It took a moment for those words to register in his brain.
"Y-you lost your magic, too?" Konrad tried to yell over all the gunfire, but he got no answer.
He got an excuse instead.
"Later, kid. Kinda busy right now," Strelok shouted, reloading his AK once again. "Don't you have something to shoot at these things?! I'm almost out of ammo."
And the zombies have kept coming.
Well, Konrad still had his Five-seveN and five full magazines for it, but—
"I'm a terrible shot," he groaned, pulling out the gun.
'If you'd let me take over your right arm,' the brain offered. 'I could fix that for you.'
It sounded sketchy if anything.
'Rude,' the voice scoffed before he voiced his concerns. 'I've been nothing but helpful so far. Your body is capable of shooting straight, but your brain tells you you can't. I can change that.'
Well, he could have argued, but the parallel brain did say this before.
If he tried to take over his full body—or use the gun to suicide—he'd disappear, too.
"Try not to get me killed," Konrad mumbled under his nose, turning off the safety on his pistol.
And a moment later, his right hand started moving on its own.
He didn't even line up the pistol's sights with his eyes.
It started blasting into the crowd below with deadly accuracy anyway. So by the time his first magazine was empty, the PDA showed four fewer zombies in his proximity.
"Terrible shot, my ass," Strelok grunted, loading up his last mag.
It created a lull in the fighting, as the enemy fiddled with their own reloads.
"I'll take these stairs behind me," his new partner yelled. "Cover me from where you are, and I'll end these fuckers within a minute. We'll find a way to get you down here, too, after that."
"W-wait," Konrad mumbled, not quite sold on the idea, but Strelok was already on the move.
Without him realizing, the brain had already reloaded his pistol, too.
'Stay in cover while he's on the move,' he suggested as well. 'Then we'll draw their attention.'
But after a short pause, the voices changed their tone.
'Unless—you want me to shoot him in the back?!' he asked. 'I'd be more than happy to do so, after that that fucker pumped me full of lead back in X-16.'
It's one thing that he felt schizophrenic ever since that thing took shelter in his head.
But was the brain about to lose his mind, too?!
"You know I need him alive," Konrad grunted, his voice firm.
Trying to take control back over his hand—
Well, it felt comforting how easy he could pull that off.
'I was joking, kid, joking,' the voice forced a laugh.
But forget schizophrenia.
The fact that he started calling him a kid pissed Konrad off even more.
'Okay, okay, sorry, Gramps, was trying to match the mood. I've seen your memories and know how important it is to secure Strelok. So if you would be so kind and give me back control—'
Yeah, well, he was more reluctant this time.
But his target was already in position, waving for him to start.
"Cut back on the jokes and keep him alive," Konrad grunted, adding, "both of us, if possible."
And let go of his hand.
'No promises,' the brain snickered.
But the Five-seveN took out two more zombies before Strelok left his cover and mowed down the rest. Then, he finished off the stragglers and the dying, checking each corpse one by one.
"Okay, let's see how to get you down here," Strelok pondered in the end.
As if nothing had happened.
He pushed the remains of that bridge platform against the wall, and—
"Here, kid. Try climbing down on this. I'll cover you."
Nope. That seemed like a terrible idea.
If he saw any other way to reach his target, he would have chosen that, but there were none.
"Hurry up before my brain melts," Strelok yelled, the barrel of his AK scanning the ends of the larger corridor. "The control room should be that way, let's make it quick."
Thus, Konrad had no choice.
The rusted and broken platform cut his fingers at least a hundred times. And, of course, Dmitry kept the anti-bleeding and healing artifacts on himself.
"Man, you should have put on gloves in here," Strelok pointed out.
And sure, he was right, but hindsight was twenty-twenty.
"I need your help," Konrad panted once his feet were on solid ground again.
"Bandages? Here," the man threw him a small package, turning away to loot the corpses.
There were plenty, and he picked up all the curved magazines he could fit into his rifle.
"No, I mean, help with Lucifer," he clarified, though he could have worded that better.
Strelok froze for a second, clutching a mag before spitting on the ground.
"He can go fuck himself. I'm kinda busy here."
Okay. Okay. That wasn't the worst answer he could have gotten.
It showed that he wasn't a fan of that fallen angel, either.
"Yeah, he can," Konrad nodded. "That's what I meant, too. We found a way to fight him, but I still need your help. Your soul's connected to his like mine, and we could—"
"For him or against, I won't miss another chance because of the bastard," Strelok interrupted.
He took one more quick look around and checked his gear before nodding at a double door.
"Come and help me finish this thing before I lose my mind," he offered instead. "I promise, I'll hear you out after that, but nothing more. Won't leave any more unfinished business here."
Losing his mind? Right.
For a moment, Konrad had forgotten where they were, but the Brain Scorcher was still active.
He had both the Psy Dampener and this parallel brain to protect his sanity, but even so. His head was also throbbing. And he couldn't even imagine how bad it must have been for others.
"On my way," he nodded, bandaging his hands on the go.
'Yeah, that'll be the room,' the stowaway voice noted, too. 'Something strong's behind it.'
Which he might have meant as comforting, but Konrad was already gulping.
"Melee or firefight?" he asked, fiddling with his pistol.
That gave Strelok a pause.
"Why would you run around with a sword, anyway?" he turned the question around. "Grab a proper gun, kid. You're not in—wherever you came from."
But the brain would scream the opposite inside.
'Melee, melee. Draw your blade before this idiot opens—'
But it was too late.
Strelok kicked the door in, decloaking three Bloodsuckers at once.
Konrad had no idea how he survived this long with this attitude.
But if he and his parasite were not here—
"Tvoyu klyatu matir," the man cried out, his AK barking on full auto.
Before Konrad swung his sword, he had already taken one out, backing away to reload.
At least his reflexes were good. But Konrad wasn't left behind, either.
The adamantite blade decapitated the second monster before it could move.
And the third—
Well, it got a nasty stab in the guts before the AK put at least ten more holes into its chest.
"I swear, these things are even nastier when I can see them," Strelok panted, kicking at the corpses. "I take back anything I said about that sword. Keep it up, kid. And let's finish this quick."