The infection started as a dull ache in her molar. Now, it was a knife twisting in Liz Martin's jaw. When the fever set in two days ago, she knew she was running out of time.
Liz Martin was a survivor, and the years after the fall had carved that truth into every inch of her being. If this were still the old world, she would have been going to college around now, probably worrying about roommates and class schedules. Her father had dreamed of watching her walk across that stage, following in his footsteps. Instead, the daily fight since the age of fourteen stripped away everything recognizable as to who she used to be and left something almost feral in its place.
Her reflection in broken windows showed a lean, weathered face that could have been nineteen or sixty. Her hair was choppy, greasy and matted. She kept it brutally short, hacking it off with her trusted KA-BAR knife whenever it grew past her ears. Experience had taught her that anything long enough to grab was long enough for the dead to grab, and she'd seen too many people with pretty long hair die to take the risk.
Her clothes were whatever she could scavenge that still had intact seams—a men's hunting jacket three sizes too big, cargo pants held up with paracord, boots stolen off a corpse that shared the same shoe size. The layers of dirt and blood had become a second skin, and she couldn't remember the last time she'd seen enough clean water to justify wasting it on a bath. She also couldn't remember the last time she'd eaten a full meal. The constant hunger had become background noise, but today the summer heat magnified every discomfort, leaving her delirious and unsteady.
Or maybe the dizziness was from her constant companion for the past week. The New World had returned humanity to its hunter-gatherer roots, but they weren't the only ones hunting. The dead ate anything with a heartbeat, and their endless wandering made it impossible to stay in one place long enough to grow food. The nomadic life left Liz surviving off the dregs of the Old World—expired cans of SpaghettiOs, stale crackers, and whatever sugar-loaded junk food hadn't been picked clean from the stores. There was no toothpaste in the mix or fluoride in the water, and now she was paying the price.
The side of her jaw throbbed in time with her heartbeat, radiating heat she could feel through her skin. Each pulse brought waves of nausea that made the world move as if she were on a boat braving the stormy sea. The back molar had developed a rancid taste that made her gag. The infection was getting worse. She'd seen people die from abscessed teeth before—fever leading to delirium, then sepsis, then a slow, painful end. She'd join them if she didn't do something about it soon.
Liz stepped through Jeremy's doorway and wobbled. She braced herself against the frame, blinking away the dark spots, letting her eyes adjust to the dark space. She then knocked on the open door and listened for the telltale stumbling and thumping of residents coming to check who was there.
Nothing came from inside, but a rasp came from outside just behind her. She turned, saw nothing, then looked down at the 5-year-old reaching up with two gnawed-off nubs as if it wanted a hug.
After all these years, she no longer remembered her father's face, but his voice was still inside her head, telling her to do better, try harder. It kept her alive. Out of habit, Liz reprimanded herself, "Always look down for crawlers and knee-biters. They're usually quiet."
She casually kicked the 5-year-old in the chest, sending it to the ground, then pinned it in place with her boot. "And always keep one eye on their mouth. The other on their hands... or nubs."
She nodded to herself, internalizing the lesson, then stomped the kid in the head until it stopped moving. Liz stumbled back to the house and knocked on the door again. Nothing.
"Keep the door open if you're just visiting, El," Liz reminded herself, then winced, touched her jaw, and winced even harder as fireworks went off in her periphery. Wiping off sweat, she closed the door behind her, feeling another wave of dizziness hit her. She wasn't going anywhere soon.
She checked the shoeprints on the moldy carpeting. Experience taught her that walkers left muddy, smeared prints while humans left more distinct shoe prints. She saw only smears. That was good. It meant no one had raided this house yet.
She crept down the entryway, whispering, "They gotta have a toolbox. A toolbox will have pliers. They got no garage, so check the closet or the kitchen—"
She froze as she turned and faced the corpse of Jeremy Shrier on the couch. Time and gravity had done their work on his once round face, pulling down his cheeks and jowls, leaving his milky sunken eyes in what looked like a melting skull. He rasped and reached out at Liz, tried to get up, but only managed to rock on the couch.
Liz kept her grip on her KA-BAR knife and examined the sight. "What are you? You're a new one." She had a naming system for the dead—roamers, lurkers, crawlers, knee-biters, rotters, and freshies—and rules for each one. Roamers moved in packs. Lurkers only moved when you woke them. Rotters were so far gone that they barely had a functional mouth. And freshies, or the freshly turned, were the most dangerous. They had all the muscle strength of a human and none of the feedback from those muscles. With a good enough grip, they could tear your skin off like gift paper... or was it Christmas paper?
Liz mumbled, her mind drifting, "Present paper? What was it called?"
She stumbled and fell on her ass. She kept her eye on Jeremy as the rest of the world swirled around her. He kept rasping, trying to get up and get at her, only to fall back down on the couch. She was on the very edge of consciousness, running a fever.
She guffawed and tried to stand back up, slurring out, "I'm gonna call you a couch potato."
She entered the kitchen, opened the first cabinet, and stared at the contents, unsure if what she saw was real. It was a fully stocked pantry. The last time she saw this many cans stacked in neat rows, she was still a kid in the Old World, walking down the aisles of a grocery store.
She opened another cabinet and found it stocked with junk food and soda. She grabbed a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos and tore into it, stuffing her mouth with the chips. She gasped as a knife stabbed into her jaw and twisted the blade. She spat the chips out and found herself doubled over, moaning, holding her mouth, cursing.
Jeremy moaned along with her, trying to twist around on the couch and grab at her.
Liz went back to the first cabinet and searched the labels. She needed food but needed something soft. She grabbed a can of condensed Cream of Mushroom soup, tore the lid off, and started scooping it out with her fingers.
All the while, Jeremy kept grabbing for her, leaning back while trying to push himself up, and the couch began to tip back.
There was a blur in Liz's periphery; then, a muted impact shook the whole house. Liz turned, soup dripping down her chin, as Jeremy flopped off the flipped-over couch and rolled onto his back.
Liz giggled as he reached for her again, looking like a flipped-over turtle.
She reached for her KA-BAR knife to put an end to him and swooned as another wave of dizziness hit her. She braced herself against the counter and muttered another one of her rules, "Never go in unless you are 100% certain you can kill it before it gets you."
She put her knife back in its sheath and turned to the large cluster of medication on the counter. "Oh god, you got everything, couch potato."
As Liz rummaged through pill bottles, the Couch Potato rocked on his back, wobbling, straining—until inertia finally rolled him over onto his stomach.
And he began to leak.
After all those years stuck on a couch, his body was now shifting in unnatural ways, putting hundreds of pounds of rotting flesh under new pressure. An oily amber pool spread underneath him as Jeremy tried to push himself up. His arms gave out, and he collapsed face-first into the mess.
"Yes!" Liz hissed as she found a bottle of Amoxicillin. She popped the cap, downed two pills with a swig from a dusty 2-liter of Diet Coke, and added a couple of painkillers for good measure.
Behind her, Jeremy tried again to rise and failed, his rotting body slamming back into the puddle of decay. Liz barely noticed—her attention was fixed on her good fortune. She yanked open drawers until she found a pair of slip-joint pliers in the catch-all junk drawer. She didn't know what they were meant for, but they looked perfect for a little DIY dental work right now.
Her father's voice echoed in her head: Better to rip the bandaid off.
She took a deep breath, forced the pliers into her mouth, and clamped them down on the throbbing molar. The pain was instant—white-hot, shooting through her skull. Tears welled up as she whimpered, hyperventilating through the agony. Both hands gripped the plier handles, and she counted down.
One... Two…
Liz yanked hard. The scream that tore from her throat was primal, guttural. Blood and puss filled her mouth as the molar cracked free, sending shockwaves of pain through her head. She stumbled, drooling red, and glanced down at the blackened tooth in her trembling hand.
"I got ya, you stinking piece of—"
A wet splatter hit the wall behind her, and Liz froze. Slowly, she turned, eyes locking onto the wall. It was dripping with... something. Something brownish-yellow and curdled, and oh God, the smell…
She gagged, covering her mouth as her gaze followed the greasy trail back to Jeremy. His bloated body shuddered as he tried to rise, and more of the putrid liquid squirted out from a bite mark on his side.
It wasn't just that one wound—his entire body was leaking, his liquefying fat gushing from every love bite his neighbors had given him over the years. A foul, oily pool spread across the floor beneath him.
For the first time in years, Liz felt something she hadn't allowed herself to feel—terror. Not fear. Fear was the calculated survival instinct that had kept her alive. This was a paralyzing, pure dread that kept you from thinking straight and narrowed your options down to fight or flight... and that was what got you killed.
Jeremy made another attempt to rise. His arms shook, and with a sickening crack, his ulna snapped, bone jutting out from his forearm. His massive body tilted sideways, and his hands slipped out on the grease beneath him. He flopped back down, hard.
A splatter of yellow, chunky cottage cheese hit Liz's legs. She barely had time to react before the stench hit her again, burning her eyes. She looked down and saw the liquid pooling around her feet. She tried to step back, but her boots slipped on the grease, sending her flailing.
Liz caught the counter, knocking the pill bottles to the ground, scrabbling for balance on the slick linoleum as she desperately tried to stay on her feet.
Behind her, Jeremy—against all odds—managed to push himself upright. For the first time in years, he stood. His massive stomach sagged, dragging almost to the floor.
But it wasn't just sagging. Liz's eyes widened in horror as his upper body seemed to deflate—his arms and chest shriveling as the liquefied fat drained into his abdomen. His torso hung loose, like a stretched deflated balloon, while his stomach swelled grotesquely.
Liz righted herself, gripping the counter, fighting to keep her gravity centered in this precarious position. Cornered in the kitchen, she picked her only option: Fight. She pulled out her knife, knowing she had one chance to take him down before she would be flat on her ass again.
The Couch Potato lumbered forward, his arms reaching for her. Liz lunged at his head with a desperate stab of her KA-BAR.
She didn't even make it a step before her feet shot out from underneath her. The blade plunged not into his head, but deep into his stomach. Instinctively, she clung to the knife, trying to pull herself up, but her weight dragged the blade downward instead.
With a horrible tearing sound, the knife sliced open Jeremy from sternum to navel.
Liz hit the ground, and Jeremy emptied onto her. Over 200 pounds of greasy, chunky, rotten fat poured out, burying her under a flood of decay.
Still leaking, Jeremy wobbled on his feet, much, much lighter now. His loose, sagging skin flapped against his emaciated frame like grotesque curtains as he stumbled forward.
Liz screamed beneath him, drenched in his mess, gagging, her hands clawing at the linoleum as she tried to scrabble away. But it was no use—she slipped and slid, trapped in place by the slick, putrid ichor.
She barely managed to flip onto her back, tucking her knees into her chest just as Jeremy's bloated corpse toppled down on top of her. His rasping breaths filled her ears, and she stared up in horror as his teeth snapped inches from her face. His still pudgy hands gripped the sides of her head, pulling her closer, his rotting breath hot against her skin.
Liz tried to grip his shoulders and hold him back, but she only managed to grab fistfuls of loose, slick skin, not the body underneath. The flesh simply tore away from the connective tissue holding it back and inched ever closer to Liz.
Desperation overtook her. She frantically scanned the floor, eyes locking on the KA-BAR a few feet away. Her hand shot out, fingers grazing the hilt, but it was too far.
And it was too late.
With a sickening rip, Jeremy's skin tore completely, and his rotting body collapsed onto her. Liz went stiff as she felt his teeth graze her neck. Panic seized her as she faced the inevitable—the moment she fought against every day of her miserable life—it was finally here. The moment they tore into her.
But the bite didn't come.
Jeremy's teeth gripped her neck, his leathery tongue pressed against her flesh. He froze, tasting himself on her, registering a bitter, rancid rot. Liz lay still beneath him, her breath held, not daring to move. The creature hovered there, torn between two conflicting impulses: the meat was rotten, but it was warm—feverishly warm.
Jeremy's vacant eyes locked onto her. For a moment, Liz thought this was it. Her whole body trembled, ready to die.
Then, a crow cawed outside.
The sound pulled Jeremy's attention away. Slowly, he released her and stood, his interest now focused on the noise. Liz watched in stunned disbelief as he staggered off, slipping and sliding across the linoleum floor, lurching toward the broken window.
Liz could only take a breath and bring her trembling fingers to brush against her neck. They came back slick and slimy—but there was no blood. His teeth hadn't broken skin. Liz didn't understand. Birds fly, and the dead bite... except for this time.
Jeremy reached the window and leaned forward, tumbling through the jagged glass. Liz blinked as the sound of ripping flesh followed him, leaving behind large chunks of loose, sagging skin caught on the shards. He fell into the overgrown bushes, his flesh further catching on branches and brambles.
The crow cawed again, and Jeremy writhed like a bloated butterfly pushing itself out of its chrysalis, tearing more of himself free as he struggled to roll away. With much of his skin hanging in tatters, Jeremy stood and wandered off into the overgrown street.
Shaking, Liz crawled out of the kitchen, leaving the grease-slick linoleum behind, her limbs aching. She pulled herself into the carpeted living room and stood on unsteady legs. Slowly, she moved to the window, watching in disbelief as Jeremy Shrier stumbled down the street. His torso was glistening red, stripped of fat and most of his skin, nothing but pure muscle. The ribbons of his remaining flesh flapped loosely at his waist, dragging behind him as he explored this New World.
THE END
Well, Jeremy did get free after all, in a strange way, thanks to her. And man, what all she went through. You really painted a bleak picture here, along with the toughness people find inside themselves to soldier on. I’m definitely impressed here, Kevin. Awesome story.