Thank God, you’re the first survivor I’ve seen in weeks. No, shh, don’t scream! Screaming will bring the others, and I’ve important things to tell you. The outbreak has spread, you see – it’s no longer confined to Pennsylvania. There’s evidence it’s gone world-wide!
I can tell you’re shocked. Who wouldn't be? The dead, rising from their graves and feasting on the flesh of the living. Who could possibly give such a preposterous story even an ounce of credence? Even when we learned it was only the recently dead or deathly ill that were initially affected…
Don’t run! No, shh, wait, wait. You see, when we examined the first corpses we had no idea what animated them. Was it viral, radiological, some kind of parasitic infestation? We couldn’t tell, not with the clumsy tools at our disposal.
Oh, excuse me! The belching is one of many unfortunate side-effects. But at least the gas rises, yes? Ha! Where was I? Sometimes it’s difficult, focusing through the pain.
Ah, yes! We were at a complete loss. Then reports came of infection – of citizens succumbing to attacks from the initial batch of…well, we never had a satisfactory name for them. Once we knew the condition was transferable, it was only a matter of time before we determined how: the bite.
Please stop struggling; you’ll only make this harder. With the infection factor added in, the rate at which the phenomenon spread became exponential. You see, there is no immunity. If you are bitten, you will die; if you die, you will rise as one of them.
But one of our many errors, possibly our most egregious, was to assume that as life had left them, so had intelligence! The shambling gaits, the unformed moans, the dullness in their dead eyes – how were we to know that inside those decrepit, decaying shells, minds continued?
Yes! Whatever this is (and we have yet to determine even the most basic truths about the phenomenon), it apparently somehow allows human intellect and personality to persist, possibly even thrive! I stand before you, proof that this is so!
Curse this rotting flesh! I can tell you cannot understand a word, despite my best attempts to speak around this crumbling palate, this disintegrating tongue. All you see is another lumbering corpse.
Have you any idea of the hell this is? Trapped in the putrefying prison of my own body, nervous system ravaged by the pain of decay and dissolution? Every second is agony! Yet I eagerly volunteered for the bite, as only through this experience could our knowledge advance!
The grand joke, of course, is this: now that I know mind continues, who can I tell? My motor control is too far gone for writing; my flesh is too rotted for speech. Still, there may be another way to send the message…
Come closer…don’t struggle. Just one bite. Maybe they’ll find you early enough to pass on the message.
The brain lives! Oh God, the brain lives!
