The lab doors banged open. Someone shouted.
Marisol screamed as the zombie bit into her.
Section III
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Chapter 1
Edwin Corish and Nick Travers stepped out of the elevator and stopped short. Crimson splashes covered the walls of the morgue hallway, the fresh blood still dripping down and forming puddles on the floor. Broken glass and pieces of lab equipment lay scattered down the hall. Red handprints and footprints covered the floor and walls.
“What the fuck happened here?” Travers asked.
Before the Medical Examiner could answer, a woman screamed from inside one of the lab rooms.
“Stay behind me,” Travers said to the ME. He drew his gun and moved down the hall, keeping as close to one side as he could without actually touching the blood-spattered wall. He paused briefly by each door to peer through the windows before moving on to the next room. With each step, the pounding of his heart grew louder and the twisted feeling in his stomach grew stronger. The palms of his hands started sweating and he had to tighten his grip on his gun.
When he reached the door marked DNA LAB, he motioned for Corish to stop. “There’s people inside,” he whispered. With one foot, he pushed the door open. He entered the room as fast as he could, stepping to one side they way he’d been taught at the academy.
He’d expected the people to turn towards him, perhaps even aim a weapon at him. He’d expected to confront teenagers, high on drugs maybe and looking to steal more, or an employee who’d gone postal.
He hadn’t expected four men covered in blood, so focused on their victim that they ignored him.
“Stop! Get away from the girl!” Travers shouted, pointing his gun in the general direction of the men surrounding the pretty lab tech. Marisol Flores, he remembered. He took aim at one who looked ready to take a bite out of her stomach.
The man - who wore a white lab coat just like the Flores woman - ignored the warning and bit down, his teeth puncturing the flesh of the girl’s stomach. She screamed again. Blood flowed from the wound, dark red against her tan skin.
Travers pulled the trigger. The .9mm roared, the sound louder in the confined space than at the practice range, which was the only place he’d ever had to fire it before. The girl’s attacker fell sideways, blood and tissue exploding from his side as the heavy slug tore through his body.
The other three men finally turned, giving Travers his first real look at them. Their Halloween masks caught him by surprise. Then he felt a chill as he realized they weren’t wearing masks.
He was looking at their real faces.
“What the hell...?” he said, unaware he’d spoken out loud.
Behind him, Edwin Corish shouted, “Shoot! For Chrissake, shoot them!”
Travers’s finger twitched and the sounds of Marisol’s next screams disappeared in the multiple blasts. One man - monster! Travers’ mind cried - crumpled to the ground, the back of his head disappearing in a wet red spray. The next round went wide and shattered the glass door of a cabinet but the following two found their targets, catching one man in the stomach and the other in the chest. Both men fell to their knees and then tumbled over.
Travers hurried to the lab tech, who was crying and clutching at her mid-section. “Are you all right?”
Before she could answer, Corish shouted again. “Look out!”
Travers glanced up and saw the two men he’d just shot running towards him. He dove to the side, his shoulder striking painfully against one of the lab benches. His arm went numb and he dropped his gun.
No!
He scrabbled his fingers against the tiled floor, trying to locate his weapon before the things got to him. But instead of attacking him they ran past, heading towards the door. His hand closed on the hot barrel of the gun just as the man who’d bitten the lab tech stood up, a gaping hole in his side revealing broken ribs and bloody organs. Travers reversed his grip on the gun and fired upwards but the bullet missed the mortally-wounded man, who leaped over the girl’s body and followed his grotesque companions out the door.
Travers leaned back against a bench and did something he hadn’t done since the time he’d almost drowned in the Hudson River when he was eleven.
He thanked God for sparing his life.
None of them saw the black, smoky figure rise up from the dead man’s body and disappear through the ceiling.
* * *
The next few minutes were the strangest of Marisol’s life. Faces loomed over hers, shouting her name. She thought one of them was Edwin Corish. Then the lab room faded away, replaced by a scene just as familiar but much more frightening.
Gates of Heaven Cemetery.
It was two weeks after the first murder in town and there’d been three more since, along with several disappearances. Herman Davis, the Chief of Police before Nick Travers, had already implemented a mandatory curfew for anyone under the age of eighteen.
But of course the Cemetery Club hadn’t obeyed curfew any more than they did their own parents’ rules.
It’d been Cory’s idea to take their usual Friday night party out of the crypt.
“It’s a beautiful night,” he’d said, and he’d been right. Not too hot, not chilly. Very little humidity, which was always a relief in the middle of a New York State summer because it meant there wouldn’t be too many mosquitoes.
Cory’s idea, yes, but none of them had put up any argument.
They’d spread a blanket out on a small area of flat, grave-less grass not far down the hill from the crypt. Passing a joint around and sharing the two bottles of beer John had stolen from his refrigerator, they talked about the same things teenagers around the world were probably talking about at the same time: music, the teachers they hated, how much their parents bothered them. At some point Todd finished one of the beers and tossed the bottle into the center of their circle. It spun twice and came to rest pointing at John.
“Good thing we’re not playing spin the bottle,” Marisol had said. “You’d have to kiss each other.”
“Maybe we should play,” Cory said, giving the bottle a tap with his finger. It moved ninety degrees and stopped, the open end pointing right at Marisol.
“You did that on purpose,” she said. Todd and John laughed and made kissing noises at her.
“Pay up.” Cory leaned forward and Marisol found herself leaning towards him as well. It was the opportunity she’d been waiting for and she wasn’t about to let the presence of John and Todd keep her from her goal of making out with Cory. They could watch or leave; at that point, she didn’t care.
Her lips were so close to his she could smell the beer and pot on his breath, when something stumbled out of the bushes not ten feet away.
“Hey!” John stood up and all three of them joined him. Marisol was prepared to run, in case it was a night watchman or a cop.
Instead, it was something that looked like it had just dug itself free from one of the fresher graves. Moonlight illuminated dead flesh, turning it bone-white. The thing’s clothes were torn and filthy, a rank foulness rolled off it in nauseating waves.
“Oh shit. Run!” Cory grabbed Marisol’s arm and jerked her around, putting action to words. John, the fastest of them all, quickly disappeared ahead, while Todd brought up the rear.
They ran down the hill to the main drive, climbed the rusty iron gate and dropped down onto the sidewalk.
Right next to a police car parked by the curb.
“Hey you! Stop!” A spotlight came on, pinning them to the wrought iron. Marisol and the others froze as the two police officers got out of the car, hands hovering over their guns.
“Help! There’s a monster chasing us!” There was no hesitation on Marisol’s part, no moment where she considered what she was saying. The words just came out. Next to her, Cory muttered, ‘Oh shit.’
“What are you kids doing in the cemetery?” one of the cops asked. With the car’s spotlight behind him it was impossible to make out his face.
>
“She told you, someone’s chasing us,” Cory said, giving Marisol’s arm a squeeze. She understood his silent command to keep quiet but all she wanted to do was dive into the safety of the policeman’s arms and get driven away. Even if away meant a trip to the station and a call to her parents.
Anything that got them the hell away from the thing in the cemetery.
“She said a monster. I think you kids are high.” The cop shined his flashlight casually across the gate. At the same time, the second cop leaned back into the car and started talking on the radio. John glanced over his shoulder at the cemetery and his whole body went tense.
She didn’t know if he saw something or was just scared, but Marisol was getting ready to say the hell with the cops and start running. Let them chase her. Better them than it.
Then the second cop, a stocky man with a mustache, came back. “Chief says to bring all four of them to the station.”
As Marisol climbed into the back seat she took a last look at the cemetery.
I’m never going back in there again.
But of course, she did. They all did.
* * *
Marisol was trying not to watch Doctor Corish put in the last of her stitches when Cory burst into the ME’s office. She’d called him as soon as the ME and Chief Travers had helped her to Corish’s office and started cleaning her wounds.
“Are you all right?” he asked, pushing past Chief Travers and kneeling next to her.
“Oh God, I’m so glad to see you!” She gave him a hug with one arm. “And yes, I’m fine.”
“You won’t be if you keep moving,” Corish said, a mock angry look on his face. “Just stay still until I’m done, will you?”
“What the hell happened?” Cory asked.
Marisol opened her mouth to answer but it was Travers who spoke first. “Addicts.”
“What?” Cory looked confused.
“A bunch of them, probably hopped up on meth or coke or some shit. We think maybe one of the techs here was supplying them. They got wasted and attacked your girlfriend.”
“You were attacked?”
“I—”
“She got bit by one of them,” Ed Corish said as he used a cotton ball to apply Betadine to Marisol’s stitches.
“Bit?” Cory looked from Marisol to the ME and back again. “By who?”
“One of the druggies,” Travers said.
Marisol shook her head. “Jake Spencer didn’t do drugs.” She was getting tired of repeating it. No matter how many times she told her story, the police chief seemed convinced he had the whole thing figured out.
Travers glared at her. He’d been doing that since the first time she uttered the word zombie. “They sure looked like addicts to me. Eyes all weird and shit. They didn’t even care when I started shooting.”
“Will somebody please tell me what the fuck is going on?” Cory stood up, one hand resting protectively on Marisol’s shoulder. She could feel the heat from his palm through the cotton scrub shirt she’d put on to replace her ruined top.
Corish stripped off his latex gloves and threw them on the desk. “For God’s sake Nick, it wasn’t drugs. You shot Jake Spencer in the chest and he got up and ran away.”
“Meth or crack’ll do that to you. Body runs on pure adrenaline.” Travers crossed his arms, daring anyone in the room to contradict him.
Marisol looked up at Cory and found him staring at her. She knew what he was thinking. She gave him a quick nod and he returned it.
“We’ll know if it was drugs soon enough,” Marisol said to the Chief. “I’m going to run samples from the dead man and Jake. If there were any drugs in their systems, they’ll show up.”
“No, you’re going home and going to bed,” Corish said. “You’ve been through enough tonight, on top of all the extra hours you’ve been putting in lately. You need rest.”
“As soon as I run the samples.” Now it was her turn to be stubborn. Her boss stared at her but in the end he backed down, as she’d known he would.
Corish turned to Cory. “You’ve got yourself quite a little bulldog.”
Cory smiled. “I wouldn’t have her any other way.” He turned his gaze down toward her. “How’s this sound? Marisol runs the tests and then I’ll make sure she goes home and stays in bed for the rest of the day.”
“Two days. With pay,” Corish added, holding up two fingers.
“Fine. Two days.” Marisol fought to keep from smiling. Two days off, with Cory and with pay? It was almost like a vacation.
Of course, we’ll probably spend the whole time chasing zombies or aliens or whatever the fuck kind of monsters are living under the cemetery again.
Marisol stood up and started for the door, Cory still right next to her.
“Wait a minute.” Travers moved to block their exit.
“What now?” Marisol asked.
“I’m gonna need you to come down to my office at some point, so you can fill out an official report of what happened here.”
“It wasn’t drug addicts.”
Travers rolled his eyes. “Whatever you say. But let’s wait for the results of your tests. Then you can give whatever whacked out statement you want.”
“I’ll be there tomorrow.” She took Cory’s hand. “Let’s go.”
Travers followed them out into the hallway where four uniformed officers stood next to yellow crime scene tape. Bright flashes from the DNA lab indicated other investigators were still busy taking their pictures and measurements.
“You’ll have to wait outside until they’re done,” Travers told them. “Be at least an hour or two.”
“We’ll grab a coffee across the street,” Cory said. “You want us to bring you back one?”
Travers stared at the bloody walls, where an officer was taking samples. “Make it two. Black.” He sighed. “It’s gonna be a long day.”
* * *
Jack Smith was parking his car in front of the city building when he saw Marisol and Cory coming down the front steps of the new wing, hand in hand. Four o’clock in the morning? What the hell are they doing here?
He ducked low, hoping they wouldn’t notice him amid the red and blue lights spraying the walls of the buildings on Main Street. He’d received the emergency call less than half an hour ago. A break-in at the morgue, with several deaths. He’d immediately hopped out of bed and had gotten dressed, his brain already in damage-control mode. The idea that Marisol might have been a victim had never even crossed his mind.
Guess I really am over the bitch. Then the picture of his ex-wife parading around town with her high school sweetheart appeared in his head again, and his anger blossomed anew. Maybe she was thinking about him while we were married. How else could she put being his wife behind her so quickly?
That galled him the most, that it was apparently so easy for her to forget him and move on with her life. It was different for him; he hadn’t really lost anything. He still had his money, his job, his connections. By contrast, Marisol had lost everything. He’d taken her from rags to riches, taught her etiquette and how to enjoy the good things in life. When you thought about it, he’d literally handed her the keys to not only the city but to a whole different world.
And it still hadn’t been enough.
No, she’d wanted love and respect on top of everything else. She hadn’t gotten it - just because he’d married her didn’t mean she was his equal after all. So many girls would have been happy to settle for what she had. Why couldn’t she?
In retrospect, his parents had been right. She hadn’t been worth the effort, hadn’t been smart enough to realize how lucky she’d been.
And now she flaunts her new man, as if she’d never been happier.
It just wasn’t right. It made him - Jack Smith the Deputy Mayor - look bad, because if people saw that Marisol was happier without him, they’d start to think that maybe some of the things she’d said were true, that Jack Smith might not be the nice guy everyone thought he was. He’d gone to great le
ngths to cultivate his public image and he’d be damned if some two-bit spic from the Lowlands was going to tarnish it.
No, in order to keep things right, it was necessary that Marisol’s public face be a sad one. Or at least untrustworthy.
Which meant it was time to put the heat on Mister Cory Miles and his friends.
His lips pursed in grim concentration, Jack pulled out his Blackberry and dialed his assistant.
Chapter 2
Cory closed his cell phone and turned to Todd Randolph. “Marisol’s still in the lab. She said that when she finishes her work, she’ll call me so I can drive her home.” He looked at his watch. “It’s only nine; the library doesn’t open for another hour. What do you want to do until then?”
Todd wiped his mouth. They’d just finished a quick breakfast of coffee and donuts Cory had picked up from the bakery and taken back to Todd’s house. John was already in Todd’s study Googling reported cases of alien abduction and possession in the New York Tri-State Area.
“I’d like to go to the police station and talk with Chief Travers. I think it’s time we came clean about what happened in high school. Maybe something we know will help him with his investigation.”
“You think Travers will talk to us?” Cory rolled his eyes. “The man’s as stubborn as a two-year-old. He wouldn’t believe something supernatural was going on if a zombie came up and bit him on the ass. Which almost happened last night, from what Marisol told me.”
Todd shrugged and downed the rest of his coffee before answering. “We owe him the opportunity to listen. If there’s the slightest chance something we know prevents someone else from being killed...” His words tailed off and he stared at Cory, an earnest expression on his face.
“What the hell. We’ll go see him. Marisol’s lab is right next door anyhow.”
“I’ll tell John,” Todd said. Before he could leave the kitchen, Abigail Clinton came downstairs.
“Mister Todd? You get those medicines for your mother?”
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