6/3/12- Introduction

Entry #1

It all started when I was at my home, simply reading a book by the glare of the lamplight. THE STAND by Stephen King was not the best choice since I had a nasty habit of not being able to put a book down and THE STAND was over 1000 pages long. I barely noticed the postings in the newspaper that year and I simply did not take the time to read them as I worked at a gas station in Macon, Illinois and I needed to shove in more hours to help my bother get bailed from jail sooner. He liked his beer a little TOO much one night in 2006 and was arrested for DUI and hitting a pedestrian. I turned the page of my copy of THE STAND and continued to reflect, my mind wandering while I was reading. Besides, I thought, the media was bullshit. I was surprisingly not infected and the economy of Macon was intact, therefore allowing people to assume that the shit would blow over like any other disaster. Uh, no. By November 6, 2007 we began to lose contact with our suppliers at the gas station, and by the eighth we ran out of food and water suppliers as well. On November 9, 2007, we ran out of food, water, and gasoline, being forced to help each other throughout the neighborhoods. My neighbors Bobby and Maria were out of wood for warmth and gasoline for their cars, so I traded them some fuel for a knife and some canned food. On November 11, 2007 we began to experience starvation throughout the ones who did not decide to journey to D.C. with the mayor or Camp Saint Teresa with one of the senates whom was visiting town from another state. City Council Chief Wendy Maloton took over the operations of the town and urged everyone to continue to trade supplies amongst themselves until the government sorted the mess out. The children were the ones whom got to eat from the town's reserves of food. The same day, Dick Parsons became infected with the Campion Virus at a local hospital, biting nurses. By nightfall, about 15 zombies were at large and attacking residents. As I read my book that night, almost at the last chapter I wondered what I would trade Bobby and Maria for food the next day and then I heard cries throughout the gloomy night. Windows smashing. Lights flashing. People yelling. The siren playing just like it would during a tornado warning. I had just enough time to fold the page of my copy of THE STAND of where I was in the book and flick off the lamplight which ran on what little electricity the town had generated when the window of my living room's front door was bashed in. A drooling, wild eyed zombie charged at me, dripping blood on the milky gray carpet. I tried to reason with him, even warning him that I would kill and I threw my book at him for a good measure. But it turned out that this thing wasn't necessarily infected. It was dead and attacking. I grabbed my army knife and jabbed it into the walker's skull. Blood oozed from the gash in its forehead. Terrified, I screamed and kicked the zombie down and ran out the door to the chaos of the small town of Macon, Illinois.

It seems funny, writing about it now. That I would be scared of a re-killed walker when now my group's main problem is runners that have taken little damage. As I write, I am in a small blue dodge pickup truck with Bobby and Maria, whom conveniently picked me up outside of Macon along with Henry, the school's janitor who had saved them from a walker with his 12-guage shotgun. We are now heading to god-knows-what, with only a shotgun, 18 shotgun shells, a truck with a full tank of gasoline, the clothes on our backs, and our sanity. And sanity is a valuable thing in times like these, where it's easy to lose yourself after everything that you've seen.