I wonder how many people ever realize they’re working with someone who will make it in the history books. How many fellow scientists understood that Einstein was “the guy?” Did Columbus’ crew comprehend that his name was the one that would go down in infamy, with the general population simply never knowing theirs? In any case, let the record show that I understand my boss, Mr. Valentino, was one of these men.
It wasn’t all Mr.Valentino that led us to our breakthrough, but I’d be lying if I said he wasn’t the major contributing factor. We toiled away at the impossible. A hypothesis, a concept. Calling the science behind it blurry and conceptual is like saying the creation of penicillin was “a pretty good idea.” But if we were able to pull off our idea, humanity would make its next step.
Telepathy. To speak without words, communicate in silence, across distances, in an instant. To convey worlds of ideas with a single thought. I remember the first time we switched on the original machine. The one that worked. Mr. Valentino and another coworker, Ronnie, were in separate rooms. They both put in their specially designed ear plug, tuned to the machine. Ronnie would hold up a note card, and sure enough, Mr. Valentino would recite out loud what was on each card. We ran ten attempts. Twenty. Fifty. By the end, we were crying. We’d have done it. That night, Mr. Valentino gave a speech to us, a bunch of exhausted, shaken, ecstatic scientists, over pizza in the break room.
“Ladies, gentlemen, today we have taken the first step of uniting humankind. Where words have failed, our thoughts will be the unifier. Language is no longer a barrier, and our true selves will be laid bare for the fellow man, who will see no difference from their own. No longer will we be prisoners to our own minds, for we have just crafted the key.”
The early tech was promising. With one of our central machines, or Cerebrums, installed (Scott won a bet against Mr. Valentino for naming rights) and our ear piece, a human could send their thoughts out to any other human wearing an ear piece in a 1-mile radius. We were signing contracts with the military, warehouses, entertainment venues, you name it. Efficiency skyrocketed. Instantaneous communication of ideas over distance, in the blink of an eye. Students could choose to get an education as they slept. Park Rangers could work together to find a missing kid within an hour. Our contracts grew, and so did our company. Mr. Valentino did right by all of us, keeping the original crew as part of the board of directors, and in turn, we kept burning the midnight oil, working to make the radius bigger, the transmission of thoughts clearer.
Thinking back, the first point of contention that arose is when the government had asked us if it would be possible to transmit thoughts without the ear piece. We speculated that it would be possible, but the ear piece allowed the transmission of thoughts to be, well, consented. I struggle to find a better word for it. Mr. Valentino, however, wasn’t as bothered by the idea as some of us were. He insisted that more connections among people would be unifying, and the government assured it could be used to save millions- an emergency broadcast signal directly to the brain, arming all civilians with knowledge that can be used to save their lives. I had my reservations, but went along with our trials into a new Cerebrum. I can’t say the same about all of us, as some of the original crew quit. Looking back at what unfolded, I’m not sure I made the right decision that day.
The test of our latest Cerebrum had a different feeling than our first one. Before, we were a couple of scientists working on a pipe dream. Now we had several different shareholders in the room with us, as we were about to change the game for the second time within five years. Mr. Valentino placed the helmet on, and flipped the switch. I remember the feeling of relief and joy that swept over me when I heard Mr. Valentino’s voice in my head- “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” There was applause, handshaking, and celebration, but no pizza in the break room. I don’t remember the full speech that Mr. Valentino gave this time, but I remember it being well spoken.
In the beginning, I admit that things were better. When a hurricane hit Georgia, both the citizens and government were much more organized in both prevention and relief efforts than before the Cerebrum. The wait times at government-run facilities had dramatically reduced. The postal service doubled its effectiveness across the board. I think this success is what drove other companies to seek our services too. Why advertise on a billboard when you can just beam the jingle into someone’s head? We spent hours on the board arguing about extending our services. In the end, Mr. Valentino broke the tie, and we allowed anyone with a big enough paycheck to seek our services. The money rolled in, and our staff of “thoughtcasters” (coined by someone in PR) would broadcast your message out to the general public, using our centralized, low-frequency Cerebrum at HQ. By now, there was external discourse for our company. A part of me agreed with that discourse. As if we don’t get enough advertisement in what we watch, on our phones, at our gas pumps, in what we read, and now, just directly into our heads? It felt too much. Some took to wearing tin foil on their heads to help block out what the advertisers wanted you to hear. It didn’t help. Throughout all of this, Mr. Valentino was single-minded towards his goal of connecting everyone. I don’t think he accounted for all the mental noise it would bring.
The first reports of the dead rising seemed like a bad prank pulled on the public. Only when seeing the shambling bodies lurch out of cemeteries from the video feed of the local news chopper did everything seem real. Across the country, the undead, tattered and mangled, shambled from our cemeteries and began to move in hordes. Emergency thoughtcasts warned people to stay at home, to barricade, to wear masks, not knowing what the cause was for the undead to return to the living. The military prepared for the worst, showing up in full force where the hordes began to fester. Years of schlock and scream queens prepared the world for this moment, to eradicate the hostile, rotting threat. But there was no threat, no groans for brains, no tearing of limbs. The mass of zombies moved with a purpose, ignoring all civilians, refusing to retaliate against soldiers who would blow them apart limb by limb. Day by day, the hordes would get bigger; no amount of mutilation slowed them down.
The first one of our locations to be ripped apart was in Iowa. Reports say the green, oozing shamblers tore through door by door, reaching the heart of the facility, wherein lay a Cerebrum. When insurance was able to get in, after an all clear by the government, they reported most of the facility was left intact, save for the Cerebrum itself, which was beyond operation. More and more throughout the country, we received reports of our facilities being attacked, each attack looking identical on paper. Mr. Valentino urged the government to step in, to put all of their resources into eliminating this threat, but as our infrastructure went down, their ability to act quickly and in a coordinated manner dwindled, probably due to a reliance on our system for so long.
Mr. Valentino spent most of his time hooked up to the Cerebrum at our main facility, sending out words of comfort to those who could hear him. As the days progressed, and the hordes moved in, those soothing words turned into pleas of mercy addressed to the rot-infested ghouls as they marched.
I stopped going into work when I saw the writing on the wall. Most people did, save Mr. Valentino, from what I heard being thoughtcasted each day. Our town knew the approach of the undead from the smell first, before anything else. A wave of miasma rolled in, followed by ragged breaths and dragged feet. The town sat in silence, choking, as tons poured in from all directions, towards the facility. The scene played out within all of our heads- Mr.Valentino became more frantic, and manic- screaming, cursing, pleading, crying, then it was silence. The silence hung for a moment before a voice hissed into our minds, a voice long not used, a voice raspy with decayed vocal cords, as it gurgled and bubbled into our minds. It did not say much, but it said enough. “Quiet, please.” The only voice I had heard in my mind from that day was my own.
Credit: Derek Llovet
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