Read The Reanimation of Edward Schuett for Free Online

her new job at all, actually, just like she didn’t really want to use her new phone. The phone just seemed decadent to her, a technology her parents had not needed during the Uprising so it couldn’t be that much more important now, despite how popular they were becoming again. And even though gate guard had once been a dangerous and noble profession, it was really pretty useless these days. Sitting in a shack with a kick-ass rifle she never got to use was just boring.
    “I’ll keep it short, then,” Rae said. “I just wanted to know if you or anyone else at Merton might still have a phone number of one of those zombie experts that moved away last year.”
    “Well, I don’t. I never really had to deal with any of them. But I’m sure their numbers are still on file at the office somewhere. Why?”
    “Uh, nothing really, I guess. I just saw something…um, strange.”
    “Strange like how?”
    “Strange like…well, have you ever heard of a talking zed?”
    Johnny was quiet for a few moments. “Um, no. Rae, zombies can’t talk.”
    “Right, I know that, but what if one could?”
    “They can’t.”
    “Well I just saw one doing exactly that, so I guess they can.”
    “You’re not drinking while on duty, are you?”
    “No, damn it. And this is not a joke either. Two guys off into the ruins getting zeds for the Jamboree just came back in, and one of their zeds was talking. Looked fresher than it should have, too.”
    “Maybe it was just so fresh it could still say some random things or something like that.”
    “But it was an actual coherent conversation. Almost like it could think and everything.”
    “Now you’re just being dumb. That’s completely impossible.”
    This time Rae did sigh. Sometimes she just wanted to kick Johnny’s ass when he said things like that. If he didn’t keep her supplied with practice ammo whenever she wanted it she probably would have left him by now.
    “I saw it with my own eyes. Something was extremely strange with this zed, and I just thought someone with some sort of expertise should know.”
    It was Johnny’s turn to sigh. “I’ll see if I can get a hold of one, alright?” He said his standard “I love yous” and hung up, but Rae didn’t think he was actually going to make any call.
    Rae set the phone back down on the window sill and picked up her rifle, holding it close to her chest as she stared out the window and thought. A zombie named Edward Schuett. Academically she always knew that zombies had once been alive, and on rare unfortunate occasions people still contracted the Animator virus and turned into zeds, but most undead that she saw had been that way since before she was born. People like Ringo brought zombies in every so often, but Rae had never thought to wonder what they might have been like in life. She had certainly never wondered what any of them were named.
    Now, however, one had a name anyway. Edward. Now that she knew that much, she felt compelled to know more. She picked up the phone again, this time dialing one of her coworkers to see if he could finish her shift in the gate house.

Chapter Five
     
    Although Edward knew he should be concerned more about his fate at the moment, he became distracted by the scenery as the truck moved through the city and actually felt some relief at being in a familiar environment. While the world outside the bulldozed circle had looked like Armageddon, here within the new confines of the city life looked almost like it should have. They passed an elementary school, and to his shock there were children playing in the fenced off playground. That was just such a normal thing to happen, and everything he had encountered up until now had been anything but normal. A few of the children saw the truck pass and stopped their playing to watch and point, but Edward didn’t feel awkward about suddenly being the object of so much attention. The existence of children in this strange new world gave him hope, although not for