Horrific Shorts: Zombie Edition

The last Nightmare Cell remained untouched.

Juno's doppelganger stood behind the reinforced glass, smiling—a reflection made flesh, composed not of bone and blood, but of echo, code, and stolen trauma.

But they couldn't deal with it yet.

The UV sweep had drawn power from deeper in the complex. Alarms had stopped. Lights dimmed. And the floor beneath their feet began to vibrate—not violently, but rhythmically. Like a pulse.

H-13 placed his palm to the wall.

"They activated him."

Juno turned sharply. "Who?"

"The one VIREX called 'He Who Heals the Dead.'"

"The only successful fusion of virus and regenerative cells. The first infected to reverse decay rather than spread it."

Shade frowned. "So he's a doctor?"

"No," H-13 said. "He's the scalpel."

They moved through the collapsed tunnels into the Medical Restoration Wing—a long-forgotten annex beneath the nightmare vaults. Inside, shattered operating tables were covered in dried flesh and syringes embedded in bone. But everything stopped at the chamber marked with only a symbol:

The air was thick with mist—sterile, but somehow ancient.

A single body stood in the center of the room.

Tall. Wrapped in layers of decayed surgical robes, face hidden behind a golden plague mask fused into his skull. Metal fingers clicked as he adjusted a bone saw with the care of a craftsman.

He turned slowly as they entered.

"You are fractured," he said to Juno, voice layered—three tones speaking at once.

Shade raised his weapon, but H-13 motioned him down.

"He doesn't kill without consent," H-13 whispered. "He offers a choice."

Juno stepped forward. "You restore the dead?"

The being nodded. "I reshape them. The virus takes. I return. But what comes back... is not the same."

He held up a gloved hand. Within it, a preserved heart—still beating, though clearly not human.

"I have stitched memory into muscle. Thought into tissue. The dead no longer rot—they recall."

Juno felt her genome resonate. Her blood reacted to his presence like a tuning fork.

"Why are you helping VIREX?" she asked.

He tilted his head. "I am not. I am VIREX—its original failure. Before the plague, they tried to heal too much. I was born in that mistake."

"And now?" she asked.

"I wish to heal you," he said softly. "Before your mind blooms with ghosts."

He stepped closer.

Juno didn't flinch.

"I've already accepted who I am."

"Then let me show you who you were."

He reached forward and touched her temple.

Her mind flooded.

Visions of her mother working beside him. Early experiments. Juno's own DNA used to restore infected limbs. Her childhood cryogenic scans. And something else...

Another Juno—the original template. She wasn't the first.

The golden-masked man pulled back.

"You carry more than cure. You carry origin. You are the memory of a hundred failed restorations. And the one that lived."

He stepped aside and handed her a syringe.

SERUM R-E3: Restore or Rewrite

Juno looked down.

Did she heal herself… or change what she was meant to be?