Seattle,
2015

I WAS LAYING ON a cot in the nurse’s room. My eyes remained shut as I laid there. Pain was making my head pound, while that strange feeling from before had disappeared. My stomach rolled again, causing a huge spike of nausea to fill me.

I remembered teaching Maryanne's class. Then, a strange feeling hit me and suddenly I was on the floor. My head probably hit something. It's explain the pounding.

My limbs felt like lead, forbidding me from moving to better situate myself or even feel my injuries. It's not that I didn't trust Elvis, the school's nurse, but I wanted to see the damage. I had a lot of experience with wounds, so I knew what was bad and what wasn't.

After a tenth attempt at opening my eyes or moving my mouth, I gave up. Guess my body hadn't completely woken up yet. Had I been a young man, I would've freaked out. However, this wasn't the first time I experience this paralysis. Whenever I died I felt this way.

Does that mean the fall killed me?

Maybe it did. I died from much less in the past. Humans are incredibly weak creatures. Most people didn't really think that, but we are. Compared to all the other supernatural things out there, we were the weaklings. Bottom of the food chain. Even without accounting for any supernatural, we weren't supposed to be at the top of the food chain. And yet, we got there. Of course the supernaturals has to come and ruin it all, so there's that.

My finger twitched slightly. I tried to grin but again that didn't work. As I continued my attempts at movement, someone walked into the room.

"Do you know what caused him to suddenly collapse, Elvis?" That was Mrs. Garcia. She was probably worried for me.

Elvis sighed. "I can't be sure. This isn't an actual hospital, so I'm unable to actually get an accurate reading on anything that concerns drawing blood and such."

"Should we call an ambulance?" Mrs. Garcia asked.

"If he doesn't wake up soon then we have to. He's been out cold for two hours." Elvis responded.

Great, it was the end of the day. I attempted to open my eyes once more, and found I managed to shake them slightly. They felt like they were glued together. My entire mission was to show them I was awake. A hospital was not good. I couldn't go to a hospital. They would question why I had no medical records. While I could make a paper trail if need be, I hadn't updated it for a little while. They'd question why I was linked to a forty something year old but looked nineteen.

Suddenly my eyes shot open. I blinked through the blinding light and the blur. "Oh! He's awake!" Mrs. Garcia exclaimed.

Elvis looked down at me, his dark brown eyes filled with concern. "Are you feeling okay, Lawrence?"

My stomach rolled with nausea again. I nodded numbly. "My body just feels like lead. That's all."

"Are you sure?"

I nodded. "I'm fine. I didn't get much sleep last night, so that's why I collapsed. I'll probably take the day off tomorrow."

Mrs. Garcia nodded. "You better. If you even dare walk in, I'm gonna push you out those doors and call an Uber to come pick you up. You are staying home until you feel better."

A chuckle escaped me, though the nausea didn't. "I'll listen to you, Maryanne. I do think I need a good long nap."

Maryanne sighed in relief. She must've thought I would oppose her. That made me want to laugh. Who would ever give up a chance to miss work? "I'll send in notice for a day off or two." I muttered, sitting up.

"You should really get a doctor to check you out." Elvis said, his frown deepening.

I gave him a right smile. "Trust me, I'll be okay. If I need to go to a doctor I'll go. Promise."

Elvis' frown deepened even more, but he didn't fight against it. I held back a sigh of relief. If he had forced me to go to the hospital than that would be horrible. Besides, it wasn't like I was dying. It was because of the damn magic used.

My mind immediately froze. That's right. The magic—

Maryanne gently helped me off the cot. "Want me to drive you home?"

"That'd be nice, thank you. I'd appreciate any help you could give me, Maryanne." I said, giving her my most dazzling smile.

The older woman began to laugh that embarrassed laugh. Her face turned red and she waved me off, covering her cheeks. Elvis rolled his eyes before grabbing a notepad and pen. I watched him scribble something down before he handed it to me. "If you end up going to the hospital and don't slash can't tell them what's wrong with you make sure to give them this."

I looked down and saw my 'symptoms' on the yellow paper. "Thank you, Elvis. I'll make sure to give this to them if need be."

Elvis gave me a tight smile before turning around and walking to his desk. Maryanne helped me stand up. "Okay, let’s get you home, Lawrence.

•••

Maryanne ended up staying at my house for over about cooking some meals that I could eat later on. She made some really good chicken noodle soup and then made a casserole for me. How that small woman managed to do that with her limited cooking knowledge stumped me.

She had left not too long ago. I was currently sitting on my couch, sipping on some soup. The TV was currently showing the news. Boredom was consuming me, so I instead flipped the channel.

I looked down as commercials were playing. A sigh escaped me as my food beckoned me again. As I ate the salty soup, exhaustion began to hit me.

"And now we bring you to an amazing story, Truthseekers!"

I jumped at the loud booming voice. My head jerked to the TV, only to see a burly man wearing a dark green flannel. His dark hair covered most of his face. He honestly could be Bigfoot. I was about to flick the channel when he spoke again. "Today Salem was once again struck by a weird event!"

My stomach rolled. Salem? Now I definitely had to change it. My hand shook slightly when suddenly that same feeling from earlier hit me. The grip I had on the remote broke and I watched the remote tumble to the ground. "Apparently some strange being attacked a café. The police killed it and quickly cleaned everything up, but rumor has it that the governor is trying to get the FBI to get to it!"

I frowned. What? "Now we have a caller on the line that has a theory on what exactly this thing is! Jeremy, how are ya' bud?"

"I'm good, how are you, Rory?"

"Peachy, especially with this incredible story! So, you had a real interesting theory that you shared with us about what this creature is. Would you care to share it with the other Truthseekers?" Rory said, his eyes alight with the prospect. I rolled my eyes. Why was I still watching this?

The other guy, Jeremy, cleared his throat before speaking. "So the videos of this being ransacking the café shows that he moves strangely, almost as if he doesn't really have complete motor function. You can clearly see him stumble through the windows and he doesn't react when the cops start shooting at him.

"My honest opinion of this is that this thing is a zombie. Think about it: while the video is shitty at best, you can clearly see that he has some sort of decay on him. Not only that, but his strength is inhuman. Most people can't tear a wall up with their bare hands like this guy does. Plus, there was a report that kind of got glossed over that a Salemite sent to me not too long ago."

I watched as the screen shifted from the video footage to an audio clip. The sound of a radio suddenly played, making the line flip out. "...reports of an apparent grave robbery has been made by one of the morticians..."

The clip ended and cut back to Rory. "And so I believe what happened is, knowing Salem's colorful history of witchcraft and the supernatural, it is my honest opinion that someone raised the dead in Salem."

As soon as those words left the screen my entire body felt like it was electrocuted. The tingles spread through my flesh, making my arms stiffen at my sides. Oh no. Oh lord. This Jeremy guy was right. Of course! How had I forgotten? That feeling—that was how necromancy felt! But why had I felt it all the way here? Unless...

I shut the TV off. There was no way this had happened. The only way for me to possibly feel the necromancy from all the way across the country was if it was done on a large scale. Did that mean the one that attacked had simply been an escapee? It was possible. My mind reeled from this icy shock. Whoever performed the necromancy either had a large cult following to help them or they were so powerful they could raise at least forty dead at once by themselves. Both were equally bad, but I'd rather deal with a cult than a single being more powerful than a god.

My mind was racing as I quickly grabbed my laptop. After a few mistyped passwords due to my shaking hands, I managed to log on. The search engine took forever to load but that was just because of my sucky internet. I searched the incident and found articles about it from all types of news sources. From CNN to Daily Mail, I found hundreds of articles. I read each and every one, trying to get a grasp at the situation.

The basics was that someone had randomly attacked a coffee station, destroying much of the place. Some witnesses said the man was bizarre in appearance, most likely a cosplayer. Others said they looked normal, albeit quite old. The police were forced to fire upon the man, killing him. Suddenly, a piercing cry broke through the silence. My phone. I sighed before I silenced it. Then, I sunk back into my own thoughts.

My mind was running through every possible situation. Clearly this man was a zombie, in layman's terms. He was someone who was forcibly brought back to life. Bringing someone back to life is never perfect, there's always one fatal flaw they possess that, upon finding it, makes it very apparent they are dead. However, a necromancer hasn't existed for decades. The last time one was spotted was around the Vietnam War. The rarity of them was what made their power so striking.

A necromancer could only exist after a witch or warlock was killed, typically in an extremely violent or devastating way. Their soul would be filled with malice and hate, and from that they would come back to life. In all recorded history that I've studied on necromancers, there had never been one who hadn't tried to kill people. They typically were drawn to areas they had died, essentially wanting to get revenge on those who wronged them. Some reports say they could change their appearance, others say they can possess people from afar.

My throat was dry. Why was I shaking? This wasn't the first time I'd found a necromancer alive and well. Maybe it was the location. Salem was a difficult topic for me, and the idea of it being destroyed by the undead wasn't unappealing. However, my morality forbade me from feeling that way.

I glanced down at my phone. The number had left a voicemail. I opened my phone and played it.

"Hello there, Mr. Herwy, my name is Detective Jacob Adams, located in Salem. I'm sure you've heard of the hubbub that recently occurred here. Because of the oddity of this case, I felt it best to call in an outside source with information on cults and other bizarre cases. Because of your credentials, I'd like to hire you for a time to investigate this. Please call me back once you've decided if you'd like to work with us or not."

I looked down at my phone, unmoving. Go...to Salem? The obvious answer was no, I would never go back. I swore I wouldn't but at the same time this was a necromancer. Information on them was scarce and available in countries outside of the US. No one in Salem, supernatural or not, would be as informed as I was, I knew that. Not to mention humans lived in Salem, and they would be a target.

My fingers drummed on the desk. I knew exactly what I had to do, even if it would kill me.