Preparation

Preparation

                Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. Then a wet ripping sound. What was going on in the next room was a little gory, even for a necromancer. They called it 'upgrading'.

                Ashour would have preferred to have the 'upgraded' bodies delivered to him for revival far away from the processing, but time had become short. He, and several other necromancers, had been brought on site to raise the zombies intended for use as 'seeds' for the infection. Nigh invulnerable, carrying a deadly infection (a risky move Ashour did not approve of), and controllable by even a poorly trained necromancer. They were the pinnacle of Ashour's work.

                Well, the work of the division he worked under. It was headed up by a tainted, a zombie that retained its living mind. Ashour had a hard time thinking of her as human - not due to her lack of true life, but because of her lack of emotions. The way tainted were created... Ashour hoped to one day change that. They were effective (exactly what Meander desired) but chilling to work with. Even for necromancers who had killed many times to further their experiments.

                The entire division had been flown in, and although they were initially promised two facilities - one for preparation, and one for creation - they had been given only one. So it was that in the next room tainted (and a few necromancers with strong stomachs) were carving up the bodies Meander had acquired, inserting armour plates and replacing bones. The damage to the flesh was no problem for the necromancers who would raise the dead - all were masters of their craft, and long used to it.

                "You don't find those... sounds disturbing?" Ashour asked the necromancer beside him, Del. She looked young, but Ashour knew that she was almost as old as he. Her work in her own time centred around preserving her youth. It amused Ashour that she was so vain - such trivialities as appearance should come after one had achieved immortality.

                "No, do you? Oh, I can see you do," she replied, chuckling. "I can't believe you have a weak stomach. We've handled plenty of dead bodies."

                "But we do not carve them up," said Ashour. "It is the blood and the guts and the - I'm sure you understand me." Ashour winced slightly as he cleared his mind of the images.

                "Haha! It's going to get worse, Ashour. We're both on leading duty - everyone is, actually. Two days from now our creations will be rampaging through the city. Well, rampaging where we're told, in a controlled, proper fashion." Del giggled again.

                Ashour shook his head. "I have my doubts about ... the need to bring the entire world down. True, our work shall be hindered less, but we will face so many trouble before we succeed that-"

                "You're with the doomsayers that reckon we'll be fighting our current allies for years to come? They're idiots - the lich knows how to play the game too well for that."

                "He knows it too well for us to be destroyed. But we're all still human, mostly. We're food for most of them. And if we want to increase our numbers? Our best option is their food."

                "If you're having doubts you should've turned traitor already. It's too late now."

                "The traitors are all dead - yes, I know that's not what the company says. They're dead. They went to the psychics, right? The psychics are fucked. Their 'little' we should take over the world club has control of most of their organisation. They took care of the traitors. I was tapped by the boss for sending them over."
                "What? So Lucile, Mark and Yuki are all..."

                "Dead. I was the 'link' for our division. It works, right? I have a couple of contacts with the psychics, I have my reservations about the damn plan. Elena came to me two weeks after the plan was put together. I put those who want out in contact with the wrong people, or she kills me."

                "Wow. You're a bloody coward."

                "I don't want to die - you know what my research is into. You know I'm willing to become a tainted, as much as I despise them, to stay alive. Don't act damn surprised."

                "I'm not, actually. Ha ha ha! Traitors got what they deserved. Why are you telling me, though?"

                "To get it off my chest. It's not going to be a secret for much longer, anyway. And we're all too far to stop."

                "You're right there. Oh, yes! First batch is ready!" Del grinned as she pointed to the grotesquely mutilated corpses being wheeled in. Beneath the stitches and cuts, they were barely recognisable as human. "Time to put your skills to work."

                "Can we close the door now?" Ashour called out. "I'd prefer silence!"

                A couple of other necromancers voiced their agreement, leading to the returning tainted closing the large door separating the rooms. The necromancers each moved to their assigned tables (splitting the groups they had been idly chatting in). Ashour and Del barely had to move - they'd been waiting by their tables anyway. Ashour had long been too sullen to be good company, and Del had been too excited to wait anywhere else.

                The process of raising the zombies would, to anyone watching, appear far less complex than the work done in the other room. Each necromancer held their hands over a body, pieces of necromantic energy soon pushing forth from their hands. Only a small part of this power was their innate ability to channel - the majority was being released from a store carried upon or buried within their body.

                Energy flowed into the bodies, and that was all there was to see. Yet each necromancer was controlling the flow, the shape, the purpose of their magic. Complex, intricate patterns were being sewn into the bodies; turning remnant life into a dark equivalent. Torn flesh was sewn up, locking metal plates into place under skin, metal beams instead of bones. Dark magic written to ensure the death of those it spread to, and their return as a mindless devourer (or servant, given instruction).

                It took time - almost as much time as those in the neighbouring room had taken to prepare enough corpses for all the necromancers. None finished at the same time, but as they did so more prepared bodies were wheeled in. The work would continue all night.

                The zombie beneath Ashour's hands came alive with a muffled groan. After a few finishing touches, it would be ready. Packed away, ready to be shipped into place in two days time. Then the probably needless slaughter would begin.

                Despite his misgivings, Ashour was quite thankful that his choice had been made for him. If it had not, he would almost certainly be dead. And he did not want to die.