Chapter 176 - Tha First One!

Zoonic the Hedgehog opens his eyes. Fading in and out of consciousness and with blurred vision, he is unsure of the reality being presented to him.

Where is he?

He is lying on the cold, ceramic tiled floor of the bathroom in his apartment. He drags his heavy body to the sink counter, pulling himself up brusquely.

"Ugh, I feel like shit." He says aloud, clutching his forehead. He is running a high fever and sweating like he had never before, and it is pouring down the sides of his face and into the sink.

Suddenly, without warning, he begins to retch uncontrollably.

"Oh no, I'm gonna…" Before he can even complete the thought, though, it happens.

He starts to vomit. The noxious bodily fluids torrent out of his mouth like a hose under pressure suddenly turned on. Before long, chunks of what he had for breakfast are now filling the sink to the brim. The surge stops for a moment, and he gasps to recollect his breath.

"Oh my God, what's happening to me…?" He manages to blurt out. He looks into the mirror over the sink and at his reflection – just yesterday, he looked perfectly healthy. But now, his skin had a sickly, pallid tone and traces of vomit were visibly lining his lips.

I have to call somebody, 9-11 or…

Coincidentally, his cell phone starts ringing.

However, checking his pockets, he realizes that it is not on his person, but the sound seemed to be coming from the adjacent bedroom.

Holding back another wave of vomit, Zoonic steadily makes his way to the ringing phone.

Whoever it was, they could help him. They had to.

Oh my God, my head… He collapses unto his knees, the crippling power of his headache. So, he is reduced to crawling, the rest of the way to his bedside dresser, where the ringing is heard at its loudest.

Clutching his head with one hand, he uses the other to shuffle through the miscellaneous items that line his dresser. A pack of cigarettes, a bobble-head of himself and an open pack of double mint gum are thrown onto the floor in the process. A photograph of him, Buzzy and Dusters standing together and smiling hits the floor and shatters with a loud CRACK. It is when he sends his alarm clock flying with a swing of his arm that he finally locates the phone, and answers it.

There is no time for a casual exchange of hellos.

"Help! I can't stop vomiting! Get an ambulance, I can't —" Zoonic shouts into the phone, only to be cut off by the continued flow of vomit. He barely manages to move the phone away from his mouth in time.

Buzzy happens to be on the other end, and he responds, just loud enough for Zoonic to hear with the phone away from his ear, "Uhh, Zoonic, what the hell? I'll call 9-11! Hold on man, I'll be right there too."

Zoonic nods pathetically, unable to vocalize a response. He throws the phone away and drops to the floor.

My head feels like it's going to explode…

He rolls in his own puke screaming in pain, and crying in it. He felt hopeless, like he was going to die, as the nightmare continued, seemingly without end.

I can't give up, though. Not here, not now...

He was like a sponge that had been left to soak in a tub full of vomit, getting up. As he walked, he would leave a trail of vomit on the floor behind him wherever he went.

Zoonic was in a delirious state of mind, and this affected his sense of direction. Lumbering about his bedroom, he bumps into his bed, crashes into his wardrobe, then finally trips and rolls into his closet. He pukes some more in there; decorating the walls and the clothes around him in a cascade of green filth.

"You don't look so well, Zoonic."

Zoonic whips his head around to see a person standing there and with that one look, he knew he was not going to survive long enough for the ambulance to arrive.

…

His name is Zoonic the hedgehog and he is fated to be the first victim of the Dysentery Outbreak in Morphius.

What had initially been the scene of a medical emergency has escalated into the scene of a gruesome murder.

The street in front of the Pink House apartment complex has been blocked off with yellow 'police' tape. Three squad cars and an ambulance are in the area, sirens flashing, and alerting nearby residents that tomorrow's news was in the making. Buzzy had just arrived on the scene; he has no choice but to join the throngs of people being held back by the tape. He is pacing frantically. He had been blocked off from the chaos just like everyone else – he, Zoonic's best friend.

How dare they not let me in?

"What the fuck?!" The distressed Buzzy shouts, directing his rage at a nearby fire hydrant, with a kick that only made the great pain he felt even worse. It was the pain that came with being powerless to help his best friend, suffering only a flight of steps away. He drops to the ground, unto his knees. "Zoonic is dying in there, and they won't..."

A knuckled hand grasps his shoulder; the hand of Dusters the Echidna.

"You're lucky, bro." He says, helping Buzzy back unto his feet.

"Lucky? What the hell are you talking about?" Buzzy is beside himself with anger. "Zoonic needs my help!"

"There won't be any help for him now, man." Dusters looks grim; with a faraway, almost dazed expression on his face when he says to Buzzy, "Just be glad that you didn't get here before me."

"But Zoonic's my best friend, I—"

Dusters grabs Buzzy by the shirt collar, and pulls him up to his face. "Shut the hell up, you have no idea, man!" He barks at Buzzy with a crazed look in his eyes, spitting in his face. "Blood and vomit everywhere, from the bathroom to the kitchen, it isn't a fucking joke, man!"

"Put him down, Dusters." Somebody says. The two look to see it is Spacio, on the other side of the police blockade. "You two getting into a fight over it won't bring Zoonic back." He pulls out a cigarette and lights it, then placing it into his mouth. "Well aren't you a big shot, Spacio?" Dusters grumbles, but concedes, recognizing that the chameleon is right.

Spacio cocks his head at Buzzy. "Never in my fifteen years on the force, have I witnessed such a brutal scene." He takes a moment to exhale, shaking his head disapprovingly. "We've had some guys literally run out of there and call it a day, with what we're dealing with."

"What do you mean? What are we dealing with here?" Buzzy ask innocently, looking between the Spacio and Dusters expectantly. It is not as though he missed the signs in what Dusters and Spacio were saying, though.

He just simply could not believe it.

Spacio must have picked up on this, because he hesitates before he answers, "We're dealing with a case of cold-blooded murder."

Murder?

There was no denying it ' head begins to swim. He gasps aloud and crumbles under the weight of the moment. Zoonic was murdered? Why? What…?Adrenaline floods his system in that instant. In one sudden burst of energy, Buzzy leaps over the police tape, the blockade, and past Spacio. He weaves past policemen lunging to stop him, and makes it through the front door of the apartment complex. He dashes up the stairs, at full speed.

1F…2F…3F…

Buzzy runs without stopping for rest until he reaches the fourth floor. There, he takes a second to catch his breath, then places an unsteady hand unto the handle of the door that separated the stairwell from the floor's main hallway.

Zoonic murdered? There's no thinks reassuringly, letting out an exasperated sigh as he turns the handle and pushes the door open.

Zoonic can't die, he's my best tries to maintain his composure and look calm, as he makes his way down the hall. It would hardly matter, though, since the floor had long been evacuated by the police.

Nobody can take his place if he begins a brisk walk, becoming more worried.

Zoonic died, and it's because I didn't get here fast enough. His walk has turned into an all-out sprint within six seconds, and he reaches Zoonic's front door gasping for breath.

He rips off the police tape blocking the doorway and steps inside.

Squick.

He looks down, having stepped in some unknown liquid. It is green and slimy. It is vomit but – Zoonic's vomit. Buzzy wails in disgust and falls to the ground with a splash of red. He scrambles back unto his feet and looks down at where he had fallen. He sees his reflection in a pool of freshly drawn blood. Cringes, he starts to mumble incoherently to himself. Recalling, what Dusters had said earlier, and it makes him feel nauseous.

Zoonic, where are you?

In true narrative fashion, it is then that his eyes fall upon the figure seated at the couch set against the wall on the far side of the room…

…

His name is Milton Buzzy Crower and what he has just seen will haunt him for the rest of his life.