Living With the Dead: This New Disease (Book 5)

by Joshua Guess

  Many in the group were clearly ill--pale faces, labored breathing, sweating profusely--but they came along anyway, determined to haul their captives right to the edge.

  Yeah. Captives. Seven men and three women, all sick themselves, were unceremoniously killed and thrown into the river. The last of them was Scar himself, so devastated with the new plague that our watchers weren't sure he even knew what was going on. He didn't get a bullet like the others. Scar had his throat slashed by a small woman, who kicked him over the edge.

  We got a message from the Exiles not long after. It was hand-written and chucked across the river inside one of those capsules you used to get at the drive-through at banks. I'm not going to transcribe it here mainly because it's in Will's office, but the gist of the thing was an explanation. Scar and his lieutenants ruled the Exile camp through fear, intimidation, and violence. Some of it subtle, some of it overt, all of it terrible. Turns out a lot of people weren't very happy about that and took their chance when they got it. The letter further explained that the large boat being constructed was intended for piracy--traveling up and down the river looking for people using it as we have, to ferry large shipments of goods around. Scar was planning on breaking the truce, another mark against him.

  The remaining Exiles want to live in peace, or so they say. As a show of goodwill, they burned the boat's skeleton last night after lowering the screens they've got set up around their home. As before, we'll take them at their word that they won't attack, but we'll plan for the worst. We're a hopeful sort of people, but not stupid.

  For the sake of the ill living in New Haven, I hope this is genuine. We haven't been shy about telling people we're weak at the moment, and while we can still defend ourselves quite well, doing so would represent a strain on our population that would make things so much worse.

  I've got my fingers crossed. We'll watch and see.

  Monday, June 11, 2012

  Peaceful

  Posted by Josh Guess

  One of the people I've been taking care of here at the house died this morning. Her name was Norma Smith, and I called her Mrs. Smith. An old habit from working at the nursing home, not using someone's first name if they're older than I am. Funny how that little foible came right back to me when I invited these folks into my home.

  She didn't pass in her sleep. Most of the people sick with the new plague who lose the fight go that way. Mrs. Smith woke up for a few minutes, her eyes glassy and her breathing harsh and shallow. There wasn't much in those eyes, desperate pain faded to resignation. All animals seem to know when their final moments are on them, and people are no different. I sat with her for those last few minutes, watched the remaining strength flow from her muscles and bones.

  I held her when she died.

  I should have felt more. I didn't cry for her. A light sadness crept over me that I couldn't do more, that the life she fought so hard to keep was taken from her in a way she just couldn't combat. Being there for her as she died was the least I could do for her. Sadly, it was also all I could do.

  Norma's death marks an interesting turn to how the new plague is playing out around our home. We seem to have reached a point of rough balance between the number of people falling ill and the number getting better or passing away. There's some hope that the worst of it is over. As we are now, we can maintain things until the sickness burns itself out.

  We have hope, as always, but not expectations. Because basing your plans and future on what you'd like to happen is stupid. We expect the worst as always and will work from there.

  Trying to comfort Norma was a strange thing for me. I couldn't help sitting there and recalling the times I'd done the same before The Fall, trying to be there for the people I took care of at work when one of them was moving on to whatever is next. I don't even know if I believe in an afterlife anymore, but I damn well believe in life.

  Think about it for a minute. Every person around you is a walking miracle. We're these animals, evolved enough to have the capacity for logic and self-awareness to a degree other creatures can't manage. We're the apex species of planet Earth, a biological anomaly. A quirk of nature.

  Each of us is a conglomeration of experiences and events that make us who we are. We've loved and hated, risked everything and taken the easy way out. We've been kind and cruel, had moments of deep insight and impervious denial. Some of us have specialized in understanding the strangest and most esoteric fields of study while others are dedicated generalists. Those experiences and the knowledge that comes with them are as invaluable for their inherent teachable data as they are for what they represent about the species.

  What kinds of knowledge did Norma have to share with us? What things did she know that might not even seem important but somewhere down the line could prove crucial to some endeavor? What about the wisdom that came from the experiences gaining that knowledge, you know?

  We're more than just repositories for information. One of the things that makes the human animal so unique, so damn amazing, is our ability to learn overarching lessons from our experiences. Through understanding, we grow wise, and we share that wisdom with those who come after us.

  In the world that was, there were so many people that we lost sight of how important those lessons were. Sitting here tapping away at my keyboard, hearing the shouts of sentries on the walls as zombies taunt them below, I can't help but feel envy for Norma and her escape from this. She's at peace now.

  The rest of us may have lost an invaluable resource. The worst part of that is not knowing if we have or not. I think, should we weather this storm, that we should take steps to change that.

  Rest well, Mrs. Smith. You'll be missed.

  Tuesday, June 12, 2012

  Breathe

  Posted by Josh Guess

  My schedule is completely fucked at this point. I've been getting very little sleep lately, usually in little hour or two hour chunks between checking on the folks living in my house. Jess isn't working anymore. She can still move around on her own but she's so weak at this point that she has passed the daily administration of her areas of responsibility to others.

  Patrick or one of his nieces is always here with me now. Pat has the new baby, which I've been remiss in even mentioning given all the chaos lately, making the fact that he spends so much of his free time helping me out all the more impressive. It's not that I need help with the work necessarily, just that there isn't enough time in the day for all the things I have to do plus the work I may potentially do and sleep. Take yesterday, for example.

  After my post went up, the bells started ringing. It wasn't a large assault, but it was global. New Breed came at the walls from every direction, in small groups. They carried big wooden boards, probably taken from one of our hidden supply caches (not hidden well enough, obviously), and they were doing their damnedest to get a foothold on the walls to scale them.

  There are numerous little crannies and crevices in the wall between the stones where those boards can be jammed to provide a decent ramp. Just over ten feet high, the New Breed only needs to get them about six feet up to have a good shot at getting over the edge.

  So that was what I did yesterday for several hours. I ran around the walkways defending the northern section, alternating between firing arrows at close range (for accuracy--after all, shots to the head are the only ones that count) and waylaying those that made it over with one of the heavy machetes the folks in North Jackson made for us. That entire section of wall, roughly a quarter of the whole, was manned by twenty-five people. Five groups of two in set positions, working a small area. Five 'flying units', like me, running between longer chunks and helping where needed, and ten sentries posted up with long guns, sending out precious bullets into the heads of zombies who got past us or were making their way to the wall, depending on the circumstances.

  It was exhausting. Fighting for hours on end with only short breaks to get a drink of water or wipe zombie gore from my face took its toll on me. It was well into the afterno
on before I made it home, where Pat had set up a rotation to care for my people. Jess is in better condition than the others at the house, so she did a bit of light work to help out. She cooked, which is rare for her. Even that much effort took a toll on her, but she seemed genuinely happy to do something for me. For us.

  Somehow I stayed awake for a few hours after that, but sometime between seven and eight I fell asleep. The good thing about turning my house into a tiny care facility is the abundance of places to comfortably fall asleep. Mattresses are all over the place, my couch is super comfy, the floors are littered with piles of pillows. I picked the couch.

  And I didn't wake up until five this morning. I slept very well, the deep sleep of a person on the edge of losing it from bone-deep tiredness. I was angry when I finally came to, but I couldn't maintain it for long. Jess, my patients, Pat, and his nieces conspired to let me rest. There was some food ready, which helped mitigate my crankiness.

  I guess I just felt like they didn't think I could do it. Like I wasn't tough enough or dedicated enough to catch a nap, get up, and take care of business. That may sound stupid, and I fell kind of stupid, but even if that's not the lesson my wife and friends intended to teach, it was correct. There's a lot on my shoulders and my stupid, pig-headed pride needs to be put on the backburner. I can't do this alone, that much is clear. The community at large needs every able-bodied person ready to fight at a moment's notice, and I'm in that category.

  I'm thankful as hell for the help, that's all I'm saying. I need it, no getting around that fact. The girls are too young to be in combat, but one or the other of them will stay here while the other serves as support staff for those who do the fighting.

  But even if there's a period of peace and the New Breed gives us a break, I still can't do it alone. Staying in the house, working nonstop on one thing or another, letting the worry build up and having virtually no socialization...that was a recipe for disaster.

  Having them here gives me time to do something completely alien: to just sit down for a few minutes and breathe. To do nothing, to have a brief time with no responsibilities and no immediate worries. I did that for half an hour after I woke up this morning, just sat on the couch after my light breakfast and enjoyed the cool breeze through the windows, the sound of crickets and morning birdsong. My cat, Simon, came in from his prowling and sat in my lap. Can't remember the last time I was able to give him some much-needed ear scratches. It was nice. I feel like an almost-new man.

  Wednesday, June 13, 2012

  Resistance

  Posted by Josh Guess

  I can't help feeling incredibly strange about the fact that I'm not sick. I spent a good portion of yesterday thinking back on the new plague and our experiences with it. Just like everyone else, I've been exposed, there really can't be any doubt about that. I spent weeks tending to the people from Louisville that first fell ill with it. I've been around sick people nonstop for a long, long time.

  But some of us just aren't catching it. Maybe whatever strain of the zombie plague we have inside us just waiting to take over when we die is too tough for the new kid on the block. That might be it, or I could simply be the next one to wake up barely able to breathe. Who knows?

  On a deeper level, this bugs the shit out of me. It's not as though I want to get sick--all of you know how much I hate being helpless and unable to stand and fight when needed--but me being one of the people still hale and hearty touches on a larger trend for me: I've been very lucky.

  Not falling victim to the new plague is only the most recent sign. Yeah, I've been injured several times, but that doesn't make me unique among survivors. We live in dangerous times and work often has to be rushed to get done at all. No, I've been super lucky. A combination of that and some foresight let me save some of my family members, though the majority of them died. One of my brothers and my sister lived, and their families. My mom made it through The Fall itself. The majority of people in New Haven lost literally every person they knew.

  I don't like it, mostly because I constantly feel as if the other cosmic shoe is going to drop. That some huge tragedy will rain down upon me and make mockery of the good fortune I've had so far. When the universe aims to balance the scales, there's isn't dick you can do to stop it.

  Y'know, if you believe in that kind of thing.

  I guess I'm just feeling bad for all the folks who're suffering with every breath right now. I see it in my wife, the folks I'm caring for at the house. I saw it in the patients at the clinic. Hell, I know how awful it is, from severe bronchitis three winters in a row, and one bout of pneumonia that would have killed me had I not grudgingly made a trip to the ER. It wears you down, fighting just to make your chest expand, to drink in trickles of the oxygen you always took for granted.

  All I have to do is go fight zombies. Compared to what these folks are dealing with, that's a fucking breeze.

  Stupid survivor's guilt.

  Thursday, June 14, 2012

  The Test

  Posted by Josh Guess

  This morning I was put in a situation that required me to prove whether or not I meant what I said about the community coming first, even as I stay home to care for my wife and others. One of our key allies in the local area, and by that I mean within a hundred miles or so, asked specifically if I'd help them with a project. They said I was their first choice, for my familiarity with the area in question as well as having worked and communicated with me more than any other citizen of New Haven.

  Understand, these folks are critically important friends of New Haven. They offer us tactical assistance in extreme need, and beyond that they're good people. And yeah, I know the part of the country they live in very well. Of all the people here, only the team I took with me across the country and I have spent any time there. Me more than anyone else; when I was a kid my mom and dad used to meet there sometimes to exchange me between them for the summer.

  And the job itself is something I have experience with. I can't say more than that right now, but there are some pretty compelling reasons for me being the one to go.

  Obviously, that would mean leaving Jess and my guests. Jess wants me to do it, and the others are behind her on this, those of them that can still talk. Pat has offered to take care of everything, to schedule duty between himself, the girls, and Becky. I don't want to go, that's my gut reaction, but I have to consider the larger implications of refusing.

  When I told Jess that I'd be devastated if something happened to her while I was away, she pointed out that given the new plague's seemingly instantaneous ability to kill, she could die while I was in the bathroom. Life is random, death is random, and if you wait around worrying about what will happen if you move, nothing can ever get accomplished.

  Have I mentioned how wise my wife is? I really should make a habit of doing that.

  I'll go, of course. I can't refuse the request in good conscience. This is a delicate situation that our allies can't afford to attempt on their own. Once I've done the job and can explain, you'll understand why that is, and why I can't go into more detail.

  Will told me that should I choose to leave, I will be able to take two people with me. What I'm being asked to do is dangerous to the extreme, but we can't spare more than that. Really, we shouldn't be sparing anyone since people still get sick almost daily and there are many hundreds of pissed-off, hungry zombies buzzing against the walls, but exceptions have to be made sometimes. We're doing something to help ensure the survival of an entire community, a group of more than three hundred people.

  It would be awful for me to be away if something happened to Jess. Logically I would understand my own faultlessness in that situation, but just imagining the scenario makes the guilt center of my brain (which feels suspiciously like my heart) go into overdrive. However, while that would make me feel terrible, not going to help people in desperate need and by so doing possibly doom them to violent deaths would be the worst kind of immoral act by way of neutrality.

  Letting th
ose people down, letting them come to harm because I was too selfish to take a risk, would be awful in ways I can't describe. I've done many terrible things since The Fall began, but not when I could avoid them. Through those hard choices and scarring acts, I've always tried to do what's best for the community. I've done immoral things to serve a larger good. Maybe that's why I can look myself in the eye.

  But if I refuse to go, I don't think Jess would be able to do the same. I would prove myself to be a different man than she married. Less than I was. I can't let our allies down, but in the end I make the choice to go because I want her to be proud, more than any other factor.

  Saturday, June 16, 2012

  O Death

  Posted by Josh Guess

  I'm in between New Haven and where I'm headed right now. I left home about an hour and a half ago, but we're stopped for a few hours while we wait out a passing swarm of zombies. They aren't close, can't see or hear us, but they're moving across a bridge we have to use so I've got nothing to do but write at the moment. I'm just glad we've got batteries for the cell transmitter so I don't have to try cranking the thing's generator in this heat.

  Something happened back home yesterday that got me thinking. If you aren't a fan of my occasional philosophical posts, you can skip this one if you like. It's that kind of morning.