Excerpt: Midnight Underground

Dax Hawkins had Business.
Business was everywhere. It spilled down alleys and wide streets, into homes and apartment buildings. It came in the form of a hundred bodies: dead, alive, and in between. It came in cloaks and hoods, in black and gray. In the prelude to morning, his City bled, but only ghosts might tattle.
Only those silent, smog-supported ghosts.
"Damn you," Dax uttered, but the ghosts were already damned, damned to the same fate as he.
As he spoke, he swiped a hand in front of his vision. The gaping mouths and empty eyes swished away, but still accused.
"Forgive me for killing you someday," he continued. "Realize it was impersonal, only a job."
From further away, their white jaws worked, trying to chew at him, trying to escape. He allowed them to distract him for a moment more, realizing he could name only a handful: the ones he'd known, then destroyed. The mass had been faded photos on copy paper, and he'd paid attention only to their listed price.
"Now if you could fade more…" he started, though it was unfair to will it so. It was his fate as much as theirs. He killed them to stay alive, or rather, undead.