The Awakening

Thirty-nine

DEREK CROUCHED BESIDE A flat, matted creature that had once scampered through the forest and now looked like it had been run over with a steamroller.

I tapped it with my toe. “I was thinking of something with more…”

“Remaining body parts?” he said.

“With more recognizable features, so I’ll know what I’m summoning. But, yes, more remaining body parts would help, too.”

“That was a mole. I think there’s a rabbit over there somewhere.”

“You can smell everything, can’t you? That’s cool.”

He looked at me, brows lifted. “Being able to find decomposing animals is cool?”

“Well, it’s a…unique talent.”

“One that will get me far in life.”

“Hey, someone has to find and clear away the road kill. I bet it pays well.”

“Not well enough.”

He stood and inhaled, then walked a few more feet, stooped, and prodded a chunk of rabbit fur.

“I’m definitely thinking something with more body parts,” I said. “Like a head.”

He gave a snort of a laugh. “It’s probably around here somewhere, but I suppose you want the parts attached, too.” He paused. “I wonder what would happen if—”

“Keep wondering, because that’s one experiment I’m not conducting.”

“We’ll find something.”

He walked a few more feet, then stopped again, shoulders going rigid as he surveyed the forest.

I moved closer and whispered, “Derek?”

Another slow scan of the woods, then he shook his head and resumed walking.

“What was it?” I asked.

“Voices, but they’re far off. Probably whoever had that campfire.”

Despite the dismissal, he slowed every few steps to listen.

“Are you sure it’s okay?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“Should I be quiet?”

“We’re fine.”

After another few strides, I cleared my throat. “About the other night. When I said I didn’t know that having a dead body around was a problem. Well, obviously, it happened after the bat thing so…”

I waited for him to fill in the blank, but he kept walking.

“I knew it was a problem,” I went on. “I knew I should say so. I just didn’t want to…overreact, I guess. When I raised that man, I wanted to admit it, about the bats, but…”

“You didn’t need me telling you you’d done something stupid when you already knew it.” He pulled back a low branch for us. “Yeah, you need to be more careful. We all do. But you don’t need me making it worse by getting on your case. I know that.”

He looked at me for a moment, then his nostrils flared and his face lifted to catch the breeze. He waved for us to turn left. “And about me not figuring out I was ready to start Changing? I lied. With the itching and the fever and the muscle spasms, I knew that’s what it had to mean. I just…Same as you, I didn’t want to overreact and freak out Simon. I figured I could handle it.”

“We all need to be careful. Especially now, knowing what they did, the…”

I trailed off, feeling the now familiar bubble of rising panic, that part of me that couldn’t stop reading those words. Genetic modification. Uncontrollable powers. How bad it would get, how far it would go, how—?

“Chloe?”

I bumped into his arm and saw that he’d stopped, and was looking down at me.

“We’ll figure it out,” he said, his voice soft. “We’ll handle it.”

I glanced away. I was shaking so hard my teeth chattered. Derek put his fingers on my chin and turned me to face him again.

“It’s okay,” he said.

He looked down at me, fingers still on my chin, face over mine. Then he let his hand fall and turned away with a gruff, “There’s something over here.”

It took me a moment to follow. When I did, I found him crouched beside a dead bird.

“Is this better?” he asked.

I bent. The corpse looked so normal that it seemed to be only sleeping. My conscience could live with temporarily returning the spirit to this body. I started to kneel, then leaped up.

“It’s not dead.”

“Sure it is.” He nudged it with his toe.

“No, it’s mov—” A maggot crawled from under the bird’s wing and I stumbled back. “Could we get one without hitchhikers?”

Derek shook his head. “Either it’s going to be like this, with maggots, or too decomposed for maggots.” He bent to peer at it. “They’re first stage blowfly larvae, meaning the bird hasn’t been dead more than—” His cheeks flushed and his voice lowered another octave. “And that’s more than you need to know, isn’t it?”

“Right, you did a science fair project on this, didn’t you?” When he looked up sharply, I said, “Simon told me about it when I was checking out that corpse in the abandoned building. He said not to mention it to you, though, because you only came in second.”

He grunted. “Yeah. I’m not saying mine was the best, but it was better than the winner’s, some eco-fuel crap.” He paused. “That’s not what I meant. There’s nothing wrong with stuff like that, but the kid used junk science. Got the environmental vote. I won the people’s choice award, though.”

“Because, apparently, people are more interested in checking out maggoty dead things than saving the environment.”

A short laugh. “Guess so.”

“Back to this particular maggoty dead thing…I guess I should get to work, trying to make it undead.”

I knelt beside it.

“We’ll start with—” Derek began.

He stopped when I opened my eyes.

“Shut up, right?” he said. “I was going to make some suggestions for a, uh, testing regimen, but I guess you can do that.”

“Having only the faintest clue what a testing regimen is, I’ll save myself the embarrassment and graciously turn that part over to you. When it comes to the summoning, though…”

“Shut up and let you work.” He sat cross-legged. “You said with the bats, you were summoning a ghost you couldn’t see. So it was kind of a general summoning. You should start by doing a specific one. That’ll tell us whether you still raise a nearby animal if you’re trying to raise a specific person.”

“Got it. I’ll try Liz.”

I figured if we were being all scientific about this, I should use some kind of control measures. I’d start with the lowest “power setting”—just mentally saying “Hey, Liz, are you there?” I did that, then checked the bird. No response.

I pictured Liz and called again. Nothing. I imagined pulling Liz through. Nothing. I tried harder, still clearly focusing on her image. I kept checking the bird and kept looking—hoping—for any sign of Liz herself.

“How hard should I try?” I asked.

“As hard as you can.”

I thought of what the demi-demon had said about raising zombies in a cemetery two miles away. I was sure she’d been exaggerating. And yet…

“Try as hard as you’re comfortable with,” Derek said when I hesitated. “We can always do more another time.”

I ramped it up a little. Then a little more. I was closing my eyes after checking the bird again when Derek said, “Stop.”

My eyes flew open. The bird’s wing was twitching. I stood and moved toward it.

“It could just be the maggots,” he said. “Hold on.”

He got up, took a branch and was reaching it toward the bird when his chin shot up. His eyes narrowed, and his nostrils flared.

“Der—?”

A distant crack cut me off. He lunged and hit me in a football tackle. I toppled over. Something stung my upper arm right above the bandages, then whizzed past as we dropped. It hit the ground behind us with a thwack and a geyser of dirt. Derek quickly lifted off me, but stayed over me, like a shield…or more likely making sure I didn’t jump up. He glanced over his shoulder.

“You okay?” he asked. As he turned to me, his nostrils flared again. “You’re hurt.”

He plucked my sleeve. There was a hole clear through a fold in it.

“I think they shot a dart,” I said. “It grazed me. It landed over—”

He’d already found the spot. What he dug out, though, wasn’t a tranquilizer dart.