Field Exercise (Flash Fiction Fridays #64)

Timmy liked to be honest with himself. After all, lying to yourself usually ended in blood, tears, and all sorts of unpleasantness. That was why he was only too happy to admit that he was very much enjoying himself right now.

Students at the Academy were the best of the best, and that meant testing them wasn’t always easy. Setting aside oddities like Katie who was a recognised war hero despite being a teenager, it wasn’t that unusual for Academy students to have experience in dealing with bandits, ruins, and other adventuring-related matters. The usual field exercise of dumping them in the wilderness to survive against wild animals for a few days wasn’t going to do anything except waste their time.

Instead, he had been asked to come up with a more… real-world scenario.

His weapon of choice?

A staged attack on the student dormitories using zombies…. lots and lots of zombies.

And while watching the whole debacle unfold through the eyes of his undead minions, Timmy was hard-pressed not to cackle, especially since Katie had decapitated one of his zombie elites and was busy cursing at him through it in a manner that would have made Avraniel proud.

Ah, the wonders of a thorough education.

---

“Zombies!” Jason turned and ran down the corridor. “Help! Zombies!”

Alas, his cries for help were unanswered as the rest of the boys’ dormitory was also under siege by the undead. There were hundreds of them. They had broken through the windows, laid siege to the exits, and even come through the walls. They were everywhere! Not far off, some poor bastard went down under a dozen zombies and was dragged off.

“Stop screaming!” someone shouted. “And help, you idiot!”

Jason scrabbled for his sword, only to remember that he’d left it behind in his room, along with his pants. At the moment, he was dressed in his underwear, and the closest thing he had to a weapon was a chair leg from the chair he’d broken over the head of a zombie earlier.

“Crap!” He wailed. “Isn’t the Academy supposed to be warded against zombies? How are there so many here?”

The flash of fire and lightning was accompanied by the rush of water and ice.

“Who cares how it happened?” someone roared. “Just keep killing them! We can worry about what to do next when we’re not knee-deep in zombies!”

Jason punched a zombie in the head and yanked the club out of its hands. It was better than the chair leg. “Fine! They’re just zombies. Who cares if we’re outnumbered. We can handle them!”

And that was when the zombie hydra decided to make its presence known.

“…”

---

Katie covered her face with her hands as the girls’ dormitory descended into bedlam. There were zombies everywhere, with anyone unable to fend them off being dragged away into the night.

“What’s happening?” Evelyn shouted. “Why are there zombies?”

Katie sighed. “This is a test. My master is controlling the zombies.”

“What?” Rather than being comforted, Evelyn seemed even more panicked. “We’re being attacked by a Grand Necromancer? What are we going to do?”

“We’re going to fight,” Katie growled. “Now, calm down. The whole point of this test is to see how we react to…” She trailed off as more screaming rang out as a zombie great eagle flew past. “Never mind. Follow me and do what I say.”

---

Author’s Notes

It’s important to point out that nobody died during this test. The people who got dragged off were dumped into vats of non-toxic (but highly unpleasant) slime to make them understand they were ‘dead’. It’s the same stuff Timmy used to threaten Katie with. As for the damage and injuries, Vicky can fix all of that in a jiffy.

Still, you can bet Timmy was laughing his ass off watching the kids get overrun by zombies. Meanwhile, Katie is trying to lead a counter attack against someone who is not only a Grand Necromancer and a master tactician and strategies but who also knows all of her habits and preferences. Fun times for her. The kids are lucky, though. I could have been worse. Timmy could have gotten Avraniel to help.

But, yeah, this is part of what makes the Academy great. They go all out when it comes to education and testing.

There was something like this during Timmy’s day, and he ended up forming a team with Vicky and James to blast their way through the exam.