Hour 23 of the Execution

I start the 24 hour timer on my watch.

Hour 1 of the Execution

I looked at my corpse. It was a collection of gore. It had brown hair and blue eyes. The eyes were disgustingly glassy. On top of that, it had on my tattered sweatpants and favorite t-shirt. Overall, I looked awful, I had expected to look shabby going into this, but didn't think it'd be this bad. It didn’t help that my skeleton had torn through the back of my corpse. 

Even before becoming this, I knew exactly what was happening to me, what happened to everyone infected. First came the stomach issues, then the excruciating feeling of your bones modifying themselves over the course of a couple hours, and finally death.

Well, death wasn’t exactly correct, While my corpse died, I was still alive. Or at least sentient, the philosophers couldn’t decide on what counted as dead. Did losing your body mean you weren’t a person? It didn’t really matter now. Regardless of philosophical questions, I’m infected and in the execution phase. I’m one of the murderous Executioners.

Leaving behind my corpse I looked into a mirror at what I knew I'd find.

A pitch black skeleton. It was the look of every Infected person’s execution stage. 

It was identical to the body that tore my family to pieces.

I finally move towards the shattered windows of the skyscraper I died in. The streets are no longer visible under the countless infected bodies running through the city. The roads haven’t been visible for a long time. 

That's why I’m doing this, things have to change, if they don’t, too many others would continue to lose their families like I did. 

But I only have a certain amount of time left before I lose who I am. After too long, I’d become an executioner in mind and body. I have to start the test while I'm still functioning as myself. 

Moving without any flesh feels weird to say the least, but also concerningly natural. I suppose the Infection wants its infected moving as quickly as possible. In this case, I oblige and sprint down the stairs of the building as quickly as possible. 

I reach the bottom in minutes.

I rush towards the lobby until I eventually find the entrance to the building. The entirety of the lobby is filled with Executioners. Since I'm now an Executioner, they don't attack me. A small part of me is afraid to see if they still don't notice me, but for this to mean anything, to give others the best chance of survival, I have to do it. 

I walk to the closest Executioner and use my new strength provided by the infection to bash in its head. None of the other infected react. I move to the next and repeat the process. I continue this with each infected in the lobby to see if they react, but none of them do. Eventually there is none left to kill. This proves my theory, it proves what I died to test. 

Executioners who have lost sentience will never attack another Executioner, at least not just from the Sentient Executioner killing a room full of Infected. Infected without sentience simply can’t recognize another Executioner as hostile. Something that was always theorized could allow Executioners in their sentience period to thin the amount of Infected. But it was never confirmed if the Executioners would feel hostile or not, now we know they won't. 

I walk over to the computer in the corner of the room. Before I died, I’d already drafted messages to update the survivors on my progress. I had been worried it’d be difficult to type with only bone fingers. And it turned out my worries were justified. Even just moving the mouse to click the send button took far longer than it should have.

After that, I move to the other side of the room that has a pen taped to the wall. Taking it off, I sign a paper with contents similar to what was written on the computer. Both things indicated that what we theorized was correct and could be used. It was important to have two separate messages just to make sure the theory got to the Survivors.

Finishing that, I start my short walk to the entrance of the building, just outside of the doors is the massive horde of Executioners I saw from above. One of many hordes in the city. A survivor was hopefully somewhere up in the surrounding buildings, watching the horde to monitor my progress. I grab and put on a bright nylon cloak that was prepared in advance so the survivor can recognize me.

I step outside the building and immediately hit and kill the closest Executioner. The horde keeps charging, ignoring the Infected I just killed.

I kill another two Executioners, despite that, the horde doesn't pause. They don’t falter. They may not have realized I killed an Infected or maybe they just don't care. Regardless, I start the second test and consequently start my killing spree.

Hour 2 of the Execution.

I keep swinging my hands, using the sheer power provided by being an Executioner to kill. Their momentum similarly helps to the point that killing them is easy. I've killed more of them in the last hour than the entire city has in months of their pointless hunts. As for the test, they’ve yet to react.

Hour 7 of the Execution.

On the bright side of losing all my flesh and only being a skeleton, it’s literally impossible to get physically tired. Which means I’ve done nothing but kill Infected for the last 6 hours. I've also been killing them in increasingly barbarous ways. They still haven’t reacted. The third test is going similarly well and chances of needing the final measure is low. 

Hour 10 of the Execution. 

I have no clue how many I've killed. But I can slowly feel myself losing my ability to function as me, feel myself slowly losing my sentience. Terrifyingly, I’ve started to feel a slight fondness towards the Executioners. Though, the Infected have started slightly avoiding the section of the streets where I slaughtered the ones before them. Perhaps they feel danger, perhaps the corpses just make it more efficient to walk around. Either way, they haven't fought back. 

Hour 15 of the Execution. 

I moved the bodies so it’s faster to walk through my killing area. Despite that, the Infected avoid it and attempt to run through the bodies instead of going through my slaughtering section of the street. There is no longer just a fondness towards the Infected. Now there is a voice in my head telling me I shouldn’t kill them. The voice is annoyingly convincing. There's similarly a deep need to kill and infect Survivors. The Executioners still haven't attacked back. Does the voice have a point? It seems the Final Measure might be required after all. 

Hour 19 of the Infection. 

The voice in my head has turned into multiple voices begging me to not kill the Infected. And Instead hunt down the pitiful Survivors, I know where they live after all. Killing Infected has become considerably harder. Especially since it's my own voice speaking now. My own voice pleading for me to not kill the Infected. The Infected still haven’t fought back. There's no need to take the Final Measure, that's overreacting

Hour 23 of the Infection. 

I can only kill an Infected every once in a while. They still aren’t hostile but everything in my body fights against me when I try to kill one. The voices have stopped but I get thoughts telling me to stop killing the Infected and kill the inferior survivors instead. Those thoughts feel like mine. Are they mine? 

Regardless, I can’t keep going, I already pushed it farther than I should have. 

I turn away from the carnage and head back to the lobby. It becomes harder with every step. I can’t stop thinking that I'm making a mistake. That the Infected are superior and I shouldn’t be doing this. That I should just turn around and leave. I don’t leave though, I can't, I still have to list the test results. 

When I get to the lobby, I turn to the second paper stapled to the wall. A paper saying that they still didn’t attack me, that I was sane and still had full sentience at hour 23. I move to grab the pen and sign the paper “yes” but pause, something is wrong. Am I really sane? Do I actually still have my sentience? 

I grab a marker and write a “15” instead of a “23”, crossing out the “23” in the process. My mind and body revolts, causing me to nearly drop the pen. That only spurs me on. I run to the computer and change the hour “23” to hour “15” instead. It’s difficult with my fleshless hands but I do it anyway and send the message. The Survivors would hopefully recognize I lost my sanity after hour 15. But did I really lose my sanity?

I move towards the entrance of the building to exit but catch myself. I don't actually want to go outside, that’s the infection. Or maybe it is what I actually want?

The fact I question that means the Final Measure is necessary. 

I shamble towards the stairway to fulfill the Final Measure. My skeletal body resists going up the stairs. I make my way up anyway, step after excruciating step. Every moment has me questioning why I'm doing this. But that in itself makes me go up the stairs just a little bit faster. I reach the floor where I first infected myself. The floor that would make sure I never hurt a Survivor. 

I walk past the rotting corpse I once was and head towards the shattered window. Looking down, I see countless Infected corpses littering the entirety of the road. The road itself is visible. There's no way to know how long it's been since a horde hadn't covered it. Maybe more roads will be visible in the future if others do what I have. I can't help but mourn the Infected I killed but that only strengthens my resolve. 

Everything in me is screaming to back away from the edge, to not kill myself and resort to the Final Measure. If I killed myself, the infection couldn't infect others. It was the only way to make sure I didn’t hurt the people around me. If I waited any longer, I’d lose any sentience and not be able to stop myself from killing Survivors. Judging by the fact I desperately wanted to kill a Survivor, I'd already lost a majority of my sentience. 

I take a step to the very edge. I’d never see the future, but as long as I’d given others a chance to, I’m okay with that. Even if the future might be better with everyone Infected. 

I take one last step to make sure I'm not the reason a child has to grow up without a family.