[color=39b54a]It is 10:40 PM. I am sitting in a supermarket security office with another survivor. We met today, and until this moment, he has gone by 'Ryan' only. He is a man with too much nervous energy, constantly biting his nails, or working away at a terribly broken pair of glasses with wire and a small phillips-head screwdriver. I produce my recorder and iPhone, and ask if I can ask him some questions for my ongoing memoir of the great death. He chuckles at first, shaking his head in disbelief, but then grows serious when he sees I actually have juice for my phone. I snap his picture <insert here> and flip on my clip-on reading light to take notes. (my interjections omitted)[/color] 

[img]https://c1.staticflickr.com/3/2941/33326702576_06c3a62b9d_o.jpg[/img]

...[color=39b54a](in a loud but insistent whisper)[/color] Hey, man! Douse that light. You want to bring 'em all in here? Use your head. 
...I don't care if it helps you write. You want to write - do it in the daylight. You really serious about this? Waste of juice, you ask me. If I had a working iPhone, I'd be listening to Modest Mouse, or CCR, not taking strangers' pictures. 
...I already told you. Ryan. 
...[color=39b54a](exasperated)[/color] Ryan Alexander Canfield. Good enough? 
...what is there to tell? [color=39b54a](pause)[/color] Fine. Ask away. 
...I'm 29. Birthday's in... uh... six weeks? What day is it, anyway? Hold on, let me check my fucking calendar. What kind of questions are these? [color=39b54a](he wipes at a perpetually-teary and bloodshot right eye. -ed.)[/color] 
...About 6' tall. Used to weigh around 190ish. Now? The belt has been taken in a notch or two. Who's to say? 
...what did I do? When? 
..."before?" Shit, man. Don't see what difference it makes. I had a bunch of jobs. Guess you could say I wasn't 'career minded.' uuuhhh... short order cook. Bike courier. Studied graphic design at college. Shit-load of good that'll do me now. Oh -- built a school once, in Zaire... 
...what do I have? Oh, you mean tools of the trade. I picked up this AK-47 in a farmhouse in upstate NY. [color=39b54a](it is, in fact, a Chinese Norinco type 56, with fixed wooden stock and folding bayonet. -ed.)[/color] No rounds for it right now though... I also have a pistol. Took it out of one of the dead ones' pockets. Guy in Albany said it was made by FN? I dunno. "Fuckin' Nasty." That's right. It's a 9mm. Holds thirteen rounds. I have three. hahahaha. 
...Huh? Oh, this? Just some old aluminum softball bat. It's light. It works. 
...Can I sleep now? Enough with the questions, man.