Water.
Water is the cornerstone of life. It nourishes us, irrigates our crops and waters our livestock. Water is vital for all known forms of life. We rely on it to wash our cars, clean our food and produce our power. It has an effect on almost every activity in everyday life. Without it, civilisation would cease to function. Governments would collapse, crippled by an undefeatable enemy – drought. It would be a matter of days – no longer than a week – before every living being on Earth perished. In short, we cannot live without water.
Two days ago, we were forced to begin doing just that.
I don’t know how it began. Nobody left alive does. During the initial hours of it, theories ranged from the barely plausible, like a new form of greenhouse gas, to the ridiculous, such as a new type of light, one that only evaporated water. I remember those hours fondly – the true enormity of what had happened had not yet sunk in and hysteria had not yet clutched the human race.
What happened?
I’ll put it simply.
The first was that every single drop of freshwater on the entire planet evaporated instantly.
I don’t think I can do this event justice, but I’ll try.
Can you imagine every single river, every single lake, every single natural source of water drying up instantly, without rational explanation? I doubt you can, but that’s exactly what happened. It wasn’t restricted to natural sources, either. As far as I can tell, all the bottled water in the world also evaporated, as did that in water tanks and other similar sources. It also disappeared from other substances, including soft drinks, creating foul sugar compounds that would make those that consumed it quite ill. There was not a single drop of freshwater left anywhere on Earth for anybody to drink.
But by far the worst result of the lack of water was the nuclear reactors.
Without pressurised water, most of the nuclear reactors in the entire world – those that utilise purified water as coolant – had no available sources of coolant, and just under half of these had poor or untested failsafe plans. The resulting effect of this led to catastrophic nuclear meltdown in roughly 46% of water-cooled reactors. The world, already reeling from the unprecedented situation, fell into total anarchy.
International communication ceased after almost exactly twenty-four hours after it began.
But there was a second effect.
The saltwater poisoning.
Many people flocked to desalination plants in the first few hours, hoping for salvation.
They found none.
At approximately the same time as the worldwide evaporation, saline increased by fivefold in every sea or ocean on Earth. Desalination plants were able to cope with this load for approximately twenty hours. Then, fuel began to run low – and with the imminent collapse of civilisation thanks to the multiple nuclear catastrophes, no more was delivered. Thus, the last ever drop of freshwater on Earth was pumped out no later than midnight yesterday.
After the drought came the collapse.
With no water available, civilisation soon descended into anarchy. Governments, typical of authority to the very end, tried maintaining order. It didn’t work. Soldiers rebelled, shooting rioters and runners alike. Those who didn’t die were brutally executed moments after. They turned on each other soon enough, with only a few militaries intact from the carnage. The deserters fled, unwilling to stay and watch the extinction of Earth.
But then came the worst, far worse than anything before it.
There was, in fact, one source of water that hadn’t been touched.
I’m so lucky I realised before anyone else in my town.
It was blood.
Blood, which is over 90% water, was the only remaining liquid fit to drink.
And so some did.
At first, I didn’t believe it. It was too horrific.
Animals went first. The desperate drank the blood of cats, dogs, pets and feral animals of all kinds. Many offered too little blood to be of any value. The situation was made worse by the fact that I live in a rather large metropolitan city and beyond domesticated pets and the odd feral animal, there was no animals to catch and drink from. Perhaps those in the country fared better – I have no way of finding out, and frankly I don’t really care.
I knew then that humans were the only other option.
I first saw it twelve hours ago.
An elderly man, dressed in nothing but a torn dressing gown, slowly made his way down the street that ran in front of my house. He called for help desperately, croaking out that his entire nursing home was dead or dying, that the nurses had fled and that he was looking for help. He was so pitiful that I almost opened my door, if only to offer him some respite from the midday sun, and some of my sparse rations.
If I had been a second faster, I would not be writing this.
Before I could open the door, three people – two men and a woman – pounced from the shadow of a nearby tree. The poor old bastard had no chance. They leapt upon him, frenzied in their dehydration, and set on him with makeshift tools. It was the most terrifying spectacle of my entire life. One of the men had a hammer – he set about bashing the man’s joints in, one by one. Crack. Crack. Crack. I retched bile each time the hammer slammed into bone, so sickening was the crunch. The other had a gardening hoe. He hovered above the elderly man, bringing the makeshift weapon down once, twice. The tool cut through the man’s ankles like a knife through a steak.
The metaphor made me vomit. After I did, I looked back, if only to satisfy my own growing horror.
Oh, how I wish I hadn’t.
The woman, who was weaponless save for her own two hands, had straddled the man’s chest. Her hands were spread on the screaming man’s face as her own companions butchered him. Then, even as I watched, she dug her thumbs into his eyes. He howled like nothing I had ever heard before. She dug harder, pushing inwards and outwards simultaneously. When they were pulled free, blood and some even less discernible liquid splattered all over her. She grabbed them and ate them like fruit. I could hear the chewing sounds from my door. They bent to consume the precious blood and I turned away.
I call them the Drinkers.
There’s one thing I want to make very clear about them. They aren’t zombies. Nor are they affected by some external force that forces them to drink the blood of humans, such as a virus or disease. They are entirely human. I suspect that dehydration affects them worse than it does others and this forces them to drink from humans in a form of pseudo-cannibalism or perish. They represent the dark side of humanity. The Drinkers also seem to recognise each other through some subtle signal. Not being a Drinker, I wouldn’t know it.
As fast as I possibly could, I took my meagre supplies, some small comforts, this journal and my .357 Desert Eagle up into my bedroom. I pushed the bed against the door with my rapidly fading strength and piled furniture on it. The Desert Eagle has a full clip of seven, and I have one spare. Enough for thirteen Drinkers and - well, I’m sure you can imagine.
—
Another six hours have passed. I can really feel the dehydration now. My tongue feels numb and my skin feels like sandpaper. I tried to eat some bread before and I almost choked, with no saliva to moisten my throat. Now I’m hungry as well as thirsty. I don’t even know why I’ve kept writing this. Maybe it’s something to occupy me during the final hours of mankind. Maybe I hold some hope that a solution will be found and somebody in the future will read this and remember what it was like. Maybe I’m just delusional.
—
It’s getting worse. I’m breathing heavily and becoming more and more lethargic. This room feels like a sauna. I can almost see the heatwaves bouncing across the room, becoming more and more intense until I am literally cooked alive. It’s not a pleasant vision. My pen keeps slipping from the page as I suffer random bursts of weakness. I’m scared I won’t even be able to pull the trigger if the time comes.
—
I’m so terribly thirsty. The last time I urinated it burned. I haven’t defecated for a long time now. My vision’s fading in and out and my head feels like it’s going to split open from the intense pressure inside. My skin is so dry and leathery. I know I’m dying, but I’ve still got the Desert Eagle. Maybe I should kill myself before I lose the strength to do so. God knows it’s better than dehydrating to death or letting the Drinkers get me.
—
so thirsty
its dark and i’ve lost the gun
vision almost gone
so THIRSTY
i’m going mad
i’m dying
wait
what’s that
so thirsty
somebody’s knocking at the door
they want to be let in
they say the drinkers are coming
should i
i don’t know
maybe i’ll go get a drink.
i’m so thirsty.
//
Credited to Archfeared.
Monday, August 30, 2010
I don't sleep anymore
Earlier this week, on Sunday night, I had a dream in which I knew I was asleep. I was stood outside of my house in torrential rain at night and thought I needed to get inside in order to wake up. I approached the front door and placed my knuckles onto the door-window ready to knock. I knew that my next action would bring me one step closer to consciousness. The moment I knocked on the door, the thudding sound of the knock was so loud, so frightening and so real that it woke me from my sleep.
BANG BANG BANG
I jumped up immediately and listened out for a further knock at the door. I was roasting hot, sweating profusely and my heart was beating so hard, I don’t think I would have been able to tell the difference between a knock at the door and my thudding heart beat. After I came to my senses and realised that the possibility of the door knocking at the exact moment of dreaming it is incredibly low, I fell back to sleep.
Monday, the very following night, I had the same dream. Right back outside the front of the house in the pouring rain again, intensely staring at the house. I slowly walked to the front door, this time it was open. I walked in and went straight into the kitchen. I opened the cutlery drawer and pulled out the largest meat knife I have. I looked into my reflection through the blade of the knife.
If you stare directly into the reflection of your eyes for long enough, eventually it will hit you that someone is looking at you. You know it’s your reflection, but for just a second, you forget and become self conscious, as if it’s somebody else behind your reflection’s eyes. It didn’t take a second of looking at my reflection through the blade to realise that somebody else was looking back. The moment I realised it was somebody else wearing my grin in the reflection, I slammed the cutlery drawer shut.
BANG
Again, I shot up out of bed. The sound of the metal clanging in the drawer as it abruptly closed was so defined and so crystal clear, it couldn’t have been a dream. Really spooked this time, I went downstairs into the kitchen. I was half asleep and had to check. I opened the cutlery drawer. I was relieved to find the knife still in the drawer. I closed it and went back to bed. It took a little longer this time, but I fell asleep.
Tuesday night, my dream started with that grin in the reflection. From the look in his eyes, I could tell that the man in the reflection knew he was looking back at someone confused and scared. I found myself looking into the reflection of the knife, already in my hand, while stood outside of my house in the rain. The front door was open again. I walked into the house, directly up the stairs and into my bedroom. I looked at the bed and saw someone sleeping in it. It was me.
I knew what I was going to do, but also knew that I couldn’t stop myself. Instead, I kept think over and over again “Wake up”. My emotions were both in two extremes at once. I was terrified, but at the same time I was thrilled and excited to kill. “WAKE UP!”
I shot right out of bed and stood up. I was absolutely drenched in sweat, roasting hot, but relieved to find nobody stood in front of me with a knife. It took a few seconds to realise that I was gripping something tight in my hand. I knew what it was even before I looked down at it and saw my reflection in it. It was the meat knife, and this time the reflection in it looked terrified.
I don’t sleep anymore.
BANG BANG BANG
I jumped up immediately and listened out for a further knock at the door. I was roasting hot, sweating profusely and my heart was beating so hard, I don’t think I would have been able to tell the difference between a knock at the door and my thudding heart beat. After I came to my senses and realised that the possibility of the door knocking at the exact moment of dreaming it is incredibly low, I fell back to sleep.
Monday, the very following night, I had the same dream. Right back outside the front of the house in the pouring rain again, intensely staring at the house. I slowly walked to the front door, this time it was open. I walked in and went straight into the kitchen. I opened the cutlery drawer and pulled out the largest meat knife I have. I looked into my reflection through the blade of the knife.
If you stare directly into the reflection of your eyes for long enough, eventually it will hit you that someone is looking at you. You know it’s your reflection, but for just a second, you forget and become self conscious, as if it’s somebody else behind your reflection’s eyes. It didn’t take a second of looking at my reflection through the blade to realise that somebody else was looking back. The moment I realised it was somebody else wearing my grin in the reflection, I slammed the cutlery drawer shut.
BANG
Again, I shot up out of bed. The sound of the metal clanging in the drawer as it abruptly closed was so defined and so crystal clear, it couldn’t have been a dream. Really spooked this time, I went downstairs into the kitchen. I was half asleep and had to check. I opened the cutlery drawer. I was relieved to find the knife still in the drawer. I closed it and went back to bed. It took a little longer this time, but I fell asleep.
Tuesday night, my dream started with that grin in the reflection. From the look in his eyes, I could tell that the man in the reflection knew he was looking back at someone confused and scared. I found myself looking into the reflection of the knife, already in my hand, while stood outside of my house in the rain. The front door was open again. I walked into the house, directly up the stairs and into my bedroom. I looked at the bed and saw someone sleeping in it. It was me.
I knew what I was going to do, but also knew that I couldn’t stop myself. Instead, I kept think over and over again “Wake up”. My emotions were both in two extremes at once. I was terrified, but at the same time I was thrilled and excited to kill. “WAKE UP!”
I shot right out of bed and stood up. I was absolutely drenched in sweat, roasting hot, but relieved to find nobody stood in front of me with a knife. It took a few seconds to realise that I was gripping something tight in my hand. I knew what it was even before I looked down at it and saw my reflection in it. It was the meat knife, and this time the reflection in it looked terrified.
I don’t sleep anymore.
The Suicide King
Modern playing cards are filled with layers of meaning and symbology that can be traced back centuries. The four kings, for example, are based off of real rulers: the king of diamonds represents the wealthy Julius Caesar, the king of clubs is the brutal Alexander the Great, Spades represents the strong but kind David of Israel and Hearts represents the… emotionally disturbed, shall we say, Charles VII of France. It is this king that we will be dealing with today. It should also be noted that Charles was the only one of the four who was actually there to see the day that his face was printed on a playing card, which may rationalize why he acted apart from the others.
Charles’ visage was put on the king of hearts at the very beginning of his rule, but he never really got a chance to come into contact with playing cards until many years later when he became very ill with a fever and was informed that he would be bedridden for the rest of his life. It was during this period that Charles began learning card games to pass the time, such as an early version of black jack, “vingt-et-un” (twenty one).
Charles lay in his bed for two years, constantly fiddling with the cards and always getting weaker. As time continued to pass, there were reports that Charles had begun obsessing over the idea that the king being the thirteenth card in a suit was causing him bad luck. He talked about how he was starting to see the number pop up everywhere and that he was close to figuring out its secret. Of course, his ramblings were blamed on the fever, and by the end of the second year, he had been declared insane, and his son Louis XII took over the thrown.
One day, several months after the end of his reign, one of Charles’ physicians went to his chamber to find the frail old man standing in the middle of the room wielding a large sword. Before the doctor could react, the king said, “Ils m’ont montré la vérité de treize, et il n’est pas signifié pour les yeux mortels.” which roughly translates to, “They have shown me the truth of thirteen, and it is not meant for mortal eyes.” Without hesitation the king proceeded to ram the blade in through the left side of his head (between the ear and temple) until it came out the other side. He wavered a moment, before collapsing to the floor dead.
After the incident was announced and it was made public that the king had gone mad, the image of Charles on the king of hearts was altered to show himself offing himself. Although the picture is now shown significant-ly less graphically, the image of Charles thrusting the sword into his skull can still be found on modern day playing cards. Perhaps the strangest part of the whole story, however, is the day that Charles chose to kill himself: 7/6/1462. Whether or not it was intentional of the king, the facts that 6+7=13 and 1+4+6+2=13 can only be explained as coincidences.
Charles’ visage was put on the king of hearts at the very beginning of his rule, but he never really got a chance to come into contact with playing cards until many years later when he became very ill with a fever and was informed that he would be bedridden for the rest of his life. It was during this period that Charles began learning card games to pass the time, such as an early version of black jack, “vingt-et-un” (twenty one).
Charles lay in his bed for two years, constantly fiddling with the cards and always getting weaker. As time continued to pass, there were reports that Charles had begun obsessing over the idea that the king being the thirteenth card in a suit was causing him bad luck. He talked about how he was starting to see the number pop up everywhere and that he was close to figuring out its secret. Of course, his ramblings were blamed on the fever, and by the end of the second year, he had been declared insane, and his son Louis XII took over the thrown.
One day, several months after the end of his reign, one of Charles’ physicians went to his chamber to find the frail old man standing in the middle of the room wielding a large sword. Before the doctor could react, the king said, “Ils m’ont montré la vérité de treize, et il n’est pas signifié pour les yeux mortels.” which roughly translates to, “They have shown me the truth of thirteen, and it is not meant for mortal eyes.” Without hesitation the king proceeded to ram the blade in through the left side of his head (between the ear and temple) until it came out the other side. He wavered a moment, before collapsing to the floor dead.
After the incident was announced and it was made public that the king had gone mad, the image of Charles on the king of hearts was altered to show himself offing himself. Although the picture is now shown significant-ly less graphically, the image of Charles thrusting the sword into his skull can still be found on modern day playing cards. Perhaps the strangest part of the whole story, however, is the day that Charles chose to kill himself: 7/6/1462. Whether or not it was intentional of the king, the facts that 6+7=13 and 1+4+6+2=13 can only be explained as coincidences.
In The Walls
Last year, I moved into a middle class house right around summer time. The move went smooth, and it seemed like everything was just…working. Nothing broke during the cycle, I had plenty of friends to help me out, hell I even found twenty bucks in my couch! Beer money? Hell yeah!
Anyway, back to the house. For the first day or two, I thought life couldn’t get any better; my girl was beautiful, my friends were happy, and my parents were fixing their relationship. However, I hadn’t realized - until it was too late - that I was doomed to remain in this prison, which I sit in now as I tell you this story.
The first time it happened, I was in my room. I was in the zone on my Xbox. You know what I mean, where you get 10 headshots without breaking a sweat? Yeah, that. As I was kicking fat terrorist ass I heard movement downstairs (My room was on the second floor). It sounded like someone was running around down there. Like, they were running from room to room banging on the walls, just being flat out obnoxious.
“Hey, Jeff! Get out of my house, I said three-o’clock, dumbass!”
The noise stopped.
I waited a few moments before turning back to my game, but it was too late. I was already doomed. I saw it come at me too late…A tank.
“Son of a…” I sighed.
The next few days were normal, there were no more sounds that shouldn’t be there, just the pipes, the heater, you know the sort. Yet, about 3 days later, that idiot Jeff snuck into my house and started beating up my shit.
“Alright, you aren’t getting off so easy this time!” I shouted as I charged down the stairs. As my foot hit the last step, something out of the corner of my eye moved. I looked over so fast that I got whiplash. “Oh, dammit!” I moaned. I didn’t even pay any attention to the fact that whatever was in my house - had disappeared.
After that, it got worse.
That same night, as I layed in bed, the banging started again. Not only was it worse, but it was on my floor of the house this time. I was sure I locked everything before I came up here, so here I was pissing my pants at 900 miles per hour while something destroyed my house. I actually pulled the blankets over me - hey, I was scared - as the noise approached my door. Just as I expected it to bash open my door and slaughter me, it stopped.
The next morning I grabbed my baseball bat as I got out of bed, if whatever that thing is, was still out there, it would regret it. I didn’t find anything, but my house was trashed. Almost everything was tipped over, torn, broken, missing, or worse. I just figured I had been robbed.
I called the police, they didn’t do shit. But the noises stopped for a week or so, and that made things easier. Sure I was pissed that some fuck destroyed my new place, but at least I was ok. But, of course, I know now that it wasn’t a robber, or Jeff, or the pipes in the walls…It was the thing IN the walls.
A week after the incident, it came back.
This time it was pissed. I was startled out of my slumber by the noise of a vase breaking into a thousand pieces downstairs. SMASH it went, with little pieces still breaking a few seconds after the initial smash as if to mock me.
Not long after, I began to hear more deep, guttural banging noises on the walls again. Coming from inside of them, no doubt. As I lie there in my bed, I let out the tiniest, quietest, timidest squeak by sheer mistake, and the noise stops.
Sharpest ears I’ve ever seen, those were.
After several painstakingly long moments of silence, I released the breath I was holding, thinking it was over for now. Big mistake, I realize, as the noises suddenly start to rampage up the stairs. Incredibly fast, incredibly loud, smack, crash, bang against my wooden floor.
The beast, which I could now accurately call it, broke my door open with intense force, thrusting it all the way to the opposite side of the room. Being an intelligent individual, I had already hidden under my impenetrable field of safety known as the common blanket.
The noise of this monster running through my room, it’s footsteps enough to damage my eardrums at this close, was the scariest thing I had ever experienced in my entire life.
With a sudden burst of adrenaline, I threw the blankets off in the direction of the…thing, somehow making a direct impact to its face. Whoever - or whatever - this was, was stunned. But not for long, and I knew that. I frantically moved across my room, attempting to make it out the door, downstairs, outside, where I could attract public attention.
This night, luck was not on my side. I knew this as a large hunk of my hair was grabbed from behind and pulled out with such force that pieces of skins came along with it, along with a shitload of blood. Before a scream escapes my voice box, I’m being held down by a dark, hairless beast that walks on all fours with a face I can hardly imagine again, that then smashes my head with it’s fist, sending me into a dark, welcoming sleep.
…
Someone new has moved in, but they don’t even acknowledge my existence, the jackass. I patiently watch, wait, hear, hoping that they will. But no. Not me. I’m not worth it to them.
Maybe if I bang on the walls.
//
Credited to Zithra.
Anyway, back to the house. For the first day or two, I thought life couldn’t get any better; my girl was beautiful, my friends were happy, and my parents were fixing their relationship. However, I hadn’t realized - until it was too late - that I was doomed to remain in this prison, which I sit in now as I tell you this story.
The first time it happened, I was in my room. I was in the zone on my Xbox. You know what I mean, where you get 10 headshots without breaking a sweat? Yeah, that. As I was kicking fat terrorist ass I heard movement downstairs (My room was on the second floor). It sounded like someone was running around down there. Like, they were running from room to room banging on the walls, just being flat out obnoxious.
“Hey, Jeff! Get out of my house, I said three-o’clock, dumbass!”
The noise stopped.
I waited a few moments before turning back to my game, but it was too late. I was already doomed. I saw it come at me too late…A tank.
“Son of a…” I sighed.
The next few days were normal, there were no more sounds that shouldn’t be there, just the pipes, the heater, you know the sort. Yet, about 3 days later, that idiot Jeff snuck into my house and started beating up my shit.
“Alright, you aren’t getting off so easy this time!” I shouted as I charged down the stairs. As my foot hit the last step, something out of the corner of my eye moved. I looked over so fast that I got whiplash. “Oh, dammit!” I moaned. I didn’t even pay any attention to the fact that whatever was in my house - had disappeared.
After that, it got worse.
That same night, as I layed in bed, the banging started again. Not only was it worse, but it was on my floor of the house this time. I was sure I locked everything before I came up here, so here I was pissing my pants at 900 miles per hour while something destroyed my house. I actually pulled the blankets over me - hey, I was scared - as the noise approached my door. Just as I expected it to bash open my door and slaughter me, it stopped.
The next morning I grabbed my baseball bat as I got out of bed, if whatever that thing is, was still out there, it would regret it. I didn’t find anything, but my house was trashed. Almost everything was tipped over, torn, broken, missing, or worse. I just figured I had been robbed.
I called the police, they didn’t do shit. But the noises stopped for a week or so, and that made things easier. Sure I was pissed that some fuck destroyed my new place, but at least I was ok. But, of course, I know now that it wasn’t a robber, or Jeff, or the pipes in the walls…It was the thing IN the walls.
A week after the incident, it came back.
This time it was pissed. I was startled out of my slumber by the noise of a vase breaking into a thousand pieces downstairs. SMASH it went, with little pieces still breaking a few seconds after the initial smash as if to mock me.
Not long after, I began to hear more deep, guttural banging noises on the walls again. Coming from inside of them, no doubt. As I lie there in my bed, I let out the tiniest, quietest, timidest squeak by sheer mistake, and the noise stops.
Sharpest ears I’ve ever seen, those were.
After several painstakingly long moments of silence, I released the breath I was holding, thinking it was over for now. Big mistake, I realize, as the noises suddenly start to rampage up the stairs. Incredibly fast, incredibly loud, smack, crash, bang against my wooden floor.
The beast, which I could now accurately call it, broke my door open with intense force, thrusting it all the way to the opposite side of the room. Being an intelligent individual, I had already hidden under my impenetrable field of safety known as the common blanket.
The noise of this monster running through my room, it’s footsteps enough to damage my eardrums at this close, was the scariest thing I had ever experienced in my entire life.
With a sudden burst of adrenaline, I threw the blankets off in the direction of the…thing, somehow making a direct impact to its face. Whoever - or whatever - this was, was stunned. But not for long, and I knew that. I frantically moved across my room, attempting to make it out the door, downstairs, outside, where I could attract public attention.
This night, luck was not on my side. I knew this as a large hunk of my hair was grabbed from behind and pulled out with such force that pieces of skins came along with it, along with a shitload of blood. Before a scream escapes my voice box, I’m being held down by a dark, hairless beast that walks on all fours with a face I can hardly imagine again, that then smashes my head with it’s fist, sending me into a dark, welcoming sleep.
…
Someone new has moved in, but they don’t even acknowledge my existence, the jackass. I patiently watch, wait, hear, hoping that they will. But no. Not me. I’m not worth it to them.
Maybe if I bang on the walls.
//
Credited to Zithra.
Sunday, August 29, 2010
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