A.N. I'm busy as hell, so naturally I was seized by the undeniable urge to write this RIGHT NOW. First it was crack. Then it was fluff. Then I submitted to the inevitable and made it angst. And strange.

Disclaimer: I own neither LOCI nor the fantabulous song 'Re: Your Brains' by Jonathon Coulton. If I did, a lot of things would be different. And strange.

"It's Bob, from the office down the hall/ It's great to see you, buddy, how've you been?/ Things've been okay with me, except that I'm a zombie now/ I really wish you'd let us in."

--Jonathon Coulton

xxxxx

She remembers the day.

Tick-tick-tick-tick-tick.

Second ('sɛkənd). Noun. Something you can never grab onto. Hold in your hand.

Minute ('mɪnɨt). Noun. Something you can never get back.

Hour ('aʊɚ). Noun. The span of time it takes for your partner to smile, stand, walk out of the squad room, stand in line at the local coffee shop, get shot, and bleed to death on the gum-spotted sidewalk.

xxxxx

"What are you going to be for Halloween?" he asks her on Friday. Sitting at their desks, almost done with their paperwork.

"A cop."

"A cop?" She knows if she looks up she'll see his lips twitch. "How long'd it take you to think of that one, Eames?"

"Days," she says, completely deadpan. "Weeks. Months."

"Years?"

She tilts her Styrofoam cup, trying to knock out that last drop of coffee. "My whole life has been building towards this very Halloween." She smacks the bottom of the cup. No luck. "My sister wants me to stand at the door and glare threateningly at anyone who walks through her lawn instead of the sidewalk."

"It's good to see your skills being put to use."

"What about you?" The watch on his wrist reads 4:34. The fluorescent light above him has burned out. These will be the things she will remember. "Going to give the trick-or-treaters a fright this year?"

"Almost wasn't, but…yeah. Zombie."

xxxxx

Blood (blʌd). Noun.

1. A sneak that hides in corners when you try to clean it away, traces like rust left between cuticle and nail from when you arrived fifty-five minutes into the hour and pressed your hands against your partner's shirt, against his chest, felt it fill every crease of your prints and stream like crimson ribbons between your fingers.

2. A viscous liquid that is eventually absorbed by concrete after he is whisked away by screaming red and blue lights, leaving a muddy stain you will see the city maintenance workers trying to scrub off every day.

3. What there is none of left in the body after the embalming process.

xxxxx

Sure you're going to need a costume for that this year? she almost says. Looks down and away, goes with, "As if you need more brains" instead.

"Actually, technically the zombie's hunger for, for the flesh of the living is a modern phenomenon. I was thinking, um, more…classic. More…White Zombie, less Night of the Living Dead. The original definition of 'zombie' across various cultures referred to a, a thrall-like state that some modern psychiatrists—what?"

She's composed her face by now, and has been looking straight at him for several seconds, eyebrows slightly raised.

"You do realize that if you go as a zombie, you'll have to stop talking, right?"

He shrugs. "Actually—"

She throws a pencil at him and he starts as it hits, the point snapping, leaving a graphite smear just above his heart.

xxxxx

Zombie ('zɑmbi). Noun. What you become when you die but don't, because it wasn't you.

Except it was.

xxxxx

"I never got the appeal of zombies," she says a few minutes later. "Vampires need blood to survive, werewolves have just turned into wild animals, but zombies? What purpose does anything they do actually serve?"

"Maybe that's why they're scary."

"They're just pointless."

He shrugs again. "Pointless things happen every day." Smiles. Is it sad? "For no reason, and we can't…" Stands. Stretches. "I'm going to head down to Benny's, get some fresh brew. You…?"

"Yeah." She looks up. "Oh, and if they have any of those cranberry things…"

He nods.

Leaves.

xxxxx

He smells like earth.

There's a creak of floorboard, a shadow, and he's sliding into bed behind her. His skin is cool.

He smells like earth, and chemicals.

"You're dead," she says, and feels him nod. He isn't breathing behind her.

She takes his hand as he slides it over her stomach, and his fingertips are worn and raw. Pine splinters. Nails missing.

"I wasn't sure."

"I know." His voice is ragged, clogged. Muddy and decayed. "We're not—the people who can die." He has no heartbeat. "We're the people who always have more stories."

His mouth hovers over her shoulder. Hesitates.

"It's okay," she says. "I'm already halfway there."

He bites down. The skin breaks, a fuzzy burning sinking inward.

"This just better not turn into Nekromantik 2," she manages, and he laughs, and they lie there, waiting.

"Hey, Eames." A whisper. She can feel his smile against her ear. It's the same as on the day he died. "I want you for your braaaaaaains."