Kill Yuan is finished. Editing is done, the final file has been uploaded to KDP, and we’ve just got a couple more formatting things to take care of (including the final cover file) and the paperback should be ready to go.
I actually hate editing, even though that’s where a lot of the work happens. By the time I’ve finished going through the work three times, beginning to end, back to back, I’m not only getting sick of it, but I’m pretty well convinced that I’m a talentless hack who has no business selling his awkward mangling of the English language to anybody. But enough of y’all apparently still enjoy my hackery enough to pay me for it, so I will continue.
Anyway, here’s another snippet, since I did say there would be a few more forthcoming:
The sentry was starting to struggle. Using the hand he had clamped on the man’s face, he tried to knock his head against a rock, but the sentry resisted, and he managed not much more than a tap. Desperate, he dropped to the ground beside the target, wrapping one leg around him and wrapping his knife arm around the man’s free arm. Of course, now he had the sentry somewhat restrained, but couldn’t stab him.
The sentry was thrashing now, the desperation of his position getting through the drug-induced fog in his brain, clawing at the arm Dan had clamped around his chest. Dan held on tightly, keeping his off hand clamped over the man’s face, while he tried to figure out what to do next.
He suddenly rolled on top of the sentry, letting go of the man’s jaw just in time to keep from pinning his hand between the sentry’s head and the tree root beneath them. He clamped that hand on the back of the man’s neck, but now his knife hand was pinned beneath the sentry’s body.
Taking a chance, he let go of the knife and yanked his arm free, putting his weight on the other hand, pressing the man’s face into the mold and loam under the tree while he sank a knee into his back. Hastily switching hands, even as the sentry got a hand free and tried to reach back to claw at him, he snatched up the knife and plunged it into the side of the man’s neck. He didn’t want to slit his throat; he’d start aspirating air and blood through the wound and making a lot of noise. He just wanted to cut the blood vessels.
Hot blood pulsed out over the blade and onto his hand. His victim bucked and thrashed under him, and he shifted to pin the man’s hands down with his knees, even while the sentry’s feet scrabbled uselessly at the jungle floor, his soft shoes unable to get a purchase. He had to be running out of air, too, with his face mashed into the ground. Dan held on, keeping the man still while his lifeblood poured out over both of them. He’d hit the artery; it wouldn’t take long.