Day Ninety Two:
Funny how one day we are making fun of Victor for his conspiracy island survival theories, and the next we are headed to Florida in the hopes that his crazy is actually reality. When I tried to argue with him and AJ they countered with a very very sound argument.
They simply said, "What else do we have to do?"
Touche'.
Even if no one made it to the islands, even if all we find is more death and chaos, so? It still gives us something to shoot for. And if that something happens to include warm water and nice weather... well, maybe it won't be so bad.
Makes me wonder though, would they welcome us? I mean, AJ pretty much confirmed that he is infected. The only thing we don't know is if he is contagion is airborne or solely through blood. We also don't know if he was already infected before being bit, which would mean we both probably are.
I suppose we will cross that bridge when we come to it, then we will probably blow the bridge up so we don't have a mega swarm of ex-humes sneak up behind us. Which brings up another interesting question: Can Ex-humes swim?
Lets hope not.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Friday, February 25, 2011
Day Ninety One:
Day Ninety One:
Today was good. First day in a while where we all just got to talk and occasionally *gasp* even laugh! Got to hear another one of AJ’s theories of the universe which is always a real treat.
His new theory is that the ex-humes are nothing new. At first I thought he was going to say they were like Bigfoot or vampires, always lurking in the shadows and waiting till now to spring their trap. But no, his idea actually seemed somewhat possible even if it isn’t very likely.
He said that maybe we had done this before, maybe mankind had made it to where we are now, maybe even further and at some point we created something that just sort of, shorted out almost everyone’s brains.
We asked how that could be possible? There would still be evidence of something if that was the case. But he countered with, what if this happened millions of years before our earliest records of cavemen. What if some of the craters that we thought were asteroids that killed the dinosaurs, were actually something as simple as a nuclear reactor meltdown. What if we had been here before, and accidentally reset the world. What if it had happened more than once.
And what if we were really trapped inside the Matrix!
AJ didn’t laugh when I said that, but Victor did.
I will give AJ credit though, because it definitely seems possible. Although the idea of mankind constantly erasing all of its accomplishments every billion years of so isn’t exactly a topic to cheer up the mood so we drifted away from that and focused in on stories from Victor.
He asked if we knew about the islands?
We said we knew that they were masses of land surrounded by water but outside of that, no.
According to Victor the government had taken the brightest and the best, and quarantined an island somewhere down south. Probably off the coast of Florida. He said that if we could make it there we would be safe. I explained that before we could do that, we would have to decide whether to take the red pill or blue pill which made him laugh again.
He told us more about his swarm experience and the people he was with. Told us where he grew up, about all the hands on medical experience he had been forced into since this thing started, and how he thought that before long the swarms of 1000 would probably combine into some sort of mega swarm. When that happened, food would start to get real scarce.
I changed topics to McDonalds ice cream which spiraled into an hour long conversation about all the food we missed. This was followed by all of us eating the last pack of twinkies I had in my backpack.
In the words of the late Ice Cube… Today was a good day.
Sort of funny that from here on out… 99.999% of every quote will be considered to be, “In the words of the late…” Ah well
Today was good. First day in a while where we all just got to talk and occasionally *gasp* even laugh! Got to hear another one of AJ’s theories of the universe which is always a real treat.
His new theory is that the ex-humes are nothing new. At first I thought he was going to say they were like Bigfoot or vampires, always lurking in the shadows and waiting till now to spring their trap. But no, his idea actually seemed somewhat possible even if it isn’t very likely.
He said that maybe we had done this before, maybe mankind had made it to where we are now, maybe even further and at some point we created something that just sort of, shorted out almost everyone’s brains.
We asked how that could be possible? There would still be evidence of something if that was the case. But he countered with, what if this happened millions of years before our earliest records of cavemen. What if some of the craters that we thought were asteroids that killed the dinosaurs, were actually something as simple as a nuclear reactor meltdown. What if we had been here before, and accidentally reset the world. What if it had happened more than once.
And what if we were really trapped inside the Matrix!
AJ didn’t laugh when I said that, but Victor did.
I will give AJ credit though, because it definitely seems possible. Although the idea of mankind constantly erasing all of its accomplishments every billion years of so isn’t exactly a topic to cheer up the mood so we drifted away from that and focused in on stories from Victor.
He asked if we knew about the islands?
We said we knew that they were masses of land surrounded by water but outside of that, no.
According to Victor the government had taken the brightest and the best, and quarantined an island somewhere down south. Probably off the coast of Florida. He said that if we could make it there we would be safe. I explained that before we could do that, we would have to decide whether to take the red pill or blue pill which made him laugh again.
He told us more about his swarm experience and the people he was with. Told us where he grew up, about all the hands on medical experience he had been forced into since this thing started, and how he thought that before long the swarms of 1000 would probably combine into some sort of mega swarm. When that happened, food would start to get real scarce.
I changed topics to McDonalds ice cream which spiraled into an hour long conversation about all the food we missed. This was followed by all of us eating the last pack of twinkies I had in my backpack.
In the words of the late Ice Cube… Today was a good day.
Sort of funny that from here on out… 99.999% of every quote will be considered to be, “In the words of the late…” Ah well
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Day Eighty Eight, Nine, Ninety:
Day Eighty Eight, Nine, Ninety:
Victor asked us all sort of questions. Where we had lived, how we survived, if we had met others (Poor Arnie), and then he started telling us stuff we didn’t know. He asked if we knew about the Swarms.
Obviously we had not so he explained how sometimes the Ex-humes move in groups which we already knew. But sometimes, those groups combine with other groups until eventually they are one super group. When that happens, they apparently act almost like locust and just lay waste to everything in their path.
The first time he encountered a swarm was with his initial group. Back then he said, they had at least forty people, probably closer to fifty, and wouldn’t have been nearly as easy to pick off when they got to that rape/labor camp but when the swarm hit…even with everyone armed they almost got wiped out.
They made the mistake of trying to fight, but the ex-humes group must have been at least 1000 deep and outnumbered them 20 to 1. Kill one, another one jumps over it. Kill that one, repeat step on. After killing about 100 of them, the remaining 900 were at the walls of their camp.
Victor asked us, “You ever try fighting a war in a full biosuit? It ain’t fucking easy.”
When it became clear that they couldn’t stop them, they retreated to their vehicles. By then they were down to 20, maybe 25 people. But as soon as they pulled off the perimeter the things swarmed in. Victor an a handful of others were lucky enough to make it to their military truck. Everyone else that ran for a regular car, truck, or house was devoured in seconds.
Victor and a few others fired out the back of the vehicle while a hair stylist named David Jenkins drove them away from the camp. When they were far enough away, the only surviving military guy in their group hit a detonator and blew their camp and most of the swarm back to hell. Then he shot himself in the head since he had been bitten.
By the time they made it to the Slaver camp, they were down to 5 people including Victor. The survivors had fought for their lives and watched their loved ones die only to be murdered by a group of psychopaths.
After hearing his story, we figured it was probably best to get rid of Bossman as well. We went to work finding spare bio-suits and doing our best to make the camp look as normal as always. Sort of tricky since, we only had three men to accomplish this and according to Victor their Bossman had at least 4 others with him.
Fortunately though, we had two more days before he was expected back. During that time we dug a hole inside the compound just past the main gate. Not just a hole, a grave. A grave that would fit an entire car and all of its occupants. A grave Stephen King would be proud of.
Once we were sure the hole was at least big enough to fit two cars driving side by side, we covered it with a brown tarp that they were using as a make shift tent at one of the guard outposts.
Unlike the disaster we encountered upon arriving at this horrible place, when Bossman returned everything went as planned. AJ notified Victor and I as soon as the car was approaching causing Victor and I to immediately the hole 1/3 of the way full with their gasoline reserves. When the car arrived, we opened the gate and watched it drive forward at its normal speed before going end over end into our hole.
The trick was to make the hole deep enough so that when it flipped, it would have enough room to go all the way in and have enough momentum to flip it over onto its roof which is did.
And then they all got to enjoy the sweet release of burning to death before hopefully going off to the afterlife and burning for eternity there as well.
We talked about staying at the camp but, after a brief discussion we decided that we would have better luck finding survivors and hopefully avoiding swarms if we stayed on the move. After packing up all the supplies we needed we left a note stating our direction of travel and where other survivors could locate the remaining food and supplies.
After today I will try to go back to 1 day entries. It has just been a crazy week. Sort of hard to stop what you’re doing and fill out your journal when you are planning to murder a car full of people.
Victor asked us all sort of questions. Where we had lived, how we survived, if we had met others (Poor Arnie), and then he started telling us stuff we didn’t know. He asked if we knew about the Swarms.
Obviously we had not so he explained how sometimes the Ex-humes move in groups which we already knew. But sometimes, those groups combine with other groups until eventually they are one super group. When that happens, they apparently act almost like locust and just lay waste to everything in their path.
The first time he encountered a swarm was with his initial group. Back then he said, they had at least forty people, probably closer to fifty, and wouldn’t have been nearly as easy to pick off when they got to that rape/labor camp but when the swarm hit…even with everyone armed they almost got wiped out.
They made the mistake of trying to fight, but the ex-humes group must have been at least 1000 deep and outnumbered them 20 to 1. Kill one, another one jumps over it. Kill that one, repeat step on. After killing about 100 of them, the remaining 900 were at the walls of their camp.
Victor asked us, “You ever try fighting a war in a full biosuit? It ain’t fucking easy.”
When it became clear that they couldn’t stop them, they retreated to their vehicles. By then they were down to 20, maybe 25 people. But as soon as they pulled off the perimeter the things swarmed in. Victor an a handful of others were lucky enough to make it to their military truck. Everyone else that ran for a regular car, truck, or house was devoured in seconds.
Victor and a few others fired out the back of the vehicle while a hair stylist named David Jenkins drove them away from the camp. When they were far enough away, the only surviving military guy in their group hit a detonator and blew their camp and most of the swarm back to hell. Then he shot himself in the head since he had been bitten.
By the time they made it to the Slaver camp, they were down to 5 people including Victor. The survivors had fought for their lives and watched their loved ones die only to be murdered by a group of psychopaths.
After hearing his story, we figured it was probably best to get rid of Bossman as well. We went to work finding spare bio-suits and doing our best to make the camp look as normal as always. Sort of tricky since, we only had three men to accomplish this and according to Victor their Bossman had at least 4 others with him.
Fortunately though, we had two more days before he was expected back. During that time we dug a hole inside the compound just past the main gate. Not just a hole, a grave. A grave that would fit an entire car and all of its occupants. A grave Stephen King would be proud of.
Once we were sure the hole was at least big enough to fit two cars driving side by side, we covered it with a brown tarp that they were using as a make shift tent at one of the guard outposts.
Unlike the disaster we encountered upon arriving at this horrible place, when Bossman returned everything went as planned. AJ notified Victor and I as soon as the car was approaching causing Victor and I to immediately the hole 1/3 of the way full with their gasoline reserves. When the car arrived, we opened the gate and watched it drive forward at its normal speed before going end over end into our hole.
The trick was to make the hole deep enough so that when it flipped, it would have enough room to go all the way in and have enough momentum to flip it over onto its roof which is did.
And then they all got to enjoy the sweet release of burning to death before hopefully going off to the afterlife and burning for eternity there as well.
We talked about staying at the camp but, after a brief discussion we decided that we would have better luck finding survivors and hopefully avoiding swarms if we stayed on the move. After packing up all the supplies we needed we left a note stating our direction of travel and where other survivors could locate the remaining food and supplies.
After today I will try to go back to 1 day entries. It has just been a crazy week. Sort of hard to stop what you’re doing and fill out your journal when you are planning to murder a car full of people.
Monday, February 21, 2011
Day Eighty Five, Six, Seven:
Day Eighty Five, Six, Seven:
The next day when the guard came back he decided he actually wanted to talk to us for once. He sounded scared and desperate. Despite what we had been through and the fact that we were naked and being held against our will in a home made prison I almost felt sorry for him.
He was talking quiet but he wanted to know if we had done anything to him, he promised not to tell anyone if we had. We lied and said we hadn’t. We told him that after he had freaked out yesterday, we went over by the door to see what had scared him and saw there was the tip of a rusty nail sticking out.
Now if he hadn’t of been terrified this might have screwed us since he could have asked a lot of questions starting with, “Where is the nail?” Because it wasn’t like we had a claw hammer to pull it out of the door with, and we couldn’t exactly pound the sharp end of a nail back into the door with our bare hands. Fortunately, he was so freaked out that all he said was, “Oh shit”.
I lied and told him he might have tetanus and that if he let us out I could get him to an abandoned hospital and treat him. He said he would think about it but after that, we never saw him alive again.
So our nasty little viral friend jumped ship from him, to all of his friends over the course of about 6 hours. By day Eighty Six damn near everyone in that place was suffering from an acute case of the “About to be deads”. Our plan was to simply wait it out. Wait till we were as sure as we could be that everyone was too sick to move, and then kick down the door. After two of our meals were skipped and we couldn’t contact any guards we decided it was time to make our move.
Here’s the thing though, have you ever tried to bust out of a reinforced door while you’re naked? No? Because it is damn near impossible. We beat the living hell out of that door for over an hour and all we had to show for it was a bunch of bruised and bloody body parts.
As Day Eighty Seven approached we had gone over a day without any food or water. This might not seem like a big deal, but when you have no concept of time and no plan of escape… things get really scary really fast. Every itch, every body hiccup, every everything feels like the acute stages of something you should know more about that is probably going to kill you.
However, half way through what must have been Day Eighty Seven we heard gunshots. Lots and lots of gunshots. Not like, machinegun fire. More like, BAM! Then, three minutes later… BAM! This went on for at least an hour or two until eventually, no more gunshots.
A half our passed and then the slot in the door where we got our food from slid open and a man said, “Hello, I’m Victor, how are you?”
He pushed some bottles of water through the door along with glorious food and clothes. Unfortunately, after hearing all the gunshots AJ and I were convinced that the water was poisoned, along with the food. We got dressed quickly and then voiced this concern to him. He laughed before saying, “You must have heard all the gunshots, why would I poison you instead of just shooting you?”
Touche.
The water was gone in seconds and the food shortly after that. Apparently Victor didn’t want to be living there either. He had also come with a group of people and had been forced to sit naked in a room. He lied and said he was a doctor, which was sort of true since he had been working on a degree to become a male nurse but… the other people in his group were unable to impress their captors. As a result, the women were handed out like candy and the men were murdered after having been worked nearly to death with no provisions.
He told us the only reason we were being fed was because they were waiting for their boss to get back from an expedition he had gone on. If bossman had been around, we most likely would not be around to enjoy his company.
We asked if he was immune to the disease like us and he said no. He explained that he kept his biosuit on at all times and only showered once a week. The other people there took to calling him Icky Vic because of his smell but he didn’t care. He laughed when I said they would be smelling a lot worse real soon.
He asked us where our camp was and we told him we were it. He said we didn’t have to lie, he was there to help and we explained that we weren’t. He managed to get the door open and asked if he could come with us. I explained that we didn’t have any idea where we were going and he said that sounded perfect.
So after gathering up a bunch of supplies, he led us to the garage where they were storing our vehicle and off we went. A trio once more.
The next day when the guard came back he decided he actually wanted to talk to us for once. He sounded scared and desperate. Despite what we had been through and the fact that we were naked and being held against our will in a home made prison I almost felt sorry for him.
He was talking quiet but he wanted to know if we had done anything to him, he promised not to tell anyone if we had. We lied and said we hadn’t. We told him that after he had freaked out yesterday, we went over by the door to see what had scared him and saw there was the tip of a rusty nail sticking out.
Now if he hadn’t of been terrified this might have screwed us since he could have asked a lot of questions starting with, “Where is the nail?” Because it wasn’t like we had a claw hammer to pull it out of the door with, and we couldn’t exactly pound the sharp end of a nail back into the door with our bare hands. Fortunately, he was so freaked out that all he said was, “Oh shit”.
I lied and told him he might have tetanus and that if he let us out I could get him to an abandoned hospital and treat him. He said he would think about it but after that, we never saw him alive again.
So our nasty little viral friend jumped ship from him, to all of his friends over the course of about 6 hours. By day Eighty Six damn near everyone in that place was suffering from an acute case of the “About to be deads”. Our plan was to simply wait it out. Wait till we were as sure as we could be that everyone was too sick to move, and then kick down the door. After two of our meals were skipped and we couldn’t contact any guards we decided it was time to make our move.
Here’s the thing though, have you ever tried to bust out of a reinforced door while you’re naked? No? Because it is damn near impossible. We beat the living hell out of that door for over an hour and all we had to show for it was a bunch of bruised and bloody body parts.
As Day Eighty Seven approached we had gone over a day without any food or water. This might not seem like a big deal, but when you have no concept of time and no plan of escape… things get really scary really fast. Every itch, every body hiccup, every everything feels like the acute stages of something you should know more about that is probably going to kill you.
However, half way through what must have been Day Eighty Seven we heard gunshots. Lots and lots of gunshots. Not like, machinegun fire. More like, BAM! Then, three minutes later… BAM! This went on for at least an hour or two until eventually, no more gunshots.
A half our passed and then the slot in the door where we got our food from slid open and a man said, “Hello, I’m Victor, how are you?”
He pushed some bottles of water through the door along with glorious food and clothes. Unfortunately, after hearing all the gunshots AJ and I were convinced that the water was poisoned, along with the food. We got dressed quickly and then voiced this concern to him. He laughed before saying, “You must have heard all the gunshots, why would I poison you instead of just shooting you?”
Touche.
The water was gone in seconds and the food shortly after that. Apparently Victor didn’t want to be living there either. He had also come with a group of people and had been forced to sit naked in a room. He lied and said he was a doctor, which was sort of true since he had been working on a degree to become a male nurse but… the other people in his group were unable to impress their captors. As a result, the women were handed out like candy and the men were murdered after having been worked nearly to death with no provisions.
He told us the only reason we were being fed was because they were waiting for their boss to get back from an expedition he had gone on. If bossman had been around, we most likely would not be around to enjoy his company.
We asked if he was immune to the disease like us and he said no. He explained that he kept his biosuit on at all times and only showered once a week. The other people there took to calling him Icky Vic because of his smell but he didn’t care. He laughed when I said they would be smelling a lot worse real soon.
He asked us where our camp was and we told him we were it. He said we didn’t have to lie, he was there to help and we explained that we weren’t. He managed to get the door open and asked if he could come with us. I explained that we didn’t have any idea where we were going and he said that sounded perfect.
So after gathering up a bunch of supplies, he led us to the garage where they were storing our vehicle and off we went. A trio once more.
Day Eighty Four:
Day Eighty Four:
Another day passed, or did it? Without any windows time gets real hazy. I guess we could have kept track of time with the light shining through under the door or, by counting our meals but when you are fairly certain you are going to be murdered shortly… time loses its importance.
What doesn’t lose its importance is striving to find a way to keep yourself unkilled. I know I could say “alive” but that word doesn’t apply here. Eating crackers and drinking some water will keep you “alive” most days. When you are locked naked in a makeshift prison, what you want is to keep yourself un-fucking-killed.
It came down to us using good old fashioned biological warfare. Because lets face it, neither AJ nor I were professional ninjas previous to this plague. Neither of us could break a man's neck with our index finger and neither of us knew how to use hypnosis, or magic, or whatever else might have saved us.
What we did know was that AJ had been bitten by the ex-humes. What we didn’t know was whether or not that meant his blood was contagious as shit to anyone without a natural immunity like us, or if the virus died as soon as it entered his blood stream.
However, any chance was better than no chance so we went to work crafting a plan. The guards barely acknowledged our existence. The only time we ever saw them was when they threw our food to us and even then, all we saw was there hand coming through the slot in the door.
Sure, we could have grabbed his hand and sliced it open with the razor blade and dumped some of AJ’s blood into it while he struggled. But I was 99.9% certain that would result in him killing us. If not him, then his boss would shoot us in the head.
Had to look like an accident. Something he could be blamed for and still feel like maybe he would be ok. Had to use the same tactic you would use when dealing with rats. Give one poison food and let him bring that shit back to the nest to poison the others.
So we carved a little niche into the door with the Swiss Army knife, inserted the razor blade so that just a small edge was poking up. Small enough to be mistaken for a nail. Then moments before we expected breakfast or lunch or whatever the same shit they fed us every time was… we cut AJ a little with the razor and left his blood on the edge of it.
Fast forward to the guard sticking his hand through, then immediately dropping our food and pulling his hand back incredibly fast. Hearing him whisper to himself, “Oh fuck oh fuck” and then to us “Did you do this?”
We pretended to be confused and AJ asked if we could help, asked what was wrong. The man told us to shut the fuck up and left. As soon as he was gone we pulled the razor blade back out and hid it. If anyone came to figure out what cut him, no point of leaving evidence of what we did just lying around. Although I was pretty sure he wouldn’t say anything to anyone.
And then we waited.
And we waited.
And we waited.
Another day passed, or did it? Without any windows time gets real hazy. I guess we could have kept track of time with the light shining through under the door or, by counting our meals but when you are fairly certain you are going to be murdered shortly… time loses its importance.
What doesn’t lose its importance is striving to find a way to keep yourself unkilled. I know I could say “alive” but that word doesn’t apply here. Eating crackers and drinking some water will keep you “alive” most days. When you are locked naked in a makeshift prison, what you want is to keep yourself un-fucking-killed.
It came down to us using good old fashioned biological warfare. Because lets face it, neither AJ nor I were professional ninjas previous to this plague. Neither of us could break a man's neck with our index finger and neither of us knew how to use hypnosis, or magic, or whatever else might have saved us.
What we did know was that AJ had been bitten by the ex-humes. What we didn’t know was whether or not that meant his blood was contagious as shit to anyone without a natural immunity like us, or if the virus died as soon as it entered his blood stream.
However, any chance was better than no chance so we went to work crafting a plan. The guards barely acknowledged our existence. The only time we ever saw them was when they threw our food to us and even then, all we saw was there hand coming through the slot in the door.
Sure, we could have grabbed his hand and sliced it open with the razor blade and dumped some of AJ’s blood into it while he struggled. But I was 99.9% certain that would result in him killing us. If not him, then his boss would shoot us in the head.
Had to look like an accident. Something he could be blamed for and still feel like maybe he would be ok. Had to use the same tactic you would use when dealing with rats. Give one poison food and let him bring that shit back to the nest to poison the others.
So we carved a little niche into the door with the Swiss Army knife, inserted the razor blade so that just a small edge was poking up. Small enough to be mistaken for a nail. Then moments before we expected breakfast or lunch or whatever the same shit they fed us every time was… we cut AJ a little with the razor and left his blood on the edge of it.
Fast forward to the guard sticking his hand through, then immediately dropping our food and pulling his hand back incredibly fast. Hearing him whisper to himself, “Oh fuck oh fuck” and then to us “Did you do this?”
We pretended to be confused and AJ asked if we could help, asked what was wrong. The man told us to shut the fuck up and left. As soon as he was gone we pulled the razor blade back out and hid it. If anyone came to figure out what cut him, no point of leaving evidence of what we did just lying around. Although I was pretty sure he wouldn’t say anything to anyone.
And then we waited.
And we waited.
And we waited.
Friday, February 4, 2011
Day Eighty Three:
Day Eighty Three:
WWMCGD
You know, sort of like What Would Jesus Do but, replace Jesus with MacGuyver and you get WWMCGD.
So heres the plan we came up with. AJ would use the matches to melt down the boat key holder over the middle of the paper clips. Then, after tieing the string to one end of the paper clip, we would tie the other end to the doorknob. I would knock on the door and get the guard to come check out the commotion. As son as he touched the door handle and began to open the door, AJ would plug in the paper clip into one of the rooms power outlets.
When the guard got zapped, I would grab the gun and then quickly subdue him in our prison. One of us would wear his regular clothes, and one of us would wear his biosuit. We then would act as a guard and escort and breeze out of the facility without anyone being the wiser.
Also, if you think that would have worked you're a fucking idiot. Because it wouldn't. What would happen is, as soon as the paper clip went into the outlet a fuse would blow. Then we would probably be left naked in a room while someone tried to replace a fuse. Either that or they would figure out the bullshit we were up to and shoot us.
Either way we would lose because in real life, MacGuyver nonsense does not work ever.
Yesterday when I listed our inventory I did forget to mention one thing. In addition to all our useless MacGuyver shit, we also realized that we possibly had in AJ a strain of the most deadly virus known to mankind. So we had that going for us, and that's nice.
Oh yeah, AJ also pointed out that after today our captors would probably decide we weren't infected. At that point, one of two things would happen.
1. We would be welcome into this camp of end of the world survivalists with open arms and be considered their equals!
2. We would be forced into slave labor or rapesville.
3. A variation of number 2, we would get raped while performing slave labor.
As much as I wanted to believe it would be number one, having the guard that morning say, "I've got dibs on you" certainly didn't help my outlook. I believe a young Juliette Lewis in Natural Born Killers expressed our intentions the best when she said, "Kill em all Mickey, KILL EM ALL!"
WWMCGD
You know, sort of like What Would Jesus Do but, replace Jesus with MacGuyver and you get WWMCGD.
So heres the plan we came up with. AJ would use the matches to melt down the boat key holder over the middle of the paper clips. Then, after tieing the string to one end of the paper clip, we would tie the other end to the doorknob. I would knock on the door and get the guard to come check out the commotion. As son as he touched the door handle and began to open the door, AJ would plug in the paper clip into one of the rooms power outlets.
When the guard got zapped, I would grab the gun and then quickly subdue him in our prison. One of us would wear his regular clothes, and one of us would wear his biosuit. We then would act as a guard and escort and breeze out of the facility without anyone being the wiser.
Also, if you think that would have worked you're a fucking idiot. Because it wouldn't. What would happen is, as soon as the paper clip went into the outlet a fuse would blow. Then we would probably be left naked in a room while someone tried to replace a fuse. Either that or they would figure out the bullshit we were up to and shoot us.
Either way we would lose because in real life, MacGuyver nonsense does not work ever.
Yesterday when I listed our inventory I did forget to mention one thing. In addition to all our useless MacGuyver shit, we also realized that we possibly had in AJ a strain of the most deadly virus known to mankind. So we had that going for us, and that's nice.
Oh yeah, AJ also pointed out that after today our captors would probably decide we weren't infected. At that point, one of two things would happen.
1. We would be welcome into this camp of end of the world survivalists with open arms and be considered their equals!
2. We would be forced into slave labor or rapesville.
3. A variation of number 2, we would get raped while performing slave labor.
As much as I wanted to believe it would be number one, having the guard that morning say, "I've got dibs on you" certainly didn't help my outlook. I believe a young Juliette Lewis in Natural Born Killers expressed our intentions the best when she said, "Kill em all Mickey, KILL EM ALL!"
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Day Eighty Two Pt 3:
Day Eighty Two Pt 3:
One razor blade
One pack of matches
One 3 foot length of string
Two paper clips
One very small swiss army knife w/ the usual attachments
That is what AJ and I were left with. Oh right, and a boat key holder covered in body secretions. I probably didn't need to tell you that but I don't want someone to find this journal 100 years from now and be all like "Wait a second! I thought there was a boat key holder! What a fucking liar!"
Additionally, even though there weren't any windows on the door I was pretty sure there was a guard stationed outside since every now and then I would see him walk past the door. Could we have jumped the guard? I don't know, probably. But who knows how many other people were in there. Not to mention, one mistake would result in us being severely shot.
Not just regularly shot. No, severely shot. Which is much worse.
First thing I did was tie the string to the boat key holder and then tie the other end to a vent in the room. That way, until we figured this horrible situation out we could leave our stuff hidden in a vent. I knew watching those Prison Lockup shows would pay off one day.
At some point we were given food that day. But it was just bread and crackers on a paper plater. So I guess I could add a paper plate to the inventory as well.
We spent the night naked, on the floor, waiting to die.
Which is actually quite a bit worse than spending the night in a car waiting to die.
Its strange how comforting clothes are.
And how terrifying life can become without them.
One razor blade
One pack of matches
One 3 foot length of string
Two paper clips
One very small swiss army knife w/ the usual attachments
That is what AJ and I were left with. Oh right, and a boat key holder covered in body secretions. I probably didn't need to tell you that but I don't want someone to find this journal 100 years from now and be all like "Wait a second! I thought there was a boat key holder! What a fucking liar!"
Additionally, even though there weren't any windows on the door I was pretty sure there was a guard stationed outside since every now and then I would see him walk past the door. Could we have jumped the guard? I don't know, probably. But who knows how many other people were in there. Not to mention, one mistake would result in us being severely shot.
Not just regularly shot. No, severely shot. Which is much worse.
First thing I did was tie the string to the boat key holder and then tie the other end to a vent in the room. That way, until we figured this horrible situation out we could leave our stuff hidden in a vent. I knew watching those Prison Lockup shows would pay off one day.
At some point we were given food that day. But it was just bread and crackers on a paper plater. So I guess I could add a paper plate to the inventory as well.
We spent the night naked, on the floor, waiting to die.
Which is actually quite a bit worse than spending the night in a car waiting to die.
Its strange how comforting clothes are.
And how terrifying life can become without them.
Sunday, January 30, 2011
Day Eighty Two Pt. 2:
Day Eighty Two Pt. 2:
Where were we? Oh right, me walking up the road with AJ next to me while a boat key holder was shoved up inside me. Awesome!
We didn’t make it far before a spotlight from the building lit us up and men in gas masks with guns trained on us began shouting orders. If you ever saw the movie 28 Days Later, it was sort of like that. If you haven’t seen the movie it doesn’t matter since you are probably already dead like everyone else. Drumroll please.
We did as we were told. AJ and I put the guns we had in our waistband on the ground. We decided to bring some handguns because how else would we have made it this far? Our hope was that they would believe that we had been surviving on foot and not go looking to hard for our car which was hidden just off the road.
When we got close to the building, we were instructed to lie down flat on the ground with our hands spread out. We did this and waited for them to handcuff us and secure us to a bench. I tried to tell them there was no need for this, that we were friends, that we meant them no harm.
They told us that we could be scouts for a larger raiding party.
I asked if they had been having problems with that sort of thing to which I received no answer but knew that it meant no. It meant that someone had watched Mad Max one too many times and was being extremely paranoid.
We were stripped naked and thrown into a very serious looking room. Not a prison since it wasn’t a jail but, lets just say that it was fairly inescapable. On the plus side, there was a make shift toilet bucket. On the negative side, I was fairly certain they were going to kill us.
Eventually someone came to talk to us but, not much was accomplished. They wanted to know where our car was, we said there wasn’t one, they called us liars, we called them crazy. And so on and so on. Eventually I asked for a blanket but, I could tell they were getting off on their home brewed version of Guantanamo Bay or however it is spelled so I didn’t hold my breath waiting for one.
I asked how long they were going to keep us there, and they laughed. Something in that laugh let AJ and I know that we were both as good as dead.
Thank God for my body cavity surprise package. Thank God for Aj’s foresight. And while I am at it, Fuck God for making all this bullshit happen in the first place and making me have to stick a fucking boat key holder inside me. Yeah God, you’re not getting off that easy any more.
Where were we? Oh right, me walking up the road with AJ next to me while a boat key holder was shoved up inside me. Awesome!
We didn’t make it far before a spotlight from the building lit us up and men in gas masks with guns trained on us began shouting orders. If you ever saw the movie 28 Days Later, it was sort of like that. If you haven’t seen the movie it doesn’t matter since you are probably already dead like everyone else. Drumroll please.
We did as we were told. AJ and I put the guns we had in our waistband on the ground. We decided to bring some handguns because how else would we have made it this far? Our hope was that they would believe that we had been surviving on foot and not go looking to hard for our car which was hidden just off the road.
When we got close to the building, we were instructed to lie down flat on the ground with our hands spread out. We did this and waited for them to handcuff us and secure us to a bench. I tried to tell them there was no need for this, that we were friends, that we meant them no harm.
They told us that we could be scouts for a larger raiding party.
I asked if they had been having problems with that sort of thing to which I received no answer but knew that it meant no. It meant that someone had watched Mad Max one too many times and was being extremely paranoid.
We were stripped naked and thrown into a very serious looking room. Not a prison since it wasn’t a jail but, lets just say that it was fairly inescapable. On the plus side, there was a make shift toilet bucket. On the negative side, I was fairly certain they were going to kill us.
Eventually someone came to talk to us but, not much was accomplished. They wanted to know where our car was, we said there wasn’t one, they called us liars, we called them crazy. And so on and so on. Eventually I asked for a blanket but, I could tell they were getting off on their home brewed version of Guantanamo Bay or however it is spelled so I didn’t hold my breath waiting for one.
I asked how long they were going to keep us there, and they laughed. Something in that laugh let AJ and I know that we were both as good as dead.
Thank God for my body cavity surprise package. Thank God for Aj’s foresight. And while I am at it, Fuck God for making all this bullshit happen in the first place and making me have to stick a fucking boat key holder inside me. Yeah God, you’re not getting off that easy any more.
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Day Eighty Two:
Day Eighty Two:
Actually this is sort of days Eighty two/three/four/five/six and might be up to day eighty eight but for the sake of continuity we will say that AJ and I were imprisoned for five days before we escaped. So what went wrong?
Fucking smoke signal wasn’t a smoke signal.
It wasn’t a “Hey friends, come on down”
It was an accident and in no way shape or form was meant to be a beacon of hope or salvation.
Remember earlier when we were worried about Arnold being a slaver/rapist? Well, what we found wasn’t that bad but, it looked like it was headed in the right direction. Actually I guess it would make more sense to say those fucks were headed in the wrong direction but you get what I mean.
I’m getting to far ahead of myself so let me go back to Day Eighty Two for a second and focus on that. We waited all morning to see the smoke again and sometime around 2 or 3 PM it showed up. Later we found out it wasn’t a signal, just lunch. But regardless of that, we drove towards it.
Around 4 PM we got close enough that we could see a house, and PEOPLE! Or at least, we saw figures moving inside the house that were a little hard to make out but Oh my God, we were so excited to see more people. I almost jumped out of the car and went running towards them but thankfully, AJ despite our excitement is always a little more apprehensive.
Its like, where I see a flower, he sees a poisonous plant. Where I see a beautiful bird, he sees Bird Flu. For everything Positive in this world you can bet that AJ has figured out what the Negative aspects are. And thank God for that, because if he hadn’t we would either be dead or worse.
Yes, worse.
Like I was saying, I wanted to go running forward and start the parade but AJ held us back. He suggested that we conceal some supplies or weapons. I told him we already were and he said “No, not in our pockets, in us”.
Whoa there buddy. It’s one thing to carry a gun, but to shove a gun inside yourself might hurt a little. So I was pretty hesitant at first.
Eventually he showed me some spongy case that was shaped like a big oval. I think boaters use them so they don’t lose their keys? Not sure, but anyway it opened and inside you could fit a small amount of stuff. So although a gun was out of the picture, a razor blade, matches, string, and maybe a little more would fit just fine.
Sooooo we had a case, what we didn’t have was a willing participant to shove a fairly unusual object up inside of them. What it basically came down to was, either one of us do that or… one of us hide in the bushes with weapons and supplies while the other drives towards the encampment.
Either become the poor man’s Bear Gryllis or… ew.
We debated this for a while. I tried my best to convince him that these were normal people just like us. He agreed, but also point out that he would rather be safe than sorry. I told him that he should be the one to, well, gross. He said that we wouldn’t do that because of his religion.
Even in the apocalypse afterworld, the religion trump card never ever fails.
So either I would get to be uncomfortable for a few seconds, or possibly spend the night in the woods. His reasoning was, if they turn out to be hunky-dory (He actually said this, I might not remember everything but I remember that) then I could just go to the bathroom and remove our little security blanket. So we would be looking, wait no… so I with a capital ME would be looking at most of like 10 minutes of discomfort.
Otherwise, if one of us stayed in the woods that might look real suspicious should they turn out to be friendly. Oh hello, we mean you no harm. What’s that? Oh yes, that is my friend camped out in the woods with a high powered sniper rifle aimed at your forehead. No, don’t be ridiculous, we are friends!
See the dilemma?
Well, after a thorough cleaning I am ashamed to say in it went. Please don’t think any less of your narrator.
I think this is an appropriate time to take a break from writing in this thing. If you can believe it, everything goes down hill from here.
Actually this is sort of days Eighty two/three/four/five/six and might be up to day eighty eight but for the sake of continuity we will say that AJ and I were imprisoned for five days before we escaped. So what went wrong?
Fucking smoke signal wasn’t a smoke signal.
It wasn’t a “Hey friends, come on down”
It was an accident and in no way shape or form was meant to be a beacon of hope or salvation.
Remember earlier when we were worried about Arnold being a slaver/rapist? Well, what we found wasn’t that bad but, it looked like it was headed in the right direction. Actually I guess it would make more sense to say those fucks were headed in the wrong direction but you get what I mean.
I’m getting to far ahead of myself so let me go back to Day Eighty Two for a second and focus on that. We waited all morning to see the smoke again and sometime around 2 or 3 PM it showed up. Later we found out it wasn’t a signal, just lunch. But regardless of that, we drove towards it.
Around 4 PM we got close enough that we could see a house, and PEOPLE! Or at least, we saw figures moving inside the house that were a little hard to make out but Oh my God, we were so excited to see more people. I almost jumped out of the car and went running towards them but thankfully, AJ despite our excitement is always a little more apprehensive.
Its like, where I see a flower, he sees a poisonous plant. Where I see a beautiful bird, he sees Bird Flu. For everything Positive in this world you can bet that AJ has figured out what the Negative aspects are. And thank God for that, because if he hadn’t we would either be dead or worse.
Yes, worse.
Like I was saying, I wanted to go running forward and start the parade but AJ held us back. He suggested that we conceal some supplies or weapons. I told him we already were and he said “No, not in our pockets, in us”.
Whoa there buddy. It’s one thing to carry a gun, but to shove a gun inside yourself might hurt a little. So I was pretty hesitant at first.
Eventually he showed me some spongy case that was shaped like a big oval. I think boaters use them so they don’t lose their keys? Not sure, but anyway it opened and inside you could fit a small amount of stuff. So although a gun was out of the picture, a razor blade, matches, string, and maybe a little more would fit just fine.
Sooooo we had a case, what we didn’t have was a willing participant to shove a fairly unusual object up inside of them. What it basically came down to was, either one of us do that or… one of us hide in the bushes with weapons and supplies while the other drives towards the encampment.
Either become the poor man’s Bear Gryllis or… ew.
We debated this for a while. I tried my best to convince him that these were normal people just like us. He agreed, but also point out that he would rather be safe than sorry. I told him that he should be the one to, well, gross. He said that we wouldn’t do that because of his religion.
Even in the apocalypse afterworld, the religion trump card never ever fails.
So either I would get to be uncomfortable for a few seconds, or possibly spend the night in the woods. His reasoning was, if they turn out to be hunky-dory (He actually said this, I might not remember everything but I remember that) then I could just go to the bathroom and remove our little security blanket. So we would be looking, wait no… so I with a capital ME would be looking at most of like 10 minutes of discomfort.
Otherwise, if one of us stayed in the woods that might look real suspicious should they turn out to be friendly. Oh hello, we mean you no harm. What’s that? Oh yes, that is my friend camped out in the woods with a high powered sniper rifle aimed at your forehead. No, don’t be ridiculous, we are friends!
See the dilemma?
Well, after a thorough cleaning I am ashamed to say in it went. Please don’t think any less of your narrator.
I think this is an appropriate time to take a break from writing in this thing. If you can believe it, everything goes down hill from here.
Monday, January 17, 2011
Day Eighty One:
Day Eighty One:
Remember when people used to say "Where there's smoke there's fire"?
Fucking hated when they would say that. So I guess having a mass population extinction does have its upside. However, the reason I am bringing it up is because today we saw a fine line of smoke in the distance. And where there's smoke... no, not fire. But people.
It doesn't look like a raging forest fire so much as a lets eat some woodland creatures fire. And that is probably the best kind of fire. So we have begun angling towards it. After a while the smoke disappeared so we drove as far as we could without feeling like we wouldn't be able to see the smoke tomorrow.
So now we wait through the night. Tomorrow we make friends.
Remember when people used to say "Where there's smoke there's fire"?
Fucking hated when they would say that. So I guess having a mass population extinction does have its upside. However, the reason I am bringing it up is because today we saw a fine line of smoke in the distance. And where there's smoke... no, not fire. But people.
It doesn't look like a raging forest fire so much as a lets eat some woodland creatures fire. And that is probably the best kind of fire. So we have begun angling towards it. After a while the smoke disappeared so we drove as far as we could without feeling like we wouldn't be able to see the smoke tomorrow.
So now we wait through the night. Tomorrow we make friends.
Day Eighty:
Day Eighty:
Drive drive drive some more. I wanted to do this why? Oh right, to make contact with a population that has vanished. Smart.
Reminds me of when I was a kid and my family took a road trip that unfortunately passed through Iowa. You know what’s in Iowa? 3 houses, 5 trees, and corn. Miles upon endless mile of fertile yellow boredom. Well guess what? Planet Earth might as well change its name to Iowa because there is nothing stacked upon heaping mounds of nothing out here.
Sure, there are relics. Everything is now a relic. A billboard relic that will probably have torn off by this time next year, building relics, car relics, but without life connecting them to a predetermined value they are nothing. Junk would probably be a better word. Hey all you people that fought about a religion before this happened, I hope you are all happy to know that your God turned the entire fucking planet into an Iowa junkyard.
Fantastic.
Anyway, AJ thinks we should consider boats. Maybe try to hit up an island, see if maybe people survived there. Problem is, AJ got bit. So lets say we make it to said island. We will look like real assholes if AJ turns out to be the smallpox infected blanket won't we?
Still no ex-humes. Some threat huh? We went from being terrified of these things to, driving around the countryside hoping one will attack just so it will break up the monotony of this boredom.
Drive drive drive some more. I wanted to do this why? Oh right, to make contact with a population that has vanished. Smart.
Reminds me of when I was a kid and my family took a road trip that unfortunately passed through Iowa. You know what’s in Iowa? 3 houses, 5 trees, and corn. Miles upon endless mile of fertile yellow boredom. Well guess what? Planet Earth might as well change its name to Iowa because there is nothing stacked upon heaping mounds of nothing out here.
Sure, there are relics. Everything is now a relic. A billboard relic that will probably have torn off by this time next year, building relics, car relics, but without life connecting them to a predetermined value they are nothing. Junk would probably be a better word. Hey all you people that fought about a religion before this happened, I hope you are all happy to know that your God turned the entire fucking planet into an Iowa junkyard.
Fantastic.
Anyway, AJ thinks we should consider boats. Maybe try to hit up an island, see if maybe people survived there. Problem is, AJ got bit. So lets say we make it to said island. We will look like real assholes if AJ turns out to be the smallpox infected blanket won't we?
Still no ex-humes. Some threat huh? We went from being terrified of these things to, driving around the countryside hoping one will attack just so it will break up the monotony of this boredom.
Day Seventy Nine:
Day Seventy Nine:
On the road again... Something something something the road again!
So after much deliberation, hemming and hawing, checking and rechecking and checking again. AJ and I are finally on the damn road. Two vehicles, each rigged up with multiple walkie talkies, loads of gas, loads of spare tires, a plethora of guns, food, water, armor plating or at least... metal plating. Is metal considered armor?
I know it protects us but, it isn't like we have tank cars. We have Home Depot cars, not quite as cool but it works.
Our first night we slept in the cars, left the walkie talkies on like baby monitors for each other. During the night I couldn't see them, but I know the ex-humes are watching us. How? I don't know. I waited and waited for one of them to try to crack our cars open like a nut but nothing all night long.
So forward we go, or maybe sideways. All I know is we are moving and it feels good.
On the road again... Something something something the road again!
So after much deliberation, hemming and hawing, checking and rechecking and checking again. AJ and I are finally on the damn road. Two vehicles, each rigged up with multiple walkie talkies, loads of gas, loads of spare tires, a plethora of guns, food, water, armor plating or at least... metal plating. Is metal considered armor?
I know it protects us but, it isn't like we have tank cars. We have Home Depot cars, not quite as cool but it works.
Our first night we slept in the cars, left the walkie talkies on like baby monitors for each other. During the night I couldn't see them, but I know the ex-humes are watching us. How? I don't know. I waited and waited for one of them to try to crack our cars open like a nut but nothing all night long.
So forward we go, or maybe sideways. All I know is we are moving and it feels good.
Day Seventy Eight:
Day Seventy Eight:
I put off waiting as long as I could. I kept hoping that if I gave him enough time, AJ would decide to go with me. Problem is, waiting a minute turns into an hour. Then the hour becomes a day. And before you know it, you're in a wheelchair fighting off mutated humans with a cane.
No thanks.
I loaded up the vehicle, packed all the supplies I could think of and just as I was about to make a go of it... AJ came running out shouting "NO WAIT, WAIT!"
Of course, I waited. He agreed to go but, he pleaded with me to wait a few more days. At first I was hesitant but he explained that with a few days of leg work we could plan our routes, back-up routes in case the original routes were blocked, and back-up routes for the back-up routes along with as many contingency plans as we could think of in case the unexpected happened.
Which we have learned, it seems to do more and more these days.
He pointed out to me that I hadn't even thought of first locating some sort of road atlas which would be extremely useful once we left our immediate surroundings.
Despite how anxious I was to leave, I can confidently say that it feels good to be able to spend a few more days at home. Because now at least we seem to be putting a dot on a map. Having a goal is a beautiful thing, even if that goal is something as simple as point A to point B.
I put off waiting as long as I could. I kept hoping that if I gave him enough time, AJ would decide to go with me. Problem is, waiting a minute turns into an hour. Then the hour becomes a day. And before you know it, you're in a wheelchair fighting off mutated humans with a cane.
No thanks.
I loaded up the vehicle, packed all the supplies I could think of and just as I was about to make a go of it... AJ came running out shouting "NO WAIT, WAIT!"
Of course, I waited. He agreed to go but, he pleaded with me to wait a few more days. At first I was hesitant but he explained that with a few days of leg work we could plan our routes, back-up routes in case the original routes were blocked, and back-up routes for the back-up routes along with as many contingency plans as we could think of in case the unexpected happened.
Which we have learned, it seems to do more and more these days.
He pointed out to me that I hadn't even thought of first locating some sort of road atlas which would be extremely useful once we left our immediate surroundings.
Despite how anxious I was to leave, I can confidently say that it feels good to be able to spend a few more days at home. Because now at least we seem to be putting a dot on a map. Having a goal is a beautiful thing, even if that goal is something as simple as point A to point B.
Day Seventy Seven:
Day Seventy Seven:
Jesus... Arnold is dead.
The fire came out of the West while we were all asleep. Before we even knew it was there it was burning down the houses down the street and moving rapidly towards us. We did what we could with the time we had. Fortunately we already had the car loaded up for the next day, but if we hadn't...
I don't want to think about what would have happened if we hadn't.
I don't want to think about this as it is.
We loaded up what we could and left, with enough food and supplies to last for the next couple years going up in flames.
We drove to our back up location in the East since, Arnold had suggested we pick out and fortify some alternative locations just in case of some disaster. We pulled in, locked up, and felt like the worst was behind us. Then, Arnold had a fucking heart attack.
I almost wish the things had got him. Then at least I would have a way to vent this anger/depression that is coursing through every inch of my body.
We escaped, we did everything right. Everything except bring some nitroglycerin pills or whatever the fuck you are supposed to give to someone when they are dying in front of you. Instead, we just stared at him and I don't know, tried to make his awful death better?
We would have buried him except, on several different occasions we had all watched as ex-humes dug up the ground only to pull out some mangled corpse from a coffin or animal that was buried there. In this future, everyone is either cremated or leftovers. Did I write about this before? I don't remember, everything is cloudy right now.
Arnold talked about sailing as a kid so we decided to give him a Viking funeral at a nearby lake. Whether or not that’s what he wanted I don't have any fucking clue. What he probably wanted was to not die from a heart attack. What he probably wanted was for us to be able to call 9-1-1 and not only have someone answer, but send us a doctor that wasn't a God Damn monster.
What has this taught me? That just surviving isn't working. I wouldn't behave this way in my normal boring life, so why in a crisis when the world needs more "real" people than ever to form a collection are we all hiding and waiting for an invisible authority to save us?
I don't know. Arnold probably would, but he's dead. And AJ just seems like he blew a fuse. Its one thing to know that there are horrible mutated humans waiting to rip out your intestines. Its another to know that even if you have the strength, intelligence, and resolve to defend yourselves against them... you still might lose because you ate to many doughnuts, or didn't properly clean out a minor cut, or just came down with a slight case of the God hates yous.
We are alive, but if we don't make an effort to move forward we are just as fucked as those miserable ex-humes. I will give AJ a week to grieve, but after that week I am moving on. If he wants to stay put, so be it. But Arnold's death has reminded me that I am still here, and I refuse to waste that anymore.
Jesus... Arnold is dead.
The fire came out of the West while we were all asleep. Before we even knew it was there it was burning down the houses down the street and moving rapidly towards us. We did what we could with the time we had. Fortunately we already had the car loaded up for the next day, but if we hadn't...
I don't want to think about what would have happened if we hadn't.
I don't want to think about this as it is.
We loaded up what we could and left, with enough food and supplies to last for the next couple years going up in flames.
We drove to our back up location in the East since, Arnold had suggested we pick out and fortify some alternative locations just in case of some disaster. We pulled in, locked up, and felt like the worst was behind us. Then, Arnold had a fucking heart attack.
I almost wish the things had got him. Then at least I would have a way to vent this anger/depression that is coursing through every inch of my body.
We escaped, we did everything right. Everything except bring some nitroglycerin pills or whatever the fuck you are supposed to give to someone when they are dying in front of you. Instead, we just stared at him and I don't know, tried to make his awful death better?
We would have buried him except, on several different occasions we had all watched as ex-humes dug up the ground only to pull out some mangled corpse from a coffin or animal that was buried there. In this future, everyone is either cremated or leftovers. Did I write about this before? I don't remember, everything is cloudy right now.
Arnold talked about sailing as a kid so we decided to give him a Viking funeral at a nearby lake. Whether or not that’s what he wanted I don't have any fucking clue. What he probably wanted was to not die from a heart attack. What he probably wanted was for us to be able to call 9-1-1 and not only have someone answer, but send us a doctor that wasn't a God Damn monster.
What has this taught me? That just surviving isn't working. I wouldn't behave this way in my normal boring life, so why in a crisis when the world needs more "real" people than ever to form a collection are we all hiding and waiting for an invisible authority to save us?
I don't know. Arnold probably would, but he's dead. And AJ just seems like he blew a fuse. Its one thing to know that there are horrible mutated humans waiting to rip out your intestines. Its another to know that even if you have the strength, intelligence, and resolve to defend yourselves against them... you still might lose because you ate to many doughnuts, or didn't properly clean out a minor cut, or just came down with a slight case of the God hates yous.
We are alive, but if we don't make an effort to move forward we are just as fucked as those miserable ex-humes. I will give AJ a week to grieve, but after that week I am moving on. If he wants to stay put, so be it. But Arnold's death has reminded me that I am still here, and I refuse to waste that anymore.
Day Seventy Six:
Day Seventy Six:
We have been trying for days now to capture an ex-hume so we could all sit back, make some popcorn and watch this weeks latest installment of ex-humes gone wild! But despite numerous ideas and attempts to catch another one, every attempt has been met with failure.
Christ, as recent as two weeks ago it seems like you could just tie a needle filled with tranquilizer to a stick, push the stick out the window and you would have one sleepy time monster. But now, I don't know. Fresh meat in the road didn't work, screams didn't work, AJ even put a beer out there just in case but nothing. Nothing at all.
What we need is one of those shark cages that they used to use to film great white sharks. Just put me in the middle of the street with a tranquilizer gun, then have AJ and Arnold shoot every other ex-hume that won't back away. Problem solved.
But even then, I think they are learning. And they know that although they have superiority in numbers, we have the power of thought. More as it develops.
We have been trying for days now to capture an ex-hume so we could all sit back, make some popcorn and watch this weeks latest installment of ex-humes gone wild! But despite numerous ideas and attempts to catch another one, every attempt has been met with failure.
Christ, as recent as two weeks ago it seems like you could just tie a needle filled with tranquilizer to a stick, push the stick out the window and you would have one sleepy time monster. But now, I don't know. Fresh meat in the road didn't work, screams didn't work, AJ even put a beer out there just in case but nothing. Nothing at all.
What we need is one of those shark cages that they used to use to film great white sharks. Just put me in the middle of the street with a tranquilizer gun, then have AJ and Arnold shoot every other ex-hume that won't back away. Problem solved.
But even then, I think they are learning. And they know that although they have superiority in numbers, we have the power of thought. More as it develops.
Day Seventy Five:
Day Seventy Five:
Holy shit, listen to this. AJ might have had the best idea that anyone has had in the last year. No, he didn't figure out a cure. That would be way more amazing actually. But, what he suggested is still pretty great.
Ok, the last time we captured an ex-hume it seemed pointless to me. Did anyone really think we could cure those bastards by injecting them with our blood? No, because that would have been idiotic.
But, what if we captured an ex-hume and fitted it with a camera? Then, we set it back into the wild. The result, informative entertaining television. At first I was skeptical since I didn't understand how we would be able to watch it but apparently when he was liberating some other electronics for home surveillance he managed to scrounge up some spy-tech gear as well.
Additionally he suggested we could attach a GPS tracking device to it and use that to follow the creature in case it went out of signal range. However, I pointed out that with the power grid destroyed it was unlikely that we would be able to find any satellites.
But still, even if it only lasted for a few minutes... watching the ex-humes interact might be helpful to our current predicament.
Holy shit, listen to this. AJ might have had the best idea that anyone has had in the last year. No, he didn't figure out a cure. That would be way more amazing actually. But, what he suggested is still pretty great.
Ok, the last time we captured an ex-hume it seemed pointless to me. Did anyone really think we could cure those bastards by injecting them with our blood? No, because that would have been idiotic.
But, what if we captured an ex-hume and fitted it with a camera? Then, we set it back into the wild. The result, informative entertaining television. At first I was skeptical since I didn't understand how we would be able to watch it but apparently when he was liberating some other electronics for home surveillance he managed to scrounge up some spy-tech gear as well.
Additionally he suggested we could attach a GPS tracking device to it and use that to follow the creature in case it went out of signal range. However, I pointed out that with the power grid destroyed it was unlikely that we would be able to find any satellites.
But still, even if it only lasted for a few minutes... watching the ex-humes interact might be helpful to our current predicament.
Day Seventy Four:
Day Seventy Four:
It’s been over a week since my last entry and AJ seems to be doing better. Then again, everyone probably seems to be doing better right before they blow their head off.
Speaking of blowing off heads, I haven't been able to shoot an ex-hume in quite a while. Started to hope that maybe the infection had killed them all off but then I managed to catch sight of one out of the corner of my eye. As an experiment, we threw a small amount of food into the middle of the road and waited.
It used to take about 30 seconds before an ex-hume would take the bait.
This time it took over three hours.
After shooting it, we waited for its friends to come out but no dice. The next morning it was gone. Which means not only have they learned to avoid us, but they were smart enough to drag the body off instead of just chowing down in the middle of the street.
It’s been over a week since my last entry and AJ seems to be doing better. Then again, everyone probably seems to be doing better right before they blow their head off.
Speaking of blowing off heads, I haven't been able to shoot an ex-hume in quite a while. Started to hope that maybe the infection had killed them all off but then I managed to catch sight of one out of the corner of my eye. As an experiment, we threw a small amount of food into the middle of the road and waited.
It used to take about 30 seconds before an ex-hume would take the bait.
This time it took over three hours.
After shooting it, we waited for its friends to come out but no dice. The next morning it was gone. Which means not only have they learned to avoid us, but they were smart enough to drag the body off instead of just chowing down in the middle of the street.
Day Seventy Three:
Day Seventy Three:
I walked in on AJ today and found him sitting in a chair with a fully loaded revolver in his lap.
In the pre-exhume world this type of discovery would have lead to me possibly calling an ambulance, possible hospitalization, therapy, care sessions, all sorts of prescribed hugs, etc...
Now days though I just kind of looked at the gun for a while, then at AJ. After I shrugged he picked the gun up off his lap and put it in a drawer. Suicide isn't frowned upon nearly as much when you are living in a doomed world with no chance for survival. In fact, although I can't imagine killing myself I have been tempted on a few of my more depressed days to ask one of my new friends if they wouldn't mind putting a bullet through my head.
Horrible right?
We will survive a monster virus, a feral threat, and the myriad of other problems that come with the collapse of society only to be murdered by our own minds. Fantastic.
I walked in on AJ today and found him sitting in a chair with a fully loaded revolver in his lap.
In the pre-exhume world this type of discovery would have lead to me possibly calling an ambulance, possible hospitalization, therapy, care sessions, all sorts of prescribed hugs, etc...
Now days though I just kind of looked at the gun for a while, then at AJ. After I shrugged he picked the gun up off his lap and put it in a drawer. Suicide isn't frowned upon nearly as much when you are living in a doomed world with no chance for survival. In fact, although I can't imagine killing myself I have been tempted on a few of my more depressed days to ask one of my new friends if they wouldn't mind putting a bullet through my head.
Horrible right?
We will survive a monster virus, a feral threat, and the myriad of other problems that come with the collapse of society only to be murdered by our own minds. Fantastic.
Day Seventy Two:
Day Seventy Two:
Originally I planned on writing everyday in this damned thing. Everyday turned to every other day turned to maybe every week. Why you ask?
Because who is my audience?
Me?
Writing is cathartic, unless it routinely reminds you of your current situation. Which this does. Don't worry no one, I'm not going to stop writing. I will continue to tell you about how we almost found survivors.
How we almost made a difference.
And how we came really really close to having something happen.
Can you stand the excitement?
If something doesn't happen soon I am packing up all my shit and driving out to Area 51. Because you know, I have always wanted to know if they have aliens there, who shot Kennedy, and what really happened with the damned moon landing.
Originally I planned on writing everyday in this damned thing. Everyday turned to every other day turned to maybe every week. Why you ask?
Because who is my audience?
Me?
Writing is cathartic, unless it routinely reminds you of your current situation. Which this does. Don't worry no one, I'm not going to stop writing. I will continue to tell you about how we almost found survivors.
How we almost made a difference.
And how we came really really close to having something happen.
Can you stand the excitement?
If something doesn't happen soon I am packing up all my shit and driving out to Area 51. Because you know, I have always wanted to know if they have aliens there, who shot Kennedy, and what really happened with the damned moon landing.
Day Seventy One:
Day Seventy One:
No helicopter today, which was incredibly depressing actually. Spent almost our entire day staring up at the sky through one of the slats in Arnold's car. Also didn't help that we weren't able to find any survivors. AJ said that he thought we would have a better shot at finding survivors if we split up. Although we all agreed, we also agreed that the risk wasn't worth the reward.
Arnold might have been working alone until we showed up, but now that we're here it no longer makes much sense to continue forward in such a way. I mean after all, its not like we have millions of lives to throw away anymore.
AJ pointed something else out too that has me worried. The Ex-humes are starting to work in smaller groups. No big deal except, it looks like they have weeded out a lot of the slower, injured, or otherwise less fit monsters. I don't know how worried we should be though since we seem to have stayed one step ahead of them so far. Only time will tell I suppose.
No helicopter today, which was incredibly depressing actually. Spent almost our entire day staring up at the sky through one of the slats in Arnold's car. Also didn't help that we weren't able to find any survivors. AJ said that he thought we would have a better shot at finding survivors if we split up. Although we all agreed, we also agreed that the risk wasn't worth the reward.
Arnold might have been working alone until we showed up, but now that we're here it no longer makes much sense to continue forward in such a way. I mean after all, its not like we have millions of lives to throw away anymore.
AJ pointed something else out too that has me worried. The Ex-humes are starting to work in smaller groups. No big deal except, it looks like they have weeded out a lot of the slower, injured, or otherwise less fit monsters. I don't know how worried we should be though since we seem to have stayed one step ahead of them so far. Only time will tell I suppose.
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