Дэвид Муди - Screaming Eagles

Bryon held his hand out and let water run over it, washing his blood onto the sidewalk. His eyes followed the flow to the ground, and then around his Nikes. By then, the crimson was diluted enough not to matter.

“Whatcha doin, fatass?”

Jesus! Rod Steckman was the worst of the bullies, and today of all days he’d decided to cross paths with Bryon.

Rod took any chance to pick on Bryon, any chance at all, whether it was slamming him into a locker—no mean feat considering Bryon’s weight—or spitting in Bryon’s hair. He had a group of cronies—on the football team, no less—and if it got any more cliché than that, Bryon didn’t know what else would qualify.

They’d once surrounded Bryon and made him crawl around while snorting like a piggy. The guys had pelted him with food, books, paper, trash—anything they could get ahold of.

Bryon had lost it and cried until they’d left him alone. One of the guys had been unzipping his pants, threatening to piss on Bryon, but a teacher had intervened and chased the kids off. He hadn’t exactly been nice to Bryon, either; more like a father scolding a child about being nicer to people if Bryon wanted to be treated with respect. The entire experience had left a sour taste in his mouth, and he’d stopped reporting the bullying to the school staff.

What he dreamed about was taking a bat to Rod Steckman and beating the jerk black and blue. He’d read articles on the internet that offered advice on how to deal with bullies. Some of them spoke of standing up to tormenters, because once you took a stand, they backed down.

He didn’t want to just take a stand; he wanted to hurt Steckman and his cronies. The Vulture could handle this guy with one hand tied behind his back.

Bryon launched himself forward, pretending like he hadn’t heard the bully. Rod picked on the guys who didn’t fight back, just like a bully. Bryon had plans for him, someday.

He was going to stand up to him by delivering a line like Batman, something along the lines of: “I’ll break you in half,” even though The Vulture came up with better dialog. He’d be all menace and hate, then he’d throw a pair of haymakers that would put Rod on his ass.

He’d hit the jerk so hard that teeth would fly and Rod would slide across the school hallway—because all of his fantasy fights took place in the school hallways. That way the girls could see what a badass he was.

Today was not his day to have a battle, but he did intend to fight back, one day, after he’d lost some of his girth and learned how to actually throw a punch. Right now Bryon had to get his project to school in one piece.

“I was talking to you, fatass!”

Rod’s voice was closer. Bryon pressed on, swinging his arms faster and faster as he launched into hyper mode. He only had another block to go before he could hop on the Metro bus so he could avoid the public school bus and the ridicule attached to riding the yellow behemoth.

More importantly, he would be at a bus stop where other commuters could be his silent sentinels.

A swish of air, and then Bryon was flung forward. Rod was on a bicycle, and when he was close enough, he grabbed Bryon’s backpack and pulled.

Then Rod was past, with his close-cropped hair gleaming with rain water, his giant American flag sewn onto the back of his old Levi’s jacket, his NRA patch on one shoulder and pot leaf on the other, his legs pumping as he howled laughter. Rod looked back as he pedaled away, and shot a middle finger in Bryon’s direction.

Bryon had gotten his hands out as he’d fallen—that was instinct. He’d had his head up, but impact with the ground had never actually happened.

As he’d been tossed toward the sidewalk, a tremendously painful pinching had occurred where he’d been stung a moment before, and his back had wrenched in agony as a muscle had spasmed, and pain had ripped through his right leg all the way down to his foot. The torment had raced up his side, and it had felt like his heart had been clenched in a tight fist.

But he hadn’t struck the ground. He hadn’t torn the skin off his palms, his jacket hadn’t been soaked by the standing water, and the breath had not been knocked out of his body.

Bryon stared down at the concrete, a few inches from his face. He looked from one hand to the other, where his outstretched fingers hovered nearly half a foot off the ground. Then he looked down, and his mind was truly blown.

Bryon was floating.

I’m an indie author and I work very hard on my books. I love hearing input from readers and the best way to provide that is via a review.

When you leave a review on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Smashwords, or where ever you purchased a book, it helps other readers. This also helps the author out more than you can imagine.

So please, friends, if you can spare a few minutes of your time, go and review THE FRONT: SCREAMING EAGLES on amazon.

Be honest and know that I read every review and use feedback to better my writing as well as have a positive impact on future novels.

Watch for THE FRONT: SCREAMING EAGLES from David Moody in early 2016.

The Front series came to life after a convention, back in May of 2015, when Craig DiLouie and I were enjoying a few libations. We’d been attending Crypticon Seattle and began to discuss the future of the zombie genre. Our talk soon turned to creating something World War II era since we were both interested in that time period as well as the millions of brave men and women who fought and gave their lives in the war.

We approached David Moody and asked him to join our project as the third author. We fully expected him to shoot us down but much to our delight he said yes. THE FRONT will span six books with us alternating authors. David Moody will write the second novel: SCREAMING EAGLES. Craig DiLouie will write the third volume titled BERLIN OR BUST.

The first book was the result of months of studying source material. While I have tried to keep events historically accurate I did have to change a few things to make everything work.

In THE FRONT I’ve written an homage to one of the most decorated platoons of World War 2. On December 16th, 1944, the 18 men of the 99th’s Intelligence and Recognizance Infantry Division, faced a force of over 500 German paratroopers. They managed to hold a hill that overlooked the village of Lanzareth (not Longvilly as I wrote in the book) for 10 hours.

They were commanded by a 20-year-old Lieutenant named Lyle Bouck. The amazing part was that the entire group of men were green and yet they delayed the German advance by up to 20 hours despite begging for artillery support and being told they were “seeing things”.

The 99th had no artillery support with the exception of a 60mm mortar despite repeated calls for help. At full strength the company numbered 22 men with the mortar (a late arrival on the morning of the attack). They suffered only minimal losses. One of the mortar team members was struck and died. They had almost no medical supplies and no morphine.

During the battle, one of the men, Private Louis Kalil, was hit in the face by a rifle grenade. Luckily it didn’t detonate. Kalil later said that he could feel his teeth embedded in the roof of his mouth and tongue. His face was fractured in 3 places.

He fought on throughout the rest of the day.

The idea that a force of over 200,000 German troops were staging an offensive through the Ardennes forest was too lubricious for the allied command to believe and they were slow to respond. Making matters worse, Hitler picked a time when there was bad weather and there was massive fog. This grounded the superior Allied air cover and left a corridor for the Germans to attack through. As they advanced, the Allied lines “bulged” outward as they tried to keep from getting flanked.