28 Days Later: The Aftermath

28 DAYS LATER: THE AFTERMATH - A writer's survival journal. Day 4

(Thu 04/19/2007 12:48am)

Wednesday, April 18th 2007

Well, the shit hit the fan. Or more to the point, the Infected hit my house, the boards gave way and I had to make a fast escape.

That's the reason for this late entry.

I had been sitting at my computer working on my next Blog and I guess I got used to the sound of constant banging and screaming outside. By the time I looked up from the keyboard, not only had the boards come loose from the window by the front door, but two Infected were already flopping over the sill.

The Infected are frantic and uncoordinated to say the least. They are pure rage which makes them almost completely out of control. In this instance it worked out in my favor.

Once they saw me a dozen or more tried to come in through the window all at once clawing and punching at the air, projecting what they wanted to do to me.

But the dumb fucks were incapable of coordinating an attack. They all came at once and the crazed dolts clogged the window, and bought me enough time to grab a few things and run for the roof.

I live in a row house so traveling the rooftops is the safest. Most of them are down on the streets. As long as they didn't see they'd stay away. But no sooner had the thought crossed my mind when the roof access door from my place burst open and I heard the rasping bark of one of the Infected.

It was woman. She was a nurse once. She still had on her uniform, but now it was soaked with her own vomit-blood.

I stood frozen in the dark for I don't know how long, gripping the duffle filled with my last remaining personal effects. The Infected swung its head fiercely from side to side and if I didn't know better, she seemed to be not only rasping, but sniffing.

It dawned on me then, I'd seen Infected with eyes so swollen, some even gouged out, and still they were able to locate their victims.

This, I thought, was worth noting.

And I grabbed for my note pad.

I was an idiot.

She heard me. I was sitting there wondering about their fucking ability to smell and forgot they could hear pretty fucking good.

I ran.

I had about twenty-five yards of roof left when she came running at me. I couldn't make the jump to the next building. They were separated by a street on that end. She blocked the sides divided by jumpable alleys.

With nowhere to go I turned at the edge and watched her come towards me like a stark raving lunatic covered with blood. She came at me fast. I dropped into a ball at the very last second and felt her legs hit my curled body hard.

A second later I heard her shatter on the pavement below, right on the burn marks from the cocktails I'd thrown the night before to clear my head.

And that's what gave me the idea for the third story. What would it be like to be torn from your home, your neighborhood, your state, your country? Maybe some wouldn't leave. I'd just proven that the Infected can be out-witted; maybe they could even be out-fought.

After I jumped to a safe roof I planted myself and handwrote this entry. I had to leave the computer behind when I'd fled.

It wasn't too bad though. I phoned Lieb and made him type it all out.

Even with the world falling apart around me, it was a nice moment of justice.

Next...final entry