Notes from the Mad Science Lab: No More Zombies

Have a seat, everyone. Are you all comfortable? Good. Then I'll begin.

I know what you've been doing. Honestly, you should all know by now that I monitor every inch of this installation, from the vehicle bays to the cryptozoo. I keep particularly close track of what happens in the labs. So I know about your drunken night out in the canteen. I know, down to the milliliter, exactly how much alcohol each of you drank. I can replay your entire conversation, complete with gestures, exactly as captured by no less than a dozen microphones and six different camera angles.

So I am very well aware that when you stumbled out of the canteen and back to the labs, you had been discussing a prank. It's nearly Halloween, after all, and you work in a laboratory. Once you realized that you could create some artificial zombies and scare the hell out of the minions -- and possibly myself -- I'm sure the temptation was irresistible. Unfortunately, all three of you got completely carried away.

I'm not entirely disappointed by this. I hired you for your initiative, after all, as well as your intelligence. And, really, if you didn't sometimes take things a little too far, and run the risk of ending civilization as we know it, what sort of researchers would you be? No, you are my assistants, and you should feel free to pursue your own projects when you are not otherwise occupied. That said...

Sam, in deciding to use a self-reproducing nanostructure to reanimate your corpse, you failed to consider what sort of failsafes might be necessary. Your infection has now claimed fully half of our minions, who are now shambling around outside the cryptozoo in the hope of infecting everything inside. This is why you should never attempt science while you are drunk.

Cassius, your decision to use "just a little" necroactive radiation to give your zombie an "aura of menace" has resulted in a creation that kills people by its mere presence. Anyone who comes within about ten feet of the thing... dies. Only about half of them reanimate, but Sam's shamblers have already infected several of the stray corpses that your radiation zombies have left behind. This has accounted for another quarter of our minions.

Bart... You, at least, cobbled together a wholly artificial creature that lacks any capability for infecting others. However, you appear to have given it a particularly active brain, and for the last fourteen hours it has been kidnapping minions, killing them, and constructing more creatures like itself - presumably to give it some company. So far there are only three of them, but their intelligence makes them vastly more dangerous than the zombies your peers created.

As a result of your combined efforts, there are now exactly three... two minions who remain alive. This is your mess, gentlemen. I expect you to clean it up. You will, of course, have access to anything in the armory... provided you can get to it. The minions and I will monitor your progress from my office. Please note that I will have the defense system up, including the turrets, so driving your zombies to my office door is a viable strategic option... provided that the hallway is completely clean by the time I emerge. Approaching the door yourselves, under any circumstances, is an extremely bad idea.

Is all that clear? Very good. Go to it, gentlemen.