Zuzanna Szmyt-Nowakowska
May 14, 2052
It’s been eight months since the outbreak and almost five months since the Nowak Revelation. It seems like this horror has been going on forever. My family and I are safe. We’ve barricaded ourselves in our house with enough supplies to last us at least two more years. It’s a really good thing I’ve been stocking on canned food and clean water ever since the COVID-19 epidemic. God… Is this all this century’s going to be? Isolation and disease? I try not to think about it. Although it breaks my heart that little Karol can’t go out to the playground and play with other kids. Poor little fella. When I was his age we used to run around the neighborhood all day long. It’s a real shame he won’t ever be able to partake of this experience. I have long abandoned all hope of things ever becoming normal again, although I would never admit it to my wife. She’s not strong enough. Every day I see her looking out of the window at the nameless shapes skulking up and down the silent desolate street with this intense longing in her eyes, which seems to be rooted in the deepest recesses of her heart. Poor Ewelina… She’s completely broken.
Anyway, I have to go outside feed our dog Fifi. We keep her in a shabby dog playpen right outside our door. It is adjacent to the barricade, which I fashioned out of every piece of old furniture or unused fence that I could find in our basement. It should hold: in case the shapes should want to break in. They seem to be scared of old Fifi’s barking, so we don’t get many of them wandering outside the barricade. At least when they’re not in a group…
One time a herd of them came around, and once old Fifi started barking they all threw themselves against the barricade. It seems like they sense that their strength is in numbers and get a lot braver once they’re in a pack. God… I wouldn’t wish the sight of that terror on my worst enemy. I had to get out there and bring the dog inside. The bellowing and belching of the shapes still haunts my nightmares. And the stench… Oh, Jesus Christ – the S T E N C H. It was unbearable. Imagine the smell of a fox that’s been run over by a car and lying all day in the heat of the summer sun on the scorching asphalt. Now multiply the intensity of that smell a hundred times. That’s how bad it was. After a while they finally gave up and took off. Thank God they did…
After the stumbling mass of shapes had disappeared behind one of the nearby residential blocks, I took old Fifi out to her playpen again. When I came back inside, I saw Ewelina watching the outside world through the window, as if she was waiting for the herd to come back. Her eyes were vacant and their expression sent a chill down my spine when she turned them upon me and asked:
“What would we do if they breached the barricade and burst through the door?”
“I don’t know…” I went to check on Karol playing in his room, leaving her by the window immersed in the darkness of her sullen brooding.
June 20, 2052
It’s been seven months since the outbreak. Exactly four months ago a group of researchers in Warsaw who were studying the recently mutated coronavirus, a close relative of the virus that caused the entire world to go into lockdown thirty years ago, discovered that the disease seems to prompt pathological activity in corpses including raising them to their feet, walking around in circles, and exhibiting violent tendencies. The discovery is now known worldwide as the Nowak Revelation, named after Prof. Andrzej Nowak who led the research in Warsaw, or the event which made the public aware of the shapes. If only Prof. Nowak hadn’t published his research…
Normally, it takes around a week for an infected human body to rise, depending on the overall condition of the deceased and the cause of death. This means that if only humans had gone on burying their dead or cremating them as they normally had, we wouldn’t have to deal with the shapes as much as we do. All that would have changed would be, at best, some unpleasant muffled sounds coming from beneath the burial grounds in the cemeteries. However, much like it always does, human vanity and stupidity prevailed, and soon people started stashing their dead in their basements or attics, sharing their loved ones’ posthumous antics on social media as if they were pets. Then a viral trend called “the zombie challenge” kicked off. People would record themselves getting chased around by the shapes and post the videos online. One thing led to another and the dead started escaping and biting the living. Any contact the infected saliva had with human blood proved deadly, turning the living into ferocious creatures wandering around our towns. That’s when we began calling them shapes, as that’s usually what you get to see before you should start running.
Every government action taken to contain the outbreak failed and soon the dead started flooding the streets. Countries like Germany and Sweden promptly banned any franchise featuring “zombies,” so as to prevent them from encouraging the public to act as if they were the heroes in the middle of an apocalypse. Of course, that wasn’t exactly effective, as some video game freaks or adrenaline junkies still chose to go out in organized groups trying to hack up the dead using such laughable weapons as axes or even swords. Can you believe that? Swords. God, I hate nerds. Anyway, all those idiots quickly perished, adding their lives to the COVID-51 death toll.
You see, the problem with the shapes is that you can’t really kill them. All you can do is hack off all of their limbs and hope they don’t crawl fast enough to bite you before you bury them in the ground. Either that or you can batter the poor wretches’ heads till they stop moving and then run for your life before they recover and get back up. At least that’s what one hears on TV. I don’t let Ewelina or Karol watch it anymore, though. All that’s ever on these days is information about the death toll and forecasts of even bigger gangs of shapes visiting certain cities. I don’t want the kids to see it. The more you watch, the more obvious it becomes that the human race is done for. This is as far as we’ve come and now it’s time to simply die or become a shape. The kids don’t need to learn about this.
I’m becoming increasingly worried about Ewelina. It’s not easy to communicate with her these days. She hardly talks anymore. She just hangs around the window with this goddamned vacant stare fixed on something undefined far in the distance between the residential blocks. Today I saw her going through our stuff in the basement and noticed how strangely she eyed the long bundle of cord lying in the far dark corner behind one of the shelves containing some of our supplies. Jesus Christ, I’m so scared for her. Ewelina please… Karol needs you. I NEED YOU. Please honey… I beg you – don’t do anything stupid…
July 3, 2052
Today at 3 AM I woke up to Fifi barking her little lungs out. I figured it’d be smart to check on her in case a gang of shapes was trying to breach the barricade again. Rubbing the sleep out of my eyes, I walked up to the window and took a look outside but saw no shapes beyond the messy, yet seemingly effective, pile of junk separating our door from the outside world. The feverish mad barking of our dog was still incessant though, so I decided to get out and see what was it that troubled her so much.
Upon stepping outside I was taken aback by the scene I saw displayed before me. There was a shape there. I still have no idea how he had managed to climb over the barricade, but he had. He most probably knocked down a box stacked on top of it by accident and used it to hoist himself up and beyond the wall. It was a horrid thing to see so close up. It lay flat on the ground with its scab-covered filthy arms stretched forward and violently shaking the high metal latticework enclosing Fifi’s playpen. The dog stuck her head out from her kennel, howling miserably at the creature trying desperately to get in. Its coal-black bulging eyes were fixed upon Fifi with a mindless desire to grab her with its bony, undead fingers and sink its teeth into her canine flesh before ripping her petite body open and feasting upon her entrails. The gargling of the creature and its putrid smell awakened the horror of experiencing the raging horde and is still haunting my memories.
I backed up into the house and locked the door behind me, looking around in search for something to fight off the shape. Hastily, I opened the basement door and found, leaning against the wall, a crowbar on the tiled stairs leading down into its dark interior. Having unlocked the heavy white door, I picked it up and ran back outside.
A horrifying chill rang through my whole body when I found that the shape, by convulsively jerking the latticework, had managed to forge a gap through which he had crawled into the playpen, leaving a stinking trail of dark, partially clotted blood. Now, the creature was fixing on getting into the playpen where old Fifi was hiding, still incessant in her barking which by now was starting to sound more like a call for help than a threat towards the intruder. Why wasn’t this shape scared of the noise like any other lonely undead wretch had been before? Could it be that they were growing fiercer and ever more fearless? There was no time to trouble myself with these questions, as the shape had already made its way inside Fifi’s enclosure. I barged into the playpen. The shape noticed my presence and turned its leprous face towards me. The bulging blackness of its eyes seemed to stare deep into my soul, though I knew there was nothing beyond it. Nothing, save for fever and bloodlust. I grabbed the crowbar with two hands and started swinging it at the wretch’s head. With each thudding blow the shape grew faint until its legs finally stopped fidgeting.
Fifi stuck out her head again, still snarling. I grabbed the motionless shape by the legs to dispose of it somehow. But just as I started pulling it out of the playpen, the dog threw itself onto the still shape and proceeded to yank at its right arm with her teeth.
FIFI! STAY OUT!” I shouted. “Shit, will yer stop you dumb fucking dog!?”
I kicked her and she backed off into her kennel, whining. I hate to hurt her, I really do, but you don’t know if COVID-51 can affect pets. No research has been done so far, and I believe we’ll be better off safe than sorry.
The cadaver was too heavy for me to just hurl it over the barricade. I thought I could throw the shape out of the window if Ewelina told Karol to stay in his room until I was done dragging the body upstairs, and that’s exactly what she and I did. As I dragged the wretch up the stairs and through the hallway, Ewelina followed me, indifferently mopping the dark blood streak trailing the shape. Moving back into the house, I stared at the shape apprehensively, anxious that at any moment it could start moving again. Ewelina helped me lift the body, and we pushed it out of the living room window. The body went plummeting face down into the pavement and the skull of the man it once was broke on impact, splattering dark putrid liquid all around. Ewelina sat on the windowsill inside and looked down.
“Are you okay?” I asked her, but she never answered. She just kept staring at the splatter beneath her, and I couldn’t help shake off the feeling that she’d rather see herself down below, on the hard surface of the pavement.
If Ewelina chose to die this way, she wouldn’t be the first one to give in to the urge of ultimate surrender. Suicide rates have been skyrocketing ever since the shapes started haunting the streets. Some people just couldn’t accept the idea of living in a world where you have to coexist with the undead. I don’t blame them, I guess. Some of those unfortunate folks with ground-floor houses probably have to put up with the deranged gargling of the shapes right outside their windows. I know I would surely go mad if I were to listen to that sound every single day. And what do these people tell their children? How do you comfort your kid when scabby blood-covered monsters are looming right outside.
I went to check on Karol and told him to stay in his room a little longer while I finished the mopping Ewelina had started. Sometimes I wonder if he’s aware of the gravity of the situation that we’re in. I hope to God he’s not. He’s only nine, for God’s sake. I’ll do anything to protect the boy from everything that’s out there and keep him safe. I just don’t know how to do it yet…
July 9, 2052
A terrible thing happened today. Early in the morning Karol came into Ewelina’s and my room and asked if he could go outside to play with Fifi. Half-asleep, my wife and I agreed since, from the absence of any barking, we concluded that there must be no shapes outside. I still cannot believe we were so reckless…
Fifteen minutes had gone by before I was roused, awakened by shrieks. In haste, I ran to the door and found Karol laying on the ground in convulsions, with Fifi rapaciously mauling the flesh of his right arm. Only it wasn’t really old Fifi. Her long fur was knotted, covered in dark blood clots, and the many red, scabby bald spots suggested that the blood was hers, coming from the wounds she had inflicted upon herself in a fit of rage. There was a hole in the latticework of her enclosure. She snarled in a manner I’d never heard before.
I instantly kicked the dog off Karol’s mauled arm. Fifi whimpered, stumbled but did not cease snarling. I saw her unusually pitch-black eyes as she struggled maniacally to bite her own hind leg. Each time she managed to grab a patch of her fur, it came flying out of her mouth ripped out along with shreds of skin. It seemed like some itching beneath it was so unbearable that she could not help but keep ripping it off in hopes to rid herself of whatever pest was inflicting such annoyance on her. Either that or she must have found that the fever that overcame her could be quenched only by the taste of blood—no matter if anyone else’s or hers. I understood. Poor Fifi caught the disease, becoming just a shape overcome with madness. I didn’t want to see her like this and the blood of my son on her fur assured me of what I had to do, even if I didn’t like it…
Tears filled my eyes as I proceeded to repeatedly stomp on her small, furry head whose eyes had once looked up to me full of affection and innocence, vibrant with unconditional love. Each time my foot fell upon her head, I felt another flood of tears stream down my cheeks. Her whimpering and snarling grew feebler and feebler with every blow. Finally, when she lay still on the ground, her repeatedly bitten blood-covered, scarlet tongue hanging out of her jaws, I grabbed her and flung the corpse across the barricade, saying goodbye to what has served as my faithful companion for eleven years of my life.
Karol was still lying on the ground, although now he seemed to have stopped convulsing. Poor boy must have fainted after the dog attacked. He always was so delicate. Too fragile for the cruel world he was birthed to live in. I wish I could have called the paramedics to get him to the hospital, but unfortunately this luxury had been taken away from us. After Prof. Nowak had published the findings of his research, most of the medical staff abandoned their work, choosing not to endanger their own lives. Due to the shortages in doctors and nurses, the government offered to transfer the ones remaining to bigger cities where the situation was more acute, and where they would be paid a fortune each day.
Soon enough, small local hospitals started to close, leaving many people with little to no access to healthcare services in their area. However, people did no cease to call for help, flooding the emergency service line. To address the issue, the government passed the infamous Aid Centralization Act, which allowed the emergency service line to automatically block any calls coming from areas considered “significantly less affected.” Our town was unfortunate enough to be labelled as such, although I don’t understand why. I mean, we’ve got a lot of shapes here. Not as many as in the cities, but still a lot. Why are we considered unworthy of help? Why were we left on our own? Now my son is lying unconscious before me and I’ve got no one to save him but me and my wife, and God knows neither of us possesses any substantial medical knowledge.
I carried Karol inside, for now I had to tend to his wounds, so that he would stop bleeding. Then all that was left was to wonder about the implications of the infected wound. How long it would be until he turned? Hell, maybe he won’t turn. There’s no scientific proof that animals can pass COVID to humans as far as I know. Ewelina helped me patch the boy up and then we laid him to bed.
“How long till he turns?” she asked.
“We don’t know if he will. It was just a dog.” I answered.
She smiled bitterly at my naivety and told me to leave her with Karol. And so I left them in the child’s room and retired to the bathroom where, having locked myself in, I sat on the toilet and cried, wiping my tears off with cheap grey toilet paper.
July 30, 2052
For the last couple of weeks Karol was growing weaker and weaker. His fever wouldn’t cease no matter how many pills we gave him. Ewelina scolded me for still clinging on to any hope of a recovery. Furious, I would ask her what she wanted me to do, to which she answered with a silent, stern stare. Today the boy’s eyes turned jet-black. There is clearly no recourse. With a silent consensus, Ewelina brought a bottle of pills from the kitchen as I headed downstairs to find an axe.
Ewelina came into Karol’s room and laid out the pills with a glass of water on our son’s bedtime table. She lifted the already half-conscious child tenderly and put him on her motherly lap.
“Mama, I can’t see… Mama?” Karol whispered under his breath.
“Shh… It’s okay, honey. Mama’s here…” She answered with her chest heaving under the force of a suppressed fit of crying and her eyes fit to burst into a downpour of tears.
“I love you, mama.”
“I love you too.”
Reassuring the child of her love, she fed him with handfuls of pills, washing them down with water until he fell into a peaceful slumber.
I’m not sure whether I’m strong enough to dare to describe what happened next. All I can say is that I’ve never done anything so terrible or painful and that the child’s bones are much more resistant than I had thought they would be. Yet I had to do it… I couldn’t let Karol become one of them—a shape, a mindless beast eternally tormented by fever and incessantly seized by pointless bloodlust. We put his remains into a wooden crate and set it on fire in Fifi’s abandoned playpen.
In this manner, I said goodbye to my only son, watching the flames consume his improvised coffin and the smoke from his pitiful pyre rising to the heavens. As I prayed that a merciful God accept Karol’s soul into his Heavenly Kingdom, my wife whimpered under her breath with her head resting on my shoulder. She held me close, soaking my shirt with tears. I don’t know how she’ll cope with it. I don’t how I’ll cope with it. God… God help us…
June 2020