Dream CLXIII

I was in Washington D.C., on a bright sunny day.  I was walking around the concourse, when a strange ship started circling in the air overhead. People stared and pointed in panic.  It was golden, and had various size fins and what appeared to be sails jutting from it in every direction.  It easily whizzed through the air, this way and that, seeming at random.  "Maybe it will go away," someone nearby said quietly, but it kept darting here and there.

Eventually it landed in a park hidden behind some trees.  And there was a tremendous explosion.  Likewise, the people around me erupted in a panic, running in every direction, certain that danger was afoot but uncertain where it would come from.  

I was running from the park, but I had to turn at an angle because of a fence, and I ran into a crowd of people with weird red eyes.  They seemed angry and driven, and rushed at me.  "I must convert you," said a middle-aged woman running toward me.  She reached out and touched me and I became a zombie.

I was filled with fierce, red thoughts, but they were confused and incoherent.  I knew I needed to convert others, but there was a conflicting instruction that said I had to destroy myself.  There were, I knew, special electrified fences that would disintegrate me if I ran into their gates, and I went toward the alien ship to look for one.

Near the alien ship, the air was suddenly hazy and dark.  But I could see one of the gates ahead, crackling with green energy, and I stepped toward it.  Other zombies were before me, and they stepped through and were instantly dissolved. 

Suddenly, I decided I didn't want to be dissolved.  And apparently others around me got the same idea, as they refused to step through the gate.  I could see a vague form ahead in the semi-darkness gesturing vaguely, but one of the zombies shook his head "No," and I said, "I've got work to do.  I'm way behind because of this."  Others started murmuring similarly, seeming, from my example, to "wake up" to their previous lives.  The vague form--one of the aliens, I presumed--stepped back and faded into the darkness and I felt their control slip completely from me.

As it turned out, the armed forces were easily able to fight back the aliens, and were on the verge of destroying their ship.  The aliens surrendered, and that's when they ordered the zombies to destroy themselves, as one last chance at a Pyrrhic victory.  However, the armed forces sensed treachery and were about to overwhelm their defenses, so the aliens self-destructed. 

The remaining zombies were carefully gathered together in a holding area.  We were told that because the secret of our creation was destroyed with the aliens, there was no way at present to return us to normal, but that scientists were working on a cure and any volunteers would be appreciated.  Because we were no longer under alien control, we were no longer a direct danger, but--and here the spokesman paused--we were still a danger to the public.  It seemed that our touch, even through clothing, could still zombify others.  The conversion could not be passed through objects--if a zombie touched an object and handed it to a human, the human would be unaffected--but the slightest physical direct contact would irreversibly zombify another person. 

So after training, they let us go back to our lives. 

I worked in a bakery for a large resort situated on a mountain.  When I arrived for work, everyone was very polite and glad to see me; some even wanted to pat me on the back or shake my hand, and I had to point out that they couldn't.  It was somewhat awkward, but there was a big poster about how to deal with zombies, so after the welcome, I got back to work.  I was a cake designer; I designed the special graphics and messages on cakes presented to guests.  My partner, as it turned out, was also a zombie, and he was the one who actually decorated the cakes to my designs.  We went right back into what we did best.

Despite our precautions, every now and then someone would touch us and become a zombie. Since there were no aliens, this wasn't as big a problem as it could have been, but people still had a sense that the zombies were...other.  Even though we really weren't, we still respected this and I'm proud to say that we never zombified anyone, it was always they who insisted on touching us.

One night, a beautiful and famous actress came into the kitchen.  She wanted a special cake, and she wanted me to design it.  I readied myself to sketch.  She smiled sadly, and reached out and touched my cheek.  Before I could stop her, she made contact and...no change in her.  Her smile, already beautiful, added a tinge of sadness.  "I have already been touched," she said, "and I want a cake to celebrate that I can no longer be loved."

I said, "I'm sorry for your loss, of course, and I will design the perfect cake for you, but...what you say isn't true.  Love adapts, and love changes, and love evolves.  Love itself is the one eternal thing that will be here when we're all dust and the zombie 'problem' is long forgotten."

She took off her dress, and was nude beneath.  No red eye, no sign of submission, just perfection.  She turned and sat on my lap.  I tried to conceal her nudity as best I could, but found myself aroused, and my attempts to conceal her were more to caress her.

"There are no zombies," she said.  "There never were."  I could feel her smile.  "Just you, and I."