I cut the heart out of one. It kept moving (the rotter did, and its heart did for a minute, too), kept trying to give me a snap-snap. The heart hadn’t been beating. It had been jiggling. It eventually stopped and I set it aside.
I tried to feed one rotter some food. It didn’t want trail mix or crackers or honey. It wasn’t even interested in jerky—maybe too tough? I cut some fresh meat from the fish that was going to be my supper. No. Rotters only wanted living flesh. And I’d never seen them shuffle after a non-human animal. They seemed only to be interested in human flesh.
Eventually, I determined the traditional stories of killing the brain or the brainstem to stop a zombie were right on. It was the only quick way to deal with them, too. They could be slowed down in many ways, but even when their legs were too broken to stand on, they’d drag themselves along the ground.
I re-killed four of my captives, gagged the last one, and let it follow me. For the next day, I led it along, studying it a bit more. It still just wanted to eat. It responded to sound, mostly, but also to movement, to visual stimulation. It didn’t seem to have much of a sense of smell, but then the funkiness of its decaying flesh blocked out most scents. I doubt much can cover it up. I never got immune to that smell. It was like a fume that seeped into my pores.
The rotter continued to decay, mostly from the inside out. Rotter flesh is gray-black, but will stay intact until some festering mass of maggots bursts out. Or until the sun dries it and it shrivels up.
Rotters can stay mobile for a long time, even though they don’t drink and might go a long time without food. If a rotter’s body had been reasonably healthy when it was turned, it could go on indefinitely. It might walk for months, if circumstances are right. But they don’t seem to think, don’t try to speak. (I did try talking to my captive, but it never responded except to follow the noise.) Their bodies don’t heal and don’t need sleep, though they sometimes wobble around in one spot; an odd attempt at conserving energy, I guess. Until something enticing passes by. They don’t seem to be able to stay still. And they don’t need to breathe. I took the lungs out of my last rotter test subject. It sputtered wheezily, attempting to inhale the air it didn’t need, but was otherwise unimpaired. The part of the brain which controls involuntary functions must remain at least partially intact after the change.
Many human drives didn’t seem to survive in the rotters—especially our desire for belonging. Companionship doesn’t matter to the rotters one whit, let alone love. They sometimes travel in swarms, but they appear to be just as content on their own. I felt like a rotter that way. I didn’t feel any particular need for companionship, and I didn’t know how to love or be loved. It seemed like a second life as a rotter version of myself might not be so bad.
But I couldn’t become a rotter.
I chopped my hunting knife across the back of the rotter’s neck, severing its brainstem. I was done with my experiment.
met a girl in the woods. Renee. She’d been a grad student when the world changed. She had been on her own for some time, hiking and camping. She was easygoing and didn’t ask a lot of questions. We ended up traveling together for a few days.
Renee was a little taller than average, and her body was lean and strong. Her hair was long and shiny, the kind of hair I’d always wanted. It was brown, like mine, but with natural gradations of color. It slid silkily over itself when she moved her head, and it shone in the sunlight. So pretty. I envied her.
Neither of us was in any particular hurry to get to any particular place. Standing on the edge of the trail, she waved her hand toward a mountain.
“Do you wanna?” she asked.
“Well, why not?”
We started down the trail. Almost immediately, we found a brook. The water babbled and burbled over smooth rocks. Renee pointed downstream. A deer was drinking from the water. We filled our water bottles (we both had the kind with built-in filters—can’t be too careful) and continued onward. The trail was rough. No one had been through this way in weeks, and I suspect the trail had been rugged even when well-traveled. After a couple hours of puffing along, we both were ready for a break. We sat underneath a stand of tall spruces, like the ones I used to climb back at the farmer’s home.
Catching a second wind, I decided to give them a try.
“I want to climb,” I said, feeling a little silly. I was a bit old to be playing in trees.
Renee didn’t seem to think it was silly, though. She scampered up the tree behind me.
I’ve always loved climbing trees. Those strong branches seem like wonky ladders waiting to support me. Spruce can be mean, its little sprills biting into skin like sharps-style sewing needles. Still, I love the smell of it. I never mind the sticky pitch it leaves on my fingers—it makes me even more secure as I bound up, farther up.
We stood on the highest limbs that would hold us, looking out at the land for a long stretch of silence.
“I haven’t done this in far too long,” Renee commented.
“Me either.”
After we descended, we shared a meal of astronaut ice cream Renee had been carrying. I’d never tried this food before, if you can call it food. I liked the odd, crunchy texture and the way it stuck to my teeth. Renee pulled on her backpack as I ran my tongue through my mouth, savoring the last bits of our meal.
“What are you doing?” she laughed.
“Getting the last of it! It was yummy!”
“You got it all from your teeth, anyway,” she commented. She still had some on her front tooth. Not really caring about it, I pointedly touched one of my front teeth, where the slimy bit of leftover remained on hers, and she rubbed it away.
I slid into my backpack’s straps, gazing up the trail.
“Teeth?” Renee asked, showing them off.
“Good!”
We moved on.
The trail kept getting steeper. We didn’t have extra breath for talking, which was fine by me. Eventually, it did even out somewhat, and we walked side by side through there.
Renee felt like a kindred spirit, even though her background was fairly ordinary, from what she told me. We could enjoy hiking together, we could appreciate nature, and the silences between us were comfortable ones. Most people can’t stand silence for long. With her, it felt natural.
We cleared the tree line, and soon we hit the truly difficult part of our hike: climbing up huge chunks of granite. There was no walking now; the trail was nearly a ninety-degree angle uphill—all climbing. My legs cramped. I stopped for a moment to pound my fist against my calf, trying to shock it into easing up.
“Advil.” Renee tossed a small bottle my way.
I swallowed two pills and took a gulp of water, then threw the pill bottle back. “Thanks.”
She adjusted her bag. “Ready?”
“As long as you are.”
Up we went. Up some more. It always seemed like the top would be just over the next rock. But then there was another, and another, and another…
And then, suddenly, the top! It felt miraculous, stepping out onto the peak. We set down our heavy loads and explored our surroundings. The peak wasn’t large. It had a small signpost, which probably listed its name and altitude. Renee read it, but I didn’t bother. I was too busy looking off the far side of the peak from where we’d entered. It was a sheer drop—had to be two thousand feet! Standing on the edge of it took my breath away.
“Wow.” Renee had arrived beside me.
“Yeah,” was all I could say.
Before settling for supper, we gathered several stones and stacked them. A cairn of sorts. We placed them artistically, discussing Andy Goldsworthy and Dan Snow and other artists who worked with nature, especially with rocks. I’d never tried expressing myself creatively this way before. I’d learned to play the guitar back at the farmer’s, and I learned to like to sing, and I could draw a little, but that was it. I’d never considered myself an artist, but what we made together up on the peak was definitely art. Not the pretentious, so
ulless stuff you might see in galleries. Something we lived and breathed and felt, something that lived and breathed and felt back. The winds buffeting the mountain flowed through our rock structure, whistling a harmonious song because Renee had tucked a couple of open-mouthed bottles into it. We stood back, pleased with our work and speechless at its glory. It continued to sing to us all through supper and all through the night.
We still had plenty of water, so we agreed to stay near the peak, but we didn’t need to use Renee’s tent. The granite ledges possessed plenty of spaces where we could be sheltered from the harsh winds beating at the mountain’s top. We both were covered in sweat. We shivered more with each breath of air that came from the sky and swirled around the peak. We crawled down into a crevice, underneath a rock which would surely crush us if it shifted. Renee spread her sleeping bag on the rough surface so it was wide enough for both of us.
“You don’t have to share it,” I told her. I didn’t mind sleeping on stone, and I was used to going without. I hadn’t even bothered to carry a real blanket.
“You’ll be more comfortable. You know the rock will just suck the heat out of you.”
I gave in and helped her spread the puffy fabric out more.
We unwrapped and unfolded Mylar emergency blankets and tucked wadded-up shirts under our heads. Exhausted from the long day, we dropped into deep slumber.
The next morning, I was terribly sore. This was to be expected. I stretched gingerly and Renee handed the Advil bottle back to me, telling me to keep it. I gave her something in exchange: a Mountain Dew that was tucked down in my backpack. She’d mentioned liking it the previous day, and it seemed like a reasonable trade.
“Seriously, really?” she enthused.
“Seriously, really. All yours. Thanks for the Advil.”
“Thanks for this!” She struggled it open and took a long drink. “Okay, so you know how you were about the astronaut ice cream? I am so feeling it right now.”
“This won’t stick to your teeth, though. It’ll just eat through them eventually.”
“I’m not going to worry about that,” she said. “Life’s too short.”
I didn’t really agree life was too short, but I nodded. I agreed with the sentiment. Do what you want to do when you have the chance to.
“You know one thing I didn’t know I’d love about mountains?” Renee asked.
“Hmm?”
“No rotters up here.”
She was right. They didn’t bother to climb up on anything, not ever.
“I appreciate that the only real stench up here is us,” I added.
“Best stench I’ve been around since Before.”
We hiked down the mountain. It took longer than the trip up had, because the walking path was so steep that Renee worried about losing her balance and breaking an ankle (or worse). She insisted that we go slowly, but I didn’t mind. There was nothing to hurry along for.
For supper, we had beef stew. Renee teased me for carrying it up the mountain and back. “I have never known anyone who hiked with this sort of stuff! Canned goods? You’re so weird!” She laughed as we watched it heat up and we shared an apple.
“You don’t have to have any,” I said with mock warning, punctuating it by chomping off a big piece of the apple before handing it over.
“I take it back! I take it back!” She giggled and took a bite.
We ate our supper in companionable silence (aside from her utterance of, “This is even better than I expected!”), then we packed up everything we didn’t need for the night. There were signs at this campsite, brown with white lettering, warning of bears in the area. Renee grabbed a hooked pole and together we hoisted our things up on the line that was strung a couple hundred feet away from the trail. Our backpacks were bear bags for the night.
The next evening, we stayed near a pond. We swam a long time, enjoying the cold water and feeling clean again. I’d forgotten what it felt like to not be covered with a film of sweat and grime. We washed our dirty clothes, too, and hung them to dry over a line we’d strung between two trees.
We didn’t sleep in Renee’s tent that night either. Instead, we made use of one of the lean-tos that used to be rented out to hikers. In the wee hours of the morning, I was pounced awake by a squirrel which had wandered in randomly and kicked the side of my head. I giggled as it scurried off, and then I went back to sleep.
That was the greatest thing about hiking. It wore me down enough to get decent rest.
We were taking a break the next afternoon. We perched on rocks and munched trail mix. A squirrel irritably chattered at us for invading its turf.
I finished my snack and hopped up. “Bathroom,” I explained, walking away.
When I returned, a rotter lay motionless at Renee’s feet. And Renee’s arm was bleeding. I checked it over, eyeing the oval-shaped wound and counting tooth marks.
I’d been bitten before, and hadn’t turned. This wasn’t information I ever gave out because the why of it was unclear to me. I allowed myself to think, for a minute, that the apple-sharing time might protect my new friend. But it didn’t.
Renee pulled a tooth out of the wound. Teal-colored pus oozed from the hole. The bite was turning a blackish green already. Her skin cracked and peeled.
“Guess I’m done,” she said, putting on a brave face and trying to pass me her knife.
I declined.
“You’ll need it for…” She stopped talking.
“Do you want…” I began. How to end my sentence? “It doesn’t seem like turning’s so bad.”
She looked surprised, as if it hadn’t occurred to her that being reborn as a rotter and living on in that way was an option.
She gazed into the sky. Her hair glinted. A sheen of sweat covered her face. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You won’t. Don’t worry about me,” I assured her.
Renee took off her oversized backpack. Her tent and sleeping bag were strapped to the outside. She passed it all to me.
“Thanks,” I said. The extra supplies would be useful.
“I think I’d like to try it,” she said decisively. The whites of her eyes had taken on a pink tinge. “Maybe wander for a bit.”
“Okay. I’ll stay with you until… after.”
We settled on the ground.
“Don’t worry about me,” I told her again. “I’ll slip out of here fast enough. You won’t be a danger.”
She looked calmed by the words. I felt proud of her. She was handling this with dignity and grace.
“I won’t forget you,” I promised.
“Wish I could say the same,” she murmured. “But, you know.”
“Yeah.”
She sighed. “We had a few nice days. Best since this shit went down.”
“Sure did.”
“I want you to know—” she uttered, but then she started to twitch, and she fell on her side. The pinks of her sclerae made the final transition in an instant, becoming bright red. The words died on her lips as the virus killed her. They weren’t revived when her body was.
Before she could come after me, I jumped up and pulled on Renee’s heavy backpack, then grabbed my smaller one, jogging away into the woods and leaving her free to travel whichever way she would.
Whichever way it would. Not her anymore. Renee’s body had become something else. Or maybe it hadn’t. I had no way to tell for sure.
enee’s backpack was a high-end one, but I’m oddly sentimental about my own backpack, even though I don’t usually get attached to things. I swapped out some clothes and loaded her food in with my stuff.
A treasure was in her bag: a tiny camp stove. It was made from the bottom pieces of two beer cans, one of which had been slid upside-down into the other. It was just over two inches tall, with holes poked all around one end. The end with the holes was the top; it served as the burner. The stove ran on methanol or isopropyl alcohol and it could boil a cup of water in under two minutes. Nifty. I tucked it in the free outside right
pocket of my backpack (the left pocket was for my drink, always), along with some lighters and a bottle of dry gas.
I carried everything along, even the stuff I didn’t want, knowing I’d soon encounter a group and someone there would be able to use the extra supplies. I strapped and bungeed the sleeping bag to my own backpack. It would be nice to zip in there on a cold night.
In those still-early days of the apocalypse, I did pick up a couple other companions. Two small dogs started following me, hoping I’d feed them. Their optimism wasn’t misplaced. The dogs wore no name tags or collars, so I named them. The small, reddish-brown mystery mutt was Mochi-Mokey. The black-and-white Chihuahua mix, who looked like she’d be a tiny butterball cow if such a thing existed, was Kaibo.
I’d never had a pet before. Not even at the farmer’s, where various animals resided. I hadn’t necessarily wanted a pet, but these little pups chose to be with me.
Mochi-Mokey and Kaibo seemed to always be hungry, no matter how much they were fed. Despite this irritation, I enjoyed having them around. They didn’t have a lot to say, and they didn’t care if I had nothing to tell them. At night, they curled up with me. One would snuggle in behind my knees and the other would rest against my belly, my arm slung over her back.
When we stopped in the woods for a meal, Mochi-Mokey would sit quietly at first, with her little jaw wobbling. I’d give her a piece of my granola. Kaibo would hop about and drool, then dance around, balancing on her hind legs. I’d laugh and throw her a piece of jerky.
“Roo-loo-loo!” Mochi-Mokey would then demand. “Roww-roww-rool!”
“Robble,” I’d prompt her.
“Robble!” she’d respond. Then she’d hop up and lick my nose. I’d give her another bit of my food.
These dogs were always exuberantly happy to just hang out with me, and it made me feel valued. I could finally understand why people had pets. I could see their value now.
Survial Kit Series (Book 1): Survival Kit's Apocalypse Page 3
