Living With the Dead: The Hungry Land

by Joshua Guess

  But I can't risk it until I'm done training them. As much as I want to stand in that line, shoulder to shoulder with men and women I trust, making the world safer one push of the spear at a time, I can't.

  Yet.

  Friday, April 8, 2011

  Tough Call

  Posted by Josh Guess

  This morning, we had to turn down offering aid to a group of survivors. We'd never heard of them before, but they are located not far from the epicenter of the zombie plague, on the Kentucky side of the river across from Cincinnati. They've kept to themselves over the last year, even though they had phones and access to the internet. They've followed this blog, and known there were options.

  Some of the things I've written about have put them off contacting us. They've had the luxury of not being attacked by marauders and having a large cache of supplies to keep them going, so they decided that coming to a place as dangerous as the compound wasn't worth the risk. I don't blame them, as we've had to do awful things to survive and protect each other.

  Now they're facing a swarm of zombies bigger than anything they've ever dealt with, including a lot of smarties, and they can't hold out. They need a large force to help them, and we just can't field it. Given the numbers of undead they're talking about, we would need to send at least fifty people to have a chance at saving them. That's weapons, transport, gas, food, water...and most important, the men and women we would send themselves. We've just gotten to a point where we're able to staff our walls and farms without making people work twelve hour shifts. We can't risk losing that many.

  It was a hard decision to make, but the council was right to do it. There were a few dissenting votes, but even those council members knew the incredible and unjustifiable risk we'd be taking if we sent so many people.

  A very small group might be sent, but that's going to be a separate vote. I don't fancy the idea of a dozen of our people going against a swarm estimated around a thousand, but those who will be going (if they get approval) will be elite scouts and fighters who've faced these kinds of numbers before. Maybe they'd be able to distract and drive off part of the swarm. I don't know. That's the sort of thing that Will and Dodger will have to figure out. I'm not sure how twelve people will be able to help, but I have faith that those two will figure out a way, if it's possible.

  I'm out. Too much frustration for me today, and the emergency meeting we had to call to vote on this means I didn't even get breakfast...

  Saturday, April 9, 2011

  Minus Six

  Posted by Josh Guess

  So...have I mentioned recently just how scary Mason is?

  Don't want to sound like a broken record or anything, but the guy is unbelievably fearless. He and five others have gotten the council's approval to head north to try and help the small community of survivors with the huge mass of zombies that have surrounded them. Half a dozen people aren't enough to do any real good in a straight up fight against a thousand or so zombies, no matter how good Mason is.

  His military training and experience make him one of the most dangerous people I've met since The Fall, but the fact remains that he's just one man, and he's human. He can't go toe to toe with that many zombies and manage to accomplish anything. I've seen him outside the walls, clearing away twenty or thirty undead at a go, but those zombies were spaced far apart, not in a roiling mass of dead flesh. And cutting that many necks and bashing that many heads wears a person out, no matter how good their physical condition is.

  But, Mason swears that with the five people he's taking with him, he can do through trickery and creative tactics what blunt force alone can't accomplish. He's being given two modified trucks to use, extra fuel, and a fair amount of weaponry. We can't spare the Tank, so the trucks he's taking are modified with armor only, and even that isn't all that heavy.

  I worry that we're getting too much in the habit of trying to save people. Granted, I've been supportive and active in most of the rescue efforts we've organized, but this soon after suffering such bad losses, I think risking even six people for a group that seems hopelessly outnumbered is just a bad idea. We want to help where we can, but for all that Mason seems to be an expert in exactly these sorts of situations, he also seems to have a pretty big blind spot in regards to the reality of what he's trying to do.

  I've seen groups of a dozen men falter and get ripped to shreds by half their number in zombies. All it takes is one error at the wrong time, and it's game over. I don't have a lot of worries that Mason will screw up or take unnecessary risks with the people under his command, but fate is a hateful bitch sometimes. You never know what she's going to toss in your path.

  I can't spend all morning worrying about it, though. There is a lot of work to be done here. The weather is looking a bit nicer right now, warm in the last few days in a way that makes the air taste like summer. Right this second it looks like rain will be on us shortly, which will slow the work at the farms as well as the repairs on the wall, but we need to top off our water supplies, so it's welcome.

  Hopefully it will hold off long enough for Mason and his people to get on the road...

  Hmm. I guess my brain is going to be stuck worrying about them no matter what I do to try and distract myself. I'm going to be really pissed at Mason if he gets himself and/or the people going with him killed. He's a resource for knowledge and strategy that we can't afford to lose, and his five best students are going along on this trip. Six people don't seem like a lot to risk, but the potential they carry is worth more than you can imagine.

  Jesus, I just read over that. When did I start seeing people as numbers in an equation and not as friends or fellow citizens? God, I feel like crap.

  Of course I want them to survive for other reasons, not just for what they can do for us. They're good people, worthy of respect and love just as much as anyone here. They're individuals that each add something unique and wonderful to our community, and losing any of them would be tragic and heartbreaking.

  Well. That sounded trite and forced, didn't it? Maybe I'll take a few minutes and go see them off. Just to show I care...

  Monday, April 11, 2011

  The Best Laid Plans

  Posted by Josh Guess

  Early this morning, one of the five men from Mason's team pulled into the compound in a truck that looked like it had been rolled down a cliff. Mason was with him, unconscious and injured. They were the only two survivors of the excursion north to try and help the trapped survivors near the Ohio border.

  By that I mean that none of the group they went up there to help made it either. The guy that managed to get back here is asleep right now, completely exhausted, and Mason is still out cold. Looks like he got a pretty bad thump to the head at some point. Before Darryl, the guy who escaped and brought Mason with him, dropped off to sleep, he gave us the bare bones of what happened.

  Our people got there and observed for a few hours, set some traps, and then tried to draw groups of zombies away from where the survivors were holed up. Long story short, it was working until some smarties caught the pattern in what Mason and his guys were doing, and caught them all by surprise. Darryl isn't sure how it happened, but apparently somehow the other truck we sent North got out of control and slammed into the building the locals were shut up in to stay safe from the swarm. He said you could hear the people scream from where he was, nearly a quarter mile away.

  I'm not sure what happened to Mason exactly, but Evans says he'll be fine.

  I'm glad that those two made it back, but I and most people around the compound are stricken by the outcome of their trip. It's hard to lose people, even one. Four at one time is extremely rough emotionally, and every one of us feels it a little differently. No, the men we lost weren't related to any of the rest of us by blood. Blood can be important, but so too is the bond that grows from living in close quarters. Giving of yourself for the betterment of the tribe.

  They were good men, strong fighters, and decent human beings. In my job, I have to be col
d and calculating at times, like figuring the loss of the truck that crashed into the apartment building of the people that they were trying to save. The weapons and fuel inside. Even the work that can't be done by the men we lost, or by Mason and Darryl until Evans gives them the go-ahead.

  Make no mistake, though. I see every lost brother or sister as a blow to the compound, and to all the people in it. It isn't made any easier to know that they were lost in service to strangers that we owed nothing to, however noble that may be. We've undergone (and, I suppose, are still undergoing) a strange evolution. We've been hard as coffin nails when the need arose, practical and pragmatic in our assessment of the world around us and what we have needed to do to survive in it. We can take pride in the fact that our lost citizens gave their lives during the act of living in accordance with their ideals--the protection of those who wish no harm on others, who can't defend themselves.

  Still, that hard-nosed bitch called realism has to step in. The plain truth is that had we not sent our men north, they'd probably all still be alive and healthy. Given that our people were the ones who breached the safety of the apartment building, it's safe to say that the chances of the whole group of survivors there being killed would have been a lot lower if our boys had stayed home.

  There isn't anything to be done for it, though. We'll cry our tears, have a service, and then move on. Our men might have died heroes' deaths, for all I know, but they're still dead. It's going to raise some interesting points of debate at council, whether we should allow these kinds of outings in the future. We've been pretty liberal with running out of town and even out of state to help others. Maybe the time has come to look at how feasible that is in the long run. Even of we only lost a person every other trip, the attrition rate on our population will end up being awful.

  The attrition of our spirits would be just as bad, if not worse. And that's the last thing we need.

  Tuesday, April 12, 2011

  The Ever Changing Wind

  Posted by Josh Guess

  The last two days have bought us storms of unusual intensity and amazing duration. The winds have been the worst part by far, so powerful that the zombies outside the walls have been knocked over. More and more of them have started acting strangely when the wind comes up, tucking their heads and stopping in place. It'd be an excellent chance to put some arrow in them if the damn wind weren't so strong that it throws off the aim of the archers on duty.

  Our reservoirs of water here in the compound, as well as the big one up the road that feeds this side of town, are full. That's good, since spring in Kentucky tends to be very wet and then very, very dry. We're hoping to build a few more cisterns and get some new water barrels in place by the time the next rains come. Jess actually came up with a good idea for easy water storage: garbage cans. There are plenty of unused ones around, from the big stores around here, and we can clean out others that we bring in from neighborhoods. I'm hoping we can just use those for holding irrigation water. I don't fancy drinking out of a container that might have once held dirty diapers, no matter how much it's been cleaned.

  The worst part of the storm is that the bridge on the west side of the compound, the little one over the creek that we blocked up to create a reservoir behind it, has finally given way. It was severely damaged before, but we managed to fix it and make it usable for travel. Not so much anymore. The dam we built against it to hold that part of our water reserves is mostly intact, but the bridge itself is done for. The winds knocked over a huge tree onto it, and the weakened supports just couldn't hold out. more than half of it has caved in under the weight, and it doesn't look like we'll be able to repair it any time soon.

  Before The Fall, that damn bridge caused all kinds of trouble in this neighborhood. It was damaged often and had to be repaired by the county, sometimes twice a year. Big chunks of asphalt would break off, exposing the steel beneath. Years and years of that all lead up to this, which is a total failure.

  It sort of underscores the fact that while we've been extremely lucky in some ways, there are still things that are going to be beyond our means to fix for a long time yet. The bridge is an obvious and recent problem, but remember that most of the dwellings in the compound are houses. Old houses at that, which means that there are constantly things going wrong with them. Shingles coming off here, a door off its hinges there. My brother has taught a lot of basic carpentry and repair to the people here, and we've looted supplies and materials for most of the last year.

  But none of it will last.

  Nature beats its fists on us, hammering us with gusts of air that can topple men alive and dead. Ceaseless water invades the cracks and crevices, wearing away seals and rotting wood. It's as if the world is trying its damnedest to destroy what was, to make us build something new. Maybe something better.

  In practical terms, it means that what would have been easy repairs before The Fall have become major annoyances. In time, I can see us razing the homes here and building structures more adapted to a world without the economy, production capacity, and infrastructure to make the traditional frame home really work. Lacking power enough to heat or cool our houses is frustrating, and we'd love to build in a way that is more efficient and that doesn't need electricity to accomplish it.

  If we manage to survive that long, we'll eventually have to do it. The homes we have will crumble around us or be heavily damaged, and we will run out of the things we need to fix them at some point.

  You know, the tree that hit the bridge was one of the last inside the compound. We cut down most of them over the last year to make sections of the wall and to use for firewood now and then. The copse of trees right next to the bridge was hit hard, but a few older ones were left.

  Today, that patch is bare. Now it matches the rest of the place. I wouldn't say we took our vengeance on the trees or anything, but then I wouldn't not say it either.

  Well, I'm off to the farms with a lot of others who are going to put in extra shifts. Time to make up for the planting we missed because of the weather. Eight hours of labor on top of my already full day of work here. Pinch me, I must be in heaven.

  Wednesday, April 13, 2011

  Half Day, Half Blog

  Posted by Josh Guess

  It's a nice morning. A little more crisp than I care for, but overall it's pretty good. The sun is shining, the sky is clear. There are less zombies at the walls than usual. Hell, I've even gotten through a big portion of my work. What's left can be handled by the trainees. I think I'm going to take a day and spend it learning something. Maybe Jess can teach me chainmail. Might go to the forge and see if Pat can make me less of a ten-thumbed jackass with a hammer-flailing fetish.

  Something different, anyway. It's pretty rare since we've been back in the compound that I have free time to spend on other things. Yeah, I know we had our little party, but even that was done in a carefully scheduled period between regular shifts. I want to get out of the office and add something to my repertoire.

  I don't think just having a good time when you can is the most productive thing for us to do. I mean, there's nothing wrong with blowing off some steam now and then. It's almost a physical need for us. I'm just saying that ONLY doing that in your spare time won't help the compound out in the long run. People need to spend some free time learning other skills and trades. Many people have already done so, including my trainees. I've got a pretty wide skill set to begin with, but I feel like I've fallen behind a little.

  Since we managed to get so much done yesterday, I won't feel bad about not going to the farms.

  I wonder what I should go work on...something new, or something old that I need to practice. It's just too good a chance to pass up...

  I'll be back tomorrow

  Thursday, April 14, 2011

  A Simple Plan

  Posted by Josh Guess

  I had an interesting time yesterday. I spent the second part of my day with Patrick, who was nice enough to teach me some of the basic principles of metalworkin
g. Not that I'd dare try my hand at it alone or anything, but I know a lot more now than I did yesterday. I get a warm fuzzy going on when I have new knowledge floating around my brain. It's a good feeling.

  My trainees did a nice job on the rest of my work yesterday, and all of them are coming along nicely. There have been enough challenging situations lately that they've been pretty thoroughly tested. I think any one of them could fill in for me on a given day safely, though we've yet to find any person that could take Dave's place. My brother is a very unique guy: super smart with an intuitive ability to assess problems and solve them in the simplest way. I don't mean that as a negative--his ideas aren't simple, but the methods we have to fix things around here are. It's a testament to his ability that he can work with what we have at our disposal.

  Which brings up an interesting topic. The small trench and berm that he started on out at the farms has been pretty damn effective in keeping zombies from wandering onto our land so quickly that they can mass. He's eager to do something similar at the compound itself, and it's a big enough project that the council itself will have to vote on it, since it will require a lot of our reserve of diesel fuel to run the big equipment. There's a few people working on a bio diesel setup, but it will be a while before we'll be able to produce anything in quantity.