Wade's breath came shallow and ragged.
Brody's body lay in two uneven halves just a few steps away, the blood still steaming in the cold wind.
His eyes, still open, stared vacantly towards the battlefield as if watching the clouds roll past.
Wade's mind refused to move past it. He'd seen death before, plenty of it, but never this sudden. Never someone he personally knew.
His chest tightened painfully. His hands trembled around Toothpick, the knuckles bloodless.
Something cracked inside him.
Then...
"Get down!"
A voice, loud and panicked, cut through his fog.
Wade's head snapped up just in time to see a shadow streaking down from the clouds. The patriarch buzzard again, talons wreathed in lightning.
The air sizzled as it descended.
He dove aside.
The buzzard's talons tore through the ground where he'd stood, raking a trench through the dirt.
The resulting shockwave threw Wade backward, heat and static burning across his skin.
