Sometimes we shouldn't follow our dreams...
Every armchair general has a theory about how the plague started. Most civilians have come to the consensus that the government had the military working on something - either a weapon to use against our enemies or a treatment to use on our own troops - and that something is what caused this whole mess. The military are on the same page, although they posit it was definitely a weapon and definitely sent by our “enemies”. They figure that the fact that the plague spread all over the world was just a matter of its creator’s overconfidence or ignorance, probably both. I’d expected the religious to see it as the wrath of the divine, judgment day…what have you. And some of them do subscribe to that line of thought. I was surprised by how many, from every and any faith, couldn’t care less about the cause, choosing to focus on the world’s recovery, both physical and spiritual. After all, wasn’t the fact that we were safe, that we were surviving, proof that this wasn’t the end?
Those civilians, those soldiers, those holy men and women - they are all gone now. The camp is gone. I haven’t seen another one in my long, hard trip across the country. I haven’t seen a single living soul in three months. I think only one thing has pushed me on, kept me moving, kept me alive. The truth. I think the world is beyond saving so now, for this old reporter, all I have left is trying to find the story. So here I am, in the suburban Chicago laboratory of a Mr. Allan Jesshoff. I have followed scraps of notes, half-remembered tales from the lips of dying men, and not a healthy bit of gut instinct to this still mostly intact structure. The lab itself is of little interest to me - I have no idea what half the devices do and making suppositions isn’t my job here, anyway. No, the lab, even with the still writhing zombie strapped to the examining table, its tattered lab coat still baring the logo of the lab, is of no interest to me now. But the small office-slash-apartment behind it is. A few hard kicks get the door open (it takes me a second to understand that I just kicked a door in and I stop for a second to soak in just how different I’ve become) and the first thing I notice are the posters on the wall. DAY OF THE DEAD. 28 DAYS LATER. I, ZOMBIE. NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD. The second thing I notice is the body, with one, precise hole through the head. The lab coat on this one not only identifies the lab but the also the wearer. I pull the door closed behind myself and push Mr. Jesshoff off the couch, onto the floor, as I sit down. There are several neatly stacked notebooks on the small coffee table. On top of the stack is a single sheet of loose leaf paper. It’s dated 01/16/2007. Below the date, in simple block capitals, it reads, “I DID IT!”
Those civilians, those soldiers, those holy men and women - they are all gone now. The camp is gone. I haven’t seen another one in my long, hard trip across the country. I haven’t seen a single living soul in three months. I think only one thing has pushed me on, kept me moving, kept me alive. The truth. I think the world is beyond saving so now, for this old reporter, all I have left is trying to find the story. So here I am, in the suburban Chicago laboratory of a Mr. Allan Jesshoff. I have followed scraps of notes, half-remembered tales from the lips of dying men, and not a healthy bit of gut instinct to this still mostly intact structure. The lab itself is of little interest to me - I have no idea what half the devices do and making suppositions isn’t my job here, anyway. No, the lab, even with the still writhing zombie strapped to the examining table, its tattered lab coat still baring the logo of the lab, is of no interest to me now. But the small office-slash-apartment behind it is. A few hard kicks get the door open (it takes me a second to understand that I just kicked a door in and I stop for a second to soak in just how different I’ve become) and the first thing I notice are the posters on the wall. DAY OF THE DEAD. 28 DAYS LATER. I, ZOMBIE. NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD. The second thing I notice is the body, with one, precise hole through the head. The lab coat on this one not only identifies the lab but the also the wearer. I pull the door closed behind myself and push Mr. Jesshoff off the couch, onto the floor, as I sit down. There are several neatly stacked notebooks on the small coffee table. On top of the stack is a single sheet of loose leaf paper. It’s dated 01/16/2007. Below the date, in simple block capitals, it reads, “I DID IT!”