[Charlee Faraday walks with me through the city she is currently living in and trying to raise back up (from the dead, so to speak). Her role is small but important, a local radio newscaster, talk show host, and DJ.]

I don’t know why you’re deciding to interview me, since I’ve heard your history of speaking with countless important figures and world leaders. But I’ll talk, if that’s what you’d like.

Before, I was a college student up in Fredericksburg. A couple friends and I had a little radio show that talked about shit that’s happened in our lives and on campus. We used the show to gain experience working with the equipment and maybe even fuel a latent desire in all of us to have our names known.

When the Great Panic started, we continued to provide coverage, and that got us into some trouble. Authorities don’t really like it if a handful of college students are inciting even more unrest than is already going on. But our listeners loved it, needed it. We were the main source of unadulterated apocalypse chatter. Where on campus was safe? Where was dangerous? Where had already been looted ten times over? We’d even get some names of people who checked in with us and broadcast them over the radio in case any of their loved ones were listening for some home.

Here, I carry around this little promo picture of our radio show group.

What happened to the others?

We… went different ways, both literally and figuratively. Our sponsor, Professor James, didn’t really support us once the Panic hit. He was more worried about himself than our show, which I get. He bolted the first chance he got. Haven’t heard from him since.

Cypherpunk and Alex both stuck around and helped me with tech stuff, and boy did they get crafty once we had to go underground.

Underground?

Yeah, we were, for some reason, being targeted for spreading awareness. All we wanted was for others to be safe and to have a way of hearing the latest while also getting help about how to stay alive! But anyways, Alex and Cypherpunk connected calls and did all the techy things I was incompetent to do at the time. Naturally, I began to learn just by watching them. By the time Alex disappeared, I was able to do most of what he could before, maybe even better. Before you ask, yes I said he disappeared. I do not think he ran away, he’s too much of a chicken to have left us.

[Charlee laughs]

I say that playfully, our group would always make fun of each other like that. So when we had no clue what became of Alex, it was just Cypherpunk and I left and by then things in the world were getting a little too tense for us to keep up our funny shenanigans on the radio. We resorted to taking callers until service was dried up, then we would host people, give them a safe space to stay in exchange for being on the radio. A good amount of people wanted to stay, and our bunker was big enough that we let them, as long as they didn’t negatively interfere with our show.

At the first sign of someone being disruptive to other bunker-mates, we’d give them a warning. Second sign they were kicked out. That was tough, actually pushing people out of our bunker. With the first couple people, we felt so bad we let them back in. But there were some bad apples that were rotten enough that we knew it was for the best to kick them out. As you no doubt already know, the ability to broadcast on the radio got harder and harder. Eventually we didn’t even know if anyone was listening. We’d resorted to just talking about the end of days and how life in that dirty bunker was going. Some days we were loony enough to just start telling stories of Before. Finally, we had to disband because…

[Charlee trails off and then abruptly changes topic]

I like to think we saved some people’s lives. And you’d think that post-apocalypse my technology skills would have come up to nothing like all those Hollywood stars ripped down from their high horses, but I’ve made a life for myself. I work the radio communications for Chesapeake and the surrounding area, giving a healthy mix of news reports, music, and random commentary. I try to keep things light, optimistic, but still truthful. We have all been through the horrors of war. Even if those horrors are different for everyone, we are all impacted. Why should I continue making the worst out of that whole mess? I keep things light on my show, because as everyone now knows, too many heavy things will drag you down farther than where any zombie’s nails could dig.

This assignment that I am redoing is to write an alternative ending to a story. My previous attempt at this assignment was good, but I wanted to make something better.

I chose World War Z since it is the book I read for this class. I decided to use my character for the semester as the final speaker of the book only when I was thinking of a name to use and Charlee Faraday was the only one coming to mind. I have always thought that small examples explain bigger ideas better than ambiguous, abstract, or just plain large examples. So, because the ending of the actual book was sort of big and militaristic, I wanted it to be small and human by focusing on a single, mostly insignificant person.

In school, Charlee had a hard time forming bonds that would last beyond the school atmosphere. Often, she wasn’t taken seriously, especially when it always looked as if she was content (her lips naturally curve upward). More so, she couldn’t exactly blend in with the crowd. She has always been tall for her age, and her full height ending up being 5’10”. Along with her height, her prominent voice was an attention-getter. Her low participation in class was only countered by her willingness to read out loud whenever she could.

Her mom always read stories to Charlee out loud, so much that when Charlee had to start reading on her own, she felt let down. When she could, Charlee would read aloud to herself, since it felt more natural to have the words be spoken and not simply read.

Her dream is to become an audiobook narrator, but she needs the funds to afford equipment. A lot of the money she gets goes straight into bills: as soon as she graduated high school her parents made her start paying rent and utilities. She doesn’t have her own car and is also putting money away for one.

She found her sole friends through her town’s local fencing club, which is just up the road from her house. Most of the people there were at least a couple years older than Charlee, but she didn’t let that stand in her way. She easily became the Most Improved member, with the help of the assistant instructor, Freya. In her thirties, Freya saw Charlee’s potential. Even though the girl didn’t like opening up to teammates, she put her whole into everything she did, and Freya wanted to expand that. Freya also offered Charlee a job at the the local art and hobby supplies store she worked at. This is also convenient for Charlee since it is just small distance from the fencing building, both of which are a good walk from her house.

Once Charlee graduated from high school, she moved from part time to full time. She did many things across the store, such as restocking the shelves, creating and building displays, and even doing repairs to the aging building. She enjoys working alone or with just one or two other employees. She herself doesn’t realize how much she valued the relationships she and her coworkers had, it being a tight-knit community. Especially important is the older owner of the store, Mabel (who happily works through retirement) and Freya, whom Charlee feels is like an older sister of sorts. Besides those close to her, however, Charlee generally acts apathetically to others.

sinned (for the wurld)”

The writing ends there, the paper ripped as if forced out of the typewriter. You peer inside the machine and see paper remaining, but once you unjam it, the paper you retrieve is blank. So much for getting the rest of the story. You’d have liked to uncover more about what happened to all those who were affected those years ago.

The surrounding area on the small desk is empty but for dust and unidentifiable debris. Interestingly, the chair is positioned as if someone pushed straight back, perfectly, from the desk and just stood up and walked away.

The account of the man’s loss in mental capacity was accounted perfectly on that paper. Your father and brother went through the same motions. Not for the first time, you feel guilty that Mom and you were somehow immune to whatever was infecting everyone around the world. You could still think clearly, but what can you do with that anymore?

The rest of the room seems to have been left tidy and untouched. You try to place the man, whose descent into “sillyness” you just read, in this room. Limp, sheer curtains; large, pale blue area rug; a twin-sized bed with nearly wrinkle-less covers. You can’t do it. The papers (manuscript?) told more about the brother, Bobby than anything else. After rummaging through the small room, you find nothing useful to take away. Except, of course, the writings. You shove those into your backpack, take a sip from your canteen, and close the door gently on your way out.

The little piece of paper reads: “Do not be overly judgmental of your loved one’s intentions or actions.”

Of course, I find a small source of food in a somehow preserved fortune cookie and it mocks me. I already had Bryce telling me yesterday that I wasted ammo on zombies just because my undead wife nearly bit a chunk out of my arm. YES, I was mad. YES, I am still mad. My wife was the one who decided it was a good idea to move to Washington D.C. and not a few months in and the zombie apocalypse begins.

Bryce thinks he’s making me feel better by rationalizing things and saying I’m just going through the “Anger” stage in the stages of grief. What does he know? He’s only ever lost his beta fish, Randall. I was there for the funeral, and Bryce only shed one tear that I can recall.

But when my wife lunged for me, unyielded by her stringy hair falling into her face. Her skin was already grey and I could almost see the clotted blood frozen in her veins. Her teeth nearly ripped my skin apart. I remember taking her to the dentist to get the implant for the one decayed tooth she always hated. I pushed her from me, and squeezed the trigger as tight as I could, though I had to look away so her brain matter didn’t go into my eyes and mouth..

To play the team game from the well-known boy wonder books is different from what most people think. You run with sticks to pretend to fly. You throw a ball around and try to make it in the round point places. I am the round point place guard player. There are people who are trying to stop you by hitting you with a different ball at the same time. A person in shorts runs around and another person is supposed to catch them. A whole game lasts about half an hour, if that. You can hit other people and bring them down, as long as you don’t hurt them too bad. It’s really fun and hard and lots of friends play all together. I hurt my foot – leg meet up place so it’s harder for me to do as much as I want but I still try to play.

Made using only the top 1000 most common words.

Thankfully, Amazon still made shipments for a while when the apocalypse first began and my Prime hadn’t ended before I bought this device. It has done wonders, as you can read in the review I posted:

“I prefer to call them biters, but yes I did.”

I stand with a teenager named Kelly inside of an abandoned mall. Abandoned may not be the best word for it, since it is filled with dozens of zombies, or biters as Kelly calls them. Most light comes in through skylights, most pre-built and some are simply holes in shop ceilings themselves. Overhead lights flicker on and off. Generators, Kelly told me when I had first asked. Powered by the few still-working solar panels.

“And you did this all single-handedly?” I ask.

Kelly breaks eye contact with me to look at the cage next to us. Zombies incessantly reach out toward us.

via GIPHY

“I had help, in the beginning. A whole team, really. We got here about a year after everything started, and almost the whole place was already ransacked, in a few places the structure was crumpled. I know it sounds dumb, but we decided to make it a safe space for biters. First it was just our loved ones, then we saw just how quick people are to kill all the others, so we started saving any biter we could.”

“How exactly did you do that? There’s are whole stores filled with them.”

“At first, I wasn’t allowed to help with the difficult things, like making blockades and routes for the biters to be brought in, and actually transferring them. But when we had a system going I convinced everyone to let me join.” She begins walking past the store fronts, glancing into each one as if to see if every zombie is accounted for. “All the stores don’t just have the front entrance. We set up back entrances to bring the biters in.”

“How do they not crowd up and go out the way they came in?”

“That was part of my job. I’d make a bunch of noise and draw the biters up to the front gate of their store, so that the new biter could enter and we’d be safe.”

Kelly turns around and walks backward, facing me. She claps her calloused hands together, causing a rise in the noise and activity made by the zombies. The metal gates curve outward in response to the weight.

I can’t help but wince. Gnashing teeth and dirty hands desperate for a taste of me. Some hands have what looks like fresh blood on them. “Have the gates ever… broken?”

“Not because of the biters, no.”

She doesn’t say any more.

We bypass a gate with no zombies behind it, only a surprisingly well-lit area of concrete that turns out of sight. It appears to lead to a whole other wing of the mall.

Ehimetalor Unuabona

Before I can ask about the closed area, Kelly moves on and another question comes to mind.

“Going back a bit, what about that huge sign I saw outside when you brought me in? I think it said ‘Zombies were people too’?”

“It says ‘Zombies ARE people too’,” Kelly says curtly.

“Right. And the term zombies is used instead of biters.”

She sighs. “That’s the most common term w-I’ve heard. I hate demoting them to such a derogatory term, but it’s easier to get my message across.”

I glance at Kelly, whose expression is hidden by the baseball cap she wears. “And what exactly is your message?”

Kelly stops her slow walking and turns to me. “You sure do ask a lot of questions. The biters are dangerous. They try to bite and scratch anyone, even loved ones, but they just aren’t in control of their body! Just because people get infected and turn into biters does not mean they die!” She seems to realize she had started yelling and takes a deep breath before continuing. “They don’t die, not fully.”

At this, she motions for me to follow as we walk down a few store fronts. Nearly every storefront with steel shutters has at least a dozen zombies pushing up against them. We stop outside of what once was a jewelry store. Inside are only two zombies. One is ambling in the darkness of the back of the store, seemingly unaware of our presence. The other has its fingers wiggling through the metal gate, its fat hands too big to fit through the bars. Its striking red eyes are the only sign that he had Changed (besides the fact that he is grinding his teeth and clawing at the shutters to get to us), so he must have been infected recently.

via GIPHY

After a minute of silence, I ask quietly “Who wa-who is he?”

“My dad. He and my brother were bit when we tried bringing in too many biters at once.”

She balls her hands into fists and lowers her head, so I don’t press further.

Then I feel something hit me from behind. I look down and see a blade slicing through my shirt, coated in my own hot blood. I can’t tell if I feel pinching, tearing pain or nothing at all. A big hand grabs my shoulder and forces me to fall sideways onto the tiled floor. Kelly only looks down at me, sleep-deprived eyes from under a baseball cap.

“I’m so sorry, I know you thought I was saving you out there, and I was, I am. But biters need to eat too.”

Original Image by Matt Artz

"I'm in an old mall with this girl. Despite her assurances, I feel that the rotting zombies she 'saved' want to break free of their cages and tear me to pieces. She said she's on her own now, but this place is pretty big for one person to keep under control…" #ds106 #theend106 pic.twitter.com/QMehLrs1kD

— Katie Hartraft (@KatieHartraft) January 26, 2018