Moonlight Sonata
By Matt Paquette

Hot pain, searing, burning, the blood gushing past decrepit, bloodstained teeth.  I scream, that's all I can do.  I thought I could make it; I was one of the last.  Years have passed, friends dead, or should I say undead? Now me, I wonder what it will be like.   No, I can't just succumb this quick.  I reach for the gun, now soaked in my own blood, my fingers brush and slip on the hot metal.  A grip, I yank my arm around and pull the trigger.  The body slumps to the floor dead, and undead, dead, oh the irony.  Well I was alive, for now.  I've watched the disease take others, watched their minds waste away.  It had been a good life, I can still recall the days before the infection, walks through the park, and the cool ocean breeze unspoiled by the smell of death and decaying flesh.  The Music, ohh the music, sounds so brilliant and joyous, turning the worst scenarios and making them better.  Alas the music I fought for.  I stand and finish off the clip of the pistol, I won't need it.  I walk past the limp body and grab the package I had risked it all to get.  I walked back to where I called home, one hand on my now coagulated shoulder the other under the package holding it up.  I close the steel doors and lock them, a futile thing I don't know why I do it.  I place the package on the table next to the semi-decrepit recliner, a bit of comfort in a harsh world.  I turn on the lamp next to it and begin to turn the crank jutting out of the package I worked so hard to get.  I pull a black disk off the shelf, a thick coating of dust falls off.  I place it onto my wound up package.  I set the needle onto the disk and sit back into my chair.  I listen as the sweet sounds of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata pour out.  A single tear drops down my check, the first in years.  I sit back and let the sounds wash over me as the madness creeps up.  Darkness overcomes my vision and madness forces its way into my mind.  As I sit in my chair the final notes of the glorious melody enter into my ears, and as the last note ends, so then, do I.