Dawn came and the man in the tattered, black coat followed in its shadow.  The road he walked was as tattered as he was, sprouting eruptions of green interspacing the unpatched potholes that marred the blacktop up and down the length of the freeway.  

He’d been walking since he’d woken several hours ago and his feet hurt as the soles of his shoes were worn into a thin line of leather.  The bag over his shoulder held some food and the majority of his life’s possessions.  It too looked worn and ill-used; with a few stitched patches and areas where the contents had worn through.  Still, he didn’t ask for much and in turn he wasn’t disappointed so perhaps this was why he was still clattering around when so many others had faded.

He recalled the voices he’d heard the other day, while exploring the highrise that towered over this section of the concrete jungle.  He’d been too afraid to shout and by the time he’d reached the ground, any sign of people had vanished.  His shadow had mocked him for that.  His shadow was always mocking him and if the man was honest, it was really starting to irritate him.  

“What, you think someone really was here -- even after all this time, someone who’s survived this long was dumb enough to talk loud enough for you to hear? That’s a dumb, fucking idea Will and you know it.”

His shadow was a precocious asshole and he’d named it after his older brother, Jacob.  Even if it sounded nothing like him.  

“You know that I know I’m crazy, fuck off.  You’d be searching too in my shoes, it’s just the nature of the thing.” He said in reply.  

“Yeah, well, I’m rooting for you man; it’s just, I don’t want you to be disappointed again.  You remember the last one?”

Will definitely remembered.  She’d been feral, almost as insane as he was.  She’d been eaten by the dead after fleeing his approach, even with hands raised.  He regretted approaching her and her screams had certainly been unpleasant.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

“Be that as it may,” he replied.  “But I think you’d agree that we don’t want to be stuck with each-other for the rest of my precarious lifespan.  A man should always strive to better himself, right?  Otherwise what’s it all for?”

Jacob blew air out from cheeks that didn’t exist.  “Jesus you’re pretentious.  You sound like a philosophy major, in a world where most philosophy majors got eaten.  There is no greater meaning; no reason for it all.”  He paused, pointing out a lumbering member of America’s new upper and only class.

“Careful with that one, I think he’s seen you.”

Will nodded his acknowledgement, eyeing the creature with a practiced eye.  The dead were a finicky lot, with no real normative to pin their erratic behavior down to.  For every nine that seemed to behave like some primitive, pack animal; some unspecified minority would buck the social pressure and hunt the world’s scant few survivors on their lonesome.  Those ones scared Will and for good reason: too many people trusted in experience, fell in love with their idea of how the dead ought to behave.  Those people ended up with dirty, boney fingers buried in their guts and an insatiable hunger once they’d passed.  

It stumbled before righting itself on the hood of a car, displaying preternatural awareness of its surroundings.  Luckily for Will, its throat was torn out and any chance of it calling in a herd was minimal at best.  A wind rife with the scent of greenery and old death blew across the overpass, the eye dropping distance to the ground making Will’s legs turn to jello.  

“Fuck this.” Will was tired of waiting for it.  Stepping up, he plunged his knife into its ear canal, feeling the squelch of brain matter through the metal of his blade.  At the last second it seemed to cock its head; as if in anticipation of the blow that came like a thought through its aged, facsimile of a brain.  

“That was bizarre,” Jacob remarked.

“No kidding,” Will muttered to himself.  He suddenly felt the overwhelming urge for silence and so shouldered his pack and walked on, the city below just coming around to the idea of morning.