Watching the world burn

“LEFT!!!” Ed was too late to react, and I watched as our former friend, now a walking rot corpse, dug her teeth into his shoulder. He screamed as his flesh decayed, just the sight of it was enough to make me light-headed, then there was the dread. We set off on this journey for food 3 days ago with 4 soldiers and us 6 kids, now it was just the two of us.

“Get to the cave!” Marco called out, waking me from my trance and pushing me forward. It was over for the rest of us, they were like the ground those things walked on, dying and decaying. I’d heard the stories, seen the grass those things had trampled on, but there’s something almost enchanting, the want to see something you know you don’t want to see.

Maybe I shouldn’t have looked, I did though. The first one was dining on his innards, the other was digging out his eye. He was still alive, screaming, crying, pissing… it didn't matter, just being touched by one of those things spelt the end of your existence.

I couldn’t handle the queeziness anymore, glanced over to see Marco with one tailing him close, he was already injured and carrying most of our gear, it was gonna catch him. “Marco! One to your six!”

He was one of the soldiers, instincts of a wolf in the wild. He spun half way and held his rifle high, the shot fired and blew the thing’s face away. It died instantly, but its fluid splashed on his face, like an acid it burned its way deep into his brain, he froze and dropped to the ground, screaming and crying.

“It’s over” I assured myself as I cowered in the back of the cave. There was only one solace, the last grenade in my pouch. I pulled the pin, but held on for dear life. The thought of the explosion tearing me to pieces, of losing my life and being cast into the void kept my grip tight, but the rot walkers that were my friends, now approaching the cave tightened my resolve.

“God dammit!” I cried out, the grenade flew from my hand and hit the cave entrance. When it exploded, the rock crumbled. What was I thinking? What if it just made a bigger hole? I’d be corpse crap in an hour. What if it let loose the rock above and smashed me to a paste… actually that sounded easier than being chewed, least then I’m dead before my eyes burst.

To my surprise, the explosion cracked the entrance and rock fell where the entrance lay.

On one hand, I had saved myself from being mauled… but on the other I had just very skillfully sealed my own tomb.

*-*-*

Had it been an hour? Two? A day maybe? Fuck who’s to say I haven’t been here longer? The dark was more unbearable than being outside, and hearing them scratching at the rock at the front was doing me no favours.

“Fuck, fuck… what do I do? What do I do?!” It was hopeless. “You fucking moron what kind of plan is this?!” As if punching myself in the head wasn’t as dumb as I could get.

Could have been another hour, but sat hyperventilating and listening out for the rot outside was just killing me quicker. My eyes got used to the dark, I could make out shapes now. Time to work out what I got.

Pockets only held lint and some coins that didn’t matter anymore. I had my keys… maybe they’d be a good weapon, I can act like a neutered Wolverine.

Marco’s bag was here too, It must’ve flew out of his hands when he started convulsing. Inside… jackpot! Some rations, a small pickaxe… a gun with one bullet… “what sort of divine irony is this shit?”

Best of all, a flashlight. Knowledge is power here.

Taking a look around, I dunno what I expected. Rock, a little bit of moss and a pool of brown water. But at the back where I had cowered, I felt a bit of a dip. Upon further inspection, it was a major crack, more like a divvet, most likely caused by the explosion.

I dug into it for a while, when I could finally fit through, I noticed there was a pathway, underground. It wasn’t that rare here, people made bunkers to cower from those things. They did work, I knew they did, but there’s more than just the rot walkers that’ll kill you, and starvation is a hell of a way to go.

This seemed different from the normal bunkers though, more fancy, more open. It was clear why when I got to the end of the hallway, I’d stumbled into something much more than your normal safe zone.

“Holy…”

This was a billionaire’s bunker!

*-*-*

A year had passed, and I kept a record of the days I spent in that bunker.

For the first few days, it was all about securing the area. The place was ginormous, fit for thousands but I bet those selfish fucks kept it for themselves and their cursed offspring.

The hole I dug to get in was my first port of call. The Rot Walkers could break down anything organic in a flash but anything man-made was immune to their disease. Because of their decay, they were weaker than normal humans, so things like brick, concrete, metals and thick glass were impenetrable. Had the mass populace watched enough anime they’d all be surviving comfortably behind giant walls, but unfortunately, that was not the case.

Despite being relatively safe it was still terrifying walking around this place. It was abandoned for a reason, and the lack of corpses suggested it wasn’t a food shortage, hell, the massive indoor greenery was a dead giveaway.

Took me a good few days to scan all the rooms for life… or, death? Either way, I was safe. There were no openings to the outside world, no way in.

The checklist of rooms were as follows:

Large living space with a massive tv that could connect to all the channels that couldn’t broadcast. A massive white leather couch, a game console, an attached library (filled with manga… hell yes.), a pool table, and a filtered swimming pool (fit with an Screen floor that you could change to look like you were at sea… it was a little weird honestly).

A huge kitchen. Likely for use of the owner’s staff that were likely dead. Unfortunately there was no way of generating meat, so I became a vegan… actually not as bad as I thought.

A greenery, perfect for growing crops. I spent most of my time here.

A plethora of bedrooms, I chose the master ‘cause it was massive and it had a panic feature for earthquakes.

A number of bathrooms, hell it even had an onsen!

And finally, the room I found last… “the Solipsys room”.

*-*-*

There was nothing I wanted more than to just boot it up and take her for a spin, but I knew I still needed to be careful.

In the past year I’d done a complete scan of the area twice a day, every day. It still terrified me, the idea of being alone here, then suddenly finding out that one of them had breached into my sanctuary, ready to rip out my guts was enough to put me off long sleeps. But the longer I spent in the vault without incident, the more confident I grew. Confidence is the killer of common sense, I always say. It’s best to prepare for the worst and remain calm.

So for that reason, the idea of jumping into a console, leaving my body vulnerable, was an absolute no no. But it still called my name. No matter how easy life was in here, I was running out of fun to have. If I have to read about the Raven and the Knight one more time I think I might drown myself. Speaking of the pool, it’s nice for about an hour, then you realise it’s literally just a cold bathtub.

I craved conversation… with a human, I’d already tried the “ball with face” thing and it just creeped me out.

It was just another day in paradise, that I threw caution to the wind, and booted up the Solipsys system. I go through the same thing when I sleep anyway, I just need to be careful is all I thought, trying to convince myself… and it worked.

*-*-*

It was all dark, for about 15 minutes, I thought it’d stopped working after so long but it turned out the headpiece needed time to calibrate, and tune into your memories.

I chose to see my family first, when I was young. I woke up on a winter morning, greeted with the smell of freshly baked gingerbread. My father was on his throne reading the newspaper, complaining about the stock market as usual. My mother pretended to listen to him, she’d gotten really good at that over the years. I tried walking in but my sister zoomed past me.

Christmas morning.

We started tearing through the wrappings, as our parents sat together drinking mulled wine and watching us eagerly. My little sister pulled out a purple bunny, her favourite animal, and held it in her arms, hugging it tightly. She wanted me to see…

“Look! It’s a bunny rabbit! Onii-chan…”

I slipped through time, she was 3 years older, showing her uniform for middle school “…Onii-chan.”

When I taunted her about her first crush and she got angry a few years later “…Onii-chan!”

When she was leaving for high school one morning, “…Nii-chan.”

When I watched her die. “NII-CHAN!!”

“CHITOSE!”

The nightmare was over, but the tears still flowed.

*-*-*

After that, it sunk in. I’d spent a full year here, pretending that everything was ok, forgetting about what life was like before it all ended. Chitose, the old man, mother… they were all gone, taken from me and there was no changing that…

No, maybe there was.

How could I have been so stupid?! The system I'd been so reluctant to use wasn’t just made to show you your past, it had one further feature… the ability to change the past.

I’ll jump in once more, but this time, it’s back to the time before those fucks existed, to search for this Dr Kozioł, and stop his research before it destroys us!

“I’m gonna save the world!”

*-*-*

When I opened my eyes, again it was April 2080, a month before the world ended. The me of this time I replaced had his hand in his pants, holding a magazine in the other, staring at the chest region of some model I don’t remember anymore. I remember this though, my old dorm room. My roommate was a transfer student from Ghana, liked to be called Freddy. He was a good guy, died protecting a girl at school, too bad she died not long after.

Once I’d managed to remove my hand from my happy place, I set off. The College wasn’t far, if I was going to change my time I needed a plan, and the best place to research Pawel Kozioł and his company was at the only building in the world named after him, at our college.

“Good evening ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming today. The projects around you are currently being worked on at our labs around the world, but I would like to explain our next work.”

There he was, holding a seminar to the masses. Looking around the room, there were press, a few students like me, and a number of onlookers here for a day out, they were waiting with bated breath.

“We have conquered the past, it’s now time to focus on the future. Our goals have always been to make people’s lives better, to make life easier. When I was young, I watched my father go through cancer. Every second was agony, and though he received proper treatment, he still died.”

“Cancer, is formed naturally. Your cells, right this second are processing an incredible amount of data, and performing the same task millions of times over. But sometimes, there is an error. Our bodies have a fail safe, they tell the cells that are in error, to die. Cancer is formed by these cells, by either refusing to die, or being unable to. They are parasitic, hide their presence and trick the body into giving it nutrients.”

“But did you know that larger animals, such as elephants and blue whales, show less signs of Cancer? Their cells aren’t special, and they are the same size as ours, they just have a lot more. Surely, with a long life span and many more cells than us, their chances of Cancer should be practically double ours but it isn’t. And the reason for that, is something called Hyper Tumours.”

A little girl in the front row raised her hand.

“Yes dear?”

“Sir, what’s a hyper tumour?”

“Excellent question. Think of it like two people fighting over a box of cereal. A hyper tumour is a second tumour growing in another. They are cells that are selfish by nature, it’s not inconceivable for another to break off and become independent. So the two tumours fight for the same resources.”

“It’s not perfect, there are still tests to run. But we have taken cells from hyper tumours, and hope that we can find the key to solving the Cancer problem that has plagued our lives and those around us, for thousands of years. And it all starts with this test subject here!”

A woman, bald and pale, the after effects of chemotherapy. She was barely awake, lying in a bed behind glass.

The onlookers celebrated but I knew what this meant. I can’t let this happen!

“Hands up!” I called.

He complied, quickly. The others ran away in their panic. I figured bringing the gun I’d bought back then would come in useful, though, the fact that it shot out fire like a lighter rather than a bullet, was my little secret. I didn’t have much time, this guy was the modern day Tesla, I was actually surprised I’d managed to get this far.

“Calm down” he urged, “let’s not do anything rash.” The researcher kept deadly still.

“No hard feelings doctor, but I needed a way to get your attention. This test your doing, adding dead cells to try and kill cancer, it won’t work.”

“Oh? And why would that be?” He was clearly stalling, moving slightly, circling around to the table with the syringes.

“Knock it off. I’m not here to hurt you. I haven’t been completely honest with you, Doctor. You see, I’m from the future.” Normally that line leads automatically to the listener thinking you’ve gone mad, but this man had basically made a time machine, so…

“Ah, you’re using my machine! How interesting! I was wondering when I might run into one of you. How is the future? Do we have flying cars yet? What year do you come from?”

“2080… the year you ended the world.”

He didn’t really seem to register that.

“Oh. That sounds interesting, though it does sound a little far fetched.”

“No, no it isn’t! This study of yours is the end of us. You didn’t reverse engineer the cancer cells, you made a mutation, much stronger, much more contagious. People die, and continue moving, passing on the cancer. Everyone we know is gone, everyone in this room WILL die. That’s why I’m here, to stop it from happening.”

“Then that’s a shame.”

My heart fell, “why’s that?”

Behind him, through the glass, the patient’s head dropped, their skin changed from a pale white to a light green, her veins came to the forefront.

“Because I’ve already administered the cure.”

It’s head lifted, and the first Rot Walker was born.

It ate through the leather shackles. Saw us, and started smashing its head into the glass, cracking it more and more with each hit. I saw the realisation on his face, that everything I said was true.

“Dammit, too late. I’ll go back further next time.”

“It won’t matter.”

“What?” I responded.

“It won’t matter. I’m sorry, but no matter if you stop this happening or not, nothing will change.”

He gasped when I took a hold of his collar. “Spit it out doctor! Why won’t it matter?!”

The glass smashed and it reached for us, the doctor decayed as it touched his skin. I could feel mine rip apart and my mind warp, I couldn’t control the scream that let itself out.

“What’s done is done.”