The Death Thief

Zombie Anatomy

"Well, at least that wasn't 'Hello Murderer.' Seems we're making some progress." Bungee stood by the register, while the clerk meticulously folded up my clothes and placed them in garment boxes. "I'm just glad you aren't screaming," he continued, his green eyes thankful and bright against the dark circles that pillowed them. "I can only handle one woman chewing my head off at a time."

I gave a sideways glance to the clerk, who was looking for a garment bag for my dress. Bungee caught my gaze and with a light laugh, waved his hand to shoo away my assumptions.

"No, I mean Calista. She's been making it a point to catch me any moment she can to yell at me."

"She thinks you're the murderer?" I asked.

"Huh?" he asked, eyes wide, his brow rising with surprise. "Oh no," he said with a shake of his head, "as far as I know, only you think that." I blushed at his statement, though I couldn't put my finger on why. "No, she's yelling at me because she wants her hair fixed. I may be required by law to pay for her regrowth, but at least I've got a year to pony up the expenses."

"What does that mean?" I asked. I remembered him being charged with maiming a zombie and I recalled the punishment handed down to him, but I still didn't quite understand the implications. Frankly, I didn't understand any of it. Regrowth, zombies, the fact a dead woman is up, walking, and yelling...

"Well..." He scratched the back of his head and looked to the clerk, who watched on with a bored expression on her long face. When she responded with nothing, but an emotionless, heavy-lidded stare, he turned back to me and took a deep breath. "Well, you need to understand how zombies work."

"You're undead, right? And you eat brains?"

"Heh, well, that's a simplification of it. You see, we are powered by a virus in our central nervous system. That's why you need to cut off our heads to kill us. Well really, you need to cut off our heads to immobilize us. The brain will continue to power whatever it's attached to, so a disembodied head can have a very long torturous life laying on the side of the road."

"That's...awful."

"Yeah, thankfully, most hunters know you have to burn us to finish us off. Really you just need to destroy the brain and that does us in." He shifted his weight and cleared his throat. "Anyway, the point is, we're damn near invincible. Heck, we can even keep going without food, it's just the virus is rather voracious. It likes dead meat, which is why it only takes to dead bodies. Unfortunately, it will also eat away at its host's body. So we just eat dead meat to keep our own bodies untouched. The few zombies that have been seen by normal people and inspired what's on movies and TV, are the ones that let the virus get the better of them by not eating enough. It's why they're also a bit more vicious. The virus is perfectly content as is, but the host has lost all sense of themselves by that point."

"Wow," I mumbled.

"You see, since the virus just needs the brain to survive, it will continue to power and run everything else out of redundancy. It just does it because it is there. However, there's one system the virus doesn't want running, our immune system. That gets shut down to prevent our bodies from fighting off the virus. The virus doesn't need it anyway. If a limb gets cut off, no big deal, we'll keep working fine. If we bleed out, nothing will happen, blood is unnecessary. If we lose our liver, none of the other organs would even notice. Which is why the virus doesn't heal lost body parts. Skin won't regrow and without that skin, her hair won't grow."

"So she still has a big hole in her scalp?"

"Yeah, but she's got long hair and she's always been good about fixing herself up. You can't see the hole the way she's got her hair made up right now." He shrugged and glanced down to the floor. "Still, she has every right to want her hair back. Unfortunately, we can only get that back with magic and the mages don't come cheap. The process can be hard on the mage and it requires pricey ingredients for some potions. Thankfully it's only skin and hair she needs. Had it been an arm, I might have thrown myself on to a bonfire."

"Will it take you long to get her hair back?"

"I hope not. Raid isn't too happy with me either about it, so I'd like to get both of them off my back as soon as possible. I normally work dish washing shifts at Hen's, but during my off hours now, I try to pick up odd jobs." He then looked to the clerk, who had the same vacant expression on her face as she had before. Still, he smiled up at her. "Like organizing stock and running deliveries. Thankfully, zombies also don't need to sleep."

"Well...I suppose you can deliver my stuff."

Before, Bungee could even vocalize the gratitude that sparkled in his eyes, the clerk had charged my card once more and handed it back to me with a snap of her wrist.

"Thank you for coming to Hearth Home. Please come see us again." She then piled the boxes on to Bungee, who made an effort to give me his thanks as I took my cue to head back.

As I went out on to the street and found my way to the hotel, I thought maybe the sheriffs were right. Bungee didn't seem the type to kill someone. Even if he was hungry. Of course, that's the kind of thing neighbors always say on news reports whenever they find out that kind family next door was a bunch of serial killers. Still, I had a feeling Bungee didn't do it. Just as I had a feeling that Calista didn't die of natural causes.

The question was, then, who in this crazy town did do it?