Free Slow Burn: A Zombie Novel by Mike Fosen, Hollis Weller

was momentarily frozen in shock, watching in morbid fascination as what could only be described as a train wreck unfolded. The next squad crashed directly into the mob, pinning several brawlers between its push bumpers and a parked car. The squad tried to reverse and, in turn, backed into the third arriving squad, driven by Officer Langston. The last two squads veered off on both sides trying to avoid a similar fate. The first squad went left, smashing into a retaining wall at an angle and flipped over. The other veered right and crashed directly into a two-story housing unit, starting a fire.
    Langston exited his squad, unsure whether to help the officer in the flipped squad or deal with the mob. He was forced to pull his service pistol, however, pointing it at a large shirtless man who he saw attacking a much smaller female, beating her savagely. Langston was shouting for the man to get on the ground from what Stephen could make out. Blood sprayed from the woman’s mouth, and at that moment Langston fired several shots, striking the man in his back and at the base of the neck, dropping him instantly. Langston must have had tunnel vision due to the shooting because he was staring straight ahead when several attackers came from his right side uncontested.
    Stephen finally broke the paralysis and began to run toward his fellow officer. “Langston! Get the hell out of there!”
    Due to the roar of the mob and the fact that Langston was focused solely on his use of deadly force, he could not hear the warning. Stephen fired several shots wildly with his AR-15 at the attackers, knocking two of them down. Langston turned his head to the right just in time to be tackled by several male attackers. His pistol discharged three or four more times while he was overwhelmed.
    “ Langston!” Stephen grabbed his radio. “Zone one, officer down!”
    He observed the next moments in slow motion. At the distance he was now, maybe what Roy said was right. It did look like they were eating one another. The screams from Langston were drowned out; the size of the mob on top of him was so large that he was no longer visible. Stephen carefully began to fire his rifle into the large pile of bodies with little effect. The bolt on his rifle locked back on the newly emptied magazine. It was precisely at that moment that the huge mob started to grind to a halt. Screams of pain and anger echoed off into the distance. His ears, ringing from the carbine’s report, adjusted to the now eerie silence. Stephen lowered his carbine, staring at the mob. His police radio crackled to life with dispatchers trying desperately to find out the status of the officers. The next sound was an empty magazine hitting the ground as Stephen pulled and seated a fresh one without looking down, just how he had trained the last three days.
    The blood-soaked ground was now littered with bodies, some still moving. There appeared to be people fighting over corpses on the ground. Were the bodies being robbed or eaten? The woman that Officer Langston had given his life to protect now had his severed right arm in her hands. Backing up slowly to give himself some additional distance, Stephen heard his partner Roy scream.
    “ Let’s get out of here!” Roy screeched from inside the car, unexpectedly drawing the attention of the frenzied, blood-covered mob.
    Stephen watched nearly every single head from the disgusting mob turn and look at him hungrily. Only a few seemed too engrossed in their task to notice. Roy squeaked in fear several yards behind him, and the squad door slammed shut, followed by the sound of the doors locking. As if that was what broke the spell, hundreds of voices roared in unison at Stephen with an intense hatred and unswayable hunger. They rose and began moving his way.

6

August 26
Day 1

    Inside the house I finally located the stairway that stretched up out of sight into the deepening darkness.
    “ It’s dark as hell up there even though the sun is still