Read The Fall (Book 3): War of the Living for Free Online

system that was his brain. Those two factors worked together, clearing his head just enough to recognize his impending death.
    Regret and relief had just begun to flow through him in an even mix when Scotty shot the prisoner in the head.
     
     
    The sound brought people running within seconds. Kell had just begun wiping the bits of brain and shattered skull from his face when sets of hands gripped him, a babble of voices echoing across the field. There was blood in his eyes, and it was not his own.
    “I'm fine,” he mumbled. Someone slipped a hand under his arms and pulled, moving faster than he could protest. He screamed and was promptly dropped.
    The pain left him in a partial haze, just aware enough to enjoy watching Scotty, still holding his pistol, dress down the handful of men who had sprinted to help. The rest of him was trying not to move, cradling his right elbow as he lay on the ground.
    Kell shook his head, focusing on Scotty's voice.
    “...the guy went for the spear. He knew what he was doing, too. Flipped K onto his head. I think he broke something. The guy was getting ready to stab K, so I shot him...”
    The lie worked because, except for the very relevant fact that Kell had started the fight, it was all true. Which was a blessing for Scotty. The guy was a decent fighter, one hell of a field medic, and as good a man as you could find nowadays, but a terrible liar. Mama Atkinson raised him right, but for the wrong world.
    “We should have had someone else here,” one of the soldiers said.
    “No,” Kell croaked from the ground. “One handcuffed old guy? He didn't look all that scary. Shit happens. We're both...well, alive, at any rate. I could use some pain meds if anyone has some. Think my collarbone is busted.”
    Scotty took over the scene, the firefighter in him coming to the fore. Kell was thankful for it, and for the lack of suspicion on the part of the surrounding men. Guilt burned in him, making it seem as though one of them would turn on him at any moment and accuse him of murder, but he pushed the thought down. Of course they had no idea. The guy had been a prisoner, a valuable one. Soldiers tried to escape capture all the time, and with Kell injured and Scotty carrying minimal weaponry, it would have seemed a perfect opportunity.
    And the honest assessment was that once the guy realized who Kell was, he probably would have tried to escape for real. This way no one else found out Kell's identity.
    The next fifteen minutes were hectic for everyone but Kell. Scotty sent a soldier off to retrieve the backup crew, including their medical bus. Dodger appeared and began to ask questions as Scotty cut away Kell's shirt to take a look at his collarbone, and was waved off.
    “It can wait until he gets looked at,” Scotty said. “A few minutes won't matter.”
    There was steel in Scotty, Kell observed again. No doubt about it.
    Whatever questions Dodger had did in fact wait, and more than a few minutes. Between flashes of pain that caused him to burst into waves of sweat, he watched people clean up and manage the scene. Bodies were piled and burned, dogs set in pickets to discourage the undead. The wounded were treated, Kell included, and someone—someone wonderful— injected him with something that made him not care a bit about his broken bone.
    Eventually a consensus formed among the medical staff that the break wasn’t something any of them could fix. The bone was bent upward in the middle but still in one piece, a partial break that would require surgery to straighten but could otherwise be left alone to heal.
    Kell, medicated as he was, shrugged. Which hurt like hell. Scotty slapped him on the back of the head.
    Eventually Kate showed up, blood splattered up her boots and across the cuffs of her pants.
    “You okay?” she asked as she approached the section of grass where he lay on his back, his only cover a thin blanket. “Why aren't you in the tent with the rest of them?” She jerked a