Diaries of a Zombie Hunter: Entry One

Diaries of a zombie hunter

Entry One

God, its fucking Friday. TGIF. I finally have a second to sit down and put pen to paper without someone from the group needing something or getting mobbed by the infected or my boyfriend trying to poke me…not with his finger, either.

Don’t get me wrong; I love my boyfriend with my whole heart and he’s got a beautiful penis that does wonderful things, but sometimes all I want is a beer, a cigarette, and some of the buzzing in my head to stop. I’d settle for a break from the moaning and screaming and squishy chewing sounds outside of my head as well.

Anyways, its Friday and just two months ago this would have meant a party or a special night in with a movie and some Malibu over crushed ice and maybe a game of Left 4 Dead or something, but now it means I put an end to another day breathing and sweating among masses of infected that no longer breathe, sweat, or fuck, for that matter…but they sure do eat. Holy fuck, do they eat.

Post-outbreak, my life is all about splinting broken bones, reloading magazines into guns and tasting gunpowder on my tongue, and jittery nights of sleep that leave me feeling dry-eyed and strung out the next morning. I feel like a vet from Nam, and probably sound like one sometimes. “You don’t know; you weren’t there!!” is something I’m sure I’ll start yelling at people years down the line. Heh. I have a group of eleven people to take care of- haven’t lost a single one of them since the outbreak- but I don’t contribute our high survival rate to my own genius or anything. It’s thanks to plain dumb luck and true grit. Let me tell you what I did today so you have a better understanding of the hell that is my life as a zombie hunter…

Around 7am I woke up to relieve the night shift from watch. We were currently camped in the Nevada desert, just off some highway. I don’t fucking know anymore. They all blur together. Anyways, this place is fairly remote and we can see anyone coming for about 6 miles all around in this clear desert air. And just as I took the watchman/ gunner’s post in the back of one of our modded out Jeeps (gun turrets are sexy, kids) I saw a zed shambling down the valley towards us through the Joshua trees and desert scrub. Well, where there’s one, there’s bound to be more. I grabbed the walkie and woke everyone up with instructions to mobilize and get ready for a rainstorm. Unluckily for us, we were upwind of our new friend and he broke into a run at the sight of us, followed by a small group that broke just over the ridge after him. Nothing we couldn’t handle, but annoying, especially before breakfast. This meant that we had to drop about two dozen zeds AND move out, because once we were discovered, we were no longer safe again. My breakfast of beef jerky and warm water would have to wait, because the zeds learned fast and moved quickly. It was almost like they instinctually knew where to find fresh food…but that couldn’t be right…could it? After all, the creatures didn’t have thoughts or anything, they were just corpses driven by insane neural firings and motor impulses.

It took about 20 seconds to get everyone armed and in position, which meant we were mobile and ready to ‘cap and run’. My favorite maneuver. This meant we made us of the machine guns that were welded into turrets in the three modified Jeep Wranglers we had, while we capped as many zeds as we could at about 10 mph. The Jeeps had a steel bar and industrial screen cage welded around the back half of the vehicle, just behind the roll bars, for added protection for the gunners. We also had a heavily armed Expedition, which my boyfriend drove like a madman. I loved him for it, and today I loved watching him race down the desert with sand billowing out from his wheels and a shit-eating grin on his face as he popped a Timbaland CD into his system…fucking capping zeds to “Headsprung”. This fucking guy. Well, what the fuck; made me chuckle, at least. Coming abreast of the small group of deadheads, we fell into rhythm. I heard the crack of machine gun fire around me as my best friend took right, my brother took left, and I covered rear. They all fell down like leaves in a rainstorm, but inevitably a few came back up. I wasn’t quite ready for what came next, however.

We kept driving and checked in with everyone after the group of zeds was dropped for good. Cresting the ridge, we had a clear sight of desert sand and scrub brush. What I saw about 5 seconds later made my blood run cold.

From the larger bushes and rocks started popping zed after zed. Must have been about three dozen of them. It was like they were blooming out of the ground like desert flowers, and they were all around us. They had fucking SET A GODDAMN TRAP FOR US. They were so close that they tried clawing at the steel cages we were in on the Jeeps and one or two hurled themselves at the Expedition. I could smell the smell of carrion on their clothes, and it made my blood run from cold to boiling,

“Guys, let’s do a Johnny Cash!” I screamed into my walkie. Immediately, I felt the Jeep I was in slam into first gear as myself and the other two Jeeps began to circle the zeds and group them into tight but roughly formed circle. My boyfriend followed just outside in the Expedition, and his friend Corey leaned out the back and poured gasoline behind the vehicle as we drove the zeds like cattle into a tiny circle. After about three more rounds of gas, the Jeeps peeled out and I lit a match. Get it? Ring of Fire, like the song. The gas fire went up like it should have, quickly and brightly, and we watched for a second or two as the zeds tumbled around each other like pins on a bowling lane. A while back we realized that they were smart enough to understand to stay away from direct fire, and we’ve been using different forms of fire and incendiaries for about a month to corral and neutralize threat, when needed. Almost immediately, everyone took aim and started dropping zeds left and right. It was a massacre. A fiery, crackly, satisfying massacre.

Only one thing bothered me about this: the zombies had engineered a trap to try to get us. This meant that they had somehow developed the mental capacity to think at least two or three steps ahead of their current situation. They were more than just shambling, rambling carnivores; now they were like simple primates. Fucking thumbs and all. I’ll have to think more about how this impacts our situation and our plans from now on. Last thing I want to do is be sitting around with my thumb up my ass when shit goes downhill somehow.

So that was my day. There are survivors out there who are huddled in their homes with their Hamm radios and Spam, but my small group and I are out here doing the best we can to not only stay alive, but to kill as many infected as possible. There’s a reason why I’m calling this “Diaries of a Zombie Hunter” and not “Diaries of a Scared, Whimpering Survivor Sitting in a Darkened Room”. I’ll write more later on, when something momentous happens that I think should be recorded, but right now my hand hurts and I want a drink of water. Maybe a little poke somewhere in there too ;P