Razor Burn

by O. J. Anderson

Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
appear in this issue.

Chapter 3

Now showered and dressed in standard ass-kicking uniform — tight black T-shirt, jeans, black boots — Razor walks out to the truck with a nutrient rich breakfast in hand: a cool fruit smoothie and a bag of homemade bran muffins.

In place of the manufacturer’s emblem on the truck’s grill is a large chrome fist. The engine — a custom-built 500-cubic inch Annihilator class — turns over. Razor pumps the gas pedal, giving it a minute to warm up. The truck yaws and shudders under the extreme torque waiting to be loosed.

He pops the lid on the Tupperware container and takes a drink of his strawberry/mango smoothie; it’s cool, sweet, refreshing. Next, he digs into one of his gargantuan banana nut bran muffins. Nice little meal.

Puts it into gear.

Takes off like an earthquake ripping through the city.

* * *

Garden City is a dump; an ultra-dystopic slum littered with all manner of hyper-violent street punks and corrupt upper-echelon executives. It’s an open, festering, puss-filled and stinking gash of a city seething with greasy-eyed pimps, maggot pushers, corner store jerkwads, pipe and chain thugs, knuckle-dragging derelicts of all kinds, free-range junkies, gerbil-faced petty thieves, silk-suited embezzlers, you name it.

If they’re up to no good, they’re here; if they’re here, they’re up to no good. The place is so bad that Razor would be perfectly justified in pulling over at any given point between here and there and issuing up an indiscriminate, mid-morning ass-kicking to the nearest scab-faced, cracked-lip maggot freak doubled over on any one of a thousand street corners.

* * *

The truck comes to an abrupt halt across the street from the scene.

Several people hurry to get out of his way as Razor walks over to Chief Conrad, standing at the delta of the alley behind the old Crossman’s printing building. The medical examiner, squatting near the body, takes pictures, contorts his face, and talks silently to himself.

A slight, bird-like young man circles the body holding a video camera. The camera is attached to a small backpack by a cable. A short whip antenna extends out the top of the backpack. His video is being transmitted in real time to various interested agencies. The young man nearly walks into Razor.

The Chief says, “I hope you haven’t eaten.”

Razor kneels next to the body. “Let’s start at the top. Why is his head the size of a basketball?”

The Chief shrugs.

“Toxic encephalitis. Swelling of the brain.” Larry Lopes, the medical examiner, steps over the body and snaps more pictures. “You’ll notice that there doesn’t seem to be any external trauma to the head and neck area. He probably wasn’t beaten with anything.” Larry stands straight and lets out a sigh. “I’ve never seen it to this extent before.”

“Probably a bad reaction to a nasty batch of rice,” the Chief says.

“Most likely,” Larry agrees.

“Okay,” Razor says, “so why did he claw off all the skin from his neck and shoulder area?”

Larry lets the camera rest from the strap around his neck. He crouches for a better look at something on the victim’s leg. “I imagine he thought his skin was on fire or something to that effect.”

“Delusional,” the Chief says. “You can imagine all sorts of things with a head that big. Remember that kid who tried to brush his teeth with the hedge trimmers?”

Razor looks at the dead man’s hands. The long, dirty nails are caked with dried blood and bits of flesh. The hands and forearms are crimson brown with blood up to the elbows.

“Here’s the truly interesting part,” Larry says. He takes a pen from his shirt pocket and pokes the dead man’s chest area. “See that?” He continues prodding and pushing at the rib cage. The victim’s body is flaccid and gives easily. Collapsed. Larry continues: “The rib cage has been destroyed. It’s as though he’s been crushed by something.”

“Like what?”

“Well, nothing. Nothing that I can see.”

“Maybe he fell from the roof?”

“If he had, it would look like he had.”

Chief Conrad adds, “The blood and vomit trail leads back into the alley.”

The medical examiner looks the body up and down again. “Other than his self-inflicted wounds, there doesn’t seem to be any forced contusions or lacerations. Nothing telling me foul play at this point, but I’ll know more when I get him back to the shop.”

Chief Conrad’s cell phone beeps. He steps away from the scene to take it.

Larry says, “I’ve seen plenty of rice meltdowns. Death by power tools aplenty, more small appliance-related dismemberments than I care to recall, buses, you name it. Not real hard cases to crack. But this...”

“Mm,” Razor says, looking at the body. Like most full-time maggot freaks, this guy’s filthy. Only wearing one shoe. Jeans all tore up; holes revealing scuffed up knees and shins. Weighs about ninety pounds. And a thousand more like him just a few hits away from taking his place.

The Chief returns. “WBI’s on it’s way. They want a look at the body ASAP.”

“WBI?” Razor stands. “That was fast. What do they think this is?”

“That’s what you’re going to find out.”

To be continued...