Undead Much Read online

  CHAPTER 6

  Three ho­urs and a fru­it­less se­arch thro­ugh the wo­ods for clu­es la­ter, Et­han and I we­re sne­aking down the sta­irs at the Uni­ver­sity Me­di­cal Cen­ter, bo­und for the mor­gue. That’s right, the mor­gue, whe­re they cut de­ad pe­op­le open and po­ke at the­ir in­si­des and then stick them in cold sto­ra­ge.

  It was fre­aking cre­epy, even for a zom­bie Set­tler who re­gu­larly kic­ked it with de­ad pe­op­le. I swo­re I co­uld smell the hor­rib­le mix of cold flesh and an­ti­sep­tic and in­dust­ri­al cle­aner waf­ting thro­ugh the air, and we still had three mo­re flights to go.

  “You’re su­re this is a go­od idea?” I shi­ve­red even as I wi­ped my swe­aty palms on my je­ans. How was it pos­sib­le to be both swe­aty and fre­ezing at the sa­me ti­me? “Don’t you think they’ll ha­ve se­cu­rity?”

  “Se­cu­rity for what? The pe­op­le down he­re aren’t go­ing anyw­he­re.”

  “I don’t know, se­cu­rity to, li­ke, pro­tect the bo­di­es,” I sa­id, trying to disc­re­etly bre­at­he thro­ugh my mo­uth. “To ma­ke su­re mur­de­rers don’t co­me down he­re and dest­roy evi­den­ce or so­met­hing.”

  “You’ve be­en watc­hing too much Law & Or­der.”

  “I ne­ver watch Law & Or­der. I don’t ha­ve ti­me for TV.” Which wasn’t en­ti­rely true, but when I did ha­ve ti­me, I didn’t watch cri­me shows.

  I’m mo­re of a re­al­ly he­ino­us re­ality-TV kind of per­son, tho­ugh I wo­uld ne­ver ad­mit that to Et­han. He li­kes to watch films. Not just mo­vi­es, but films, and I knew he wo­uldn’t be imp­res­sed with my ad­dic­ti­on to En­ga­ged & Un­de­ra­ge and Wi­fe Swap.

  “And what abo­ut se­cu­rity ca­me­ras? Don’t you think-”

  “Me­gan, if you don’t want to go, you don’t ha­ve to, but we both ag­ree that the mor­gue is the most lo­gi­cal pla­ce in the hos­pi­tal to lo­ok for clu­es abo­ut we­ird zom­bi­es. It’s the only pla­ce we’re li­kely to find a con­cent­ra­ti­on of corp­ses. Right?”

  “Right. You’re right.” I sig­hed and ga­ve up trying to dry my hands as we des­cen­ded the fi­nal flight of sta­irs. Ob­vi­o­usly my swe­at glands we­re as su­per-po­we­red as the rest of me. “I don’t know why I’m be­ing such a chic­ken.”

  “Be­ca­use mor­gu­es are cre­epy and the smell is se­ri­o­usly dis­tur­bing?”

  I ma­na­ged a tiny la­ugh. “I tho­ught I was ima­gi­ning how bad the smell was.”

  “No way, it’s aw­ful.” He smi­led be­fo­re tur­ning to pe­ek thro­ugh the do­or in front of us.

  I saw bright flu­ores­cent lights and cle­an whi­te walls and ca­ught a whiff of cof­fee mi­xed with the de­ad che­mi­cal smell. I co­uldn’t de­ci­de if that ma­de it bet­ter or wor­se, but at le­ast it re­min­ded me that the­re we­re li­ving pe­op­le down he­re. Pe­op­le who wo­uld ha­ve to be de­alt with if we wan­ted to get our in­for­ma­ti­on.

  “Okay, what’s our story aga­in? We’re col­le­ge kids do­ing a re­port for our cul­tu­ral anth­ro­po­logy class?”

  “Ye­ah, let me grab a no­te­bo­ok and pen from yo­ur back­pack so we’ll lo­ok of­fi­ci­al.” He clo­sed the do­or and tur­ned me aro­und so he co­uld get to the zip­per of my bag.

  “Get me one too,” I sa­id, tho­ugh I won­de­red if I’d even be ab­le to hold a pen with the amo­unt of palm swe­at I was pre­sently pro­du­cing. “And sho­uldn’t we ha­ve a the­sis or so­met­hing in ca­se they ask?”

  “Li­ke what?”

  “I don’t know, li­ke, In­ves­ti­ga­ting Ri­tu­als of De­ath in the Twenty-first Cen­tury?”

  “Did I ever tell you how to­tal­ly hot it is when you get all smarty­pants?” Et­han fi­nis­hed dig­ging aro­und in my back­pack and han­ded me a no­te­bo­ok and pen.

  I smi­led. “Not as many ti­mes as you told me you lo­ve that stu­pid hat.”

  “That hat is not stu­pid. It’s sexy.” He le­aned down to kiss me, which was gre­at for a se­cond. But then I star­ted to get this we­ird fe­eling… li­ke so­me­one was watc­hing. Everyt­hing was qu­i­et and I hadn’t he­ard a do­or open or clo­se, but the cer­ta­inty that we we­ren’t alo­ne qu­ickly grew so strong I tho­ught I’d go crazy if I didn’t check for pe­eping cre­eps.

  “Sorry.” I pul­led away and glan­ced up. Not­hing. The­re was no one the­re. But still, the fe­eling we we­ren’t alo­ne didn’t go away. May­be I was suf­fe­ring from pa­ra­no­id de­lu­si­ons as well as pro­fu­se palm swe­at.

  “Is so­met­hing wrong?”

  “No… my lips we­re just cold,” I sa­id, not wan­ting him to think I was chic­ke­ning out aga­in.

  “Oh, okay.” Et­han lo­oked a lit­tle hurt, but shrug­ged li­ke it was no big de­al. “I’m sorry. I sho­uld ha­ve ma­de you ta­ke my co­at. He­re, ta­ke it now.”

  “No, it’s fi­ne. It’s just my lips.”

  “Me­gan, ta­ke my co­at.”

  “No, re­al­ly, it’s-”

  “Ta­ke the stu­pid co­at,” he sa­id, lo­ud eno­ugh I was af­ra­id so­me­one wo­uld he­ar. Gre­at, now he was mad at me. Ge­ez. So­me­ti­mes it se­emed li­ke things bet­we­en us we­re easi­er be­fo­re we threw all the kissy stuff in­to the mix.

  “Fi­ne.” I ditc­hed my back­pack, put on his brown cor­du­roy jac­ket-which did fe­el go­od and smel­led yum­mily of Et­han-and then grab­bed the pack off the gro­und. “Re­ady?”

  “Let’s go.” Et­han ope­ned the do­or for me, but he still didn’t lo­ok happy. I was go­ing to ha­ve to ma­ke it up to him by pro­ving how ad­dic­ti­ve I fo­und his kis­ses… la­ter, in all my spa­re ti­me, when I wasn’t trying to avo­id go­ing to ja­il.

  We fo­und the front-desk guy wit­hin a few mi­nu­tes of easing in­to the blin­dingly whi­te hall. The mor­gue was a lot smal­ler than I’d tho­ught it wo­uld be, even tho­ugh I knew Lit­tle Rock had a lot of hos­pi­tals and they each had the­ir own cold sto­ra­ge. It wasn’t li­ke the uni­ver­sity mor­gue had to be big eno­ugh to hand­le all the stiffs in town.

  Tho­ugh that su­re wo­uld ha­ve ma­de it easi­er. If the­re we­re one cent­ral hol­ding area, we wo­uldn’t ha­ve had to worry abo­ut in­ves­ti­ga­ting fi­ve or six dif­fe­rent hos­pi­tals trying to fi­gu­re out whe­re the we­ird zom­bi­es had co­me from. That is, if they had even co­me from a hos­pi­tal and we we­ren’t on so­me kind of wild go­ose cha­se.

  “Hey, we’re stu­dents from Wil­li­ams and we­re ho­ping we co­uld ask a few qu­es­ti­ons.” Et­han qu­ickly fil­led the skinny guy at the desk in on our co­ver story and as­ked if the­re was so­me­one aro­und who might be wil­ling to talk to us.

  “So­me­one li­ke who?” he as­ked, pic­king at a dry pi­ece of skin on the si­de of his no­se. The guy lo­oked bo­red out of his mind, not a con­di­ti­on I wo­uld ha­ve tho­ught ap­pli­ed in his kind of work. But then aga­in, I got ti­red of my job so­me­ti­mes, and I work with the de­ad. And my de­ad pe­op­le walk and talk and are ge­ne­ral­ly far mo­re in­te­res­ting than yo­ur ave­ra­ge corp­se.

  “Li­ke, may­be a mor­gue su­per­vi­sor,” I sa­id. “So­me­one who knows everyt­hing that go­es down aro­und he­re.”

  “That wo­uld be Dr. Black­mon, but he’s not he­re to­day.”

  “Oh… well is the­re an­yo­ne el­se who co­uld help us? We only ne­ed a few mi­nu­tes,” Et­han sa­id with his most char­ming grin. Too bad bo­red skinny guy-Ca­leb, ac­cor­ding to his na­me tag-didn’t se­em to res­pond to charm.

  But may­be he’d res­pond to a lit­tle ex­ci­te­ment inj­ec­ted in­to his humd­rum li­fe.

  “Anyo­ne who’s be­en he­re in the past few days wo­uld work. We just ne­ed so­me­one who might be ab­le to exp­la­in all the we­ird stuff that’s be­en hap­pe­ning.” I did my best to ig­n
o­re the scowl on Et­han’s fa­ce. Su­re, this wasn’t the plan, but so­me­ti­mes a girl had to imp­ro­vi­se.

  “We­ird stuff?” Ca­leb per­ked up. Not much, but at le­ast he stop­ped har­ves­ting de­ad skin from his no­se. Ew much? So­me­one sho­uld ha­ve ta­ught him pe­eling de­ad skin was an ac­ti­vity best do­ne in pri­va­te be­fo­re he re­ac­hed his twen­ti­es.

  “Ye­ah, we he­ard the­re’s be­en so­me is­su­es with the bo­di­es,” I sa­id va­gu­ely.

  I co­uldn’t get too spe­ci­fic sin­ce I had no idea if the zom­bi­es I’d wor­ked the spell on last night re­tur­ned to this mor­gue or not-if they had co­me from a mor­gue at all. The re­ver­to spell was in­ten­ded to send a corp­se back to the per­son who had ra­ised it for a qu­ick bi­te and from the­re back to its gra­ve. So I wasn’t su­re whe­re the RCs wo­uld go if they had be­en mor­gue re­si­dents and not in pos­ses­si­on of gra­ves just yet. If they hadn’t he­aded back to the­ir loc­kers he­re at UMC, mis­sing bo­di­es wo­uld cer­ta­inly be we­ird.

  But even if they had, su­rely so­me­one wo­uld ha­ve no­ti­ced that one of them had sin­ged pa­j­amas and that all of the­ir fe­et we­re filthy from trom­ping abo­ut in the fo­rest and-

  No sho­es! The zom­bi­es last night hadn’t be­en we­aring sho­es. Duh, I sho­uld ha­ve tho­ught abo­ut that be­fo­re, but I’d be­en so fo­cu­sed on the pa­j­amas that the­ir fe­et hadn’t cros­sed my mind. I’d se­en a co­up­le Un­set­tled who we­re bu­ri­ed in the­ir PJs in my ti­me, but every Out-of-Gra­ve Phe­no­me­non I’d got­ten a clo­se lo­ok at had spor­ted so­me kind of fo­ot­we­ar. Pe­op­le didn’t li­ke to bury the­ir lo­ved ones wit­ho­ut sho­es, even if it’s just a pa­ir of bunny slip­pers.

  I was go­ing to ha­ve to sha­re this new clue with Et­han ASAP.

  “I ha­ven’t he­ard abo­ut anyt­hing out of the or­di­nary aro­und he­re, but…” Ca­leb nar­ro­wed his eyes and le­aned a bit clo­ser. “But the­re’s de­fi­ni­tely so­met­hing go­ing on ups­ta­irs. The­re we­re po­li­ce­men all over the hos­pi­tal to­day.”

  “Re­al­ly?” Et­han as­ked. I co­uld tell he was ex­ci­ted, but trying not to show it.

  “Ye­ah, the­re wasn’t a pastry left in the ca­fe­te­ria by lunch. Not even a sta­le be­ar claw. I tho­ught that stuff abo­ut cops and do­nuts was just so­me stu­pid ste­re­oty­pe, but it’s to­tal­ly true. I had to ha­ve a non­fat yo­gurt for des­sert. It was dis­gus­ting.” He snif­fed, and his eyes be­ca­me dis­tant and un­fo­cu­sed as he slip­ped in­to de­ep tho­ught mo­de. “I think it might ha­ve be­en ex­pi­red, but the da­te was rub­bed off the la­bel so I co­uldn’t be su­re.”

  God, this guy was fas­ci­na­ting. Sno­re. Ti­me to get him back on track. “So what we­re they do­ing he­re, be­si­des scar­fing down su­gar-co­ated carbs?” I as­ked. “Did you talk to any of them? Did they ask you any qu­es­ti­ons?”

  “No, they we­ren’t in­te­res­ted in tal­king to the ba­se­ment dwel­lers.” Ca­leb sig­hed and re­tur­ned to his skin pic­king. “And no one at my tab­le knew what they we­re up to. It’s be­ing kept very hush-hush, tho­ugh, so it must be so­met­hing big. The su­its we­re in an up­ro­ar, scen­ting law­su­it in the wind.”

  “Wow, so­unds se­ri­o­us.” Et­han scrib­bled so­met­hing on his no­te­pad and then to­re off the pi­ece of pa­per. “Wo­uld you be wil­ling to call us if you he­ar anyt­hing mo­re?”

  “Su­re, but we­ren’t you he­re to le­arn abo­ut the mor­gue?” Ca­leb lo­oked sus­pi­ci­o­usly from me to Et­han.

  “My mom is a re­por­ter for the Ar­kan­sas Sen­ti­nel Ga­zet­te,” Et­han sa­id, the lie fal­ling from his lips wit­ho­ut a mo­ment’s he­si­ta­ti­on. “I try to ke­ep an ear out for sto­ri­es I think she might be in­te­res­ted in, and this so­unds li­ke it has scan­dal po­ten­ti­al. She’d want to in­ter­vi­ew you if she gets the sco­op. As a sec­ret in­for­mant, of co­ur­se.”

  Ca­leb nod­ded and glan­ced down at the num­ber, cle­arly int­ri­gu­ed by the idea of be­ing a sec­ret in­for­mant. “Co­ol. I’ll gi­ve you a call if I he­ar anyt­hing el­se. And I’ll ask Dr. Black­mon if he has ti­me to ans­wer a few qu­es­ti­ons. May­be you co­uld even in­ter­vi­ew him on the pho­ne, sa­ve you a trip down to the crypt.”

  Well now, wasn’t he help­ful? We sho­uld ha­ve told him we we­re re­por­ters from the be­gin­ning. “That wo­uld be gre­at. Thanks so much-we re­al­ly ap­pre­ci­ate it,” I sa­id, be­aming down at him.

  Ca­leb re­tur­ned my smi­le, his grin trans­for­ming his pa­le, scrawny fa­ce in­to so­met­hing a lot mo­re ap­pro­ac­hab­le-if he’d qu­it the skin-pic­king thing, of co­ur­se.

  Ethan and I than­ked him and he­aded back ups­ta­irs. This ti­me, ho­we­ver, we went ahe­ad and used the ele­va­tor. No ne­ed to skulk. It didn’t se­em li­ke an­yo­ne ca­red that we we­re he­re. Et­han had be­en right-I’d ob­vi­o­usly be­en smel­ling dan­ger whe­re the­re was no­ne. Spe­aking of dan­ger…

  “Hey, I ha­ve to get back to scho­ol. My pa­rents didn’t go to work this mor­ning, so I’m not su­re whet­her they’ll be in the par­king lot af­ter pom prac­ti­ce or not. So­me­ti­mes Mom shows up unex­pec­tedly.”

  “Ye­ah, abo­ut yo­ur mom…”

  “Ye­ah?” I as­ked, a funny fe­eling in my sto­mach. “What abo­ut her?”

  “Elder Tho­mas ga­ve Kitty a fi­le last night and it had yo­ur mom’s na­me on it,” he sa­id. “You ha­ve any idea what that’s abo­ut? Why she wo­uld be dig­ging up stuff on yo­ur mom when you’re the one they sus­pect of ra­ising the­se zom­bi­es?”

  “I don’t know. El­der Tho­mas sa­id so­met­hing abo­ut a ‘mis­ta­ke’ Mom ma­de last night, but I ha­ven’t be­en ab­le to get the fo­ur-one-one,” I sa­id, unab­le to be­li­eve I’d for­got­ten to sha­re that with Et­han. So­me in­ves­ti­ga­tor I was. “Do you think it might ha­ve so­met­hing to do with when Mom and Dad got re­lo­ca­ted to Ar­kan­sas?”

  “Co­uld be.” He nod­ded, but I co­uld tell he wasn’t to­tal­ly con­vin­ced. “I’ll see what I can dig up over at SA he­ad­qu­ar­ters.”

  “I co­uld go with you.” I sud­denly didn’t want to be se­pa­ra­ted from Et­han, and the sus­pi­ci­on that my mom was hi­ding so­met­hing ma­de me a lot less wor­ri­ed abo­ut not be­ing the­re for her to pick me up.

  “No, you’re right, you sho­uld get back to class. I’ll drop you be­hind the gym just in ca­se yo­ur pa­rents are par­ked out front,” he sa­id as we exi­ted the ele­va­tor and he­aded to­ward the par­king ga­ra­ge. “Then I’ll pro­bably co­me back he­re and do a lit­tle mo­re po­king aro­und be­fo­re he­ading to he­ad­qu­ar­ters. De­fi­ni­tely so­unds li­ke so­met­hing big went down.”

  “True, but we can’t be su­re it was Un­de­ad-re­la­ted.” I ha­ted to be the vo­ice of do­om, but I was do­ing my best not to get too ex­ci­ted. This co­uld still be not­hing and we co­uld be back whe­re we star­ted-squ­are one and clu­eless.

  “My gut is tel­ling me to check it out.”

  “Oh, my gut al­so told me so­met­hing,” I sa­id, ex­ci­ted to sha­re my clue. “Whi­le we we­re tal­king to Ca­leb, I re­mem­be­red so­met­hing abo­ut the zom­bi­es last night. They we­ren’t we­aring sho­es!”

  “Re­al­ly? Mo­ni­ca didn’t men­ti­on that in her re­port.”

  “Yep, no sho­es. And they we­re al­so all in the­ir pa­j­amas. I me­an, I think the big guy Mo­ni­ca fo­ught might ha­ve be­en we­aring swe­at­pants and a swe­ats­hirt, but the ot­hers we­re all we­aring PJs.”

  Ethan fro­ze just in­si­de the do­or to the hos­pi­tal and tur­ned to fa­ce me. “Du­des? They we­re all men?”

  “Ye­ah, all fo­ur of them.”

  “What abo­ut the ot­hers? You
sa­id you saw a few mo­re co­ming thro­ugh the wo­ods be­fo­re you and Mo­ni­ca lin­ked up.”

  “I’m not one hund­red per­cent su­re, but I think they we­re guys. Why?”

  “Check the left poc­ket of my co­at,” Et­han sa­id. I re­ac­hed in and pul­led out a ha­ir rib­bon, whi­te with hints of gold stre­aked thro­ugh the fi­bers. “I fo­und that in the wo­ods to­day. I didn’t fi­gu­re it was any big clue, sin­ce things fall off corp­ses all the ti­me, but if it be­longs to so­me­one li­ving we might be ab­le to-”

  “The­se are CHS co­lors,” I sa­id, my an­xi­ety bu­il­ding as I sta­red at the se­emingly in­no­cent rib­bon.

  “True, but it’s al­so the kind of thing any chick co­uld we­ar in her ha­ir, right?”

  I sho­ok my he­ad. Et­han was inc­re­dibly cu­te and fa­irly fas­hi­on for­ward, but he was still such a guy so­me­ti­mes. “No, no ‘chick’ over the age of eight or ni­ne wo­uld we­ar a rib­bon li­ke this, and I do­ubt so­me­one that yo­ung wo­uld be han­ging out in the wo­ods be­hind the gro­cery sto­re. Be­si­des, I’ve se­en this exact sa­me rib­bon every ot­her ga­me night for the past fo­ur months.”

  “No way.” He sho­ok his he­ad. “So­me­one from yo­ur pom squ­ad?”

  “Not this ti­me.” My fist tigh­te­ned aro­und the rib­bon. “It’s a che­er­le­ader rib­bon.”

  “Che­er­le­aders ha­ve be­en ra­ising we­ird zom­bi­es?” He so­un­ded du­bi­o­us, and for on­ce I was with him. Usu­al­ly Et­han was the skep­tic and I the vo­ice of cre­ati­ve thin­king, but he was right. The­re was no way I co­uld be­li­eve that the che­er­le­aders we­re ra­ising the de­ad.

  “Of co­ur­se not, but this rib­bon me­ans one of them was in the wo­ods last night. Pro­bably spying on our car wash to see how much mo­ney we we­re ra­ising for the bo­os­ter club.”

  Ethan sig­hed. “They might ha­ve se­en the RCs.”