by Greene, Dane
As I run, the horde chases me. There’s no doubt in my mind that I’m pulling enough away to allow my group to escape. They’re focused on me, and they are angry.
Excitement ripples through my body. My plan is working. My friends and loved ones will make it out of here alive. When I’ve run far enough to lead the Palemen away from the building, I turn around to face the horde.
Taking a few seconds to check over myself, I see several small bites and scratches, but none of them are very severe. The Palemen are fifty yards behind me. I drop my hatchet and Dao sword. I also pull my combat knife out of its sheath and throw it into the ground.
Forty yards. I empty two pistols into the horde, Palemen dropping with each shot. Thirty yards. I throw the pistols to the side and replace them with backups. Sixteen more shots, sixteen more dead. Twenty yards. I empty my last two pistols. Sixteen more dead, one thousand to go.
Combat knife in my left hand. Dao sword in my right hand. Ten yards.
“Ahhh!” I scream as a charge headlong into the Palemen horde. Behind the horde, I see my friends escaping.
“Live for me. Remember me!” The words leave my lungs with such fury I know that they reach them.
One yard. Bodies collide. My Dao sword cuts through one or two. It’s torn from my grasp by the waves of Palemen. They grab me and I stab their eyes, throats, chests, and groins. They bite, and so do I. My fingers break inside the duster guard of my combat knife. I don’t care. A Paleman bites off my finger. I cut open his jugular. Dozens grab me, but I won’t go down. I must stay standing. I must buy time.
My world devolves into blood, flesh, and pain. Morality has no place here. Savagery is the only thing that remains. I gore as many Palemen with my mouth as I do with my knife. My elbow slams into a temple. A Paleman falls. Another takes its place.
The Palemen break from me. I frenzy and jump one who retreats, stabbing him three times in the face before jumping to the next. The horde rips my hair, flesh, and clothes as I stab into hearts, heads, and throats. They retreat more. Why? I push these thoughts aside. My bloodlust demands more.
Blood drips, some of it mine and some of it theirs. When I chase one down, he tries to grab me. His grasp slips on my blood-slicked body. Sanity leaves me as I continue my rampage. The Palemen try now to get away from me.
They can’t. I’m faster. I’m death. I stab, he falls. I elbow, she falls. Over and over my dance goes on. The knife falls from the broken remnants of fingers, so I punch, kick, and bite those I catch. They fall to me like a lamb to a lion.
Laughter comes from my lungs. I won’t stop.
“Hahahaha,” I cackle madly as I hunt down Palemen now desperately trying to escape me. I hear their fear. I hear their pain. I consume it all. It’s stronger than any drug, more intoxicating than anything I have ever known.
“Ahahaha!” Blood tastes sweet. Fear is sweeter. They tell me they’re waiting. They tell me I’ll join them soon.
“AHAHAHAHA!” I don’t care. All I want is more death, more pain. More anger! I tear an eye from the socket and blood spatters into my face. Waves of ecstasy go through me. My rage is a white-hot flame. With it, I consume the colder flames around me.
“She died in my arms,” a voice says as I punch his face over and over. I only stop when its mind stops screaming. There’s no stopping me. I am Wrath.
Colors leave my sight. Morality tries to interfere. It tells me they’re still partly human. I push it away. There’s no room for sympathy; there’s only room for hunger.
“AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!” Tears stream from my face as I cackle. Blood pulses through my veins. It burns like fire. The infection is taking over. The pain and bitterness fuel me. My anger manifests itself, and I become unstoppable, immortal, and untouchable.
Enemy bones break underneath me. Ribs shatter. I use more strength than I should be capable of. I snap arms that reach at me and rip any flesh I can grab. My hand is mangled and bloody. I use it anyway. My body is cracking under the strain of my rage. Bones crack and cartilage tears. I’m being reborn. I’m awakening to my true self.
The Palemen retreat. I try to run at them. They move with me. I cannot reach. I cannot kill. I cannot feed. Crouching down, I scream out at them. The sound I hear is unimaginable. I’m no longer a human. I’m a monster and they fear me.
Hundreds of Palemen, dead and dying, lie around me. Some sanity returns as I look at all the bodies. My life is near its end, and I’m scared. The horde focuses on me. They call out to me, telling me to join them. My mind resists, but my resolve is shattered. The laughter stops as I lose control and the disease takes over. My returning sanity is ripped from me, and I’m cast from my own body.
Chris’s laughter replaces my own. He isn’t the survivor I thought he was, but a manifestation of chaos. He’s in control now. Angry tides wash in. I’m trapped in my own mind, watching in black and white.
For the first time, I can see the people trapped in the Palemen. They’re angry and they want release from their bodies. They want it to end. They want death. They, like me, are forced to watch as their bodies create tragedy.
There’s no moving, no speaking, only watching. Fear rushes in on me, and I ask myself how long I’ll be in this hell. Will it be days? Years? Will I have to watch as my body kills others, helpless to stop it?
Rage pulses deep from within, burning and trying to break me free. Fear engulfs me, but I’m not alone in my fear. All around me, others hold the same fears I do. If they cannot break free, what chance do I have? So many beg for death.
Their wishes fall on deaf ears. Only those trapped in hell can hear the cries for salvation.
We are the collective. We will follow the horde. My body moves, and I’m helpless to stop it. The horde’s attention changes to my escaping friends. Somehow, I know Chris is the one controlling it. When I see my friends on the shore, launching a boat, I’m relieved.
My relief turns to horror when I hear Chris shout out a psychic command to the horde.
“Kill them! Kill them! Kill them!” Chris dictates commands to the horde. It moves with a grace of a horde controlled by a general. My mind lashes out, trying to stop Chris. We share a mind, so I know he plans on controlling the Palemen and having them kill my friends.
“Control is mine now. Watch me as I kill all your friends. They will be ripped apart. You will watch as I eat the heart of your child.” My mind screams because my lungs cannot. My own agony joins the chorus of the others around me. The anger, agony, and regret consume me and lock me in my cage. I try to close my eyes but I can’t. I’m forced to watch. Even when I try to speak to Chris, to beg him for mercy, I can’t. All I can do is scream in agony.
My friends are barely in the water. With Chris acting as general, the Palemen are moving fast enough to catch up to them. We’re only a few hundred yards away, and we’re closing fast.
My friends look toward us, and they see that they are doomed. Their faces tell me they know I’ve failed them. They know that this will be the end. If I could’ve lasted a few more minutes, they’d be safe. Jason aims his rifle at me, and I’m glad that he does. He knows I’m a general. I don’t know how, but he knows.
If he can kill me, there’s a chance for them. My death might cause confusion among the masses. It might give them enough time to move into deeper water. Even in the shallows, they might be able to get far enough out to fight off the Palemen.
If I could smile, I would. I see the gun go off. My body jerks at the same instant I hear the pop of the gun. A searing pain radiates from my shoulder, and I realize that the shot missed the target.
Time slows down, and I realize in an instant that I felt the bullet strike my shoulder. As if to confirm the feeling of pain, I notice pain coming from all over my body. It’s so intense it threatens to drive me mad. Instead of retreating from it, I embrace it. If I can feel that pain, I must have some control. If I can feel the pain, then the nerves are still mine.
This disease and Chris can’t stop me. All m
y focus goes into the pain in my hands and shoulder. As I concentrate, the feeling of pain starts to spread up my arms. My flesh feels like it’s burning, but I force my mind to be silent. If I scream now, Chris might figure out what I’m trying to do.
The burning spreads to my throat, and I feel burning air searing my lungs.
“Jason, don’t shoot!” Words come out as a scream of agony.
If I can control my body, I can control the horde. If Jason shoots me now, though, the horde is close enough to catch them. We’re only twenty yards away, but my resistance has stopped Chris’s commands.
The minds trapped inside the Palemen encourage me. They give me strength, and the pain lessens. Feeling starts to return to my body. My fellow Palemen give me the strength to keep fighting, and now I’m starting to win.
They beg me to take control and to move us into the lake. They want to end their suffering and the suffering they cause. Chris tries to silence them, to silence me.
“You fool, you think you can take this away from me…”
Chris is quiet. The horde focuses its minds on him and pushes him out. They want me. They need me, and I need them. We become one mind working toward a common goal. We desire it. We will have it. My soul is seared away as I welcome the strength of others, and my body starts to listen to me.
Our legs move. One step and water laps my ankles, or are they someone else’s? Another step and I feel cold sand between open toes. Another step and I feel hard concrete. We have many bodies. We have many arms. My speed increases, and water fills my lungs. Some die. More move.
Memories of lives from before the power went out and after flash through my mind. I see primal acts. Things we regret. We use them to push us on. Instinct fights to keep us alive, to make us stop. It is strong. Our will is stronger.
Those on the boat are far away. They’ll escape, and a small part of us rejoices. The job isn’t done. We aren’t all gone.
Time means nothing. Seconds might pass or hours. Hunger and thirst are in us. Fatigue and pain are there as well. The collective absorbs these feelings and we keep moving.
Some struggle. Some fall. We trample them, and they go silent. Most of us are in the water. We go under and breathe deep. More of us end, and fewer are under my control.
Some try to swim, try to stay afloat, but we force them down. Only when I’m the last above the water do I go under. As Palemen die around me, I gain more control of myself and remember who I am.
The voice of the many blinks out as I let the air out of my lungs and start sinking to the bottom. The water is full of corpses, some floating, some sinking.
There’s no more anger in my mind—only silence. My lungs burn for air, but they’re denied it. It’s too late to say goodbye. A smile comes to my face. They made it. The promise I made to my father is fulfilled, and they made it.
Everyone knew what they were doing when we left. At first, we thought we would make it unscathed, but we learned. We lost a few, but we—they—made it.
My lungs can wait no longer, and they gasp for air. They only get water. A vision of a future I’ll miss comes into my mind’s eye as my vision starts to fade.
Evelyne runs up to Sophia and me on a beach, yelling joyfully like a little girl should. We embrace, and I smile, happy to be here. My father is behind me, and I know I have to go with him. There’s no question as to why he is here. I know why.
We walk from the beach, and Evelyn waves goodbye. Sophia smiles and I wave goodbye to them. There is no sadness. Someday, I’ll see them again.
Epilogue: Evelyn
March 13th
As I look at my reflection in the water, it’s hard to believe that it’s been so long. Even now, I can hardly believe it’s been fifteen years since we first made it to Beaver Island. When I look behind me, I see what’s been my home all this time, and it’s fading away.
Memories of the first day we came to the island play in my head: the bittersweet of finally being safe but making it there without my father. Back then, I didn’t appreciate what he did. I hated him for it. The others had to bind my wrists and feet to keep me from swimming back to him.
A part of me believed that if we went back, he would be alive. In my young mind, we could’ve saved him, no matter what, like he would have done for us. It took me several years to admit that I was wrong. It took even longer for me to forgive, respect, and understand what Aaron did for us all that night.
We never found the remains of my father. Sophia was sure they sunk to the bottom of the lake. All that was left of him was the Dao sword he gave us and Sophia.
The last time I was on this lake, we were making our way to Beaver Island for three days. Now, it will only take us a few hours to return to the mainland. If we had been on a salty body of water, I doubt we would have made it to Beaver Island back then. By the end of the journey, we were all weak from hunger.
We were greeted on the shore by the locals, who immediately told us to leave. If I hadn’t been with them, we would never have convinced them to let us stay. They were foolish to think that because I was young, I was a child, but I’m glad for their ignorance. It’s one thing to cast out adults, but sending a small child to her death is a difficult thing to do.
The patrol that stopped us on the beach agreed to let us speak with the village elder. They said we could ask his permission to stay to recover. At that point, it was Brian who saved us. He made the elder see the value of our knowledge. We were allowed to stay because we could teach them how to fight the Palemen.
It started as teaching others how to fight, but over time, things changed. After a few months, Melany started teaching other aspects of the world, and soon, Jason joined her. After a few years, the island changed.
During this time, Sophia and Brian decided they would raise me. I never stopped missing my adoptive father, Aaron, but I did grow to love Sophia and Brian. Things on the island were not perfect, especially in the beginning, but they always did their best to take care of me. After a year or so, I even came to think of them as Mom and Dad.
Melany and Jason started a school. They began teaching the children about what happened to the world and how it was before. I, of course, was not exempt from having to go to class. At first, I hated school, like all children do, but I grew to love it. Despite our age, Melany and Jason treated everyone like adults. They often said that the time of having a childhood was over.
Even after we started to live on the island, the locals were terrified of outsiders. They refused to allow anyone to join the community. That all changed when Alexis came to the island around a year after we arrived.
She came with supplies and motors, and our lives changed. I remember the day she came to us and how happy Brian was. Alexis had become a mercenary leader of sorts, and she’d saved thousands of lives.
After Brian saw her again, there was no stopping him; he started leaving the island to help others. At first, the town opposed it. When he brought back things like powered lights and water filtration systems, the opposition evaporated.
Deep down, I could still see the scars Dawn left on him, but Brian was never happier than when he was saving others. He and his sister would often collaborate on missions. The people they saved would either go to her compound or live on our island.
I remember being surprised when, on one of his return trips, Brian had Aaron’s family with him—what remained of them, anyway. Back then, I didn’t know them that well. Seeing a familiar face was still nice at the time. Brian’s family decided to stay at the military base with Alexis, and I remember Brian being happy they chose to.
It was only about a year after Brian started going off the island that we had gone from a sparsely populated town to a city. With Brain’s trips, we even had working power generators and some basic lighting, as well as working plumbing and water filtration systems.
Around that time, Sophia and Brian got married. It had been about two years since we arrived on the island, and their marriage surprised no one. It wasn’t a surpri
se when Melany and Jason followed them.
Sophia had been focused on raising me, but after my grandmother Stephanie came, she had more time to work. Sophia set up a hospital with Stephanie’s help. They put together a small compound, which was quite sophisticated considering the lack of technology.
Sophia was always kind to me, but she was never sure how to be a mother. Brian was the same. I know they both love me, but a part of me always knew they only raised me to honor Aaron’s memory. That’s why I understood when they sometimes focused more on other priorities. The reason I never grew to resent them was because Stephanie was there to take care of me.
Stephanie and I grew close very quickly after she made it to the island. Only a few months later, I was living with her most of the time. We learned how to grow into the new world together. What I didn’t learn from Jason and Melany’s school I learned from her. I’ll forever be grateful to Stephanie for all that she’s done for me.
When I look away from the reflection in the lake, I see Stephanie paddling next to me. Her being here warms my heart. I told her of my plans to leave the island, and she wanted to come before I could even tell her why. She’s been such a great source of strength for me, and I know that without her, leaving would have been much harder.
As I look back to the island, my thoughts drift back to the past, to the first day I met an international traveler. He brought a laptop with him. The technology was so much more amazing than anything I had seen before. And technology was not all he brought.
I wasn’t allowed to listen at the time, but he also brought news of the world. He told them, I found out later, that North America was the only country to lose power, but not the only place infected.
The infections didn’t survive as easily in rich countries, and it was wiped out there. Poorer countries were not so lucky, and the disease stagnated. The distrust it caused started a war. When the war broke out among the richer countries of the world, things escalated and nuclear devices were used.