Playback Recording: The Corpses of San Pedro

[physical violence, gore, mentions of abuse; suicide]

*click*

…

You already know why I’m here, the fuck is the point of saying it again? So my mental health gets wrecked even further? That it? Quack therapy, that’s what I think this is.

…

I’m angry? Yeah, no shit Sherlock, thanks for catching that. 

…

I lost everything, Doc, how do you think that makes me feel?

…

I’m just as clueless as you are. Aside from whatever that black substance was, there was zero indication for what was going to happen. San Pedro is a town on the side of a mountain in a city no one goes to because there’s nothing to see but cows and goats. Population, two thousand, where everyone is connected to everyone to some degree, literally.

Every day I went to school, I’d be greeted by street food vendors: “Hoy, siomai sir, for breakfast!”

“Fishballs here! Or kwek-kwek if you want!”

Friends and acquaintances would make plans: “Good morning, pare! You’re still down for a game after school, no?”

And here’s the kicker: save for a few grad students like me, we rarely ever leave town. If they were planning to spread that substance around in the hopes of creating a doomsday scenario, San Pedro is the worst place to use. Yet, here we are? Wanna explain that to me?

…

I know you know something. You were with those guys in the suits, the Bureau. I ain’t opening up until you tell me what I want to know. Where did that black liquid come from?

…

A chemical lab. Really? In a place like San Pedro we would have known about it before it was being constructed. 

…

That’s convenient. Update your intel faster. “Analyze” that shit now. 

…

(Sigh). Once you do though, I deserve to know, you hear me?

…

What’s that?

…

Hmm. That makes sense. I never noticed anything wrong with the food, more so the people eating them. But now that you mentioned it…

It was the day before our graduation, and my friends wanted to eat at some expensive place, which for us meant hiking up the road for thirty minutes to go to Dako Balay. We got the bulalo, since the meat was fresh and that throughout the day they’ve been getting rave reviews. When the food came, not a single piece of meat was left. They all ate it; I didn’t touch a single piece. I just slathered the bone marrow over my rice, that’s it. I’m thinking that black liquid got on the meat, but never affected the marrow or rice.

…

At the time it didn’t seem out of the ordinary. 

After eating one plate full of food, one of my buddies, Kent, said, “Next one’s on me once we get into Manila, boys. Get ourselves our dreams and beautiful wives, while Mr. One-Track-Mind here settles in with his puppy crush.” 

I laughed and punched him on the shoulder. “I just hope she says yes.”

Another one of my buddies, Dom, piped up. “Honestly, whatever Laura says, I’m just glad you finally had the balls to ask her. And on the most important day of our lives too.”

“Got that right,” smiled Vic. I wasn’t that close to him in the same way I was to Dom and Kent, but Vic had his own charm that was nice to be around. “As for me, I’m just excited to see all the new stuff there.”

Kent snickered. “New stuff meaning girls?”

Vic nodded aggressively. “What else do I mean? Honestly, I’m probably going to grow out of it one of these days. Kinda want a family of my own—don’t laugh, I swear to God, I’m legit.”

“Don’t worry,” I said, biting my lip to stifle a chuckle. “Yeah, go on.”

“But yeah. One of those, I kinda want to get it out of my system, you know? Experiment a little… okay, maybe a lot. And then after that’s done, I learn what I gotta learn, and then I can truly be with a woman I really love.”

“Before or after you’re getting a job?”

“Bro, I haven’t thought that far ahead yet.”

“Woah, you think? That’s new.”

He almost flung his spoon at me.

…

Why am I smiling? The fuck kind of question is that? We were the happiest we ever were, Doc. We wanted to do big things. I wanted to be an animator. I’d go to Manila, set myself up in an art school and grind until I’ve made a name for myself with some decent films under my belt. 

Kent wanted to be a businessman, make his way up the corporate ladder first to learn from the best, and leave whatever company in order to apply what he learned. San Mig had a nice work culture, said that was his dream company to start off in. That, and he always loved their Pilsners. 

Dom was set to go to La Zolle on a full scholarship. Smart lad, he made it to one of their most competitive premed courses against the odds, despite coming from San Pedro, beating out thousands of applicants from all over the country raised with silver spoons shoved halfway into their mouths. 

Vic was always a “it’s about the journey, not the destination” type of guy. He wanted to scrap whatever he had left from here, move all the way to Manila and literally start from the bottom to see where the winds of fate would lead him. That’s aside from the wonderful wife.

And then Laura. My dream girl. Pretty beyond comprehension, loves to have fun, super smart and really kind. Tiny little imperfections like the mole on the top of her lip, her laugh that sounded like a dying whale-seal-sheep thing, the way she kept tripping going up the stairs and forgetting homeworks: they all just made me fall for her even more. The only real problem? Her family. Abusive pieces of shit, but not in the violent way. They ignored her independence. Liked to keep her locked in the house. That’s why she wasn’t able to come with us when we went out that day. The last time I saw her alive was that afternoon as her father fetched her from school. 

She gave a tiny smile and a wave, told me to look good for the graduation picture. 

I said to her, “You too. Because I have something I want to tell you tomorrow.”

“Really?” She said, “Because I have something I want to tell you too.”

She winked, and her hair whipped to the side as she turned her back to me as she walked away from school. Her father eyed me from afar, never glancing away until he had his hand on his daughter’s shoulder. 

Can I have some water?

…

Thank you.

I woke up early for graduation the next day. My parents seemed relatively normal when I spoke to them. Sure, they were griping about how being an animator wasn’t a “real job” and I should get into something like accountancy instead, but I didn’t see it as anything other than their usual qualms about the fine arts. 

As I was walking to school though, that’s when I felt something off in the air. The streets were mostly empty. Vendors left their stalls unmanned. A few families had come out to go to graduation. Instead of the usual greetings we got, the people that were there shouted and cursed. 

“Lucky bastards, our family could never afford an education. You all knew that and never even helped.”

“Look at you, all dressed up. You’re son cheated through school, you’re not fooling anybody.”

“You stare like that to me again one more time and I’ll make sure I’m the last thing you ever see.”

It was easy to brush off at first. But there were more. It didn’t stop. It made me feel bad about graduating. I convinced myself it was an off day for these people, and that I shouldn’t let their negativity affect my mood.

…

When I got to the school gymnasium where graduation would be held, more than half of my classmates were missing. I saw Dom in his assigned seat, went up to him and asked where the hell everyone else was. He said he didn’t know.

“I tried calling Kent and Vic a while ago,” Dom said. “They didn’t pick up.”

“I… see.” Something was off about Dom. His eyes were red and bloodshot, and he had heavy eyebags. He blinked rapidly in quick bursts, as if trying to stave the sleep away. 

“What time did you sleep last night?”

“I didn’t.”

“What do you mean you didn’t? Right before graduation?”

From his lap he produced a thick anatomy book. “I was studying in advance.”

“E-excuse me?” 

“For premed. I have to be ready. I can’t be an incompetent fool in front of all my classmates. I can’t risk any lives with my lack of knowledge.” 

“Dom, I’ve seen the academic calendar of La Zolle. Your classes don’t start until three months from now.”

“I know.”

“Then why did you study all night? We don’t have any exams, there’s no need—”

He dropped the book then. Its weight slammed against the hard concrete floor, an echoing BAM that drew a lot of eyes towards us.

“I said…” he turned to me, and I got a good view of his face. Hollow cheekbones like he hadn’t eaten since yesterday, his jaw hanging open ever so slightly, and that look in his eyes. I can’t describe it, it just spelled death to me. But not my own; his. 

“I have to be ready.” He repeated much louder.

The adults started talking. A teacher asked what was going on. Dom’s parents tried to calm their son. Murmurs from everywhere. My parents asked me what happened. I don’t remember much, only that they were angry I was making them look bad in front of everyone.

My mind was pulled from so many directions. 

That was when someone crashed through the gymnasium door. 

It was Kent, stumbling around half naked, and with a bottle of San Mig Pilsner in his hand. His parents weren’t with him. A guard shouted from behind him, hands shaking, hesitating to follow Kent inside. There was fear in his eyes. He told Kent to stop again.

Kent didn’t listen. “I’m gonna… make it to the top,” he slurred, teetering dangerously to one side, then the other. “I’m gonna… I’m…”

The guard took Kent’s instability as a weakness. With one final warning that fell upon deaf ears, the guard ran towards Kent.

I didn’t see what happened clearly because he moved so fast. One moment Kent was doubled over on his knees, and in the next, he was standing over the guard, his Pilsner bottle smashed into pieces, fingers clenched on the bottleneck. The guard, sprawled onto the floor, eyes rolled back into his head, breathing shallow with a huge gash over his head, bleeding into a pool that only grew, and grew. 

Kent flung down what was left of the bottle over the guard’s face. I looked away. My heart was beating rapidly. 

Whoever these people were, they weren’t my friends.

My eyes landed on Dom. I don’t know how long he had started, but he had since picked up the anatomy book and continued to read it with his fingers plugged into his ears. 

“I’m gonna… be the best… 0.01 percent.” Kent proclaimed again, taking unsteady steps down the gymnasium. The adults were panicking now. Students had since left their seats, their parents long gone and out of the gymnasium. Teachers were frantic about what to do, some of them checking on the guard. 

“Buddy,” Kent said to me with a saluting. “I appreciate you man.” And then his eyes wandered up to the ceiling. “See ya at the top.” He ran up to the side of the wall, footsteps like an elephant’s smashing down on the floor, and he dug his fingers into the concrete. 

Then, he started to climb. No support, it was a flat wall. He dug his hands into the concrete, his fingers an inch or two drilled into the wall. Slowly, he went up. He cried out each time he jabbed his fingers. Blood dripped down from each hole he bore. That was the first time I saw the black liquid, mixed in with the red. He was halfway up when he started crying.

“Reach… the top…”

His fingers were crooked and bent. Bone protruding if you looked hard enough. I couldn’t look away, not even if I wanted to. I couldn’t believe it was Kent doing that. It was as if something dark had taken over him. Something far worse than the devil.

He was a little more than halfway up the wall when his elbow caved. It cracked when he tried to jab his hand in again, and it hung limply from his body. He laughed and cursed. Then his other hand slipped out.

“Pop goes the weasel.”

I knew what was about to happen. I turned away and looked down at my feet. Blood and black spattered against my shoes and my pants. We were supposed to graduate together, all of us. Go to Manila and have our own adventures. That’s what was supposed to happen. 

I ran out the gym. No one stopped me. The hostilities grew worse as I ran down the street. Some directed at me, others directed at each other.

“Fucking die, you rat.”

“Good for nothing piece of shit.”

“SAY THAT AGAIN, I DARE YOU.”

Screams. Shouts. Loud bangs, booms, crunches. I started crying then. I didn’t know what was happening. I didn’t know why it was happening.

I ended up in Vic’s house. I knew where he lived since I’d visit a lot for movie nights. I didn’t have to knock; the door swung open. I stepped inside.

The first thing I heard were these moans. These were different from the normal, sexually intimate ones though. These moans were robotic, voiced as if from necessity rather than love. They sounded tired. I could only assume how long they were at it. I strode past that door to Vic’s room. 

That door too, was unlocked. And inside was Vic with the same dead look as Dom in his eyes, fixed onto a porn video on his screen with his headphones on. His penis—or what was left of it, skin ripped and scabbed with dry blood—in his hand as he continued to stroke, up and down, up and down. I called out his name. No response. I thought about unplugging the computer, but the way Kent moved, the way his strength surpassed the natural limitations of his body. That scared me. I didn’t want to die. 

So I ran off again, back into the streets. I covered my ears and eyes to the anger and wrath around me. Streets stained with blood. Women and children crying and laughing and screaming in equal amounts. I almost couldn’t make it to Laura’s house. 

Unlike Vic, the door to her house was locked shut. I called for Laura. The door clicked, and pulling it open was her father, eyes red with blood and black from a gash over his forehead. His muscles were taut as he held a hammer in his hand. He didn’t need to say another word. I left immediately and hid somewhere. After he went back in,  I circled around the perimeter of the house to find Laura’s window. It was opened. I thought she made it out somehow.

I really thought…

Laura’s room is high up on the house. Three floors, one of the richest families in San Pedro. Like Rapunzel, except she didn’t have anything like her long hair. Her body was right next to the base of this tree, her neck hyperextended upwards at an awful angle. Blood—pure red with no sign of black—dripped down from her mouth. Her eyes were half open, a blank look up towards the darkening sky. She was never infected by that black liquid; her parents were. I don’t want to imagine what they were about to do that pushed her to recklessly risk her life like that. And now…

I never even got the chance to tell her… 

*thump*

…

Sorry. Just had to hit something. After all that, I ran. To nowhere, with no sense of time. I just wanted to get away from San Pedro, and all the while I did, guilt bubbled up from my stomach and almost suffocated me, coaxing me to turn back. That I should help them. That they could still be saved. 

…

(Sniff). But what the fuck could I even do? I-I’m only eighteen and this… this thing just had to happen on my graduation day. It took everything away from me, from them. And for what? Why would someone even create a substance like that? Why would… (sigh)… what if I never took them to eat at Dako Balay? What if I’d convinced everyone to just go home? None of this would have happened.

…

Yeah. The Bureau found me. I’m alive. Thanks for that, I guess.

…

I don’t know what I’m going to do, Doc. I have no money to move to Manila now. I don’t know where I’m going to live, where I’m going to get my next meal. I’m lost. I miss them all so much. (Sobbing). I… really do… my parents, Kent, Dom, Vic… Laura… and everyone in San Pedro. They of all people didn’t deserve that. There are much worse assholes out there. Much, much worse.

…

(Door opening). Are these guys from the Bureau? We’re still having our session, aren’t we Doc?

…

…

No…

No you get that thing away from me. 

MY MEMORIES ARE MINE. PAINFUL, BUT MINE.

…

GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM ME! YOU’RE NOT TAKING THE ONLY THING I HAVE LEFT OF THEM! 

PLEASE.

Please.

Pl… ease…

*click*