Day, I don't know how many…
I don't know why I'm writing this… It's not like anyone will read it. Not that many people can still remember how to read. The young, if there are any, aren't being taught the lessons of old. All that made humanity worthwhile was slowly forgotten in the face of the end. All that is taught, if they aren't automatically killed for food, is how to survive in a dying world. I am what is considered to be old now. I'm just older than thirty I think. I haven't exactly been keeping track of the days. I used to, in the early days after the end but then I lost my journal and didn't waste time trying to find a new one. And as I said, no one would read it anyway…
It has been years since the End, and the earth is slowly going into another ice age. Resting it's batteries like it did millions of years ago. If humanity could survive those, I think we can do it again. I'm not trying to be optimistic, there is no point. I can see with my own eyes that the world has gone to shit but hey, I always was a history buff. I figure that if humanity could do it once then maybe our species could survive again.
A week ago I decided to risk going into a city (can't remember the name of it before the End) to get an empty journal and some pens. It was very stupid and risky of me but hey, there are very few good things in my life now-a-days so I figure I'm allowed to splurge on the few things I do like. I remember, before the End that I really loved reading and writing, that was all I would ever do; read or write. I wasn't one of those kids who played video games or went to the mall to hang out with friends, I was the type to stay at home and read. I used to think that made me a dork, an outcast… but now… I'm one of the few survivors in a dying world. I'm not kidding, sure there are probably a couple million humans left but to be honest, I have no idea how many survived. I'm guessing and also hoping that it isn't less than that.
The point is… this is going to be my memoir (hope I spelled that correctly, It's not like I've had the chance to write someone a letter in the past fifteen or so years). But yeah, I figured, 'Hey, I survived the first fifteen or so years of the Apocalypse! Time to celebrate!', pat on the back and all that jazz. So this is my plan… yeah. I'm hoping that maybe, sometime in the future, I will meet someone who won't try to kill/eat me and I can, not settle down, but maybe have a kid so that I can teach them the old ways and share my story with them. This journal will help me do that… I hope. Who am I kidding? I'm lonely and if I'm writing it feels as if I have someone to talk to. Even before the end I had a wild imagination that would create stories and dreams of people, not real I know, but people that understood that I was different, I didn't fit in and I was lonely. Now, loneliness, other than cold and starvation is one of the main killers of the survivors. Some just give up… can't stand the pain of surviving, alone…
I had just turned eighteen when the End of Days occurred. I really don't know how to describe it in human words… It was as if the planet was having a seizure and the antibodies of the planet finally decided that humans were the issue, the disease. To sum it up, I think in the early days of the Apocalypse I would have happily gone to Hell to take a nice little vacation from the shit-storm that was life on earth. And before the End, I didn't believe in Hell, fuck, I didn't believe in God either. I wasn't atheist, I was… I don't really know to be honest. All I believed was that the earth was alive and that even though natural disasters happened, the earth wasn't evil it just was. It's like death, not evil, just happens. You see, even before the shit hit the fan I was pretty apathetic. No that's the wrong word… I accepted things for the way they were and just moved on. Yeah, that's better. I knew that everything had to do with whatever perspective you took it from. That probably will make no sense to whoever may read this but it makes sense to me so I'm not going to explain myself when I don't even know if anyone will ever read this. But yeah, the first few weeks of the Apocalypse were Hell, no better word to describe it.
It's funny how in post-apocalyptic movies, books and video games you see girls running around in leather bikinis with huge ass swords or flame throwers… yeah, I think a few guys were a bit disappointed with the reality of the Apocalypse. There were a lot more corpses of innocent people, injured trying to get help, sick trying to find medicine, people who had lost their loved ones, and everyone was frightened and on the move. No one stayed where they were. They all had what seemed like an instinctive need to travel, move, from where they were to try to find some semblance of safety for them and whatever number of their loved ones remained.
There were also a lot of dickheads who thought they knew best too. All the refugees/survivors that I had come across seemed to gravitate to anyone they thought was the strongest or the smartest. Basically who they thought could somehow get them out of this shit situation. That was what I saw. Humans huddling together in groups like penguins (don't really know if any are still alive, penguins that is, for people not of the original generation to know about them). It always happened to be a cop, fireman, football player or pretty much anyone with enough physical status to look like they could protect the group. Humanity had gone back to being sacred animals looking up to the alpha male (even if the alpha male knew shit-all and was just as scared as the rest of them but was trying to form some semblance of order in a fucked up world). I also came across a few groups led, not by a physically strong man but sometimes a lawyer or an avid video game player who knew the type of stuff you needed to do to survive in a simulated post-Apocalyptic world. They were always the less violent groups, always the ones to be more cautious but not downright freak-out –about-anyone-who-even-resembles-a threat. They were the thinkers, strategists instead of the brawny meat-heads. But hey, they were still just as fucked up as the other groups but maybe a little less on the panic side.
If you can't tell, I avoided groups. I knew that if I joined a group I would be considered as a kid (I'm short) and no one would listen to a word I say because even though I have a brain, I'm not influential enough or intimidating enough to gain any positive form of attention. Let's just say that if it was a pack, I would have been at the bottom or near there. I was a barely adult, skinny as fuck male in a world where morals were practically thrown out the window. So yeah, you could say that my situation royally sucked.
But anyway, I was a major introvert, could practically imagine what a shitty life I would have if I joined one of the groups I came across, so I tended to avoid them at all costs. Sometimes that made me feel like I was an animal being hunted, hiding in the shadows while the predator passed, but then I would see the miserable members of the groups (there were always there – at the back of the group, trailing behind them) and I would feel like I was the predator stalking my prey. Don't know what made me feel that, there was no way I could take on any group and survive but a guy needs to stay somewhat positive about his situation otherwise he will give up and give in to the temptation of the relative safety of a group. So for the first year or so I remained cautious, stayed away from all humans and pretty much tried to survive the best I could… by myself.
-Stiles-