Hell or High Water (© Alex Zimmerle)
Page 2 So he traveled into town
fighting his way through the flood and the dead and managed to get into a drug
store that had been untouched surprisingly. Most of the food was spoiled by the
waters that seeped in but a few of the can goods remained and enough liquor to
drown himself in so if they ever did get in he wouldn’t feel anything they did
to him. He raided the drugs they had, self prescribing himself to many
different things. Unfortunately he found that the anti depressants just made
his problem worse as on several attempts he found himself drunk, deep throating
his revolver. So he stopped but he kept the pain pills he found and anti
biotics and other things he felt might come in handy. Either to help him deal
with injury or sickness, or make him forget about his situation. Amidst the
collection of food and drugs he had found, he managed to find an abundance of
ear plugs. They helped somewhat but he used the liquor more. He tossed and turned before
settling in and letting the whiskey finish the job it started. With his index
finger he screwed in the orange sponge into his ear canal, but before he could
work one into his other ear he collapsed and left one nightmare and dove
himself into another. There she was again, laying
next to him covered only by a sheet, holding her head up with her arm and
staring at him with those brown eyes of hers. Dante could see himself next to
her and even though he knew this was just an illusion he was going to enjoy it
the best he could. He leaned in and kissed her. He could feel her soft hands
make their way through his hair as he ran his hand down her thigh. She stopped
for a moment and looked down at him. Her hair falling over her face until he
brushed it aside and lifted his head for another kiss. As they embraced he felt
warm. His eyes closed and he tried his best to enjoy the feeling again until he
woke up. He knew it wasn’t real but he could feel her again. He could feel her
skin, her breath, her lips and his heart race. It didn’t take long for
that to flutter away. Her warm lips turned ice cold. Her skin turned to
leather, and her hair began to flake off of her head. Dante pulled away and
gazed at her face as it decayed before his eyes. Her pupils filled with a murky
substance and clouded over as her skin opened and sores started to form. Her
teeth rotted and her breath grew hot and as much as he tried to pull away his
body was parlayed. It was if his mind wanted him to see this. As if he needed
to see this. "She’s dead Dante" She
snarled at him Her lips cracked open and
turned purple. She flashed a decomposed smile at him and whipped her tongue at
him. He still laid there powerless to wake up or move. His knees had buckled
and his spine followed. As she ran a rough hand down his face he managed to
slip out a defiant disagreement. "No, no she’s not dead" he
shouted She lunged into his face
and ran her rotten tongue across his teeth. He slammed his eyes shut squeezing
out a tear. "Yes, yes she is. And there’s
not a goddamn thing you can do about it!" His mind let him watch from
above as she tore into him, ripping him limb from limb. He couldn’t help but
chuckle as he noticed she ate his heart first. There was some irony there. Dante awoke to the sun
casting a beam directly into his eyes. He was sweating, and from what he could
figure from the marching band in his head, he was hung over. Grunting, he swung
his legs out onto the floor and tried to collect himself. The ray of light was
fixed on his eyes still and he tried to shield it with his hand as he walked
over to the window to shut the blinds. Outside the flood waters
still raged. They engulfed the city, swallowing most of it up. Funny, he
thought to himself, as if one natural disaster wasn’t enough god sent a
contingency plan to make sure he finished the job. He hadn’t as far as Dante
was concerned, not as long as he was alive. Hurricane Asshole , as he had
dubbed it, had swept through downtown Houston just a few weeks earlier. With
the TV out and no weather channel to warn him, he was caught with his pants
down. The building he was in suffered a lot of damage. With nobody to stop the
flooding the waters broke through the boarded up windows and doors and claimed
the first floor. He barricaded himself up stairs. Unfortunately a few of the
dead, managed to swim their way into his house so he threw his piano down the
stairs in an attempt to keep them from opening the door to the stair way. He
had been lucky so far. Every now and then there was a pound but they dead didn’t
have any leverage fighting against the current. [ Continue to page 3 ] |