by Gayle Katz
“So, you believe me?” It was the first time he was able to look directly at Sergeant Bourne.
“Yes, I believe you.”
Julian was amazed.
“And good job for turning yourself in. For some reason, she seems to fixate on certain people, so they do her bidding.”
“That’s crazy. She needs to be stopped. When I’d heard she was dead, I thought she was dead.”
“I know.” Bourne’s phone buzzed. “Sorry, kid. We have a home invasion in progress. I’ll have to leave you here for now. I’ll have Maia bring you food and something to drink.”
“OK, that’s fine.”
“Oh, and by the way, how long have you been a zombie?”
“Ummm, about eight months now, I think?”
“That’s got to be a record.” Bourne headed to the stairs. Just when he thought he’d seen and heard everything, something else came up.
zzz
Philly stomped around Stewart’s living room, holding a gun in her hand. “I knew someone would find me out eventually.”
The teens were all seated on the couch with Stewart. Owen looked worriedly at the gun.
“Now, Philly, you’re being silly. Supporting your sister is one thing, but you don’t have to commit her crimes,” said Stewart.
Philly started laughing.
“What’s so funny?” asked Stewart in an annoyed tone.
“I think your team here has figured it out.” She looked at them.
Zan looked uncomfortable. “Um, yeah, you’re not her sister.”
Philly laughed.
“What am I missing?” asked Stewart.
“Dr. Arora has no sister,” explained Owen. “This woman was just playing you.”
“For what purpose?” asked Stewart.
“To try and get closer to your team,” she explained.
“So, are you Dr. Arora?” asked Charlie.
Philly laughed. “Hell no, but she could use my body if she wanted. No, I’m one of her zinions. I also run that special Zombie Rights group that you keep on hearing about.”
“Oh gross,” said Zan.
“Zombie rights?” said Charlie. “You got a boy poisoned really bad!”
“Oh right, wrong person. We were targeting the mayor. Boo-hoo. Too bad. He’ll be fine. Don’t worry about it.” She had a smirk on her face and was prancing back and forth between the walls of the room.
“Oh, and since you’re all going to die, I can tell you this too. Your friend Sebastian is with me.”
“What? That can’t be true,” asked Charlie.
“He’s a zinion. He accidentally got poisoned, remember? That was meant for the mayor, not him.”
“And there was that John guy who got arrested,” said Stewart. “The one who threw glass at the mayor.”
Philly smiled. “Yep, John is a zinion too. I’ll kill him later. Sebastian was the one who broke the mayor’s window.”
“Oh right,” said Stewart, slowly edging closer to the end of the couch. “Jay called and told me what had happened.”
When Philly had her back turned, Owen motioned for Zan to get behind him. She squeezed behind him. Charlie rolled onto the floor between the couch and the table.
“Anyway, too much blah blah blah.” She whirled around and pressed the trigger.
“Ahhhh!” someone screamed in pain.
zzz
“How can Sebastian be with the Zombie Rights group?” asked Marta. “He was inside the whole time. How could he have thrown that rock through the window?”
Jane looked at her. “Was he inside the whole time?”
She shrugged.
“Think about it. He went to the bathroom. He could have hopped out the window there and grabbed that rock that he set up in advance. Then ran over to the window and tossed it through the glass. And then ran back to the bathroom, hopped through the window, and back into the hallway.”
“That’s crazy,” said Marta. “It’s a good thing we’re safe in here.”
“Yeah, real nice furnishings,” said Jane, shifting uncomfortably in her small metal chair and gazing at the beige walls. “OK, that’s it. I’m calling Jay with our latest findings.” She picked up her phone.
zzz
Sergeant Bourne kicked Stewart’s door in. It slammed against the wall. His gun went off. Philly dropped to the ground. He ran in and took the gun from her.
“Are you OK, Stewart?” He saw the gunshot wound on his shoulder.
“Yeah, the bullet just grazed me.”
Jay looked down at the floor. The three teens were all hiding behind the table. “It’s safe to come out. Perp is down and we need an ambulance,” he said, muttering into his radio.
Owen helped Zan and Charlie up. “Are you both OK?”
They nodded.
“That was crazy,” said Charlie.
“Yeah, what a whack job,” said Zan.
A few minutes later, they heard the sounds of sirens on their way. They waited and gave Sergeant Bourne official statements, while Owen hunched over Philly and held a towel to her bullet wound.
Finally, the paramedics arrived. They quickly took Philly away, and attended to Stewart’s scratch.
“Is everyone OK?” asked Sergeant Bourne. “I’m heading to the hospital to question Philly. We’ll keep in touch.” He turned and headed to the door. “Oh, and you might want to get that checked out,” he said to Stewart.
“I’ll drive you,” said Charlie, beckoning to him.
“I’ll see Zan safely home,” said Owen.
Charlie had been driving for ten minutes when she stopped at a light. She turned and looked at Stewart. He was crying.
“Oh no. It hurts that bad?” Then she paused. “Oh crap, sorry about Philly. That’s just awful.”
“No, you were totally right. I should have listened to you. I was telling her about my experiments, when she snapped.”
Charlie grimaced and drove the car. “But she wasn’t even a relative of Dr. Arora’s.”
“And even Owen thought something was peculiar about her. Though I thought it was just the awkwardness of being in a new relationship.”
“Sorry,” said Charlie. She drove the last few miles in silence.
Chapter 16
________________________________________
IN THE DISTANT PAST: PORTLAND UNIVERSITY
“Hey, Rory. Are you coming to the party tonight?” asked her friend.
Rory frowned. “I have so much homework. And there are finals on Monday. Why isn’t the party next week?”
“Because there are more parties then too!” he replied.
“Well, thanks, but I’ll see you next week then, after all the chaos is done.”
“OK, bye!” He took off.
Cute guy, but she was more interested in finishing her doctorate than dating at this point.
She smiled and walked up the stairs to the professor’s office.
“Hi, Rory. It’s nice to see you. I have your papers here.” He handed them to her. “Good job! All As!”
“Great. Thanks, Professor Higgins. I appreciate all your mentoring to get where I am today.”
He smiled at her, but his bright blue eyes were just a little bit creepy.
“Well, I have a proposal for you,” he said.
“Yes?” she asked, uncomfortably.
“There is no need for you to take the chem exam on Monday, as we both know you’ll ace it.”
“What?” she asked. “Is this a joke?”
He laughed. “No, I mean, I do this for you, and you do something for me.”
“So, you’re taking my exam?” she asked him.
“No, I’ll just provide a complete one, with a mistake or two of course, to make it look real.”
Rory was confused.
Then he reached around and grabbed her.
PRESENT DAY: DOWNTOWN PORTLAND
“Will Stewart be OK?” asked Owen.
“Yeah, he’s tough,” said Charlie. “Don’t let his nice guy app
eal fool you.”
“Those pink shirts though! Why?” exclaimed Zan.
The three teens were sitting down for dinner at the local vegan Chinese food eatery, seeing as everyone was too freaked out to eat pizza. But the pizza place was all over the news, offering a special promo, and the public was being supportive, understanding that a worker had deliberately poisoned the soda. The health department had gone in and tossed out all the food and beverages, and a special fund was created to help the restaurant get back on its feet.
“It sounds like that pizza place is on the rebound,” said Zan, finishing up watching the news on her smartphone.
“Yeah, but what happens to Julian?” asked Owen.
“Well, he’s still in the jail and not willing to leave. I think everyone is happy with that.”
“I think they will say he was being blackmailed into doing it. But he’s lost his job and any references,” explained Zan.
“That is still so unfair,” said Owen. “Why would Dr. Arora do that? Like, destroy people’s lives for no reason.”
“Yeah, if she messed with my life, I’d kill her,” said Charlie in anger. She bit into her tofu and grimaced.
“Ha-ha! Yeah, me too!” said Zan.
“And I heard that Sebastian is on the run. Jay wants to find him and make him confess, so he can get Julian off,” Zan added.
“That’s going to be tough,” said Charlie, “seeing as it was Julian on the video camera who put the rat poison into the mayor’s soda.”
“Jay thinks that he can get Sebastian to confess that he forced Julian to do it, otherwise, he would kill Julian’s parents.”
“I hope that works,” said Charlie.
Owen finished off the remnants of his meal. “Um, not bad for plants,” he said.
“Yeah, this actually tasted pretty good,” said Zan.
“Yeah, not bad,” said Charlie. “Though I can never get used to this tofu.” She tentatively ate the last bite.
“Should we send flowers to Stewart?” asked Owen.
The others nodded as they finished their meals.
“He’ll like that,” replied Charlie.
“I can’t help but wonder what Dr. Arora is up to now. What could possibly cause her to go this crazy? Crazy enough to turn people into zombies, but still think she’s helping them?” Owen pondered aloud.
“I don’t know. People are weird,” said Charlie.
“You got that right. Well, I have to go home and dress up Major Fluff in a cute little dress and take some selfies.” Zan stood up and grabbed her garbage.
zzz
Dr. Arora walked back and forth. This new body was something, but she would get used to it. She smirked. Then she frowned. She remembered something from her past. That terrible man had groped her, but she had managed to break free of his grasp.
After it had happened, he had threatened her with a gun and told her that she’d never be a doctor if she reported it. She had raced out of his office and down the stairs. She had tried to appear normal while trying to figure out what to do. And then her friend Marcia had run up to her.
“I hate men. I’m going to kill them all,” she said.
Rory took a deep breath. “What happened? Why?”
“That stupid ass dumped me! Can you believe it? I’m the heir to a vast fortune. That goon is going to drop out of school. He should have stayed with me if he knew what was best.”
“I’m so sorry to hear that,” said Rory. “Hug?”
“Oh yes, thanks!” She received her hug. “You look a bit sad too. What’s up?”
Rory laughed. “Boy troubles too.”
“Say, what’s that in the bag?” She just noticed Rory holding a brown paper bag.
“Oh these? Why they contain the next big scourge on mankind¬— Ophiocordyceps.”
“That’s a fungi, right? Zombie fungi?” Marcia laughed. She could always count on Rory to cheer her up.
“Yes, it infests ants. However, they brought a monkey into the school that had a bad skin infection. And guess what it contained? This fungi! And the monkey was infected! The monkey bit the scientist!”
“No!” said Marcia, forgetting about what had happened.
“It’s just like with the Ophiocordyceps. It controls its host, and makes it do what it wants, until the fungi reach the ant’s brains and encourage it to start chowing down.”
“Wow. That’s quite the discovery.”
“I know. And so, I’m in the testing lab. We’re running all sorts of experiments.”
“Cool! Can I help?” asked Marcia with great interest.
“Sure thing. We need an assistant.”
“Really? That would be great!” She smiled at Rory, fully expecting her to protest. After all, Rory had managed far bigger projects than this during her last year of med school.
“Sounds good. See you in the lab,” she said, smirking. She said goodbye to her friend, and then went off to her dormitory to get washed up.
After she had showered, she thought about what had happened. She actually grinned and laughed. Wasn’t the professor so lucky to have found her? Because she was going to experiment on him from now on.
Dr. Arora’s mind brought her back to the present.
She walked down to the basement of her house. She pulled out a box from her storage closet. Inside it were newspaper clippings.
“1st Human Ever Infested with Ophiocordyceps Zombie Plague Dies a Savage, Brutal Death.”
She had a good laugh over it. She also had a good laugh over when he found out what he was infected with. He had actually given her $200,000 to find a cure, even though he knew it was her who had jabbed him with the needle. She had told him that she had developed a good drug to make his erection last longer.
She was certain that every student he had preyed upon had been happy to read that headline.
She put the clipping away. She wanted to go and have a bath as the current home for her soul had questionable body hygiene, and she really wanted to get her house in order, among other things.
zzz
“Things reveal themselves at the right time,” said Stewart. He was looking through the lens of his microscope, trying not to wince at the pain in his shoulder. He really should be resting, yet he had a thought after watching a nature show on television. He had quickly visited the Internet, and then he had printed out a photo, which was now pasted to his mirror.
“Bingo!” he said, pulling the paper down. “It’s a match!” He smiled proudly at his achievement. He was no scientist. He was a biology teacher, but he had identified something unusual. Then the pain in his arm got worse, so he decided to go and lie down for a bit before he called his team with the news.
zzz
Julian paced the cell.
“How is it going?” asked Sergeant Bourne.
“Fine,” he replied, “if it means I can’t hurt anyone.”
“Yeah, well, your parents are kicking up a storm. I need to find Sebastian and fast, to get you out of here.”
“OK,” said Julian. “Can I help?”
“Yes, anything about where he hangs out. Where would he go?”
Julian sat down on the cot. “If I were a zinion, where would I go?”
“Exactly,” said Bourne.
“Well, he’s probably at the skateboard park or the pool hall.”
“I already have those on my list,” said Jay.
“Then why the hell are you here and not out there checking them?” Julian looked up at him.
“I’ll get on it, kid.” Bourne turned and left. He muttered something quiet, something about lack of a budget and staffing, and cops can’t be everywhere all at once.
zzz
“Hi, Jay. What’s up?”
“Hi. I hope you’re feeling better?”
“Not really. I’m just going to lie down and get some rest,” explained Stewart.
“Oh sorry. Anyway, I wanted to ask if you have any idea how Dr. Arora is inhabiting certain people. Is there some way to stop
it from happening again?”
“Let’s see. Well, if you’re worried she is going to inhabit your body, don’t be. So far, it has only been people that she has met in the past. Somehow, she has gotten hair clippings from them. This is based on voodoo principles.”
“OK, but what if she got a hair clipping from me?”
“Well, you’d probably be in danger then.”
“Great. My barber is going to love this.”
“I don’t think you have to worry,” said Stewart. “It also involves magic. And obviously she just can’t take some random guy’s hair as she’s now in the ether. She must have a stash somewhere.”
“OK, so I’m safe then, even if someone runs up to me on the street and pulls my hair,” said Sergeant Bourne.
“That’s right,” said Stewart. “Unless it’s someone else practicing witchcraft. Anything else?”
“Nope, I was just wondering,” he said. “Oh, and if she used all of Julian’s hair, wouldn’t he be safe now?”
“Oh, that’s right,” said Stewart. “Unless she didn’t use it all up, but I doubt that, because the more you have, the greater the chance of success.”
“OK, but I don’t think Julian is leaving that cell until Dr. Arora is banished back to where she came from. Or until I find Sebastian, at least.”
“Yes, that’s understandable. Did you have a chance to follow up with Philly?”
“Well, I would, but she’s still in a medically-induced coma. Oh, and I’m so sorry about that. It’s really sad.”
Chapter 17
________________________________________
While Sergeant Bourne was off investigating, Julian was sitting in his cell. He felt a lot better now. He smirked, as he had led Bourne on a wild-goose chase. He knew exactly where Sebastian was. He’d worked that out during his time spent locked up in this cell.