@Ozzyy 14 February 2022 more from that month

Un-Dead [WP] You watch in horror and strange fascination as the undead husk which bit you suddenly sprouts healthy new flesh where once rotting meat sat, its moans starting to sound more and more like human screams of agony and confusion. You have successfully infected the zombie with you ***** "You know and understand pain," Tom speaks in a neutral tone distorted by the microphone, no word is accentuated more than another. He doesn't seem to register that you cannot answer, neither with your mouth or through gesture. "In fact, no one knows pain better than you." You're blindfolded, for your own psychological well-being. The world is easier in the dark than under the spotlight. You remember the white room, the smell of medical alcohol, the pricks of needles. It is still there. From the relative seclusion of your tank, you know tubes still enter your veins, can feel the rods in your back through the anesthetic. "I readjusted the dosage, I hope you feel better," Tom's voice goes in through a speaker, it is the only person speaking to you. The others think you can't hear them anymore, or rather, they convinced themselves you cannot. It's easier to go on with their job believing your consciousness is long gone, that your body lives without your mind. It wasn't for lack of trying, old scientists with glasses can be surprisingly creative when it comes to killing. First they gave you a drug and your heart stopped beating. They awaited the death of your brain for reanimation, this way they got to do science, not torture. Then they decided to take over your vital functions one after the other, until your consciousness retreated forever in a dark corner. The tube in your nose gives you the oxygen, the tank both fully restrains and moves your limbs around to keep the flesh healthy. But your brain pulled through, so did your consciousness. Torture became alright in the name of science and humanity. "I heard South Africa has pulled through, Cape Town and Pretoria are still more or less functional. We will see the end of it, I promise we will," there, a hint of tearing up. Not a single day goes by without you wishing for death. Or what passes as a day in the dark, you lost the feeling of passing time and of yourself, except for pain. There. A burn, a bit, a sudden and violent tear, quickly soothed by the liquid going through your veins, and forgotten. "I did it as fast as I can." A life can be worth nothing, or it can be worthy enough to inspire a religion. Yours is the only one that is both. When the dead rose, a group of scientists was quickly pointed out as responsible. They didn't deny it, science went wrong. You ran for your life like everyone did, you stumbled, you fell, and they gnawed at you, the vicious, rotten mouths... suddenly turning back to life. The first you saved were quickly eaten by the risen dead right behind them, and you would have died from blood-loss if it wasn't for the keen eyes of a child who witnesses the strange happenings from a distance. You're called a miracle from God. You, better than all, know there is no god. You knew from the moment the convicted scientists pointed out the facility used to create the virus was the only one with the machinery to keep you alive in a way to spread the serum to all the infected. "I can't look people in the eyes anymore." Outside, they call the day you were carried to the underground facility a holy day, when you gave your life to save all of them. How many of them remember how you screamed and trashed against your chains? How many know the scientists working on you were the same who released the virus, believing to better mankind? It's easier to believe God intervened and forget the rest. Belief. The tank, the drugs, the pain, all brought by someone else's belief. You lost yours long ago. Here you are now. Fed intravenously with substances made to help you grow the flesh back at a fast rate, a single being feeding billions of infected worldwide. "It's going forward, one day it'll be over. It has to be. Someone please tell me it will be," Tom's voice sounds less robotic. You'd love to go insane or die, your idiot brain won't let you. They call you a martyr who will sit next to God. You wish for an afterlife to exist, if only to meet your zealots and show them how much you suffer. "They grow restless. my colleagues. They know we'll only get to live for as long as we're needed. Once it's over, there will be payback. It won't be pretty. We fear both the virus we unleashed and the end of it." Tom. You learned to pity the poor soul. He's the reason the group was spotted, he's the whistleblower, because he has a conscience, because he couldn't silence it. He can't ignore how you're still alive and thinking in there, it's his curse, just like miraculous flesh is yours. You're his morality pet. The kindness of words and voice he gives you is the only way to keep his tenuous grasp on sanity intact. It won't last long. You've heard him lose the soothing tone, the nihilism creeping into his words. For the rare times you hear his colleagues when they speak near the microphone, you know they are alright. They speak of everything and nothing, you're just an object with an assigned number. But Tom, he has a heart, his sins weight on his shoulders. "I'm thinking about you in there, okay? I won't forget you." And that is why he's condemned to go insane in the end, the price to pay for empathy. From your tank, you can appreciate the dark irony. It's the only thing you can do. ***** THE END.