Dead.

This is an all-time low.

I stared at the wriggling rodent trapped between my fingers. The wildly pumping heart was a song to my sensitive ears, calling for me to sink my teeth in.

So hungry. So, so hungry.

The rat bit down on my finger, not realizing I couldn’t feel it. Black blood dripped from the wound, I ignored it.

Saliva flooded my mouth as I moved closer. I opened my mouth, the rat squealing at the unpleasant sight of my teeth.

Those squeals were what saved the poor thing.

I snapped my mouth shut and set the rat back onto the ground, I watched it scamper into a dark hole mournfully, wiping my palms off onto my filthy shirt.

Pathetic. All the other Z’s are cracking skulls and I can’t bring myself to eat one skinny rat.

A scraping noise made my head snap to the side, towards the entrance of the alleyway I was crouched in. A dead-eyed woman limped by, bone shining from her twisted shin; she paused hopefully, yellow, pus-filled eyes training on me.

I bared my teeth, growling deep in my throat. Getting the hint, she looked away and hobbled on, sensing that I was just as sick as she was.

I sighed, the sound dry and whistling from my diseased lungs.

My body begged for relief, wishing I had the lack of heart and gag-relflex that would allow me to satisfy it.

I looked down at my finger. It seemed rotted now, with my black blood oozing. Physical pain was a distant memory. Makes me feel even less human.

My guess is that as long as my heart and brain aren’t damaged, I’ll just keep chugging along, eternally starved of both flesh and human contact.

Sounds like fun, yeah? I’ve been a starved, rotten shell of a human being for a year and sometimes, I forget that I used to be something else.

You see, I was Infected real early. In week two of the apocalypse, in fact.

To the best of my knowledge, it began in a Chicago airport and took down the city the next day. My memories are fuzzy, all blurred together. Another perk of being Infected.

The clearest memory I have was the day I died, figuratively and literally.

I think we were looking for supplies, my family and I. We stopped because my sister insisted she could hear a baby wailing from a crashed minivan.

My dad and I went to check it out, weapons held tightly in our hands. A thing I vividly remember was the smell, the horrible stench of death and rot.

When we opened the car door, I turned around and vomited. A baby was still strapped to his car seat, his half-eaten mother beside him. He was gone…well, not gone, Infected.

We were understandably distracted. It was a forested area. Neither of us saw it coming.

They swarmed out of the trees, mouths snapping, diseased fingers clawing. We bolted back to the truck.

I threw myself into the backseat just as Dad started the engine. But my door hadn’t been shut yet.

The truck roared forward. A large man in a filthy Longhorns shirt and a beard congealed with blood lunged forward just as I reached for the handle to shut the door.

His fingers caught my wrist. My sister’s cries echoed behind me as I tumbled out of the truck.

I didn’t stand a chance.

He sank his teeth into my neck, ripping into my flesh with rabid ferocity. I screamed for a long moment before I choked on my own blood.

The truck screeched to a stop, but the rest of the horde was coming for them. As horrible as it was, I was going to die. They knew it, I knew it, the man ripping out my throat knew it.

In my last moments, I watched my family battle the Z’s from inside the truck. They made the decision and began to drive away.

Over the sick crunching of my bones and the happy slurps above me, I heard my mother scream. A raw, wild howl of pure grief.

The man mauling my neck fell, a gaping hole through his brain.

My last thought as an Uninfected was that she should have aimed a little lower.

And then I died.

First thing I remember was hunger. A deep, aching, gnawing hunger that took complete control over me. For a while, I was just like every other mindless Z; chasing, killing, anything to be satisfied.

Eventually, something must have shaken loose in my brain, because one day, I woke up from Z mode. I don’t know what happened or what had triggered it, but me was back, the non-cannibalistic version anyway.

I’ve haven’t touched an Uninfected since. A feat only possible by staying far, far away from them.

It’s not hard, my pale skin is now nearly translucent, my lips are the deep, smeared red of the Infected. They actively avoid me when they’re not trying to kill me.

I never found out what happened to my family. I guess that’s why I haven’t let some Uninfected blow my brains out. I don’t remember where I used to live, or what my name was. But I do remember their faces, and I’ve been searching ever since.

I stood from my crouch, listening to my stiffened body crackle and pop.

Maybe I’ll find a running car in this miserable little town.

 

I’ll admit, this one was a little gory. The rat bit even disgusted me. I hope you liked it, because this is the third time I’ve rewrote this story. Please comment, critique, yell in all caps, whatever tickles your fancy.

Ciao, until the next one.