Preamble of Ashford

Entry 009:

Wow. I seriously feel rested today. And warm. My belly is screaming for more food, but that’s just because it got a taste of some and has since been insatiable. But I know better – and I know I can survive with water for breakfast. So that’s just what I do; I sip until my stomach ceases its grumbling. Before long, I feel as though I’ve eaten – quite the trick to play on one’s own digestive system!

I really can’t remember the last time I awoke with this much zeal. It feels like eons, but I’m sure I felt this way only a few years ago. The best I can pinpoint this sensation is the season: strangely enough, the last time I felt this alive was wintertime. I know it was after the pandemic spread, because I was worried about zombies instead of homework. I want to say it was during that first winter, since I have a vague feeling that I was still eating and sleeping regularly, but I could very well be wrong – on every count of the blurry recollection. This supposed sensation – or recollection, or whathaveyou – also has the distinct flavor of wishful thinking; perhaps I’ve never felt this way in my entire life, and in my current delusional state I want so badly to believe that I have previously awoken as such so that maybe I can hold onto some slim memory of a life that, in all actuality, never was…

Or maybe I’m just going crazy, and pointlessly – if not obsessively – ranting with this ill-begot pen of mine about half-truths of a life of which the memories are slowly distorting or altogether fizzling. It's so hard to discern reality from fantasy – both past and present...all that keeps me grounded anymore are the words previously written. Surely, I couldn't have been so crazy at the onset of all this. So the tale of my past, as written thusfar, must be real...I hope...so maybe the ancillary memories I (supposedly) recall are real as well...

Real or fantasy, the next piece of my tale (as I recall it right now) is as follows:

The town of Elbe was a trip. First, I noticed the bizarre absence of people, vehicles, and ghouls alike. Second, I found the local Kirche (an old landmark of the town) was burnt to the ground. The steeple had collapsed inward and the cross stood out from the rubble at an awkward angle; it was charred impiously, unapologetically. And then, as I passed a house near the edge of town, I felt a disturbing presence and cold eyes that augered down to the depths of my soul.

Pedaling as fast as my weary feet could pedal, I sped away from this eerie town.

A little further down the road, a large-caliber machinegun startled me off the road. From the sounds of it, someone was blasting the crap out of the countryside from a moving vehicle. While lunching in the forest – scared to this position by the approaching machinegun-fire – I saw the vehicle; it was a green pickup truck with a .50-caliber mounted in the bed. The bullets ripped through a nearby tree, but I managed to avoid a smashed-in face by ducking behind a fallen tree. And after the fear of these maniacs subsided, I climbed a large oak and settled in for a quick bit of shut-eye.

—I remember quite vividly my surprise at having awoken to full-dark. I had apparently been exhausted enough to sleep for hours and the day had hence been washed away. I laughed at myself and climbed back down to my bicycle.

Still quite groggy, despite energizing my blood with every pump of the pedals, I failed to weave through a throng a little ways down the highway. One of them caught a hold of my wheel and sent me sprawling. But my reflexes, however groggy I may have been, were still quite keen and I brained the lot of them in a matter of moments. Though, I’m quite sure that anybody watching would have been witness to a rather entertaining bout indeed. They approached from every angle and I swung and spun and pirouetted through them with the grace of a ballet dancer. (Or maybe that’s my ego speaking; I probably swung wildly and stumbled over myself, landing lucky shots on my way to this great escape…)

In any case, I was away in a flurry, sheathing my staff on my first pump of the pedal. A fresh gale of groans followed my escape – a good plenty of them, from the sound. But I pedaled on, my eyes sharp in the dim starlight, worrying more over the road ahead – and rightly so!

What this road eventually brought to me was intriguing, if not enlightening, as well. The people I encountered in Ashford gave me my first glimpse of the desperation of man. They were convinced of a concerted military effort that would eventually rescue them. Well, the pair I dealt with the most had this view, at least. The other pair – as this band consisted of a mere four individuals – I met only in passing. (I would later come to know one quite well, but that is a story for another day; as of this particular day, I only met her in passing.)

They were holed-up in a mountaineer’s shop. More specifically, they had made camp in the back rooms of this shop; the storefront itself was darkened to conceal their presence. To their credit, this band was quite aware of security; keeping to the back rooms was just one precaution. They kept watch, day and night, and had modified the slanted roof with makeshift scaffolding on which the watchman could settle or strafe comfortably. I never saw this modification myself, but they told me it was quite the marvel. I had – and have – no reason to doubt this.

The pair I dealt with was mountaineers; the other two were tourists (according to the first pair, anyhow). Greg and Bucky…interesting fellows indeed. One was young (Greg) – perhaps my age, give or take; the other (Bucky) was middle-aged and soft-spoken. They spoke mostly of their impending rescue and asked on the outside world. I told them what little I knew of the circumstances (which, as you well know, wasn’t really all that much). They were in disbelief that I didn’t know more and tried to press me on the matter until it was apparent that I had no information to give. I told them an abridged version of my tale, asked of theirs. We shared in hot cocoa and discussed the worldly ramifications of the scourge, wondering how far it had spread and whatnot.

They were desperate. All four of them were. Though they seemed to separate themselves from the mountaineers, the tourists (Rhea and Jothan – with a soft J – I believe were their names) were also desperate. Desperate to understand, desperate to recover what they had lost – desperate to live. They wore this desperation clearly on their faces, and carried its hefty girth upon their shoulders. It bled so freely from each of these four that even I began to step in it. I wanted to get away before I began to soak in it. But I couldn’t leave until morning light.

At least, that’s what I told myself…

I tried to rest after a spell – after the conversations and cocoa ran dry. But this attempted rest was distracted and fitful – my fear of their desperation ate at the free space in my head, as if it were a condition that was catching. It was illogical, I know. But I felt a vortex about the place and knew that if I remained I’d be sucked into the drama and desperation.

After a few hours of failed sleep and an internal dialogue about excuses for my departure, I decided to just sneak out. And so I did. Dawn was nearly upon the world, so I was near to my goal of waiting until daylight. This logic, plus the irrational fear of wading in the emotions of others, sufficed in cementing my resolution.

Nobody witnessed my departure – and for this I was thankful.

When the headlights shined across my backpath, two thoughts shot through my head: first, that the crazed machinegun truck had returned to wreak havoc on the town of Ashford; second, that the military was indeed beginning their rescue operations. My intuition tended toward the former rather than the latter, and fueled my fear, which pumped the adrenaline I used to pedal into the darkness. I felt alight and exposed in the headlights’ beams and was thankful when I outrode their reach. I was even more thankful when I realized these headlights were no longer following the highway. My best guess is that they, too, stopped at the shop (this was a subject to which I’d never be privy).

That morning I slept a few hours atop a roof on the outskirts of town. After waking, I would make my way to a place that, in time, would hold a great deal of personal growth and social understanding (as well as a greater understanding of the scourge and its victims).

But that is a story for another day…for now I must rest my cramping hand and find some sleep. Rest yourself, as well, weary traveler, and fear not the disease; just know it exists – and so do you. Adieu…