Zombies: A Hunter's Guide Read online

  ELIMINATION AND PREVENTION

  Ask any professional zombie killer which variety of zombie he least wants to face, and the answer will invariably be necromantic. This is not because they are particularly tough or dangerous, but because their elimination is incredibly messy. Unlike revenants or other horde zombies, necromantic zombies possess no single weakness. Since many lack any kind of brain, and some even lack heads, hunters cannot rely on the classic head shot or decapitation. Instead, the only way to kill a necromantic zombie is to bash it to pieces.4 There really is no scientific way to state this. These zombies are bound together by magic, and it is only through mangling and dismembering the corpse that the spell can be physically broken. Exactly how much damage a zombie can take depends on the skill of the necromancer who created it in the first place. If a zombie does possess a head, shattering the skull will normally do the trick. Otherwise, it is probably best to go for the spinal column. More often than not, breaking the zombie in two will also break the spell that animates it. If not, it will at least severely slow it down.

  While machetes, katanas, and aluminum baseball bats are probably the ideal necromantic zombie killers and one should certainly be carried as backup, it is always best to take zombies out at a distance. The key for eliminating necromantic zombies with gunfire is caliber. While a .22 might be used effectively for sniping the brains out of other horde zombies, its lack of punch makes it mostly useless against magically powered corpses. If you want to kill these zombies, you need something that can blow off big chunks. At a minimum, hunters will want .45s, which is why so many modern hunters carry a Colt 1911 as their sidearm. However, the king of zombie killers remains the shotgun. Armed with either slugs or shot, at close range, a shotgun blast to the chest or head will generally take a zombie down.

  The best solution to a necromantic zombie incursion or threat, and one that is unique to this variety, is killing the necromancer. Although not an easy task, finding and eliminating the necromancer that created the zombies will break the spell, and the corpses will immediately deanimate, crumpling into a pile of flesh and bones.

  There are some people out there, even a few within the animate necrology community, who argue the value of “white magic.” There is certainly compelling evidence that some forms of magic can be used to effectively combat the undead. However – and I want to state this as clearly as possible – “white magic” and “death magic” are vague and nearly meaningless terms. At best, they are two sides of the same coin. At worst, “white magic” is just a slightly cleaner form of necromancy. Both are at odds with the natural world. While the temptation to fight fire with fire remains great, it is always better to trust your 12-gauge than some ancient incantation.

  LICHES

  Put simply, a liche is an undead necromancer, and thankfully, they are incredibly rare. To become a liche, a death wizard commits a form of magical suicide in which the body is killed, but the soul is bound to the reanimated corpse. Whether a liche is a zombie remains a topic of academic debate, but at a minimum they should be considered an extremely dangerous form of magical zombie master. In appearance they resemble their zombie servants, with frail bodies withered by their own magic; however, that is where the similarities end. Liches possess all of the knowledge, skills, and abilities they possessed in life, including their magical abilities. They think, reason, and speak. They also seem to maintain whatever dexterity they had in life.

  Since liches remain so rare, there is little that can be said about them with certainty. Liches have no known weakness. Massive amounts of physical damage may be able to destroy the magical bonds that hold them together, but this has never been put to the test. Incineration is probably the best bet. If there are currently any liches in the world, they have remained hidden. Then again, when you are already dead, time is on your side.

  Of course, where necromantic zombies are concerned, the best solution is prevention, as it is easy to put the deceased beyond the clutches of even the most powerful death wizard. A corpse cannot be reanimated if it has been buried or interred with the proper rites and rituals of a monotheistic religion. Some people have argued that this is proof of the power of white magic, but more likely it is a flaw or weakness in the spells of necromancy. Since necromancy developed in societies where monotheism was rare, or nonexistent, it seems the early wizards never factored the idea into their magic. Either way, it works. Christian, Jewish, or Muslim makes no difference; the rites of each will stop necromancers cold. This also helps explain why necromancers are most prevalent during great wars, when thousands of corpses are left strewn across the earth, having never received their final rites.

  1 Generally called “The March on Salisbury,” a horde of several hundred zombies was eventually hunted down and exterminated by a group of royalist cavalry.

  2 The Journal of Animate Necrology, Miskatonic University Press, Vol. 39 No. 2

  3 The term “horde zombie” is sometimes used to group necromantic, atomic, and viral zombies together as these three types share a similar “herd mentality” and often form together in large groups.

  4 Linguistics is still searching for words to replace “kill” and “fatal” in discussions of the undead. Since none have yet been found, I will continue to use them.

  Voodoo Zombies

  When the rise of Christianity drove the necromancers out of Europe, one group disappeared into the wilds of West Africa. Over the centuries, they wormed their way into positions of power and incorporated aspects of their black magic, including the creation of zombies, into the local religions. Records from this time are almost nonexistent, and what little information we have comes from ancient folklore. However, this strain of necromancy slowly re-emerged with the rise of the slave trade in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. As the European slavers transplanted thousands of native Africans, including many witch doctors, to the islands of the Caribbean, the African religions slowly mixed with Roman Catholicism to create the culture of voodoo. And with this culture came a new variety of zombie.

  US Marines stationed in Haiti in the early twentieth century.

  Technically, voodoo zombies are a subclassification of necromantic zombies, but since they have been studied in isolation for so long, and because their magical reanimation contains so many unique elements, most animate necrologists continue to view them as a separate category. In fact, the most important contributions to the study of voodoo zombies have been made by anthropologists, most of whom are either unaware or unconcerned with the greater threat of the undead.

  Voodoo took strongest root in the nation of Haiti, and it is there that a majority of voodoo zombies are found. Even so, voodoo is practiced by over sixty million people worldwide, including strong concentrations in parts of North, South, and Central America as well as the other islands of the Caribbean. In fact, voodoo had one of its strongest followings among the Creole people of Louisiana, and it is from their language that the word “zombie” originates. After the American Civil War, many of the Creole practitioners of voodoo were rounded up in the general pursuit of necromancers, and today the darker practices of voodoo only survive in America in the back streets of New Orleans and the most isolated parts of the Louisiana bayou.

  A rare photograph of a voodoo zombie.

  After successfully tackling the zombie problem at home, the United States attempted to strike against the heart of voodoo. After the lynching of Haitian President Jean Vibrun Guillaume Sam in 1915, the US Marines led an invasion of Haiti, ostensibly to restore order. Over the next twenty years, the Marines engaged in a systematic attempt to stamp out voodoo across the island.

  Despite America’s clandestine war against necromancy and voodoo, most of the citizens of the Western world remained blissfully ignorant of the undead threat. This began to change in 1932 with the publication of The Magic Island by William B. Seabrook. While many modern ethnologists have labeled the book “sensationalist trash,” Seabrook’s account of his travels through Haiti includes many deta
ils about voodoo, including an encounter with a zombie. The book caught the public imagination, especially the zombie incident, and soon the idea spread to Hollywood. In 1932, The White Zombie, starring Béla Lugosi, hit theaters across the United States and launched a new genre of horror film that continues to cloud and confuse the true study of zombies to this day.

  The United States withdrew its forces from Haiti in 1934. Although the Marines had made a thorough effort to eradicate voodoo, it survived and slowly rebuilt. In 1950, François “Papa Doc” Duvalier came to power in Haiti and fostered the regrowth of voodoo. For twenty years, Duvalier ruled the country through a fear partially inspired by the black magic of voodoo. Some claim that he created his own small army of zombie soldiers, though this has never been confirmed.

  Political upheaval eventually forced Papa Doc’s son and heir to flee the country, and thus ended the governmental support of voodoo. The practice remains strong, however, and America continues to send agents to the island to monitor the situation.

  WADE DAVIS

  The foremost researcher into Haitian voodoo zombies, Wade Davis came to prominence in 1985 after the publication of his book, The Serpent and the Rainbow. In its pages, Davis first revealed the importance of zombie powder in the creation process. Davis even managed to obtain samples of this powder, which revealed the presence of tetrodotoxin. In response to criticism, Davis followed up his first book with a second, Passage of Darkness: The Ethnobiology of the Haitian Zombie, in which he presents further evidence. While it remains unclear whether Wade Davis ever saw a true necromantic voodoo zombie or just a fake zombie produced by diluted zombie powder, his works have brought valuable attention to the Haitian zombie problem.

  CREATION

  The strain of necromancy that lives within voodoo has a distinct flavor that sets it apart from the death magic of Europe and Asia. The wielders of this magic are called bokors,5 and even within their own culture are usually viewed as pariahs. While these bokors deal in all kinds of black magic, including fetishes and charms, they are most feared for their ability to create zombies. Unlike Western necromantic zombie creation that only deals with corpses, the creation of a voodoo zombie involves capturing a person’s soul.

  Among ghost hunters and others who study the ethereal undead, it is a well-established fact that an individual’s soul lingers near its body for a least a day or two after death, before continuing on to its second existence. During this period of lingering, souls are at their most vulnerable to necromancy. Using their dark arts, bokors can imprison souls in a sealed jar or trap them inside a fetish. These imprisoned souls are known as zombi astral and are forced to do the bidding of their captor. A zombi astral can be released by shattering the jar or fetish holding it.6

  Once a bokor has imprisoned a soul, he can command the corresponding body to rise up from death, using a substance known as zombie powder. This powder is basically a solid form of the brew used by other necromancers, though it contains several unique elements such as tetrodotoxin, an extremely powerful poison found in some puffer fish and octopi. Bokors sprinkle the powder into the mouth of a corpse while taunting it with its own captured soul. After rising, the zombie remains under the command of whoever controls the vessel in which its soul is imprisoned.

  It is worth noting that many bokors use zombie powder as a poison, slipped into food. There is no cure for this poison, and death normally occurs within four to six hours. Afterward, a bokor can quickly trap the soul and raise the zombie without a further application of powder.

  Because voodoo zombies require the trapping of the soul, it is only possible to create them from the newly deceased.

  IDENTIFICATION AND THREAT

  Voodoo zombies are the least immediately recognizable form of zombie. From a distance, they appear to be normal human beings, though perhaps a bit slow and lethargic. Up close, however, it is a different story. Voodoo zombies have empty, soulless eyes, slack-jawed expressions, and very slow movements. They do occasionally speak, responding to direct questions in a nasal voice devoid of emotion. A few bokors sew the mouths of their zombies shut, to prevent them from eating salt. Due to a peculiarity of voodoo necromancy, the ingesting of salt causes a voodoo zombie to go wild, attacking the bokor that created it.

  Like all forms of necromantic zombie, voodoo zombies are capable of using weapons and even tools. In fact, it is probably more common for this variety of zombie to be used for manual labor than as a weapon. When they are armed, most zombies carry the traditional Haitian machete, a weapon they wield with lifeless indifference. Otherwise, they will attack with their hands, displaying normal human strength.

  François "Papa Doc" Duvalier, President of Haiti from 1957 until his death in 1971.

  In comparison to other forms of zombie, voodoo zombies offer little threat to mankind as a whole. The process of creating zombie powder is long, difficult, and expensive, and its use is limited to the newly deceased. Thus bokors are unlikely to assemble the large armies of other necromancers. On the other hand, the threat to the individual of being raised as a zombie is incalculable. With the possible exception of revenants, all other forms of zombie are the product of corpses whose souls have departed this earth. Voodoo zombism is the ultimate threat, the idea of slavery and imprisonment even after death. It is perhaps the greatest evil that necromancy has to offer and the main reason that the US government and other zombie-hunting agencies have worked so hard to stamp out the black magic of voodoo.

  PSEUDO-VOODOO ZOMBIES

  Research into voodoo zombies has often been confused by the presence of “fake zombies” or “living zombies.” Haiti remains a poorly policed state, and in many areas local gang bosses use the threat of zombification to terrify the populace. But these greedy and dangerous individuals rarely agree to pay for the services of a bokor, even if one can be found. Instead, these men sometimes buy a diluted form of zombie powder, which they use to poison those who attempt to defy them. While not poisonous enough to kill, the powder causes a deep paralysis. The gang then buries their victim in a mock funeral and leaves them trapped underground for half a day. The victim, still suffering from the poison and partial asphyxiation, is then dug up and beaten. The effect of this horrendous treatment can often break the spirit of an individual and reduce him to a highly suggestible, half-comatose state that resembles zombification in many ways.

  These fake zombies have led to many cases of mistaken identity, and have made both bokors and voodoo zombies appear to be much more common than is actually the case. While the Haitian government has outlawed the use of drugs as a means of threat or intimidation, this does little to stop the practice. Fake zombies have also led to the creation of several “zombie rehabilitation centers,” a concept that would be laughable in the case of true zombies.

  ELIMINATION AND PREVENTION

  The most fragile of all zombie types, voodoo zombies can be eliminated by either destroying the brain or through large amounts of damage to the body. A single shotgun blast or several shots from an assault rifle usually takes them down. Unlike other necromantic zombie types, killing a bokor does not automatically destroy his zombies, but the zombies will deanimate the second that their zombi astral is set free.

  Because of their long association with the black magic of voodoo, the inhabitants of Haiti have invented many ways of preventing a loved one from becoming a zombie. Since cremation is generally out of the question, many families elect to rekill a corpse by destroying the brain or cutting the throat. Some even go so far as to sew the mouths shut to make the application of zombie powder more difficult. The most common form of prevention is for the family to stand guard over the body or grave for two days after death, ensuring that the soul safely passes on to the next world.

  Bokor with voodoo zombie

  While voodoo zombies are rarely employed as weapons, most bokors select a couple of their smartest and toughest creations to act as bodyguards, using them to intimidate their foes and to provide cover if a quick getaway p
roves necessary.

  Note the zombie with the sewn mouth. This may have been done by the family of the deceased individual to try to protect against zombification, or just as likely, by the necromancer himself to try to guard against the dangers of salt.

  5 “Bokor” can have different meanings depending on where it is used. I am using it only in its most common definition.

  6 Despite their name, zombi astral are an ethereal form of undead, and thus beyond the scope of this investigation.

  Nazi Zombies

  Hidden beneath the British World War II codebreaking center at Bletchley Park is a vast basement, officially called “The Cloak Room.” All access points to the rooms were sealed in 1947, and since then no one, government or civilian, has set eyes on the place. According to the records, the Cloak Room served as an intelligence gathering center, but those records are exceedingly vague as to what information was collected. It is only in recent years, as the generation that worked in those rooms has begun to pass on, that a few whispered voices have spoken about the place as the location of Supreme Allied Command: Shadow Theater (SAC:ST). It was from these rooms that American General E. L. Whately organized a war within a war and led the battle against the Nazi Occult Division. While credit and honor is justly given to the Allied soldiers who fought against the Nazi war machine, the men and women who worked for SAC:ST should also be remembered. If not for their tireless efforts and great sacrifices, Allied victory might have proved impossible and the earth consumed by an endless tide of Nazi undead.