Assuming I can bring him down, I’d still have to get everything off him. In the time that would take, the rest of the monsters would pounce on me. After a while I devised a plan. It’s really horrible, but it’s the best I’ve got.
I don’t want to ask my neighbor for help. He’s wound so tight, I can’t rely on him. Plus, if something happened to him, my guilt would kill me. No. It’s my plan, my risk, and my reward. I don’t have the slightest idea how to use a gun, but it would make me feel a lot safer to have one. With it, I’d try to get out of here. And I won’t hesitate to use it on myself to keep from turning into one of those things. That’s for sure.
Now that I know what to do, I have to figure out when to do it. I’ll wait a few hours. I want to be sure there aren’t any more of those things out of my line of vision. I loaded the speargun and had some target practice in the garden. Pulling the trigger releases the tension in the band, and the spear shoots off like a rocket deep into the tree trunk. I sweated a lot getting it out. I couldn’t get a grip on it. I won’t have time to retrieve my spears. Since I only have six of them, I’ll have to be a very, very good shot.
ENTRY 35
January 27, 11:25 a.m.
My hands are shaking. I needed a long, long break and another swig of gin to be able sit down and write. Dear God, my nerves are going to explode!
I started at the crack of dawn, when the light was good. Those things are deceptively slow; they can move really fast when they want to. I don’t know if they see well at night, but one thing’s for sure—I can’t see for shit in the dark. And there’re so many of them. I don’t intend to find out how many, at least for the moment.
Thinking it through, I realize my plan is pure madness. But it’s the best I’ve come up with over the last feverish hours. I need to do something to relieve the agonizing tension that’s built up since those things arrived. Plus, the gun and backpack have become a symbol. I’ll get them at any price.
All this excitement has infected poor Lucullus. He’s been running around the backyard all morning like a wild animal.
After hours of watching those eleven monsters, I realized they only move when something gets their attention. At about seven this morning, a rat or a hedgehog or something was darting around at the end of the street. Several of those things headed after it but apparently didn’t catch it. Six of them—two children, three men, and a woman—remained at my end of the street, about forty yards away, with their backs to my front door. When I saw that, I realized that my plan might have a fighting chance.
My entire plan hinges on the fact that there’s only one way on to my street, where it intersects with the main street. On the other end my street dead-ends at the embankment where the civil guardsmen and soldiers headed several nights ago. It’s steep, so I doubt any of those things can climb it. But I’m not 100 percent sure of that—one more unknown in my wonderful plan. I can see small groups of them wandering aimlessly on the main street. They don’t seem to find my street especially exciting. In the last two hours, a couple of monsters walked a few yards down my street but went back the other direction after a while.
The soldier-monster is on the far side of the street, close to the embankment, swaying in the middle of the road. In addition to him and the six monsters with their backs to me, there are three women and one man, Thumper, who continues to haunt the house next door. One of the women is missing an arm and half her chest. She’s standing in front of my house, less than two yards from my door, staring at the wall. Nothing has changed in an hour and a half, so I’ve decided to act.
I’ve racked my brain over what to wear. I don’t want those things to bite me or touch me. I don’t know if they sweat or if you can contract the virus through contact with their skin or their sweat. The sad truth is, I don’t know shit about them. I just know they’re dead, they’re aggressive, and they’re at my front door.
After a lot of thought, I decided to wear my wetsuit. It’s superthick, top-grade neoprene—flexible and water resistant. I doubt they can bite through it. At most, I’ll get a bruise under that layer of neoprene. Plus, it’s completely smooth and thermo-sealed; there are no buttons or loose edges they could grab me by. It’s like a second skin. I wasn’t sure if I needed to cut the hood. It covers everything but my face, including my ears. Since it’s so thick, I can barely hear. I have to be able to hear those things coming up behind me. It also limits my peripheral vision.
With a sigh I picked up the scissors and trimmed the hood. This baby cost me almost twelve hundred euros a year ago. I’ve taken it on many weekend dives, and now I’m destroying it. But what other choice do I have?
Next, I put on winter gloves and tennis shoes because they’re flexible and—very important—quiet. I got a look at myself in the mirror. Jesus! I looked like some weirdo in my diving goggles, with the speargun and a handful of spears on my back. I don’t know if I’ll take down that soldier, but one look at me and he might die laughing. That is, if he has a sense of humor. Damn, I’m delirious!
I also grabbed an old umbrella and tore off the fabric and all the spokes. It had a mean ivory handle that must’ve weighed a ton. It’ll do in a pinch.
I’m trusting my life to a speargun and a broken umbrella…great!
Time to get going. I’ll leave Lucullus in the backyard. If something happens to me, I hope he’ll have the sense to escape over the wall. My poor friend. He doesn’t deserve all this shit.
Before I unlock the door, I pick up my secret weapon. My whole plan depends on a silly little toy I found when I was rummaging through a drawer. If it works, I’ll have a chance. If not, I’ll be really in big trouble.
ENTRY 36
January 28, 3:45 p.m.
Human beings are extremely complex. If you’d told me a month ago I’d be capable of what I did yesterday, I’d have laughed my ass off. And yet—I did it! And I’m still alive.
After I got my wetsuit on, I opened the upstairs window a crack to get an overview of my street. I shoved the speargun out the window and propped it against the windowsill. I toyed with the idea of shooting the monsters from the safety of my roof. What a stupid idea! There was no way I could hit a target the size of a human head thirty yards away with a speargun, even if the spear hit the target with enough speed and strength. I had to keep in mind I only had six spears. Only six shots…
I started laughing hysterically. I couldn’t help it. I was thinking about shooting people from my bedroom window! It was all so absurd and ironic. Those things down there were clearly not human. Once upon a time, they had lives, family, friends. And now they’re…whatever they are. The people they used to be had been either slower-witted than I was or not as lucky. That’s all.
With a sigh I decided it was time to face the inevitable. I grabbed a roll of duct tape and pulled out my secret weapon: a little teddy bear with copper cymbals in its paws. When you press the button on the bear’s back, it frantically bangs the cymbals and sort of hiccups. The noise is earsplitting. One of my young cousins, Laura, brought it to my house months ago. After chasing around an indignant Lucullus, getting chocolate all over my curtains, and breaking a picture frame, she finally fell asleep on the couch and left her teddy bear underneath it. I found it the next day and put it in a drawer until its owner could come to claim it. Now she may never be back.
For the love of God, she was only five years old! I hope she’s okay, or if not, I pray she was shot in the head. Just not turned into one of those things…