“Cold.”

“Is it?” Sadao said, looking sidelong at the man who’d spoken. Members of the local Sheriff department and animal control hustled and bustled around the tiny, rundown shack of a house. They carted out carcasses of dogs, cats, birds, ferrets, rabbits- anything that could be a pet, or had been, anyhow. The Animal Control member beside him sighed and let his breath smoke out on the cold, cold air. Sadao’s breath went nowhere these days, least of all inside any lungs of his. How long had it been now? More than twenty, that’s for sure. Another animal control officer thrust a thumb over his shoulder.

“Where do these ones go?” He asked, tone more like a bored clerk than a bleeding heart animal control officer hellbent on bringing animal abusers to justice. 

“In the fuckin’ truck, Dave.” The officer beside Sadao said. Sadao supposed it happens, though, the gradual wearing down of one’s ability to care the more honest the world gets about how cruel it is. Those dogs will find loving homes, and he was glad for that. The whole day wasn’t lost. On another metal pole similar to the ones some of the dogs had to be kept on, a sickly pale woman was brought kicking and screaming over the threshold of her front door. Almost no one reacted, leaving the woman’s screams and gurgles to echo out into the thick forest beyond. “Hard to believe, huh?”

He would’ve said yes if he was human still, shielded from the world so close, yet so far. A world filled with monsters and black magic. Some days, he did feel that way, still coming to terms with waking up on that beach, stared at by painted faces and dark-skinned women dancing around his stone bed, tits flopping, bundles of sticks smoking on the air, clutched in the hands of grim-faced, warbling priests. And the fear of it. And the swimming, months of swimming, losing chunks of himself all along the way. He turned to the man, “No.” He shook his head.

“I guess this is just a normal morning for you boys in the Paranormal Police, huh?” The officer chuckled. “We don’t get much calls like this, I tell ya.”

“Investigations.” Sadao muttered.

“Huh?” The man turned to him and sniffled.

“Paranormal Investigations. We’re not police. More like…” Sadao eyes would’ve looked up as he thought, he crossed his arms, “Exterminators? We take care of the things you’d shit yourself at.”

“That so, huh?” The officer crossed his own arms and shrugged, nodding appreciatively, “You done much pants shitting, then?”

“Not for a while.” He tugged off a glove from his boney-bare hand and wriggled the long, white fingers so they clacked together in front of the man’s face before removing his sunglasses, revealing the pale blue lights in his eyesockets, “Have to be able to eat to be able to shit, friend!”

“What the fuck!” The man stumbled back and clutched at his chest like his heart was going to give at any moment. He sat, huffing and puffing big clouds of breath into the air. “What the fuck?”

“I get that a lot.” He looked back to the screeching woman and the sound of a sigh came from his skull’s smile, still hiding behind the black scarf around his face. He replaced his glasses, that was enough fun for the morning, he guessed. Hardly seemed an appropriate time for any kind of fun. The case he’d been working was missing pets. At first, they only suspected coyotes, or maybe bears or mountain lions. They lived in the middle of the forest, after all. But no bears or any kind of animal had been sighted by hunters or other locals. PHPI took it, gave it to him, and Sadao thought it was a chupacabra, or maybe a wendigo. They’d dealt with one a while ago, so it was unlikely another had moved in, especially after they cleansed the area with that ritual. Finally, he got an inkling it was one of his reanimated brethren. After all, wasn’t much of a leap to think some of the zombiefolk liked their food wriggling and fresh, as disgusting as it was. Trouble was, people are apt to miss a dog more than they will a buck licking at a stream. A sad fact.

In a couple strides, he took the woman’s face between his surprisingly strong hands. Blame black magic. She had no choice but to turn her head his way, where he wanted it. The dead, glassy eyes stared at him and he stared back. Had he ever been so barbaric? So ghastly? So terrible? No. He’d had a long memory, and some barbaric, ghastly, terrible ones at that. But he’d never hurt another who didn’t deserve it. “You give us a bad name. Should send you to the chopping block, or a wood-chipper. I hope you died bad the first time.” He let go of her face after pushing her away from him none too gently. He should’ve felt sorry, maybe, some people handled being reanimated differently. But all he wanted to do was plug her with a few slugs. "Either way, I hope you die bad again." He threw over his shoulder.

He walked over to his car, opened the door and slammed it shut once he was in. “What a morning.” 

And he was off down the road, back to the offices. He wished he could still drink.