I spun around and shot it. Twice in the head, twice in the chest. Liquids and organs splattered. The zombie tumbled down but it was still moving towards me. It was missing part of its skull and most of its brains at this point. Shooting it was only going to slow it down. Where the hell was Simon?
"Incoming!" Simon's voice came out. I looked up to see a ball of flames flying through the air. It hit the zombie and exploded into a mass of fire. I shuffled back a few feet, my heart pounding, my rib aching, and panic rising because the zombie was still moving. A regular flame wasn't hot enough to burn a skeleton, but if there were no flesh or muscles to keep it together I hoped it would stop.
The acrid smell of a burning body filled the air, but it still moved towards me, just slower now. Simon jogged to my side and we watched it crawl over the street. A flaming zombie. We could hear the screams and the sirens. I needed it to stop moving before the authorities got here, I didn't want more people in danger from it and there was no telling how long it would take or if the rest of it would burn.
I licked my lips and focused all my panic and adrenaline on the flames. Another explosion crashed over it, creating more heat. Gobs of skin melted against the skeleton as the flames charred it. The zombie contorted in its spot on the ground. Blaring sirens came from behind me. The deafening silence was startling as they stopped and firemen flooded out of the trucks.
"Don't put it out." I called. "It's a zombie, that'd be a bad idea."
They looked confused and I prayed they listened to me.
"Listen to her, boys, she knows what she's talking about." Detective Mason stepped out of a cruiser that had just pulled up.
Thank the Goddess he was the one to show up. "Hey, Mason."
"Can't keep out of trouble for one night, Abby?" He motioned to the now twitching mass of flames. "Kidnapped, hospital, now a zombie."
I smiled. "Yeah, that sounds like my week. Sorry for the mess. Someone sent him for me as a present. We're going to need a team down here to pull blood samples off my front step."
He raised a brow.
"I shot him, four times. Bastard didn't want to slow down and I can hardly run with a broken rib."
Mason actually laughed. "I'll get my team down here. But really, a zombie? We haven't seen those in years."
"And we both thought Nick was nuts. Yes, zombies." And I wanted to know how the person knew my address to send their zombie after me. There was no way that it was a mistake; they don't just wander around, they have to be controlled.
He grunted and then pulled out his radio. He barked orders for a forensic team to come down.
Simon nudged me. "Not a dull moment with you. I never would have guessed we'd find a zombie in your house."
"Will you go check on my cat?" I asked, my gaze still on the now dying pile of flames.
He smiled. "Your cat? Are you keeping him?"
"If the meeting tomorrow doesn't work out, yes." I motioned. "Go, go."
Simon shook his head and jogged back to the house. Once he was out of earshot I turned to Mason. "The zombie was after me and I'm not sure who sent it or why."
"Maybe you're close on the case." He shrugged. "Or you asked questions of the wrong person."
I nodded. "Yeah. Story of my life." I rubbed my eyes. "Did I miss much while I was in the hospital?"
"Other than the fact that I called every hospital in town and none of them said you'd been admitted. Got an explanation to that?" He shook his head. "Abby, you worried all of us, you were in a car that wrapped around a tree. You're walking, talking and other than your face you look fine."
"Does it look that bad?" I asked and added a dramatic sigh.
"Let's just say you aren't going to win any beauty contests. Seriously though, what happened?"
I thought about telling him the truth, but then he'd want to contact Oliver and put him on an EMT team or a trauma team. He'd know if I lied, especially since he had called all the hospitals. "I was lucky to have a friend there. They wish to remain anonymous, but they were able to heal most of the damage."
"Why not all of it?"
"To keep people from asking questions. Less attention on them. So as far as anyone knows, it was nothing short of a miracle."
He laughed. "It was a miracle, you were lucky they were there."
"You have no idea. Once he finishes burning," I pointed to the corpse. "There won't be anything left to identify him."
"You okay?"
I nodded. "Yep, just another typical night. I'm going to ask Simon to watch the house while I buy a new door."
"Abby, if this is starting to turn into your typical night you might need a career change."
I laughed. "Mason, you know as well as I do that the only way I'm going to retire will be if I die." This wasn't the type of job you just up and left. Since the government created the division for PIB, not many people in PIB lived to see forty. I was twenty-four and I was hoping I'd make it to forty. Maybe further. Those who did live past forty were put into office jobs. I knew of one or two who had ended up in a mental facility.
"Ye of little faith, go get your house taken care of. I have this." He shoved his hands in his pockets. "Zombies, damn him for being right."
"We don't know if this is connected to the murders."
He gave me wide eyes and looked back to the now smoldering pile of ash. "I never thought I'd say this, but I hope it is."
So did I. If not, then I had an assassination attempt via car bomb and zombie to now worry about. It made me wonder who the hell I had pissed off. I walked back to my house to see Simon standing there holding the cat.
"Have a nice chat with Detective Mason?" He asked and walked further in with me. "The superstore doesn't sell doors. I already checked."
Sometimes I wondered how he knew me so well. Of course, calling about a new door would be the first thing most people think of. "Okay. I'll just sleep with a gun tonight, maybe block the door off."
"Block off your only escape route?" He shook his head. "Why don't I crash on the couch?"
I hadn't thought of that. "I can go through the window."
He gave me a droll stare.
"Okay, fine, crash on the couch. I'm going to take some painkillers and go to bed. Wake me up if someone tries to get into the house."
Osiris jumped out of Simon's arms and followed me to the bedroom. My phone rang and I snarled.
Pulling it out I saw it was Nick. "What?"
"Crabby after you escaped death? I figured you'd be in a good mood."
I really wanted to punch him at that moment. "I'm in a bit of pain. What do you need?"
"I have bodies, Detective Mason isn't answering his phone."
That's because he was here dealing with a zombie. "Where are you?"
"Cheyenne hospital, it's not pretty and you'll never guess what's still here."
I had a feeling I knew. "Walking corpses?" Cheyenne was a private hospital; only those with the best insurance went there. I found it odd there was a zombie attack there and at my house the same night.
"How did you know? We've got them isolated, I'm waiting for the containment team to get here and dispose of the corpses."
"I've got one here, Simon and I set it on fire, it just finished burning." I rubbed my eyes. "I'll be there in a few minutes. I need to beg a ride off Simon. I planned on picking up the Hummer tomorrow."
"Do you have to bring him?"
"It's not like I can just take his car, Nick, so it's either you leave the scene or Simon brings me. He knows how to behave on a crime scene." I walked back out of my room and Simon was already standing by the door. I cursed his werewolf hearing.
"Fine. Just make sure he behaves himself." Nick hung up on me. One day I was going to get what was behind his hatred of vampires and werewolves, but tonight was not the night to play Dr. Phil.
"Where are we going?" Simon picked up my bag and handed to me.
"Cheyenne hospital. There's a few zombies there and Nick has non-animated corpses.” I pulled my ba
g over my shoulder.
"Oh, shiny." He looked at the door. "What are you going to do about your house?"
I hadn't even thought about it. I looked out at all the officers that were still wandering the streets. "Hope that it doesn't get vandalized, I guess."
"Why don't I drop you off and come back? I'll head to the home improvement store first thing in the morning to get you a door."
I debated for a moment. I wanted him with me, but on the other hand he didn't belong at a crime scene. "Okay."
Simon dropped me off and I made my way through the thick crowd and the flashing lights of press cameras. The police tape surrounded the concrete building that had windows leading up at least ten stories. I made it to the barrier and an officer raised it up for me when I showed him my badge. Nick was standing there talking to a detective.
"Ah, Abigail." He held his hand out to me. "Glad to see you could make it. Nick here was telling me that you might have a theory on these zombies."
Nick should have kept his mouth shut. "Detective Balin, it's been awhile." Mostly because he hated calling PIB. "I know that there was a zombie raised at Evergreen Cemetery, I'm just waiting on blood results to see if the splatter I found was from the zombie or the necromancer."
"There hasn't been a necromancer in our area for years, are you sure that's what is going on?" Balin shook his head. "It's hard to imagine someone with that much power getting into the city without either Levi or Greg knowing what was going on."
I found it weird too, which made me wonder if they had been invited or if they had lived here long enough to come in under the radar. "Do you know anything else that can raise a zombie, detective?"
"No."
"Then it's a necromancer." Nick finished that thought. "Let's go take a look at our victims and then look at our zombies." He ushered me into the hospital before either one of us could get upset with Balin.
"Detective Mason couldn't take the case." Nick said as if reading my mind.
"We could have waited for him to finish up at the other scene." I countered and followed him through the pale cream-colored halls of the hospital. It was strange to see a hospital with colors; most of the ones I had seen were all white.
"Balin just showed up." He said. "I would have rather waited."
"Even though Mason doesn't like you?" I kept my voice light.
"Yes, even if Mason doesn't like me." Nick shook his head. "This town doesn't like new-comers, I've been here for six months and he still hasn't warmed up to me."
I shrugged. "Well, it was your brother who caused all the problems when you showed up."
"Which I had nothing to do with; I didn't even know he was in town." He snorted. "You know that."
I did, but Mason was skeptical. I knew that Nick studied the Cult of Ra and I figured he knew his brother had gone rogue. "Yep, but Mason is harder to convince."
"Okay, we have three victims, all torn to shreds here." He waved to the officers at the door and opened it. "Be my guest."
I walked in and glanced around the room. The smell of blood hit my nostrils and bile burned my throat. Three bodies lay scattered around the room, their heads on the opposite side of the room. The skin of the bodies hung from the muscles in shreds. What was going on here? "Do we know who they are?"
"Reporters, they were here asking if someone was a patient."
I looked over when I heard the tone of voice he used. I couldn't figure out what he was getting at. "Why were they in the office? HIPPA laws protect the patients."
"That's what they were being told. They'd gotten an anonymous tip that you were here." He sighed. "So it looks like you might be another target."
Again. "That might be a good thing."
"How is this good? Zombies are after you. Vampires kidnapped you. I think this is a bad week for you." Nick moved further into the room. "We moved the camera equipment and I'll have forensics go through the film."
There wasn't anything the room could tell me that I didn't already know. "It's good because it means that we're on the right trail." It also meant I had met the person that was doing this, in theory. My address wasn't public record and they had sent a zombie there.
The Criagslist people. I put a hand to my head. I'd only met two out of three, but all three had my address. It only caused my list of suspects to grow. I thought about the car bomb and wondered who had set that up and if it was even connected to everything else. I wasn’t convinced that the zombies were after me; everything that pointed to the conclusion was simply coincidence.
"Nick, see if there's any other high profile people here."
"What are you thinking?" He stuck his hand in his pocket.
I pressed my lips together. "I'm thinking there has to be a connection to people here that we haven't found yet. And if we can figure out who the zombies were sent after here maybe we can find that connection."
"We’re just looking for someone that's high profile?" He turned to leave the room.
"Start showing pictures of our victims to people who were just recently admitted. If they are super high profile, start with them first." I pulled my bag around to my front and pulled out a set of rubber gloves. I'm not sure what I'd find that Nick hadn't already, but I needed to search through the bodies.
Nick walked out without another word. I'd deal with his attitude later. I found it hard to believe that someone would send a total of four zombies out looking for me. One to scare me I could understand, but a mini-horde and in two different locations? I thought the murderer was looking for something. And not a witch named Abby. I squatted down by the first body. It was chest down, an arm stretched out like he was trying to get to the door. His head was only a few feet from him. I knew his face, but not his name. He was a local news anchor, normally stuck with smaller stories. He must have thought coming here was going to give him his big break.
I flipped his body over so that I could see the shredded mess.
"You know, I prefer my bodies to stay where they are until I can see them." Jason's voice made me look up.
I smiled at him. "I didn't know that they were going to send you on scene."
"Me either, but they wanted me here ASAP. Now I see why." He looked a little pale as his eyes darted around the room. "What on earth did this?"
"You don't really want to know the answer to that." I stood. "Three victims, all decapitated, all of them have their chests torn out." Unlike the movies, zombies didn't go after brains, they went after whatever they could get their hands on. They were at the mercy of whoever was controlling them.
"I've got this handled if you want to go meet up with Nick." Jason put his bag down. "I promise you'll be the first to know if something comes up."
I knew I would be and I wanted a chance to get a look at those zombies before the necromancer caught on and pulled the magic from them. "Thanks. I'll check back in a bit."
"Of course, how are you feeling? After your accident?" There was a real concern in his voice that warmed me a little bit.
"My rib is killing me, but I'm happy to be alive." I stripped off my gloves then threw them in a biohazard bag by the door.
He gave me a smile and then turned to work. I walked out into the hall and leaned against the wall. I wasn't kidding, my side pounded in pain and I put a hand against it. I closed my eyes and counted to ten, taking small breaths to help soothe the pain, but not so deep that I caused more.
"Agent Collins, can I speak with you?"
I turned to see Agent Grace standing at the end of the hall. My mind raced as to why she'd be at my crime scene, but I nodded. "Of course."
I walked to her and she motioned to an empty waiting room.
"Please sit, I see you're in a lot of pain." For the first time since I've met her, I saw her careful face show a hint of concern.
"Just a cracked rib, but thank you." I sat down and looked at her. "What can I do for you?" I kept my voice friendly; there was no reason to get defensive.
"Have you heard from Agent Tomes?"
&n
bsp; I shook my head. "I was just released from the hospital earlier today, so I haven't seen him since the day of the accident."
"He told me he visited you earlier today, here." She pointed to the ground as if to make me realize she was talking about the hospital.
Visiting me was impossible. Oliver had told me he made sure everything was taken care of. Clearly he'd mentioned to someone I was in a private hospital. "I'm sorry, I don't know what to tell you. I haven't had any visitors today. It was meant to stay that way. I'm a very private person."
"Have you met with Agent Tomes without me at all?" She met my gaze and I knew something else was going on.
"The day my car blew up he was with me. He disappeared before anyone else came out. I figured it was because he didn't want to explain what you two were doing in town. What is going on?"
She leaned back in her chair. "I can't let you know yet, Agent Collins, but as soon as I can share information I will."
I didn't like it when people kept secrets from me. I opened my mouth to say as such and she held up a hand. "It's not my choice, it comes from higher up. If it was my choice I'd have trusted you with information long ago."
That was reassuring. I nodded. "If there's anything I can do to help with the vampire case, please, let me know."
"Of course, but I have instructions to keep you away from that too." She offered me a smile. "I know you don't like secrets and I know you don't trust easily, but just trust me on this."
I needed to focus on the case at hand. "I'll do my best. Now if you could excuse me, I have zombies to take a look at and victims to make connections between."
"Of course, thank you for your time."
I stood slowly and walked out the door. The encounter was strange and I wanted to know why her partner would lie to her about visiting me in a hospital that I was never a patient at. I pushed it out of my mind and went to find Nick.
Nick was standing behind the building with two officers looking into the chain-link cage that had been erected. I tried to imagine how they had herded the zombies through the hospital and back here. It had to be quite the sight. I walked up behind them. "The zombies still, um...moving?" Living wasn't the right word, but I couldn't think of the correct one off the top of my head.
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