Free Z-Risen (Book 3): Poisoned Earth by Timothy W. Long Page B

to squeeze water into the hole. Yellowish fluid came out.
    “Okay. I’m going to feel around the wound and try to locate the bullet, as well as any fragments. This will probably hurt.”
    “I don’t really care right now. I’m high as a kite,” she grinned.
    Roz looked at me. “Hold her.”
    I leaned over and put a hand on her shoulder and then my arm across her chest. Roz moved beside me and pulled the bandage off of Anna’s wound.
    “I told you that I’m not into that stuff, Creed,” Anna said, and then giggled. I didn’t envy her when the high wore off. She was going to sleep and wake up hurting, but we didn’t have painkillers to spare.
    “Yeah, I’ll keep that in mind,” I said.
    Roz started by probing the wound with her fingers. She didn’t press hard but as she explored, Anna’s body language changed.
    “I can feel that but it’s not too bad,” Anna said and took a deep breath.
    “It’s going to get worse. Sorry,” Roz said.
    I had to look away when she stuck the tweezers in the wound.
    “Motherfuck!” Anna said and nearly bolted up off the bed.
    I held her down, but I didn’t like it. Anna was slight but she was powerfully built, so I had to hold her none too gently.
    “I’m sorry. I almost had it, try not to move.”
    I glanced over and then regretted it. Blood oozed out of the wound and ran down the back of Anna’s arm. The hole was small, but it looked red and infected. I’d seen a lot of nasty stuff out in the z-poc world, but it was different when the damage was on someone I cared for.
    “That can’t get, like, infected , right?” I said to Roz and lifted my eyebrows for emphasis.
    “Of course it can, Creed. It may be infected now.”
    “That’s not what I…”
    “He means can the zombie stuff get into my wound,” Anna said between clenched teeth.
    “I fucking hope not,” Roz said.
    Roz dug in the wound and then pulled the tweezers up. Anna bucked under me.
    “Shit, I almost had it.”
    “Let me go, Creed,” Anna said. “I’ll do this myself.”
    I looked for confirmation from Roz.
    “ Now , goddamn it!” Anna swore.
    Roz nodded.
    I lifted the pressure off her body and stood up.
    Anna reached across her body and grasped her upper arm.
    The door rocked open and in stepped Joel Kelly. He took one look at the blood and his face dropped.
    Anna grunted. She squeezed the skin around the wound, teeth clenched, lips in a snarl. She let out something like a growl and then pressed upward.
    The bullet popped out of the wound and fell on the towels.
    My mouth dropped open.
    Roz grinned.
    “Positively badass, Sails. Positively badass,” Joel said.
    I felt like passing out.

#25 - All Hands on Deck
     
    07:30 hours approximate
    Location: Just outside of Oceanside
     
    Another day, another headache.
    That’s not a metaphor. For the last few days I’d woken up with a headache that started at the base of my skull, spread up my head, and then ended with a pounding sensation behind my eyes. I tried and tried to ignore the pain.
    Today the thumping was bad enough to remind me of my epic drinking days: fun times that had ended just a couple of months ago, thanks to the zombie fucking apocalypse. It wasn’t that there was a lack of booze--there was plenty, if you looked in enough houses. It was Joel Kelly, who ended up being my personal AA and sponsor all wrapped up into one.
    “Get drunk, get dead,” Kelly had said after I spun the top off a bottle of cheap whiskey.
    I’d procured the drink from a rambler a few days before, and had been saving it.
    “Not if I get whiskey dick.”
    “Gonna get dead is what you’re gonna get. Can’t stay frosty if you’re drunk off your ass.”
    “A little sip or two isn’t the end of the world,” I’d argued.
    “This is the end of the world, and there ain’t no coming back. No waking up in the brig cause you assaulted an officer. No waking up in your rack reaching for a half dozen aspirin. It’s lights out like a mo' fucka.”
    I