Prologue

1894: Somewhere out in the Atlantic

        The wind blew its cold, icy breath over the boat, shaking it back and forth. He looked out into the sea and remembered the events that transpired days earlier. “I will come back and make you and your family pay!” the witch doctor screamed as he was dragged into the earth by demons. He remembered the way his black eyes boared into him as his face twisted in agony. He shuttered, and remembered back to the time he killed his archenemy, Dracula. His eyes looked at him in the same way as his nemesis did as the stake slid into his heart.

        He was Abraham Van Helsing. Monster hunter. When word got to him about a rash of Zombie attacks in Africa he had to leave Quincy behind. Quincy was his only family.  Abraham was his surrogate grandfather. He didn’t like to leave the boy, especially with his father killed by extensive wounds from Dracula during the last battle. Abraham Van Helsing felt guilty for that. Quincy Morris followed him to the castle and stormed it. Jonathan Harker, the other member of their party, helped kill the vampire Dracula. But Quincy Morris was mortally injured after he gave the lethal blow in the assault. He left behind a young son. Quincy Jr.

His skill set was needed there, in Africa. He needed to see what exactly was going on. He hopped on the next boat carrying cargo for Africa. He needed to see this for himself, and figure out a way to stop it.   Passing through local trade routes and listening to the stories of the Bushmen, he was able to track down the shaman, or witch doctor, of the Ondonga tribe.

Witch doctors are healers. It is believed that they heal using black magic or witchcraft. Something that Van Helsing was studying to understand the science behind it. The he was studying witch doctors and witch craft was because there were a few practicing doctors in England at the time. These doctors were called “cunning men” in England, and the term witch doctor was coined there. In Africa it seems that witch doctors were much more nefarious. It is said they sacrifice animals to the higher powers to be able to work their magic.

He watched the Witch doctor’s rituals in the Ondonga tribe. The witch doctor’s eyes were wild, like a feral cat, flitting here and there. He would commune with spirits of the past and present, taking in their spirits, speaking as them, and spitting them back into the netherworld. Tribes people believed that he could speak to their loved ones across the afterlife, and hoped that their loved ones were happy. The shaman only saw pain and agony. Through his spiritual journeys into the afterlife the witch doctor confided in Van Helsing that he spoke with a higher being, someone who tortured the dead. “The bad people, they burn.” The Witch doctor said. “They cry out, they want help.” Van Helsing urged him to stop communicating with the bad person.  “You are a healer, heal people.” Van Helsing told him. “I will heal them,” the witch doctor said, “The bad man told me to.”

That is when the witch doctor started to raise the dead. His rituals become more elaborate, sacrificing chickens, sacrificing small mammals, all to the bad man. His actions started to become erratic and his personality changed. He kept claiming that the bad man needed these people saved, to help protect the witch doctor, to help protect his people, to help protect his land. The dead rose. Slowly at first, then with more frequency. Zombies. Shells of the former tribes people of Africa. He was building an army. An undead army.

        A zombie is an animated corpse raised by magical means, such as witchcraft. Others believe that an zombie is someone who is hypnotized, who has no self control or consciousness, but is self aware enough to respond to stimuli. The witch doctor was reviled as a bokor, someone who can revive a dead person. This bokor, has control over the person since they have no will of their own. Bokors can capture the soul of the zombie and keep it to make him more powerful. With the frequency of the zombie rising, it was the idea that the witch doctor was getting stronger by keeping the soul of each zombie raised. It is believed that if you kill the bokor, then you then release the zombie.

        Zombies are vile creatures. They are shells of their former selves. Rotten bags of meat that have been reanimated for one purpose, to become an army for the witch doctor, the bokor that raised them. They walk around looking to eat the meat of animals. They started small, killing the pests that plagued the tribes, small rodents, birds and the like. Then they started to go after bigger prey. The tribes people. They would drag them into the woods and tear them apart, eating their vital organs, mostly the brain. The brain held the sustenance to keep them going. Van Helsing came up with a hypothesis. He believed the zombie ate the brain to take the memories of the victim. All Van Helsing knew was they hunted at night and it wasn’t safe to be out after dusk. Most of the tribe was nervous of the lions and hyenas that hunted at night, but all were frightened by the zombie. Van Helsing had to stop him.

        His plan was simple. He would use witchcraft to fight witchcraft. Summoning was not one of his strong suits, but he had to try. Since the dead were rising, Van Helsing’s goal was to summon something sinister to take the witch doctor away. His goal was to summon demons that would drag him to hell. The witch doctor was always going on about the bad man, and Van Helsing wanted him to meet him. While in his tent he configured a spell that would summon the demons that he needed, and set plans in motion to stop him that night.

        As the witch doctor stalked around the campfire that night, raising the dead, Van Helsing got to work with his summons. Chanting and giving some of his own blood as sacrifice, he watched the witch doctor. The fire flared around the witch doctor and danced around him, the earth opened up and dark hands reached from the earth and grabbed the witch doctor around the ankles. The witch doctor turned looking for help and locked eye with Van Helsing. “You have done this to me!” He screamed as the realization hit him, “I will make you and your family pay!” He howled, froth flying from his mouth, his feral eyes flitting between the demons dragging him down and Van Helsing. “You have not seen the last of me!” He exclaimed as he was swallowed up by the earth.

        As if a light switch had turned off, the undead died again, dropping around him like pillars of stone. Van Helsing wiped his brow with a handkerchief and breathed a sigh of relief, then collapsed from exhaustion himself.

        When the work was done, he jumped on a boat back to England to be reunited with Quincy. The beast-like scream still ran through his head as he looked out over the bow of the boat, watching the sea “I will come back and make you and your family pay!” When, he thought, how much time does my family have?