Capitulating Scarletwood

Sitting alone down a dark corridor, I open my notebook, safely breathing fresh air from the unusually quiet night through a slightly cracked window on the third floor of my present location. The wounded have stopped piling in, and though the radio squawks incessantly, the squawkers are mainly wining with fear typical of the safely-gated within the walls of Fort Perryn. I have been moving so constantly I've had barely any time to collect my thoughts. My notebook is full of scribbles, drawings of safe passage, and musings I can hardly make any sense of. But they do remind me just enough. I click my pen to begin writing.

Scarletwood fell, it seems, as quickly as we regained it earlier in the month. I'm writing now from Whittenside, but wish to recall some of the events of late November as Scarletwood tumbled back into ruin.

Our light contingent was holding well at Hillard Road Police Station, mere blocks from Sleway Row PD, where I served before the breakout. We had managed to stay fairly well organized for a short period of time with every member helping out with fuel, barricades, etc. By then, Randy Shughart had reappeared on the scene, and I was somewhat relieved.

There was a break in at the neighboring Angell Building on Nov. 13th, I guess this is where things began to go down hill pretty bad. The Channel 4 News Team got dismantled, I haven't seen the famous Ron Burgundy since. I refuse to believe he's passed on, but it may be some time before he's back on the air. Myself and the other Hillard Road survivors attempted to push back the break in. When I arrived on the scene there was little work left to do. One of my comrades takes down two zombies, leaving one more. It stares at me. "Mrh?" is groans aloud, then gestures at itself, then at the ceiling, then again at itself. "Mrh?" it repeats at me.

"You want me to toss you off the roof?" I asked, somewhat befuddled by the thing's unusual behavior. Before I could get any further with it, my comrade put one in its brain. The CRACK of his .45 gave me a bit of a jolt. Then I shrugged, my curiosity was quickly abated by the dangerous circumstances of our bleak reality.

The next day there was a piece of good news or, at least, what seemed like good news at the time. Little did I know then what Chaos and death would come of such good news. Over the radio came another broadcast, this one from what I thought at the time would be friendlies. "Let's keep transmitters tuned to 26.20, the district frequency of Whittenside. Fort Perryn is back in business and back on the air." I remember the relief in the police station that night was palpable, and we all had a little drink to celebrate. A little tipsy, I climbed up to the radio cage and broadcasted in response: "Read ya loud and clear in Scarletwood, Ft. Perryn. Great news."

Unfortunately, our spirits were not long for the heights. Nisi Nirvana was the last to come back to the station and had missed the festivities having spent the early twilight hours repairing barricades and structure at the nearby Basson Building to our North. It seems that he may not have properly secured the breach on the the the third floor, because one of the many diseased half-living humans (the sort that's been revived, but never really psychologically came back from the dead) snuck in at some point. On watch that night was Fireman 32 (I never got his real name) who found the thing just as it was finishing its destructive handy work on our generator. The thing cackled at him as he went after it with his fire axe. He managed to wound the bastard, but it got away before he could finish the job.

The rest of us were awakened by the ruckus and found our way down to the generator room. 32 looked back at us as he was heading towards the the third floor breach in pursuit. "Fuck, I almost got him but he ran." A few minutes later we could hear 32's voice crackle through the radio to the other survivors in area to beware of the thing, apparently ours was the second generator it downed that night. We all looked at each other, crestfallen. "At least he didn't destroy the radio, just the genny. Easier to replace the genny." I said, before heading out myself to find a new one at the factory many dangerous blocks away.

When I finally returned several hours later with the generator, Shughart had managed to find some fuel and were able to get power back up. But Sam Cork called from the roof top with more bad news, "The Angell Building is under siege again. Come lend a hand, we can still stop them!" Dammit, I thought, we're never gonna be able to hold this area down.

Randy and I looked at each other, "there will be blood," I said quietly. I felt totally beaten at that point, tired from lugging that damned generator all those blocks. I could see it in Shughart's eyes too.

Sparky overheard my utterance and belted out, somewhat drunk, "will there be, Cal?" He shook his flask at me almost useless. "I'll have half a pint, I'm driving tonight." Truly, Sparky was a good driver, but since his sister was taken by the undead, his alcoholism hasn't helped the community very much.

It took us until well after noon on the 15th realize the gravity of the fight at the Angell Building, former home of the Channel 4 News Team. Many of the survivors had been killed in the siege, and the Sever Building to our east had also gone down. Marc Gross and a small party were able to clean that mess up fairly quickly.

Tired from the siege at Angell, we retired back to the station for some rest, though the battle at Angell had barely reached its midpoint. This was around when Patrick Applegate, a member of the NMC (of which Burgundy was a primary leader) started to try to run things. I'm not sure if the situation was seriously out control by then, or if Applegate's leadership was hopelessly inept. There wasn't enough time to find out before we were out on our asses in retreat. Applegate had coordinated much of the radio traffic (using the very transmitter I had set up) in the fight for Angell, and had made a few mistakes. Around one in the morning I had
taken it upon myself to reinforce the barricades that Gross's team had put up at Sever earlier in the day and overheard Applegate trying to send wounded to Fort Perryn. An absurd decision considering there were to hospitals in our district only two blocks away.

When I got back to Hillard Road Station, I told the group not to listen Applegate. "We should get our hospitals up before sending wounded to besieged Ft. Perryn. Especially the infected who can't make it that far." The rest of the survivors seemed to agree, and Applegate was still obsessing over the Angell building. "Do what you will and godspeed." I added, trying to let the provisional commander know I wasn't trying to usurp his position, although I was tempted.

I pause in my writing for a moment. The amidst the incessant chatter from Fort Perryn, over which I had lowered the squelch to concentrate on my journal, I hear something else and turn up the radio: "Attention all members of the Channel 4 News Team...You are needed in the next phase of the plan in E. Grayside."

I think that perhaps I will head that way shortly. Ft. Perryn's become a mess of ridiculousness, and I don't know if I can stand it. Whittenside has also become extremely tame. The streets are barely populated with the undead. Also, heading to East Grayside would take me through the hold stomping grounds and I'd have the opportunity to see what remains of Hillard Road Police Station.

Trying not to get bogged down in the decision making process, I turn my attention back to the notebook, click my pen, and continue writing.

Some time around 11am the next morning Nisi Nirvana had finished repairs to the Angell Building. It had been a hard fought struggle through out the night, but the sense of safety that came with the victory had us all feeling somewhat better. Alyssa Nails was high on the asskicking she had delivered, and was regaling the other survivors with her exploits. "Wow! Those guys were dropping like flies," she was saying when as I approached the doorway of the briefing room with a bottled water. "Flies with a pistol in their mouth and a bullet in their brains!" Several other survivors laughed. I realized I needed some rest and stepped away from the door. "But one of them decided to start hitting back..." she continued as I found my way down the dark hallway.

Things seemed under control, or enough so, at that time that I made the decision to that I would head north to the factory to try to recover another generator that could be utilized in one of our two neighboring hospitals. It turned out I wouldn't make it that far. The Bentley Hotel, which connects us to the Sealey NT building had been ruined and occupied by a small pack of undead. When I entered the ruined building I found none other than that drooling shitbag that had trashed the last generator I brought back. Forgetting about the generator I drew my pistols and emptied them into the thing, a wailed at first, then just gargled at me. It bled a river onto the floor, along with some guts and other awful that stank. Trying to hold my breath, I got close and, wielding my fire axe, chopped its damn head off.

Nerves were out of sort, and I decided just to head back to the Station for the night, I'd go for a new genny in the morning. When I got back to the station, Fireman32 is trying to raise Ft. Perryn on the radio. "How goes the Defense in Perryn?" he asks, "Need backup?" We both wait there in silence, lit only by the glow on the face of the tuner. He was thinking what I had been thinking for days, when should we go back to Fort Perryn? Was it strong enough to hold or was it ready to topple again immediately. Neither of us knew what we were asking for at the time. A response came through, "Apparently we're having a big siege soon. We might need help." We looked at each other and nodded. I wasn't sure if I would got at the time, but after some rest, I knew I'd have to make a decision.

I awoke on the morning of the 17th to a terrible sound. They had gotten in down stairs. A guy we call "The Funk" had been the first to respond and was able to take out one of the things, but not before it had managed to destroy our generator and our radio transmitter. He tried to get the barricades up, but to no avail. Then there was a a whole mess of them running around in the station. You could hear their loud groaning up and down the halls. The others followed suit in defense very quickly; Aizu, Prophet Z, then Suzie Lee who mopped up and got the barricades back in order. Another moment of relief followed. I believed, once again, that our little group at Hillard Road Station was strong and could hold out; that we'd weather whatever would or could be dealt next. There would be no need to rely on Fort Perryn or it's rotating guard of mad-man wannabe generals and assassins, no need to keep an ear to there endless radio drivel, waiting for a kernel of useful information that may never come. So long as they keep the storehouses full and the gates up, they own the place, and the safety of their hundreds of survivors.

I hear a call come from down the hall. More wounded have been brought into the hospital. I assist through triage and manage. I recognize among them someone I know, her name is Winkalt, she's a make-up artist and hair stylist with the Channel 4 News Team. I patch up her wounds. She is dazed and tired. "That should help," I say, wrapping the last of her bandages and still wondering how she can fight the hordes in a blue skirt and stiletto heels. "Winkalt," I say, barely grabbing her attention, "are you going to head to East Grayside with the rest of the Channel 4 Team?" but she is too tired to speak, and allow her the rest.

With the wounded attended to, I retire back to private corner where I can breathe the night air and continue writing in my journal.

Leaving the others to repair the barricades to there best abilities, I struck out north on a genny run. It took me most of the day to reach the factory and locate and working generator. By the time I was on my return route, it was long since sun down. As I cut my way through the upstairs admin level of Methringham Bank, flashlight before me and the heavy generator in tow, I stumbled upon a rotter gnawing on what was probably once the leg of a stodgy banker. Or perhaps, in hindsight, the thing was the stodgy banker (ex) and was enacting perhaps a desire it may never have enjoyed in life, to devour his boss, or some other stodgy banker who he'd had a lifelong rivalry with. The matter seemed less important to me as I opened its head like a melon on the awkward side of my fire axe. Somehow the fantasy had stuck somewhere in my had, because as I dumped its remains out of the second story window a voice in head said, Good for you.

After the ordeal with the banker (ex), I wound up at Club Cort where I ended up crashing. Sadly, Botros was not performing that night.

The last days of Scarletwood are a bit of a blur. I was moving as quickly as I could to try to keep us one step ahead of the undead. My efforts, sadly, would prove useless.

On the morning of Nov. 19th I managed to get the genny back to Hillard Road and turned right around to head for Blesley Mall, many blocks away, with hope of acquiring a new transmitter. I didn't know that was that last time I'd see the Station in operation.

On the way to Blesley I managed to scrounge up a can of fuel for the genny. I thought I was doing well, killing two birds with one stone. I got to Blesley and spent the rest of the day trying to see if I can get a transmitter. The malls are dirty places these days, bartering, trading, and cut throat deals are made in a swarm of needy and frightened survivors waiting to eaten when the next wave of the zombies cracks open the mall like a melon to feast on the fruit inside. I hesitantly spent the night there after successfully gaining the transmitter.

The morning of the 20th: I returned to south-central Scarletwood to find absolutely everything in ruin. The hospitals, the Angell and Sever buildings, and the Hillard Road Police Station. That afternoon I hunkered down with a small group of equally hopeless survivors at the Bentley Hotel, gripping a useless can of fuel and a the radio transmitter, trying to decide what to do, aware that everything around us was in jeopardy. I wondered about the fate of my comrades and eventually after much worry, passed out in one of the rooms upstairs.

I awoke to a break in in the middle of the night, one of the other survivors had been grabbed and dragged out into the street by the zombies, I could hear his screaming as they tour flesh from his bones. Not knowing about the rest of the survivors in the building I fled. I fled as quickly as I could, carrying my fuel and transmitter out into the streets of crumbling Scarletwood. It was not yet dead, but I wouldn't be there to witness its final death throes. From there, through rubble and dodging the hordes as they picked at the bones of Danversbank, I found my way to Whittenside and my final destination: Fort Perryn.

When I arrived at Perryn the lights were on and everyone was home. The next day was Thanksgiving, and I was thankful to have the fort back.

The thankfulness wore off very quickly. On my third day at Fort Perryn I learned that Fireman32 had been accused of murder over freq 26.20, and several nut-jobs at the fort were calling for blood. I hopped on a transmitter as soon as I could. "This is Cal Morse," I broadcast, hell they didn't know who I was, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to put a name with the voice. "I can vouch for Fireman32 to the contrary. He was a great help in Danversbank after Perryn fell last month." I backed away from the transmitter with a terrible feeling. I was reminded why I don't like the fort: people get blood thirsty and turn on one another quickly and easily in the crowded environment.

On the 24th I was smoking a cigarette outside of the Infirmary when I hear the tail end of a radio transmission that makes me feel sick. "...also, Scarletwood has fallen." and I wasn't there to help it gracefully, I had run away. But that's what we've learned to do, run when we must, strike when we must, stay alive at all costs.

The blow is painful enough, a slight loss of hope, that I decided I couldn't stomach the fort. I gathered up my things quickly and without saying goodbye to anyone, I left Fort Perryn in search of somewhere I else, anywhere else that I could make myself useful and take my mind of the tragic fall of Scarletwood and our fine group at The Hilliard Road Police Station.

I close my journal, satisfied that I have managed to chronicle our loss of Scarletwood, our loss of a strong, tight community, bereft of the insanity of the forts and malls. I click my pen and return it to my breast pocket by my badge. I stand and on tip-toes tilt my nose upward to the open window above and inhale once more the fresh night air. As I breathe in the cool autumn air, I breathe hope in with it and a strong conviction that we can survive, rebuild, and revive our lost culture in the face of madness, mayhem, idiocy, and the enduring hunger of the undead.

Collapsing New Buildings

The rebuilt facades of the city are crumbling. Like a living concrete palimpsest the urban skyline erects itself even as it topples into ruin. Over the low moans of the dead I can hear the sound of the city in its tumultuous reformations.

How long has it been since I left Hillard Road heaving in the monstrous shriek of its inevitable collapse? Who knows... But here, in this place, death is not what it used to be...even for the buildings.

I've heard broadcasts from Fort Perryn. Apparently its walls are inching skyward under the watchful ministrations of salty sergeants and their doomed recruits.

Think I'll mosey on over and check things out for myself. Who knows? Maybe I'll see a few familiar faces; pitted and scarred as they may be by the horrors they have known since last glimpsing mine.

Testing the rope, I hoist myself into the breach; collapsing new buildings sing to me as they are reborn to die.

Gone Shopping

You can find two things at the mall. A wealth of supplies and the certainly doomed.
The things flock to these places and are constantly finding every way in possible.

I stayed in Blesley Mall for a night, lucky (if that word bares any further meaning) in my holdover to acquire the radio transmitter I had ventured there for. In less than 24 hours there were at least three break ins, maybe four. The mall is a crunchy cement artifice with a chewy human center, and the dead know this. Now I know it too. Now you know it.

During the night I was awakened by the crackle of my receiver. At first confused, I flinched, then turned it down and listened to the broadcast: "This is Ltbird with MacAddict to anyone in Pennville. Respond if able." I silenced the device, sure that if I survived the night and its regular attacks that I would return to Scarletwood with a hopeful response.

I'm my way back through Scarletwood I pass through Club Cort, sadly it seems as though the singing zombie has been given his walking papers. He's nowhere to be found. I move on and arrive in an abandoned hospital, there is one patient anywhere to be seen. He sits in a waiting room near the ER behind an extremely heavily barricaded entrance. He is distantly nursing the spots in his neck where a Necrotech syringe must have been used. In the flickering flourescent light I approach cautionsly, still unsure of the state of his well-being or his disposition for violence. He barely notices is me, but I see that it is, in fact, Botros. Now, I suppose, the ex-singing zombie. I wonder whether he has any memory of his crude exploitation at Club Cort. For his sake, I hope he doesn't.

I pass through a couple more buildings. I see familiar faces among the sleeping survivors as I find my way to the nearest police station. Here, I hook up the radio transmitter and tune to frequency 26.20 and procede to broadcast. "Ltbird, MacAddict. I read you in Scarletwood. Haven't heard from Pennville since it fell a couple weeks back." I pause for a moment with the microphone in my hand. I look around at the tired survivors in the police station. They look weak, unwilling to fight very hard. I continue, "Looking to take back Ft. Perryn. This is Cal Morse. Over. " I let it go dead and, waiting patiently for a response, I set down the mircophone and spray paint cades at EHB til Scarletwood is green Radio freq 26.20 onto a wall. I sit down in a chair next to the transmitter and slowly allow my tense, tired muscles to relax. It's not easy and I require the aid of some medical brandy from a first aid kit I found in the hospital. I am empty the small bottle, set it down, then let the overwelming exhaustion wash over me and take me off to sleep.

Eu falto-a.

Eu falto-a.

Não há nenhuma palavra para revivify no meu portugese. Anyhow... alguém está sinalizando-me do telhado através da maneira. Têm uma lanterna elétrica e algum tipo da arma. Estão grelhando a carne acima lá. Tudo que eu devo fazer para os alcançar deve cruzar a rua.

Eu tenho que deslizar no cabo, usando meus braços e pés que penduram das linhas de poder defunct. Eu devo cruzar três estiramentos para alcançar esse telhado distante. Meters somente abaixo de minhas trações dos pés uma multidão dos undead. Olham acima listlessly em mim, em suas lingüetas lolling para fora, em seus bordos parched e flexionando como peixes.

Eu alcanço o rooftop seguinte apenas enquanto começa a chover. Os cabos tornaram-se perigosamente lisos. O último estiramento do cabo vai quase em um ângulo de 45 graus até o rooftop com o signaller, que continua a grelhar mesmo nesta chuva.

Escalar o estiramento final é muito mais difícil.

Eu estou começando também a querer saber o que é ele está cozinhando acima lá. Eu era um carniceiro por um momento. Eu não sei o cheiro desta carne.

DESLIZAMENTO!!! Minhas mãos deslizam abaixo dois pés.... Eu prendo mais apertado, escavando em meus pregos na borracha, profundamente.

ZAP!!! Eu electrified.

Eu estou caindo.

Eu caí em uma cama das palmas outstretched.

Os undead carregam-me sobre suas cabeças como Jesus da cruz.

Juntam... como uma escola dos peixes.

A eletricidade fêz meus cérebros unpalatable?

Carregam-me no museu de Bowles.


Eu considero-me nos tetos espelhados enquanto minha cama do zombi me carrega com os hallways vaulted. Meu cabelo girou o branco. Minha visão é afiada: eu nunca necessitarei vidros outra vez, se ou não me comem.

Fazem exame de me ao lobby da exibição do dinosaur.

Lá o cano principal da água erupted, flooding o esqueleto de T-rex até seus joelhos.

Eu sou deixado cair do balcão no lago abaixo.

Alguns peixes pequenos estão mordendo-me.

Espera! Estes não são peixes.

Estes são fetuses minúsculos do zombi.

Que acontecerá com mim agora?

Eu falto-a.

The Lurching Fear

Two days.

That's what he said. I don't remember him anymore, his face blending into the endless blur of desperate and resigned eyes that pass before me on my fruitless circular travels through this hellhole.

But I remember that much: Two days.

Two days lost drifting in and out of sleep, nursing my wounds and cleaning out the infection in my blood.

When I finally came aware my searching gaze fell questioningly on a lone man sitting in the corner of the room I'd been occupying on the upper floors of Sixtus General.

He shook the glaze from his eyes and softly said: "Two Days." Apparently satisfied he nodded to me and left.

I'll probably never see him again. But in that moment we were both comforted by the illusion that keeping track of time still has relevance in a world consumed by thanatic entropy. How many days and nights slip by unnoticed in the cold insomnia of ever-present death? It no longer makes any difference.

Scrounging through the empty wards of the asylum, I gathered together a few supplies and left the hospital. Abandoning once more its sad little community to wander through the half-lit halls, haunted by merciful shadows and echoing the twisted memories of its former inmates with their own tortured experience.

I turned back only once, satisfied to see lights still gleaming through the wooden boards nailed across the windows of the police station I had to leave behind.

A few of them survived. A few of them continue. And so do I...continue. In circles; across the rooftops and down through the abandoned subways of the crumbling cityscape.

I've heard from Morse. He's still alive! That fantastic beautiful bastard. I'm going to find him. In this place, a man you can trust is more precious than cigarettes. Bent beneath more weight than I should rightfully be able to shoulder, I turn my attention to the undead night and plunge headlong into its foul reeking stench. I inhale the infected air. The lurching fear writhes in the hidden darkness below me and I can hear the mindless footsteps of its limbs passing through the streets.

Dare not dream, lest ye follow me bellow.

Puddles of Drool

I awaken to one of the local clubs in Scarletwood, I'm not sure which at first, I don't care for any of them. I begin to stir finding my head on the table, my hat on the floor, and a puddle of drool. The latter is not mine.

I had passed out on a supply run. The lack of sleep is pervasive and unescapable. A never ending cycle of supply, re-supply, barricade, defend, evade. Some of the time I find I've simply become the process, not really human any more, just a machine; searching, rebuilding. That feeling is likely what drove me to the bottle in the first place. I look around, trying to focus my eyes, and don't see a generator or gas nearby, so I must be going, rather than coming. The nearest object is a half-empy beer bottle. I'm surprised no one took it while I was out.

There are others here too, some of them transients, others local, a member of the DRRP I used to know who's given up hope. They're either sleeping one off, or lethargically trying to tie one on in the dim light offered by the club's generator, which is low on fuel.

There is a lone zombie here.

I'm startled for a moment and reach for my fire axe, but remember suddenly, that there is no danger. I shift my eyes to the wall; some one has spraypainted please do not shoot / revive the singing zombie onto a wall. I relax and reach for the beer instead. So it's come to this, hasn't it, Cal? We're so tired, so desensitized, that the horror's become quotidian, and the monsters have become...performers? Showmen? The thing is taking a break, sitting in a chair on stage, drooling all over itself and looking my way, but not at me.

Fearing the senselessness will penetrate my brain before the things outside have the opportunity to munch it themselves, I gather up my things and put my hat on. I'm still a cop, I still have a job to do. I leave a few bucks on the table, for who I'm not sure, and climb the stairs to roof level and peer across the way to the next building. I take a breath. Move on, Cal, keep moving.

Expedições das estradas inoperantes! o caro deus ajuda-nos!

este armazém está cheio dos ratos que eu não posso respirar me perdoo Matilda doce eu sou logo talvez um dos mortos urbanos!

--- Sergeant Lino Carvalho

Out of the Mist

Awake.

A vapid raging pounds against the barricades that have fallen almost completely into ruin overnight. Everyone is sleeping. I begin a futile effort to block the doors but the makeshift reinforcements fall as quickly as I put them up; there's more than one of them out there.

Gripping my shotgun I move to a strategic position and await the inevitable. I gaze around at the sleeping and the half awake; those that are conscious look at me with the pleading desperation of the useless. I'll do what I can; but most of you are doomed, I think, as the last of the barricades fall loosely to the floor.

Its him. I know it the second the doors fly open and he lets out that soulless shriek of primal hunger that haunts the collective nightmares of us all; his fetid groan debasing the world of the living with its foul stench and mindless horror.

It knows me. Gesturing wildly it moves towards me with an unholy speed, bits of rotting foulness falling off its flailing corpse as it races towards its meal. But I'm ready.

I fire into its chest, blowing a hole clear through its back and sending chunks of blackened insides onto the teaming hordes behind him. The softness of his flesh defies my calculations and instead of falling backwards as I predicted, it falls upon me, tearing at my flesh with torn claws and shattered teeth.

I brace myself. Time enough to recoup later. I fire again...and again...huge chunks of him fly around me. I'm covered in his horrible liquefied mess. I cry out silently to my forsaken God; the bastard is eating me alive.

I empty round after round from gun after gun. Coldly ignoring my wounds that grow more severe with every passing second. Just a little more. My vengeance is so close I can taste its cold metallic sweetness in the blood that fills my mouth. A final bullet tears through its active brain centers, blowing half its fucking head into a fine black mist.

It falls to the floor as the others swarm around me. I stomp on the remains of its head as I break loose from the horde and stumble upstairs. Move Soldier! I ignore the screams of those I've left behind as I stumble upstairs towards the window...and the rope. The terrible sounds of feasting travel through the floorboards; I jam a syrette into my thigh and the soothing warmth spreads through my body, dulling the pain as the sounds below fade into a whisper.

Grabbing the rope I make my way across to the hospital; the fog has lifted and out of the mist I can see that the lights are still on. Ignoring the quietly dying cries behind me I finish the crossing and fall into the upper floors of the hospital, bringing the last remnants of window glass with me onto the floor.

I grab another syrette and jam it into my arm as a small group of people move cautiously towards me; one of them begins tending to my bloody shoulder. A man comes tumbling through the window behind me; he's unharmed and panting.

"Thank you." he says, looking me in the eyes as I pass out under the combined efforts of my wounds and the morphine.

Vengeance is mine.

A Pyrrhic victory.

Impatience

I don't even feel it anymore. The crunch of broken glass beneath my feet, the shallow pulse leaving the vein. Before the hunger there was nothing, now there is still nothing...only more of it.

Today (?) I stand among my brethren...waiting at the Wicklin Monument for my chance to wake up from this nightmare. Freedom is so close, my anticipation as sharp as the needle jammed into my neck. I feel it rushing into my brain but stopping, suddenly. Locked up in my rotted grey matter, the revivification serum is useless, pointless.

He's angry, but I didn't do anything to him. Suddenly I'm on the ground; a smoking hole in my temple, as dry as the dead leaves gathered at the foot of the monument. Extinguished like so much rubbish. But I can still smell him...I can still smell him...

Have you seen the fog?

Prying loose a small board, I peer outside a darkened windowless frame into the godforsaken street...

Out of the thickening swirls of falling ash and mist a shambling figure shuffles forward... I recognize its body, obscured as it is by the elysian smog...Mandibles...

The Eldritch memory of an indescribable terror grips me for a moment and between one second and its isochronal death I can remember the foul taste of writhing flesh. I wretch quietly, forcing the bile back into my grinding stomach.

I shudder and replace the barricade over the hole, closing off my inarticulate vision...but the smell of death and the horrid whisper of our approaching doom seeps through the cracks....

I know he's out there. For the love of my abandoned God and everything that was once holy but has now fallen into decay and ruin, I will have my cleansing vengeance...but not now...
perhaps not today...soon though...very soon.

I close my eyes. All in Good Time...