Wishes

A long time ago, before all this, a friend of mine and I were walking home from school. My spine seemed to be creaking under the weight of the textbooks I was hauling, and I said to my friend, "Man, I wish they didn't give us so much to do." My friend simply looked over at me and gave me one of his crooked grins and said, "Wishes are like assholes, everyone's got one, and most of them are shitty." We both shared a laugh and continued on our way.

It's been almost 20 years since then, hell, I can barely remember that kids name. What I wouldn't give for just one more day of that youthful innocence. But there's no use getting tied up in the past. Things are much different now. It's been just over a year since what we scientists call the final mutation of the Flu. Hell, I don't even know why we called it a "flu" for as long as we did. We knew the second that first man got back up after being clearly dead that this was something new. We just never wanted to face facts.

You've probably noticed the heading on this paper by now. Yep, I worked for the CDC. And my coworkers and I are the ones you can blame for letting this bug spread like it has. The second it mutated we should have clamped down much harder than we did. Instead we just shipped whatever infected we could find out to that rusty shit hole Camp Theresa. I went on a tour of that camp with some of the other doctors. I'm surprised the fences they used to keep the infected in didn't get blown over by the wind. When I heard of the break out I wasn't surprised in the least. If only I'd known how bad things would become, I might have been able to do something. But when the virus started spreading cross country I did what most would call a cowardly thing. I called it an act of self preservation and tried to convince myself i did the right thing. If only so i could live with myself. It didnt work. What I did was simply packed up my stuff and leave. I Left my office at the CDC and my research and coworkers and hoofed it out to the wilderness. That was about a year and a half ago.

I could spend pages recounting my travels and documenting all the people I've met along the way to where I am now. But that's a story that will probably never be told. I can't take this guilt anymore. The resentful stares I get from people when they find out who I am, what my job was. We failed. I failed. And no matter what I was thinking when I left it was still a cowardly move. I take responsibility for whats become of this world and all the suffering it's people have gone through. It's time for me to experience what I've put my countrymen through. I can see my friend flashing that crooked smile through time at me when I say that I've got nothing left to say but a few wishes. I wish you good luck in all you do to survive this brave new world. I wish I could be there to see how our human race will triumph over this horror. And speaking on the part of viral scientists everywhere, I just wish we had more time.

-Dr. Richard Smith 

PS-If you see a zombie wearing a tattered lab coat, put him down quickly. It's time for me to pay my dues.