Undead Much

by Stacey Jay

  The girl’s na­me was Bob­bie Jane. I’d se­en her two or three ti­mes du­ring the fall En­for­cer tra­ining, tho­ugh I hadn’t re­ali­zed she wor­ked at Piz­za Pie un­til now. Her mom and dad wor­ked full-ti­me, and she usu­al­ly had to watch her lit­tle sis­ters, so she didn’t ma­ke it to every tra­ining ses­si­on, but Set­tlers’ Af­fa­irs didn’t stress abo­ut her be­ing the­re. She wasn’t a very po­wer­ful Set­tler to be­gin with and wo­uldn’t be go­ing in­to En­for­ce­ment, but she wasn’t a to­tal slo­uch eit­her. She sho­uld ha­ve be­en ab­le to hand­le a co­up­le of zom­bi­es wit­ho­ut too much tro­ub­le. The two OOGPs-Out-of-Gra­ve Phe­no­me­na-must be bad news if she ne­eded help.

  Mo­ni­ca and I ran for the kitc­hen. Even be­fo­re we burst thro­ugh the do­or, I had a hor­rib­le fe­eling I knew what we’d find.

  “Shit,” I sa­id, even tho­ugh I’d be­en trying my best not to cur­se as part of my lengthy list of New Ye­ar’s re­so­lu­ti­ons.

  My bad fe­eling was de­ad-on. Ac­ross the ro­om we­re two zom­bi­es exactly li­ke the ones Mo­ni­ca and I had fo­ught in the wo­ods-they lo­oked ama­zingly li­fe­li­ke and didn’t re­ek of gra­ve dirt, and both wo­re pa­j­amas-craw­ling over the cold sto­ve and dish­was­hers in the­ir has­te to get to the three of us.

  “Ye­ah,” Bob­bie Jane sa­id, ag­re­e­ing with my as­ses­sment of the si­tu­ati­on. “And it gets wor­se. I wasn’t ob­ser­ved, but they we­re. The­re we­re fi­ve pe­op­le in he­re. They all bo­oked it out the back, but-”

  “They’ll be lo­oking for help,” Mo­ni­ca fi­nis­hed. “Which me­ans we’ve got fi­ve, may­be ten mi­nu­tes to re­ver­to the­ir-”

  “But the re­ver­to spell isn’t wor­king.” Bob­bie Jane sho­uted to be he­ard over the mo­aning and gro­aning of the zom­bi­es he­aded our way. “I ha­ven’t tri­ed the pax fra­ter, but-”

  “It won’t work eit­her. The­se fre­aks are dif­fe­rent.” Mo­ni­ca grab­bed my hand and drop­ped her shi­elds, not was­ting furt­her ti­me exp­la­ining, which was a go­od thing. Zom­bie One was al­re­ady over the dish­was­her-sen­ding the dis­hes on top clat­te­ring to the flo­or-and had ne­arly cle­ared the in­dust­ri­al sto­ve. Zom­bie Two wasn’t far be­hind.

  Ta­king a de­ep bre­ath, I fo­cu­sed my at­ten­ti­on on pul­ling Mo­ni­ca’s po­wer in­si­de myself and pre­pa­red to cast. This wo­uld be ca­ke com­pa­red to the last ti­me. The­re we­re only two of them. May­be if I to­ok just a lit­tle bit of Mo­ni­ca’s energy and wa­ited un­til the RCs we­re clo­se, then I wo­uldn’t be so mes­sed up af­ter­wards. Then I co­uld fol­low them back to whe­re­ver they ca­me from, trap the per­son who was res­pon­sib­le for ra­ising them, and cle­ar my na­me. If I just wa­ited un­til they we­re a lit­tle clo­ser… a lit­tle clo­ser…

  “Do it, Me­gan!” Mo­ni­ca yel­led over the hungry ke­ening fil­ling the ro­om.

  “Just a se­cond.”

  “Now!” Mo­ni­ca sho­uted just as Bob­bie Jane scre­amed and hit the flo­or be­si­de us.

  We’d be­en am­bus­hed from be­hind!

  The­re wasn’t ti­me to lift my palm and cast be­fo­re so­me­one rip­ped Mo­ni­ca’s hand from mi­ne and a thick, so­lid body knoc­ked me off my fe­et. I lan­ded on the hard ti­le flo­or with a gro­an but did my best to flip over. I co­uldn’t see who was on top of me, but I was bet­ting it wasn’t a fri­end.

  “Gunh!” The boy gro­aned and lun­ged for my neck just as I shif­ted on­to my back.

  He-no, scratch that, she. It was a girl. The bald he­ad had thrown me for a se­cond, but it was de­fi­ni­tely a girl’s body un­der her red flan­nel pa­j­amas, and de­ci­dedly fe­mi­ni­ne lips cur­led abo­ve her te­eth as

  I knoc­ked her fo­aming mo­uth away.

  “Ple­ase help me!” Bob­bie Jane was crying now, I ca­ught sight of her te­ars­ta­ined che­eks and blo­od po­uring down her arm out of the cor­ner of my eye.

  She was figh­ting the RC who’d ta­ken her to the gro­und, but she’d be­en bit­ten-badly. Bob­bie Jane wasn’t one of tho­se wimpy chicks who cri­ed if they bro­ke a na­il. She wasn’t the stron­gest Set­tler, but she was to­ugh. I’d se­en her get the wind knoc­ked out of her spar­ring with Bar­ker and she hadn’t so much as whim­pe­red. If she was crying, she was se­ri­o­usly hurt. Mo­ni­ca and I had to get ho­oked up aga­in and get rid of the­se things be­fo­re she lost any mo­re blo­od.

  I punc­hed the chick on top of me stra­ight in the no­se and rol­led swiftly to the si­de, knoc­king her off long eno­ugh for me to strug­gle to my fe­et. Mo­ni­ca was less than fi­ve fe­et away, slam­ming one Un­de­ad’s he­ad in­to the sto­ve whi­le de­li­ve­ring a ro­und­ho­use kick to the he­ad of anot­her lurc­hing in be­hind her.

  “Mo­ni­ca, over he­re, we-”

  Her eyes dar­ted to mi­ne. “Be­hind you,” she sho­uted.

  Spin­ning on my he­el, I de­li­ve­red a sharp up­per­cut to the fa­ce of the girl I’d just knoc­ked off of me a se­cond ago. She cri­ed out but ral­li­ed in ti­me to block the kick I’d aimed at her so­lar ple­xus. Dam­mit, she was fast! No black-ma­gi­cal­ly ra­ised corp­se sho­uld be ab­le to mo­ve that fast!

  “Me­gan! Me­gan, ple­ase!” I ris­ked a qu­ick glan­ce over at Bob­bie Jane, who was now strug­gling aga­inst two zom­bi­es-one who had her fo­re­arm loc­ked bet­we­en his te­eth and anot­her trying to get a mo­uth­ful of her leg. Bob­bie Jane kic­ked and buc­ked and fo­ught li­ke a champ, but she was out­num­be­red and in an un­de­fen­dab­le po­si­ti­on. We had to get her out of he­re, had to-

  “Ah!” I cri­ed out as Red Flan­nel Girl slug­ged me in the fa­ce, then ma­de a lun­ge for my neck that I just ba­rely ma­na­ged to dod­ge.

  What was with the hit­ting? The Un­de­ad didn’t pos­sess the smarts to dist­ract so­me­one with a punch be­fo­re ma­king a bid for the blo­od and flesh they cra­ved. They we­re so­ul­less, mind­less shells ra­ised to pur­sue the will of anot­her. They shuf­fled and gro­aned-they didn’t dart and we­ave.

  Appa­rently this chick hadn’t got­ten the me­mo, be­ca­use ten se­conds af­ter slug­ging me, she kne­ed me bet­we­en the legs-which hurts, even if you’re a girl, I’ll ha­ve you know-then swept my fe­et out from un­der me with the ex­per­ti­se of a tra­ined figh­ter.

  “Unnh!” I hit the gro­und a se­cond ti­me, win­cing in pa­in as my ta­il­bo­ne felt li­ke it exp­lo­ded. If I hadn’t bro­ken a bo­ne, I’d co­me darn clo­se, which tic­ked me off suf­fi­ci­ently that the next punch I lan­ded to Red Flan­nel Girl’s fa­ce sent her ca­re­ening back­wards in one of tho­se slow-mo­ti­on arcs you see in the mo­vi­es.

  It was ac­tu­al­ly pretty swe­et. Too bad I didn’t ha­ve ti­me to re­lish my small vic­tory.

  Sen­sing mo­ve­ment be­hind me, I spun my arms in a circ­le, twis­ting as far to my right as I co­uld, shat­te­ring the kne­ecap of the du­de re­ac­hing for my neck. He scre­amed li­ke a fi­ve-ye­ar-old and col­lap­sed, dist­rac­ted eno­ugh by his pa­in that his gras­ping hands mis­sed me as

  I jum­ped to my fe­et and le­apt over him. I he­aded stra­ight for whe­re

  Mo­ni­ca was still hol­ding her own ne­ar the sto­ve, kno­wing ti­me was run­ning out.

  Bob­bie Jane scre­amed aga­in, a blo­od­curd­ling so­und that ma­de my skin bre­ak out in go­ose pimp­les. I didn‘t even ca­re any­mo­re that she was pro­bably go­ing to bring a bunch of ave­ra­ge hu­man pe­op­le run­ning, and all three of us wo­uld be ex­po­sed. All I co­uld think abo­ut was get­ting to Mo­ni­ca and eva­ding the zom­bi­es long eno­ugh for us to get lin­ked up and ac­comp­lish the re­ver­to spell.

  But whe­re co­uld we go? The kitc­hen wasn’t that big, and un­less we knoc­ked the zom­bi­es un­cons­ci­o­us, the­re was no way we co­uld get far
eno­ugh away from them to buy the ti­me we ne­eded.

  Then I saw the pots and pans han­ging abo­ve the sto­ve, strap­ped to so­me sort of in­dust­ri­al grid bol­ted to the ce­iling. It lo­oked pretty strong, but was it strong eno­ugh to hold me and the Mo­nics­ter? I wasn’t su­re, but we we­re get­ting re­ady to find out.

  “Mo­ni­ca, up!” I sho­uted as I ran, po­in­ting abo­ve her he­ad.

  She glan­ced to­ward the ce­iling, then tur­ned back to her zom­bi­es, cloc­king them both in the fa­ce be­fo­re in­ter­la­cing her hands, for­ming a fo­ot­hold. Say what you want abo­ut Mo­ni­ca, but the girl thinks fast and is a kick-ass per­son to ha­ve on yo­ur si­de in a fight. I step­ped in­to her hands and she ga­ve me just the bo­ost I ne­eded to re­ach up and grab the ed­ge of the grid.

  I swung wildly back and forth for a se­cond, pots and pans cras­hing to the flo­or as I clim­bed on top, but fi­nal­ly ma­na­ged to le­ve­ra­ge myself up and over the ed­ge. Scramb­ling aro­und as fast as I co­uld, I re­ac­hed a hand over the si­de just in ti­me to grab Mo­ni­ca-who had clim­bed on top of the sto­ve-and pull her up be­si­de me. On­ce she was sa­fe from the zom­bie hands snatc­hing at us from be­low, I sum­mo­ned her po­wer.

  “Re­ver­to!” This ti­me, the af­ters­hock from the com­mand sent me sho­oting ac­ross the me­tal grid on my sto­mach, bru­ising my hip bo­nes and ribs and pro­ving Mo­ni­ca right-I ne­eded to ga­in so­me we­ight. If I’d had a lit­tle mo­re me­at on my bo­nes, it wo­uldn’t ha­ve hurt ne­arly as much.

  As it was, I was still win­cing in pa­in as the zom­bi­es stre­amed out the back do­or in­to the marsh­land be­hind Piz­za Pie. Trying to ig­no­re the throb­bing of my ribs, I craw­led to the ed­ge of the grid. I was dizzy, but I had to get down. If pe­op­le ca­me in and saw me, I’d ha­ve a to­ugh job exp­la­ining what the heck I was do­ing.

  Of co­ur­se, get­ting down wo­uld ha­ve be­en a lot easi­er if Mo­ni­ca had stuck aro­und to help. Ins­te­ad, she’d bol­ted the se­cond the zom­bi­es he­aded for the do­or. I as­su­med she was chec­king on Bob­bie Jane, but when she spo­ke it de­fi­ni­tely wasn’t a fel­low Set­tler she was tal­king to.

  “Yo­ur mom’s Dr. Samp­son, right? Okay, I ne­ed you to go get yo­ur mom and bring her back he­re, then I ne­ed you to call ni­ne-one-one and tell them we ha­ve so­me­one very badly hurt and we ne­ed an am­bu­lan­ce, and I ne­ed you to get Mr. Mo­ret­ti. Do you un­ders­tand?” Mo­ni­ca as­ked, her vo­ice soft and kind of high-pitc­hed, li­ke she was tal­king to-

  Kids. The­re we­re three kids stan­ding in the do­or, I re­ali­zed as I hit the flo­or, sen­ding pans clat­te­ring to the gro­und. Two girls and a lit­tle boy we­re sta­ring at the two of us with wi­de, frigh­te­ned eyes, but nod­ding the­ir un­ders­tan­ding of the­ir va­ri­o­us du­ti­es.

  “Go­od, now hurry.” Mo­ni­ca wa­ited un­til they scat­te­red be­fo­re rus­hing over to Bob­bie Jane. The ot­her Set­tler lay very still, a pud­dle of red sme­aring her Piz­za Pie uni­form and the whi­te ti­le aro­und her. She’d lost a scary amo­unt of blo­od. We ne­eded to stop it or the am­bu­lan­ce was go­ing to be too la­te.

  He­art po­un­ding in my ears, I tur­ned and sur­ve­yed the ro­om, gra­te­ful to see so­me cle­an-lo­oking dish to­wels ne­ar the sink in the cor­ner. I hur­ri­ed to grab one as fast as my dizzy he­ad and wobbly legs wo­uld al­low and then rus­hed back to Bob­bie Jane. “He­re, we ha­ve to press this to the wo­und and stop the blo­od. Apply di­rect pres­su­re on-”

  “It won’t do any go­od,” Mo­ni­ca sa­id, ig­no­ring the to­wel I held out.

  “Yes, it will. I re­mem­ber the first-aid clas­ses we to­ok last Oc­to­ber. If you apply di­rect pres­su­re-”

  “No, Me­gan. It’s not that,” she sa­id, tur­ning to lo­ok up at me with te­ar-fil­led eyes. “It won’t do any go­od be­ca­use… she’s al­re­ady de­ad.”

  CHAPTER 10

  I co­uldn’t re­mem­ber ever fe­eling so cold. Su­re it was pro­bably thirty-so­met­hing deg­re­es out­si­de and I’d be­en hud­dled on the gro­und for fif­te­en mi­nu­tes, but I knew that wasn’t the re­ason I co­uldn’t stop shi­ve­ring.

  Bob­bie Jane was de­ad. Not that I’d known her all that well, but what did that mat­ter? Bob­bie Jane, with her bo­uncy curls, he­art-sha­ped fa­ce, and eyes that had se­en far mo­re than tho­se of the ave­ra­ge six­te­en-ye­ar-old, was go­ne. Now tho­se eyes wo­uld ne­ver open aga­in, and it was all my fa­ult. If I hadn’t wa­ited so long to cast, if I hadn’t be­en mo­re wor­ri­ed abo­ut cle­aring my na­me than abo­ut ke­eping pe­op­le sa­fe, may­be she wo­uld still be ali­ve.

  I was po­si­ti­ve I co­uldn’t fe­el any wor­se when the sho­uts ca­me from the marsh.

  “We’ve got anot­her one! Abo­ut a hund­red yards back.” Som­ber-fa­ced po­li­ce­men rus­hed in­to the swampy wa­ter, car­rying guns and ca­me­ras, fol­lo­wed by the EMTs.

  “Oh God, no. Ple­ase, no.” Ta­bit­ha’s mom was whis­pe­ring, but I co­uld he­ar the an­gu­ish in her vo­ice all the way ac­ross the par­king lot.

  Once the ini­ti­al cha­os of le­ar­ning Piz­za Pie had be­en at­tac­ked by drug­ged-up cult mem­bers-the of­fi­ci­al story be­ing spun by the Set­tler un­der­co­ver on the Ca­rol PD-had cle­ared, we’d re­ali­zed one of the che­er­le­aders was mis­sing. Ta­bit­ha, a sop­ho­mo­re, had go­ne to the bath­ro­om a few mi­nu­tes be­fo­re all heck bro­ke lo­ose and ne­ver co­me back. Now they we­re pul­ling her from the swamp on a stretc­her.

  “No! Is she okay?” Her mom scre­amed, a so­und that tur­ned in­to a hor­rib­le wa­il as she rus­hed to her da­ugh­ter’s si­de. It was Ta­bit­ha. The blond ha­ir and sig­na­tu­re gold rib­bon we­re cle­arly vi­sib­le abo­ve her pa­le fa­ce.

  “She’s cons­ci­o­us, but she’s lost a lot of blo­od. We ne­ed to get her to Uni­ver­sity for a trans­fu­si­on.” The EMT hust­led to­ward the am­bu­lan­ce, fol­lo­wed by Ta­bit­ha’s sob­bing mot­her.

  “I wish that was Bob­bie Jane. I wish she was go­ing for a trans­fu­si­on,” Mo­ni­ca sa­id, her to­ne as flat and emo­ti­on­less as it had be­en sin­ce we we­re pul­led out of the kitc­hen and rus­hed to the am­bu­lan­ce for tre­at­ment.

  Mo­ni­ca had a co­up­le of bi­te marks, and I had the be­gin­nings of a kil­ler black eye, but not­hing se­ri­o­us eno­ugh that we ne­eded to go to the hos­pi­tal. We’d in­sis­ted on wa­iting for our pa­rents to co­me pick us up. No do­ubt we we­re both in ne­ed of pa­ren­tal com­fort, but the­re was al­so the lit­tle mat­ter of the En­for­cers, who we­re on the­ir way to in­ves­ti­ga­te the de­ath.

  De­ad. Bob­bie Jane was de­ad. No mat­ter how many ti­mes I re­pe­ated it, it just didn’t se­em to ma­ke sen­se. This co­uldn’t ha­ve hap­pe­ned. Pe­op­le we­ren’t mur­de­red in Ca­rol, es­pe­ci­al­ly not by zom­bi­es. Set­tlers didn’t let things li­ke this hap­pen.

  “Me­gan?” I tur­ned to see Mom le­aping out of the car be­fo­re Dad had even fully pul­led to a stop. Un­for­tu­na­tely, Kitty and Bar­ker we­re in a car right be­hind them.

  “We’re just go­ing to tell them the truth, right?” Mo­ni­ca as­ked in that mo­no­to­ne, which was star­ting to fre­ak me out.

  “Ye­ah. Pro­bably the best thing,” I sa­id, awk­wardly pat­ting her knee. I had a fe­eling she was in shock, but co­uldn’t re­mem­ber what I sho­uld do abo­ut it. My bra­in didn’t se­em to be wor­king, which ma­de me sus­pect she wasn’t the only one who was a lit­tle out of it.

  “Ho­ney, are you okay?” Mom cro­uc­hed down be­si­de me, cup­ping my fa­ce in her hands and run­ning her fin­gers thro­ugh my ha­ir, as if she had to to­uch me to ma­ke su­re I was ali­ve.

  “Ye­ah, I… no. No, I’m not.” I swal­lo­wed hard but co­uldn�
��t fight the te­ars po­oling in my eyes. “Bob­bie Jane is de­ad.”

  “I know. I he­ard,” she sa­id, lo­oking as sad as I felt.

  “It was mo­re of tho­se fre­ak RCs,” Mo­ni­ca sa­id. “We tri­ed to get rid of them, but they got to Bob­bie Jane first. We co­uldn’t… We tri­ed, but we-”

  Then she fi­nal­ly lost it, bre­aking down in full-fled­ged sobs that had my mom wrap­ping an arm aro­und her and pul­ling her clo­se. Mo­ni­ca’s mom and dad had be­en an ho­ur away at so­me po­li­ti­cal fund-ra­iser when she cal­led and hadn’t ma­de it back to Ca­rol yet, but I gu­es­sed any mom wo­uld do in a cri­sis. Mo­ni­ca clung to my mom’s swe­ater and cri­ed li­ke the world was en­ding. If I’d ever had any do­ubt that the­re was a go­od per­son in­si­de the of­ten cru­el girl sit­ting next to me, it was ba­nis­hed as I watc­hed her gri­eve.

  “We’re sorry, but we ne­ed to talk to the girls.” Kitty’s vo­ice was res­pect­ful, but firm. I lo­oked up to see her and Bar­ker stan­ding a few fe­et be­hind my mom lo­oking as pa­le and sha­ken as I felt. It se­emed even the big, bad En­for­cers we­ren’t go­ing to be ab­le to ta­ke this one in stri­de.

  “Can’t this wa­it?” Mom as­ked, ma­king no at­tempt to hi­de her an­ger. “Obvi­o­usly they’re both very up­set, and-”

  “It’s okay.” Mo­ni­ca snif­fed and swi­ped at her eyes. “Let’s get it over with. I want to go ho­me.” She ro­se and stom­ped off in­to the dark­ness at the ed­ge of the par­king lot. Bar­ker fol­lo­wed wit­ho­ut a word. Gu­ess that left me with Kitty.

  “Me­gan, you know you don’t ha­ve to do this. You ha­ven’t be­en as­sig­ned a me­di­ator yet, and un­til you ha­ve, you-”

  “No.” I sto­od up and brus­hed the gra­vel off my je­ans. “I want to do wha­te­ver I can to help them find the per­son res­pon­sib­le for this.”

  “Just be ca­re­ful,” Mom sa­id with a sigh. It was pretty ob­vi­o­us she didn’t want me to talk to Kitty, but she knew how stub­born I co­uld be when I set my mind on so­met­hing. And my mind was de­fi­ni­tely set. I had to help catch the re­al Very Bad Thing, even if it me­ant put­ting my own sa­fety and fu­tu­re at risk.