ARAGON

In a world ravaged by a mysterious epidemic that has turned people into savage zombies, a dead man wakes up—without a name, without a memory, and without a beating heart—but he possesses something no other zombie possesses: consciousness. He's the only zombie who knows he's a "living dead"... but he doesn't want to stay that way. He later names himself Mr. Zombie after finding a torn ID card on an old corpse that reads "Mr. Z...." From there, he begins a journey to discover who he is, why he's different, can the dead change, and is humanity even worth surviving?

MR.Z

Not some cracked, antique fairytale thing—just a regular mirror. The kind people glance at before they go outside, to make sure they're still human.

Gray flesh. Yellowed eyes with pupils like bruises. A mouth twisted in permanent sarcasm, or maybe agony—I can't tell. Half of my scalp looks like someone forgot to finish coloring it in. There's something stuck between my teeth. (I pray to whatever gods are left it's not a finger.)

I stare at that thing. That... me.

And I whisper, "What the hell happened to you?"

The reflection doesn't answer. Of course. Mirrors don't lie, but they don't comfort either.

The old man—he finally introduces himself as Dr. Everett Vale—takes me to the basement lab every morning. He pokes me with scanners, talks about neurons and synaptic decay, and mutters to himself like a mad monk.

He's trying to map my mind. I don't have the heart (or possibly the organs) to tell him it's mostly just fog, static, and elevator music up there.

The girl—Lia—she watches. She doesn't say much, but when she does, it matters.

Today, she asks me something strange.

I blink at her. "Dreams are for people who sleep."

"I close my eyes sometimes. But it's not sleep. It's more like… waiting for the world to forget I exist."

She doesn't laugh. She just looks at me like I said something profound, which is funny considering I once bit a squirrel because I thought it was a sandwich.

Dr. Vale interrupts, waving a chart like it's the lost book of Genesis. "Mr. Z, your brain is reactivating certain pathways. Weak signals, but familiar patterns. Memory fragments. Identity structures."

I raise an eyebrow—well, half an eyebrow; the other one fell off three days ago.

"You're remembering who you were."

And just like that… everything inside me goes still.

Later, Lia brings me an old notebook.

Found it in the attic, covered in dust and spider politics.

"Write," she says. "Whatever you remember. Doesn't matter how small."

I hold the pen like it's made of bones. I sit. I stare. Then I write.

It's right there, just out of reach. A whisper on the edge of a scream.

That's all I get. That's all I am.

That night, something strange happens.

Old jazz, drifting from the radio Lia repaired. Static-filled, half broken, but alive.

I sit by the window. I close my eyes.

And for the first time since I woke up in that cursed field… I feel something.

Things That Used to Be Me