Slow Burn (Book 8): Grind

by Adair, Bobby

  I’d realized a long time ago how useless that intuition was. I just needed the presence of mind not to listen to it when it prompted me into something extra stupid.

  I chose not to listen.

  Instead, I calmed myself, thought about my goal, and considered—given my limited resources—the best way to achieve it.

  Given the variables, it wasn’t a difficult problem to solve.

  When I neared the culvert, I stopped running and dropped down to a knee beside the guardrail. It had to be there to keep inattentive drivers from running off the shoulder and crashing into the creek next to the road.

  I caught my breath, unscrewed the cap on my quart of lighter fluid and broke the foil seal on the bottle. I put the cap back on and then tested one of the lighters, just to make sure. I’d had too many little things go wrong too many times to have my plan fail on account of a malfunctioning disposable lighter.

  Out of habit, I took a look around. The battle still raged. Naked Whites were dying by the thousands against a well-armed army of dipshits. But the dipshits were losing, they just didn’t know it.

  I got up and jogged along the guardrail until I was over the culvert. I leaned over. Just below me, where the concrete walls had been poured to funnel floodwaters into the big pipe beneath the highway, at least thirty Whites were standing, patiently waiting to be told what to do. Those messengers could speak, at least in a rudimentary fashion. Some of them were probably even of normal human intelligence. Either way, the mix was good for my purposes.

  I reached out with my lighter fluid and squirted it, squeezing hard to empty the bottle as quickly as possible, trying hard to get at least some on every one of the Whites waiting below.

  A few protested with grunts and dirty looks. Some wiped at their faces and eyes. Most shuffled around as the lighter fluid rained down. The Whites on the right-hand side got the biggest dose.

  As soon as the bottle emptied, I bounded a few quick steps and leapt over the guardrail onto the sloping ground beside the road. My boots skidded down the slope as I kept my balance and made a turn into the gaping concrete mouth of the culvert.

  Most of the messenger Whites were looking at me by then, I suppose wondering what craziness I was up to. The ones I’d doused with the biggest dose of lighter fluid were closest to where I came to a stop.

  I wasted no time. I rushed them, keeping a tight grip on my machete, holding it in front of me to keep their bodies from touching mine. I flicked my lighter to get a flame. In the confusion, the first White didn’t notice the lighter come close to her skin. Too bad.

  The fluid on her shoulder caught fire, and the flame spread instantly around her neck, over her face, and onto her bald head. She screamed as any animal would, no matter how stupid. Fear of the flame is burned deep into the instincts.

  She turned, waving her arms, trying to flee, spreading the flames to those beside her.

  I jumped back a step and started to swing my machete.

  Whites pushed back and tried to run away from me. They’d all been in the horde long enough to know that when a blade came out, the White on the business end of it turned into supper. They’d learned to fear the blade.

  The flames spread across the whole bunch of them as they panicked, screamed, and pushed for all they were worth into the culvert.

  They stampeded into the Smart Ones inside.

  I dropped my lighter, quickly pulled my knife out of my boot, and followed, hearing nothing but agonizing fear echoing out of the big metal pipe.

  Whites were falling and scrambling forward on hands and knees. Some went down and stayed there, injured by trampling feet.

  As I ran by, I slashed at any who weren’t on fire, taking an extra swipe at ones who resisted. Those, I guessed, were the Smart Ones.

  When I was halfway through the pipe, I came to a White nursing a wrist as he got up on his knees, looking at me with the clearest blue eyes and the most intense stare.

  I’d seen that fucker before.

  He was the one who’d set himself up on that makeshift throne all those months ago in Sarah Mansfield’s living room—King Monkey Fucker. He was the leader.

  I raised my machete.

  “Don’t,” he said, “I’m not like them.”

  Exactly!

  I swung down as he raised his good hand to block. My blade cut his hand in half and sank into his skull.

  I wrenched the machete out as he fell over, twitching and gulping.

  I yelled into the darkness, “Mark!”

  At the other end of the culvert, out in the daylight, I saw a silhouetted figure on its hands and knees look up.

  I ran, feeling a rush of joy so profound I nearly cried. But that shifted to rage in a rush of blame I’d attached to him for the pain of all my losses.

  When I came into the light, Mark was looking up at me, confusion on his face.

  I kicked him in the face and he fell over backward.

  All around us, injured and dazed Whites were on the ground crawling away or just laying there. Plenty were still on fire and running while they screamed.

  I put a boot on Mark’s chest and put the blade of my machete to his throat. “You remember me?”

  He laughed and sputtered blood through his teeth. He shook his head.

  “Speak, fucker.”

  Mark looked cautiously left and right. He had his habits, too.

  “You recognize me?” I asked again.

  “No.”

  “I’m Zed Zane. I saved your dumb ass back at the dorm on campus.”

  Mark laughed again. Blood flowed out of his mouth, courtesy of the boot I’d planted there. He said, “You didn’t save me. I’m a god. We’re all gods. This is our world now.”

  “Gods?” I asked. “Gods don’t bleed.”

  “And they don’t die, either.” Mark laughed again, as though the joke were on me.

  I swung my blade down to prove him wrong, but he moved his head and grabbed my ankle. The end of my blade ripped through his face, cutting a long slash all the way down through his sinus cavity. His grip on my ankle relaxed. Mark’s mouth opened and closed a few times, and his eyes blinked.

  I raised my machete and cut straight down, burying it through the center of his head.

  He didn’t move after that.

  Habit took over, and I looked around, right, left, and behind, not taking any time to revel in the feeling. No White was paying any particular attention to me.

  Machine gun fire was still everywhere. Helicopters still flew over and strafed. Whites still screamed.

  It was time for me to go.

  I ran.

  Chapter 58

  It was late in the day, and I was tired as hell.

  After spending the day sneaking and running through Killeen, Harker Heights, and part of Belton, I came out of the trees on the backside of the Expo Center. In front of me was a fairly small, fenced parking lot, probably reserved for exhibitors and what not. An easy deduction, since a giant rolling steel door on the back of the building opened onto the parking lot.

  I climbed the fence, being extra careful to keep my man parts off the barbed wire loops at the top. I crossed the parking lot and walked in through the open door.

  “Hey.”

  It startled me at first, but I calmed instantly. “Hey, Murphy.”

  “I see you made it.”

  “Did you find a way to get up top?” I asked.

  "Yeah," he said. "I've been up there all day. I saw you coming across those fields over that way, so I came down to meet you."

  “Thanks.” I smiled.

  “You got him?”

  I nodded.

  “No shit?”

  “No shit.”

  “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.” Murphy dug into his pocket and came up with the scratch-off ticket he’d taken from the convenience store. “You won.”

  “How much?”

  “Does it matter?”

  I shook my head. “You didn’t happen to pick up my clothes
after I left you this morning, did you?”

  Murphy shook his head again. “There's a custodian's locker room or something like that.” He pointed to the other side of the arena. “I think you might be able to find something there.”

  “Good.” I walked onto the arena floor. Murphy came along.

  “You really did kill him?”

  I nodded again.

  “How did he go?”

  “Badly,” I said. “Very badly. For him, anyway.”

  “Good.” Murphy heaved a dramatic sigh. “So we got that out of our system?”

  I nodded.

  “What next then?”

  “You still wanna go to College Station?”

  “What the fuck do you think?”

  The End

  Well, not really the end. There will be a Slow Burn 9. Want to know when? Like my Facebook Page or subscribe to my email list. I like to keep in touch, and I swear, I won’t SPAM you or sell your email address. No, really…

  Email: http://bobbyadair.com/subscribe/

  Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/BobbyAdairAuthor

  From the Apocryphal Texts of the Last Apocalypse

  Book of Kinsley and Khyla – History of The Zed

  November 26th, 0001 PA

  Kinsley: Zed Zane was stinky but Kyla wants to kiss him.

  Khyla: Eeew! He’s old enough be like my grandpa or something.

  Kinsley: You smiled at him the whole time. You want to grow up and marry him.

  Khyla: If you don’t stop saying that I’m telling mom you’re not a good historian because you’re too immature. Besides you giggled the whole time. So when you turn eighteen you can marry him but he’ll be like a hundred by then and all his teeth will fall out and you’ll have to feed him corn mush with a spoon like a baby.

  Kinsley: I’m a better historian than you. Zed Zane was stinky and he needs a bath. And later that day Khyla had to burn the sheets on the bed because they were too stinky to wash.

  Khyla: I’m not going to burn the sheets. You’re going to wash them later because it’s your turn to help with the laundry.

  Kinsley: Is not.

  Khyla: Is too.

  Kinsley: We’re not washing today because it’s Thanksgiving. You’ll have to wash them tomorrow.

  Khyla: Nope. You’ll have to wash them tomorrow instead. That’s the way it works on holidays.

  Kinsley: I don’t want to wash the stinky sheets. I had to hold my nose the entire time we were talking to him.

  Khyla: Too bad.

  Kinsley: Please, wash them for me, please.

  Khyla: Nope.

  Kinsley: I’ll do you a favor.

  Khyla: Like what?

  Kinsley: What do you want?

  Khyla: I want you to leave a review for Slow Burn: Grind so everybody in the whole world will know what a great piece of literature it is.

  Kinsley: Okay. How do I do that?

  Khyla: You follow the link to where you got the book and leave it on the Slow Burn 8 page.

  Kinsley: Wait. I can’t do that. The Internet is gone now. We had that apocalypse, remember?

  Khyla: Oh yeah, you’re right. That means you waited to long to leave a review so I guess you’ll have to wash stinky sheets instead.

  While you’re waiting…other series links!

  Here are links to the first books in a few of my other series in case you’re interested.

  The Last Survivors – http://smarturl.it/TheLastSurvivors

  A collaborative series with fellow zombie author T.W. Piperbrook, this series has a little more of a Sci-Fi feel. It explores what happens 300 years in the future after the apocalypse, when man has rebuilt and gone back to an almost medieval society.

  Ebola K – http://smarturl.it/EbolaK-1

  A really great terrorism thriller with a bazillion reviews. Not the heart-pounding action of Slow Burn book but a little more in-depth and complex. It focuses on the recent Ebola outbreak and the possibility of weaponized Ebola. It’s also historically accurate, so you’ll learn a little about the history of the disease as well… did you know that Ebola has been airborne in the US in the past?

  Dusty’s Diary – http://smarturl.it/DustysDiary

  Fun and crass but be careful if you’re easily offended. Has some great advice about what to pack in your post-apocalyptic bunker (don’t forget the naughty mags!). Dusty’s Diary has an uncertain future…people like it, but I haven’t decided what to do with it yet.

  Text copyright © 2015, Bobby L. Adair & Beezle Media, LLC

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author/publisher.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, places, or events is purely coincidental.