So separated
Underwater kung ballet
But you got no map
You got no place to go
You're sexy kill joy
Bringing everybody down
But I eat confusion
And spit it out slow…
– from Resuscitation by Sheryl Crowe
.
"Mr. Furlong!" Casey chirped shortly after his little party of three stepped through the door.
"Present," the teacher called from where he sat at his desk.
Marybeth looked around shortly, before smiling as she laid eyes on Stokely, and then striding away to join her. Sam raised a brow… now that is one Hell of an odd couple!
"I found something on the football field," Casey was saying as he walked closer to the teacher, leaving Sam to head for her seat. "I thought you might like to take a look."
"What is it?" Mr. Furlong asked.
"I was hoping you could tell me."
.
Sam hopped off her stool and headed towards the front of the class. A small crowd was developing around Mr. Furlong's desk, and she didn't want to be left out of it. She pushed past the people in the cluster, who knew better then to get in the way of the psychotic girl who protects the class wuss, especially after some had gotten a punch in on him that morning before she'd shown up, and stopped next to Casey, holding the backs of her arms idly.
"It certainly has a zone that only exists in the kidneys of certain squid and octopi," Mr. Furlong was saying as he looked through a microscope at the creature. "Which doesn't make sense because…"
"This is Ohio." Casey finished.
"Right," said Mr. Furlong. "It's a pelagic organism."
"What's pelagic?" asked Gabe, who was standing next to Stokely.
"Sea-dwelling organism," and several heads, including Sam's, turned to see whom somewhere farther back in the room had answered. It was Zeke.
"Exactly," said Mr. Furlong, as Zeke was already walking up towards the desk. The teacher went on: "I don't recognize this surface tissue at all, Casey. I don't want to blow smoke but I think you might have found a new species here."
"Yeah right!" scoffed Gabe.
"Hey, it could happen!" Mr. Furlong defended. "New species are found every day."
Sam looked back at Casey, who seemed utterly fascinated with everything Furlong had to say, and didn't even really hear what Zeke said, though she did hear Marybeth say something snappy about how he "knows everything", which reminded her in the first place of the new student.
Swimming…
"Check the follicles on its underbelly…" Mr. Furlong was saying, and Zeke was now looking in the microscope.
"What does that mean?" asked Casey.
"It means we need to call the university," replied Furlong, shooting a glance at Casey. "Let them take a look, maybe even get in on some of their federal grant money…" Now he paused, and looked up at the class in general. "Our secret, alright?"
"Hey, maybe it's from your planet, Stokely." Sam hardly heard Gabe crack.
"Oh, blow me, bozo," Stokely shot back… and then, everyone gasped and jumped back a little.
Sam nearly jumped out of her skin, her head jerking up immediately to look at the thing on the table… it looked like Gabe or Stokely had spilled a glass of water… but that wasn't what was bothering everybody… it was that the thing… had moved.
"Did you see that?" Casey asked, his voice barely above a whisper, as he switched his gaze back and forth between Sam and the creature. Sam nodded.
"Ca-ching," breathed Furlong.
"What's it doing?" Gabe asked, but Mr. Furlong had already picked up the tray with the creature on it and was walking towards the back of the room. Everyone followed him instinctively as he moved towards the aquarium.
"So you think it is amphibian?" Zeke asked Furlong.
"Well, water resuscitated it," responded the teacher, stopping in front of the tank.
"But couldn't this kill it?" Casey asked.
"Yeah you don't wanna drown it," Gabe agreed.
"Only one way to find out…" said Furlong, and he gently let it slip off of the tray and into the tank full of water.
It fell for a moment, and everyone's hearts were on edge, before it began to swim! It swam for only a moment before long, red feelers began to grow out of its body, kind of like an angelfish, only extremely different.
It made a quick swerve and everyone gasped. Sam stumbled back, bumped into someone, and then looked up to see whom they were… just some jock, therefore not humane enough to apologize to. She simply regained her footing and stood again next to Casey.
"It's alright," Furlong was saying, in an attempt to calm the class. "It's okay," and then he began to pull on white plastic gloves.
"Mr. Furlong, what are you doing?" Gabe asked. Sam had never seen him so full of questions since… never?
"Just gonna check it's prostate," replied the teacher as he reached into the tank. "Actually its surface texture changed so… I wanna fell it."
There was another infatuated silence among the masses as the teacher reached for the creature. It dodged. He reached for it again, pinched it, and it turned into two!
"Jesus, it can replicate!" said Furlong, startled.
One of the creatures turned back to Furlong's hand. It pulled its lips back to reveal a set of sharp teeth and sank them right into his finger.
"Fuck!" Furlong shouted, yanking his hand out of the tank, bringing a few drops of water with it. There was already blood soaking around the wound. "God damnit!" he looked at his bleeding finger. "… I'm okay," said he, realizing he was the adult in front of a class full of easily impressionable students.
"It has teeth…" Casey's eyes were wide and unmoving from the thing in the tank. "Where did it get teeth?"
Mr. Furlong sighed. "I'm going to call the university."
But once again Sam was zoning out, as she watched a mesmerized Stokely press her hand to the glass of the tank. The voices behind her became muffled, but she forgot all about them as she watched the creature spread its feelers out to form a perfect lining inside Stokely's hand.
Sam's brows narrowed in bafflement and she leaned in closer, unsure if she was really seeing what she thought she was seeing. No one else – not even Stokely – seemed to notice what the creature had done…
.
Sam walked quickly through the halls, until she finally caught up with Casey. She winced when she first saw him, though… he was with Delilah.
The last period of the day had ended only a few minutes earlier, and leftover teenagers that hadn't bolted out the door the very second the bell rang were finishing with their lockers, mumbling through the halls, going to talk to friends before they leave, or heading for the door
"Hey, Case," Sam smiled and looped her arm with his playfully. "I've been thinkin' about that fish thing… got any idea what it is yet?"
"Oh yeah that's right!" Casey cried, and looked at Delilah happily. "We found a thing in biology today… it's bizarre… really bizarre… Mr. Furlong thinks it might be a new species!"
"Ooooo, let me race to the stands for that issue." Delilah replied sarcastically.
It was an awfully ballsy thing for anyone to make fun of Casey with Sam present, but all she could do before Casey spoke was shoot Delilah a nasty glare.
"Why do you rag on me so much? What did I do?"
"Nothing, it's just your fate. You're that geeky Stephen King kid. There's one of you in every school, isn't there, Samantha?" She gave Sam an overly sweet smile.
"Don't make me hurt you," Sam responded in a low voice.
"And how would you do that?"
"Please, Barbie. If someone smudged your eyeliner you'd go into a bought of depression for a month and spend the brunt of it dramatically ranting about whether you should go on living or not…"
Delilah didn't respond. Instead, she stopped walking and rested with her back to the door of the faculty lounge, her hands on the knob, and looked up and down the hall to make sure they were alone before opening it.
"We can't go in there," Casey pointed out quietly.
"Casey, you're with me," Delilah said quickly, swinging inside. "Be brave."
Casey frowned, grabbed Sam by the wrist in a silent plea for her to come with him, and then stepped into the faculty lounge behind Delilah; even though he knew the type of trouble he'd been in if they were caught. That was the biggest reason Sam hated Delilah: she could get Casey to do anything and often times did. She used the poor guy!
"Okay… so… what are we looking for?" Casey asked, eyeing the lounge.
"Anything," Delilah responded, moving to some shelves and looking through them. Casey and Sam shrugged and began looking in some cupboards.
"Nurse Harper's medicated," Delilah muttered, reading the label on a bottle of pills she had pulled from a purse. "Big surprise…" She dropped them back in the bag and stuffed the purse back on the shelves.
"Hey," Casey said softly as he pulled out a flask and held it up for Delilah to see. She wrinkled her nose and shook her head.
"No, I exposed Mr. Tate's alcohol problem last year. Nobody cares." And she began to stride away as she continued rattling cruelly. "At least his wife certainly didn't when she ran off with the babysitter…"
"God you can be such a–" Casey said, shaking his head mildly.
"A what?" Delilah interrupted sharply.
"A pretty cool human being when you're not being a first class grade A bitch," Casey said, louder this time. Sam silently celebrated a success… that must be the closest he's ever come to sticking up for himself against Delilah.
"… Are you hitting on me, Casey?" Delilah arched a brow.
A quick laugh escaped Sam's lips. It was a sort of hysterical chuckle, like the sort of chuckle you give someone when they're being incredibly stupid and/or irrational. Delilah shot her a look but Casey quickly picked up conversation, trying to distract them so that they wouldn't start another fight.
"No," he said, drawing Delilah's attention back to him. "I just think you can be cool, sometimes… this not being one of them."
"Wait, Case, you said when she's not being a bitch," Sam pondered aloud. "You mean there has been a time in all of her life when she wasn't D.O.A in the hair dye isle?"
Delilah was about to tell Sam off when they heard footsteps outside the door. Casey was the first to move and all three of them dived inside the faculty closet. Casey shut the door just in time as the door to the lounge opened and backed away from it. The three of them paused for a moment, before they all moved quietly to peak out through the blinds.
Couch Willis and Mrs. Olson were standing in front of the water cooler, both with a little white paper cup in hand. The Couch was drinking his, but Mrs. Olson was talking.
"What happened to Mrs. Brummel?" she asked evenly.
"She didn't make it," responded the couch, swallowing his water. "Her body was too old; the heat got to her."
Sam looked over a Casey. He seemed to know, so she made an expression that asked him, as well as mouthed the words, "What are they talking about?"
Casey placed a finger to his lips and shhed her quietly. She frowned and looked back through the blinds.
"Be careful of the climate here," said Mrs. Olson. "It compromises the nervous system… makes one pulsate."
"Has the entire faculty been commuted?" asked the couch, emotionlessly.
"Almost."
"What about the students?"
"Soon."
Delilah jumped, which made Sam jump, which made Casey jump, as the door to the faculty lounge opened again and Nurse Harper stepped in, blowing her nose.
"What are you two still doing here?" she asked them, the strain from her cold clear in her voice. "I thought it was the only one left…" She walked over to the shelves Delilah had been picking through moments earlier, and pulled out the same leather purse Delilah had looked through.
"There aren't enough drugs in the world…" the nurse muttered, pulling out her pills.
Mrs. Olson looked back at Coach Willis. He nodded, and then she nodded in return. Nurse Harper was at the faculty fridge, washing down the medication with her V8 tomato juice, when they began to arrange themselves.
Sam held her breath as she watched them, though she could feel Casey's soft, warm breathing against her cheek, and hear Delilah's nervous breathing to her right, the opposite side of which Casey was on.
The nurse shut the fridge and turned around, bumping into the coach. She jumped, and then smiled meekly, before waking past him… but, nervously, she noticed the way the two teachers were looking at her.
"What?" Harper asked, visibly creeped out.
"I have a pain," said the couch, touching the side of his neck with a finger. "Right here…" Nurse Harper took a step back, but he grabbed her and threw her on the couch. Delilah gasped but didn't stop watching. Casey shhed her, now.
Couch Willis got on top of Nurse Harper, who was struggling, on the sofa. His eyes rolled back in his head and deep blue veins became visible all over his body. He opened his mouth wide and something came out of it and shot into the Nurse's ear. Mrs. Olson just stood there, at the head of the couch, watching.
There was blood.
Delilah stumbled back until she had stumbled into the coats on that side of the closet… but something fell out from behind them, and landed on top of her. Casey and Sam looked at it and, in horror, realized it was a corpse!
Sam opened her mouth to scream but Casey clamped a hand over it and pulled her right up next to him. Delilah shifted out from under the corpse and stumbled until she'd backed up into Casey, who clamped his other hand over her mouth. She tried to twist away, but there really wasn't enough room to in the little nook they had themselves tuck into.
"Shh, shh, shh," Casey kept repeating desperately. All three of them stopped whatever they were during as they heard the couch stand up off the sofa. "Alright… are you okay, Sam?" he whispered. Sam nodded. "How about you, Delilah?" She shook her head feverishly, and tear tracks were smudged on her previously perfect cheeks. "Delilah." He said, a little more persistently. She let out another sob, perhaps from frustration, but forced herself to nod anyway.
"All right, I'm going to let you go now," Casey said, slowly releasing both girls… they could both hear footsteps approaching the closet. "Now listen, here's the plan…"
Moments later, the door came open, with Coach Willis in its frame. Casey shoved the broomstick into his stomach and the coach collapsed to his knees. Delilah burst out, ran past, and shoved Mrs. Olson over a table. Casey and Sam then dashed out of the room after Delilah.
Sam nearly tripped, but grabbed the doorframe to keep from falling. She looked down to see what she tripped on… it was Nurse Harper, blood running down her face, and she had grabbed her ankle.
Sam screamed, "Casey!"
Both Delilah and Casey stopped, and Casey jerked around and grabbed Sam by the waist, pulling her free of the nurse's grasped, then he let her go and the three ran down the hall together.
"What the hell is going on?" Delilah sobbed as they ran.
"Hey, slow down there!" Said Principal Drake as she stepped out into the hall to spot the children running.
"You gotta help us, Ms. Drake, they're after us!" Sam exclaimed in one quick breath.
"Hey, hey, hey; who's after you?" asked Ms. Drake, much too calm for the situation.
"Coach Willis and Mrs. Olson," Casey said quickly.
"Just ask Nurse Harper, okay, they attacked her," Delilah panted.
"Who attacked–what?" asked Mr. Tate, who had just turned the corridor. "Mrs. Drake, what's going on here?"
They're already dead!
"I don't know, I came in right in the middle of it," said the principal with a little smile.
They're already dead… they're on the ocean floor… they drown a long time ago… before we even came in the water, they were dead…
"Mrs. Brummel wigged out in the shower and then we found her body in the faculty closet!" Casey said, desperate to explain.
"What were you doing in the faculty closet?" asked Tate, arching a brow.
"Look, the coach–" said Casey.
"–And Mrs. Olson–" said Sam.
"–Attacked Nurse Harper!" finished Casey.
"Look, there's Nurse Harper," said Delilah, looking over her shoulder. "Just ask her, okay, th-they attacked her."
The two teachers and Nurse Harper stepped out of the faculty lounge… perfectly fine and unharmed, though they looked so… zombified.
"Oh," Mrs. Drake smiled, though it seemed evil, wicked, somehow. "Now we can get to the bottom of this."
"Oh, God," said Sam, slowly, in a low voice. All three of them took a step back, before Casey shouted: "Run!" and they did. They broke into a sprint immediately and headed for the exit, which was only around two corners.
Casey slipped and fell. "Wait!" he yelled. Sam turned around, shot a glance over her shoulder to see that Delilah kept going, muttered something like "fucking bitch" and then ran back to help Casey up to his feet, then they bolted out the door together.