Undead Much Read online

  So the­re had be­en that fa­mily’s dra­ma to de­al with; then one who­le sec­ti­on of the cli­nic had be­en clo­sed off be­ca­use they’d had to bring in a pri­so­ner from the con­ta­in­ment cen­ter down­town-a girl suf­fe­ring from se­izu­res ca­used by wor­king too much black ma­gic. It had ta­ken me all of ten se­conds to fi­gu­re out who that was. Jess was the only black-ma­gic ar­tist pre­sently be­ing held at the SA fa­ci­lity in Lit­tle Rock. So I got to lis­ten to my for­mer BFF try to swal­low her own ton­gue whi­le I was sit­ting in the wa­iting ro­om. Re­al­ly fun. Re­al­ly.

  That she was still de­aling with the fal­lo­ut of her big bad plan last fall was mo­re dis­tur­bing than I tho­ught it wo­uld be. No mat­ter that she’d plan­ned to kill me and was a comp­le­te, psycho nut­ca­se, I still didn’t want her to be bra­in da­ma­ged for li­fe… or wor­se.

  “Me­gan?” Mom’s hand on my sho­ul­der was just the whis­per of a to­uch, but it still ma­de me jump. “Are you okay?”

  “Ye­ah. I’m fi­ne.” I co­uldn’t worry abo­ut Jess right now. I had plenty of my own crap to de­al with. “I think I’ll ta­ke a sho­wer. My ha­ir is… ” I fro­ze in the hall out­si­de the kitc­hen and threw my arms up to ke­ep my pa­rents from go­ing any furt­her.

  “Me­gan, are you-”

  “The­re’s so­me­one he­re,” I sa­id, cut­ting my mom off with a harsh whis­per. “Or at le­ast so­me­one has be­en he­re. Lo­ok at my back­pack. I didn’t le­ave it li­ke that.”

  On the flo­or a few fe­et away, my L.L. Be­an back­pack lay open, every com­part­ment un­zip­ped and all my bo­oks, prac­ti­ce clot­hes, and ma­ke­up strewn ac­ross the flo­or. Ugh, and Mom’s ro­man­ce no­vel! But ho­pe­ful­ly she wo­uldn’t no­ti­ce I’d li­be­ra­ted Sa­va­ge Kis­ses from un­der her bed in all the ex­ci­te­ment of our ho­use be­ing bro­ken in­to.

  “Gi­ve me yo­ur pho­ne,” Mom sa­id. “I’m cal­ling SA.”

  “No ne­ed. We’re al­re­ady he­re.” El­der Tho­mas step­ped in­to the hall and ac­tu­al­ly had the ner­ve to smi­le when Mom and I scre­amed. Li­ke it was funny that she’d ne­arly sca­red us half to de­ath. The whi­te-ha­ired, gran­nyish-lo­oking wo­man had on­ce be­en my fa­vo­ri­te El­der, but now I won­de­red how I’d fa­iled to see the evil in tho­se rhe­umy blue eyes.

  Okay, not evil, but she cer­ta­inly didn’t ca­re abo­ut me or my fa­mily. She ca­red abo­ut the pres­ti­ge that ha­ving one of the most po­wer­ful yo­ung Set­tlers in ye­ars had bro­ught to her town, and she was de­ter­mi­ned not to lo­se what my fre­aki­ness had ga­ined. The wo­man watc­hed me li­ke a hawk, al­ways re­ady to pra­ise my ac­comp­lish­ments, but even mo­re re­ady to jump all over me when I ma­de a mis­ta­ke. Li­ke she was in a po­si­ti­on to cri­ti­ci­ze. It was her stub­born­ness and SA’s un­wil­ling­ness to be­li­eve te­ena­gers co­uld be de­ep in­to black ma­gic that had al­most got­ten me kil­led last fall. In my opi­ni­on, an­yo­ne with the­ir he­ad that far up the­ir you-know-what sho­uld mind the­ir own bu­si­ness. But that was an opi­ni­on El­der Tho­mas ob­vi­o­usly didn’t sha­re.

  Hen­ce the bre­aking in­to my ho­use and no­sing thro­ugh my things.

  “You went thro­ugh my back­pack?”

  “And yo­ur ro­om. The of­fi­cers are fi­nis­hing up now. We sho­uld be ab­le to le­ave you to yo­ur sho­wer in a few mi­nu­tes.”

  “You’re se­arc­hing my ro­om?” I as­ked, not bot­he­ring to hi­de my out­ra­ge. I’d ma­na­ged to ta­ke down at le­ast six we­ird zom­bi­es whi­le ke­eping myself and Mo­ni­ca ali­ve. What had I do­ne to de­ser­ve a bunch of pe­op­le pa­wing thro­ugh my things?

  What if they’d fo­und my stash of Bab­y­sit­ter’s Club bo­oks and tho­ught I was an idi­ot who co­uldn’t re­ad age-approp­ri­ate ma­te­ri­al? Or what if, even now, the Pro­to­col of­fi­cers we­re re­ading my di­ary? What if Et­han was re­ading my di­ary, and get­ting an eye­ful abo­ut my gro­ping tor­ment? Grrr… this was so not fa­ir!

  “Yes, we are.” The fri­endly fa­зa­de va­nis­hed, and El­der Tho­mas na­iled me with that cold “I’m as­ses­sing a mu­ta­ted spe­ci­men” lo­ok she did so well. “And we’d li­ke to ask you so­me qu­es­ti­ons. I as­su­med you’d be too ex­ha­us­ted and the mat­ter co­uld wa­it, but yo­ur mo­uth se­ems to be in per­fect wor­king or­der. So if you’d li­ke-”

  “No, I wo­uldn’t li­ke.” Damn stra­ight my mo­uth was in per­fect wor­king or­der. “I didn’t do anyt­hing wrong, and I-”

  “No one is sa­ying you did.” Mom jum­ped in be­fo­re I co­uld say so­met­hing even stu­pi­der. I sho­uldn’t talk back to El­der Tho­mas. She might be inept at ti­mes, but she was an inept per­son who co­uld get me in a heck of a lot of tro­ub­le But I was just so sick of be­ing tre­ated li­ke a fre­ak who had to be in­ves­ti­ga­ted every ti­me so­met­hing stran­ge hap­pe­ned in Ca­rol. “I’m su­re the Pro­to­col of­fi­cers just ne­ed yo­ur sta­te­ment.”

  “Actu­al­ly, I’m al­lo­wing the En­for­ce­ment te­am to hand­le this.”

  “Enfor­ce­ment? But we-”

  Elder Tho­mas cut Mom off. “I’m not at li­berty to dis­cuss the mat­ter. I’m sorry, Jen­ni­fer.”

  “Hey you guys, glad you ma­de it ho­me,” Kitty sa­id as she ma­te­ri­ali­zed next to El­der Tho­mas. “Me­gan, I tho­ught I he­ard you co­me in. Long night.” She smi­led and blin­ked ti­redly be­hind her thick glas­ses.

  Kitty was ba­rely fi­ve fe­et tall and lo­oked mo­re li­ke a re­fu­gee from Re­ven­ge of the Nerds than a mem­ber of the Set­tler sec­ret ser­vi­ce, but I knew bet­ter. The wo­man co­uld kick ma­j­or butt, had a know­led­ge of Set­tler spells and his­tory that was down­right fre­aky, and was the big boss lady over the te­am of En­for­ce­ment of­fi­cers who we­re han­ging out in Ca­rol un­til I was tra­ined and my po­wer was firmly un­der cont­rol.

  “You want to get so­me Do­ri­tos and hang out at the kitc­hen tab­le whi­le we get this over with? I don’t know abo­ut you, but I’m dying for a snack.” She was al­so re­al­ly ni­ce, and I knew I’d for­gi­ve her for let­ting Bar­ker and Smythe turn my back­pack in­si­de out… even­tu­al­ly.

  “I think I’ll just snag a Spri­te,” I sa­id, mo­ving in­to the kitc­hen. “My sto­mach isn’t up to Do­ri­tos, but I’ll get you a bowl.”

  “I’ll be in our ro­om, Jen­ni­fer.” Dad es­ca­ped in­to his and Mom’s ro­om, cle­arly an­no­yed to ha­ve our li­ves in­va­ded aga­in. Po­or Dad, it co­uldn’t be easy be­ing a nor­mal du­de in a world full of zom­bie-figh­ting fre­aks.

  “I’ll get the chips, Me­gan. You and Kitty go ahe­ad and get star­ted. It’s a scho­ol night and I’d li­ke to see you in bed in the next ho­ur.” Mom ur­ged me to­ward the tab­le and be­gan bust­ling abo­ut the kitc­hen, fetc­hing far mo­re bowls than a sing­le ser­ving of Do­ri­tos re­qu­ired. She se­emed… ner­vo­us. I gu­es­sed it was the En­for­ce­ment pre­sen­ce.

  Usu­al­ly a te­am of En­for­ce­ment of­fi­cers se­arc­hing yo­ur ho­use wo­uld be a very, very bad thing. They didn’t get in­vol­ved in lo­cal mat­ters un­less so­me se­ri­o­usly il­le­gal stuff was go­ing down. But Kitty, Bar­ker, and Smythe we­ren’t just any En­for­ce­ment of­fi­cers. They we­re my te­ac­hers, tra­iners, and kind of my fri­ends. We’d all exc­han­ged Christ­mas/Ha­nuk­kah/Kwan­zaa pre­sents, for God’s sa­ke.

  So I didn’t fe­el any hu­ge ne­ed to fre­ak. They we­re pro­bably just hel­ping our lo­cal SA chap­ter out. The Ca­rol Pro­to­col di­vi­si­on was pretty small and no do­ubt unp­re­pa­red to in­ves­ti­ga­te so­met­hing li­ke the zom­bi­es Mo­ni­ca and I had en­co­un­te­red in the wo­ods.

  “Mo­ni­ca told you abo­ut the we­ird RCs, right? That’s what this is abo­ut?” I set­tl
ed in­to my cha­ir with my Spri­te whi­le Kitty pul­led a tiny ta­pe re­cor­der from her poc­ket. Mom set the Do­ri­tos down bet­we­en us and then re­tur­ned to put­te­ring aro­und the kitc­hen, cle­arly in­ten­ding to eavesd­rop, which was fi­ne. I had not­hing to hi­de from her or an­yo­ne el­se.

  “She did, and she was tho­ro­ugh. As usu­al.” Kitty win­ked at me and I smi­led. “But I’d li­ke to con­firm everyt­hing with you. On the re­cord.” She pres­sed the re­cord but­ton and got her of­fi­ci­al vo­ice on. “Inter­vi­ew with Me­gan Berry. Janu­ary thir­te­enth, ap­pro­xi­ma­tely twenty-two hund­red ho­urs.

  “Due to the la­te ho­ur and the fact that Miss Berry suf­fe­red he­ad tra­uma ear­li­er in the eve­ning, this in­ter­vi­ew is pu­rely for the con­fir­ma­ti­on of the in­ci­dent, as per re­gu­la­ti­on fo­ur po­int three, sub­sec­ti­ons a and b. Are you re­ady, Me­gan?”

  “Um, ye­ah. I me­an. Yes.” I cle­ared my thro­at, catc­hing a bit of Mom’s an­xi­ety.

  It was hard not to be an­xi­o­us when Kitty star­ted so­un­ding li­ke the FBI-type per­son she re­al­ly was. I ma­de a vow right then to ke­ep my vo­ice fri­endly when con­duc­ting En­for­cer in­ter­vi­ews. As­su­ming, of co­ur­se, that I en­ded up be­co­ming an En­for­cer li­ke ever­yo­ne and the­ir sis­ter’s fri­end’s dog wan­ted me to be.

  “Okay.” Kitty smi­led aga­in, ob­vi­o­usly trying to put me at ease. “When did you first no­ti­ce the Out-of-Gra­ve Phe­no­me­non?”

  “Abo­ut ten mi­nu­tes af­ter I got to the car wash. Pro­bably aro­und fi­ve? I smel­led so­met­hing funny, then he­ard gro­aning, so I grab­bed Mo­ni­ca-um, Miss Par­sons-and we he­aded in­to the wo­ods.”

  “You smel­led so­met­hing? Co­uld you be mo­re spe­ci­fic?” she as­ked, and I did my best to desc­ri­be the smell of the herbs I’d no­ti­ced. “Gre­at. So you en­te­red the wo­ods unob­ser­ved by any hu­man wit­nes­ses?”

  “The ot­her mem­bers of the pom squ­ad and the guy get­ting his car was­hed saw us.”

  “But they didn’t see the Out-of-Gra­ve Phe­no­me­non?”

  “I don’t think so. No one ca­me to lo­ok for us un­til we’d jo­ined po­wer and-”

  “We’ll get to that in just a se­cond. First, co­uld you tell me how many Re­ani­ma­ted Corp­ses you ob­ser­ved and bri­efly out­li­ne any unu­su­al tra­its they may ha­ve had?”

  I to­ok my ti­me desc­ri­bing as much as I co­uld re­mem­ber abo­ut the stran­ge RCs-the­ir fast mo­ve­ments, the lack of red eyes, the pink che­eks and ap­pa­rent ab­sen­ce of gra­ve dirt or any re­al signs of de­com­po­si­ti­on.

  “So you’re sa­ying they ap­pe­ared to be ali­ve?” she as­ked ca­su­al­ly, as if that we­ren’t a hu­ge we­ird de­al.

  “Well… I gu­ess. I me­an, the two I got re­al­ly clo­se to we­re pretty pa­le, but the­ir skin wasn’t cold or stiff.” I hadn’t tho­ught of it at the ti­me, but Shorty and Baldy’s hands had be­en warm. “But they we­re both re­al­ly strong, li­ke zom­bie strong, and they de­fi­ni­tely wan­ted a pi­ece of me.”

  “They tri­ed to bi­te you?” Kitty’s eyes nar­ro­wed just the sligh­test bit and a sha­dow pas­sed over her fa­ce. If she we­re so­me­one el­se, I wo­uld ha­ve sa­id she do­ub­ted my ho­nesty. But this was Kitty. She knew I wasn’t a li­ar, es­pe­ci­al­ly abo­ut so­met­hing li­ke this. So why was she lo­oking at me li­ke that?

  “Se­ve­ral ti­mes. I ma­na­ged to stop them, but it wasn’t easy. No­ne of the com­mands we­re wor­king, even the pax fra­ter. I don’t know what we wo­uld ha­ve do­ne if com­bi­ning our po­wer for the re­ver­to spell hadn’t wor­ked,” I sa­id, a hint of ac­cu­sa­ti­on cre­eping in­to my to­ne. “You ne­ver told us the­re we­re RCs that didn’t res­pond to spells. That wo­uld ha­ve be­en a go­od thing to know, you know. Li­ke, be­fo­re we al­most di­ed.”

  Kitty sig­hed and to­ok off her glas­ses to rub her eyes. “All Re­ani­ma­ted Corp­ses will res­pond to Set­tler com­mands if the­re’s suf­fi­ci­ent po­wer be­hind the spell and a ma­na­ge­ab­le num­ber of Out-of-Gra­ve Phe­no­me­nons. Ne­ver in the his­tory of our pe­op­le ha­ve we had a do­cu­men­ted ca­se of-”

  “But, I swe­ar, the­re we­re only se­ven, fo­ur at first, and they didn’t-”

  “Ne­ver ha­ve we had a do­cu­men­ted ca­se of Re­ani­ma­ted Corp­ses be­ha­ving as you’ve desc­ri­bed.” Kitty slid her glas­ses back in­to pla­ce and na­iled me with her cle­ar gray eyes. “I’m af­ra­id I can’t tell you any mo­re at this ti­me, but be as­su­red yo­ur tra­ining in how to ma­na­ge the Un­de­ad has be­en tho­ro­ugh.”

  “Then what we­re tho­se things?”

  She lo­oked sorry for me for a se­cond, but ap­pa­rently not sorry eno­ugh to ans­wer my qu­es­ti­on. “Me­gan, co­uld you tell me one mo­re thing?” she as­ked, sud­denly very in­te­res­ted in typing so­met­hing in­to her Black­Ber­ry. “Whe­re we­re you bet­we­en fo­ur o’clock and fi­ve o’clock this af­ter­no­on?”

  “I was-”

  “She was right he­re. Eating la­sag­na with her fa­mily, ” Mom in­ter­rup­ted in a sup­re­mely pis­sed vo­ice. She’s a ve­ge­ta­ri­an and nor­mal­ly way mo­re hippy than mi­li­tant, but on­ce you ma­ke her angry she can be pretty scary. “And this in­ter­vi­ew is over.”

  CHAPTER 5

  “Jen­ni­fer, ple­ase,” Kitty sa­id. “I’m not trying to-”

  “Oh, I know exactly what you’re trying to do. You’re trying to trick an in­no­cent six­te­en-ye­ar-old with a he­ad inj­ury in­to be­ing in­ter­ro­ga­ted wit­ho­ut the be­ne­fit of rep­re­sen­ta­ti­on.” Mom grab­bed the chips from the tab­le and set them down on the is­land be­hind her with lo­ud thunk. Cle­arly, hos­pi­ta­lity ti­me was over. “If Me­gan is a sus­pect, you’ll ne­ed the pro­per pa­per­work, and we’re go­ing to ne­ed a me­di­ator.”

  Set­tlers don’t ha­ve law­yers, but me­di­ators are ba­si­cal­ly the sa­me thing. They step in and ma­de su­re pe­op­le sus­pec­ted of wrong­do­ing are tre­ated fa­irly un­til the­ir gu­ilt or in­no­cen­ce is de­ter­mi­ned. Af­ter SA had de­ci­ded to try Beth and Jess in Set­tler co­urt, a me­di­ator had be­en res­pon­sib­le for get­ting Beth’s sen­ten­ce trans­mit­ted to a stay in a men­tal fa­ci­lity ins­te­ad of Set­tler Af­fa­irs pri­son. Tests had shown she was de­aling with a bunch of dif­fe­rent di­sor­ders and was a go­od can­di­da­te for re­ha­bi­li­ta­ti­on on­ce her me­mory had be­en wi­ped by En­for­ce­ment.

  If Mom tho­ught we ne­eded a me­di­ator…

  “Okay, let’s just calm down,” I sa­id, cer­ta­in the ma­ter­nal unit was over­re­ac­ting. Kitty was my fri­end. She’d ne­ver think I had anyt­hing to do with tho­se we­ird zom­bi­es. “I didn’t do anyt­hing wrong and I’m su­re Kitty and-”

  “Don’t say anot­her word,” Mom sa­id, po­in­ting a firm fin­ger at me be­fo­re tur­ning back to Kitty. “I’d li­ke you and yo­ur te­am out of my ho­use.”

  “Mom! Ple­ase, stop it.”

  “Be qu­i­et, Me­gan, and… and go to yo­ur ro­om!”

  “My ro­om is full of En­for­cers!” I jum­ped to my fe­et so fast my cha­ir clat­te­red to the gro­und be­hind me. “And this is crazy! I didn’t ma­ke tho­se zom­bi­es, if that’s what ever­yo­ne’s thin­king. Use a lie-de­tec­tor charm on me, I swe­ar it will-”

  “I do­ubt the charm wo­uld work, Me­gan. You’re too po­wer­ful.” The way Kitty sa­id the words ma­de it cle­ar she didn’t think my po­wer was all it was crac­ked up to be. Gre­at. Ne­it­her did I.

  “Then find so­me ot­her way to test me. I’m tel­ling the truth.”

  “Me­gan, lis­ten to me,” Mom beg­ged. “You ne­ed to be very ca­re­ful what you say.”

  “But I-”

 
; “Yo­ur mom’s right. You sho­uldn’t say anyt­hing el­se.” Kitty flip­ped off her re­cor­der with a soft sigh and pus­hed back her cha­ir. “I’ll ha­ve the pa­per­work fi­led by to­mor­row mor­ning. You’ll get yo­ur copy by early Thurs­day at the la­test. Af­ter that, it will be yo­ur res­pon­si­bi­lity to fi­le a pe­ti­ti­on for rep­re­sen­ta­ti­on. In the me­an­ti­me, it wo­uld pro­bably be best if Me­gan didn’t dis­cuss this with an­yo­ne ot­her than fa­mily mem­bers who, as you know, can’t be cal­led upon to tes­tify aga­inst her in a fe­lony ca­se.”

  “Fe­lony?” It felt li­ke all the air had be­en suc­ked from my lungs.

  I’d bent the ru­les a few ti­mes, su­re, but what ma­de Kitty and her te­am think I’d com­mit­ted a fe­lony? A fe­lony was li­ke… using black ma­gic to mur­der so­me­one or so­met­hing hor­rib­le! Even the ti­me SA tho­ught I’d ac­ci­den­tal­ly sum­mo­ned a bunch of RC clo­nes, no one had sa­id anyt­hing abo­ut me­di­ators or fe­lo­ni­es.

  An ac­ci­dent! May­be this was so­met­hing I’d do­ne by ac­ci­dent. I still didn’t ha­ve to­tal cont­rol over my po­wer, so it was pos­sib­le.

  “What if I did so­met­hing wit­ho­ut kno­wing I did it?” I as­ked, hur­rying on be­fo­re Mom co­uld tell me to shut up aga­in. “Li­ke the ti­me they tho­ught I ma­de tho­se clo­nes?”

  “Not this ti­me.” Kitty’s to­ne al­lo­wed no ro­om for ar­gu­ment.

  “We’re fi­nis­hed in her ro­om.” Bar­ker, anot­her of my En­for­cer tra­iners, ap­pe­ared in the ent­ran­ce to the kitc­hen.

  He was so tall his he­ad ne­arly hit the top of the do­orf­ra­me and so wi­de he had to stand at an ang­le to ke­ep his sho­ul­ders from hit­ting the si­des. The du­de was big eno­ugh to be flat-out scary and usu­al­ly had a scowl on his fa­ce that comp­le­ted the “fe­ar me” lo­ok, but now he just lo­oked sad. And di­sap­po­in­ted.

  My Spri­te gurg­led sickly in my sto­mach as I re­ali­zed I was the one who had put that lo­ok on his fa­ce. Or wha­te­ver he tho­ught I’d do­ne. The man co­uld ba­rely lo­ok at me, which ma­de me sad. And angry.