“It’s viral.” That’s the first thing she says in her reedy little voice, the words delivered with matter-of-fact calm. “Danny’s team over at the med school managed to isolate a sample and get some pictures. It looks sort of like Ebola, and sort of like the end of the fucking world. They’re online now.” She smiles, the heartbreaking smile of a corn husk angel. “They’ve been trying all the common antivirals. Nothing’s making any difference in the progression of the infection.”
“Hello to you, too, Eva,” I say. A duct tape circle on the floor around the couch marks the edge of the “safe” area; any closer puts us at risk of infection. I walk to the circle’s edge and stop, uncertain what else to say. I settle for, “Professor Mason just gave an update. We’ve lost contact with the library.”
“That isn’t a surprise,” says Eva. “They had Jorge over there.”
“So?” asks Andrei.
“He updated his Facebook status about three hours ago to say that he’d been bitten, but they washed the wound out with bleach. Bleach won’t save you from Ebola, so it’s definitely not going to save you from Ebola’s bitchy big sister.” She coughs into her hand before saying, almost cheerfully, “Good news for you: the structure of the virus means it’s not droplet-based. So you don’t need to worry about sharing my air. Bad news for me: if Jorge took three hours to turn after being bitten, I’d say I have another hour—maybe two—before I go.”
“Don’t say that.” There’s no strength in Andrei’s command. He lost that when Eva got the blood in her eyes, when it became clear that she was going to get sick. She was the one who told him we needed to run. Losing her is proof that all of this is really happening.
Eva continues like she doesn’t hear him: “I’ve been collecting everyone’s data and reposting it. The campus network is still holding. That’s the advantage to everything happening as fast as it has. Professor Mason has a pretty decent file sharing hub in place. If you can keep trading data, keep track of where the biters are, you can probably maintain control of the campus until help arrives.” Matter-of-factly, she adds, “You’ll have to shoot me soon.”
Andrei is still arguing with her when I turn and leave the room. The smell of the swamp travels with me, hot decay and predators in hiding.
Minutes trickle by. Susan from the Drama Department gives way to Andy from Computer Science; Death Cab is replaced by Billy Ray Cyrus. There are no gunshots from inside. Professor Mason gives the afternoon update. Contact with the library has been reestablished. Six survivors, none of them bitten. There are no gunshots from inside. The hot smell of the swamp is everywhere, clinging to every inch of the campus, of the city, of the world. I wonder if the alligators have noticed that the world is ending, or if they have continued on as they always have…if they observe our extinction as they observed the extinction of the dinosaurs: with silence, and with infinite patience.
The risen dead have more in common with the alligators than they do with us, the living. That’s why the smell of the Everglades has followed them here, hanging sweet and shroud-like over everything. The swamp is coming home, draped across the shoulders of things that once were men. Was that how it began for the dinosaurs? With the bodies of their own rising up and coming home? Did they bring it on themselves, or did the dead simply rise and wash them from the world? The alligators might remember, if there was any way to ask them. But the alligators have no place here. Here there is only the rising of the dead.
Professor Mason is on the campus radio again, this time with an update from the CDC. They’re finally willing to admit that the zombie plague is real. Details are given, but the gunshots from inside drown them out. The smell of the swamp. The smell of blood and gunpowder. The smell of death.
My grandfather’s hand throwing the rock. The sound of the rock hitting the water. “Always remember that Nature can be cruel.”
“I never forgot,” I whisper, and open the door.
The campus stretches out in front of me, majestic in its stillness, the smell of swamp water and the dead holding sway over everything. The door swings shut behind me, the latch engaging with a click. No going back. There is never any going back for those who walk into the swamp alone. This is cleaner. This is the end as it was meant to be—for dinosaurs, for humans, for us all.