by Gayle Katz
“It’s right here at the hospital,” she explained.
“Are you serious?” said Charlie in amazement.
“Yep. I expect something is going on right under our noses. Literally,” she said, peering down at the ground.
“Down in the morgue?” asked Charlie.
Zan nodded.
“OK, get down there and see if you can destroy them,” said Charlie.
“On it,” said Zan, proud of herself for figuring out what was happening.
She raced down the hallway and to the stairs. At the very bottom of the staircase was a large metal door. She tried to turn the knob, but it was locked. She leaned sideways and then kicked her foot out. The knob fell off the door. “Works every time,” she said, feeling quite pleased with herself. “Who needs lock picking?”
She opened the door and found another hallway. She walked down it. The morgue had to be here somewhere. It was always in the basement, so it was kept far away from the living.
Finally, in the distance, she saw a huge sign that said MORGUE on it, like it was necessary to advertise what was inside the room.
She peered through the glass windows at the top of the double doors. There was no one inside. She pushed the doors open. It wasn’t locked. But then, who would steal bodies? Perhaps criminals who hoped to profit off the dead.
She entered the room. Ahead of her were three exam tables and about thirty refrigerator doors. She started on her right. Might as well get this done. The first few yielded no bodies. The next three did. She couldn’t be certain about their stage of decomposition. She decided to play it safe and rammed her dagger through their eye sockets and into their skulls. Even if someone tried to reanimate them, they would not succeed. She pushed the gurneys back in and closed the doors. The next set of doors revealed nothing. She looked back at the main doors. She should have time to examine all of them.
This was the only solution she could thing of. That and possibly wait until the guilty party entered the room. On the other hand, she guessed that many people probably had access to the morgue. Perhaps the best thing she could do was to destroy the corpses, and then try and find out how they were being reanimated.
zzz
Back in her room, Charlie started feeling strange. She felt a bit lightheaded and brain dead.
“How are we doing today?” asked the same doctor who had given her the dose of antibiotics earlier.
“A bit weird, dizzy.”
“Oh, that’s normal after an allergic reaction. Get some rest, and you’ll feel much better tomorrow.” He left the room. There was something creepy about that doctor, but she couldn’t put her finger on it.
She wondered if meal service started soon. She could eat a nice raw steak at the moment.
zzz
Zan had finally gone through and destroyed all the corpses’ brains. There. No one would be using any of these bodies to create zombies and make zrugs.
She heard a noise in the distance. “Where to hide, where to hide?” she muttered to herself.
The door opened. “I could have sworn I heard noise in here,” said one orderly to another.
“All looks fine,” said the other guy.
“This room creeps me out. I swear Dr. Fisher is up to no good sometimes,” said the first guy.
“You mean, he might be making drugs on the side or something?” He had a good laugh.
“Yeah, you never know.”
“Well, what I don’t like is that all these people are getting allergic reactions to an antibiotic, and then dying. Doesn’t make sense.”
“That is unusual. Let’s keep an eye on it. We might have to report it.”
The two orderlies left the room. Zan could hear their footsteps heading down the hallway.
“Shit! Antibiotics!” she yelled. She pushed against the fridge door and it opened. Good thing it opened on both sides, otherwise, she’d be permanently cooled. She jumped out, and then closed the door. She padded over to the main doors and looked out. No one was around.
She threw open the doors and raced down the hallway. She ran up the stairs and back to room 3A. She flung open the door to Charlie’s room, but she wasn’t there. Surprised, she found a nurse tearing the sheets off the bed.
“Where is Charlie Warner?” asked Zan, panicking.
“Oh, dear. I’m sorry,” said the nurse. “She didn’t make it. The orderlies took her away on the gurney.”
Zan raced down the hallway. They would be heading for the elevator. She watched as the indicator slowly changed to B. She found the stairwell at that end of the hospital and raced down to the basement. They had to be taking her to the morgue.
Ahead she saw a man, who appeared to be a doctor, wheeling the gurney to the morgue.
She raced up to him. “Excuse me, she’s not dead,” said Zan.
The doctor looked up and stopped moving. “Of course not,” said the doctor. “There’s a reason why I need her alive.” He went back to pushing on the gurney. He pushed it straight through the swinging doors of the morgue. Zan followed them in.
Inside, the doctor pulled out a gun.
“So, it’s you who’s been making zombies!’ said Zan, realizing that he was likely the source of all the zombie issues for the past few months.
The doctor had a smug expression on his face. “Oh yes,” he said. “I started out helping Eli to make the zrug from zombie brains. Might as well make some profits on the side, right? Then I decided to infect the Portland High School students. I worked with Steve, John, and Stan, though that last guy is weak. I set up the zombie wedding at the mansion. I convinced John to sell zombies to the fashion show. I tried to infect the students at the dance, but that drug I sold those kids was ineffective and did nothing. I’ve been experimenting for a long time now.”
Zan looked at him and the gun in his hand.
“I’ve finally perfected the zrug. I’m going to make millions of dollars. And, I can quickly and easily infect as many people as I need.” He raised his gun and aimed.
The shot rang out.
Zan dropped to the ground. She’d learned to dodge more than a few bullets in her time.
The doctor aimed the gun again. But this time, no shots rang out. She took this opportunity and leapt out at him. She raised her dagger in her hand and plunged it into his eye socket. As she did so, she saw a contact lenses slip out of his other eye. Beneath, his eye glowed green.
Zan ran to Charlie and removed the titanium dagger from inside her hospital gown. She ran back, plunged it into Dr. Fisher’s other eye socket, and recited the spell, “Reliqua autem impius!” That stopped the glow. The zleader dropped to the ground.
Zan ran over to Charlie and slapped her cheeks. Her eyes opened.
“Hey, you OK?” she asked.
“Yep,” said Charlie. “That was one hell of a dream.”
Zan quickly dragged his corpse into one of the fridge slots before cleaning up. She then wheeled Charlie back to the main floor of the hospital.
“Such incompetence,” she said to the nursing station. “She is alive.” The nurses rushed to the gurney, wheeling Charlie back to her room.
A new doctor showed up, one that could be trusted.
“I’m so sorry, Miss Warner. That doctor has had some complaints on his record. We have been destroying any and all antibiotics that he’s been administering to patients. I’ll be sure to report him to the authorities.”
The doctor gave Charlie a clean bill of health, but said she’d still have to stay overnight.
Zan decided to stay and make sure that no further incidents happened. She called Stewart, Owen, and Gran to let them know what was going on.
“That’s crazy,” said Charlie, when Zan told her about the doctor. “I’ve been a zlayer for almost two years and I have never ever seen zombie plagues occur at such a rapid pace.”
“I know,” said Zan. “Turns out that something was up after all. Imagine, making real zombies.”
They had a good chuckle over that.
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Epilogue
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Charlie relaxed in her hospital bed. They’d given her just enough painkillers to dampen the pain in her shoulder, but not enough to make her brain too foggy.
She heard footsteps outside the hospital room. She closed her eyes.
“Shhh,” someone said. “She’s still out. We should let her rest and come back tomorrow.” The footsteps left.
Relieved, she opened her eyes. She’d see everyone tomorrow. She was so glad that her friends had survived. This time she hadn’t lost anyone.
Then there were more footsteps to her room, probably the nurse to check on her.
“Hey, time to get up. They’re discharging you today,” said Stewart.
She opened her eyes. “Fine,” she said.
“You feeling all right?”
She nodded. “Where’s Gran?”
“She’s at home preparing your room,” he explained. “I promised her I’d bring you back home.”
She sat up in bed, feeling a bit woozy.
“Take it easy,” he said.
“So, is everything back to normal now?” she asked. “I can really retire?”
“Yes, you can really retire from zombie slaying. How ironic that Doctor Fisher laid a false trail of zleaders for us to find. I should have known something was up every time they’d spring up somewhere else.”
He tucked her jacket around her since there was no way she’d be able to put her left arm into the jacket’s sleeve. Then he helped her into the wheelchair that the nurse rolled in. He pushed her out of her room to the front desk, where she signed out.
Feeling strong enough, Charlie was able to stand up and they walked down the long corridor to the parking lot. The hospital was quiet at this time of day. They quickly found his car and he drove her home.
She breathed a sigh of relief.
“Now, I know you’ve retired from zombie slaying, and it’ll take some time for the bullet wound to heal up, but hear what I have to say.”
“What is it?” she asked him.
“Well, word has it that zombies are loose in Seattle.”
“What?” she said. “Wait, someone went to Seattle recently. Who was it?” She pondered the thought.
“Yep. Apparently, that’s where the next outbreak is,” said Stewart.
“Wait a minute. I think it was the owner of The Bean Trip.”
“You mean that coffee shop that burned down on Main Street?”
She nodded. “Yes, before Steve died he told me that the owner had fled to Seattle. He was tired of his life of crime.”
“Oh,” he said. “So, this means one of two things. One, he was bitten before he fled. Or two, he took some of the zrug with him that Doctor Fisher had made.”
“Wait, can he use the zrug to make more zombies?”
“I’m not certain. I’m a mentor and biology teacher, not a scientist. But with some of the things that have happened in the last few years, I wouldn’t be surprised.”
“Great. So we’ll have to figure it out,” she said.
“Yep. Wait a minute, are you coming to Seattle with me?” he asked.
She sat back in the seat. “I’m not saying anything. First, I want my stupid shoulder to heal up.” Then her eyes opened wide. “When we were holding Tonia in Zan’s backyard, she said that Owen was immune to zombie bites.”
Stewart and Charlie looked at each other. Perhaps they would be better prepared for the next zombie outbreak. Maybe retirement could wait.
Prologue
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Charlie was lying back in the passenger seat of her VW Beetle. The seat didn’t go down far, but that didn’t matter. She gobbled up her Big Burger and sipped her diet soda. She wouldn’t be able to eat for a week after this meal. Zombie slayers were not allowed to get fat. She could have sat inside the Big Burger diner but decided against it.
Christmas had come and gone without incident. She breathed a deep sigh of relief. Portland was reasonably safe from zombies for now. She knew stuff was going down in Seattle, but that wasn’t her concern. Stewart talked about sending her team over there, but he was still working out the details about some school trip or something. She inwardly cringed that she was turning into a geek. Mind you, they were a whole lot better than zombies.
She was looking forward to a cruise next summer to Grand Cayman Island. This vacation was long overdue and sorely needed. And it would give her an opportunity to hang out a bit more with Gran. She felt somewhat guilty that most of her time in Portland had been spent zombie slaying, with not much time left for family.
She sat up straight when she heard a sound coming from behind her car. She tossed her garbage back into the paper bag and tossed it on the floor of the car. She carefully patted her back jeans pocket, the one that had been altered to safely fit her dagger so she didn’t stab her butt.
Whatever it was moving around behind her car made rattling sounds. She slowly opened the passenger side door and got out.
A dark figure loomed in front of her. His hands reached for her neck, while his jaws chomped up and down. As he got closer, he slowly dragged one foot after the other. She just stood there watching him, with a bored expression on her face.
The creature came closer. His eyes glowed green. He stuck out his tongue, and then bit it off. The tip fell into his hands. He placed the tongue back in his mouth and swallowed.
“Really?” she asked. “How will you moan?”
The zombie was now right beside her. She pulled out her dagger and quickly plunged it into his eye socket. The body dropped quickly to the ground. She quickly sheathed her dagger.
Then her skin twitched. She abruptly looked around in all directions and used her key to open the hatchback of her classic car. She quickly grabbed onto the male body and pulled him into the back.
“Oof,” she said. “Must do more weightlifting. There.”
The body was in the back of her car. She slammed the door shut. Just as she was glancing at the ground for blood to clean up, she felt something strike her head. Her body slammed against her car, and then slipped to the ground. She tried to fight and maintain her consciousness, but she felt herself being picked up and carried into the back seat of a car. She felt so sleepy and wanted to take a nap.
Chapter 1
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Mr. Stewart George had a special class after school for his best students. Except that it wasn’t his regular biology class, this was for his zombie slaying team. Zan and Owen were already there, but Charlie had yet to show up.
“I think we need to move our meetings elsewhere,” said Mr. George.
“Why?” asked Owen. “It’s convenient.”
Zan didn’t say anything. She was too busy looking at her phone.
“Because I don’t trust Principal Allan since that mess back in the fall. He really should be in prison, but because nine-tenths of the police department doesn’t believe in zombies, there’s not much I can do. Especially since dead bodies caused by zombies usually go missing, not that I have anything to do with that.” He smirked. “Fortunately, no one is noticing that there are far more missing persons’ reports in Portland now.”
“Doesn’t matter,” said Zan, looking up for a moment. “He’s keeping a low profile.”
“Have you asked him again to be your mentor?” asked Owen.
She shook her head. “I’m not working with him,” she explained.
“Just the same, I’d like to move the meetings someplace else,” said Stewart. “How about one of your homes?”
Zan quickly tossed her phone in her bag, looking worried. “Gosh, my parents don’t know what I do. They’d freak out.”
“Same here,” said Owen. “They’d pull me out of this school, fast, if they knew I was in a gang. I mean, it’s a good gang, but they watch too much TV.”
Stewart paced the classroom. “Well, we can hold it at Charlie’s house, as he
r Gran knows what she is and what she does. And we have protections surrounding her house, should the bad guys figure anything out.”
“I thought we all had protections surrounding our houses?” asked Owen.
“You do,” said Stewart. “But I understand the concern. The less your parents know, the better.”
“Say, aren’t all the bad guys dead?” asked Owen. “After we killed the zombie leader, the rest of them fell.”
Stewart nodded. “True, but there is activity in Seattle, which I’d like you guys to investigate, if only Charlie would show up.”
“I’m worried,” said Owen. “It’s not like her to not show up.”
Zan frowned too. She picked up her phone again. “I get no answer when I call and she’s not answering her texts.”
“OK, folks. Meeting adjourned,” said Stewart.
“Cool,” said Zan. “Thanks for wasting my time.” She left the room without saying goodbye.
Owen smiled and waved at Stewart. “Some things never change,” he said as he left the classroom.
zzz
Zan headed back to her house. “Hey, I’ll be in the basement. Don’t come down there, OK?” she called out to her parents.
“Sure thing,” said her dad. “We await your surprise.”
Zan headed down the stairs. “Yep, you’ll love this surprise,” she said, smirking to herself. As she walked down the final few steps, she grimaced. The smell down here was getting ripe. She flicked on the light switch, and then walked over to open the window. She then headed to the table where there was an aromatherapy device sitting in the middle. She poured some essential oils into it, then plugged it in and flicked on the switch. The light lit up that end of the room, while a fresh smell permeated the air.
“Much better,” she mumbled to herself, as she donned a white lab coat. “I’ll deal with the smell right now.”