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The man with the gun….

Fat lookin' zombie! Word count: 29394

Written 2500+ words today, putting me almost ahead of tomorrow’s minimum count. Amazing what I can get done when I sit down to do it, leave the distractions behind, exercise some actual willpower. Oh, also having stuff to write about helps.

Just read the pep talk from Jonathan Lethem (who’s written a couple of my favorite books, but whose work I’ve fallen behind on reading) and was pleased to note that he offered a tip I used way back when writing Illinoir. That one was a noir-inspired detective story, so for inspiration I read a lot of Raymond Chandler and Dashiel Hammet. Chandler said: “When in doubt, have a man come through the doorway with a gun.” It’s good advice, and never fails…. So enter the stranger. His identity is yet to be revealed, and this isn’t exactly the best dialogue I have to offer, but it is today’s excerpt anyway.

I didn’t exactly go to sleep. I was pretty certain at that point that sleep was something I’d never do again — something that saddened me because I really did love to sleep. It was one of my favorite activities. I guess I’d say that I spaced out for a while. Entered the zone. Meditated. Shut down. I was dimly aware that the sun was moving through the sky, time was passing.

I was roused from my mental slumber by the sound of footsteps, quietly and carefully approaching. They were quiet, made by someone who was used to — and damn good at — walking without making much noise. I probably wouldn’t have heard them had it not been so quiet both outside and within. I reached up to lift my hat.

“Move slowly, friend,” said a voice. It was a man’s voice. The voice of someone who had seen it all and survived to tell the tale in his gruff, raspy voice. “Don’t go doing anything that might make me nervous. I don’t like being nervous and you definitely won’t like making me nervous.”

My hand halted in midair, my other one came up to join it, palms facing out towards the source of the voice, a gesture of deference and good will.

“No need to be nervous,” I said. “We’re all friends here.”

“Brains,” Westy said, and of the three of us, I could tell that Westy was the most nervous. There was apprehension there. Fear.

“It’s alright,” I said, more to Westy than to myself or to the stranger.

“Go ahead and lift your hat,” the stranger said. “But you should know I’ve got my scattergun trained right at your head and I won’t hesitate to take your hat off for you, if you catch my meaning.”

“No need for that.”

“Brains.”

“Just stay calm,” I urged.

I lifted my cap, holding it out to one side. The sun had set; what little moonlight there was came from spilling out from behind clouds which had rolled in as night fell. I could see the man standing 20 feet away, the scattergun he’d mention held up to his eye as he sighted down the barrel at me. Slowly, I put my hat back on my head, hoping he hadn’t noticed my zombie-pattern baldness. I kept my hands in the air, hoping it would make the stranger at ease.

He stepped forward, keeping the gone trained on me, his eyes darting in all directions, seeming to take in everything around him while still keeping me in focus. He stopped at about 10 feet; close enough to have a conversation, far away enough that I couldn’t make a move for his gun without him getting a decapitating shot off first. I got a better look at his face. He looked young; younger than his voice sounded. He also looked familiar but I couldn’t place where I knew him from. He let a duffel bag that he carried over his shoulder fall to the ground. It landed with a heavy thump.

“What’cha doing out here?” he asked.

“Just taking a break,” I replied.

“A break? From what?”

“Well, from walking I guess.”

“Walking where?”

“North.”

“Ain’t nothing up north but more of this.” He jerked his head towards the littered road.

His way of talking was infectious; I quickly picked it up and made use of it myself. “Ain’t nothing south but more of this either,” I said.

“Well now, that’s the truth,” he said, chuckling. “What’s yer name?”

“Zach. Zach Graves.”

“Well, Mr. Graves, I hope you’ll excuse my impoliteness but it does seem awful strange to find a man out here all by his lonesome. Makes me ask questions.”

“I was thinking the same thing about you. What are you doing out here?”

My effort to derail the line of questioning was futile. The man was unflappable. “I guess I don’t have to remind you that I have a very powerful gun pointed directly at your head.” He was right; he didn’t. He tapped the barrel of the gun with his right hand anyway.

“Since you’ve got the gun, I guess you don’t have to answer my questions,” I allowed. “That’s how it works in the movies, anyway.”

He chuckled again. His laughter seemed to come much easier than I would have expected for a gun-toting lone wolf. “The movies. That’s rich.” He eyed my suit. “Speaking of rich, that’s a mighty fine suit you’re wearing. Haven’t seen finery such as that in a long time.”

“My dad bought it for me,” I said without thinking.

“Your dad. Well, wasn’t that sweet of him?” he asked without a trace of irony. “He didn’t see fit to buy you a warmer jacket though, huh? Ain’t you cold, Mr. Graves?”

Of course, I hadn’t felt the temperature drop, hadn’t felt the cold that came in with the night. I realized that with each word the man spoke, I could see his breath forming steam in the air. Mine had no such effect.

I faked a shiver. “Now that you mention it….”

He knelt to the ground. While still holding the gun on me, he managed to get the duffel bag open and rooted through it. “Ah. Here we go. I can spare this, I think.” His hand came out with a black hooded sweatshirt, the back of which bore the embroidered logo of the local women’s roller derby league. He tossed the hoodie to me. I tried it on, finding it to be at least two sizes bigger than I’d normally wear. In my emaciated state, it was at least a third size too big. It fit nicely over my suit coat, however.

“Isn’t that better?” he asked. I assured him that it was. I made enough grateful noises of new found warmth to set the man’s mind at ease. Not so much at ease, though, that he felt he could lower his weapon.

“Is this how you greet everyone you meet?” I asked. “A gun in their face and a warm sweatshirt?”

The chuckle again. “It’s what’s kept me alive this long. Can’t ever be too careful. But,” he said, “you don’t want to be so careful you stop being human, know what I mean?”

“I do indeed.”

Meet Westy

Mirror zombie. Word count: 26436. Word 25k: guttural

Photo of Westy courtesy of Erica

So, Zach now has this voice in his head, which he has named “Westy.” Debated about translating Westy’s words (Westy only ever says “brains”) and decided that A) It would be more clear what the conversation was and B) translation = words. Always go with the word count, says I. Zach and Westy step out on the town, dressed in Zach’s Sunday best…. And we have our first interaction with zombies! Scaaaaary!

The streets were emptier than they usually were; in fact, there wasn’t another soul around. Even late at night, this part of town remained pretty busy. With several night clubs, late-night bars, and music venues all in a three block radius there was plenty to do and see and people would come to do and see it. But not tonight. The windows of the bars and restaurants were dark; the marquees of the clubs were unlit and devoid of the names of bands that usually graced them; the liquor store was closed.

The liquor store never closed.

“How long was I out?”

“Garrrrrrrrrrrrr.”

The voice — no, it wasn’t a voice. It was just a guttural growl, a low moan, an angry, hungry groan. And it hadn’t come from inside my head; it came from the shadows, from a dark alley to my right. There was movement there: a slow, awkward shuffling. A figure emerged from the darkness. It was a Z, shambling out of the night. Slumping forward, arms slack at its sides, it lurched towards me.

It was instinctual fear that froze me in place. I’d never come face to face with a zombie before, never seen one this close (unless you count my own self examinations in the mirror) and though all the zombie preparedness videos and pamphlets had told me exactly what to do in case of a zombie encounter, the tips and tricks all left my head and I was rooted in place, unable to move.

It walked right past me and on down the street.

I stood there, in shock. I had just had a close encounter with a Z and it hadn’t attacked me! I watched as it walked into the distance, just shuffling along, uttering the occasional growl, not a care in the world (save for the constant, never ending acquisition of brains.) So absorbed was I in my observations that I didn’t notice the group of 30 more Zs which subsequently emerged from the alley and streamed around me as they followed the lone scout before them. They passed me close enough that some even bumped me as they went by. At the contact, they would utter the occasional grunt or groan but there was little reaction to my presence beyond that. They all seemed driven and focused on something at the end of the road, something beyond my sight or knowledge.

    I realized that while some part of my brain that was still rooted in the past had felt fear, had caused me to mentally panic at the sight of the walking dead, I hadn’t actually felt it. There was no chill up my spine. No goosebumps or hair standing on end. No physical fear response. And no emotional fear response either: my life hadn’t flashed before my eyes, I hadn’t begun bargaining with God for my life. Whether this was a product of my dead nervous system or that I had just known that the zombie wouldn’t harm me in any way, I do not know. What I did know was that I was the best-dressed zombie in town.
And that made me smile.
“Westy. Seriously. How long was I out?”
“Brains.” You took some time. Longer than we expected.
“‘Some time?’ ‘We?’ Can you elaborate?”
“Brains.” Three of your years have passed since we entered you.
“Three years?” I managed to muster up some righteous indignation, just out of sheer habit. But I wasn’t really feeling it. The thought depressed me — if I couldn’t work up a sweat getting angry about something, was there any point in living anymore? But then, I didn’t really feel the depression anymore either.
“I’m like Dexter!”
“Brains?”

“He is…or was?… a character on TV.” I sensed confusion. “Television. Little box. Moving pictures. That’s not important right now. What is important is… well, I couldn’t say this is important either, but it is the point, and that should count for something. Dexter is this guy who’s got what he calls the ‘Dark Passenger’ riding with him, and it makes him kill people, but since Dexter has a conscience, he follows the code that his father showed him, and he only kills people who need killing, like serial killers and rapists and stuff. But his whole deal is that he’s a monster and he’s pretending to be human and pretending to have feelings and whatnot. Like me!”

“Brains.” Except that you have no code to follow. You will kill the next living thing you see, eat its brains, and be done with it.

“Well, we’ll just see about that, Westy.”

“Brains.” Indeed. Now, shall we see where those fellas are going? The voice in my head somehow nodded towards the group of zombies who were just now disappearing into the night.

“Fine. Yeah. Whatever.”

Catching up to the Zs wasn’t hard. They don’t walk all that fast unless they’re chasing food, and there wasn’t much in the way of food on the street. I was tempted to stop in the Taco Bell, but it looked as if it hadn’t been a functional food source for quite some time. The rest of the fast food joints on the street were all in the same state. Windows were either boarded up, or broken, doors hung loose on their hinges, lights were off, nobody was home.

The Zs were headed north, which suited me fine. I didn’t really care where we went, was just along for the ride, there to see what I could see.

The commercial zone gave way to a residential area, but it was just as empty. Houses were boarded up, barricaded however the owners could imagine to do it. It looked like everything had come on in a hurry, like people were a bit rushed when trying to build their fortifications. This zombie thing had been going on for years and it still took these folks by surprise. It didn’t look like these fortifications worked all that well — windows were broken, doors torn down, worse….

Here and there,  you’d see it. A lone Z, or maybe a couple of them, on hands and knees, tearing at entrails, feasting on a kill. What was left of my humanity caused me to wretch. What was left of my stomach was completely empty, so nothing came out.

“Brains,” said Westy. C’mon kid. The first one’s always the hardest. Like this was a murder scene and Westy was the grizzled veteran homicide detective and I was the young rookie looking to prove himself. Except that here, proving myself meant finding some living thing, preferably a human being, and eating it. I wasn’t all that eager to get that first notch on my belt.

Getting to the Good Stuff

Lightness and hope! Word count: 23734

I think I finally found what I wanted to write, maybe where I should have started from. Hitting halfway point today, slower than usual, but I think I have enough meat with this current stuff to get a lot done over the next few days. Would love to get another 15k done before Thursday. Tall order? We shall see.

Part Four: “Line? Oh yeah. Braaaaaaaaains.”

“Braaaaains.”

If I thought that the ringing in my ears was bad, the voice that woke me up had it beat by far.

“Braaaains.”

“What?” I asked.

“Braaaaaaaaaains,” the voice repeated.

“Sorry?”
“Braaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaains. Braaaaaaaaaaaaaaaains,” the voice said. It sounded annoyed. “Brains.”
“Oh. Brains. I thought you were saying ‘stains.’”

It might have just been the power of suggestion — the room was covered in filth, stains that would, even with the power of modern cleaning supplies, never come out.

“Braaaaaaains.”
“Yeah, I got it. It’s….you’re right. Brains.”
“Braaaaaaaaains.”
“Can I just…. Can I put you on hold for a second? I need to figure this out.”
“Brains.”
“Cool.”

I was glad to have established some sort of rapport with the voice. I was so surprised to be conscious that I put aside entirely the fact that there was a voice in my head at all. I took a quick account of myself, another self-diagnostic, and was further surprised to find myself more or less intact, and more or less pain free.

I stood up, expecting joints and muscles to scream at me. Other than some stiffness which I figured must have come from being in a kneeling position for however long I was out, everything worked, maybe even worked a little bit better than before.

The mess on the floor — and on the walls, the bed, the lone chair, even on the ceiling I discovered when I risked a glance upward — was a disturbing mix of everything that had ever been inside me. And it was dry. It must have been a few days, I surmised, a few days of just kneeling there. Doing….what?

The voice chose that moment to add its two cents: “Braaaaains.”

Right. Brains. Brains. Brains. When someone says a word enough, it starts to sound weird, like it’s not spelled right, or it’s pronounced some other way. Brains. I rolled the word around in my head, in my mouth, on my tongue. Brains. I tried saying it again.

“Brains.”

“Braaaaains,” the voice agreed.

The word was getting weird. Chewy. It sounded delicious. Like the best steak I’d ever had. Like the best meal my mom ever made. Brains. How could I get some brains? Maybe I should go out.

Clinical Detachment

Hourglass face/Harry Caray glasses zombie. Word count: 22454

As long as I get to 25,000 tomorrow, I’ll be on track. Haven’t been this close to the minimum-count line during a Nano….ever? Life is too distracting anymore to do these things. Of course, I create most of the distractions myself, but this is beside the point.

So we finally get to the good stuff: Zach Graves is turning into a zombie. Stage III of Westphail described in detail. Take heed: graphic grossness and lots of swearing follow.

The mucous ran like a river out of my nose, down my face, and onto the floor. And I could see, by the light coming through the window, that the snot was tinged with red. Tinged with red. Blood. All the fluid in my body was trying to evacuate. Flee the sinking ship. Get the fuck out. Dimly, my mind realized what was going on. I’d seen and heard and read enough about the stages of Westphail to know that I had somehow jumped to Stage III. The virus was carving out space in my body to make room for whatever nefarious purposes it had in mind. I’d done so much reading and research that I’d become something of an expert on the subject and so I experienced a sort of clinical detachment of my own, a kind of out of body experience, hovering over my pathetic body: feet together, pointed back towards the bed; knees together; sitting back on my feet; body somehow upright, my hands outstretched towards the sky, towards my out-of-body floating mind’s eye, appealing towards something I didn’t even believe in, knowing there was no heaven, no help, no hope.

Even with all the reports I’d read — the Wikipedia articles; the autopsies; the newspapers — there were still surprises in store for me. Not one to make things boring, Westphail was a real champ at keeping everything interesting even as it was busy running its course. The runny/bloody nose was well documented, as was the bowel evacuation (details of which I am repressing for my readers’ benefit; you’re welcome) and the vomiting (like a fountain, I watched as my last two meals were violently ejected from my stomach) but nobody had ever mentioned the high-pitched ringing in the ears which was nearly drowning out the noises that all these other activities were making.

I felt strangely calm, thankful for the rational thoughts going through my heads, without which, I’d surely have been panicking up a storm, freaking out, knowing exactly what fate was about to befall me, screaming — if I’d been able to, what with all the vomiting — my head off. As it was, I felt surprise. Nobody mentioned a high pitched ringing! I’ll have to edit the Wikipedia page. Would this count as first hand research though? Would that make it an ineligible edit? Not to get too deep into my thoughts, but I was so far gone and so deep in my head that I was, in another layer higher, examining the layer of my brain which was observing the war taking place in my body. Look at me, being so calm. I’d make a great scientist. I missed my calling. Is there anybody else in the world who could be so rational and detached as they were going through this shit as I am? Above all that, I will admit, there was another train of thought going: FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK HOW THE FUCK ARE YOU NOT FREAKING THE FUCK OUT? BE MORE CONCERNED.

Conversation between the layers was limited, but there was some discourse, namely the other, calmer layers, telling the layer that was, to use its own words, “freaking the fuck out” to calm the fuck down. The scientific, rational layer was pissed that the freaking-out layer was making so much noise as to make its observations difficult to carry out. The self-conscious layer which was observing my rational observations adopted a somewhat more rational tone tapping into a heretofore unknown hippie-ish, peace-loving, flower-picking side of me. Come on guys, it said, can’t we all just get along?

Explaining this all now; finally writing it all down in one clear narrative, I have discovered that I am unsure as to how much time elapsed between my coming to realize that Stage III was in full effect and when I went down into Stage IV. As I recall these events, and remember all the various tracks of thoughts that went through my head, all the inner dialogue that went on, it seems like it went on for hours, and yet the strongest memories I have tell me that it all happened in an instant. Had a movie been made of my life to that point, the long boring years leading up to this moment would have filled reel after reel of film while the sudden violent transformation from normal, unproductive human being to freak of nature would have taken place in a series of tableaus, flashes of me at various stages; short, frantic images, hinting at the various disgusting moments which I was at that point experiencing, accompanied by some appropriate music like a moderately heavy Nine Inch Nails song or maybe that cover of “Mad World” that was so popular around ‘05.

Losing it at a Bar

Matter-of-fact zombie. Word count: 20649

Why is it that so many of my characters end up losing their shit, taking their turn for the worse, in a bar?

“You don’t look so good, friend,” Watson said suddenly. I looked up from the paper which I’d only been pretending to read and realized he’d been staring at me for some time. The jubilation I’d felt at being given a zombie-free bill of health had given me adrenaline enough to make it to the bar and get that first beer, but it was wearing off, and when Watson commented on my appearance, I suddenly felt the full weight of the cold again.

“Yeah,” I said, using humor to as a shield as I usually did, “I know. I never do.”

“That’s not what I mean.” He took a step back, nervously. “You look really… not good.”

I forced a chuckle. “Oh, that. Don’t worry. Just came from the clinic. I’m clear.” I produced a printout of the test results that had been provided me on my way out of the church. “See?”

Watson looked at the sheet skeptically but refused to come any closer. I slid it across the bar to him so he could get a better look. He examined the document, saw the official seal of the Department of Health in the lower right hand corner — there had been stories of fake lab results going around — then looked at the date, my name, the photo, the whole thing. He decided it was official enough and slid the paper back over to me. “Still, you might want to lay off the booze, yeah? Get some rest? Drink some OJ?”

“Eh, I dunno. Lotta time…” I was having trouble forming sentences; finding the right words. “…booze all that helps. You know?”

Watson rolled his eyes again. He certainly knew an alcoholic when he saw one. “Maybe you should get out of here.”

“Nahh,” I slurred. “I’m good. Real good, you know? Make me….” I trailed off, I guess. Silence.

“What?” Watson asked.

I guess I blacked out, because I came to face down in the newspaper. Maybe he had a point. Maybe it was time to find my bed, get some good rest. Something in me, though, wanted more.

“Hot toddy,” I managed.

“No, pal, you’re done. Don’t make me call the cops, alright?”

“It’s just a cold. A iddy biddy cold. Nothing worry about. Right?” But I knew I was losing it, and I wasn’t usually one to push this sort of thing. If I felt like crap, I felt like crap, and I’d rather take my lumps at home. Uncomfortable as it was there, I’d at least made myself a nest of sorts, and I knew I’d feel better being there. Still, there was something, inexplicably, making me want to stay.

“I’m just going to say this one more time, pal,” Watson said. But then he stopped. I think he saw something in my eyes. He decided to take a different tack. “Hey, it’s not that I don’t appreciate your business and your company, Zach” — he had seen my name on my lab result report, I guess. I remember being impressed that he knew my name — “it’s just that I’m worried about you. You might be clear of Westphail, but you look, no offense, like shit. And I don’t think another drink is going to help you.”

I’m not sure how I remember what Watson said to me that day, since at some point, everything became blurry, words and noises blending into a constant buzz in my head. It’s entirely possible that my brain is just filling in the blanks, patching up the holes in my memory just so I can paint a more complete picture. I could just say that I passed out completely and woke up, confused and bewildered with no idea how I got there, and that’s more or less true, but there are bits and pieces of memories, flashes of images that tell parts of the story. I know I protested mightily, and I know that Watson had seen something that made him scared of me, or very concerned for me at least. That I had somehow turned into something that put me in a position of power where he was no longer insisting that I leave because I was bothering him, but that he was suggesting I go because he was worried; either about my health or a threat to his own. I know I passed out a few times, sometimes for just a second or two, sometimes for a full minute, maybe more. That I spilled what was left of my beer, that I demanded a hot toddy, another beer, a bloody mary, a Balvenie on the rocks. That I knocked over bar stools. That Watson threatened to call the police and was deterred by my protests, but eventually his fear/concern outweighed anything I could have said to him and that the cops were called. I’m pretty sure that being overworked as they were, and rather loosely maintained what with all that was going on anyhow — much of the police force had been dissolved as the world started to circle the drain; there was a greater focus on military policing, and “public safety” officers such as the guard at the church/medical center — that they never showed up. Finally, I must have passed out completely, and Watson himself laid me over his shoulder — he was not a big or burly man, his appearance apparently hid strength I didn’t know he had — closed up shop, and taken me to my room. To his credit, he could have just dumped me in the gutter, or thrown me in the alley and been done with me, but he didn’t. He saw me safely home, and I woke up the next day in my bed.

Oh my God, I’m so damn tired.

GQ Zombie. Word count: 19,200

Ran 8K this morning. Then went and ate salads, watched NU. Tried to write. 1200 words, but still short 800. Will I ever catch up?

Real short bit today.

The doctor came, swabbed, and went. I waited. Like I said, those five minutes were an eternity, waiting to see what fate had in store for me. The guard knew his job, standing at the ready, probably expecting me to flip out if the test came back positive, probably hoping that I would, now, just so he’d have an excuse to get me in a headlock, cuff me up, shove me around, toss me right into the DEI station, push the button himself, just ‘cause he didn’t have the guts to hit on a hot chick, even if she was a nun. I sat there, quickly getting more and more pissed off at this asshole of a guard, all due to (I now freely admit) stuff that was being made up in my head. I had just stood up with the intention of giving him a piece of my mind when the doctor returned. The doc paused for a second, taking in the image of the security guard with his hand a little tighter on his gun, taking a step back from me, me, standing there, facing the guard, my right hand raised, my index finger extended, pointing accusingly at the guard. We turned to face the doctor who shrugged as if saying he’d seen far stranger than this.

“Test’s negative,” he said. “Get out of here.”

He turned and left. The guard, though I couldn’t see his face through the tinted visor on his mask, was obviously disappointed he wouldn’t get a chance to run me through the wringer.

I shrugged. “Sorry, bub,” I said. “Can’t win ‘em all.”

A Press Conference with the ASA

Darkness and scary! Word count: 17,294

I’d forgotten how much I enjoy/am better at writing dialogue. Conversations just flow. 1200 words in the blink of an eye. Still a bit behind schedule, but only need to do this ridiciulousness once more (i.e. write 1200 more words) today to be back on track.

The following happens in the wake of a series of unfortunate events which cause the CDC HQ in Atlanta, GA to unleash a particularly virulent strain of Westphail which causes the true start of the zombie outbreak….. One bit I kinda like is the thought that even when the “enemy” is a virus, or a zombie, people who question the government will still be seen as “giving comfort” to the enemy….

 

Seismologists who still ply their trade agree that the earthquake that occurred 25 minutes after the shelling from Somerset’s unit stopped would have happened regardless of whether or not the young colonel had made the decision to call in the explosive artillery. The Bremert Fault which runs parallel to Cattahoochee River was due for a quake, there was no denying it. When it would have occurred is a matter of some debate with the more conservative of the earthquake nerds pinning it at anywhere from 10 to 25 years in the future, while the more renegade of the bunch saying it would have happened five minutes earlier had the bombing not happened to delay it.
“I’m not saying that Somerset is a hero per se,” Dr. Ralph Pitimin, spokesman for the American Seismologic Association, said in a news conference three days later, “but, I would say that he is a man of distinguished courage or ability, who should be admired for his brave deeds and noble qualities. If his admittedly ill-advised decision to drop 30 tons of explosive ordnance on a civilian area that was only experiencing a zombie incursion that by any standards could only be described as miniscule had come any later, this earthquake, which would have measured 8.8 on the Richter Scale and occurred 10 minutes earlier, would have been completely devastating.”
When one reporter, who had clearly done his homework, asked Dr. Pitimin how the earthquake which caused the wide dispersal of a virus which had previously been rather well contained could be called anything other than ‘completely devastating’ Pitimin responded:
“You, son,” Pitimin started — the reporter sneered; he was at least 20 years Pitimin’s senior, “are falling into the trap of a logical fallacy known as argumentum ad historium. You can not say with any certainty what would have happened had certain events taken place differently or not at all. Therefore, by assuming that the earthquake would have happened even if Somerset had not shelled the outlying land, you are following fallacious reasoning. All that can be likely said is that again, while I am not calling Somerset a hero, I would have to say that he is a being of godlike prowess who might come to be honored as a divinity.”
The reporter, wily veteran though he was, had never encountered such amazing double speak and question avoidance. Nevertheless, he dove back in.
“That’s not at all what I’m saying. In fact, it seems that you are appealing to argumentum ad historium by saying that if Somerset hadn’t shelled the land that the earthquake would have caused a complete disaster. What I am trying to say here is that the earthquake was in fact, a complete disaster.”
“Look, Mister –” Pitimin started, acting as if he were searching his extensive memory for the reporter’s name. The truth was that he had never bothered to learn any of the reporters’ names even though he had spent the last ten years as the Association’s spokesman and had given any number of press conferences, had allowed numerous reporters to buy him drinks and had slept with at least two of them and even more of their daughters.
“It’s Caesura,” the reporter started, for it was none other than Hitch Caesura, star reporter for the Atlanta Star-Tribune, the very man who had broken the story in the first place with his dogged investigation of Somerset’s incompetence. His research into Somerset’s background had lead to a three day front page report on the mishandling of the viral outbreak by the National Guard, the CDC, and the Atlanta Streets and Sanitation Division. “Hitch –”
Pitimin continued, not bothering to wait for Caesura to finish. “We could argue all day back and forth about who did what, but I don’t see how that could possibly change the fact that while I’m not calling Somerset a hero, I would go so far as to suggest that in the Homeric period, Somerset would be considered a warrior-chieftan of special strength, courage, or ability. And that your reports, while well-written and wonderfully edited by the fine folks at the Star-Tribune, might be actually, in some way, giving comfort and aid to our enemy.”
“Comfort and aid to the enemy?” Caesura asked incredulously. “The enemy is a viral! The virus can’t read!”
Pitimin smiled wryly. “I didn’t know you were an expert on the literacy of the Westphail virus, Mister….”
“It’s Caesura.”
“Yes, well, Mr. Reporter, I realize that you have done extensive research on this so-called viral outbreak” — Pitimin used air-quotes to diminish the legitimacy of the words — “but are you ready to stand here and insist to the world” — a sweeping gesture to the cameras and microphones that filled the room, the bearers of which were now engaged in an intense game of ping-pong in an attempt to capture not only Pitimin’s responses, but Caesura’s as well. Other reporters who, moments before had been eagerly awaiting their turn to ask their own questions now scribbled frantically to record Caesura’s queries. They knew that the conversation they were witness to was better than anything they could come up with. They knew when they were outmatched — “that the Westphail virus can’t, in fact, read?”
“Yes,” Caesura responded. “Yes, I am.”
Pitimin laughed sardonically, “Well then the rest of us can all relax tonight, can we not?” He threw his hands out to his sides, appealing  to the reporters, to his aides, all of whom were taking steps to separate themselves from the obviously deranged man. Nobody wanted his name to appear in a caption under a photo of Pitimin lest their reputation be completely destroyed by association.
“I wouldn’t suggest that any of us can relax anymore, not now that a rare and particularly destructive strain of Westphail has been unleashed upon the southeast United States due to the incompetence and nepotism of the Georgia National Guard and the subsequent earthquake which we came here to ask you about.”
Pitimin was unfazed, the singular quality that made him perfect for the job of spokesman. His superiors had always been worried that his tendency to go off-script, and to speak in circles like a politician had made him something of a loose cannon. However, his complete and utter lack of shame when spouting gibberish and the fact that no reporter had ever, or seemingly could ever cause him to trip up gave them comfort.
“So, Mister….”
This third time, Caesura simply let Pitimin pretend to search for the name, refusing to give the man the opportunity to cut him off again. There was a tense staring match for a matter of minutes before Pitimin continued. “Mister… Mister. You have questions about the earthquake? Go ahead and ask them.”
“I’ve already heard enough,” Caesura said, putting his notebook into his satchel which lay at his side.
“Surely you’d like to stay and hear what the rest of these fine reporters — your friends and colleagues — have to say, wouldn’t you?”
Caesura looked around the room. His journalistic brethren all shook their heads and shrugged. “I think they’re done as well.”
“Well then, if that will be all, I’ll just sum up here and say that Colonel Somerset, while certainly not a hero, could definitely be called a large sandwich, usually consisting of a loaf of bread of longroll cut in half lengthwise and containing a variety of ingredients such as meat, cheese, lettuce, and tomatoes. Good day to you all, gentlemen.”The subsequent publication and broadcast of this interview, though tangential to the matter at hand, were viewed and read possibly more than any other press conference in the history of press conferences. Government sympathizers used the material as evidence that the media had gone bonkers, publishing anything they could no matter how irrelevant the content. Those who still had half a functioning brain left in their heads pointed to the reports as damning proof that the United States government had completely jumped the shark.

Going to the Doctor

Our hero (to whom the narrative has now returned) goes to the doctor to check out his cold:

 

The cold hit me in the morning. I woke up with the tell-tale tickle in my throat. In years past, I would have drowned myself and the cold in vitamin C, but diseases of 2018 just laughed at vitamin C. They loved that shit. They asked for seconds. Cold medicine wasn’t much better. It used to just mask symptoms so you could get through the day. With these viruses, cold medicine actually made things worse. I saw a guy with H8N3~pt87 (a newer and rarer but less deadly strain of Westphail) on DayQuil who sneezed his own goddamn nose off. I’m not kidding. He covered his mouth and nose with a handkerchief, sneezed, and when he lowered his hand, his goddamned nose was gone from his face, sitting in the goddamned handkerchief in his hand. He freaked out. I freaked out. His mom freaked out. The whole situation was horrible and really put a damper on the mood of that evening. So, I stayed away from the C and the Quil, and headed out the door and right to the damned doctor. The closest doctors to me worked out of a Catholic Church which had been converted to a medical center the summer before. The building swarmed with nuns who’d been pressed into duty as medical assistants and security personnel who eyed everyone that entered the church as a potential threat. The line was long, but there was plenty of reading material on hand to make the wait go by faster. I put on the supplied surgical mask, its inability to block the virus had already been proven in clinical trials, but in terms of having something for show, there was no equal. I settled in to wait while reading a six year old copy of Time Magazine. When they finally called my name, I had read it cover to cover. Twice. “Right this way, Mr. Graves,” said a pleasant young woman. The yellow and black HAZMAT suit she wore did its best to mask her curvy figure but failed; the hooded headpiece was similarly ineffective at hiding her beautiful features. I tried to make out if she wore a habit underneath the suit but couldn’t. “Thank you, Miss –”  I made a show of reading the nameplate printed above her left breast; further excuse to stare. “Alcott. How are you today?” I saw her frown through the plexiglass covering her face. “It’s been a rough day,” she admitted. “We’ve had seven positive cases. Three went right to DEI.” She paused and collected herself. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be telling you that.” “No, it’s alright,” I said, though the news did little to calm my nerves. “I asked.” She sighed and shrugged, a gesture muted by the suit. “Still, I shouldn’t–” “Honestly,” I said, “it’s the new reality. The sooner we accept it, the better.” “I guess you’re right, but it’s easier to accept when you’re not about to face testing.” She shuddered and caught herself again. “Listen to me, going on and on like this.” She lead me into a makeshift examination room near what used to be the church altar and showed me to a gray folding chair next to a tray of medical instruments. A guard stood ominously behind the chair, a rifle slung across his back, his right hand resting on a pistol loosely carried in a holster on his hip. The visor on his helmet was tinted darkly; I couldn’t discern whether there was a man in there or some sort of brand new security robot. He stood so still, it was impossible to tell.  A pair of handcuffs seemed out of place amongst the swabs, scissors and other devices on the tray, but their import was not lost on me. If the test came back positive, I’d be wearing those in short order.

“The doctor will be with you shortly,” said the woman.

“Oh, I hoped you’d be doing the swabbing,” I said, imbuing my words with as much double meaning as I possibly could. Remarkably, even though I’d spent most of my days over the past several years just holed up in a fleabitten, run-down motel which catered to the lost and transient, I still hadn’t lost my natural rapport with members of the fairer sex. Or at least, I thought I hadn’t. Her face darkened visibly.

“Are you attempting to flirt with me, Mr. Graves?” she asked.

I hadn’t realized I’d been so transparent. “Can you blame a guy for trying?”

Her hand disappeared into a pocket of the suit, coming back out with a string of rosary beads which she fingered nervously. “With a nun in a church that has been turned into a last bastion in the defense against the growing horde of the walking dead which threatens to destroy everything that God and man have created? While on the verge, yourself, of learning whether you are to join that horde? Yes, I can blame a guy for trying.”

The guard behind the chair coughed, obviously trying to stifle a laugh. It must have been the funniest thing he’d heard all day if it caused him to break his stoic silence. At least now I knew there was something living and breathing inside that uniform.

Tim Stimph

Today's picture taken the next day. It counts. I'm a zombie, dammit. Word count: 15003.

Having trouble generating zombie photo. Or many words, really. But, am back on track. Thanks to Kip for this guy’s name.

 

I contracted H5N3P53 on April 19th, 2018. I know the day and I know the asshole that gave it to me. I was making a rare trip outside my room to the grocery store and some dickwad sneezed on me. That’s right. Me, the one who had lived in his loner castle, a hermit in a cabin in the middle of the city, eschewing human contact, keeping everyone at arm’s length, refusing to participate in society, in life, in anything, brought down by a single sneeze, from some douchebag named Tim Stimph. How do I know his name? Because six months later, I ate that asshole’s brain and stole his wallet.
I’m not even kidding. But, I’ll get to that later.
I was at the grocery store, buying a six pack of beer to get me through the night. It was going to be a hard night, I knew, because I had finished reading the only book I owned and there were nothing but reruns of Justin Bieber’s sitcom on the only channel my television could pick up. Beer was the only thing that was going to carry me through. As I wandered through the grocery store towards the beer and wine section, I noticed a thin, pale, waste of a human being about my age wearing a White Sox hat, looking through the adult diaper section.  I couldn’t believe someone as young as I could be so incontinent as to need to wear Depends, but from the way he was looking at the packages and reading the sizing information, I was quite certain that he was buying them for himself and not for anyone else. Also, there were the poop stains on his pants. I snickered as I walked past, thinking, amongst other things, “What an asshole.” Also, I was thinking, “This guy is a total waste of space. I wonder if he experiences oral incontinence as well. You know, diarrhea of the mouth and whatnot. I bet he does. I bet he never shuts up even when he knows everyone around him wants him to just shut the fuck up. But he never will.” I don’t know why I had such an immediate and negative reaction to this prick, but there it was, and I never second guess my first impressions because, more often than not, I’m 100% correct.
And, it turns out, my gut feeling was right once again.
Look, I don’t think I can impress upon you nearly enough what a total reject, retard, dickface, snotnose, asswipe, fucknut, halfwit cockmunch this guy is. Was. Remember: I ate his motherfucking brain. And you know what? I think it made me stupider. In fact, I’m certain of it. Prior to that, I knew how to do differential calculus. Afterwards? Not a bit. Before I ate that jerkwad’s brain, I could, with  my eyes closed,  field strip an M16 while I was being attacked by rabid dogs, my hair was on fire and my nuts were being squeezed by a 300 pound gorilla. Afterwards? Not even close. I know. I tried.

Atlanta

Blurry scary zombie! Rawr! Word count: ~12,000

Was really just grasping at straws today as this super subpar excerpt will verify. Big ups to the people of Paxton for their contribution.

The catastrophic moment — the event that turned this whole thing from a “Oh, wow, this is another crazy pandemic but one which will eventually fade away and become just a chapter in human history books” kind of thing to a “Holy fuck, we’re all going to die!” kind of thing — took place at the CDC Headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. I remember hearing about it and thinking, “Wow! Just like in The Walking Dead!” But, I was disappointed to learn, the CDC HQ is nowhere near as cool looking as AMC made it out to be — the building they used was just some performing arts center. The actual CDC campus consists of 13 buildings, many of which look like regular, run-of-the-mill office buildings. The most interesting shit happens, as with everywhere else government-related, deep underground: precisely 2 miles underground.
Besides making for a more secure environment, well-suited to ward off chemical, biological and nuclear threats, terrorists, direct military sieges, and nosy media types, having your labs that deep in the Earth allows you to save serious money on your energy bills. Warmed by the heat from the Earth’s core, and using geothermal generators for electricity, the CDC was really one of the more environmentally friendly government agencies, God bless them. With a state of the art ventilation system, a dozen clean rooms, safeguards out the ass, fail safe devices for their fail safe devices, the CDC was one of the most secure buildings the United States had ever built, even boasting one of six safehouses scattered across the country for use in event of total devastation to house the President, his family, his staff, and other top-ranking government officials. Had the choice been made to actually move the President into this particular protective housing, untold numbers of staff would have been displaced, probably leading to the deaths of most of them. Fortunately for everyone at CDC HQ (and, if you’ll forgive some political editorializing on my part) the rest of the nation, President Romney was mistaken for a zombie and killed by a member of the Paxton, Illinois Volunteer Zombie Protection Squad during an ill-advised surprise visit to the town. The sniper who pulled the trigger was never identified but was memorialized in a statue, lovingly and pain-stakingly handcrafted by town artisans who did so at their own peril. Who carves a marble statue in the midst of a zombie insurrection? That’s some serious dedication right there.