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going to use the bathroom in the ditch. He waved and said something to his partner that I couldn’t hear.
    I found a spot near the bottom of the ditch where a small tree was growing that I could use to hold onto for balance and I dropped trou. I had a satisfying first effort but a noise just on the far side of the ditch made my colon seize up and jerk the second turd back inside. I was sure I’d heard a wheezing, rasping breath not far from me. I grabbed the belt loops of my jeans and started to pull up my pants when one of those diseased creatures burst from the brush and tackled me.
    I didn’t have time to do anything but throw up my hands and grab the thing around the neck. It clawed at my arms and kicked out with its feet at my exposed legs, anything to try to get my death grip from around its throat. I was scared shitless and adrenaline must have surged through me because I was able to keep it at arm’s length. I shouted as loud as I could for help from the guards and I prayed that they’d be able to help me once they got there.
    The creature gnashed its teeth over and over as it tried to bend its head enough to get a chunk of my skin. The thing’s fingers were like iron as they gripped my forearms and repeatedly attempted to jerk my hands from where they were locked around its throat. I squeezed with every bit of keyboard-hypertrophied strength I could muster from my fingers. I felt the creature’s larynx collapse under my grip, but it still continued to attack me.
    I heard men shouting from the direction of the warehouse and I hoped they’d make it in time before I got bitten. I thought of Rebecca, going about her day at her new job and the life that we were trying to carve out in this world. It wasn’t fair to her that I get killed out here by some radiated freak that was too stupid to avoid contamination. I yelled in anger and I felt an even greater strength surge into my fingers and I squeezed harder. I squeezed so hard that the windpipe completely compressed and the thing couldn’t breathe. The tugs to dislodge my hands became frantic and then stopped all together and I fell forward on top of it. I continued to crush the thing’s throat. I kept going until my fingers embedded into its flesh and then the skin began to tear. The creature’s arms fell away as it suffocated and died.
    I held on for what seemed like forever, then a dark halo began to form on the outskirts of my vision and my head felt funny. The ring contracted and the dead face in front of me seemed to elongate and get farther away. The tunnel of my sight was closing rapidly and my head felt light. I couldn’t think of anything besides continuing to squeeze my fingers around the creature’s throat. Then I collapsed and fell on top of my enemy.
     
    * * *
     
    When I came to, it was to the sound of laughter. I opened my eyes and was staring straight into the dead face of my former attacker. “Oh, shit!” I yelled and pushed myself off of the creature but my pants were still wrapped around my calves so I stumbled backward and landed hard on my cold, naked ass. I scrambled backwards up the ditch in a crabwalk from the thing I’d just killed.
    The laughter only increased at that. I turned my head and saw at least twenty guys laughing so hard that they were bent double. I lay back and jerked my jeans up over my thighs and zipped them up. I spotted Jesse just as he yelled out, “Jesus Christ, Chuck! That’s probably one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen, definitely the funniest since the start of the apocalypse. What the fuck were you doing? You know, you can still catch their disease by fucking them, right?”
    My face burned bright red around my mask as I realized what it must have looked like to the guys who’d ran over here to help me out when they heard my shouts. It was times like this that I wished I was witty, but I couldn’t really think of anything to say.
    “What, that pretty little thing you’re with not giving you