The Unusual Case of the Zombie and Magus

by JN

Chapters

01: Coins and Thoughts
02: Days and Nights
03: Rain and Blossoms

01: Coins and Thoughts

A outstretched palm holding a single copper coin presents itself before me.

“Hey.”

I had a paperback novel in my left hand, which I was pretending to read. As such, I didn’t look up.

“What?” I replied in monotone.

The hand gestured impatiently. “Penny for your thoughts.”

I paused my act and spared my companion a questionable look.

“Who does something that cliche in this day and age?”

“Who cares? Take the penny.”

My long time friend Taelyn "Twilight" Saito, sat across from me at a round table in the cafe of the Equestria University’s community building, a pen in one hand scribbling notes into one of her many notebooks, and a mug of raspberry tea in the other for her cramps. Well, I wasn’t supposed to know that, but when you're friends with someone for so long...

Oh, and Twilight's just a fun nickname she likes to be called, apparently what with her birth name relating to the stars and all that. She must think it's cute, so I play along with it.

Stacked top to bottom with plenty of trinket shops and restaurants like the one we both were sitting in, the bulk of the business conducted here was by student interns who wanted hands-on experience in the real world, if you could give a place like this such a label.

Presently, it was spring break. The cafe was situated on the second floor, where we had the best view - that is, the most obscured one. Many of the trees surrounding the building had just enough height to completely block our view of the campus from the windows, imposing a mass of branches and leaves against the glass. I didn’t mind - I called it the “best view” despite what most people would think because I found the sight of a vast view filtered by a canopy of calming green was somewhat relaxing.

Taelyn didn’t really care for sights anyways, so she was fine with my request to sit under the umbra of the fittingly in-season oak trees. However, she certainly was imposing in her own way.

“Give me a break, “ I sighed. However, I did take the the penny, my fingernails slightly grazing the surface of her palm as I did so.

I shoved it into my coat pocket and resumed “reading.”

“...And?”

“What?” I repeated, my eyes scanning the stoic font of the pages before me.

“Your thoughts. I payed a penny for them, didn’t I?”

I set the novel down and stared at her directly.

“I was just thinking about how absolutely, mind-blowingly unattractive you are.”

In retrospect, I should have followed up much quicker with my, “sorry, it was a joke,” than I did so as to avoid what happened next. Taelyn’s actually somewhat attractive face quickly contorted with anger as she gripped something tightly in her hands and threw it at me.

“You—!”

My wording just now was strange. Allow me to elaborate. I did avoid what happened next, but I wish I could have prevented it from occurring in the first place.

To Kill a Mocking Horse made a beeline for my face. I could have caught it, but that hardly would have been satisfying for her. I could have taken the hit — I wouldn't even feel any pain, but that would probably result in a lack of physical feedback and thus look jarring to her.

This event was unfolding within less than a second, but in my headspace, the book appeared to be spiraling towards me at a pace where it would make impact with the bridge of my nose in another ten seconds. I took this time to consider my options.

I decided to compromise and duck. The 1960 literary masterpiece hit the wall behind me, a violent rainbow shower of post-it notes flying out of the pages upon impact.

“How could you say something like that?!"

The ruckus caused a scene that made a few people at other tables stare. As much as I liked to poke and prod, I figured I should pick a better time and place. And perhaps a different topic as well.

“Sorry, it was a joke.”

The lavender-haired girl sighed, left her chair to collect the book and the post-it notes, and took her seat again.

“Al, with a serious face like yours... I can’t tell when you’re joking and when you’re not.”

“Oh,” I replied lamely. I felt like I should have apologized again, but what for, I wasn’t sure.

“Well, if you didn’t mean it, then I guess I’ll let it slide.”

She called me “Al.”

Technically, that wasn’t correct.

My name is Allen Hunter. Taelyn had just decided on her own that “Al” was a good nickname for me. I didn't think someone like her, who thought so highly of something like "Twilight" would come up with something so sensible for me.

It wasn’t the name given to me at birth, of course. It was my foster parents who took it upon themselves to give me a name that was befittingly normal for someone of my looks. At least, that was the most they were able to infer from what little I had - that is, no living relatives or any direct indication of my ethnicity. I have most features you’d find on any European male, so I suppose that’s something. I have to say, they didn’t do a bad job. After my “death”, it took all I could to remember how to walk and even talk properly, much less decide a name for my own being. In the vein of conversation referring to my non existent relatives, I did pursue my parents and my past life for a time, but it was an unforgiving, meaningless undertaking. By the time I had resolved to stop the search, my memory had already faded to obscurity.

“See? You’re doing it again.”

I realized I had been gazing out the window with glossy eyes when a soft, concern-filled voice jolted me back to reality.

“What?” I asked for the third time that day.

Taelyn sighed and addressed me pointedly.

“Pulling that long face of yours. You were cocky enough to kill a second ago, and now you look like a kitten that someone left on the side of the road in a box."

I didn’t understand. My looks must have said it, because she decided to continue, a strand of her lavender hair falling over her shoulder as she leaned in, her similarly colored eyes narrowed in concern and staring me down. As she came closer, every detail about her jumped out at me, my eyes absorbing them through the thin film of my contacts.

Her slender jaw line, the faint scar tracing the underside of her chin, the single pimple concealed beneath a thin layer of concealer on the left side of her face (which I’m sure she would not have been pleased to have me point out), the way her winter coat folded and creased along the outline of her thin frame.

The tea which she had been drinking moments before moistened her pink lips, the microscopic droplets of liquid reflecting the light of the lamps hanging above our table.

You’d think that a dead person wouldn’t have the most accurate pair of lookers, but if anything, I found that my “zombie vision” was quite perceptive, almost exaggerated to an extent; It made me wonder if something about being human withheld the function of our eyes, just like the limiters of the brain.

I was able to comprehend all of these details in a fraction of a moment, long before she opened her mouth to speak again.

“I’m saying that you look pitiful! Don’t you feel the same way about abandoned kittens?”

“Um.”

What exactly was I supposed to feel about abandoned kittens? I wasn’t following, but I at least knew that I should save the personal self-reflection for later, seeing as it was putting my companion in a fix. Not that I hated seeing her squirm a little.

“Sorry.”

Another exasperated sigh, and she sat back down. She clearly didn’t think I was being sincere.

“And so?” Taelyn had started tediously re-applying her post it notes back into her book. “Spring break is almost over. Are you done with all your coursework?”

My eyes firmly locked on my paperback, I replied lamely, “it’s coming along.”

“Well, aren’t you relaxed,” she pouted contemptuously, her mood only worsening by the tedious task keeping her hands busy. "Meanwhile I've got to put all of these back on their respective pages, and later I have to record them all digitally since apparently you need to take all your notes on a laptop these days, can you imagine what kind of professor would enforce a rule like that? I mean, I get that we live in an age of technology, but..."

The truth was, I had already finished all of my assignments. The very day they were assigned, that is. I really didn't see any point in putting them off. I did the bare minimum where it was needed and called it then.

However, with Taelyn being a natural perfectionist, she was struggling to tie up all her loose ends before the new term began, making sure to double and then triple check all her notes and readings, hence her grumbling. The pretense for our meeting today was for a “study session,” and as I had no need for such a thing, I decided to feign interest in an “educational” paperback novel for a course that I didn’t even take.

It was, of course, impractical. Irrational even. I had nothing to tangibly gain from this situation. So why, you might ask, would I commit myself to something as unfruitful as being in the presence of Taelyn Saito, even at the danger of being pelted with books?

That would be... that I wanted the company. Rather, I wanted Taelyn to keep me company. I wanted for her to be near me, and to be able to casually have a conversation over drinks.

Because despite our somewhat violent exchange, she was an important person to me.

My friend. My important friend who, nine years ago, saved me from a fate worse than death.

I say that figuratively of course.

A faint smile which I’m sure Taelyn could not have noticed tugged at the corners of my lips, because I couldn’t help the thought that came to me next.

How befittingly human of me.

“Well, I’m not getting any further today. How about you?”

“Yeah, I'll come back to this later." I pretended to yawn, not that I was tired in the least bit. However, I usually ran my body on "energy saving" during most of my waking hours in order to decrease the amount of vitality consumed in between feeding sessions. As such, I had a rather lethargic look to me, but this beat being an athletic monster and running around like crazy, risking exposure of my zombie nature all the while.

She giggled. “Someone sounds like they could use a nap."

I let a fake, easy grin come to my face. It was different from the impulsive smile I had moments earlier - after all, this one I practiced at least a dozen times a day before stepping out.

“Maybe,” I replied good-naturedly.

02: Days and Nights

To explain:

In this world, “unnatural” is either despised or romanticized. Consider this further; there is usually no such thing as a “mild interest” in the occult or someone who just “dabbles” in a supernatural hobby. If you think on it, you’ll find that every person in your life who believes in or even practices these things is, by all intents and purposes, a nut about the topic. Perhaps that’s a little harsh but, simply put, human beings have a complicated relationship with obscurities. One often finds themselves in a paradox of yearning to “correct” the “irregularity” before their mind’s eye and at the same time avert themselves from the truth in order to protect their personal interpretations less they be forced to correlate all the contents of their minds and be faced with, as one great author would say, insanity.

That just might be what allows creatures like me to exist in this world.

Nevertheless, it can't be denied that human beings are truly fickle. Even with years upon years of interaction with them, I can’t even pretend to fathom the contents of their headspace in the slightest. However, there’s a key difference between that ability to fathom and the ability to understand the theorem of human behaviorism. That gap between “truly empathizing with” and “receiving information and reacting appropriately” is the code by which I have lived and survived by for the past nine years.

I’m hoping, however, that you don’t take me as some kind of automaton who cannot “understand emotions.” To the contrary, questions about the psyche that would have been near alien to me years before now make perfect sense, and the answers to them come to me naturally.

For example, what is it that makes a human happy? Some would say good health. Others might consider love, in all of it’s many splendorous forms. The bulk of society - including me - safely cite wealth, an answer not unsubstantiated considering the the rampant proliferation of materialism. Then, what makes a human sad? What causes them despair? To fear? That would be, above all things, death.

Such is my bad luck. That the very thing humans fear most they would turn into a cultural icon that I just so happened to embody: the zombie.

Let’s not start off with a bad taste in our mouths. I am, undeniably, an undead. A ghoul, monster, walker, reanimated corpse, put it in whatever way suits your taste. My heart no longer beats, I do not independently produce any new cellular tissue, and direct sunlight is a bit of a hindrance. However, I would contest that despite all these things I actually look quite alive. No matter what angle you observe me from, I really do appear to be nothing more or less than your average human.

Two legs, two arms, a rising and falling chest. A somewhat thin but lean and solid frame. 206 bones total, minus the individual components that were un-fused at birth. Hair, too - a mop of brown hair that is somewhat of an effort on my part to keep tidy, but nothing to fuss over. A sense of fashion that generally keeps up with the times. Every other part of me I can dress up, change or modify in one way or another - except for my eyes. Dazzling, aquamarine pools of vibrance... is what I’d like to say, but they’re just modified contacts that I wear over a pair of disturbingly storm grey lookers.

My eyes underneath the thin film of silicone hydrogel seemed to have retained their look at the time of their owner’s death. Suffice to say, I become somewhat disjointed when I happen to catch myself in mirrors without the lenses. People would cross the street in droves to avoid me without my contacts, that's for sure.

When all's said and done, I'm really not much to talk about. Though I wouldn’t venture to describe myself as the most picturesque image of a young man at 19 years, I would say I rate at an average of 7.9/10 based on appearance alone (this is based on direct feedback from others - some anonymous, some direct). I have a few of my own stubborn quirks, experiencing no change nor improvement no matter how I may try to erase them.

Well, details are details.

Superficially, but convincingly, I am human. True it is that my skin can be considered a little paler than most, my movements and mannerisms a bit more reserved, my cheek and collarbones more pronounced compared to other people’s. However, this also is something I am certainly in debt to human society for - the concept of outliers, people with “quirks.” Stuff like that.

Almost as if to add insult to injury, most popular fictional interpretations of zombies make it incredibly easy to dispel the claim that I am one myself (though nobody’s ever challenged me on that front). “Zombies” are apparently ghoulish friends with swamp-green skin, little to no hair, crooked yellow chips for teeth and an insatiable penchant for brains. Other interpretations don’t venture very far from this caricature.

These are a strange take on humor for me. Brains are not really more or less appetizing than the rest of the body. I digress.

On the night of December 30th, nine years ago, I died. Don’t ask me what it was like, because I barely remember any of it. My memories of the day I ceased living as a human being are a series of incoherent snapshots of which I cannot make heads nor tails of to this day:

A cold wind that felt like knives against my skin.

A noise so loud that I can feel it inside of my head, turning my eardrums inside out.

A blindingly white light.

An impact of such unholy strength and velocity that it consequently feels like nothing at all; a force that turns my entire body numb in a split second.

Every kick drum in the world suddenly played in unison inside my head, a subsonic gong so powerful I can barely comprehend it.

My mind is shattered.

A brief sensation of flight.

And from there, I fall, fall, and fall into absolutely nothing. Everything from there is a blank.

My consciousness resurfaced next in a sea of crimson red. The sky was still a blanket of pitch black darkness above me, but for some reason, I could make out the outlines, shapes, and essences of every object around me. Hunched over, something firm yet undeniably fleshy was held in my right hand only a few inches away from my open mouth.

I was aware of what I was doing at that point, and didn’t stop. A string of complicated thoughts followed next.

Whatever it is I’m eating, I continue eating, almost impulsively. I had to eat. I don’t remember if it was hunger driving me, because I couldn’t even grasp the concept of hunger - just that I needed to keep at it. And as I continue to eat, I think that it’s unlike anything I’ve ever tasted before - but what does it mean, to eat something? To put in your mouth and.. chew.

And then?

Oh, I use those firm things to mash it up and then force it down my throat and...

I can swallow it.

...What does it mean to “swallow”?

I eat more, then remember that it involves the use of my throat muscles, my tongue, and some saliva to properly eat food.

It’s flavor is, well, salty... no, bitter. On second thought, it’s actually quite sweet. On two occasions, I forget how to breathe. I eat more, and then remember how.

I keep eating and eating, ravenously and in amounts so voluminous that I don’t even remember where it all went. And as I ate, I remembered more and more. Every instinctive question that popped into my head, I answered with another bite. Some time passes, and I don’t know how much, before I arrive at my penultimate question - that is, what am I eating?

A human being.

And what’s a human being?

A very, very fragile existence.

I ate even the bones of the bodily remains that lied before of me, tearing and breaking apart every last difficult portion with my hands and with my teeth, not even sparing the blood-splattered soil that surrounded the corpse. I ate, leaving absolutely nothing in my wake save for a scuffled mess of ground where someone could have kicked up some dirt.

When I decided enough was enough, the wind was warmer and the sky above me lightened. I was no longer hungry, and so with no clear direction nor incentive, I walked aimlessly. Whenever I came across a terrain too steep to walk, I climbed. Where I met water, I swam. To this day, I don’t remember if the human I ate was simply a corpse or a victim that I had really attacked, and at that point, my total apathy prevented me from giving any further thought to it. Somewhere along the line, I must have collapsed, meeting my physical limits without even knowing it.

This where Taelyn Saito comes in. A girl at 11 years old, my senior by a single year, happening upon a bloodied and ragged child, lifeless in her backyard. A shock for her, I’m sure, and for her mother as well, which was all the family young Taelyn had left. I imposed on the both of them for a time.

After thoroughly devouring an entire adult human body and traversing what could have been three or three hundred miles for several or perhaps several dozen days, the loss of strength in my body reduced me to a near vegetative state. Conscious, but unresponsive.

Taelyn Saito and her mother nursed me back to health in her brother’s room, unused since it’s very construction since the intended occupant had apparently died prematurely at birth.

When I was asleep, the world was still, as well as silent.

When I was awake, I did very little but sit up in bed and stare. I stared around the room, at Taelyn, at her mother, at the world outside my window, a mute boy with a million thoughts running through my head at once.

If I tried to walk - and believe me, I tired - my knees would buckle and lose feeling, and I'd collapse dozens of timesf. My eyes didn’t have an inkling of life in them, which I believe unnerved Taelyn. Her mother, however, was very considerate of me. I ate the food she prepared for me, but only the meats in her meals sustained me. I was somehow aware of this - after all, everything else that passed my lips and my throat felt like nothing more than pieces and clumps of flavorless paste on my tongue.

I absorbed. I absorbed the kind words that Taelyn’s mother passed on me, the tidbits of conversation that Taelyn herself offered me every now and then, which grew friendlier and friendlier by the day. I absorbed the unfamiliar feeling of warmth, comfort, and kindness. I absorbed the light of day, the dark of night, the melancholy of sunset and the brilliance of dawn. And, of course, I was absorbing whatever protein my body could process from the meat in those easily digestible soups that Taelyn's mother made for me, elixirs that invigorated my body little by little.

One day, I spoke.

The next day, I walked.

And a few days later, after various complicated affairs took place, I was classified as an official ward of the state, and inducted into a nearby foster home. I was diagnosed with retrograde amnesia due to severe head trauma, and neither my fingerprints nor my DNA revealed evidence for any relatives, living or dead. Adoption proved impossible for a period of time - perhaps it was because of the exceedingly odd circumstances of my discovery.

To this day, one detail appears hazy in my mind’s eye. Any child who is processed by the government would obviously be subjected to a mandatory health inspection, which would have revealed that I no longer had a pulse and that my body heat was practically nonexistent. Whenever I heard it mentioned, it was always waived off like an unnecessary detail. The one who usually handled this business was Taelyn's mother, who was the head nurse of the local clinic.

Speaking of whom, it had become impossible for me to continue to live with the Saito family while officially being a child of a foster home. Taelyn and her mother went to great lengths in order to see that I was comfortable living in a new environment, however, and Taelyn herself visited me almost daily. Before I knew it, I was adopted by another family and taken away to a city. I say that, but it really was only a single bus trip away. With that, we were able to keep seeing each other.

I knew what I was long before I truly understood what it meant. I was sustained for a while on minor animal meats, knowing that it was enough to keep me alive but far from actually assuaging my hunger. I needed the same food that I ate when my consciousness first resurfaced; human flesh. The moment I was reintroduced to and accepted into society, the very sustenance I craved existed all around me, lived under the same roof as me, a few steps away and sometimes just within reach. Yet, whenever the thought of eating my adopted family - or anyone else, for that matter - came to mind, Taelyn Saito's face appeared in front of my eyes like an intrusive overhead display.

She was human too.

Eating a live human being would basically be the same thing as eating her, and I couldn’t accept that. I don’t know why. It was an unsettling, debilitating feeling. A bird with wings would fly, an ant with mandibles would scavenge, and any creature with a given, hard-wired directive would accomplish their goals by any means possible. Such as a zombie, who would naturally give in to their instincts and indiscriminately eat human beings.

But I restrained myself.

I was the termite who lived away from wood, the bee who refused to pollinate, the turtle who abandoned its shell; the anti-thesis to my very being.

I, a bona fide zombie, who could not nor would not ever eat a human being.

A live human being, that is.

A few years later, I was 15 years old and a shut-in. Half the time, I was too weak to leave the bed, and when I was able to walk, the mere breeze caused me to stumble. It was at that point in time that I began hearing rumors of a popular “suicide spot” that existed just outside the border of town, situated on an abandoned railroad track that led off a cliff: Echo Ridge. An area that was a dead end in more ways that one - it was a spot for the star-crossed lovers, the widows and the widowers, the criminals with nowhere left to go, those who had nothing left to live for.

If they had any inkling of regret as they made their decision, their screams would echo across the forest where the tracks led off towards, hence the name. Existing outside of authority knowledge, it went unnoticed by police and therefore was not roped off from the public.

I decided that in order to gain back my former strength, I would have to eat human flesh, regardless of how it was provided. For a few weeks, I left the house on the pretense of visiting friends and preyed on suicide victims. It was my only chance at returning my strength while not breaking my promise.

One body, regardless of how big or how small, sustained me for months at a time.

Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, there was never a lack of victims to claim. Echo Ridge had, by then, garnered a bitter popularity among people from other towns and communities. Thus, it saw use. I cannot say whether or not I am happy about that turn of events, but I did see plentiful benefits from this situation. As far as I could tell, no one minded that the bodies kept disappearing either.

Eating non-human meats would have continued to benefit my growth too, and they certainly did so for a long time, but only in small increments and to much dissatisfaction. In the first place, it seemed absurd that a dead thing like me could continue to develop my body and grow older, but even I have yet to fully understand the rules of my zombie nature. It seems the one directive of life has not changed even when I have become something that is no longer human - I must eat in order to live. Rather than intaking nutrients as a natural human process, I imagine that my act of "eating" is more a show of force in making the sustenance act as biofuel. They turn into a sort of vitality that ebbs and flows throughout my body. Regular exercise seems to speed up the process of this "vitality" turning into usable energy and producing growth. If I wanted to know more, I'd have to get somebody to cut me up and look inside - not something I'm eager to do nowadays.

Nevertheless, though I hate to admit it, human flesh does me the greatest good. Granting me the most "vitality," the strength and power that eating people returns to me is even capable of things like healing small wounds, a feat normally impossible since my body has no white blood cells capable of repairing the damage. In places where I'd usually have to suture, that vitality will enact some kind of change which will temporarily grant me the means to repair my body.

Well, thanks to that discovery and all the other discoveries it led to, I managed to win some small part of my life back. Specifically, the part where I became physically healthy enough to live as a normal person. By that point, I could even make trips to Taelyn's home on my own - but I was never the ace of a sports team nor the number one leader on any record boards.

No, achieving those positions would be all too easy, and would attract too much attention to myself as a result. The thing about living undercover is that you generally don’t want that outcome. I'm sure you've been told this, but the human brain allows for the utilization of only 10% of the human body’s abilities, a limiter set in place and enforced by sensations of pain, doubt, and the subconscious. As a zombie, using 100% of my body’s capabilities became something I had to restrain consciously, lest I accidentally break a glass with just two fingers or sprain both ankles running laps in gym.

Well, despite all the quirks, my late childhood and early teenage years were nothing to scoff at. One could say, despite being abnormal in all my own ways, that I lived a truly fulfilling life in those years.

Time has passed.

Years later, I’m now living independently with a job on the side and attending a nearby community college, "Equestria University," with one of my peers.

It goes without saying that peer is, of course, Taelyn Saito. She grew up alongside me and become quite a responsible young female.

I've made a few forgettable acquaintances over the years, but of all the strongest social bonds I could remember forming, she was and still is the most pertinent, right next to her mother. I wouldn't go as far as to say she saved my life, but I will say that I've decided to stick around her. At least for the time being.

Above all, she remains the sole reason as to why I swore off eating live human beings for the rest of my life. She is a human being, and one of the few that I have sworn to protect, even if it... well—

Even if it "kills" me.

03: Rain and Blossoms

Today’s weather is plain and overcast, appropriate for the rainy spring season. As soon as Taelyn and I leave the cafe, however, dark clouds approach the area directly above us en masse in a motion similar to those “personal rain clouds” in newspaper comics. The girl beside me looked up and frowned.

“That sure doesn't look like a good sign.” She hugged her books close to her as if she were in danger of being mugged. By who, I couldn't tell you.

“You heading back to your dorm now?” I inquired as our footsteps became more hurried in response to the darkening of the sky.

The lavender-haired girl stopped short for a moment, apparently in deep thought.

“I was, but..”

“But?”

She clapped her hands together and looked pleadingly at me.

“It’s a little too far to walk, and it’s gonna rain any second now. I don’t wanna get myself or my notes wet, and your loft is just up ahead, right? Soo…”

“Oh?”

This girl had guts. That, and some nerve.

“I don’t mind,” I said in an offhandedly, “but the landlorder banned bringing girlfriends into the complex a week ago, for your information.”

“Is that so?” she remarked haughtily as our paces grew quicker, "well tell him to stuff it next time you see him, or better yet, stuff it for him."

I sighed.

“And it’s landlord, not landlorder!”

Why are you correcting me there, but not the part where I implied we were a couple?

“Jeez, how many times do I have to remind you?”

It takes us only another minute or so of power walking to reach the apartment complex where I live. It’s situated conveniently adjacent to the campus and nearer to the community building than the dorms. By that point, the rain was coming down in torrents, in amounts I could hardly believe the sky could have been withholding just moments prior.

“Phew!”

We both entered my apartment on the third landing with our clothes only slightly damp, which was quite a feat considering the weather's sudden turn for the worse.

And so we'd arrived at my base of operations, the place in which my grand schemes as an undercover zombie were carefully crafted and refined to perfection. Letting Taelyn into this place was a gesture that held dire, dire consequences...

Haha, of course not. It's a normal apartment. There’s a single common room, split by a counter that divides a moderately sized living space and a kitchen. Off to the side, three doors - one that leads to utility, the other to a bathroom, and the last to my bedroom. Overall, it wasn’t fancy living, but it was good enough for me. A sliding door off to the side of the common room, leading out to a small landing, provided a decent view of the great lake that the university was so proud of. On drier days than this, I let my laundry dry on a clothesline from the fresh breeze that wafted from the impressive body of water.

Not her first time visiting, Taelyn dropped her things off at the front door and plopped herself right down on one of the bean bags in the common room, exhausted from our rush from the community building to here. I wasn’t really tired at all, to be honest. Then again, there was no way for me to feel fatigue, so I suppose that’s a moot point.

"Come on honor student, don't be lazy in another person's home." I bent down to pick up some of her things and to hang up her coat, which she hurriedly tossed aside upon entering. Really, she was so uptight about a lot of things but seemed to instantly let her guard down whenever she reached a safe haven. I guess I should have felt something like happiness that she was willing to act as she pleased around me, but that was just something that came naturally as childhood friends. I had mixed feelings on her treating my apartment as her den.

We just came from a cafe, but neither of us had ordered anything with caffeine in it (with the exception of Taelyn's tea) and as such, I called out to the back of her head which poked out from the bean bag in the other room,

"Should I brew some coffee?"

Taelyn herself simply made a noise with her mouth into a pillow that she held over her face. It sounded like, “Ungh.”

I think it was approval, or something. I set to work with the coffee.

Minutes later, Taelyn recovered enough strength to reach for the remote and turn on my television, which was wired for the local news first and foremost.

Measuring a few cups of ground beans, I perceived the voice of a familiar area broadcaster delivering a news report from across the room. It seemed Taelyn had picked up at a good point.

“... These series of murders, called by police and public as the Traceless Killings, are exactly what they sounds like.

The scene of the crime is identifiable in every instance, confirmed not only by witness testimonies and blood evidence, but also clear markings of a physical struggle in each location where the victim was last seen. However, not a single body has been recovered from any of the sites in which the homicide took place. It's been reported by forensics that the amount of blood at the crime scenes are significant enough for us to assume that the victims are most likely dead.

However, there is reportedly no sign of the body being dragged away or taken elsewhere by any means at all in any of these Traceless Killings."

The camera cut to footage of a press conference being held inside a stuffy-looking meeting room. A thoroughly distraught chief of police stood before the microphone.

"Investigations are ongoing and we have every available officer on the case, we ask that you all remain calm during these turbulent times—"

A torrent of camera flashes floods the screen and a handful of reporters struggle to speak over each other.

"Sir, we've heard reports that it’s almost as if the victims of this murderer simply vanish after death. Do you have anything to say in response to this? Is there a possibility of the FBI getting involved?"

The hectic footage cut back to the reporter, who took a brief moment to return to her tele-prompt, "A through and through puzzle to the public and authorities, it is strongly suggested that civilians do not wander anywhere alone nor into any area where there are no other people, as these conditions seem to fit the modus operandi of the Traceless Killer—”

Click.

With a tired motion, Taelyn shut the television off. “First on the radio, then in the papers, then from Rosalyn, then again from the teachers, and now here too." She threw up her hands. "Nobody can keep their traps shut about the killings!"

Though she spoke like she was above it all, I couldn't glean any sarcasm or whining from her voice. Taelyn seemed genuinely distraught.

I set the heat to high under a pot of water and turned to dry my hands on a dish towel, carrying my voice over to her from the adjacent side of the kitchen,

“You have to expect at least this much. Nothing exciting has happened around these town for the past few years, and then, suddenly, we have half a dozen homicides in the area in just under a month..."

When my hands were dry, I leaned over the counter to directly address Taelyn herself.

“People might not stop talking about this for a long time,” I added.

The honor student sighed, letting herself slump into the beanbag chair even further.

“I mean, if so many people are already in on this, why hasn’t this guy been caught yet?” she whimpered, her eyes shut and her eyebrows scrunched up. “Six murders and not a single clue as to who this person is or what he thinks he’s doing? It just doesn't stand to reason! There has to be some evidence...”

I turned back to the pot of water on the stove, which was now boiling intensely. Slipping on a kitchen glove, I lifted the pot by the handles and slowly poured it over a filter into two mugs.

“No kidding,” I replied lamely as an ink black liquid slowly started to accumulate at the bottom of the cups.

Taelyn turned to look at me, clearly annoyed. “Is that all you have to add, Mr. Grumpyface?”

I regarded her blankly. “Who’s got a grumpy face? Is there a ghost standing behind me?” I pretended to check too.

I thought she’d get mad, but all she did was exhale loudly out her nose and settle deeper into the beanbag. As Taelyn got comfortable, I brought over two mugs of steaming liquid and placed one on the table in front of her before taking a seat myself on the opposite end.

“Anyways, just relax.” I calmly spoke in between a few tentative sips of my medium roast, “Like they said, the killer only targets people who travel alone. And you stick to me like glue, don’t you?”

I snapped my fingers. “You could market yourself, you know. The best adhesive in the world, as long as your name is Allen Hunter.”

Taelyn closed her eyes and tried not to smile, but I could tell.

"Of course," she whined, “out of all the bodyguards in the world, I had to end up with a guy who loves to joke but can’t make any good ones!”

Taelyn sat up to take a sip of my brew, and promptly smacked her lips once or twice.

"Makes some pretty good coffee though."

"You know what your issue is, Al?"

It had been roughly two days since our study session. While I fully intended to lounge around my room and enjoy the remainder of my spring break in languid peace (and perhaps sneak a visit to Echo Ridge), Taelyn urged me to stroll around with her around the campus from time to time for no real reason other than to simply walk and talk. Again, if it wasn't her, I'd definitely turn the offer down.

Luckily, though, the weather had definitely improved. The cherry blossoms were starting to bloom all along the sidewalk as we took our time making our way across a large stretch of road.

I sighed, bracing myself for another one of Taelyn's "I know it all" life lessons.

"You're too uptight! I mean seriously!" She bumped into me pointedly while locking arms. "All we're doing is walking and yet your head is totally in the clouds! Are you sure you're ready for the next semester?"

"I won't forgive you if your let your grades slip down just because you can't be bothered to try, mister!" She poked my cheek, staring daggers at me. "Even if you've totally got the whole manual labor job shtick down, you can't be doing that for the rest of your life. You have to look up and forwards!"

I made a face at her. "Well aren't you wise? You sure you don't wanna just make all my life choices for me?"

I sighed and shook my head. "I know people say that a bossy wife is a responsible one, but I personally am not one for matriarchs in the family..."

She jabbed me in the ribs. I reacted appropriately with a small flinch and an "ow."

"You're so dense, you know that?" Taelyn teased, but she smiled with a faint pink tinting the edge of her cheeks. "How do you expect me to decide anything for you, you big lump?"

"Yeah, yeah, degrade me all you like while clinging to me like food wrap," I spoke out loud with the intent to embarrass her. "By the way, could you let go of me now? It's kinda hard to walk."

She giggled and squeezed me tighter. Even though I lacked the ability to process physical sensations, I could somehow understand that something soft at chest-height was squished right up against me. "Nooo can do. Like you said, I'm the world's number one adhesive. Also, it got warm out and you're basically a walking ice pack!"

That I couldn't argue with.

As we continued our walk, I found myself mellowing out. Peaceful days like this were really what I lived for— in a manner of speaking, of course.

Seeing Taelyn smile and laugh like she did filled me with a familiar happiness, and being able to talk to her as an equal and a friend was something I didn't even need to be human to know was a privilege. I'm sure if my heart were still capable of beating, it would be pulsing with joy right about now.

Yes, days like these...

Thinking back on it, this was really my last chance to save her before it all went to hell.

My lack of apprehension dulled my senses, caused me to lose sight of who I truly was. A zombie, not a human. There was no way I could ever hope to live as one of them. Not when the truth faced me so directly, in the form of the Traceless Killings.

And this mistake would cost me dearly.