Gray checked his system clock and saw that it was just a bit after 9:00 AM. He walked over to the fence line, tapped Dr. Edwin Jenner on the shoulder, and said, "I think it's time."
Jenner turned around, looking thoroughly confused. "Time for what?"
Gray smiled. "To bring your wife back."
Jenner's eyes widened in absolute shock, his breath catching in his throat. "Really? Right now?"
Gray nodded. "Yeah. It's as good a time as any."
Reaching into his system inventory, Gray pulled out Candace Jenner's body and gently laid her down on the grass next to his RV. He opened his shop and purchased the One-Time Resurrection Syringe for 5,000,000,000 Gold. With his 3-billion-per-hour passive income, the massive cost barely made a dent in his wealth.
He pulled the artifact out of his inventory. The heavy, high-tech syringe was filled with a brilliant, glowing golden liquid that pulsed with pure life energy. Gray pulled a clean blanket over Candace's form to respect her privacy, leaving only her arm and neck exposed. By this time, the commotion had drawn the attention of the courtyard. Almost everyone in the prison had gathered around in a wide circle, staring at the corpse and whispering, wondering what Gray was about to perform next.
Gray stepped forward, drove the needle home, and injected the glowing golden liquid directly into the body.
The moment the fluid entered her system, the transformation was nothing short of miraculous. The glowing golden energy aggressively spread through her blood vessels, lighting her up beneath her skin like a map of pure light. Damaged nerves and decayed tissues began knitting themselves back together rapidly. Her missing brain matter, which had been harvested at the CDC, started regenerating at a speed completely visible to the naked eye.
Not even a minute later, the pale body, flushed with a healthy, vibrant color. Suddenly, Candace Jenner gasped violently for air, her chest heaving as her eyelids snapped open.
The entire courtyard gasped in unison. Everyone stared in absolute, paralyzed awe as a decomposing corpse completely healed itself right before their eyes, sat up, and began breathing again.
Hershel stood at the front of the crowd, his hands trembling violently as he witnessed the impossible. His mind immediately went to his deceased wife and stepson, who had been locked in his barn for so long before being put down. If Gray could simply get more of these golden syringes out of thin air, it meant his family wasn't truly gone forever. He could have them back. He stared at Gray with an intensely hopeful, pleading look.
Gray caught his gaze and gave the old farmer a knowing, serious look. "We can talk later, Hershel. I already know exactly what you want to ask me."
Hershel swallowed hard, tears building in his eyes, and gave a tight, grateful nod. "Thank you, son."
The moment Edwin Jenner saw his wife gasping for air and looking directly at him, he burst into tears. He rushed forward, collapsing to his knees, and threw his arms tightly around her neck, sobbing uncontrollably.
Candace looked completely disoriented, blinking against the bright morning sunlight as she awkwardly hugged him back. "Ed...? Ed, what happened? Last thing I remember... I was laying down at the CDC while you guys were scanning my brain. Where are we?" She paused, her voice cracking as her eyes scanned the massive stone walls, the military APCs, and the crowd of heavily armed strangers staring at her.
Gray stepped up, his voice cutting through the emotional chaos. "You're in a fortified prison somewhere in Georgia, ma'am. You passed away a few months ago. We just brought you back to life."
Candace frowned deeply, shaking her head in complete disbelief. "What do you mean 'brought back to life'? How is that even possible?"
Jenner finally pulled back, wiping his tears away as he held her face in his hands. "I'm going to explain everything to you, honey. Every single bit of it. But what matters most right now is that you're back. You're alive, and you're with me."
Gray gave them a respectful nod. "Bring your wife up to speed, Doc. Take all the time you need."
Finally, Gray turned around and saw the entire community still standing there like statues, their mouths gaping open as they stared at the resurrected woman. Gray raised his hands and aggressively shooed them away. "Alright, get moving! Give them some privacy and get back to your designated stations. The show is officially over. We have work to do."
The team got straight to work with great efficiency. Out in the courtyard, Otis and Big Tiny took charge of the heaviest labor. They cleanly put the cows down and hung them up to completely drain the blood. The exact moment the draining was finished, the rest of the butcher squad used their new skills to skin the hides and cut the meat into halves.
Oscar and T-Dog were in charge of the heavy lifting at the end of the line. They carried the massive beef halves and hung them on the new tracking system straight into the freezing air of the walk-in locker. Everyone got used to the bloody work fast. Down in the farming area, Axel and Maggie kept logging the growth of the crops on their clipboards.
Gray helped around the butcher area, keeping an eye on how things were going. Noticing that people needed knives to speed things up, he opened his system shop and bought a bulk crate of high-quality butcher knives and cleavers, placing them right on the tables.
With the sharp new tools, people kept working fast. They only stopped for lunch, resting for around an hour before they kept going. After they butchered exactly half of the cows, they finally stopped for the day.
Gray told the tired crew to put their tools away. "Alright, we can finish the rest of the work tomorrow. We did enough for today."
Before going back inside, Gray walked down to the farming area to check on the Minecraft seeds. He was amazed to see that some of the crops were already more than halfway ready for harvest. The fast video-game growth was working perfectly.
Once everyone had taken a hot shower to wash off the blood and started resting for the night, Hershel went to look for Gray. He found him in his RV and knocked on the door. Gray let the old farmer inside.
Gray handed him a glass of water, seeing that Hershel was reluctant to start the conversation. Gray was the first one to speak. "I don't think I've ever seen you this speechless before, Hershel."
Hershel let out a little chuckle. "Yeah... It's not every day you find out someone can bring the dead back to life."
"We have seen it, though," Gray said. "Just look around, there are a lot of walkers roaming around still."
Hershel laughed. "You know what I mean, son."
"Yes, yes, I do," Gray replied. "You wanted to ask me something?"
"I think you already know, but I wanted to ask anyway," Hershel said, taking a sip of his water. "Can you get more of that golden syringe?"
"I can," Gray replied honestly. "It takes a while, but in a few days, I should be able to get them faster."
"I wanted to ask if you could get three more of those... if it ain't much trouble," Hershel said, looking down in shame.
"I honestly wasn't planning on ever getting something like that again," Gray continued. "It was probably the only way I could convince Jenner to join us. But yes, if you're willing to wait for a few more days, I can get three more of those."
Before Hershel could even answer, Gray stopped him and kept talking to make things clear. "But... this is going to be the last time I do this. I don't want people thinking I'm going to bring back the dead just for them. So if you can help me spread the word, I'd appreciate it. I don't want them thinking they can go and die out there, thinking I can just bring them back."
Hershel stood up and thanked Gray. He promised he would spread the word to the rest of the group.
Before Hershel walked off, Gray told him one last thing. "In the next few days, we can go pick up the bodies from your farm to bring them back." Hershel nodded with a look of pure relief and walked out into the night.
Gray went outside to do his new workout routine. After three hours of training and a hot shower, he walked out into the cool night breeze. He noticed the lights inside the mobile BSL-4 lab were still on. He walked over and knocked on the door, and Jenner let him inside.
Candace was also there, intently looking through a microscope.
"Already working?" Gray asked. "You can rest, you know?"
Jenner laughed. "I already asked her to take it easy, but she won't listen."
"I already slept enough," Candace said, looking up from the lens. "Besides, come look at this." She pointed to a display showing a sample of her own blood. "There is no more infection. At least for now, I'll have to keep monitoring it to see if I catch the virus again later. But for now, we can run more tests."
Gray smiled and shook his head. "That's great. Just don't overwork yourselves." He paused for a moment. "I'm guessing Jenner told you about my abilities?"
"Yes, he did," Candace said, turning her chair to face him. "I still can't wrap my head around the idea of you having these abilities. How did you get them?"
"Woke up one day with them, that's all I know," Gray shrugged.
"I see." Candace got closer, inspecting him from head to toe. Eventually, she grabbed a clean syringe. "Do you mind if I take a blood sample?"
"Not at all." Gray extended his arm, and Candace expertly drew around five vials of his blood and put them away safely.
"Thanks. If I find something different, I'll let you know," she said, before immediately turning back to her work.
"I'll leave you guys to it then. If you need anything, you know where to find me." With that, Gray walked out of the mobile lab.
As he walked through the courtyard, he noticed a few of the survivors sitting around with nothing to do. Gray opened his system shop and searched for media storage. He found an ultimate external hard drive for 100,000 Gold. It contained every single movie, TV show, and anime ever released up to 2025.
He bought it on the spot. But before handing it over to the group, he took it back to his RV and plugged it into his laptop. He spent a few minutes searching the files and carefully deleted all The Walking Dead related series and media. He didn't want anyone in the community stumbling across the show and seeing themselves, their families, or their friends get brutally killed on screen.
Once the files were cleaned, he walked into the cell block's common room. He opened his shop, bought a massive 85-inch flat-screen TV, and mounted it to the wall, plugging the hard drive directly into the port.
Seeing that the media interface loaded perfectly, he called over the nearby survivors and told the group they now had thousands of shows and movies to watch whenever they wanted to unwind.
By the next morning, Gray walked down to the temporary farming area to check on the crops. He was pleasantly surprised to see that everything was fully grown and ready to harvest. Checking his system clock, he did some quick math and realized it took exactly 24 hours for a full crop rotation from seed to mature harvest.
Next, he walked over to check the Minecraft animal pasture. He scanned the fields but couldn't find the calves, chicks, piglets, or lambs from yesterday. They were completely gone, replaced by fully grown, adult animals. The accelerated growth cycles were working perfectly for the livestock, too.
Gray finally turned around and saw most of the survivors walking out into the courtyard. They were already up, energized, and ready to get the rest of the heavy butchering done. Leaving the mature Minecraft animals alone for the time being, Gray stepped up to the prep tables to help the squad finish processing the remaining cattle herd.