+A B N O R M A L I T Y+

+A R T I F I C I A L+

Roy began visiting the zombie regularly. Every time he came the zom would be in the room, usually sitting on the floor. Every time Roy would enter the room, his lips would form into a weak smile and his golden eye would light up with joy. Roy had decided that the zombie was male, so instead of "it," Roy now called the zombie "him."

The first few visits had been awkward, the zombie unsure of what would and wouldn't set off Roy's defenses. He would reach out, mouth open as if to say something then he would pull back, closing his mouth again and averting his eye. Roy was content with just studying the weird zombie the first few visits. Why did he act so different? Why did he act so much more human than any of the other zoms? After the first two visits, that was boring and the zombie was timid around him still. The next time he came, he brought some books. The reading levels ranging from kindergarten level up to adult. The zombie had perked up when Roy had told him to choose a book. His eyes lit up at Roy finally interacting with him instead of just staring and also because Roy had brought.... What were they exactly? The zombie picked up one of the books, a picture book and looked at it curiously, opening the cover then closing it, smiling in delight, he paged through the book, looking at the pictures and seeing squiggles along the top of each page. His face wore a look of concentration as he tried to figure out what the squiggles meant. His concentration broke when Roy pointed to a group of closely located squiggles and said a word.
"One," he started then pointed to the next group of squiggles, "fish," and it went on, Roy pointing at each group of squiggles and saying a word along with it.
"One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish."

The zombie smiled again, it seemed that each individual squiggle made a certain sound. Like the squiggle with a straight line and a circle attached to the bottom left side of it made a "duh," sound while a straight line with another line crossing through it made a "tuh," sound. The zombie pointed to a word like Roy had been doing. They were reading a different book now. Roy had read the first word, just one letter, "a," and before he could point to the next one the zom points at it.

"Guh... Guh.." No that wasn't the right sound. His tongue felt like a dead weight and didn't move the way he wanted it to.

"Guh... Guh... Kuh..." There it was!!! That was the sound!

"Kuh-a-ad," that wasn't right, "a-ad... A-a-ad... -at," he smiled that was the right sound! "Kuh-uh-a-at... Cat..." He looked up from the word smiling proudly and expecting Roy to be smiling with him but the man was frowning, a shocked look in his eyes. The zom's smile disappeared and he looked away. Had he done something wrong...? Again...?" Eventually though, Roy snapped from his stupor and just continued on pointing  and reading. The golden eyed zombie listened quietly, Roy's voice was so soothing, and followed his hand across the page with his eye.

When Roy had finished reading the book, he shut it and put it back in his satchel. The zombie frowned, when Roy packed up that meant he would be leaving. He didn't like it when Roy wasn't with him. It was so lonely out here sometimes. Roy grabbed his gun from the table in the room, calling back behind him a promise to visit again in a couple of days before disappearing out of sight. The zombie looked away. There was nothing to do to amuse himself when Roy was gone. He mindlessly picked at the loose threads of his ragged clothing or picked the dirt and grime from under his nails. He'd given up trying to stand a while back and now just sat or kneeled on the floor. There was a full length mirror in the room in which he would stare at himself, picking out all his flaws, counting the wounds that would never heal and grimacing at the ugliness of the socket that was missing an eye. He sighed as he remembered why it was missing. He'd gotten into a fight with another zombie who had been closing in on a human scout and the scout had had no where to run. Ed surprised the other creature by jumping on him from above but the other zombie was brutal and had at one point, reached out and grabbed his eye from under the lid, yanking it out forcefully. He had screamed when the zombie had and while he was distracted with the blood gushing from his now empty socket, the other zombie started stalking towards his prey again. He wasn't able to save the scout that time...

He turned away from the mirror, sighing. How could Roy not run from him? How could he sit next to him and read to him and not be disgusted by him? The zombie sighed again. For whatever reason, Roy was special, different from any other human he had met. His eyes flickered across the room confusedly and cautiously.

He smelled a human.

Not Roy though.

Some one different.

Little did he know.

It was him...

"Repeating, Repeating,

I'm dying,

I'm breathing.

Repeating Repeating,

I'm crying,

I'm healing."