Absorbance

Anthony flicked on his machine; he was dressed in his white, classic lab coat. The energy of the machine thrust him over the room before hitting a wall, hitting his head and landed in a heap of the floor. Mere seconds later he woke up, feeling awfully hungry. Strange, he thought, as he had just eaten some hours ago. Anthony got up, went out of his laboratory and into a world that had now changed forever.

Days later he ran into a small group of living people. They ran from what they called zombies, in lack of a better word, before he eventually sat down inside an empty warehouse to explain things some people saw as important. "Well, you see, at a certain wavelength lies the light, the consciousness, the memories of all of mankind. I figured  out that particular wavelength; my plan was to use it as energy. It wasn't supposed to hurt anyone, cause I found a way to only access the memories, the consciousness of the dead", Anthony explained to the small group. "But then it backfired..." He let the feeling of grief, of sadness, of madness and regret hang on for a little while, before he continued. "That's why the dead are alive; I sparked their consciousness, and since the brain's still in their body, they got up again. Simple as that. Of course, it's all my fault." Anthony chuckled. "I'm like a mad scientist", he said, before reality finally sunk in; "My God, I'm responsible for the end of mankind." Anthony started crying, but no one stepped up to comfort him. He deserves a little time for himself, they thought. Some even thought he should rot in hell, before they remembered that hell probably didn't even exist. Eventually, Valerie stepped towards Anthony and hugged him; she'd had enough of his suffering. Anthony put his head at her shoulder, using it to cry on, while Valerie comforted him as best she could. This went on for a little while, but people grew bored; Anthony had promised them answers. Even if they felt sorry for the man, he couldn't go on crying forever. It was also the nagging fact that the zombies could turn up again at any moment; they had no proof proving the opposite. "So, why do they eat brains?" Anthony's head popped up from Valerie's shoulder. He looked devastated. Anthony got up, wiping his face free from tears with his arms. Then he set out to answer Bill's question. "When I turned on my great big machine, the very machine that started all of this, I trigged, no, sparked their consciousness. What I didn't do was give them back their memories. Now, there is a very simple reason for that; memories don't hold power, and since my experiment was to make power out of the consciousness of the dead, I didn't need something powerless like memories - it would only take up space." Bill didn't like this answer. In fact, he didn't like it at all. "Are you saying that my memories doesn't mean anything?!" Anthony smiled weakly - these people really needed him to explain everything. Oh, well. That's where genius gets you, he thought bitterly. To the end of mankind. "Bill is right. Memories do hold great power, but without you, without a mind to relish them, they are nothing but mere shadows of dead people and their existence. But consciousness itself is a great thing, filled with all sorts of energy. Without consciousness, there are no memories, no thoughts, no nothing - it's just... blank." Anthony stopped speaking, only to find Bill continuing to bother him with questions; "You still haven't told us why they're eating people's brains." "Yes, that's right. Back to the crux of the matter, and what was, to me at least, a complete and utter mystery in the beginning. Now, however..." Anthony licked his lips at the thought of what was about to happen; the moment was so close now that he couldn't hardly wait. "I understand it completely." Anthony turned around, facing Valerie. "They are looking for their memories - they are hungry for information; they want info about this age, about what's going on, about the world in its current state. When they eat, they absorb the victim's memories, the victim's life." Anthony licked his lips again. "Just as I'm going to do with you." He smiled at Valerie and dove in, trying to bite her neck. Valerie darted backwards, clawing her right hand across Anthony's face. She watched curiously as his face was ripped off, revealing Anthony's real face behind what was apparently a mask, and a pretty excellent one at that. It had covered up all the features of the zombies they knew - the all red eyes, the decomposing flesh, the smell - oh god, the smell, she thought - they had all reacted to it, but no one had thought about it, being that it smelled vile everywhere else too. But now, the smell was stronger, more apparent. All these thoughts ran through Valerie's head as Anthony came forward. She darted sideways this time, but he got her arm, running straight forward and ripping it off. Valerie screamed, fell on the ground and screamed some more; when Anthony walked up to her and started beating her head open with a stone, she was terrified, a feeling that quickly passed as Anthony lifted her brain out of her head and started eating it, absorbing her life and her dreams, her frights, her passions and her death.


After a while, Bill stopped running. This was a good thing, because Anthony had grown ever so slightly tired of it. He turned around, towards Anthony and said the following, while catching his breath; "I'll let you eat me. I'll let you take my brain, dine on my memories. But I want answers." Anthony looked at him in disgust, finding himself hating the man and all his questions. "You'll get two questions, but that's it.", Anthony said, thinking it was a fine deal. Bill nodded firmly, then spoke once more. "How are you a zombie? You still have all your memories, don't you? And we know that the living can't turn into zombies - thank god for that." Anthony smiled. "This fact puzzled me too, before I finally came up with a theory; I died mere moments before I was zombified, reborn, awakened or whatever you choose to call it. That's why I have my memories, even if I am dead - my head was hurt, but it was still working, if ever so slightly. Now, as I said I don't know if that's what happened, but hey, at least it's a theory." Bill looked at Anthony, wondering which question to ask next. "But if you have your memories, why do you still eat brains?" Anthony became very serious; Bill thought he looked angry. "I'm a scientist by heart. That's what we do - we experiment. And all that wisdom in people's brains... You have no idea how sweet that tastes." Anthony smiled and hit him with the screwdriver. When he thought about it, he was quite fond of that screwdriver - it seemed to crack open people's heads quite easily. One blow, that's all it took with the screwdriver. Handy little thing, Anthony thought as he cracked open Bill's skull and lifted out the brain.

"Curiouser and curiouser" said Anthony, staring at his blood-soaked hand in amazement, grinning with his now revealed decomposing mouth. He proceeded out of the tunnel after eating the last in the group, the question-maker Bill, which it turned out didn't taste all that good - apparently he had watched his wife eat his son, an incident which had turned him into quite the sad man, longing for answers. Well, we all have our problems, thought Anthony as he exited the tunnel and watched the new world. Then he said "It's the end of the world as we know it." He chuckled, and the decomposing grin once again filled his face. "And not only do I feel fine; I brought it about!" Anthony started running; he could feel the scent of fresh meat not far from here. It was time for yet another infodump. Little did Anthony know that he was about to eat, and absorb, the last fresh information on the globe. It was, if you think about it, rather fitting; the man who brought this vile thing about shall also make it stop.


In a way.

Comments

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I liked this. It seems there's a run of awesome zombie stories lately and I'm loving it. Eating brains to (re)gain memories and to fill up th empty consciousness is a great twist on the genre and I'm so happy you shared this with us in TT.

[WatchingPreacher]

Thank you for your comment. It is very much appreciated. I don't like writing zombie-stories that much, but the idea of brain-eating to (re)gain memories struck me as cool, so I went for it. I thought it was a nice little twist on the whole "the dead are walking the earth"-story. So glad you enjoyed it. ;)