Celia led
her husband through the forest, knowing exactly where she was going. If history were any indication, the clearing
where her daughter and Levi usually met would again be Sonia’s destination tonight. Celia had to get there before her daughter
did to make sure that nothing bad happened to her. Mary had made no indication that Levi was not
still out, freely roaming the woods, waiting for someone to feast upon. Celia knew about zombies and their
curse. She may be reckless in terms of
throwing her power around but that did not mean that she did not research the
hexes themselves beforehand. A zombie
needed to feed almost constantly in order to keep moving, and she was going to
do her best to ensure that her daughter was not the appetizer. Celia and Moses came upon the clearing and
immediately saw the carnage. The ground
itself was stained with blood, way too much blood for anything to have survived
its loss. Yet there was no indication
that Sonia or Levi were even in the area.
It was possible that the blood was not Sonia’s, that it could have been
from an animal that was then carried off into the night, but Celia knew in her
heart that it was not true. Those
feelings were confirmed when she saw a shape moving in the darkness of the
trees, almost as if it was stalking her.
She looked to her left and was able to make out a feminine silhouette
amidst the trees. It looked to be
wearing the same clothes that Sonia had on when she went to bed, but they were
dirty and torn. Celia could not tell in
the dark whether the gait was that of man or monster though. Moses saw it too and immediately moved to
intercept what he thought was his daughter.
“Wait
Moses, I am not sure if that is our daughter,” cautioned Celia.
“What do
you mean ‘not our daughter’?” Moses
responded, “It looks just like her.”
“It may be
our daughter, but it may be something else as well.”
“Do you
mean…” Moses motioned to the blood soaked ground with his head, refusing to
take his eyes off what he believed to be his daughter.
“I think
so,” said Celia. With that the figure
stepped into the clearing, the moonlight glistening on the blood-stained figure. Upon closer examination, the Durants could
see a large chunk of flesh removed from the side of Sonia’s neck, the jagged
edges of skin flopping around with each labored step that their child took
toward them. The eyes were lifeless,
sunken pits that bore no resemblance to the bright blue eyes that had once been
so full of youth, hope and promise a mere few hours ago.
Moses took
one step toward what was once his daughter before Celia’s hand on his arm
stopped him. “She is no longer there,”
said Celia, “we have to leave here before she feeds on us.”
“But, but
my baby girl,” whimpered Moses, tears now freely flowing down his face, his
voice catching in his throat as it tried to move past the ball of sorrow that
had quickly taken permanent residence there.
“Tell me you can fix this Celia.
Tell me that you know what to do!’
“I may be
able to help, but I can’t do it if she kills me. Let’s go.”
With that, the two Durant parents took off through the woods, back to
their home. Celia was only partially
truthful with her husband though. As
they ran, Celia pored over her current knowledge of zombies for any indication
that the curse could be lifted. While
she may not have the answer readily available, she was more than willing to do
the work to figure it out as long as it meant getting their daughter back. That would mean that Celia would have to
create more zombies in order to test and confirm or deny any hypotheses that
she may devise.
This would need a rapid influx of
people, one that was not common to this area.
Celia was not out of touch with society, regardless of the archaic
nature of her belief system, so she knew that the promise of seeing zombies
would bring people to her. All she
needed was for them to be within her reach in order to ensure that she was able
to lay the curse upon them. Once they
were fully changed to zombies she would track them down in the forest and use
them as test subjects to see if they could be returned to their previous, human
form. Celia would obviously need to keep
some of the people as normal humans, and not curse them all. She needed a control group, her time with
Moses taught her that. She also had to
test and see how people reacted to being bitten as well as their reactions to
the curse itself. While this plan was
not easy by any means, Celia could not help but chuckle to herself regarding
her cleverness as she wound her way through the forest and back to her home.
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