Dave lightly laughed in an effort to counter the miserable mood. "I've been such a selfish cunt all my life that I'm perplexed by what's happened. I just can't make a decision that I can place my full conviction into."
"Hey. At least a cunt's useful for something, and you don't seem like a bad person. Whatever happens just do what you can. No need to expect the impossible."
"Thanks. And I guess that this is goodbye."
Josh reached out his hand and shook it with Dave's. "See you mate. Stay alert."
"You too. Let's meet up again and have a beer."
"By then this will be all over and we'll have some amazing stories to tell."
They broke their hand shake and quietly took turns climbing down Josh's ladder. They both took one final look at each other and started to jog their seperate ways.
* * *
Dave slowed down and stopped jogging. He stood with his hands on his hips while regathering his breath.
He had gotten to the edge of the central business district but he was still not free of high rise buildings. It was mid-afternoon and the streets were eerie in their silence. Abandon cars filled the road - many with doors and windows open. But not a single person was to be seen - not even a discarded corpse. No weapon of mass destruction, no outbreak of the plague, no uncontrollable form of mass panic could have been this thorough at making the people of a once crowded city disappear so completely without trace.
Not all life was gone. Those feathered rats of the city - pigeons - roamed here and there, frustrated in their inability to find food. Dave was unaware that the pigeons were starving because no one had eaten lunch. No lunch meant no food scraps. And no scraps meant that the pigeons were left starving, and they were really upset. Had Dave been aware of the state of the pigeons he would have been greatly unsettled.
As expected, Dave had plenty to be unsettled about.
He had seen enough of the process to understand how it went. You take one of the dead who appeared mostly grey skinned with yellow patches. That dead person would bite into a living person. The biting continues until the once living person is dead. The original dead wanders off, looking for a new victim. After some time (Dave made a mental note that it might be helpful to time the transition.) the newly dead person's skin would turn almost completely grey with yellow, hand sized patches. Any damage to their body was healed even to the point of reattaching limbs that had been cut off. Then the once living person was now "dead" (with quote marks), and would stand up in a manner that was incomprehensible. As a new dead they would then walk off and repeat the process.
That was a disturbing sequence. Dave had this terrifying thought that nearly everyone in the city had become this weird dead that had the weird colouring scheme of being grey skinned with some sort of yellow patches. They also had red eyes and had an unavoidable craving for human flesh. Dave gave a rapid series of glances all about the streets. They were empty now, but what if they filled up with these strange dead people who desired to eat flesh? What could he do on foot with no weapons or other means of defending himself?
These were terrible thoughts and Dave struggled to come up with a plan. When he was jogging earlier he only focused on putting one foot in front of the other. His plan was escape and otherwise his mind was white and unthinking. It was possibly a reaction of his mind that was struggling with maintaining his sanity. But Dave was open to the idea that he had long left the realm of sanity. Sometimes insanity was more comfortable than reality.
A vague plan came to Dave. Night time was coming and he didn't like the idea of being caught on the dark streets. Dave looked at a nearby convenience store and decided that he needed supplies and shelter. There was little in the way of shelter, but the store hinted at a decent stock of consumable supplies.
Dave stared suspiciously at the store's automatic doors. The dead didn't seem all that intelligent but even they could walk through an automatic door. But man cannot live on nothing, so Dave cautiously approached the store door which hissed open at his approach. Dave froze and listened. It was quiet. The store door was open and waited patiently for Dave to go through.
Screwing up his courage, Dave walked into the store. His heart picked up in pace for a moment as the door closed behind him. Had those doors really been that loud? or was it that Dave was really that jumpy?
Slowly and quietly, Dave walked past the aisles, checking for anything that might be considered a threat. It was a simple store with only a few aisles and Dave saw nothing. Even with the sensation of being trapped in a closed space, Dave quickly relaxed a surprising amount through not seeing anything dangerous. Dave's emotions were an out of control roller-coaster.
Needing something to carry the supplies Dave returned to the counter to grab a few carry bags. He didn't delay any further. He grabbed a bunch of soup cans - being certain to grab those that had self-opening keys on them. A few tins of meat and a good supply of water. Finally, Dave grabbed a few large note books and some pens. He didn't grab too much as Dave considered that going light in order to be able to run from danger might be really important.
Before leaving Dave wanted to grab a cold drink from the freezers at the back. Near the freezers was door for "employees only" that Dave hadn't noticed on his scan of the aisles. The door was at first slightly open, but as Dave approached it was slammed opened. Dave panicked but could do nothing more as a scream arose from the room beyond.
Dave uselessly raised an arm in defence, as a screaming middle aged man ran by and dashed out the store. Seeing a lack signs that one would see on the functional dead, Dave broke from his frozen state and ran out to the street in order to follow the screaming man. The man was clearly sprinting as fast as he could back in the direction that Dave had come from. Dave almost immediately gave up on any idea of following the running man.
As the sprinting man ran off while screaming loudly, Dave almost called out to him before having a sudden urge to be silent. There was no reason for it, but Dave was certain that the city around him was listening for any noises. Dave could almost imagine thousands of invisible eyes turning to follow the sound of the running man.
The running man was still screaming as he turned into a side street. Suddenly the screaming stopped. After a short pause, and equally suddenly, the screaming restarted only louder and in a manner that Dave doubted a human could make or should. The screams became gargles. And then silence.
With a creeping sensation of terror, Dave glanced about, quickly making certain that he was still undiscovered.
Fighting a rising sense of uncontrollable panic, Dave lugged the bagged supplies over his shoulder. The cold drink forgotten, he continued to jog along the street. This time, as he weaved among the abandoned cars, Dave did all that he could to hide the sounds of his running. Dave could see that the streets were empty, and yet he had heard someone die a horrible death which left him with a deep unease. Whatever was committing murder Dave hoped that it would remain unseen.
Time was short. The daylight was running out. Dave needed to find a safe place for the night. But after all that he had seen, Dave wasn't so sure that there were any safe places any more.
* * *
Dave hadn't jogged far when he noticed a change to the buildings around him. He was on a main road and the streets were lined with various shops and eateries. They weren't the tall buildings of the central business area but the two story kind with a facade. As Dave went past side streets he could see hints of residential areas. Most were tightly packed terraced houses with a few family houses scattered about.
As Dave was in the middle of passing one of those side streets he heard the noise of what he thought were voices. They weren't very loud and had Dave been more distracted then he might have very well missed hearing them. Dave paused. Alert. Focusing his hearing as best as he could. Was is a threat, or was it actually other people in a similar circumstance to his own?
Dave couldn't help but walk towards the faint noise. Curiosity getting the better of him.
The noise came from a single family house that had a large brick fence. The front gate seemed locked so Dave wasn't too sure how to get in at first, causing him to walk about looking for an easy way in. The neighbouring house had a small fence at the front that Dave could easily step over. The bottom half of the adjoining fence was concrete with the upper half being reinforced wood slats.
It was a bit fiddly getting himself and his bags of supplies over the fence, but Dave was able to step up onto the lower concrete part. Looking over the fence, Dave noticed that the lawn on the other side was actually higher than the sidewalk and was held in place by the lower concrete part of the fence. It wasn't a far drop, so it was easy enough for Dave to foist his supplies over the fence and onto the lawn of the house from which the noise was coming from. Without the burden of the bags, Dave quickly pulled himself over the fence and onto the lawn.
Leaving his bags where they were, Dave walked over to the fence that faced the street. Dave leaned on the fence and looked up and down the street. He could see nothing. Or more precisely he didn't see a single roaming human-like figure. That made no sense to him. Dave glanced at the house behind him. There were clearly voices coming from within. How could that not attract some hungering attention.
Dave looked at his bags for a moment and wondered what to do with them. There was no guessing what would happen so it was best to take them with him. So Dave went and picked up his bags before walking to the front door and knocking. No one answered. Then Dave noticed a bell button and almost pushed it. His finger hovered over the bell button for a moment while he nervously looked back at the empty street. He decided to not risk it and carefully knocked again. This time he heard someone moving around from within the house.
There were thin glass windows in the frame of the door and through these Dave could see a man approaching the door. The door opened to reveal a tired man. He was probably a middle aged man but had a strange look in his eyes that made the man look older. Dave didn't like the look in the man's eyes as it was what the eyes of a man in which something has broken would look like. Dave pondered leaving but his pesky curiosity stayed any thought of fleeing.
"Hi," said Dave, suddenly not sure what his was doing. "I was just passing by and I heard noise coming from your place."
The man stared blankly at Dave before turning and walking away. "Come in."
Dave stared after the man and stepped inside the house. It was clean and well kept. Dave turned to look at the door, clearly thinking if he should reserve an option to escape and leave the door open. Dave shrugged before pulling the door closed behind him. Dave placed his bags near the door as place where he could quickly snatch them up if he found himself having to flee the house. He followed the man into the lounge room.
The man had sat on the biggest couch in the room and began staring blankly at the TV. There were other people in the room who were also staring at the TV. Dave guessed that the people were the man's wife and two daughters. They all shared the same blank look as the man who had answered the door.
The TV had transfixed Dave. It was one of the News stations and they were showing footage that resembled what Dave had seen from before. What Dave had experienced was obviously happening all over the city - spreading like a rapid infection. A clearly distressed TV hostess was stammering through the descriptions of the footage. There wasn't much new information. In fact the hostess was more confused than informative.
"As you can see there are people on the streets and they are attacking people. It's not really clear why they are doing this. Efforts have been made to talk to these people, but ... no one has survived the efforts to start a dialog. We've been trying to contact the police or anyone for a comment but no one has responded. The phones seem to be working but we've not found many people picking up. Um. The only advice that we can give is that you stay off the streets. Stay in your homes. Wait until the authorities give out further instructions. Try to avoid all unnecessary contact with strangers. Only go outside for essential activities."
Dave snorted. Didn't the TV host understand what she had said? There are no authorities. How can you expect anything from something that didn't exist. It was unhelpful, if not dangerous, wishful thinking.
Suddenly Dave straightened up and began to pat his pant pockets. "Fuck," he exclaimed as he determined that his mobile was gone. It was probably still back on his desk at his office. His phone has run out of charge on his way to work and had failed half way through the journey, and so he had plugged his phone up to the power board on his desk in order to recharge it. Ironically his phone was most likely fully charged up and ready, while at the same time being completely unusable as Dave had no intention of returning to his office.
The man who had opened the front door was looking at Dave.
Dave pointed to the TV. "Crazy stuff don't you think?"
The man starred at Dave a moment before speaking in a slow and detached manner. "It's the only show on TV. The other stations appear to be offline."
"It's not a show. It's a News broadcast."
"Of course it's some show. That can't be happening."
Dave slowly began to realise that there was a terrible reason behind the man's blank stare. He began to fear just how deeply this had torn the man's mind apart.
"I've just come from the street. It's quiet right now, but it was exactly like that earlier," said Dave pointing to TV that showed a group of a few dozen staggering dead.
The man paused as if slowly digesting a heavy meal that disagreed with his stomach. "I think that you should leave."
"What?"
"You heard me. You should go away."
Dave looked at the man and the man's family. Dave felt a strange conflict. On the one hand Dave felt a need to help these people, while on the other hand Dave was terrified that in the process of helping these people that it would lead to his own death. They were obviously not a dangerous group of people, but they seemed like a group of people who had stopped caring. Some sort of switch had failed in their minds. Carelessness can be just as deadly as deliberate malice.
"Okay," said Dave. "I'll leave. But turn the TV down a bit. You can clearly hear it out on the streets. You don't know what might come."
As if calling Dave a liar, the man picked up a TV remote and doubled the TV volume.
Dave reached towards the TV remote. "That's too loud."
"Leave," insisted the man. The petulant tone of denial was clear in his voice.
Dave lowered his arm and looked at the man on the couch. Dave couldn't understand what he was trying to do here. He was trying to tell himself that something needed to be done, but what? What would a hero do here? Dave felt at he should do something but he couldn't think of a solution where he could do something without the consent of the man on the couch.
It was unsatisfying but Dave couldn't think of anything else to do. "Okay. Okay. I'll leave."
The man on the couch turned back to watching the TV. Dave had been completely forgotten.
Dave walked back to his bags, picked them up and looked through the glass in the door frame. He could see a single dead man standing on the street and looking at the house where Dave was. The TV had been loud for some time and had attracted this one dead man. With the volume even louder then many more of the dead would come.
Going out the front door wasn't an option. Dave almost returned to the lounge room in order to ask if he could use the back door. Dave understood the futility of that. From the front door there was a hallway that lead directly to the back of the house where there was another door. Dave walked down the hallway, opened the back door, looked about, stepped out, and closed the door behind him.
Dave walked over to the back fence. It wasn't as intimidating as the front fence and had a simple wooden gate with a latch. Dave put his bags down and climbed up onto the fence. On the other side there was a dirty single lane road. Dave squinted as he looked back and forth along the road. He hated the idea of being trapped on this street but there was no where el
se to go.
Dave dropped back off the fence and picked up his bags of supplies. He flipped up the gate latch, opened the gate, stepped through and pulled the gate closed behind him. After hearing the click of the latch, Dave rattled the gate a bit to be sure that gate had closed. If the family within were to meet a bad end, then it wasn't because of some thoughtlessness on Dave's part.
The back street was currently clear, but Dave didn't know for how long. He started to jog away from the sounds of the loud TV, his bags of supplies flapping on his shoulders. But even as he ran he was eaten by doubts. Could he have done that better? Was there something that could have brought that family back to reality? Did he give up too early? The doubts grew into guilt and clouded Dave's mood.
* * *
There was still plenty of light in the day but Dave wanted to find a place to stay for the night. He had walked out of the busiest part of the city centre and had just reached a slightly more residential area. It was the twilight zone of the city - it wasn't high rises, nor was it suburbs. There were plenty of three story apartments along the main road. Once you got into the small, side streets you'd find tightly packed single family housing. Dave was looking for an apartment with an open balcony door - as he didn't like the idea of going deep into any building, where there was the chance of discovering something human shaped that wasn't a living human. A balcony gave him the means to run away if he were to see anything within.
Dave had found a few potential places, but though he could see an open door he couldn't determine a way to climb up to the balcony to reach that door. A part of Dave was worried that he might have no choice but to risk going fully within the a building and climbing the claustrophobic stairs. Then he spotted a building that had an abandoned ladder in its lawn. From the various scattered tools it looked like someone was recently attempting to do some painting to the apartment's outside walls.
Dave put down his bags and picked up the ladder and placed it along side the nearest balcony. He climbed the ladder and jumped onto the first floor balcony. The door was all glass and the walls either side of the door were windows that reached from floor to ceiling. For privacy there were curtains and these were pulled tight. Dave still found a gap in the curtains that he could squint through. After checking that the room was empty of any threats, Dave tried to open the balcony door only to find that the door was firmly locked.
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