Apocalypstagram

‘Boyle Street. Boyle Street.’

Gordon said the words aloud, wondering if he was in Sydney or Melbourne now. Five years of running, screaming, hiding, fighting, bleeding, and simply surviving had fried Gordon’s sense of direction and place.

Gordon had no plan, he simply wandered. After the contagion spread and monsters started killing everyone, it had taken such little time for the world to start reclaiming itself. A few years of unadulterated growth, and nature was proving its superior strength against man-made constructions.

Gordon walked the wilderness, no other directive pressing him than survival. He’d spent time in some groups, but they usually collapsed quickly, little microcosms of society following the same swift patterns that led to disaster in the first place.

Of the people he’d known before, there was nobody left for Gordon to find. He told himself they'd made it to the Blue Zones. In his head he saw Charlie and Delphie making it to safety, a clean tox-screen, getting through the walls to what might be a semblance of a life.

Anyone left on the outside now was a carrier, even if they hadn't become a monster. No more Blue Zones for them.

They'd been left to the Ravenors.

Hefting his pack, Gordon looked up at the sky at the thought of the Ravenors. He needed shelter soon, before the sun fell, and they started coming out.

He fought off the instinct to check the phone that wasn’t in his pocket for the millionth time. He hadn’t carried a phone in years, but the habit of a lifetime was hard to break. He’d tried a watch he’d found in a smashed jewellry shop, but after a Ravenor’s claw had got caught in the band one time, Gordon had decided that, besides sunset and sunrise, the specific time of day didn’t matter that much anymore anyway.

Walking down the street, Gordon scanned the houses, looking for a place of refuge. Shattered windows and broken doors adorned almost every house. Another suburb victim to the predations of scavengers, survivors or possibly worse; those sad, mad people who had spread the virus intentionally.

The light was changing rapidly and Gordon cursed. He picked up his pace. A small house on his left, number 44, had its facade intact, and he didn’t hesitate before walking across the fallen fence to take a closer look.

He didn’t rush. He'd been burned before, and survival taught a certain amount of caution. The house looked relatively sheltered, the overgrowth having crawled around the sides of the building, leaving only its front exposed.

Swiftly but quietly, Gordon moved up to the front windows, trying to peer in. It was difficult to see, there was little light to illuminate what was inside. With a practiced hand, Gordon quietly pulled the handle of the door down. Only a gentle squeak rang out as the door swung open, unlocked.

So far so good, thought Gordon. He immediately revised this thought after he took a single step inside, the floorboards beneath his booted foot letting out a long creak. Gordon froze in place.

While the front of the house was relatively untouched, there was a gaping hole in the back wall of the living room, dramatically reducing the safety the house provided.

Also of worry was the group of Ravenors, huddled together in the centre of the room, twitching in restless sleep. Gordon couldn’t help but stare for those first few terrifying moments. It was rare for him to see a Ravenor without it attempting to eat his face.

The bony ridges of their protruding spines and the odd angles of the limbs seemingly belied the idea that the creatures had once been human. The Ravenor virus had molted their humanity from their bodies and minds. With their deformed, elongated teeth, they looked vicious even in sleep.

While their senses might be lacking from the transformative ravages of the virus, they made up for being half blind and deaf with terrifying ferocity, speed, and a guarantee of full infection from their bite.

The growing darkness of the room heralded the imminent, hungry, awakening of the slumbering beasts. Gordon had to move.

Gordon made his escape with muted alacrity, backing out the front door into the blessed quiet of the overgrown grass. There was still enough light left, but little time.

Gordon’s search became frantic as he put space between himself and the Ravenor house. He jogged up the road, feeling the weight of his pack slowing him, hoping to hell he wouldn’t have to ditch it. The feeling of desperation was beginning to crawl up his skin. He jogged past a collapsed house, a cornershop with a tree through it, a neatly mown lawn, a flipped car, a…

Gordon pedaled backwards, slow jogging steps, to see something he was certain had been made extinct. A neatly mown lawn?

It was one of those old Victorian style houses, the ones that had been around for decades but constantly gutted and refitted. The brick wall surrounding it was still sound, as was the latched iron gate at its front. The windows were fitted with iron bars, and some matte-black material on the glass blocked any view in. Inside the wall, before the small stone stairway leading up to its front door, was a lawn of bright green grass, watered and mown.

Gordon had witnessed many strange and horrifying things that had become the new normal of this “post-apocalypse”. In that moment, the mown lawn caused him more confusion than almost any of them, a sight more unexpected than the nightmare creatures he’d only just stumbled upon.

The yawning howls began to echo in the distance. His brain kick-starting back into gear, Gordon jerked forwards, testing the latch on the iron gate and finding it unlocked. He pushed through and followed the driveway around the mown grass to the front entrance. Gordon reached for the handle, but something about the situation of walking up to the house brought back a sense-memory, so for the first time in half a decade, he knocked on a door.

There was a pause, but Gordon could hear movement on the other side. He irrationally thought it could be more Ravenors for a moment, but instead of the door opening to reveal a monster, it was a young man.

He was in his twenties, pale, wearing a collared pink shirt with the buttons undone and blue shorts. The interior of the house behind him was streamlined in a look Gordon recalled as being “modern”, illuminated by candles of all shapes and sizes scattered across multiple surfaces.

Gordon blinked as he didn’t make eye contact with the youth but instead found himself staring into the back of a phone so large that it could have doubled as a saucer. The young man was looking at the phone, holding it out on a stick in a manner that seemed lingeringly familiar. Before Gordon could speak, the young man cut across him, speaking to his phone-on-a-stick.

‘Woah-woah-woah! What do we have here Champions? This is exactly like I tell you all, every episode: When you open your spirit to the universe, the universe will respond in kind. Our challenge for the week was to open our spirits to new experiences, and look, see, mine just arrived at the door of our little Shangri-la. This here is…’

The phone-on-a-stick angled towards Gordon, who could see the screen was black but for a small red light shining from its base.

‘Uh, Gordon, I-'

‘Gordon! Ugh, yes! Gordon. Gordon. Gordon. I bet you can feel the energy of this guy from where you all are, Champions. Right? A new face, a new person brings all the experiences and energies of their life to yours, remember that. Wherever you are, say it with me now. Gordon. Gordon. Gordon.’

As they stood there, the young man chanting Gordon’s name, the howls of the Ravenors called out again, this time alert and seeking.

‘Uhm!’ Gordon’s voice cracked as he found it again. ‘I mean, the Ravenors are waking up, is it safe inside here? I don’t have much but please let me in.’

The young man still had his eyes on the phone, and he pulled a faux-thoughtful face.

‘What do you think, Champions? Should I let Gordon in? We don’t normally break the sanctity of Shangri-la, but this week is all about new experiences, so whaddya say?’

There was a pause as the young man froze for a few seconds, as if waiting for a response, but the phone made no sound.

‘Alright! Let’s do it. Jonah’s makin’ a new friend. Come on in G,’ said the young man, apparently named Jonah. His voice dropped to a dramatic whisper. ‘We’ll have to be quiet, Frankie and Lucas are streaming right now so we don’t want to interrupt Influencers at work. Let’s take G on a tour, Champions.’

Gordon felt himself pulled into the house, the door closing behind him. Now inside, the scents of the candles washed over Gordon’s senses like radiation from the red zones, with almost the same effect. They were overpoweringly sweet, fruity, and unrecognisable, burning against Gordon’s sinuses.

Adding to the sensation of moving through ash was the strange material attached to every other blank surface. Consisting of a lumpy, black mesh that drank in sound, it muffled their footsteps to a whisper and muted Jonah’s tone as he continued to narrate.

Gordon felt wary of the strange youth, especially his use of the word ‘streaming’ in a way that didn’t make sense. Long moments passed inside Gordon’s mind until the memory clunked into place. Streaming. On the internet. These people had internet access!

They could communicate with the Blue Zones! Charlie! Delphie! He could contact them!

Moving through the invisible haze, Jonah took Gordon to the kitchen, which was three impractically small steps above an open living room where a young man and woman were doing synchronised exercises in front of a camera, puffing loudly as they did long knee-bends with weights in hand. The cloying, combating candle scents lingered in the kitchen as well, and the soundproofing was even more prevalent. Contributing to Gordon’s growing headache was the metal sheeting placed in key areas to reflect and amplify the light, illuminating the exercise area.

‘Come on Champions, you’ve got this!’

‘Only fifteen more to go, one at a time, up and down, feel that burn, that’s your body making itself better guys!’

The pair were undoubtedly fit, with muscle tone rippling across their bodies underneath the tight exercise clothes, but there was a waxiness to their skin that seemed...unhealthy. As they moved, it seemed as if their veins were struggling to escape, pushing at the skin like snakes under a rug. They both had shocks of white-blonde hair, which eerily reminded Gordon of the Ravenors.

‘Look at that, Champions,’ Jonah mock whispered to his phone, not to Gordon. ‘There’s the super duo, hard at work. Bringing power to the masses in a way no one else can.’

A voice quietly cut across the room, muffled yells pushing through the soundproofing. Gordon’s arm was yanked again to peer beyond the kitchen into another well-lit area. A woman bedecked in multiple, brightly coloured, see-through sarongs, beads and shawls had her phone to her ear, aggressively speaking down it as she paced around her own little studio-room. Yet another camera was recording her.

‘No! That is not how we reach our goals! If you wanna meet those heights then you have to suck it up and make that change happen! Take action! Make those posts, take those pictures, show the world what you want from it so it makes it happen for you! Influence the world with the reality you want to be. You’ve gotta make the change you want to happen - happen.’

Gordon could tell from his expression that Jonah felt they were witnessing something immensely grand.

‘That’s Vivyénne. Fourth and final member of our little Shangri-la house of Influencers. She’s a motivator, bringing the true sense of the word influencer to our Champions. Isn’t she just great? Gah! That positive, holistic energy is just so inspiring, right?’

‘I, uh...is there a chance I can-’

‘You know folks, it’s people like Vivyénne who give me the strength to keep on keeping on every day. Some days I don’t wanna get up and make candles. But then I think about my goals, and all you Champions out there in the universe who need what I’ve got to give, and I remember: I’m part of that universe too, and I have to help provide or else the whole thing comes crashing down. Isn’t that just right, Champions? Alright, I think Frankie and Lucas are done, let’s head on back.’

The exercising couple had moved up to the kitchen and were chugging down putrid smelling green broth from tall jugs. They were apparently unphased by Gordon’s presence, not to mention Jonah’s habit of walking and talking to his phone-on-a-stick.

Frankie put down her emptied jug and beamed at Jonah.

‘This part of your new experiences week, Jonah? Man, you’re always so right about the universe providing.’

‘Hey man, good to see ya!’ said Lucas with unnerving cheerfulness, as if he’d known Gordon for years, slapping him on the arm. ‘Aw, yeah, feel these arms babe.’

Frankie started squeezing Gordon’s other arm, fingers gripping his bicep while she made professionally appreciative and interested noises.

‘Hell yeah!’ she said with enthusiasm. ‘Give us a few weeks to help develop these and we’ll have you looking almost as good as us.’

‘That’s right, babe,’ said Lucas, his words and manner cheerful but somehow also condescending. ‘Listen man, you’ve made a real good start on getting in shape. What’s your regimen? Jackman? Pratt? Johnson?’

Gordon was unsure as to whether his instincts were off due to his long absence from “normal” human conversation or if these people were completely mental.

He didn’t move aggressively, but he firmly removed the couple’s hands from his body.

‘Right, that’s um...very nice of you, but I don’t think I’ll be staying that long. I’m just gonna stay ‘til daybreak and be out of your hair in the morning.’

He pulled his pack off his back, unzipping the top to start looking through his items.

‘I can trade with you if you like though. I’ve got got some defensive items, all homemade but effective out there, some charged batteries if you need some better lights, some ham tins, I’ve got this pipe bomb I made, there’s-’

‘Woah-woah,’ said Frankie seriously. ‘We might need to ask you to take that outside.’

‘Oh, don’t worry, I was an engineer back in the day. They’re safe until you open the chamber and light the fuse.’

‘Not that my dude,’ said Lucas. ‘Those ham tins. That’s a big no-no in here.’

He gestured to the jugs of green liquid, as well as several other jars and shelves stocked with greenery.

‘All vegan diet here, homegrown in the Shangri-la garden out back. No need to go takin’ things from out there if you provide for yourself at home.’

Lucas had addressed the latter half of that sentence to Jonah’s camera, as well as the approving nods of his housemates. Gordon blinked a few times and put the ham back in his pack.

‘Er, right. Sorry? It’s not always easy finding food out there.’

‘Hey man, I get it,’ said Lucas. ‘I hear you, I’m listening to you, you’re not getting judged here. It’s a tough world out there to survive in, always has been. Just remember that survival at the expense of someone else’s survival isn’t a real kind of survival, it’s taking from the universe without any give-back, and it makes the universe weep. We don’t like to make the universe weep here. We leave that to the outside, uncaring world.’

He looked sideways at Jonah’s camera, giving it finger-guns and clicking his tongue with a wink.

‘’Cept for you Champions out there, amiright? Bringing care to the universe just like we showed you.’

‘Sure, of course. Um, as you do. You don’t mind if I just keep it in my pack though, rather than leave it outside? It’s just I don’t want to attract the Ravenors. My exercise regime mostly comes from running away from those freaks out there, so a night’s break will be nice.’

He’d meant to engage with them on the exercise front, but all three of the younger people winced and grimaced.

‘Hey man,’ began Jonah with the air, if not the presence, of a wise teacher. ‘There’s a lot of suffering out there, but here in Shangri-la we understand that it’s only a symptom of a wider problem. If you wanna live your life in peace then you gotta bring that peace to the world, yeah? At the end of the day, Ravenors are just people like you and me.’

‘HashtagRavenorsarepeopletoo!’ said all three youths jovially, sticking their faces together for a smile in front of Jonah’s phone.

Mental, thought Jonah. They’re definitely mental.

‘I...but...what? They’re Ravenors. They’re not people anymore. They don’t even look like people anymore. They literally eat people!’

‘Hey Gerald, let’s not get offensive okay?’ said Jonah. ‘You’re beginning to offend me. That is not the sort of thinking the universe needs, especially when it’s offensive.’

Gordon was sure he’d lost his sanity years ago. He’d been through a lot, surviving on his own in the Wilderness. This experience was unlike anything he’d felt in that time. In fact, it reminded him more of a time long ago; an office party where he’d been quite tipsy until he fell off a balcony into a pool. That feeling of instant sobriety shot through him, although now he was breathing in fresh sanity rather than air, while floundering in utter madness.

‘Offensive? You find my thinking offensive? I find Ravenors to be pretty offensive when they try pulling out my intestines for a snack on a nightly basis. Sure, alright, they used to be people but the reality of the disease sure as shit means they aren’t human anymore. What they’ve brought “to the universe” hasn’t exactly been peace. I don’t think your “hashtag” grasps the situation exactly.’

‘Hey, buddy!’ the kaleidoscope-coloured Vivyénne came storming into the kitchen from her studio-room. ‘I dunno where you came from but you better check yourself. This place is about harnessing the flow of the universe and makin’ those changes we wanna see happen in it. If you go out there thinkin’ of the Ravenors like monsters then that’s what you make them into, see? You’re what’s wrong with society. HashtagSocietyOfLove.’

‘HashtagSocietyOfLove!’ chorused the others.

‘Look, Vivienne,’ said Gordon.

‘Excuse me! Vivyénne! You’re not saying it right.’

He hadn’t, on purpose.

‘When was the last time any of you actually left this place? Have you seen any of the chaos out there, or even been up close to a Ravenor? There is no “society” out there. The universe doesn’t reorder itself because of a hashtag. The Ravenors, literally, destroyed, society. You can’t just want it to be so and expect it to happen that way. You said it before. “You’ve gotta make the change you want to happen, happen”. You go out and actually do something, like what they did at the Blue Zones, making space for everyone not infected to be safe.’

Vivyénne looked as if she was going to argue further but Jonah spoke up first.

‘Hey that’s some interesting thinking, gang. He’s right, we’ve been going about this all the wrong way for so long.’

Gordon was surprised as the others as Jonah kept speaking.

‘The universe provides, but only if we make it happen. We have to be the catalysts, we have to be the Influencers of our time to see that change become more than a slogan, to make it real. The Ravenors aren’t human anymore, society has broken down.’

Jonah turned towards his phone.

‘You hear that Champions? No more of that old thinking. Let’s make HashtagMakeRavenorsHumanAgain a thing that everybody knows and takes to heart! We can bring these people back but only if we do it together!’

All four heads squeezed together in front of the phone as the housemates cheered.

‘HashtagMakeRavenorsHumanAgain!’

Gordon stopped floundering, and felt himself drop under.

‘Listen, I’m gonna go. I’ve got ham in my pack and I don’t wanna offend anyone. Before I go, can I do a quick check online for a friend of mine? It won’t take long and after that I’m just gonna...head off. Go out there and meet some Ravenors and get started on that whole...make them human again...thing.’

‘Oh yeah man, for sure,’ said Jonah. ‘Our editing suite is in the office just through that door there.’

‘Great, thanks, won’t be long.’

Gordon left the gang working out their new “game-plan”, trying just to focus on remembering Charlie’s old email and other contacts he could search for. He opened the door to the office, seeing a computer at the desk and sinking into the chair. More sense-memories tingled through him, from times at offices and desks in another life, as he reached over to press the on button.

The screen remained blank.

Gordon tried the monitor button, the power button again, the switch at the back of the computer tower. Nothing.

Dropping down to his knees, he looked under the desk at the cables, following them back to the power socket. He went to pull the plug out to try a different socket but it simply fell out at his touch. Then the socket itself simply fell off the wall. Blank plaster behind it.

Gordon paused under the desk for a good couple of minutes as he collected himself.

‘Right. Yes. Okay.’

He stood up, and walked calmly out of the office to the kitchen. He thanked Jonah for letting him come in and use the computer. He looked at Jonah’s phone closely as he did so, taking note of the red recording light, which had been covered up by a small ruby-coloured shiny sticker. Nodding to himself with frustrated resignation, Gordon picked up his pack, giving a sharp wave to the gang as they mixed more green drinks for themselves.

‘Thanks Champions, I’m out.’

‘No problem G!’

‘See you later Gerald!’

Gordon let himself out the front door, closing it gently behind him. Night had well and truly fallen, and stepping out of the sound-proofed house he could hear the howls of Ravenors on the wind once more.

He stopped at the top of the steps, pulling his pack around to pull out a ham tin. The metal lid pulled open by the tab, and Gordon helped himself to the top couple of pieces. Then, he set the can on the top step, open and unfinished.

He walked down the steps, over the grass and unlatched the gate.

He thought about it for another moment before reaffirming his decision. Sometimes, the apocalypse wasn't the worst thing in the world.

‘You’ve gotta make the change you want to happen, happen.’

He shouldered his pack, took a big breath, and started to march up Boyle Street.

The gate swung back and bounced on the frame. Open and unlatched.