Apocalypse Z: The Beginning of the End

another one of those things suddenly came around a parked car. Shit. I hadn’t seen that guy before. The speargun was hanging from my shoulder, but I didn’t have time to load another spear. I let go of the soldier for a moment and steadied the umbrella shaft with both hands. With all my might, I struck the creature’s temple with the ivory handle. I don’t know if I killed it, but I do know the bone in its left temple cracked and it collapsed on the ground. I dropped the umbrella, grabbed the soldier’s body, and made it through my front gate, slamming it behind me, just in time. They were just a few yards away.

I left the soldier’s body in front of the front door and threw up. I’ve been drinking for nearly twenty-four hours. I’m drunk. Now these things know I’m here. But I’m alive. And if you’re alive, you can fight to live another day.

ENTRY 37

January 29, 5:14 p.m.

If things keep on like this, I’ll go crazy. They’ve been pounding nonstop on my front gate for hours. I can hear them no matter where I am in the house. It’s horrible. And all that moaning! Jesus Christ! They’re destroying my nerves. I’ve been drinking too much, I know, but I don’t know what else to do.

Miguel, my neighbor, isn’t any help. Instead he’s a pain in the ass. He’s hung up on the idea that we should head to the marina, get his boat, and sail somewhere else. But he doesn’t have the nerve to do it alone. He’s driving me crazy with his constant complaining. He’s insufferable.

I tried to get him to see things clearly, but he won’t listen. The roads are either cut off or blocked by abandoned cars, accidents, collapsed bridges. It’s insane to think about the trip as if everything were normal. Anything can happen. And the consequences could be fatal. You have to plan things out if you’re going to survive.

Tonight I got up the courage to climb up to my attic. It’s a small space under the roof, barely more than a closet. I haven’t been up there for two years because it’s full of my wife’s stuff. The day after her funeral, my sister and her boyfriend put all her things up there. Until three weeks ago, when the technician installed the solar panels, no one had been up there. There’s dust on everything. Over the musty smell, I can still detect a familiar scent—her perfume, which still permeates her clothes. My heart shrank, and I collapsed on an old couch with tears streaming down my face. I’ve been crying like a baby for hours, holding her old sweater. I miss her so much. Thank God she doesn’t have to witness all this.

After a while I calmed down. Something’s still broken inside me; I mourned for a while and vented. The stress I’ve been under is brutal. Taking refuge up here for a few hours was a good idea.

The technician’s footprints in the dust went from the trapdoor to below the skylight. There were some bits of wire and a plastic bag of leftover screws. The remains of the installation. Silent witness that someone did his job what seems like a million years ago. I wonder what became of that guy. Maybe he’s one of those things wandering around.

I opened the skylight and let in some cold air. I tied myself to some buttresses and climbed very carefully onto the roof. The last thing I needed was to break my leg! Next to the skylight is a flat surface you can sit on. The roof slopes down from there and is covered by the iridescent solar panels. It’s about a twenty-foot drop to the ground, where these things have tirelessly massed in front of my gate. Falling is definitely not a good option.

A few new creatures have arrived, drawn by the noise made by the things congregated at my door. Broken Hip’s body is lying in a heap in the middle of the road. There’s no trace of the other guy. The thump on the head I gave him mustn’t have been enough to send him back to hell. Too bad.

Normally I had a spectacular view of the city at night. Now I was amazed at how completely dark it was. Most nights I could see thousands of lights, but tonight there was utter blackness. The electricity was definitely off. And they sure weren’t planning to send a team in to fix it. I lit a cigarette and thought things over.

When all this started, people quit showing up for work. Power plant operators, too. So for two weeks now, those plants have been operating on automatic pilot. I tried to remember the way a friend’s boyfriend, an engineer, explained it to me. A thermal power plant that runs on coal or fuel can only be set on automatic for twenty-four hours before its boilers run out of fuel. In theory, a hydroelectric or wind-powered plant could stay on indefinitely, but it requires skilled technicians to repair any damage done by around-the-clock use. It could last about two weeks before its systems started to fail. Parts would be tough to get now. It’s horrifying to think of a nuclear plant operating with no one to make repairs. Chernobyl, the guy said with a sad smile, is an example of a nuclear power plant that wasn’t maintained properly. I hope the report was true, that the nuclear power plants have been disconnected.

So I guess the whole country is dark, or soon will be. The electric company had a contingency plan if a plant or two failed, but all of them failing at once must have caused the entire system to collapse. In one fell swoop, they’ve sent us back to the nineteenth century. Except that we’re struggling to stay alive, surrounded by walking corpses. That’s a helluva picture.

I stubbed out my cigarette and went back inside. It’s cold. I haven’t looked through the soldier’s backpack yet. I hope it was worth it. Let’s see what I find.

THE JOURNAL

ENTRY 38

January 30, 6:38 p.m.

The last twenty-four hours have been a disaster. Just when you think nothing else can go wrong, reality sneaks up behind you with a new surprise.

As if I didn’t already have enough problems with those monsters beating mercilessly on my door for the last two days, there’s something new on the horizon. Because of the widespread power failure, the Internet has ceased to exist. Kaput. That’s it. My blog’s dead. So’s the entire Internet. All I get is the white Explorer screen. The servers closed down days ago. That mine lasted this long was a miracle. It’s amazing how much we depend on electricity for everything. We’re back in the nineteenth century, with all its drawbacks. I don’t know if I can handle it.

I’m going to keep writing entries in this journal. I need to record what I see and feel. I need to set my thoughts down on this blank page or I’ll go crazy within a couple of months. This journal will speak for me; it’s the only place where I can confide my experiences. If I really fuck up, at least there’ll be a record of how I lived through these terrible times. And that’s some fucking comfort.

I got up my courage and went back out to the front patio. I opened the door as stealthily as I could and peeked out. The soldier’s body was lying where I left it, right inside the gate. Here, the noise those things made was deafening. I placed my hand on the steel gate and felt the vibration from their pounding. They know I’m on this side of the gate and are frustrated that they can’t catch me.

I sat on the front steps and lit a cigarette as I studied the body. For the first time I got a good look at one of those things up close. It was starting to smell really bad. Putrefaction and rigor mortis must slow way down when they mutate into those monsters. Once they are really dead, that process seems to move at a normal pace. A sticky liquid flowed out of the hole in his skull and formed a clot on the tile floor. I didn’t think I’d ever get that spot out, but I guess that doesn’t matter now. His skin was yellowish, waxy, and his circulatory system was drawn on his skin like delicate lace. Combined with the terrible wounds on his face, the effect was chilling.