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It starts out slow yet sudden, like the thunderous, heavy heartbeat that used to plague him when he was once more than a simple thing. Opening his crusted-over eyes, squinting at the graying clouds above him, he tries to recollect his scattered thoughts. He must’ve fallen asleep- again. He’s fed up with waking to find himself in the same fenced-off field, fed up with opening his eyes to see, even with his fuzzy vision, the darkening skies and the promise of rain that the winds whisper as if saddened. Most of all, fed up with being more attached, more present than the average Turned.
Because of how quickly his kind, called ‘zombies’, ‘undead’, or ‘Turned’, took over, there had been nothing left to spare in terms of flesh. For days and days on end, he’s had nothing and no-one to occupy his stomach and mind. Since he was Turned, in fact, he’s had nothing except his past memories. Sure, there have been others like him that he’s passed by, but none living. None that were not brainless, sluggish and rotting away as they desperately searched for food that simply does not exist anymore. Hunger took it all, and will continue to take and steal from those unfortunate enough to experience it, until there is no trace of their small time here. Payback, he supposes, for how his kind ravaged and took from the living ones until there were none left. Not even their humanity.
And maybe, because of this, because of how he’s had nothing to eat, and sleep has been his only energy provider, is the reason behind his understanding and comprehension despite his Turning. From what he’s gathered, though not much, every last living human is no longer, all either laid to rest or Turned. His species, whatever they may be classified as, will soon die out and Earth will once again be a lonely planet. Just like himself, he muses faintly.
Even though it’s… oddly assuring, in a way, he still feels anger at how everything’s turned out. Sparks of anger, though small, isn’t something that the Turned are supposed to feel-- only a deep, unwavering hunger. He knows he’s not like the other sluggish, bumbling undead. He’s but a maggot-infested corpse not yet completely corroded with that inhuman hunger, and his desires were not quite in alignment with the millions of others lumbering about. Even in his Turned form, he cannot seem to be on par with, nor understand his peers.
Though, he can’t seem to gather the energy to try to, not anymore. Definitely not like when he was alive. Seeing as his insides were decaying, his mind slowly rotting to a liquidy slop that spills from his ears, easy for the maggots and flies to find and feast. Rather than being saddened or plain unaffected by his slow decomposition, he thinks he feels at ease. At least a little, anyways. He’s always been lonely, cast away time and time again. This time, it’s for good.
That is, until he manages to spot a rogue Turned waddling and stumbling through the field he lays in. A small clench of his chest gives him the tiniest bit of hope, that maybe, they’re like him. He squashes that feeling like an ant, and he can practically feel the gooeyness of its twitchy body underneath his thumb. He casts his itchy, blurry eyes away from the Turned, feeling lonely and entirely too comprehending for someone like him.
He turns, slow as a century old tortoise, onto his side. His infected, wine-colored blood that's akin to slime sluggishly seeps into the once soft fabric of his striped sweater, and he doesn’t find it in him to care enough to move again. Even as his sight strays to his glasses that landed beside him, long cracked and damaged from when he was first Turned, doesn’t draw enough energy in him to pick them up and see properly for the first time in days. The sight reminds him of how he came to be here, the reason he stays and doesn’t stray from this field.
Of course he was once alive- young and desperate for any sort of recognition, be it good or bad. Being such, he jumped at the opportunity to do something helpful, just for once. To bring back firewood for the little survivor group he managed to locate. Sure, they casted him out with hurtful sneers and stifled laughs aimed at his retreating back, but this was the closest he’s come to acceptance in a long while. He had gotten the wood, excited to do something good, until one of the un-dead came screaming. It hurt his ears, and eventually, he hurt everywhere. Even then, he wanted to live, though now he can’t seem to remember why. Fighting back, he had shredded open his cheek, been skewered on the Turned’s claw-like, bony hands. He had succumbed to the feeling of infection buzzing through his veins. Hours later, he opened his eerie, dark eyes to find it had been quite a while since he had left the group. Aching everywhere, he had craned his stiff, knotted neck to find a small cluster of some of the other survivors, all with downright terrified and aghast expressions. They all went running, most likely to relocate, not one of them staying to see if he was alright or not Turned. They ran like he was dangerous, another mindless being that only wanted to fill their rotted stomachs. Though true, he could have been dangerous, it had still hurt. They should have known by then; he was not like anyone else on Mother Earth.
And that is the reason why he’s still here. Why he hasn’t picked up all of his jumbled bits and pieces and left to find energy, sustenance. Through their looks, he had found what he had unknowingly been searching for, for almost his whole life. He accepted that he was not normal, he never fit into any stereotype, and that he deserved to be shunned for it. It seemed as if the clouds, even the wind, agreed with him. Now, it’s not totally dark, but the thick gloom blocks out most of the light. Distantly, he thinks he can hear the rumbling of thunder. Curled up in the overgrown field, his concerningly skinny and tinged-gray knees tucked tightly up by his chest, he thinks of the reason why. Why he is this way, why people feel the need to conform and make everything fit just so, why did it come to this, and many more. He’ll never get answers for his questions, he knows this. He knows and yet he stills asks, because even in his last moments, he will forever be the curious little kid who wondered why.
A light drizzle had started, the world’s last goodbye. Earth’s last bit of goodwill, and as the droplets slide over his graying, sunken skin, the last bits of his apprehension and worries slip off with them. Now, he can feel his unwilling veins stop rushing with a weakened, pulsating lifeforce, the subtle pressure behind his eyes stutter to a stop and drift away as if the wind herself took it in her hands. Whereas most Turned would screech and run wild at the feeling of leaving, he lays and bleeds and accepts. Maybe he was destined to stay an outcast forever, and that’s okay, he comes to find. If it’s how he’s meant to go, then so be it. Maybe it’s just about time he embraced that side of himself after all, even in permanent passing.