Zombies are the undead. They are people who have been raised from the dead by an animator or necromancer. They have no conscious thoughts of their own, and they are not considered beings with rights. They cannot be sustained for very long, unless drastic measures are used.
Feeding a zombie flesh or raw meat will allow it to retain its appearance for a longer period of time. Capturing the soul at death and putting it into a reanimated body will keep the body from rotting. Ghouls are basically zombies, but zombies that somehow raised without an Animator's request, and somehow raised with the knowledge that eating raw meat will sustain them.
To raise the body, the following steps are necessary. Firstly, the animator performing the ceremony must have a death. Usually this involves the sacrifice of an animal, but older dead will need larger beings, sometimes a human. A necromancer can use their own blood for a death. The blood from the sacrifice is used to create a circle around the area where the zombie will be raised. The zombie will not be able to leave the circle, unless the circle is broken. Secondly, the animator rubs the blood on their own body, usually on the face, both hands, under the shirt, and over the heart. Blood is smeared on the tombstone, and a revolting ointment is placed on the stone, containing mold, clove, sage, thyme, cinnamon, and rosemary. The third step involves a chant by the animator to call the zombie. Blood is offered, because the blood will cause the zombie to recall its former life. Some success has also been had in skipping the ritual and Raising, and instead going with application of Trioxyn 5, although this has been limited to controlled conditions by private firms.
When the zombie is ready to be laid to rest again, salt is thrown at the chest, and the words 'With salt I bind you to your grave' must be uttered by the animator. The knife used in the sacrifice is passed over the lips, and the animator must say 'With blood and steel I bind you to your grave. <Name>, be at peace, and walk no more". The zombie will return to its grave. One can also just wait until dawn, or make liberal use of fire and/or wood-chippers.
Normally a raised zombie won't do anything that isn't told directly to it by the Animator or Necromancer that raised it. They -can- be told to follow the instructions from another party though, and sometimes (very very rarely) a Necromancer more powerful can usurp the Raiser's control. The corpse's rotting is fixed up by the act of raising, although a seriously trashed or dessicated corpse will take a very good Animator to revitalize it in order for speaking. A zombie can recall everything about its life if directly asked (hope you like playing 20 Questions), but the details about its death are lost. Everything from the moment of death to when the person knew they were going to die is just as much of a mystery as what the zombie experienced in the afterlife. A zombie that died from accidentally shooting itself in the head will be able to relate cleaning the gun and dropping it, but not the shot. A zombie that drowned will be able to relate the boat tipping, but not sinking under the water. A zombie that choked on a bone will recall eating chicken and getting a little something caught in their throat, but not the actual choking. A zombie that was killed after being held at gunpoint for a few hours won't recall those few hours. Zombies also tend to blank out if you remind them they're dead.
Trying to zombifiy a dead shapeshifter will just produce a normal zombie, since viruses don't do much in corpses (even re-animated ones), and it requires critter-form for a shapeshifter to pass on lycanthropy. Trying to zombify a dead fairy will either produce nothing, or will produce a (fairly useless) ghost (thus the hypothesis that fairies have no souls). Trying to zombify a corpse post-death pre-vampire won't do anything. Trying to zombify a vampire after final death won't do anything. Trying to zombify a dormant vampire won't do anything (and wouldn't work anyway, since vampires are dormant during the day and Raising only works at night). Trying to zombify an active vampire will just tick off the vampire. Zombie psychics/sorcerers/faithful/summoners don't retain their tricks, since they don't really "want" their tricks to happen anymore.
Obviously, zombies don't make for the best of player-character types. As a matter of fact, they don't work at all. But it's not unheard of for a PC to ICly die, their corpse to be raised as a zombie, and then that zombie asked about various details. If this should happen, staff will make every attempt in a reasonable period of time (relative to the situation) to contact the player of the dead character so they can run their own answers. But if the player can not be located in time for the scene, staff reserves the right to "fake it" and do the best they can with what they know.
