by Thomas M Malafarina
“By the book 3 of the Dead Kill trilogy, Malafarina is doing things with the zombie genre which will make living and undead heads spin.” — Jay Wilburn
Teaser from Dead Kill 3: The Ridge of War
by Thomas M Malafaria
The Systematic Expansion process was a multi-phase system. The first phase was to put together a crew comprised of dozens of road workers, highway equipment, supplies as well as a small army of well-armed well-trained spotters, guards and sharpshooters. The road workers would begin resurfacing the roadway for several miles beyond the city limits under the watchful eyes and weapons of the spotters.
This was often extremely hazardous work and there was far too much bloodshed involved with what, at one time would have been considered the routine task of road resurfacing. This type of expansion was beginning to take place more frequently thanks to the reformation of the national governments and the gradual rebuilding of the armed forces. Nonetheless, the work was always hazardous.
One road crew told of coming upon a circular clearing in a forest they had been reclaiming. The area had apparently once been a camp for a tribe of outlanders. The unholy scene they had discovered was the aftermath of horror beyond understanding. Surrounding the clearing in a circle were six equally spaced poles fashioned from small trees about three inches in diameter and more than six feet tall. Atop each pole was a decomposing head. The tops of the skulls had been hacked open and the brains removed. Crows and other such scavengers had pecked at the flesh and eaten the eyes. Swarms of blue-black flies surrounded the rotting skulls making them appear to have a perpetually moving layer of bluish-black flesh. Looking closer the workers could see scores of white maggots undulating beneath what little actual rotting flesh remained.
An arbor of tree branches covered the clearing and dangling from them were lines of rope from which practically fleshless human arms and legs hung. The bones clattered together like macabre wind chimes whenever a breeze blew, sending chills down the spines of onlookers. A few of the limbs were still somewhat intact having enough scraps of flesh remaining to make them identifiable as what body parts they had once been. These didn’t clatter but struck each other with a dull thud that was somehow even more disturbing.
In the center of the circle were the burnt remnants from a large cook fire perhaps five feet across. Rising up from both sides of the fire pit were two tall thick Y-shaped tree branches. Suspended between them was a long heavy pole. Skewered on that pole were the remains of a headless, limbless charred human carcass. A slice ran from pubis to throat with no sign of its eviscerated innards. It was also apparent from the manner in which the flesh had been removed, slice by slice, that the cadaver had been cooked and eaten.
Filling the base of the fire pit were the relics of previous feasts; human bones of all sizes from fully-grown adults to infants. A good distance back in the woods beyond the large clearing the crew had found the corpses of several men tied to trees, the flesh flayed from their bodies. It was obvious from the looks of anguish frozen on the poor souls’ rotting faces they had been alive at the time of the flaying.
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If you want to read more, check out Dead Kill 3 or begin with book 1 now.
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