Thread: Survival Diary

Journal of SSG Harald K. Schmidt, of the USIF.

The Creature summons me.

I feel his call in the back of my mind where I can feel all of them; my brothers, my cousins, even the mindless ones. This is how we communicate. Not as words and vocal sounds as the humans, but in this spot in our minds. Images and intent, mostly, but for me and the few like me that can still recall human memories, the images and thoughts translate to words.

We have very little use for human-style communication. Some of my kin cannot even make words anymore. My brethren and I can, if we concentrate hard enough. Our mouths have the ability, but often, for us, the hunt occludes all else.

The Creature can speak as the humans do, and often he mumbles words. But for him, it seems as though he is unaware of what his mouth and voice are doing most times, acting of their own accord. Often his mouth mumbles of "the balance."

The Herders have mouths that can speak also, but for them the effort of keeping the attractant bile inside requires their constant concentration; to attempt speech would take away that concentration and they would vomit their contents at the wrong time. For them it is nothing but gaseous noises and groans as they fight to hold their bile.

The Queens could speak, but they only ever seem to use their voices for the crying they do. They are ruled by despair and anguish. Even when one is near enough for me to hear them in my mind, nothing passes from them but despair and anguish. It rules everything they do. They are nothing else.

But for the Tanglers and the Juggernauts, speech is not possible. The Tanglers have very little left in them but their tentacle. It replaces their innards, but for the diaphragm that forces it out, and the lungs they use to breathe. What nutrients they ingest comes in through the tentacle. Their lungs are filled with the noxious smoke that is the byproduct of whatever biochemical reaction that takes place to constantly make new segments of the tentacle. This smoke seeps from their pores.

The Juggernauts could not speak even if they had a lower jaw with which to form words. But their minds are simple, even in the mental link. They are anger and hunger, always anger and hunger. They are the weapon we point and then move out of the way. The Juggernauts can do very little else.

The Horde though... they can speak. Those like me, the upper castes, call them the Mindless. In my mind they are like a sound. A thrum. It reminds me of.. I must remember, the Creature tells me I have to remember. I must find.. Bees. Their sound in my head is the thrumming of a hive of bees. A hunger is felt in the thrum, but there are no thoughts. The Herders, and to a lesser extent the Tanglers, can separate the thrum into groups and segments. To my brothers and I, however, the Mindless are one mass conscience. The Herders can segment them the best, directing even small groups of them. But then, that is the Herders' function. The Horde is not mindless, though, not really. They're thoughts, however, a driven by hunger. And they can speak.

As I move past one, I hear it speak. It is looking around, as though searching. It seems lost.

"Alice?" It says, in its grating voice, "Alice, where are you? I can't find you." It then turns and vomits. After it vomits it stumbles off in a random direction, no longer seeking.. nor speaking.

In my mind, there was never anything but the thrum of their conjoined existence.

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As I approach the Creature's location, I hear her--both in my head, and in my ears. A whimpering cry, filled with despair and anguish.

A Queen.

He stands over her hunched-over form, gazing at the back of her head. As I approach she becomes more agitated; her cries become louder, as I draw closer they turn to shrieks. Her glowing red lantern-eyes meet mine and I stop. The Queens are the most dangerous of us. Not the strongest, not the fastest, but the most unpredictable. They are ruled by their pain, and they lash out in it.

But then the Creature does something that I do not understand.

He touches her. He kneels next to her, and places his hand on the bare skin of her back. Then he gently moves his hand in a circle, caressing her skin over the protrusion of her spine and ribs. The meaning of this escapes me and again I force myself to remember.

Comfort. Consoling. The Creature is consoling the Queen. I feel his mind reaching to hers, but his patterns are blocked from me and I cannot see what he tells her.

It works. She begins to calm, resting back on her knees, her cries subsiding. She goes completely silent. Even her place in my mind begins to silence, the despair and anguish receding. I can feel it being walled in. Walled in by cold rage and hate. Whatever the Creature tells her, calms her, but fills her with ice. The ice keeps the despair and anguish, the Queens' strength, at bay, but ready for use. In this moment, she becomes a predator, more dangerous than any of my brethren, perhaps even as deadly a predator as the Creature.

She gazes into his eyes, the red lantern glow basking his face, making his skin appear pink. Only his black eyes remain unchanged. They never reflect light of any kind. They eat the light until it is nothing.

"Yes." She says, both in our minds and with her voice. Her voice is silken, that of a young woman, and yet the lilt has an innocent cast. "Yes" She says again.

The Creature turns to me.

"This is what you will do," I hear in my mind, turning his images and intent to words. And he tells me. He tells me of the journey I will make, and of the journey three more of my brothers--three like me, that he has instructed to fight to remember--will make, and of what we must do. I see the images of the city with the hospital, and the place they take the humans they rescue from there. I see what I must do.

I am pleased. I long for the hunt, even if the journey will be long. I will collect two more of my brothers and we will go. We will not stop, for we do not need sleep as the humans and the Mindless do.

As I formulate my plan, the Creature holds out his hand to the Queen. She stands slowly and takes it. Their fingers intertwine like human lovers', and he doesn't seem to notice as her razor claws prick the skin of his forearm.

They gaze, each at the other, and of its own accord his mouth moves. "Balance," his voice says, without him ever knowing, and he smiles. She smiles in return, and my instinct is to flee. They turn and walk away together, hand in hand.

The Creature and his Predator Queen.

March 20th. Journal of Allane.

I don't know where to begin. Ever since we escaped the city, things have been, for a change, uneventful.

The routine is never broken. Eat, patrol, rescue the occasional survivor, kill the occasional horde, eat again, sleep. Potemkine and I have proven to be the most successful soldiers, next to Ruukil. Speaking of Ruukil, we see him day in and day out, but we never speak much. Our regimens keep us in different areas and different mess halls, even different missions.

But... Something is not right here. I can feel a tension mounting. The SSGT has gone missing. Several members of the compounds were found dead. Potemkine and I investigated, and we found that the claw markings were much like a Hunter; yet a Hunter probably would not have escaped the compound, and no Hunter was found dead. Is it possible that some people turn into these... new Infected? The one that killed Chloe and Ficet?

Their deaths still fuel Potemkine and my rage. Whenever we go out on patrols, and move closer to the city, we both keep each others backs closer than the others, and we're always searching for the thing that killed our friends. (Let Walkerxes rest in peace forever) However, we cannot ever kill enough of them. In fact, they seem almost scarce. Penned up in the city, waiting for something. Well, whatever comes our way, we should be prepared to handle it.

Potemkine and I spend almost all our time together, except when I'm cooking in the mess hall (wouldn't want him stealing my recipes). We play cards for hours on end, we talk about our pre-Infection days, or we just ramble on about current events, not like there are many. The monotony of things here are starting to grate on me, but I don't know where else we could go to escape the Infection. Maybe the other continents haven't been infected yet? How far has the infection spread? I'd like to know answers to these questions, but no one seems to know.

Always waiting,
Allane.

Journal of SSG Harald K. Schmidt, of the USIF.

We run silently. We are fast, my brothers and I. I catch vague human memories from my past life, making this same trek in vehicles, sometimes in flying machines. It was faster in those, but there was no hunt.

Today there will be a hunt.

We sense them, far off yet, but there. Two humans, scared and running, hoping to find salvation. They will find us.

We close on them, it takes less than an hour.

There is a man and a woman, both worn from fatigue and starvtion. They have stopped to rest. Both have guns, but it doesn't matter. They are two, and we are three. We are Hunters.

I let my two brothers have the kill.

They pick their targets, each sending images to the other which they will attack, and in unison they crouch. The silver.. I must remember, the Creature says I have to remember, it is there, I have to remember, have to remember.. tape. Duct tape. The silver duct tape bindings--that help slow our rapid blood flow so that we may make efficient use of it--tightens around their legs, trapping the blood there so that the oxygen suffuses their muscles, lending them strength. Growls escape their throats and I send stern reminders to maintain discipline. Instinct is difficult to combat. It is too late, the humans heard. They stand, holding their weapons to the ready, seeking for what hunts them, but it is too late.

My brothers attack together, each leaping at their target with a scream. The scream is instinctive too, but I allow it. By then it is too late, and the scream lends a rush of fear to our prey, making the meat more savory as the adrenaline rushes through the blood. Both hit their target, both victims cry out.

I watch, feeling my brothers' exhiliration at the kill.

The taste of their colors are sweet.

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As we sit, digesting, preparing to move again, I feel the Creature.

He appears in my mind suddenly, and I am aware that he is directly behind me. I never heard or felt him coming.

"Balance" I hear behind me. "You stole the balance."

I spin, adrenaline rushing through my blood, fear sparking my thoughts. No one sneaks up on a Hunter.. except for the Creature. He is a predator of a higher order.

Anger transmits through his mind to mine. A killing rage.. directed at me.

Before I can move, he strikes me to the ground, jumping atop me, much like my brothers and I do with our victims. One of my brothers reacts and leaps at the Creature. Like lightning the Creature lashes out and tears out my brother's throat. I call out to my other brother to be still. He complies.

I wait.

The Creature grabs my throat in his fingers and pain sparks. He is going to kill me.

"Schmidt" both his mind and his mouth say. Then I see images of a three men, two are Potemkine and Allane; I remember them. The third I do not recognize. The Creature sees I do not and his hand tightens on my throat.

I must remember, I have to remember, the Creature wants me to remember, I must find the memory, oh god he's going to kill me, remember, remember.. Walkerxes. The third man is Walkerxes and as a human I ordered him killed.

The images flash, now, of Walkerxes being gunned down by a firing squad. Me, as a human, stands watching, giving the order. I hear him cry out, "Kill the fucker that got Ficet and Chloe. You KILL HIS ASS FOR ME!" just as I give the order to fire.

I understand. The Creature is the one this Walkerxes wished to have dead.

"My adversary." The Creature transmits. "You destroyed that which was mine to kill; my adversary."

He gets up off of me, his hot rage subsiding into cold anger.

"When we have destroyed the humans," he says, using human speech and mind-link simultaneously, "I will kill you."

I know this to be true. The Creature keeps his promises.