Chapter Text
Eliza slips out of the room after Zed.
"What are you doing?" she hisses.
"Dude, we're at a real school" he says. "You want to stay in some basement?"
"Zed—" Eliza starts, but just then, a human sees them.
"AHHHHHH! ZOMBIES!!!" they scream, and before Zed or Eliza can do anything, pull the nearest Z-alarm.
"Fuck," Eliza curses, and then "Zed!"
Zed has disappeared, presumably back to the basement, and panicked students are beginning to pour into the hallway. Eliza ducks into the nearest room, which happens to be, ironically, a zombie shelter.
She has just about thirty seconds to try and figure out what she's gotten herself into before the door hisses open again. Eliza wants to scream. She rushes for cover, as quietly as she can. It's a human, because of course it is.
"Hello?" the human calls cautiously. Eliza stays silent, hoping they haven't noticed her.
"Helloooo? I'm Addison," the human repeats, drawing it out. "I know someone's in here, I saw you move."
Shit. Eliza knew she should've stayed put.
"Hello?" she calls back, trying to sound friendly.
"Who are you?"
"I'm Eliza, she/her," Eliza replies, silently cursing Zed for this.
"She/her?" Addison asks.
"My pronouns,"
"What are. . .?"
"They don't even teach you grammar here? Pronouns are what people use to refer to you. Like you would say 'She's Eliza. Her clothes are the coolest.'"
"Oh." says Addison. "But why do you need to tell me that? You're obviously a girl."
"Because—you know what, never mind,"
Addison has been slowly moving towards Eliza's voice as they talk, and Eliza is running out of things to hide behind. It's dark in the room though, and so she reasons that it's okay that she's standing exposed in the middle of the room, talking to a human. Her sound logic is promptly shattered by the click of the room's lights turning on. Eliza is now fully visible to Addison, who is less then two feet away from her. Addison screams and shoves her away. Unfortunately for Eliza, a metal bunk bed is right behind her.
"Ow! What the hell?"
"Sorry!"Addison really does look apologetic. "I didn't mean . . ."
She trails off as she looks at Eliza, really looks at her. Eliza feels slightly uncomfortable under her scrutiny.
"My parents always taught me that zombies are disgusting, dead-eyed freaks, but . . . you're not hideous at all," she says thoughtfully.
"Wow, is that your idea of a compliment?" Eliza scoffs. "You're a real charmer."
"My parents have always hated zombies since one bit my grandpa's ear off." Addison says by way of explanation.
Eliza doesn't know what to say to that because what? She's saved from having to parse whatever that was supposed to be by a group of cheerleaders bursting in.
"There you are!" one says, and yanks Addison bodily away from Eliza, while the others exclaim about zombie germs and filth. "If you ever touch my cousin again it won't be pretty, which as you can see, is off-brand for me." His lip curls in disgust as he sanitizes his hands. "To the cheer tryouts. Seabrook awaits!" he proclaims, yanking Addison out the door.
When Eliza returns to the basement, Zed is missing, and Bonzo only knows that he went upstairs. She finds out where upstairs in the last few minutes of the day, when Zed returns, and informs them that, unfortunately, he was rejected from the football team for, wait for it, being being zombie.
"I could have told you that," says Eliza. "Besides, the football team is stupid anyway,"
"Hey thanks for the pep talk," Zed replies sarcastically.
Bonzo mutters something in Zombie to Eliza and they both laugh.
"Hey, you know what, I did get something out of it," Zed protests. "I met this cheerleader, she seems really nice! Addison, I think?"
Great.
"Look, Zed, humans are bad, but cheerleaders are monsters." She points to the anti-zombie graffiti on the wall. "Things need to change."