The Bull, The Spy, The Walking Dead

Marcus stood in his corner office, thirty-seven floors above Manhattan, watching the reflection of himself in the glass — a corporate spy who'd forgotten who he was supposed to be before the cover story became his life. Three years undercover at Prescott Pharmaceuticals, gathering evidence for a hostile takeover, and somewhere along the way, Marcus had become the zombie he pretended to be.

"You look like shit," said Eleanor, his analyst, leaning against his doorframe with coffee in hand. "Even more than usual."

"Bull session with Prescott at nine," Marcus said, not meeting her eyes. "He's in full bulldozer mode."

Eleanor's laugh was bitter. "The aging bull who thinks aggression is the same as competence." She paused. "You know what's funny? I spent three months thinking you were Prescott's mole in our department. Imagine that — a spy hunting a spy who isn't even a spy anymore."

Her words hit harder than she knew. Marcus had been ready to execute the final phase of the takeover tomorrow, expose Prescott's cooked books and fraudulent research. But last night, he'd discovered something the investigation hadn't uncovered: Prescott was dying of pancreatic cancer, and his fraudulent research had been desperate attempts to fund experimental treatments that might save his granddaughter's life.

Sometimes the monsters were people who'd made bargains they couldn't keep.

"What?" Eleanor asked, seeing his expression.

"Nothing," Marcus said. "Just thinking about how we're all zombies, really. Walking around, pretending to be alive, while something inside us keeps dying a little more each day."

He closed the folder on his desk. Tomorrow, he'd choose which version of himself would survive — the spy who destroyed a dying man's legacy, or the zombie who'd forgotten what he was fighting for. Either way, someone would lose.

The bull would keep charging regardless. That's what bulls did.