Chapter Text
Wednesday Addams was absolutely, completely, indubitably done with Tyler Galpin; her feelings (blech) for him were but a blip, a failure of her body, and a minor deviation from her path to best Mary Shelley.
But
Wednesday had her investigations (which she adored), her novel (which had run into a wall at the publishers), and her worry for Enid’s well-being (a grating mess), and sometimes the only remedy for an overly full mind was a sedate walk through an asylum. Wednesday definitely didn’t come to Willow Hill because Tyler was there, and he still…intrigued her. No. She was here to settle her mind, check in on her uncle, and spend an afternoon not hearing about the dreaded Bruno. Plus, there weren’t that many asylums in Vermont, and Willow Hill happened to be the closest one.
As she prepared to hijack a ride, this time by sneaking into the van of a food vendor who serviced both Nevermore and Willow Hill, her brother popped up like an unexpected wart.
“You’re going to Willow Hill, aren’t you?”
It was shocking how on the money Pugley could be sometimes, but he was an Addams after all, even if he was an imbecilic one.
“Maybe,” Wednesday replied, “What do you want?”
“Can you give a gift to Slurp for me?” Pugsley asked pitifully, “I’m worried that he’s going to be hungry. I’ll even give you a great-Aunt Walburga’s saber, of you do it!”
Wednesday had lusted over the elegant blade with the slight and graceful curve ever since their great aunt had given it to Pugsley on a whim. She had been planning to break into his room and steal it, but she had enough on her plate.
“What do you want me to give him?”
The ‘gift’ had turned out to be a hive box, more likely pilfered from Eugene, full to the brim of pig brains that Pugley had bartered for from the local butcher. He was now working at ‘Milfords’ Meat Emporium’ for one day a week until he paid off the cost.
So Wednesday was stuck in the freezer compartment of the truck with a fragrant box of pig brains. By the time that she was able to sneak out with the box, she was drawing together a mental list of the ways she could torture he brother for this.
The gently sloping grounds with people tottering around zombie-like or staring into the gray Vermont sky called to her, along with the bald head of her uncle, but she wanted to rid herself of these brains most of all.
It took a bit of marching through hallways, but eventually she found the room with the encarcled Slurp.
He was in a straitjacket and lunged at her with enthusiasm, but as she looked at him, she couldn’t help but notice that he was…different. She hadn’t gotten the best look at him before, but she knew that he certainly hadn’t had a nose before. He had more skin; the bone was covered up, though the skin was twisted and discolored. He had much more hair now, and he was more fluid as he lunged towards her.
On the floor was a half-eaten meal of spaghetti, the red sauce of the meal still on his now-existent lips.
Wednesday assessed the situation in the same way that she assessed a cadaver—carefully, and being on the lookout for the mistakes of fools, coroners, and everyone who wasn’t her.
Willow Hill was obviously not feeding this reanimated corpse properly.
Despite it all, it seemed to be, well, not healing, but taking considerate steps away from being purely a rotted corpse, at this point, it could be some sort of twisted creature
She was…drawn to it, maybe, something in those dark, not quite dead eyes that made her want to learn more, to dissect, not literally, not right now at least. Wednesday didn’t sigh, but wearily put, ‘figure out how she could investigate a zombie’ on her list of things to do.
After an enjoyable walk through the grounds, Wednesday finally found her uncle as he nibbled on choice pieces of gravel from the paths.
“I’m sorry I don’t have better news for my favourite niece, “ he said after they had exchanged greetings, “they have decided to try and get some of the pieces of metal out of my brain and are sending me to Massachusetts General Hospital for a week or two. Normally I’d get out of it, but I’ve been feeling a bit run down and could use a nice refreshing coma.”
Wednesday felt tempted to argue, but her uncle did seem a little off. He was slightly flushed instead of his normal waxy-wan. He would be no help to her if he were sick, and while the cemetery mystery and, of course, the threat of Enid’s death hung over her, two weeks wouldn’t be the end of the world.
“Fine.”
It was one of her more compassionate ‘fines’. He did look rather ill, and she had other things to do.
Of course, it was then that her uncle decided to be almost normal, something so abnormal that she was almost tempted to dig around in his brain herself.
“How’s school? Your classes?”
The shock was so strong that Wednesday answered without thinking.
“All fine except for Biology, it seems that I am…disruptive.” It turned out that bringing your own animal to dissect, correcting the teacher almost incessantly, and concocting poisons in spare Bunsen burners led to some issues.
“Why don’t you do an independent study?” Fester offered offhandedly as he stuck his pointer finger so deep in his ear that Wednesday was sure that he was going to prick his finger on one of the nails in there.
“Independent study?”
“Yeah, it’s an old Nevermore tradition. If you are able to say that your project will push forward the well-being of outcasts or make a substantial impact on the wider outcast community, you are allowed to work on that project instead of attending one class.”
“Hmm,” was all Wednesday said, but the well-oiled and wickedly sharp gears in her mind began to whir.
***
Two days later, she was back at Willow Hill, an officially sanctioned student-researcher exploring the regenerative properties of zombies. Principal Dort had practically drooled when she had given him her appropriately gruesome presentation on the unexplored biology and psychology of the not-quite-living. Wednesday had even sunk to mentioning that the normies were not treating him properly and how other, more sentimental outcasts would call that a shame. Dort had practically teared up as he wrote a note to include her research project in his newsletter to potential donors.
Now she was able to go to Willow Hill three times a week for 2 hours each, as that was the length of her Bio class with the extra time for labs. It would have been perfect, she had even brought her 200-piece sampling kit with all the delightful apparatus, when Dr. Fairburn, politely but firmly pulled Wednesday into her office.
“Now, I appreciate you studying…the patient–”
“I am calling it specimen number one if you would like to do the same,” Wednesday interjected. She may decide to call it something different, but at the current point, anything was better than Slurp.
“The patient,” Dr. Fairburn continued doggedly, “but, it’s against protocol and an additional safety concern, and well, I said yes but…”
Wednesday knew a little bit of blackmail and manipulation when she heard it.
“What do you want?”
Dr. Fairburn folded her elegant hands.
“Well, just you spending thirty minutes with Tyler Galpin. I think it might spark something in him if we give it enough time, and I am running out of things to try, and I am trying not to use my last resort.”
Of course! Wednesday thought as she glowered, of course, things couldn’t ever go smoothly.
“That’s half my time,” she stated. It took thirty minutes to get from Nevermore to Willow Hill, and she only had that two-hour chunk of time…
“Better than no time,” Dr. Fairburn said innocently.
Wednesday couldn’t help but feel impressed. Dr. Fairburn drove a hard bargain.
“Fine. May I go? I’ll visit him on my way out.”
Dr. Fairburn came out from behind her desk and smiled beatifically.
“
Why don’t you visit him now?”
Wednesday pointedly stared at the hand that Dr. Fairburn was resting on her shoulder. Dr. Fairburn quickly removed her hand.
“I have to get these to the specimen.”
Wednesday had broken into two funeral homes and one morgue to gather thirteen brains, and while it had been invigorating, some light breaking and entering was good for the soul, she had called in her Christmas present early and would be having fresh brains delivered twice a week from Frump Mortuaries.
She had her brains in black tupperware stacked on top of each other in a large grey bag, which Dr. Fairburn pulled out of Wednesday’s hand, which she only just barely allowed.
“Don’t worry, I’ll deliver it and make sure he’s filmed while he consumes the…contents.” Dr. Fairburn reassured, not that Wednesday needed it.
“He bites,” was all Wednesday said.
***
Tyler looked much the same, sweat glistening on his bare chest. Wednesday didn’t even acknowledge his presence. Dr. Fairburn said that she would have to respond if he spoke to her, but she never said that she had to address him first. She neatly crossed her legs and slipped into a sitting position. It took two minutes of her scribbling in one of her notebooks for Tyler to speak.
“Here to study me, are you?” His voice was slightly raspy, like maybe he had been yelling or screaming the day before. Wednesday would never say this to a living soul, but something about the almost ravaged nature of his voice pricked something warm in her.
“No, I’m studying another patient. The world doesn’t center on you, Galpin.”
He…chuckled? A low, almost pained thing.
“Of course, Wednesday Addams is the ‘student researcher’ who is studying the zombie.”
He pulled his hand up as if to wipe his face and then let it fall, and opted to blow the hair out of his face. It was so like the beleaguered barista in the small cafe that she had come to…care for that Wednesday had to look back to her notebook.
They spent the rest of the thirty minutes in silence, and neither of them said anything when Wednesday left. The tension that she was feeling didn’t leave her even when she was in the hallway. It stuck with her as she moved, almost in a daze, through the asylum. When she entered the other cell, her mind was churning with such ferocity that she was almost, almost surprised when a voice croaky with disuse said,
“And who might you be?”