Zombie Science 101

Chapter 4 of Descendants~ Finally finished it!

   She had absolutely no idea where she was, beside the fact it was a dreamworld version of the place, or so she guessed. It was most definatly some where cold, there was snow on the ground and the size of the buildings only led her to guess she was in a city. Zephyair looked around, trying to get any hint of where this city was. Instead, she found Amarith sitting inside a coffee shop, just across the street from her.

   After a moment he noticed her and waved. She rolled her eyes and ran across the street, unafraid of the cars that just drove right through her like a ghost, but not without consiquence. It left a weird tingling feeling where ever it had passed through.

   She entered the coffee shop. She noticed then that Amarith wasn't alone. Tori was with him. They were talking animatedly about something. She couldn't tell if they were arguing or, just talking, but they stopped when they saw her coming. She sat between them, glancing at the table, she tugged at a corner of her shirt. She felt bad that they had stopped talking when she arrived.

   She peeked up, through her long bangs, to see Amarith and Tori with annoyed expressions on their faces. She decieded to break the deepening silence. "Where are we?" she asked.

    Tori looked shocked. "We're in my home town of course!" he replied. "This is Detroit." He made it seem like it was a big deal.

   She nodded, "Cool, I've never been here before..."

    Amarith glanced at her. "Out of curiousity...What was the farthest trip you've taken from home?" he asked.

    She had to think back for a moment. "I think it was Guelph," she answered. "It was a very boring family reunion."

   "You've never been out of Canada then?" he asked.

   "Nope, I guess this would be the first time, eh? I don't even have a passport," she said, laughing quietly.

    "You've lived a sheltered life," Tori said, shaking his head. "Even I've been to Canada a few times before the whole zombie thing happened."

    She glared at him. "Well, my family wasn't exactly the richest. We barely had the money to get to Guelph and back."

    Suddenly, the sound of screaming echoed from the streets. They looked out the window to see people running in the streets, shouting and panicing. The cause of the chaos soon reveiled itself to be a shadow beast. It roared as it chased a very paniced woman. She ran onto the street, the beast right behind her.

    A car was coming in their direction. It swerved to avoid hitting them, but ended up coming towards the coffee shop where Zephyair, Tori and Amarith sat. They dove for cover despite the fact that the car would just pass through them anyways. It burst through the main window, flinging brick and glass everywhere. No one inside was several hurt, though some screamed while others attempted to help the disheaveled driver from the car.

     Outside the building, the shadow beast had taken noticed of them. It growled loudly and shift

       Amarith began to lunge for it, but was held back by Tori. "I got this one," he said, leaping over the car and into the street. He strode almost arrogantly towards it. The beast growled and slowly began to circle its newest target.

      Zephyair peeked around the car to get a better look at Tori and the beast. Amarith leaned toward her. "As, you know that's a shadow beast..or fiend. Whatever you want to call it. They're the only thing other than us that can interact with this world. Unfortunetly, they can also been in both worlds at the same time," he said, matter-of-factly.

     She looked at him annoyed. "I knew that first bit, but not the part about being in both worlds. I think I hate those thing eve more now," she muttered, turning her attention back to Tori and the shadow beast thing.

     The fight had already began, Tori was leaping over the fiendish thing as it ran toward him. Once he was behind it, he conjured a ball of fire into the palm of his hand. He dodged several more lunges from the beast while he waited for the flame to grow. In seconds it encompassed his entire hand. Then he threw it at the beast, hitting its side. The fur caught fire and the shadow beast howled in pain. Tori didn't give it time to retaliate. Soon, two spirals of flame twisted around it, growing bigger and spiraling inward to engulf the thing completely.

       Zephyair shivered as it gave its final howls and roars. When it went silent, she knew it was dead. The flames dispersed, leaving the smolderig corpse of the thing blacken on the road. Tori returned to where Zephyair and Amarith were.

"That was quite the brutal way to do it," Amarith commented, leaping over the still stuck in the window car. "It would've been over much faster if you let me do it."

Zephyair managed to climb over the car and join them outside. "I could've done it without having to move, I think," she remarked. To prove her point, she conjured up a shadowy tendril and loosely wrapped it around Tori's neck.

     "Holy crap," he yelped, attempting to pull it away from him. She dismissed it, smirking at her obvious success. 

    He stuck his tongue out before walking away, very quickly. He didn't get far before his form began to appear transcluent and dissapte slowly. He managed to turn back to Zephyair and Amarith and say, "See you guys later," before dissappearing completely.

     She realized that something had woken him up from the real world, just like she was only the night before. She looked at Amarith, who was also beginning to disappear. She frowned when he was gone completely, leaving her alone. Leaning up against the nearest wall, she waited to be woken up, unable to wake herself up. Finally she felt the tug of reality as someone began to shake her awake.

     Zephyair opened her eyes. And immediatly regretted it. Tanser was looking down at her. She closed them again, grabbing the pillow below her head and hit him in the face with it.

      "What the hell was that for?" he shouted, rubbing his face.

      "Why did it have to be you...?" she grumbled, sitting up.

       He snorted. "Would havre prefered Amarith wake you up?" he asked.

       "Anything but you and your emo wannabe-ness," she replied.

      He left the room annoyed after telling her to get dressed. She sat there for a few moments, trying to wake herself up completely. Pulling herself from the bed, she yawned and stumbled to teh nearest dresser. She eventually decieded on a pair of black cargo pants with chains hanging from te pockets and a shirt with a graphic splatter design in blood red. She frowned, unable to find any finger gloves or a brush for her hair. She raked her fingers through it begore going out into the hallway.

    He was waiting for her. "Took you long enough," he sighed, grabbing her arm and dragging her down the hallway.

     "There's so many clothes to choose from, though. I didn't know whether to take them from one of the dresser's or that huge closest," she replied, grinning.

     Tanser led her to the basement, where Samyal had his laboratory. The whirr of computers buzzed throughout the room. The walls had shelf upon shelf of strange vials and containers filled with odd coloured things. She noticed that it was just one room out of what appeared to be a series of rooms for his tests and information.

     'Why am I here? Is this some kind of early morning science class or something?' she wondered. She spotted Amarith sitting on one of the couches that were placed spadorically around the room. He smiled and patted the spot beside him.

      "Tori's not here yet. It could be awhile before he gets here," he said, as she tentatively sat beside him.

     "I thought we'd be the last ones here," Tanser huffed, leaning against a desk across from them. "Tori's probably spiking his hair or something."

     Samyal came out of the adjecent room. He waved at the others and returned to, what appeared to Zephyair as, setting up some kind of presentation on the single computer in the room.

      She turned to Amarith. "What's going on?" she asked.

     "Did Tanser not tell you?" Amarith replied. "Well, you would've asked me if he had. Samyal apperantly created a...semi...cure for the zombie infection. He's using us as guinea pigs to get input about how people would react to the procedure. He thinks some people would be against it because its not cost effective or something." He waved his hand, obviously unimpressed by such a thought. How would put cost over saving a life from eternal damnation?

       "Why am I here then? I don't understand a whole lot about sciencey stuff...," she said, slightly ashamed by her lack of attention during that class.

      "I can translate the big words if you want me too," he replied, smirking.

She glared at him and moved to the other end of the couch. He fiegned a heartbroken gesture before laughing. "I'll probably have to explain it all again to Tanser anyways," he added. "He pays more attention MTV than anything else."

     Zephyair pretended to gag. She'd never understand why people loved that channel so much or why people watched so much TV in the first place. 'Reading is better for the imagination and creativity. Even if it comics,' she thought, but she knew she was probably the only one in the room who thought that.

     Tori finally found hiw way into the lab then, or at least she just noticed him. He had bumped a shelf, knocking down one of the beakers. It crashed to the floor, shattering with the contents spreading quickly. He looked around the room with an alarmed look, searching for something to clean it up with. When he saw Samyal very unimpressed expression he ran upstairs to get a mop and bucket.

      Amarith leaned towards her. "Its not the first time its happened. He knows exactly what to do now," he laughed. "He might as well leave the mop down here."

She watched as Tori nearly tripped back down the stairs and hurry to clean the mess up before Samyal saw it. It was too late though, Dr. Nightling walked into the room to see him attempting to hide the bucket behind the nearest couch.

      "H...Hi, Samyal...," he said, quickly sitting on the couch between Zephyair and Amarith.

     "Good moring...," the doctor replied, knowing exaclty what had happened. He turned to the computer next to him and clapped his hands together. "Let's get this started. Amarith you explained what this is all about right?" His prodigy nodded. "Good, so you all know that you are to listen on how the cure works and then tell me what you think. With four of you, it should be a good enough survey of reactions."

        He pressed a button on the keyboard and images of thing Zephyair had seen in science class showed up. Red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets and other things regarding the heart, brain and blood stream, she recognized, but then a bunch of black things showed up. It reminded her of North during the 'Grossology' exhibit.

     Samyal then explained that the black ones where cells from a zombie and that they were dead. From what his studies told him, it seemed that they survived mainly on...survival insticnts and that most of the brains other functions had ceased.

He pointed out the fact that once a person was bitten it took a while for a complete 'zombification', which was because the disease had to spread throughout the body and infect all of the blood cells and organs necessary for a person to properly function. It was within that time period, before it was widespread that it had to be stopped.

     She began to think of Aven and how she bit him, 'Did I stop the infection from spreading? Because I...sucked it out of him..?' She wondered if she should tell Samyal, but then she remebered Aven was Amarith cousin and wasn't sure if he would want to hear that. She stayed quiet and continued listening to Samyal's presentation.

     He was talking about using a form of dialysis to remove the dead cells and rather than just cleaning the blood, replacing some of it by also transfusing new blood into their system. That's where the cost effectiveness came into play. Would there be enough machine for the currently infected to use? Would they have to make more? And with all the vampires now, is there enough blood to preform so many transfusion? Because now they lacked both donors and supplies were limited due to having to feed an entire populluce off it.

     "There are many problems with this theroy, but its the only one that's known to work yet," Samyal said, finising his presentation.

     They sat there in silence for several minutes. "Well, you guys were useful," Samyal said at length. "You cna go now. By the way, pack for a trip to Washington. If you want to go that is. Its where I have to give the first public presentation of it."

Tori was the first up and out of the room, disappearing upstairs before Samyal got a chance to scold him for breaking the beaker. Tanser and Amarith left at the same talking like they'd been friends which she didn't doubt.

      As they disappeared up the stairs, Zephyair walked up to Samyal. "I don't know if other people would like to hear it, but I know this 'theroy' of yours will work," she said.

     He turned and looked at her, with a confused expression. "You don't think its just a theroy?" he implied.

     "One of my friends were bitten by a zombie...And, well, he looked up some myths on vampires and found that maybe by biting it him it take out the infected blood with no harm to me...So, he asked me to do it. And since I didn't want to lose one of my best friends, I did it," she relied, looking and the ground shamefully.

     "Would this friend be Aven?"

      Zephair spun around quickly. Amarith stood on the stairs, looking down on her. A very intimidating arua was eminating from him. It scared her, but she nodded, "Yeah, it was Aven, but it worked! He was okay after that."

    Samyal stared at her in surpirse. He said more to himself than anyone,"Merely taking out the infected blood is enough." He quickly left the other two and went back to the adjecent room.

     "You bit my only cousin?" he asked again.

     "Yeah, but....He asked me too," she answered. She didn't want him angry. She hadn't seen him angry yet and she didn't want to. "And was I just supposed to let him become a zombie? He would already be one if I hadn't."

     He grimaced. "Aven's dead now anyways..," he murmured. He made his way up the stairs, she followed not far behind.

     "Amarith...Please. Don't be mad just because of that," she pleaded, "Besides, he was thankful after and-"

     "It doesn't matter...I don't....I don't even know why I am angry for it...," he said, turning around to look her in the eye. His hands became fists, shaking at his side.

She was surprised the arua of angery rolling off him. She stepped back. 'Is it because its his closest cousin....Or is it a kinda of vampiry jealousy because I drank blood from some one and he hasn't?' she wondered, taking another step away.

       They stood there for awhile, neither knowing what to do or say. Somewhere in the mansion a phone rang, snapping them out of their silence. Amarith, she guess, knew where it was and went to answer it, leaving her to stand in the hallway alone. She was ready to collapse with relief as he left, taking the ominous arua with him.  She managed to get to the nearest lounge before flopping onto the couch. Since when did anger have such a drainging effect on people? Of course, it wasn't her anger or rather rage was the better way to desribe it but she had caused it. 'Maybe I shouldn't have said anything about that...,' she thought.

       Just then Tori appeared at the oppisite end of the couch. "Come on, we got a job to do," he said, smiling.

      "Job? I don't remember anything being mentioned about a job," Zephyair replied, frowning.

      "Yeah, one of the road barriers got hit in an accident. Knocked it right over and moved a couple next to it, so there's a quite a bit of a gap to fix. Ghouls are starting to poor in, the zombies aren't far behind," he explained. "We've got to take care of them.Also, there is a risk of shadow beasts wandering in the area."

     "Why us? Isn't there-"

     "Because Samyal volunteered to stuff like this. Apperantly so its so we learn to control our powers...but I think he does it because it gets us out of the house," he interuppted, "Now come on."

 

     Amarith laughed as Zephyair held onto the seat infront of her. She was obviously terrifed of Tori's driving. He was used to it, in fact, he was beginning to think of it as a rollercoster ride. Swirving in and out of traffic and most definatly making skid marks on the pavement. He wondered how Tori got his licesnse in the first place.

He glanced in the rear-view mirror at Zephyair again. He wondered when exactly he had stopped being angry with her about taking blood from Aven. It was probably when he realized that it was none of his business. He reached into the glove compartment where there was a couple pairs of sunglasses. His ability had the tendacy to blind at times and when fighting ghouls and zombies, it wasn't the best scenerio. As the car finally came to a screeching stop, he tossed the extra pair to Zephyair.

       "You'll need those. My ability can cause blindess," he said, before getting out of the car. The light didn't blind him for some reason, but it did others when flashed. It also attracted zombies and ghouls, which could be used to bring them to a specifc area. In seconds he had light flashing around him, bring the zombies to him. He summoned the sword, a double edged blade that glowed dimly.

       He had taken some fencing classes to learn how to use it but, that was with a rapier, a sword that was only a fraction of the size of this and stabbing wasn't a very good technique against zombies. Slashing and chopping worked the best.

      He brought the sword up as the nearest zombie approched, dazed by the lights. He used a diagonal slash, cutting it clean through the neck and severing an arm. As it stumbled back he, spun around to face a wolf ghoul that was ready to pounce. He ducked as it soared over head and as it turned to lunge again, a downward stab halted it.

      A fireball flew past his face, burning several strands of his hair. "Tori!" he shouted. "Learn to keep your fire under control!" He looked to the fire controlling vampire. He had surronded himself with flames, but then were burning dangerously close to cars. He feared what would happen if the gas tanks in them blew. Hoping it wouldn't get that far. He chopped another zombie's head off, before looking for Zephyair. She was standing still but, around her swirled strands of shadows and darkness. A chill ran down his spine as he watch her dispatch the ghouls and zombies by commanding the shadows to slice them or spear through them if they came to close.

       The throng of undead was becoming less and less. The wall was nearly fixed and all that was left was too get rid of the ones trapped inside. The zombies weren't hard to find, but the ghouls were sneaky. It was always their stench that lead to their demise, though.

     Amarith ran a hand through his hair as the last of them were burned. He looked to the sky as snow began to fall. The clouds it came from were dark, very dark he wondered if it was going to storm that night. They had to leave before it started and the roads got bad. He found Tori, muttering under his breath as he walked around the car.

    "A damned ghoul jumped on the hood," he said, guessing what Amarith was going to ask. "It got the motor and several other things...We're not going anywhere until Samyal or Tanser come to get us."

     Amarith couldn't help but laugh. "You let a ghoul wreck another one of the cars? Soon enough Tanser's not gonna buy you a new one," he said, then he got serious. "Where's Zeph?"

      "Am I supposed to know?" he replied, shaking his head angerly.

Amarith turned and left Tori to mourn the death of yet another car, sure that was the fourth car so far. He went in search of Zephyair, looking in the last place where he'd seen her. He wandered toward one of the larger cars that had crashed into a guard rail and left behind. It was a good shield from the wind.

     She stood there shivering. The coat that he had given her wasn't excatly the warmest. He glanced down at his own much warmer one. He walked up to her, taking it off and handing it too her. "Here...This one's warmer," he said. "I'll trade you."

      She shook her head. "Its fine...Really," she replied, lips quivering. She quickly turned her face away from him. He put the coat back on and instead, conjured a small faintly glowing orb of light. He learned from past experince that light can give off heat and had figured out how to make his orbs give off warmth. He placed it near her to keep her warm.

      Amarith watched as she stoppped shivering, but she still kept looking away from him. "Something wrong?" he asked. Of course, he didn't expect her to answer. He knew she didn't like being here. He knew he should be avoiding her by all costs so she didn't kill him for practicaly kidnapping her. But he was drawn to her and wanted to make sure she was okay. Even though he was pretty sure she wouldn't tell him what was wrong in the first place.

      She didn't answer. She looked out at the empty road that was slowly becoming less and less visable as the snow falling became thicker and thicker. He could only guess what was going through her mind.

      But before he could give it any serious thought, the cell phone in his pocket vibrated, causing him to jump and grab for it.

      Tori had texted him, saying that Samyal had arrived to pick them up. Amarith rolled his eyes, 'He could've just shouted or something,' he thought, tucking the phone away into his pocket.

       "Zephyair, Samyal's here to pick us up," he said, softly. "Let's go before the weather gets any worse."

       She noddded and followed him back to the car that awaited him near to the one that had orignally brought them there. Samyal was making a tsk, tsk noise to Tori about the demolished car. Then leaving him to get into the one he had brought, Samyal climbed into the driver's seat with a groan. He was getting old, nearly sixty-five, or that was Amarith approximate guess.

      They all climbed into the car. Zephyair stared aimlessly out the window. Her gaze never leavign the grey skies as they drove down the road. It was worrying him. Had it been anyone else, he was sure he wouldn't care so much, but because it was her.....He wasn't sure. He had heard stories about vampries having REAL soul mates, people chosen for them. He wondered if that was the deal with him and Zephyair. He shook his head, it didn't matter.

       "-Amarith? Are you listening?" Samyal said, breaking him from his thoughts.

       "Oh! Sorry, no I wasn't...What were you saying?" he asked.

       Samyal smiled in the rear-view mirror. "Never mind. We'll talk about it when we get back to the house."

     He sighed, looking out the window. 'Its probably about the trip to Washington,' he thought. He was still debating whether to go or not. He wasn't sure if Zephyair was or not and if she wasn't, then he wasn't about to leave her in that house alone. In fact, he didn't want to be anywhere away from her.

     Maybe the idea of soul mates wasn't so far fetched, they were vampires after all, anything could happen.

Author's Note

please note: I'm using Word Pad to write my stories now because MS Word has dissappeared off of my laptop...So if there's any spelling or grammar errors tell me so I can fix them~

Reviews

[Thoctar]

As usual awesome story, awesome chapter. (there are a lot of spelling and grammar errors so I wont even bother XD) I like it.