Zombie (part I)

"Zombies".

Most people who hear this word imagine semi-greenish humanoid beings walking slowly and in a bizarre manner with their tongues sticking out; looking for flesh or human brains to satisfy their hunger.

Before I start I want to erase this image from your head. 'Zombies' also called 'ghouls' in their ancient form of nomenclature, do not differ much from a normal human. Of course, the name given to them is based on the cartoonish image attributed to the original meaning of the word. And this is because there is a vital similarity between the real and the imaginary: the fact that they actually feed on human flesh. However, not in the wild way most people believe. They eat much less than one human being a day. In fact, it is not uncommon for a zombie to ingest real pieces of food (vegetables, coffee, etc.) so as to try to hide its identity and just have a bite to eat at night while everyone else sleeps. However, when a zombie eats food instead of human flesh it is not being fed; It's like a human eating wood or scraps of paper. If it goes on like this it will become increasingly hungry and will have to actually feed itself eventually.

If food is the vital similarity between legend and reality, the vital difference would be the form of propagation. In urban legend anyone who is bitten by a zombie will be transformed into another zombie and so on until they reach an uncontrollable stage of the epidemy. Usually the first birth is attributed to a virus or something, in some beliefs there is a cure for the virus, in others there isn't.

However, the real reason why a zombie is born is currently unknown. Everything that is known is that it happens somewhere between the death of the human body and its decomposition. Sometimes it takes a few hours, sometimes a few days, but before the flesh is completely decomposed, a human being can simply be reborn as a zombie. Scientists have been trying to make profiles, categorize family relationships, race tables, elevate propensity traits, but all to no avail. Everything leads us to believe that it happens simply at random. A definitive solution would be to keep every dead body under surveillance until the end of its decomposition to see if it would become a zombie or not. However, due to the very low rate of events, coupled with the fact that the government does not want to publicly acknowledge the existence of such supernatural being, it is preferred to avoid that unnecessary spending and keep such existence a secret.

After birth, or rather; the rebirth, despite sharing the body of the dead human, the zombie is now a totally different being. There are rare instances of vague recollection of human life, but it happens very rarely and on a very small scale. But I must admit that the reborn being develops mentally much faster than a human. It can easily identify the humans around him are different and detects their contempt for its difference almost immediately, which leads them to quickly try to hide among humans to avoid persecution. Is this what they call instinct? Perhaps a trait that has been passed over time, as a form of evolution; an attempt to adapt to the environment? To blend into society undetected? Nothing is known. About the nature and biology of the zombie, nothing is known. And to tell the truth, it is not the focus of this story.

Although these beings are very similar to humans, there are some classic ways to detect them among us. The first would be the eating habit, obviously. It cannot be denied that there's something very strange in eating a human being, so when seeing something that appears to be one person eating another, the best thing to do is to cry out to the authorities, regardless of whether the predator is in fact a zombie or isn't.

The second form would be by the smell. Since they arise from human decomposition zombies have an intrinsic smell of decomposed body, some have more, some less, apparently it varies according to the time required for their resurrection. A zombie may try to disguise its scent using colognes and perfumes, but if you are living with one of them, you will notice the difference when it just got out of a bath, for example.

The third way would be taking advantage of the fact that they do not remember their human life. If someone who has seen it during its life tries to instigate memories of when its body was that of a human being, this someone will not get a satisfactory answer. Also, it would be even easier to identify if the person asking knows the owner of that body should already be dead in the first place, since humans do not simply come back to life and walk around after their death like that.

The advantage of a zombie over a human being is that they are naturally stronger. In fact, they are physically stronger than all other known animals.

In order to kill a zombie all you have to do is to kill it a second time. Just a lethal wound, like killing a human being. It is very difficult for the disease, the virus, or whatever the reason it is reborn manifests again in the same body. To tell the truth, I believe that up to today there have been only two reported cases where one of them came back to life a second time, and no cases of zombies coming back the third. So basically, once dead, the zombie is dead for real. Ultimately the zombie condition is like a reincarnation, a second life, and nothing much more than that. The only difference is the hunger, the physical traits and the stench of rot.

Only a few people know this so please do not go out all revealing but the thing is there is a police division specializing in murder cases related to these fantastic beings. The purpose of the existence of this division must be cherished in secret, since if it emerged it'd reveal the very existence of these creatures, frightening the population. I talk about zombies because their cases are one of the things we have to deal with in this division. Our job is not only to capture zombies (since they are criminals in the eyes of society because of their eating habits), but also making sure their existence remains unknown, after all we don't want to worry civilians about monsters wandering around wanting to devour them. So when there are cases where there is action by our division, they usually go on with a long day lying / negotiating with local newspapers to try to explain the events of the previous day in a publishable way. This is the work of the Special Affairs Division, or SAD.

Speaking of local newspapers, in Sproustown there is sort of an agreement between the daily newspaper and SAD where they delay the release of news which may have something to do with these special cases so that we can freely investigate and check whether there really is any paranormal nature before making these events public. And one of these cases was taking place there, in that afternoon, in my office inside SAD's building.

"The store owner reported at 12:11. The camera caught what appeared to be an impossible theft while the shopkeeper was taking care of the stock. Characteristics of the suspect: late-thirties, Caucasian, about seven feet tall, recognizable tattoo on his left shoulder. The suspect came in and smashed the glass by the door, grabbed most of the contents with his bare hands, not bothering to cover up the fingerprints, and escaped with the contents. This happened between the time the owner heard the glass breakage and moved from the stock room to the store. The reasons for suspicion of a special SAD case are: the fact that the glass was tempered, holding up to four hammer blows yet it was broken with the suspect's bare hands together with the fact that the time between the blow and the escape summed less than twenty-two seconds. The store owner Steven Wolf reported seeing only the suspect's back running across the street after his arrival at the front of the store. The local guards were warned but could not catch the suspect in time. " It's the report.

The person standing across my desk, reading that story impassively, wearing a spotless black cardigan while poking at her thick-eyed glasses was called Emma Crane. She is my secretary, or rather the SAD secretary, and who had received the report of the robbery that Tuesday afternoon.

"Twenty-two seconds…" I mumbled, "and without the help of any instrument, hm? Now this sure sounds like a case."

I was sitting in my large swivel chair, lifting the front of it off the floor while smoking a cigarette, as usual.

"He must have been in a hurry."

"The robbery station got that report what? About three hours ago?"

"Sounds like so."

"And the bloke was not identified until then?"

"No."

"Did they take the prints?"

"They did. And they said they would send'em to SAD after they were done with them"

"Ok. Thanks." Thanks was the code for Crane leaving the room and leaving me alone. Don't get me wrong, I like my people, but my head works better when they're not standing in front of me, or worse: wandering around.

I believe I forgot to introduce myself: I am Lieutenant Henry Dotson, or only Dotson (or sometimes only Lieutenant) of the special affairs division, and among those who come regularly (ie in person) to work I am the second highest rank. As I said, dealing with zombies is one of SAD's specialties and part of my job. As you may have guessed: the incident of that afternoon was related to one of those horrible beings. You must have guessed that especially because I had all the trouble of starting with a whole introduction to the nature of their species.

Sproustown's SAD consists primarily of the captain, me, the secretary, Joey (the Detective) and also Detective Cole Chapman who is more of a secret agent who I happen to not trust at all. Of course, there is a lot more of staff support, but those who investigate and are able to handle the toughest cases are basically those I mentioned. And yes, secretary Emma Crane of the glasses and cardigan is included.

It took me a few more minutes to finish my cigarette and after that I called Joey and informed him about the situation.

In contrast to my hard-earned and well-deserved physique, the one who appeared to be a thin and maybe handsome seventeen-year-old boy was my working partner: Joey Meyers. As a lieutenant I can call anyone to help me when I go to a crime scene, but in general I call Joey and leave Crane to handle Chapman.

Later that morning we both went down to the crime scene, the "Club Jewel" jewelry store in downtown Sproustown. We left the head office to talk to this Steven Wolf bloke, the store owner and also the citizen who reported earlier.

Once we were at the crime scene, we heard basically the same story again except from Wolf's mouth. Although he had told it to the robbing division, he didn't seem particularly exhausted by having to repeat it.

The whole scene was restricted. I approached the broken glass to check the damage of the blow. It was a right-hand strike, cleaning about two inches thick of high-quality tempered glass. To think such a small jewelry protects its products with that kind of glass...

"This was done with punches, you said. Punches as in plural or just one punch?"

"It was a single punch, sir. He came and boom!" Wolf imitated the gesture with his hand. "And poof! It was broken."

"The camera caught everything, I believe?"

"Yes sir, I sent the movie to the police earlier, you must have watched it..."

I abstained from explaining the robbing division and SAD are not the same thing. Instead I just confirmed with a nod. We asked some more routine questions, but the more I looked at that scene the more the idea I initially had made sense: it had to be a zombie work.

I want to make this clear from the outset: dealing with resurrected cannibal beings is by no means the only function of SAD. As a matter of fact, zombies are just one of ten distinct categories labelled as dangerous for humans in the classification table which must be kept secret by the work of our department. Even though I started with that long introduction to the revival after the decomposition of the flesh, there was nothing in particular that pointed out it was really with a zombie we were dealing in that afternoon. However, there is something called experience you can use at these times. Joey will insist what I say may be considered species prejudice, but yeah: I associate stupidity with the zombie. And there is nothing apparently more stupid than showing up midafternoon at a half-assed jewelry store, breaking the glass with brute force and stealing the contents. What is this? Does it want to draw the attention of the police and get chased? "Look at me, I exist. I'm a zombie." That was the impression I've had since Crane read that story in front of me. I didn't say anything out loud to Joey because he was going to come up with a discussion about how biased I was about the zombie species, but that thought was the reason I anticipated it would be a nice thing to put the dogs in the car before we came to Club Jewel.

The dogs are really helpful. Perfume and deodorant may deceive human smell, but the smell of decomposition will be pursued by dogs to the ends of the Earth. With the dogs' help zombies cannot escape the police.

My last question to Wolf was rhetorical in nature:

"You didn't happen to smell anything funny when he left, mr. Wolf?"

"Funny smell? Hmm now that you mention it…" Wolf was going to say something, but Joey had gotten out of the car with one of the dogs. Wolf was a little embarrassed to see hounds entering the store, but eventually gave in. The sniffer managed to catch something upon the glass.

"Haha! Bingo, Lieutenant!" Joey said as he started to follow it.

There's no reason for two people following the dogs so I lit a cigarette and waited leaning against the car until Joey contacted me through a call. No matter where the suspect had run to or how far he was, as its stench comes from the decomposing state of a body and not something temporary like sweat or anything, it never goes away. If my guess was right Joey would find the target sooner or later.

Dogs are wonderful.

However, it seems that the suspect had run for a bunch after putting its hands on the jewels because the dog only stopped much later and in a very distant place. Not that it was an isolated or abandoned place, quite the opposite: it was in the middle of Marshmoore, which is a busy area. But I say distant as in the sense that Marshmoore was too far away from Club Jewel, which made that robbery even weirder. What would a zombie gain by stealing that particular store? Why didn't it pick a store closer to where it was hiding? And if it planned to go so far, why did it run on foot? If it had gone by car, the dog might not have been able to sniff it out... Like I said: stupid equals zombie.

Joey called me once at the address and I reached him by car. It was in a less crowded place, an alley, and as it was almost close to the end of work time for most local business establishments; there was almost no one left on the street. There was only one person. Or rather the remains of a person. He was a man in his forties, or at least his front half: his back had been torn off by something, as if a giant mammal had bitten and torn off a piece. There was also blood scattered everywhere, jet splashes on the wall, a puddle concentrated on the sidewalk, a brighter red trail running down the curb until it drained down the drain. Half missing, as if it had been ripped off along with the bite. Part of his flesh leaked out of place, spilling over his side.

With so much flesh missing and so much blood red composing that grotesque image, I believe I don't need to say the man was dead.

And that was the definitive proof we were dealing with a zombie. It was no longer speculation.

"What is that...?"

"A zombie... You were right... They feed on..." Joey didn't finish the phrase.

"Yeah... I know."

Still ... These attacks never cease to amaze me.

"Woah. Blood is running down the drainpipe... It looks like the floor was paint red. And look at these insects landing on him ... How disgusting." Joey touched one lightly.

" ..."

Even us would need a moment to digest the situation. Basically Joey was right: it looked like someone had painted the floor red. The image suggested that something attacked the man from behind, he struggled as he was devoured on that blood-covered sidewalk area, and after a while fell and crawled to the curb, probably perishing for lack of blood.

The bummer of our job was having to witness this kind of thing.

"Did the dogs find anything else?" I asked after putting myself together.

"The smell stops here, but it looked like they wanted to come in." Joey nodded at an enclosed establishment with an iron door which probably connected to the second floor of a small two-story building. One of the dogs was standing there staring at us and the other was still sniffing blood spattered near the door. Joey commented:

"It's amazing that no one came by yet, I mean ... Normally there should be a crowd around here."

"Did you call for help?"

"I called the forensics guys and an ambulance to take the body away. They should be here soon. What do we do? Should we go in?"

Entering the building was the right choice but it should be considered carefully. If the suspect was there it could be dangerous. It would be better to come in after the reinforcements arrive, but something inside of me told me the suspect would not have stood waiting inside the building this whole time after committing the murder, so there was a ninety-nine percent chance that it was no longer inside, which reduced the danger to zero. I decided we would come in to search the place.

A staircase led up to the second floor of that enclosed property, which led to a two-door corridor: Each seemed to be the door of a residence, so there were two apartments: one was probably rented and the other owned by the property owner. Because of the precariousness of the condition, it seemed the kind of owner who let anyone be a tenant, so probably if the owner was questioned, he would say that he knew nothing and heard nothing. We pushed the door of the rented house strongly - and we had strength- thus it gave way.

The inner side was a mess: various things tossed on the floor, from kitchen utensils to socks, underwear, and various small objects that could be stored in drawers or neatly sorted into boxes.

"Looks like my room," Joey said casually, but I already knew him well enough to distinguish irony from reality.

The whole place consisted of a large front room with a partition only to a corridor that had two doors: one to a bedroom and one to a bathroom, the rest was clustered in the large main room: there was a space for the sofa, the television and all the other things, and then both the kitchen and the dining table were on the right, a little farther, but without separation. The kitchen table was overturned, which explained why there were so many kitchen objects among the mess: all these objects must have been primarily on the table. Other stuff had also been overturned: The cabinet under the TV had all the drawers open and empty and the TV had a hole in it.

I went to the bedroom. As I imagined everything had all been turned over there too. The bedding was on the floor. The cabinet drawers were open. The clothes inside the closet were thrown everywhere. The window was open. Looking around the place gave me the impression that someone entered, searched frantically for something and had jumped out the window as soon as he found it. I looked out the window and saw that it led to a courtyard where residents parked their cars, and behind the courtyard one could see the back street from far.

"It's all messy here, too…" Joey entered the room stating the obvious, "what do you think? Did he jump out the window?"

"Seems like so. Wanna bring a dog for sniffing this room?"

"Ok."

But in any case, the suspect somehow got rid of the smell. The dogs stopped in that room and then found nothing else. They sniffed at the window sill and then stared at me as if searching for an explanation.

"It must have taken a vehicle," I said, "this way the smell would be inside the vehicle and could not be detected."

"Did he possess a vehicle on the back street then? Or maybe he stole one?"

"In any case, the owner must be able to recognize any missing vehicle. Let's have a chat with him."

We heard a noise outside.

"The people I called must have arrived," Joey explained.

After the ambulance and the forensics guys arrived, the work in that place was more with them than with us SAD investigators. There was not much we could do. Joey and I left and went to have a chat with the owner of the establishment, who lived in the apartment next to the one we broke into. The owner was short, (almost) bald and fat. He had a black mustache and didn't look very reliable. He stood in front of the door throughout that whole little interrogation.

"Yes?" He started after opening the door in response to our knock. I showed him my badge.

"Lieutenant Dotson and Detective Meyers, could you give us some time?"

"Yes...?" He changed to a more hesitantly tone.

"It's about your tenant ... He's currently suspect of a robbery and murder..."

"Oh." He didn't sound exactly very surprised.

"Can you tell us a bit about him?"

"I ... I'm afraid I don't know much about him... He rented the place just a couple days ago, you know ... He didn't have a very favorable track record if you understand me... He said he had just been released from jail or something but to tell the truth I didn't care much so I let him stay anyway... I didn't think he was... Involved in any such activities."

"I understand ... Did a gray Prestige 2010 vanish from the yard there?" I mentioned a random car brand. Joey was just looking around the place while I asked the questions.

"Prestige? Uh...? No... No, sir..."

He was acting overly cautious so my gut told me he and the suspect might be working together or he might be covering up for it. Of course, it was just a possibility. I mentioned a random car to see if he would vaguely name his car when the answer was negative, such as "Prestige? Oh no, my car is a blue x..." Not knowing what it was, I could have made him let that information slip, but if I had asked his car brand directly and if he was really working with the suspect then he would lie. But apparently my scheme didn't work.

"A Prestige disappeared after crashing the car in front." My last attempt to make him somehow sketch some reaction if he was indeed involved in the case.

"I don't own a car, sir... I'm thinking on putting my hands on one, but..."

So there was no reaction...

"I understand... And did our guy own any?" In the end, grudgingly, I had to ask the question directly. If they really were together the answer would be negative anyway.

"No, sir. He didn't."

Ditto...

We chatted for a little more but it didn't bring any results. I asked if he heard any noise, heard the suspect arrive, and then asked him for the suspect's rental file and left.

On the way, Joey was taking a look at the obtained file containing the information about the target.

"Do you think he was hiding something? I asked Joey as he casually examined the file."

"Not really... He seemed naturally shaken by the sudden news, so it's just natural he didn't talk too much."

"It seemed like he was avoiding me..."

"It must have been the stink of your cigarette, Lieutenant. Even I had to turn away." Joey always made that kind of impertinent comment casually and blankly. He began to mutter as he examined the renter's file:

"Jeffrey Sprohic. Forty-two, 6'9'' tall. Apparently he's a former Silverbay inmate. He was looking for a job after his sentence. Or at least that's what it says in the document. There's his ID number here. I'll send it to SAD."

"Do it. And after that we'll have to wait. There's nothing more we can do," I said as I tossed my cigarette on the floor and crumpled it with my shoe. We were now in front of the street where the forensics guys were analyzing that bloodthirsty scene. The crowd of onlookers we had once anticipated was now there in double, all clustered apart by the yellow line giving unbearable work to the support staff. I snapped my neck and went on.

"The forensics will see if they can find any clue, the coroners will call the dead's family to identify the body and the dogs can't smell further... The best thing to do is to go home."

"It is already dusk anyway," Joey answered while looking at the sky. We had been working overtime for pretty long. That incident had taken much of our time because of the distance Joey had to walk the dog.

The bystanders almost forced away the line in order to see what had happened. The more blood, the more nosies it attracts. I would hate to work as support staff

After that we went to home. This is: Joey to his and me to mine.