Who: Zania and Nic Where: The Castell House When: Late night, Sunday, December 17th Status: Complete
Zania had been unsettled all day, on edge for reasons that she couldn’t put her finger on. Maybe it was something in the air, something other than the snow that continued to fall on and off, though it was possible that it was just that. Zania loved winter coats, scarves, gloves and boots, but she hated being cold. The further they got into winter, the more often she was cold, and maybe she was just irritable for no reason other than that. As she tromped across the backyard towards the greenhouse, she could feel her toes and nose already starting to go numb and a chill shook through her as an offending gust of wind swirled up her coat. Damn this weather.
She pulled her coat closer around her and huddled her hands under her arms as her feet moved faster, and that was when her foot caught on something, knocking her onto the cold, wet earth. “Fuck,” she cursed, pain shooting up her arms from her wrists. She knew she could do more damage catching herself like that, but it was instinct not to fall on her face. Zania sighed, kneeling up to brush off her hands, then felt pain shoot up her ankle. She yelped as she kicked out, surprised when her boot made contact with something of substance. Not a rock, but not grass. Zania turned to look, her eyes widening when she realized it was a rat that had bitten her.
Moving as fast as she could, Zania scrambled back on her hands, kicking the creature away, then sharp little teeth sunk into her hand. Zania screamed and jumped to her feet, but the rat sunk its teeth in deeper, biting down her until suddenly it burst into flame. Zania panted, holding one hand with the other, when she realized that there were more, all of them crawling towards her. Zania backed up, only to find them behind her as well, surrounding her by tens, twenties-- there had to be a hundred rats, all of them crawling over one another in their frenzied attempted to get to her.
Zania screamed, kicking out, trying to keep them at bay. When that wasn’t enough, she began setting them on fire, the smell of charred flesh and fur surrounding her. It felt like they just kept coming, killing themselves to get to her, screaming as she burned them, but never stopping until they were nothing more than meat and bone. They began to pile around her, a circle of fire and blood, until Zania decided to make a run for it.
The first step was the worst. She could feel their bones breaking beneath her boot, the muck of their insides sloshing up around the toe and splashing on her jeans. The sound was almost worse than the feel of it, the crunch and the slurp, but Zania kept moving until she was grabbing the backdoor and slamming into the hard surface of Nic’s chest.
“Move!” she screeched, pushing him back inside, sure that the creatures were just behind her. Her brother shuffled back, looking out into the yard as she raced into the kitchen and climbed up on a chair. “Shut the fucking door!” she shouted when she saw him still standing there with the door open, staring into the night. Beyond him she could see the ring of fire on the lawn, the light slowly dying as blood drenched the flame. Her eyes darted to the floor, but nothing scampered in after her. Outside, it was quiet.
“What happened?” Nic asked, shutting the door as he turned to face her. He’d heard her screaming from his room and had come as quickly as possible, but he’d still missed whatever had transpired. The smell was awful though, wafting into the house even with the door shut, and he muttered a spell to at least put out the fire and kill the smoke as quickly as possible. He wasn't concerned about the lawn, he was concerned about his sister. Zania wasn't easy to scare, but this definitely shook her up.
"Rats! Fucking rats everywhere! Fucker bit my fucking hand!" she snapped, then dropped down onto the table, cradling her bleeding hand with the other as she glared into the night. The pain wasn't that bad now, she'd had far worse, but the shock of it all left her shaking, her fear turning to rage as she considered setting the backyard on fire just to cleanse the area. It wasn't enough, knowing she was safe and they were gone. She didn't get the satisfaction of a proper revenge, not when they were all dead. "Raise them up," she demanded, her attention turning to Nic. "I need to kill them again."
Nic had been worried, but the second Zania decided she wanted zombie rats to smash and burn that worry turned to annoyance. "No," he said, walking over to a drawer to retrieve a small jar of healing salve. "That's too much work just to give you something to burn. If I raise 'em, it'll be to keep it from happening again, to use 'em as protection, not so you can torch 'em." He still wasn't sure what had happened or how many rats they were talking about, but even half a dozen was more than he'd ever raised at once. If the numbers were as great as she seemed to think, the blood and energy it cost would likely knock him out. "Where did they come from? Animals like that don't just attack people. Not unless they've been starved or something."
"I don't. fucking. know," Zania said. That grated on her most of all. There was no reason for it. No explanation. It felt like one of those random occurrences that she'd been completely unprepared for. "They were just there, surrounding me, crawling up my boots, then my jeans, and I just--" She took a deep breath and closed her eyes for a minute. "I just had to get them off me," she finally said. If it hadn't been so late at night, if it hadn't been so dark, or so cold, maybe she could have managed it without killing them all in a blaze of fire. But what was done was done and she only cared that they were gone now.
"Here," Nic said, handing over the salve. "I'll go cleanse the yard, put up some additional wards. Make sure nothing's getting in tonight. We can take a look in the morning, okay?" If this was just the first wave, then the second wasn't getting in the house, he'd make sure of that. If they were being attacked, it would buy them some time, but Nic had the feeling this was just another one of those weird things that happened in Point Pleasant. If a couple of bites were all that came of it, then that really wasn't so bad.
"Kay," Zania sighed, her eyes ticking out to the yard. It was so dark she couldn't even see the greenhouse now, shadows swallowing everything, including the remains on their lawn. "Be careful," she told him, then began to spread the salve on her hand. In a few minutes there'd be no evidence that she'd even been in danger, except for her frayed sanity. She'd never considered herself afraid of rats, but almost anything in large numbers could be frightening, especially when it came to creatures that could eat a human alive.