulled from underneath the body parts and concrete. The worker demon grabbed the back of my armor and flipped me over. The creature loomed over me. Its pack of eyes flickered back and forth and then it clicked hungrily as it realized I was alive. It leaned over to slice my face off with one of its jagged mouths.

The demon’s face exploded, splattering me with hot bits. A figure stepped over me and kicked the headless corpse aside. The man knocked a second monster down with the stock of his rifle. Another monster ruptured in a shower of yellow bile. He worked a Marlin lever-action rifle and fired from the hip, disemboweling a third creature. He kept shooting and shooting and shooting, driving the demons back. Somehow the rifle never seemed to run out of ammo.

He was wearing MHI-issued body armor, bandoleers of individual rounds of .45-70, and on his arm was a patch featuring a walrus with a banjo.

It can’t be.

I’d never seen these demons show fear before, but this Hunter scared them. Screeching and chattering in their incomprehensible language, the horde retreated. “That’s right, you bugs!” he bellowed after them. “Run back to your master and tell him he’s not the only one with friends at this party.”

“But you’re dead,” I croaked.

“Duh.” Sam Haven turned around and grinned at me from beneath his gigantic mustache. “But screw death. I’ve got shit to get done. Come on.”

“Are you from my imagination?”

“No. That’s stupid.” Sam snorted, reached down, grabbed my armored collar, and hoisted me as if I weighed nothing. “Can you walk?”