I had another nightmare. Still haven't had a good night's sleep. This bad dream had me standing over Cheyenne's grave, surrounded by Sandra's makeshift crosses. I had one in my hand as well, and I went to kneel down to her grave and put it in the freshly overturned soil when a column of dirt exploded in front of me. Cheyenne reached out from her grave, her body fully decomposed, nothing but rotted flesh and bone. She grabbed my wrist and slashed it with something, not sure what, but it felt jagged like broken bone. Before I could pull back, she slashed my other wrist and grabbed me by the back of the neck pulling me into a kiss. Her putrefied tongue forced its way into my mouth, like a fish burrowing into the bottom of the sea floor. I pushed her face away as she hissed at me, "THANKS FOR NOTHING!" and whatever sharp tool she used to slit my wrists she used on my throat, slitting it clean open.
This time, I didn't jolt awake. I didn't startle Kat. She was sleeping peacefully. I wanted to wake her, to talk about the dream, but I waited until tomorrow. She has such a warm way of comforting me. The way she hugs me, my worries seem to melt into her and she dissolves them. If only we could just hold each other forever. I know, that sounds real sappy. I wonder how I would be able to process things without her, but then a part of me reminds myself I wouldn't be here had it not been for her. I don't know what the point is of dwelling on that fact...
We had an incident today building the barrier. In order for us to build such a thing, we had to line up roughly 3000 feet worth of tables and cars. It would be impossible to connect Fishing Creek and the Susquehanna River with the barrier, so we attempted to just cover up the gaps of any clearings in the streets. We were going to use the fences of Highland Cemetery and Lock Haven University as part of the wall, which would end just at the river, but we didn't make it anywhere near that. We were jumped by four extremely quiet freshies.
Dustin spotted them just as they leapt around the corner of a building just as we were rolling cars out of its parking lot when Carmello withdrew his Alligator and charged at them. He kept the attention of two of them while the other two darted for Jonathan and me. Dustin rushed in and tackled one of them just before he reached Jonathan, and I went to swing with my bat at the one making a bee line to me. It leapt clear over me with such swiftness, I wasn't sure if I was fighting a zombie or a ninja. Zombie ninjas would be the absolute worse
I turned around and blindly swung at the thud I heard behind me and I connected, but it wasn't the zombie's head. It was enough force to knock him off balance, and I followed through with a leg sweep, rolled over on top of him and smashed my bat into its head like a pile driver. As I looked up, I saw Dustin struggling to hold the zombie down who was clawing his way toward Jonathan, but was met with a kick to the jaw by his steel-toed work boot. The blow brought the zombie flat to the ground where Jonathan lifted his foot and brought it down on the zombie's skull like a T-Rex pinning its prey. That's when we heard Carmello cry out. Just as he decapitated one, the other grabbed his right arm and managed to land a bite on his hand. He kicked it away, transferred the machete to his left hand, swiftly chopped off his right, and then jammed the blade into the freshie's forehead.
We ran to him as he dropped to one knee and Dustin quickly tore off one of his sleeves and made a tourniquet around Carmello's forearm. We were all impressed by Carmello's quick thinking, but we were also concerned if what he did to save himself would work. Jonathan panicked and said we should kill him now just to be on the safe side and had to duck as Carmello threw his machete like a tomahawk. Had he been able to do that right handed, Jonathan would not be with us today. "YOU WAIT UNTIL I TURN YOU MOTHER FUCKER!" was what Carmello yelled to him when Jonathan looked at him dumbfounded. Dustin calmed both of them down saying the best thing now is to get back to the hospital.
Before we left, I noticed something about the freshies. I wasn't able to tell from across the river the other night but now seeing them up close, I could see. Their skin was different. It was somehow darker, like it was tanned. Not a tan from a tanning salon or the beach, but tan like tanned hide; like leather. Their skin appeared to be aged. These weren't freshies. These looked to be older zombies, but those kind decay. They lose mobility. Their tendons and muscles erode away. That's why they drag their feet. Are they mutating?
I told Dustin we should grab one of the corpses back to the hospital and have Nicholas and Timothy examine it. Dustin said it wasn't a bad idea. He put Carmello's good arm around his to help keep him upright and Jonathan helped me carry the decapitated body. I told him to grab the head as well, not sure what good it would do,but who knows? Maybe the doc and zombie expert could use it.
We arrived to the hospital and were met with two waves of screams from the women. One was when they saw Carmello missing his hand, and two was when Jonathan and I arrived with a zombie carcass and head. Poor Sandra. I didn't see her for the rest of the day. Nicholas ran to Carmello and quickly brought him in and began tending to his wound while we brought the zombie into another room and laid him on the table. I asked Timothy to join us while Nick worked with Carmello. Immediately, Timothy saw what I saw. The difference in physiology was readily apparent to him He confirmed my worst fear. They were changing. Not having any obvious state of decay, Tim had no idea how to date the zombie, but he waged a guess and said they were at least three to four weeks old based on how tough the skin looked.
When Nick was finished with Carmello, he joined the rest of us. He then examined the head, expecting the eyes to pop open at any moment. I asked him, and Tim as well, why the head isn't alive since the brain was damaged (not really alive, but you know what I mean) and his theory was that it was mostly due to the fact that the brain stem was severed from the spinal cord. Remember how I told you that ANY part of the brain you damage shuts the zombie down? That delicate network extends to the brain steam as well, it seems. Hmm... makes me wonder if it goes all the way down the spinal cord. I'll have to try that out next time...
After dinner, Kat and I retired to her room, which we now have come to call our room. We talked, which lead to snuggling, which lead to kissing, which lead to us taking each other's clothes off, which lead to more sex, which led to spooning, which led to more talking. She told me about her parents, how she lost both of them to the airborne strain, how she watched each one get sick, one getting sicker than the other and the other getting sicker than the one. It was like some kind of tandem roller coaster ride where each train was racing each other to reach the other end of the track. She knew they were an hour or two from turning.
That's when she confessed to me through nearly incomprehensible sobbing. She killed her parents. She couldn't take seeing them getting sick anymore, knowing what they were about to become, so she left their room, grabbed a gas can from the garage and doused the first floor, lighting a match on the way out. She sat on the lawn, watching the house burn to cinders with her parents inside, still alive, too sick to scream. When the fire was nothing but smoking embers, she realized no firetruck or police cars came. That's when she decided to leave Canada.
She told me she felt so guilty for freaking out over me murdering someone when she killed her own parents, but I stopped her right there. What she did was hardly the same as what I did. I killed someone in cold blood, out of concentrated anger. She killed out of mercy. Her parents were already dying, and were going to turn into undead monsters. She saved them from a fate worse than death, from being stuck in a mortifying state of limbo. No matter what I said, though, I couldn't calm her. She was choking on her sobs, her body shaking so hard, it was rocking the bed. I tried my best to sooth her, but the harder I tried, the sooner I began to cry myself. Eventually, she cried herself to sleep.
I'm so sick of tears right now. I'm so sick of her crying, me crying. I'm sick of death and suffering and sadness. I'm sick of feeling so drained. I NEED a good night's rest! Just one night, at least a few hours of uninterrupted sleep, no nightmares! I want to start feeling normal again! Please God, stop fucking with me...
Until tomorrow.
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