"I can tell I'm more sensitive than I ever was in life, but it's nothing I can't tolerate."
.. . than I ever was in life. . .
How indescribably strange to be able to say that.
Lacey smiled. "Maybe we'll just have find you some SPF 2000 sun screen."
"I'm just grateful I won't have to live like them—hiding in the day and crawling out only at night. I don't know if I could take that."
They stood for a while with the waves lapping at their feet and watched the birds and the surf and spoke of how the undead plague hadn't affected the beauty of the world or touched its wildlife. Humanity had borne the full brunt of the assault.
Lacey said, "Some of my radical ecology friends, if they're still alive, probably think it's all for the good—the fall of civilization, I mean."
Carole shook her head. "How could they possibly—"
"The end of industry, of pollution, overcrowding, all that stuff they hate. No more forests being raped, no more fluorocarbons depleting the ozone, all their causes made moot because the undead don't seem to be into technology."
"Only the technology that helps them keep their 'cattle' alive. Franco went on to me about how once you've turned, your existence becomes entirely focused on blood. All the other drives—for money, knowledge, achievement, even sex—are gone. The undead are immune to cold and see in the dark so they have no interest in keeping the electricity running except as far as their cattle need it to survive. Even so, I'll bet the power will be off more than it's on. Over time I can see the level of technology declining and the world devolving into some sort of pre-industrial-level feudal order. They don't seem to need technology. Or perhaps have no mind for it is better way of putting it. They already call their human helpers 'serfs.' That will be the social order: undead lords, serfs, and herds of human catde."
"If only the Internet were still around," Lacey said. "We could communicate, organize—"
"The Internet is history, I'm afraid—with no reliable power source, few working phone lines, and a decimated server network, it's a goner."
Joe felt his skin beginning to tingle, as if the sand were blowing, but there was no breeze. He glanced at the sun and thought it looked considerably brighter than a few moments ago. Hotter too.
"Is anyone else hot?"
Carole and Lacey shook their heads.
"No, not really," Carole said.
Lacey spread her arms and lifted her face to the glow. "It feels good."
"Does anyone mind if we go back inside? It's a little too warm for me."
He turned and started back up the dunes; Carole and Lacey came along, one on either side. As they neared the house, Joe felt his exposed sunward skin—the back of his neck, his arms, his calves—begin to heat up, as much from within as without.
With the growing discomfort pushing him toward the house, he quickened his pace. Or tried to. He felt unsteady. His legs wobbled like an old man's—a drunken eighty-year-old's. Still he somehow managed to pull ahead of Carole and Lacey.
"Unk!" Lacey cried from behind him. "Unk, your skin!"
He looked down and saw that his skin was starting to smoke wherever the direct rays of the sun touched it. He broke into a lurching run.
The sun! Cooking him! Had to escape it, find shade, shelter, darkness! The very air seemed to catch fire around him, glowing with white-hot intensity. A heartbeat ago the house had been less than a hundred feet ahead, now he couldn't find it through the blaze of light. And even if he could he doubted he'd reach it on these leaden legs. His knees weakened further and he stumbled, but felt a pair of hands grab his left arm before he could fall.
"We've got to get him inside!" Carole cried close to his ear.
Other hands grabbed his right arm.
Lacey. Carole. They had him and were supporting him, tugging him forward on his rubbery legs.
They burst through the broken door and into the shady interior.
But even inside the sunlight pursued him through the doorway and sizzled through the big picture window, chased him like a fiery predator, reaching for him with flaming talons of light. He shook off Carole and Lacey and stumbled headlong on into the deeper, shadier areas of the front room.
Not enough. The reflected sunlight, from the glass table top, even the walls and floors, felt toxic, like scalding acid.
More—he needed more protection. No basements in these bungalows. He spotted the alcove to his right and veered for it. The bedrooms. He barreled into the one toward the rear. It faced north and west—the darkest place in the house at the moment. His legs finally gave way and he collapsed in a heap next to the bed. Thank God the curtains were closed. He grabbed the flowered yellow bedspread and rolled it around him, cocooning himself with the stench of his own seared flesh.
The touch of the fabric against his scorched skin sent waves of agony to his bones, but stronger than the pain was the numbing lethargy seeping through his limbs and mind. Only fear kept him from succumbing, fear that his tolerance to sunlight had been only temporary and now was deserting him. Was it a sign that whatever remnants of humanity that had lingered with him last night were ebbing away, leaving him more like the creatures he loathed? He prayed not.
He prayed especially that he wasn't turning feral. He saw the creature's ravaged face now, the one Franco had called Devlin, remembered its mad eyes, devoid of reason, compassion, or any feeling even remotely human, heard its bestial screams as it clawed at the door, remembered its talons sinking into his shoulders, felt its hot foul breath on his throat just before its fangs tore into his flesh.
And worse, he remembered Franco's parting words.
. . . when you look at Devlin you are seeing your future . . . he didn't retain enough intelligence to distinguish between friend and foe . . . sol can't even use him as a guard dog . . . in less than two weeks you'll be just like Devlin, only a little less intelligent, a little more bestial. . .
Was he losing his mind along with his tolerance for sunlight? Was his descent incomplete, still in progress? Was he still changing, devolving further into an even lower life form? Was this another step down the road toward Devlin's fate?
He heard Carole's voice from somewhere in the room.
"Joseph! Joseph, are you all right?"
He could only nod under the bedspread, and even that was an effort. He dared not speak, even if his numb lips would permit it.
"The mattress!" Carole's voice again. "Help me with it."
"Help—help you what?" Lacey said.
"We've got to tilt it up against the window. That way when the sun comes around behind the house it won't shine into the room."
Carole . .. wonderful Carole . .. always thinking ...
The lethargy deepened, tugging Joe toward sleep, or something like it... the deathlike undead daysleep. He tried to fight it. He'd thought, he'd hoped that he'd escaped falling victim to the undead vermin hours, hiding from the sun, slithering around at night. Now that hope was lost. He was more like them than he'd thought or wished or prayed against, and was falling closer and closer to their foul state with every passing hour.
The nightmarish thought chased him into oblivion.
CAROLE . . .
"We almost lost him."
The two of them slumped on the front room's rattan furniture, Carole in a chair, Lacey half stretched out on the sofa.
"I know," Carole replied.
Oh, how she knew. That had been too close. Her insides were still shaking. The sight of his skin starting to smoke and cook as he was walking . .. caused by this same sunlight bathing her now in its warmth .. . she'd never forget it. Worse, the reek of his burnt flesh still hung in the air.