Horrific Shorts: Zombie Edition

The chamber lit up with flashing red as containment protocols failed. Subject H-13—no longer contained—walked calmly beside Juno and Shade through the white halls of the forgotten lab.

Alarms echoed above them, but none approached. Machines shut down as they passed. Lights dimmed. The entire facility seemed to obey him.

"What is this place really?" Juno asked, eyeing rows of sealed doors labeled GEN-SERUM, CLONE BANK, NEUROMAP STATION.

H-13 answered without speaking. Instead, he pointed.

Room 7: "Serum Vault A – Split Protocol"

Inside, they found a room filled with vials suspended in magnetic columns. Red on one side. Blue on the other. At the center: a steel table with two injection guns and a blinking console.

File: PROJECT SPLIT

Summary:

"VIREX failed to find a single cure. So they made two."

"Red: Aggression suppressant. Blue: Neural stabilizer."

"Individually incomplete. Together: unstable. Each alters the infected—but with opposing outcomes."

Juno narrowed her eyes. "They split the cure on purpose?"

Shade nodded grimly. "To control who got what."

Suddenly, the console flickered to a live file. Surveillance footage from months ago. A lab tech, pleading on camera:

"You can't administer both. It breaks the host. It tears their identity. But they're doing it anyway. To test loyalty. To see who remembers what pain feels like."

Then static.

Then silence.

Then… a recording of Juno.

A childhood memory.

Her, in a hospital bed. Crying. Screaming for her brother.

She stepped back, shaken. "How do they have this?"

H-13 answered softly, aloud this time: "The cure works through memory absorption. They used you. Your trauma… became their prototype."

Shade stepped toward the vials. "So which one do we take? Red or blue?"

Juno stared at both. "Neither."

But H-13 moved to the table. He lifted both vials—red in one hand, blue in the other.

"Together," he said. "I survive them both. I show them what balance looks like."

"You said it splits identity," Shade warned.

"I am already many," H-13 replied. "Let me choose which self survives."

Before they could stop him, he loaded both vials into one injector.

And pulled the trigger.

He convulsed.

Eyes glowing. Veins turning violet.

Then—he collapsed.

The room dimmed.

Monitors surged with overlapping data. Heart rate: unstable. Neural pattern: rewriting. Memory index: expanding.

Juno fell to her knees beside him.

He opened his eyes.

Inside them—everyone.

Her brother. The scientist from the recording. The Sibling's scream. Even Shade's voice echoed faintly in his speech.

"I… see them all now," he whispered. "Every life they broke."

"Are you okay?" Juno asked.

He stood, taller somehow.

"I'm not okay," he said. "I'm complete."

Suddenly—sirens outside. Footsteps. Real ones.

VIREX had found the lab again.

H-13 smiled, turning to the door.

"They'll regret splitting me."