Chapter Three: A Ghastly Return
1
Back in the pontoon, the swampy trees surrounded Jack. In them, a gloomy darkness seemed to scream loneliness. Down the narrow river the pontoon sped; and all around the innumerable trees, with their thick trunks, hid what might be an unseen fear—a hidden violent multitude, just waiting, hungry for the taste of flesh. In that solitude, there was nothing to do but sit still and think. Think about what was happening all over the world. How bad was it in other nations? What about the west coast? How much of the population now roamed flesh eating zombies? Can any of the Old World be saved, resurrected from this deathly squalor?
Jack looked at Candy. Her head was down, staring at the floor of the boat. He could sense her sanity cracking like a dam about to flood the once fertile, happy lands of her mind.
His glasses slipped down; he pushed them back up.
Was his sanity slipping as well? Would his mind come crashing down like a shattered wine glass against dark, black stone?
He watched Andrew guiding the boat. The thin shoulders of his cousin were hunched; an unseen weight pressed upon them.
A flock of black birds screamed out of the trees to Jack's right; they flew high in the sky like a ominous black cloud. He thought of Jenny from Forest Gump asking God to make her a bird so she could fly far far away. The birds were safer than any human; that was for certain; able to fly and go as they pleased; the world now belonged to them and the dead; it belonged to the crows and the gators, the wild things of the night.
The black water swirled around the boat. The sun was rising like a hell's beacon; a fire strip across the sky. His stomach rumbled; he hadn't eaten in almost twenty four hours; at least not a decent meal, he'd only picked at the food Okona gave them. He felt weak and tired. He wanted to sleep.
Up ahead, he could see their small swampy home.
2
Back at the shack, the trees enveloped Jack in lonely shadow like a forgotten ghost. He watched his cousins enter that rickety home. Candy’s maddening scream made him jump. His neck tensed and his heart pounded. He ran for the house. His feet crunched into leaves and soft swampy earth. Her screams persisted—a loud tearful bellow, hell's siren call.
Jack darted in. His heart stopped. My mind went numb.
Candy laid on her knees screaming out of her mind. Andrew sat in a corner not saying a word, just watching, void of emotion.
Two little girls, piled on top of each other, ripped open; and Jack's dear ole granddad, dead as can be, savoring their entrails, one bloody handful at time.
Jack fell to his knees, his glasses slipped off and cracked on the blistered wood floor. He saw his reflection in the broken glass; and stared back at his shattered self. He saw his hand reach down, and remove his pistol. He held it by his side, and stared with hopeless eyes. He breathed in deeply as he lifted the pistol with a shaky hand, placing it against his temple.
Hidden deep within a swamp, far from the world outside, he still couldn’t save them; in a world set with only tragedy, horror, and depravity—no man can live, no humanity can shine. In a world where the living and the dead walk, there is no place for good men to stand.
He knew it had to end; so he squeezed the cold steel trigger.
3
Candy’s mind was slipping. Her thoughts a grave yard of growing instability as she dragged Jack to his bed. He was bleeding badly; but he’d done a poor job of killing himself. She’d seen failed suicide attempts like this before. A gun to the temple was not always the best way to do it. The gun can slip just a bit and only leave a nasty graze. She quickly applied a bandage, but did nothing else then.
She walked back into the living room. Her thoughts wheeled quickly through her mind. Grayness threatened to take over; her moral compass was cracking; right and wrong, good and bad losing any real meaning. Her police uniform was in tatters; a symbol of a torn past.
She carried the bodies of her girls and Papa outside one by one. Andrew brought a can of gasoline and handed it to her. She said nothing. She poured the contents over the bodies. Andrew handed her a box of matches. She opened it, took one out, and struck it against the side of the box. She threw it onto the bodies and flame engulfed in a fast whoosh.
Andrew was crying. Candy just stared; her thoughts darkening as quickly as the bodies of her family. She watched them smolder; their white skin turning dark black. The smell was abominable; but she breathed it in, refusing to try and avoid the dead perfume of cooking flesh.
The black smoot now covered her face like a black, smudgy mask. Her red hair now showing through black dust. Her soul now tainted with the decay of the New World.
4
Jack awoke, his vision a blurry haze of unimaginable pain. His entire face screamed for mercy; and the world was black from the right side over. He laid in his bed, surrounded by the old wood of the swamp shack, and the always present swell of the dying world. He had no idea how he'd gotten there.
What had happened? How was he still here? These questions rushed through his mind for only as long as the throbbing pain allowed. He let out a low bellow of agony. The memory of Papa chewing on the remains of the girls sparked in his psyche. How did he allow this to happen? His life is over. It is a forgotten memory. Part of the world that once was, and will never be again. His hopes, dreams, and worst of all, he feared, his humanity, his wonder and joy, forever lost in the dark haze of a darkening, insidious world.
He tried to move, but to no avail. The pain swelled once more. He couldn’t move. He didn’t want to breath, though his body forced the air in and then out, causing grief mixed with self-hate to plunder his soul, his mind, his heart, every inch of him calling out, without saying a word, to please just let him rot, just let him die now.
“Candy.” He barely spoke; it came out of a hoarse whisper.
But she heard him none the less. The door creaked open, and in she came carrying something in a brown bottle with a white screw on lid. She didn’t say a word. In his now left sided vision, mixed with the pain of failed suicide, he saw her battered police uniform; it was covered in dirt and the stench of swamp water; clotted portions of smoke smut blackened the once pristine and pressed uniform. The odor of a recent fire followed her, and lingered with her every step. Her face was emotionless; her eyes unresponsive, her cheeks smothered in dark soot. She walked with impatience, and stood over Jack for a moment, staring down with blank eyes, almost as though he didn’t exist. He felt her firm grip on his chin, and a bandage tore from his face. He screeched in agony.
“Shut up.” She said and forced his face in the opposite direction. The sound of the brown bottle's top twisting open, and then the striking sting and smell of alcohol smothered his face. His legs jerked, his hand gripped the dirty sheets, and he cried tears of discomfort, hate, and suffering.
She wrapped a new bandage on his face; he then heard an old wooden chair scratch against the splintered floor; candy plopped down beside him. Her stare focused on the floor, and her elbows met her knees. Jack stared at the top her head; her filthy red hair, meshed with sweat, blood, and soot, half clung, half dangled from her scalp.
“Candy…” Jack murmured.
“I have to go into town. Your wound is gonna get infected soon. The humidity, the moisture causing it to fester. That's the last of the alcohol and bandages.” She said.
“Where is Andrew?”
“He's waitin outside. I have to go now.” She stood, and walked out of the room without another word.
He laid helplessly, unable to fathom his idiocy. His mistake. His bamboozled attempt to end it all in the face of that scene. Oh god. He ate them. He was gone. Papa. The girls. All gone. Forever. Never see them again. The pain. The horror. The filth he lived in now. The world is gone forever. Nothing. Left. Gone. Yes. He will die. Soon. He hoped.