Before Z-bands

Chapter 13

Eliza was finally released from containment four days later. Wyatt was excited to see her in person - not through a screen or glass and not contained in a room.

Eliza gave Wyatt a little cuddle when the van dropped her off. Everyone had gathered to welcome her back. The entire community - the whole team.
Eliza hurried to talk to Zed and Bonzo.
"Hey, Zed!"
"Hey, Eliza! How are you? You okay?"
"Yeah... I'm just real tired."
"Why?" Zed asked.
" I've been awake all night."
"Why?"
"Because of the grugzat grumans! They are so annoying! They kept banging on the wall every time I tried to sleep! I swear they did it on purpose!" She had started off whispering but her voice soon grew to a frustrated shout.
Everyone stared. Then, from the depth of the crowd, Mrs Zambi made her way to Eliza.
"You kids can talk to her later. I think she really needs sleep right now." She said, putting a hand on her daughter's shoulder.
Mrs Zambi led Eliza home and the crowd dispersed in different directions talking about what had just happened.
Zed and Bonzo stood there for a while. Wyatt joined them.
"Well, that was strange..." Zed said.
"Why?" Wyatt asked. "What's strange about it?"
"Eliza never shouts like that. She only does that when she's had a very bad day."
"She's just tired, Zed. Leave her be for a day or two and when she returns to school it'll be like she never went anywhere." Wyatt said.
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Wyatt couldn't have been more wrong. When Eliza came back to school, she couldn't concentrate. She was always staring at her Z-band or shaking it or trying to break it or pull it off. Something was wrong. The patrol had done something to it. Her band didn't seem to work too well. Maybe because Chip had had to fix it. Maybe he didn't fully fix it.

Eliza seemed to always have a craving for flesh and brains now. She'd never hurt a human in her life but suddenly she was trying to attack them almost every day. And she seemed to follow her instincts now. Before she'd ignored the constant hunger for something more than brains in a can and colli-brains. But now it seemed to grow stronger every day.
Addison didn't know why. Is it something with the electricals? Did her uncle do a bad job at fixing her Z-band? Was it still broken?
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The answers came to her a few weeks later. Eliza had gotten into a pretty severe fight with some human teenagers at school.
They'd been talking about her dad. Eliza would attack pretty much anyone for no reason at the time, but if she had a reason she'd probably kill them. Luckily, they escaped with just a few severe injuries and the Z-patrol never found out.
Addison had asked to see her Z-band afterwards. Eliza stuck out her left arm. Addison examined the band for anything that wasn't normal. Then she saw it. The little troll icon. Eliza's band had been hacked.

Author's note

After this book is done I'm going to do another about Eliza's adopted sister. I think I'll call her Lizzie because I think it'll be funny to give them similar names. I'm gonna call it "Peace".
I'm gonna do maybe 2-3 more chapters of this book to wrap it up and then maybe a final part that tells you about Eliza's mom meeting her stepdad and them adopting a child (Lizzie).

Don't forget to vote if you enjoyed this and read 'Peace' when it comes out if you liked this, I'll probably post chapter 1 next week or maybe tomorrow if I finish this book quickly.
Love you, guys,
~Mimi/ZombieGirl8300~