The Plague

A man is trapped inside of his own body when a strange infection starts spreading.

 

I don’t want to think. There is nothing to think about anyway. Everything is filled up with facts and ideas. But me, I’m empty. I’ve forgotten what feeling is like. What an emotion is. I’ve become mentally numb. Seething with raw nothingness. My body is chilled to the bone by my own self-unconsciousness. What was it like to be alive? More importantly, what was it like to be human? How can I go back to that existence?

 

At first I felt degraded. Disgusted by my own actions. I wanted anything to end my life. A simple bullet to the head and it would be over. But, being one among thousands, what were my chances? It was always some other lucky b*****d. I had come to realize that death was just wishful thinking.

Two months. It had been two months since the infection had begun spreading. It had appeared suddenly and without warning. People tried to run. I tried to run. I can still feel the damning jaws wrapping around my throat.

I’m trapped inside my own mind. My body moves as if someone else controls it. I’m forced to watch myself wreak havoc on the civilization that I was once a member of. The world referred to us as the living dead. If only that were true. I would give anything to be one of those Hollywood created monsters. To be a mindless drone, walking the earth. An empty shell, reanimated. My existence is much more real than that. Painfully real.

I’m watching a never-ending movie of death and torment. I wish I could shut it off but I can’t. I’ve tried shutting my eyes so I can’t see, but they will not close for me. And so, I watch myself slaughter hundred of people. Tearing the skin from bones and using it to fuel my body. Ripping into peoples’ necks to spread my virus.

It hurts as I walk the streets of this city. But not in the traditional sense. I feel no actual pain. The last remaining morals of the life I once knew tell me that what I am seeing is wrong. What my body is doing is wrong.

I see a man in the middle of the street. His hands are shaking badly, wrapped around a gun. He’s not firing it. Just holding it. Shaking it. I wonder if there are any bullets in it. There probably are. Why else would he have it? He doesn’t seem to see me, even though my body is walking straight at him. His eyes aren’t resting on one location long enough for him to notice. I watch the gun closely. I wish my head, my heart, would be his target.

If only it were that easy. If only I could remove my hands from this man's throat and let him blow away my suffering. I give in to my new indoctrination and squeeze. His still warm hands go limp in their grasp. He falls to the floor. I move on. I try to close my eyes again and let the infection run its course. My mind fogs over and I stop thinking. I just watch. I see the first hand account of hundred of murders and dozens of new infections, but I try not to keep count.

Houses destroyed. Bodies lying in the streets. I observe the destruction caused be my ‘brethren’ and I. Why can’t we be stopped? Why doesn’t the government do something about this? Is there even a government left? I know nothing outside of this body. What is the nature of my curse? What hellhole did it crawl out of? What ways does it affect humanity? Aside from the obvious. I think all of this while seeing a little girl be torn apart by my own bloody hands. What will become of me? Will this infection last forever? Will my body last forever? Something I won't know until ends. It has been two months since I was trapped in here. I’ve had two months to think of the life I’ve lost and the lives I’ve taken. What has it gotten me? I’m tearing into the arm of a young woman. She is screaming so loudly. My teeth sink into her neck as I open the gates of hell for her. Welcome.

There must be something I can do. The mind controls the body. I’m the mind now aren’t I? Maybe that’s what the infection does. Severe the link between the physical and the mental. Could I rebuild that connection? The city has grown significantly quieter. There must be a way to stop myself. I have to find it. The feeling of consciousness but the inability to move is maddening. All I want is to be able to move. To be more than a mental existence inside a mindless body. Like a dream where you can’t get yourself to stand up or to run away.

I wish I could feel. Something. Some emotion to remind me that I am still alive. Still human. I bust down the door of a gas station and enter. There is a man cowering behind one of the shelves. I walk slowly toward him, staring into his eyes. Eyes filled with fear. I wish I could feel fear. I bend down and drag him up. My actions are met with no resistance. Sounds of pain start making their way out of his throat as I squeeze.

Will I kill him, or turn him? I can never tell. Staring into his eyes still, my body reaches a decision. Infection seems to be a suiting end for this man. If only he could feel death. Once my deed is done I drop him. In a few hours he will rise again, to spread the seed. I hate this world. I hate this curse. Everything I’ve done and seen. It has to end. When does it end?

I clench my fists in anger.