Dark Recollections

by Chris Philbrook

  Sniff test fail.

  I was no more than 5 feet down the central hall before I got a whiff of something rank. As was the case, I couldn’t hear anything, but it was pretty obvious what was going on. There were four rooms in the upstairs. Two doors were open. One bathroom was evident, and one bedroom. The two bedroom doors that were closed had scratch marks all over them. Bloody streaks running north-south as well as a few lodged fingernails deep in the wood. It looks an awful lot like my heavy duty front door of Hall E this morning. Pretty clearly a zombie or zombies tried to get in these rooms. I wonder why. Could it be because there were living people inside?

  After I checked the two open rooms and made sure they were safe, I checked the first shut door. The door knob was locked, and as soon as I rattled it, I heard shuffling on the other side, and the door got pushed forward in the frame. I stepped back and watched for a few seconds as it got pushed forward over and over insistently. Mindlessly. I thought about it for a second, then leveled the shotgun off at chest height, and blasted a dinner plate sized hole in the door.

  There was a sick, wet, thump noise as something heavy got flung across the room. I took a deep breath, leaned over, and looked through my new peep hole. Ripped apart in the middle of the room, propped up against a queen sized bed was the decayed body of a young boy. Not a day over 10 years old. My shot hit him too low to finish him though, it just ripped his chest apart. What was left of his body was falling over on the floor to crawl its way back to the door, to eat me. I stifled a wretch, reached inside the hole in the door, unlocked, and pushed it open.

  Honestly I’d lost my urge to fight at that point. I didn’t want to kill kids today, even the undead ones. It still turns my stomach. I drew the sword, and busted the young kid’s head open to put him down permanently. I wound up throwing up some in the sink as I wandered over to the other closed door. I don’t know if it was because I had just ripped a ten year old in half with a 12 gauge, or because I fucking had the worst feeling the other room would just the same as the first. I don’t know.

  The second door was locked too, and as soon as I gave the knob a twist, there was a soft ramming from the other side. Over and over and over. I rested my head against the bloody, scratched door and felt it push against my head a dozen times. Took me a long time to build up the nerve to do it, but I blasted another hole the same as the first. This shot’s elevation was more appropriate though, and I killed the little kid on the other side.

  I can’t tell you if it was a boy or a girl. It was wearing neutral style pajamas, and was probably about 7 years old. The body itself had already been eaten substantially, and there wasn’t enough… parts left to tell one way or the other. My head shot wrecked any chance of seeing a face.

  I am so fucking weary of this. Every day, day in, day out, more of the same. Mind numbing violence, destruction, and emotional wreckage. I tell Otis my troubles almost every day too, and as great a listener as he is, it’s just not the same. It’s days like today that make me wish I had more people to sit and talk to. At least we could bitch at God together, right? It’s the little things. Maybe I should start giving praise to some flavor of the almighty, and flip the script. Change my tune. Bite my heretical tongue.

  Fat fucking chance. I have no filter. I swear all the damn time. I once told a gay guy at a poker tournament that my hand was “very homosexual.” I fucking knew he was gay too. Just didn’t occur to me to shut my face before I said it. Had no intention of hurting his feelings. Went over like a fart in church. I had to let him hit me a few times just to let him get even. True story.

  At any rate, after that I checked the basement, and it was thankfully devoid of demon possessed undead children. No spinning heads, no green pea vomit, and no flesh eating monsters.

  I sat down at their kitchen table and just blanked out for fifteen minutes to get my shit together. I don’t know what it is about killing kids, but it leaves me empty inside. I have no will, no motivation, no nothing after I do it. Fucked up shit. And I know I will have to kill more as time goes on. These zombie bodies don’t seem to decay at all. If they are, it’s really fucking slowly. There could be zombies around forever. There’s a scary thought Mr. Journal.

  I emptied the house. It looked like they were staging their escape as shit hit the fan. Most of their food and water was already in the kitchen or the living room, so I didn’t have to lug it all around. They had a lot of really good entertainment crap, which was nice. DVDs, CDs, etc. Food wise they had a lot as well. I think all they fed their kids was canned shit and boxed macaroni and cheese. They had condensed milk, lots of sugar, and I shit you not, a full case of hot chocolate packets. It’s the little things. Oh, and Ward had a fucking A awesome flashlight. Finally, a decent fucking flashlight. Heavy duty police style Maglite.

  There were a few other neat things as well, but I’m not gonna spend a paragraph listing the mundane, yet useful items. TP, PT, soap, bleach, blah fucking blah blah. Add nice towels to the list too. High thread count sheets. Makes me want to go get my bed again. I think I’ll put that on the list of shit to do.

  Sooooo…… End of the afternoon. Came back, unloaded my shit, tended to the plants, refilled the generator gas tank, took a hot shower, fed Otis, refilled my boy Blue, cleaned the shotgun, made myself something to eat, and now I’m writing in here. And that’s an easy day.

  Tomorrow… I will deal with tomorrow. Tonight I watch action movies from the 80’s.

  -Adrian

  p.s. nincompoop.

  December 2010

  December 1st

  I am in much better spirits today. I have found and focused my inner happy place Mr. Journal. Hopefully my newfound reservoir of patience and bliss lasts me. Almost held a straight face through that. Lol. Couldn’t hold it though.

  It’s now Wednesday, December 1st. Yippee. The Christmas season has begun for me. I’m starting to think I’m going to skip Christmas shopping this year. I think I’ll gloss over my Hanukkah obligations as well. Kwaanza seems like a waste as well. I just don’t feel like dealing with the kind of crowds I’d expect nowadays at the malls. God can you imagine how bad it is at the malls? In any of the urban areas where the populations are more dense? Christ. It’s bad enough here, and there’s less than ten thousands folks in town.

  The city had over 20 times that. And that’s nothing compared to the really large places like Los Angeles, Dallas, Chicago, Boston, or D.C. What a nightmare. Of course those cities probably had a more structured police response, so for all I know, I’m sitting out here like a fucking tool fighting all these dead guys and the cities are these peaceful utopias. Somehow I doubt that. I bet the cities were fucking slaughterhouses.

  Glad I am not in the cities Mr. Journal. I can make do with my suburban lifestyle. Even if my carbon footprint is much larger than if I was to be in the city. I wonder what all the assholes paranoid about global warming are worried about right now, assuming they’re still alive somewhere. I’d drop a paycheck that their number one issue is global rampant undead cannibalism. That or the distinct lack of patchouli incense. I’m thankful that soapbox got kicked out from under people. Not that I’m not all for saving the world from ourselves. I just hate people.

  Something that always bothered me about zombie movies was dental hygiene. You ever sit down and watch a zombie movie, and at the moment that the person resurrects, they sit up, do this animalistic hiss, and bare their teeth? You tell me Mr. Journal how many of those hissing, teeth baring zombies have brown or black teeth when they sit up and do that shit.

  They fucking ALL DO! It makes no sense. It’s like wearing a condom when you piss. Doesn’t make any sense. Why did so many special effects guys paste on brown and black sludge onto their actor’s teeth? I mean, after some time, sure the zombies are going to have crappy teeth. I have yet to see a zombie brush their teeth. They have so much to do! There’s no time to brush.

  They have 24 full hours of shuffling around and stalking living prey to do. No breaks allowed. God
help us all if the zombies decide to form a labor union. Local Zombie 403. Shortly after that the fuckers will have a good health plan too I bet.

  Zombies have the same dental quality in death that they had in life. Just wanted to clear that up if anyone was still curious Mr. Journal. Tell all your friends. Tell them twice if you have to.

  On a more literal and informative note, I have been lazy. My thumb has been really sore, but was a little better at the end of yesterday. After my pre-school shotgun spree on Monday I didn’t have it in me to clear houses. I don’t think I would’ve been able to pull the trigger on a zombie if I’d run into one. Just too much stress built up after killing those two kids in that house.

  So yesterday I took it easy. I ran the generator all day to keep nice and warm, and I tended to my plants, which are now sprouting a little bit. I feel like a proud papa. Otis has been a little bitch about it though. I’ve caught him several times now sniffing the baby plants, and whenever he does that to something, eating it is usually not far behind. I’ve moved the plants into their own room upstairs, which I’m now calling the greenhouse. I know, clever.

  Other than tending my plants yesterday I didn’t really do much. Decent weather, as in no snow, rain, or sleet, but the temperature is 20F. If you aren’t aware Mr. Journal, that’s testicles into ice cubes cold. It’ll get worse this winter too. I can feel it in my bones. And right on cue, it started to drizzle outside. Sigh.

  During my lazy day Tuesday I fired up the Playstation, and stared at about five hours of Prince of Persia. I have a hard time getting into the violent games right now. If I want a first person shooter, I’ll walk the fuck outside and make some noise. Lately, I want something unreal and fantastic. Knights in shining armor. Cubes falling from the sky into piles on the floor. I don’t know. I just know I’m sick of hearing guns go off in the real world. Plus there’s a big part of me that doesn’t want to get into the habit of shooting like a video game teaches you.

  In the real world, running, jumping, crouching, and firing incessantly gets you killed almost immediately. At the very least you burn through ammo much faster than you need to, or can afford to. I don’t want my good weapon habits ruined by a stupid video game.

  I’ll probably change my mind though when I get a hankering to play through Fallout 3 again. I really wish Fallout New Vegas came out before the shit hit the fan. I was really looking forward to that game. Shrug. Lots of things I was looking forward to. I always wanted to see the Pyramids too.

  There is a certain satisfaction I get whenever I do something that I don’t want to do. I remember back in college I frigging hated writing papers, but when I buckled down, and fired up the laptop and got it done, I always felt good about it. I got a more thorough satisfaction from doing the things I didn’t want to do too. Doing the shit I wanted to do had no reward really. It was what I wanted to do, and was a reward all in itself. Crossing something unpleasant off the to-do list meant I had been a good little person, and that I had done something because it had to be done, not because I wanted to do it. It validated my work ethic.

  I feel that way about clearing houses. I hate doing it with a passion now, but it needs to be done to secure the area for my safety, and the safety of any people who wind up joining me up here. Plus I’ve accumulated a wide array of loot here that will help me survive not only much longer, but in a higher comfort level. Better food, better tools, better clothes, etc.

  I did three houses on Auburn Lake Road today. That drops the grand total remaining on Auburn Lake Road down to 2 houses. I plan on doing those remaining two tomorrow. That means all that I have left are the 9 houses on Jones Road, and the 7 houses on Prospect Circle. Once those houses are done, the entire road and all its tributaries are clear. Exciting, yeah? I know I’m stoked.

  So my day today was pretty good all things considered. I was fortunate enough to not find any dead bodies, human or otherwise in them. I also was lucky enough to not have to kill any more zombies, adult or otherwise. Every day that goes by where I don’t shoot a bullet, or swing my little sword is a good day in my book.

  What was the haul you ask Mr. Journal? I got a pretty good assortment of canned food, cleaning agents, consumables etc. As far as nice gadgets are concerned, one house had a BITCHING coffee maker. One of the fancy schmancy Italian deals that makes espresso and lattes. It even steams your milk for you. If I had normal milk, that would be awesome. Not sure if it works with the powdered milk though. Same people also had a French press for coffee too. They loved coffee. Fucking loved it. Absolutely adored the shit. I’m happy though because that means as long as I can boil water, I can make coffee with the French press. I can always boil water, even if the generator dies, and even if I run out of gas.

  The other two houses had two kind of neat things inside. One of which has absolutely no practical value, but I had to take it anyway because it was cool. The other was radical. As in, “dude, this is RAD.”

  I found a baseball card collection. Actually it was a sports card collection. Not a little one either. Eight huge white boxes filled with row after row of meticulously organized sports cards. Each carefully slid into a plastic sleeve and labeled. There were six binders filled with plastic pages to hold cards too. Unreal. I haven’t gone though them yet, but I saw stuff going all the way back to the 1940’s. I saw some Mantle cards too I think. Pretty neat shit. I’m like a historian now, gathering things of value to pass on to future generations. In a strange way, it makes me feel good about raiding these houses. I’ve got the cards stacked up in the living room here so I can sort them when I take a break. Maybe after I finish writing this entry.

  The third and final house I did earlier was a bust in terms of food. There was almost nothing left inside, and the place looked like it was cleared out in a big hurry.

  Right square in their kitchen, pretty as a gold ingot, was a cast iron woodstove. Hallelujah. It’s fucking enormous. Two or three feet deep at least, and probably almost six feet wide. It has burners, a warming shelf, multiple zones for keeping areas of the stove warmer than others… It’s perfect. I just need to figure out how I’m going to get it back here. After I do the last two houses on Auburn Lake I think I’ll try and tackle the stove issue.

  I also need to try and find a way to get the damn thing installed somewhere. Do I put it in here to save on the gas, or do I put it in one of the other dorm buildings so that they have adequate heat? I’m leaning towards option B because I don’t NEED a stove in here right now. I shouldn’t have said that. Six hours from now the generator is going to explode. I always jinx myself with shit like that. Wish me luck on that regard Mr. Journal. I need to figure out how to install the pipes, and make sure I don’t set the floor or walls on fire as well.

  Unless I meet and befriend the Hulk over the next few days, I will have to find a way to take the stove apart and transport it back piece by piece. Should be no sweat right? And there’s my second jinx of the entry. Man I am stupid sometimes. If I’m not careful I’ll keep talking like this and find a way to give myself the Clap from jerking off. I’ll be the first motherfucker in the post apocalyptic world to find a way to get an STD all by myself. Sigh.

  So yeah, that’s where we are today. Few added supplies, a new coffee maker of epic proportions, a giant stack of baseball cards to sort through, and a located woodstove. It’s exciting. I like days like today. They give me that fictional thing… you’ve heard of it I’m sure.

  Hope.

  -Adrian

  - About The Author -

  CHRIS PHILBROOK is the creator and author of Adrian’s Undead Diary as well as the popular webfiction series Elmoryn and Tesser: A Dragon Among Us.

  Chris calls the wonderful state of New Hampshire his home. He is an avid reader, writer, role player, miniatures game player, video game player, and part time athlete, as well as a member of the Horror Writers Association. If you weren't impressed enough, he also works full time while writing for Elmoryn as well as the world of Adrian’s Undead Diary and hi
s newest project, Tesser; A Dragon Among Us.

  - Find More Online -

  Visit adriansundeaddiary.com to access additional content. Learn more about Adrian’s world, contact the author, join discussions with other readers, view maps from the story, and receive the latest news about AUD.

  Check out Chris Philbrook’s official website thechrisphilbrook.com to keep tabs on his many exciting projects, or follow Chris on Facebook at www.facebook.com/ChrisPhilbrookAuthor for special announcements.

  Read more by author Chris Philbrook in The Kinless Trilogy. Explore Elmoryn, a world of dark fantasy where death is not the end. The story begins in Book One: The Wrath of the Orphans, available in print, Kindle, and online. Visit elmoryn.com to learn more about Elmoryn, view concept art, and much more.

  Follow Chris Philbrook’s latest epic series as it unfolds in Tesser: A Dragon Among Us. Meet Tesser, the Dragon. He who walks in any form, and flies the skies free of fear. He has slept for millennia, but now he has awoken in a world ruled by human hands, where science has overshadowed even the glory of old magic. Follow Tesser as he seeks to understand why he slept for so long, and where all the magic has gone. Visit adragonamongus.com to learn more.

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  Table of Contents

  Auburn Lake Preparatory Academy map

  SEPTEMBER 2010

  September 21 st

  September 27 th

  September 28 th

  OCTOBER 2010