The Phantom Touch

Need

"This is going to kill my business! We've barely been open for a whole day and someone has already come in to steal my clientele!"

Calista stormed through the store, doing circles around the low refrigerated units that divided the store in two. There was only myself and Liz working that day since Calista knew there wouldn't be that many customers after the bulk of the zombies bought their meats on opening day. However, she hadn't counted on it being completely dead thanks to the news of Mercedes' return.

"I don't know," said Liz with a shrug. "I personally don't have any desire to go back to a human diet. I like thoroughly dead meat. In fact the more rotten the better." When I shuddered at the thought, she turned to me with a pleased smile. "Gives it a more potent taste and adds some variety to the diet."

"I know we'll still have a few customers," said our boss with a sigh, before bracing her hands against one of the counters and staring deep into the store's selection of butchered human meat. "But, we were already cutting it close with overhead costs to run the store during the day as it is. If we lose even a small percentage of our customers, then I won't be able to afford to keep all of my day shift on. I'll have to let a few of you go."

I swallowed and looked out the windows to the quiet street. We only had a couple customers that day who, like Bungee, couldn't make it out to the store the previous day to buy food. Outside of those few though, it was a ghost town. I wondered if Bungee and I celebrated my new job too early.

"What about the blood profits?" asked Liz, glancing over to the wall of refrigerated blood packs in the back. "Surely, you make a lot of money from that."

"We do, but you have to remember, we're not just paying you," answered Calista with a shake of her head. "We have to pay for our sources. Mattias and I may own the crematorium we are getting our meats from, but we still have to pay the staff there as well as the rent. Then, for the blood, we have to pay feeders. Right now, we're sourcing the blood from feeders that are currently sponsored, but that's not sustainable as the feeders first and foremost belong to their sponsor. We'll eventually want to support feeders that we sponsor completely. That's a hefty sum to pay. We're a non profit and Mattias has a fund that will keep us going for a long time, but we also don't want to drive this in the ground from the start."

She let out a wail before burying her head into her arms, which sat crossed upon the counter.

"Isn't it a little soon to give up hope?" I asked with hesitation in my words. "I mean, Mercedes only just got back with this whole new diet. I'm sure people will need some time to think it over."

"I don't know about that," groaned Calista, who got up and stepped over to our side of the room by the cash registers. "Raid has called an all zombie meeting for tonight. Our clan wants answers and some are still too scarred from so many years of hunger. They're eager for an alternative, even if they now have a source of quality decayed human flesh. Word is Mercedes is going to take whoever is interested in the new diet over to the clan she met with to learn about how it works in person. So we'll see tonight just how many zombies are ready to jump ship."

"Well I'm team human meat, no offense," Liz offered, turning to me with an apologetic smile.

"None taken," I answered.

"That's great," sighed Calista, "but I have my doubts about everyone else. How could I not when I'd prefer to eat fresh vegetables and a proper steak that's fresh off a cow myself? What am I going to do?"

After that our boss headed into the back room and I spent the remainder of my shift listening to Liz's gossip.

I wondered how Bungee felt about the diet.