First chapter draft of the thing I’ve been working on

Fri, 15 Nov 2013 01:03:10 GMT

instead of my fanfics. I've been banging my head against the next few RoYAN chapters regularly, but I'm still feeling too crappy to write the necessary funny scenes, so I'm taking a break for the melancholy zombie apocalypse. (metaphortunate just inadvertently reminded me that I had failed to crosspost this from Tumblr.)

-

What are you doing?

Huh? I don't know...

You've been in and out of this room three times already this morning.

Yeah... I don't know, I think maybe building barricades makes you weird. A little crazy, I guess! Or not crazy but... weird. You start looking for holes in things that don't really matter, like the table, the floor, your backpack, people. I was looking at a picture of a hand this morning and I saw a crack in a fingernail and was like, oh man, where's some of that nail repair stuff ladies use!

I don't use it. There might be some in the commissary.

No, it's okay, I don't need it. But it's just, like a zombie's going to get in through the fingernail, right? That's silly.

Sure.

And you know, I've checked the barricades for holes so many times, it's just dumb. It's been like three months since I finished them and I still feel like I need to do it every day. I mean, I don't some days, because it's just... I don't want to. I get tired of it.

It's boring.

It's boring, but it feels important, like I'm doing something. But I don't trust myself to do it right still, because I always shut myself in rooms really tight like this and check the room for holes. I don't like being in the cafeteria because there's the counters.

Stuff can hide behind counters, you mean?

Yeah. There's that big box with all the metal scraps in it, I keep thinking I should dump it all out and make a little fort out of the box just big enough for me. If I could touch all the walls I don't think I'd feel like I need to keep my eyes open and watch for shit.

You're claustrophobic, moron.

I was a year ago! Now I'm more afraid of getting eaten by zombies.

Makes sense. So you gonna do it?

Do what - oh, dump the scrap out and sleep in a metal box? No, 'cause then the scrap would just be lying out and I'd be like, oh, man, I better look under there. Something might be hiding under there! - And also I'd just make myself upset over being in the box somehow after a few days anyway. I'd have a bad dream I'm in a coffin or a cockpit or something.

Why a cockpit?

I don't know. How do you sleep?

I don't sleep.

Don't be a doofus. You can always sleep.

No. I mean, I died a long time ago. You're talking to yourself again, dumbass.

You get used to checking the barricades for holes and you just get progressively more and more stupid about what even counts as one, how big they're allowed to be. And I guess it's pointless because nothing's even been outside for a long time. We're so far away from the world. There's nothing left out there for them to eat. So they've got to be gone, right? They must be gone. But I keep checking. I wrote down a list to see if it made me feel better.

A list of what?

All the stuff I check. I mean, look at this.

How many pages is that list?

A lot, I don't know. It didn't make me feel better.

What would be "better"?

I don't know.

What would be a "better" way to feel about the literal actual goddamn zombie apocalypse?

I don't know!

So fucking think about it.

Geez, okay! You're mean today.

It's like automatic behavior now, like eating and breathing, I eat and breathe and I check for holes. There's been nothing outside for years now I think, but I keep checking. I don't think I can stop. I feel like I'd die if I stopped. It feels the same as not eating, it's the same kind of giving up.

You actually haven't been eating.

I haven't?

No, asshole. You've got all these fucking cans of fucking food set out, and you have not been eating a damn thing.

Well. Crud. I forgot.

You didn't forget to check the front fucking door. Forget that for once!

Why are you cussing at me. I don't want you to be cussing at me.

Sorry.

I don't even know what I'd be if I stopped checking, I don't feel like I'd be the same person.

You're not the same person.

What

I don't even know what I'd be if I stopped checking, I don't feel like I'd be the same person.

You're not the same per

Here's how I want to feel, this is like my one goal right now. I want to feel like I can stop checking for holes long enough to make a plan. It should be safe now, nothing's happened here in so long, there's nothing outside. I want to feel like I can stop checking for holes for a second and think.

But you don't spend the whole day doing it, you just sit around playing with the computers a lot. You type up all these conversations. There are hundreds of these text files now.

I'm thinking about checking for holes while I'm talking to you. Why'd you have to die?

It's the zombie fucking apocalypse, shit happens. Why the fuck do you associate me with holes, by the way?

Hey look - wait -

I don't even know what I'd be if I stopped checking, I don't feel like I'd be

I don't even kn

there are holes in me

I don't even know what I'd be if I stopped.

You just need more rest, shithead. Even if you don't sleep, you need to fucking rest, just calm the fuck down for once. And stop making that noise.

Yeah, yeah, okay.

Fucking thank you.

Why'd you have to die? I miss you so much.

Zombie fucking apocalypse. Shit happens.

I miss

I don't even know what I'd be if I stopped checking, I don't feel like I'd be the same person.

You're not the same person.

Because I'm tougher now? Has it made me a man? Am I super-manly?

It's made you something, let's put it that way.

I don't even know what I'd be if I stopped checking, I don't feel like I'd be the same person.

You're not the same person.

Are you?

No.

Because you're dead.

Dead as a fucking dead thing, dumbfuck. So why do you keep fucking talking to me?

I don't think there's anyone real left to talk to.

You could go the fuck outside and check.

Why are you cussing at me! I'm just talking to myself, I always hated it when you cussed at me! You shouldn't be able to now!

I can do whatever the fuck I want. You're stuck in here forever, but I died out there. I don't have to care about the goddamn rules anymore. The rules are for people like you, who don't have any other fucking options.

I guess it's kind of silly to argue with myself like this, especially when I'm not making any sense, but I could leave. It's just, there's nothing out there. There's no reason ever to leave.

Are you still there?

I don't even know what I'd be if I stopped checking, I don't feel like I'd be the same person.

You're not the same person.

Are you?

Hard to say. I don't know how you're remembering me. No human being is capable of perfect perception of another - there are always gaps you've got to fill in with your own ideas about what they should be like. One human being's not big enough to take in another person. You've just got pieces of me, the shit that looked important to you. And you know what? Maybe you were fucking wrong. Maybe they weren't the right ones.

Why are you mad at me?

Talking to you is making me crazy.

What

just got pieces, the shit that looked important to you. So you've always got to fill another person with pieces of your own dumb fucking self, because that's all you've got to fucking work with, even when it's not fucking good enough. And I do regret that. I do regret what I'm going to have to do.

What?

I mean, I don't know how to fucking fix what you've turned into back to what you fucking used to be. I don't have the stuff I need for that. I feel like I wasn't paying enough attention now, that I never really knew you. I can't even name the thing you had that you've lost.

What?

The only thing I can think of is, you really need to open the fucking door soon.

What?

I'm trying to tell you something important for once, you dumb piece of shit. Do you even remember how to open that goddamn door?

That's really all I've got left to say to you. You've got to open that goddamn door.

I haven't heard from other people in a long time. There's no reason to open the door. There's never going to be anyone on the other side.

You wouldn't even notice it if there was. You've got to open that goddamn door.

How did you die?

Why the fuck are you asking me that?

Because I don't know. I mean - I do know that you're dead. If you don't see a body, you get the idea that, you know, it might be a trick or a mistake, the person might be okay somewhere.

Yeah.

But I know you're dead. The way I know about Dad, because I saw him there.

Sorry about your dad. So why do you know that?

I don't know.

Think about it.

I can't. I don't want to.

You're going to think about it, and then you're going to ask me that again. And then you're going to open the door.

How did you die?

I got infected and they took me out. Fucking bang.

I guess I wouldn't want to remember seeing that.

You didn't see it, you weren't fucking there. You ran for the ship. You'd been gone for months. You never heard from any of us again after you left.

I don't know what's going on.

You've got to open the fucking door, shit-for-brains. That's the last thing I want from you.

I don't want to open the door. If there's anything out there, it'll kill me.

There's a question you were going to ask me. Ask it.

I asked you how you died already. I don't want to ask again. It hurts.

Yeah? What's that like. Nothing hurts me anymore.

Don't joke about it. It's not funny.

I wasn't the one who shot you, was I?

Like you could shoot a fly with a fucking watergun, dumbass. No. You weren't there.

Good. I wouldn't want to have hurt you.

You didn't. You never hurt anyone, you dumb son of a bitch.

How did - no, wait. Why do you want me to open the door? There's nothing out there.

If there's nothing out there, then why haven't you fucking done it? You should've tried it by now, right? Why haven't you?

There's no point.

There's no point to any of the shit you do! So why haven't you tried opening the damn door?

I don't know... I was going to ask you something, but I keep forgetting.

I fucking know you do!

How did you - no, wait.

What is the question you wanted to fucking ask me? You remember it? Yes or no?

No.

This is something you said a long time back, I've been wondering about it. You said some shit about a cockpit. When were you ever in one of those?

I wasn't.

You compared a box to a cockpit, you said you didn't want to get in a fucking box because it was like a fucking cockpit. Why did you say that?

I don't know. They're supposed to be cramped.

Are they cramped?

No. I don't know.

What's the door look like? To the cockpit?

Blue. What cockpit?

Okay, thanks.

Is there something outside that you're afraid of? Why won't you go the fuck out?

I don't know.

Can you not move the fucking door, is it rusted in place or some shit, help me out here. Why won't you open it?

There's nothing out there.

Look outside, dumbass. Tell me what you see.

There's nothing.

You're not looking. You haven't looked in a while. There's a security camera still working out front, look at what it's fucking showing you.

I'm afraid of them.

Why? They're human. They're waiting for you to open the door. Isn't that what you wanted?

I think I remember the question now.

So ask me.

Why can't I go outside?

Because you can't move anymore.

Why not?

I don't actually need to answer that, do I?

I guess not. How did I die?

I don't know yet, but I'm pretty sure you got infected, locked yourself in this thing's cockpit, and sat tight until you fucking died.

What cockpit? What thing?

The one your body's in right now. You might be able to fucking see it if you look, I don't know what sort of equipment you've got in here.

Am I a ghost?

I don't know what the fuck you are!

Where are you? You're not outside with them. I can't see you.

I'm right here with you. Your body.

No. That's not us.

I'm so fucking sorry dead people look dead, asshole.

Sorry.

append initrd=/boot

-

The Linux boot command fragment was not supposed to be there, that was from something else. I'm leaving it to remind myself to stick some more-appropriate code-ish-looking-stuff in there.

So, yeah, zombie apocalypse thing where one of the zombies is basically a Helmsman. There's this recurring thing in my dreams about machines only the dead can use.

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I Am Completely Serious

First chapter draft of the thing I’ve been working on