So here I was standing on the roof of an arcade gaming plaza. We had lined up the outside of the store with gas cans scavenged from a nearby gas station. We had packed the inside of the store with some propane tanks, gas cans and plenty of boxes of nails and makeshift shrapnel from the hardware store. We stocked the basement of the store with all the propane tanks we could scavenge from around the block. We had dragged a diesel generator onto the roof and had plugged it into the gaming consoles downstairs. We had lined the outside of the store with speakers and strobe lights.

Survival tip #5: Be a hero. He is the only guy not dead in the end.

That much was pretty consistent in all the zombie moves and stories. The hero usually  is the most courageous of them all and he is hardly ever dead at the end. I wanted myself to be brave, but more importantly the ‘not dead’ part enticed me. That was the reason I had conjured up this high-risk high-reward plan.

The plan sounded simple enough. We would start the generator, and the music blaring from the speakers would fill the silent night air. The lighting display would act as a beacon shining in a coal mine. Zombies from miles away would be drawn to this store like moths to a flame. Funny I say that because that is precisely what’s in store for them.In a couple of hours when every single zombie that could be here is here, I shall light up a rag and toss it through the skylight. The gas cans would burn,  propane tanks explode and the improvised shrapnel would tear through everything in the blast radius.  Before the stink of a thousand burning undead bodies reached us, we would have walked across the wooden plank to the roof of an adjoining building and run far away by the time the fireworks began. We would have to be far from here when the basement tanks exploded.

I looked towards Kim and she seemed scared. I don’t blame her for not wanting to be at the center of an undead riot. I reached out and held her hand reassuringly. I had thought this over umpteen times and the plan was bulletproof. I gave her an assuring nod, walked towards the generator and yanked the cord. Once, twice and … all of a sudden this dead city came to life. But it didn’t feel or sound anything like I had imagined. The monotonic arcade music from multiple gaming consoles mixed together in a haphazard lack of rhythm. The various string-lights, strobes and floodlights flashed psychedelic. This sounded worse than anything I had ever heard, including some of the rock concerts I had been to. Nevertheless I saw shadows moving from across the street towards us. I guess the zombies weren’t fussy about their taste in music.

Half an hour had passed and I already estimated over a couple of hundred zombies in the store. And as far I could see in the dark, I saw more of them making a beeline for us.  I was getting twitchy now. I didn’t want to start the pyrotechnics too soon for the fear of killing only a couple of hundred with hundreds more on their way. But I didn’t want to wait too long and risk the horde tearing the place apart and sabotaging my plan. I decided to wait as long as I could.

It was now getting close to an hour and there must have been between four to five hundred zombies in and around the store. They were literally trashing the place. I wanted to start the fireworks before something went horribly wrong. I squinted in the distance and could barely spot a dozen signs of movement. I decided it was time for the shenanigans. I lit up the rag, walked a heroic walk towards the skylight, peered down at the mass of zombies and tossed the flaming rag inside the store. I would have liked to say something that sounded cool, but couldn’t think of anything that wouldn’t sound stupid.

The ragged clothes on the zombies immediately caught on fire and spread rapidly through the store. The zombies were packed so tight in the store that within a minute they were all flaming. It was happening faster than I had anticipated! I motioned for Kim to rush. She ran for the edge of the roof and hopped on to the plank. Her foot landed on the edge of the plank, shifting it a bit. She overcompensated on her next step and missed landing on the plank altogether. She fell!

I peered over the edge. She had landed on the horde below, breaking her fall. And she was up real quick and started running away towards the relatively empty street. At least a dozen zombies hobbled after her. Instinctively, I reached out towards the ledge and tried spotting a good place to land, but a thought flashed across my head like those pop-up ad banners on some websites.

Survival tip #5: Don’t be a hero. Heroics get you killed.

The thought was annoyingly true. How many times have we read a murder mystery and flinched when the brave guy tries to take on the killer alone? How many times have we predicted the unfortunate outcome of a movie scene when a brave guy tries to fight off the bad guys alone?

It was better to be a coward than end up dying a courageous death. Especially in a case such as this where there wasn’t even any witness to laud your bravery. Even if I jumped after her, the two of us would make only  slightly better odds against those hundreds. I didn’t like this one bit, but my survival instincts took over.

I ran across to the other building and jumped onto the next one. Just then, a blinding light flashed turning the night into day. A huge blast echoed through the neighborhood. And the shockwave that followed threw me a couple of feet away. I rose to my feet and looked back. Thick black smoke billowed from where the arcade once stood. The mushroom cloud of smoke resembled some pictures I had seen of volcanic eruptions. I knew none of the zombies in and around the store would have survived that blast. The ones that hadn’t shattered   in the shockwave would burn to ash in the searing heat.

I turned in the other direction. Kim was trying to get onto her feet. She had been far away enough from the blast to have avoided a serious injury, but so were the zombies chasing her. I saw about a dozen zombies stand up and continue going after her. I would have liked to help her, but I wouldn’t be able to fight off so many zombies bare handed. And Kim would only slow me down if more zombies rushed us. I turned away.

I didn’t know if Kim saw me running away. I didn’t even know if I cared if she saw. Right now, my survival instincts were in complete control of my body – all my base are belong to it *. I kept fleeing away. The loud blast, flame engulfed building and billowing smoke would be spotted from miles away. If those lights and speakers brought in five hundred of them, this would bring in more than a few thousand. That had been the secondary plan. While those zombies were being drawn towards this, I had a better chance of sneaking past them towards a safer place outside the city. I would be miles away by the time the horde reached the arcade … and Kim.

I stopped like I had run into a concrete wall. I felt my breath being knocked out of me. I lost all my strength and fell to my knees. There was  no concrete wall in front of me. Only the wall of morality. And conscience. And maybe love. I couldn’t go ahead with this. I couldn’t flee leaving that girl fighting for her life. I stood up and ran back towards the crimson glow.

In the distance, against the harsh glow of the ever rising flames I saw the silhouette of Kim staving off the  zombies and trying to escape. But there were just too many of them and Kim was struggling to find a way past them. I charged headfirst into the mob pushing and ramming everything out of the way. I think Kim saw me. She paused fighting for a split second and a zombie behind her was about to seize the opportunity to bite her neck. I leaped over the ones between us and got my punch right onto the rotting face of that zombie. My fist almost went completely through his face. I held Kim by her wrist and pulled her away from the mob. We ran, arms flailing and knocking everyone who stood in our way.

We had to run as fast and as far away as we could. With all those propane tanks in the basement, the blast that had already occurred would feel like a firecracker compared to what was coming. I could bet on the blast flattening out the whole block. We kept running.

Initially, we spotted several zombies heading towards the fires. But we hadn’t seen a zombie for quite some time now. We stopped running. All was quiet. All we heard was our own heavy panting. I looked over my shoulder. The flaming store was so far behind us, we could only see its orange glow from this distance. But the glow was pretty spread out. The fire probably had spread to adjoining buildings by now. It would be days before the fire burned down its own fuel and died. Till then it would keep gravitating zombies towards it. And when those dozens of tanks in the basement exploded, they would take down the city block and the hundreds of zombies with them. I think our path out of the city would be pretty safe.

In my peripheral vision,  I noticed Kim staring at me. I looked at her. She had a look that said it all. She wanted to kill me for leaving her and running off. She wanted to hug me tight and cry for coming back for her. She did neither. She grabbed me by my hair and pulled my face onto hers.

Survival tip #5: Be a hero. He always gets to have the cute girl.

In this series:

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6

What would other survivors like us do? Would they try to barricade and try holding out? Unlikely. After all, how many days could you hide before you ran out of supplies. And we still didn’t know how many days (or heaven forbid months) these walking dead could survive starvation. The survivors  would likely head to a place where supplies would last them a long time.

 A lone survivor would already have a great deal of courage, resilience and awesome luck to go with a stock of supplies and possibly a  weapon. Multiply all of that a hundred times and it gives you a fight-back and surviving chance like no other. A place that could sustain more than a handful or survivors would be the ideal location.

The more I gave it a thought, the more one survival tip came to mind.

Survival tip #4: There’s always a survival camp somewhere. That’s where you want to be.

What I didn’t know was how to find one. I would have thought the Walmart would have been an obvious choice, but I had already been proven wrong. A grocery store or mall would be a nice temporary camp, but to hold fort one needed a secure camp. A gated apartment complex, or a secured police station, maybe even a consulate office. These have a secure perimeter, strong doors and enough room to hold up to a hundred survivors. Of course supplies would have to be replenished often and that would mean a site close to a grocery store would be ideal.

I talked this over with Kim and from our combined knowledge (or not) of this part of the city, we came up with a shortlist of three such locations. All three were secure buildings with a grocery store nearby. The only problem was that the three locations were each  a day’s walk apart. There was no way of knowing if the one we head to harbored any survivors. We couldn’t take a guess. We had to know.

Walmart! They should have a public phone. And also a yellow book. We sprinted the couple of miles back to the store.

The  first two calls went unanswered. I even tried alternate numbers to no avail. The final call was to a Korean embassy. The phone barely rang twice before someone picked up. I was afraid some Korean guy would answer and say something I would have no understanding of. Thankfully an old man with a quivering voice answered in American English. He seemed really happy about us calling and wanted us to head over right away. He said the embassy had over twenty survivors holding out and they were well stocked with weapons and supplies, but when I asked to speak with whoever was in command he seemed to hesitate. We told him we would make it there in about four hours and he acknowledged with a grocery list! Yes, he literally told me to get him some canned food and juice!

I narrated the conversation to Kim and she seemed amused. I was a tad skeptical too. Twenty men with weapons and a grocery store right across the street and they wanted us to get food for them? We convinced ourselves it was probably a test of our character and survival instincts.

So we spent the next five hours trudging to the Korean embassy. Once again the walk was uneventful (really, where the heck where all the zombies?) A quick stopover at the small local grocery store got us bags full of cans, juices and energy bars. Dragging the bags behind us we approached the embassy.

I expected rifle barrels sticking out of windows or sniper scopes on the terrace, but there weren’t any. The heavy metal gate itself was unlocked and I made sure I locked it after me. We walked along the driveway and up to the main entrance and still no sign of anyone. Agreed, we didn’t look completely like zombies (yet), but I would still think the survivors would take precautions against early infections. We were just too tired to do anything but enter. The heavy wooden doors were locked, thankfully.

I rapped my knuckles hard on the door. I heard the door being unbolted and it opened a crack. A slight pause, before an old man opened the door wider.

‘Come on it folks.’ The same shaky voice who had answered the phone.

We entered, dragging our groceries along. The old man introduced us to his wife. We talked a bit while they gulped down a few cans we had brought. Still no sign of anyone else.

‘So where’s everyone else?’ I couldn’t wait any longer to ask.

The old man looked at me hesitantly. He seemed to think about it before replying, ‘Well, it’s just us actually.’

I should have been shocked, but I wasn’t. Somehow in the back of my mind, judging by the unfolding events, I knew this  was a lie. I knew there wasn’t really twenty people out here. But I had gone ahead with this. Maybe because I wanted to know the reason for the lie. Maybe I was a glutton for punishment. Maybe I didn’t care how many there were as long as the location was a safe one.

I stood up and gave the old man a stare. ‘Why? Why lie?’

Without the slightest hesitation he said, ‘Look at us. We wouldn’t survive between just the two of us. We have been starving the whole day, but didn’t have the courage to go across the street. And if I had told you the truth, you probably wouldn’t have come.’

Of course he was right. We wouldn’t have come all the way if we had known this was not survivor camp. I felt sorry for them, but I continued glaring. We had been played, obviously. We had taken a chance and at least this didn’t turn out as bad as our Walmart excursion. We were in a safe place with a strong metal fence around the property. We could replenish our supplies every day from across the street. We might be able to hold fort for a week unless we find a better & bigger group of survivors.

I sat down in thought. It was obvious to me now that there would be plenty of these small groups of people who were too scared to go outside.Their timidity would keep them alive for the time being. The brave who ventured out probably either met their end or are already at a survival camp by now.The odds of us landing at a big camp was pretty low.

My thoughts were distracted by the old woman limping towards me.

‘Son,would you be able to get us some Tylenol from the store? My joints are acting up again.’

So much for finding a survival camp with tons of people, weapons and supplies.

Time to adjust my survival tip.

Survival tip #4: There’s always a survival camp somewhere. You want to be in one which has a chance for long-term survival.

In this series:

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6

With renewed determination (or was it hunger), I walked briskly in search of a grocery store. Ten minutes of walking got me my first smile of the day. Far away at a distance, I recognized the familiar stone building with the big bold WALMART brandishing the blue billboard. In my joy, I almost jogged my way there, before slowing down in the parking lot. Walmart had food and had plenty of it. By now, the store had either turned into a feasting ground for those zombies or a safe haven for survivors. It could very well play out both ways, the only surety was that it would not turn out empty.

As I neared the entrance, I saw a positive sign. The glass doors were smashed, but just inside was a heavy barricade with wooden shelves, grocery carts and living room furniture. This meant there was a group of survivors inside, hopefully a hundred, probably a dozen. This was good though and in line with my next survival tip:

Survival tip #3: Find a group, stick to it and watch each others’ back.

I walked up to the entrance, put my face against the barricade and tried looking in, half afraid of rotting hands coming out from the barricade and pulling me inside. Whoever set up this barricade, did it pretty well. I couldn’t find a single chink in their barricade where I could peek in. I cupped my palms against a gap between a couch and a bookshelf and yelled out ‘Anyone in here?’. I waited for a while before yelling again. I thought I heard a muffled speech. I yelled out once more. More muffled speech. Then I heard something move. There was a scratching sound of furniture being moved. I saw some movement in one corner of the barricade and then part of a face. The guy whispered sharply ‘Stop yelling idiot! You are going to get every one of them come up here.’
‘Nice meeting you too’, I said. Really softly.

After a grueling scrutiny to check if I had been bitten, scratched or infected in any way, I was escorted inside. I was introduced to the four survivors. (Four? I had expected a lot more, but seems the infection had spread faster than I had assumed and people didn’t have time to get to safety.) Jim was the tall lean dude with the pistol, Mike was the hefty tanned man with the shotgun, Jose was the short pudgy guy holding a revolver (he was the one who had called me an idiot!) and Kim … Kim was a young gal who looked like she would be better placed in a model photoshoot than out here.

They didn’t seem too happy to have me join them. They talked rude and looked grumpy and there wasn’t a good vibe around. Now they were all looking at each other like they were talking telepathically and at one point I thought I even saw them nod in agreement. Holy cow Batman! Were they thinking about getting rid of me? One less stomach to feed, one less person to take care of, one less baggage to carry. I was about to politely ask permission to leave when Jim said ‘We had decided on heading for a survival camp as soon as we were five of us. We got to move to a safer place.’

No! All this trouble to get here and now I am going out in the open again? That didn’t seem like a good idea to me, but my puny whining was cut short as they all started heading out with straddled backpacks. Kim looked back towards me, and I could tell she was scared, but wanted to stick to the group. I recollected my own survival tip and shrugging my shoulders, rushed deeper into the store. No, I wasn’t abandoning the group, just preparing better than last time around. In a few minutes I walked out of the Walmart safehouse with a backpack laden with water, energy bars, a flashlight  and a first aid kit. Oh and I had also ditched my trustworthy bat for a fireman’s axe.

As I caught up with the group in the parking lot, I could see them arguing about something. The atmosphere was tense, and everyone seemed to be on edge. Mike and Jose were having a staredown, and neither was backing down. Another bout of slandering and cursing gave me the gist of the fight. Mike and Jim wanted to head south and out of the city, while Jose wanted to head towards a Police Headquarters someplace North. Kim looked clueless and I would personally prefer the safety of the police quarters too, but lacked the courage to speak up.

‘You go wherever the hell you want to, but the kids come with me’, Mike was saying.
‘No way! They will come with me to a safer option. They ain’t a dumb $@%#! like you’, Jose retorted.
I could see rage building up in Mike’s eyes. He leveled his shottie at Jose, ‘Mind your nasty tongue , or you won’t have much of the $@%#*@#! thing left.’
Jose’s hands reached for his gun, but Mike stopped him short ‘Don’t! I will blow your $@%#@#! brains out if you move an inch.’
This was getting ugly, and I wished I was inside Walmart and not out here with them. Kim and I inched ourselves away from the fight.
Jose kept cursing and I could tell he was itching to grab his gun. But he knew he was outdone. He slowly lifted his hands and raised them over his head. ‘Let’s all calm down. I’ll go alone.’
He turned around and started walking away slowly still holding his hands over his head.

Mike watched him for a minute before staring at us. ‘You coming with us?’
I didn’t take it as a question. It was an illusion of choice, I knew. I scampered towards him as if I so wanted to head out the city. We started our long walk out of the city…
BANG!!! I was jarred by the loud sharp blast so close to me. What just happened? I looked at Mike, whose face was in shock. He started falling down, his back torn away in a mess of flesh and blood. I looked back. Jose had just shot him point blank in the back, and was pumping his gun for another go.
BANG! BANG! BANG! Jim punched three quick shots into Jose, who was still standing.
BANG!! Jim’s head looked like it had been through a meat-tenderizer.
Jose fell down, but was definitely not dead. In fact he was still pumping his shottie. Shit! I didn’t want to die. I didn’t want Kim to die. I couldn’t run far enough in time. I couldn’t wrestle the gun out of Jose. I couldn’t do anything. I was frozen stiff. I don’t think I was even breathing. I closed my eyes so tight, my eyeballs hurt. Those seconds seemed an eternity long.

And then Kim screamed. And she continued screaming. I would have joined her, but I was still paralyzed by fear.
I saw Jose try and level his gun out to Kim. Maybe me. I wasn’t sure since we were standing so close to each other and Jose’s hands were swaying all over the place. And then out of nowhere a kick flew out and kicked the  gun out of his hand and out of his reach. I looked down and realized it was my own leg doing the kicking.

Before Jose could grab the fallen gun, I rushed towards it, picked it up and moved back towards Kim who had thankfully stopped screaming. ‘We should leave’, I said.
‘Kill him!’ she yelled partly in fear, partly in hatred.
‘No’. I was a coward and couldn’t kill Jose if he were a snake leave alone a human. But I couldn’t let Kim know that. ‘No point wasting ammo on him’ That sounded manlier.

I picked up the other fallen guns, grabbed Kim’s wrist and pulled her along. I glanced back to see Jose fallen helpless, grimacing in pain. I started shivering and breathing hard.

The last few minutes had been ghastly. I had never seen a person shot before, and now seen three people being blown away point blank. It could so have been me! I could have a shell pumped up my head or stomach so easily. Worse yet, I could have had a few bullets go through my legs and leave me alive but incapacitated! When Jose had leveled his gun at me, I thought I was a goner. If not for that subconscious reflex kick to disarm him, I was surely a goner!

Sticking to a group was fine, but not a group of strangers. Not with strangers who had guns and weren’t afraid to use them. Not with strangers you didn’t know had a temper like Eyjafjallajokull. I think I would be better off alone than betting on my life with a Jose.

Survival tip #3: Stick to a group you would want to bet you life on. Watch your own back first with strangers around.

In this series:

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6

The fracturing bat in my hand reminded me that I was without a good weapon. Maybe getting hold of one should be a higher priority. I didn’t want to be craving brains by the time I got to the grocery store now, did I? I could always go on a food raid after arming myself with a good weapon. This brought me to the next tip for survival.

Survival tip #2: Head to a gun store and arm yourself with an actual weapon

Movies featuring zombies in it typically have the actors heading to a gun shop and arming themselves with big heavy weapons. At once, their chances of surviving improve ten fold, and why not? Which flesh-rotting brain-dead creature could survive getting shot point blank with a shotgun, or getting their body riddled with a stream of rifle ammo, or for that matter even getting their face blown off with a revolver?

Even ignoring the sheer power of a bullet fired through a gun, just the fact that you could deal with danger from a safe distance itself made it worth it all. Of course, I didn’t see myself hauling a gatling minigun or even fumbling with a pump-action shotgun. A one time trap-shooting was my only experience with fire-arms, and I was miserably bad at that. So I could really use something I could spray around without having to aim. Maybe a submachine gun or even an assault rifle would do wonders for me. Suddenly the wooden bat in my hand felt so puny. The decision was made – off I headed towards the gun store.

I walked along the yellow center line of the empty street (I have been wanting to do this for ages!) This way I wouldn’t be surprised by an infected pouncing at me from the windows of the buildings, or one rushing at me from the abandoned stores or dark alleys.  The nearest gun store was a few blocks away. I wanted to be there as soon as possible, but didn’t want to rush things and get caught in trouble.

My walk to the gun store was as uneventful as one could hope for in this scenario, but as I turned around the final corner, my heart skipped a beat (plenty of beats actually). Even from this distance it was obvious – I wasn’t the first to the gun store! Its reinforced shutters had been rammed through. The chunks of human flesh sprinkled over the dried puddle of blood on the sidewalk indicated I was late to the party by a day. Of course! How stupid could I be? In times like these was I the only person with the ‘brilliant’ idea of heading to a gun store? Between hundreds of survivors seeking the protection of a fire-arm, the gun store owners probably camping in the store to protect their assets (and asses) and the infected wanting to get their hands on the humans inside, what chance did I have? If anything, I was lucky I arrived here a day late!

The infected had probably ripped out the shutters to get at the cornered survivors inside just like we use a can-opener to get at canned tuna. Of course, the tuna isn’t alive, scared shit knowing the fact we were going to eat it alive.

So, did I walk all the way here for nothing? Heck, I was here, might as well step in to the store. Maybe, just maybe I might find a small pistol that was too weak for anyone to use. Maybe I would find a small revolver lying in a dark corner that was overlooked by the raiders. Maybe somebody even left some energy bars on the counter (yeah, I think that’s my stomach hallucinating)

I walked up to the store entrance and tried looking in through the ripped away section of the shutters. It was dark inside – the lights probably  blown out in the gun fight.  As my eyes got used to the dark I noticed the place was  in shambles. The cabinets, once lining the walls had been ripped off. The display cabinets too had been broken down to pieces. There were empty ammo boxes strewn all over the place. Whoever did that had gone way beyond the intent of just stealing guns. This was a very deliberate and systematic demolition.

Thankfully, there were no dead bodies inside. Maybe there were at some point and sometime later they walked out searching for someone to eat. Looking over my shoulder one more time, I stepped into the store.

About twenty minutes of thorough searching got me three 9mm rounds, a couple of .22 rounds and a 12 gauge shell. Man, these guys were thorough at looting! No guns or even energy bars for me.  Disappointed, I stepped out the store, looking at the ammo in my palm and contemplating if I should toss these away or keep them as a token of my wasted time and energy.

I had neglected my starving and had ignored the danger lurking in the streets, only because those stupid movies made me believe this was the best place to find a weapon during such an apocalypse. The truth was far from it. I should have known, in such a scenario this was the last place one would find a weapon. It was time to refactor this survival tip too.

Survival tip #2: A gun store would be the last place to obtain an actual weapon

In this series:

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6

Survival tip #1: Get hold of anything you could use as a weapon.

Humans haven’t evolved for hand-to-hand fights. If you have ever seen a street brawl, you know what I mean. Ever since the first neanderthals used a stone to smash skulls of hunted animals, we have grown increasingly dependent on weapons to fight. We have combated with spears and axes, fought battles with rifles and cannons, waged wars with stealth bombers and drones and even deflected ray-gun blasts with light-sabers (I take that back. That was only in Star Wars) . If we decide to do away with weapons and only fight hand-to-hand, chances are those wars would last decades before each soldier was beaten up enough to not be able to fight. So weak is our ability to inflict damage by our selves alone. (On the other hand, watch a MMA fight and you would think I was just talking silly!)

I haven’t been trained in martial-arts. I haven’t ever beaten up anybody. I should mention though that I have wrestled my dog to the carpet, but he is 17 pounds to my 170 pounds, and he isn’t allowed to bite.  I did punch a few jaws when I was in school, but punching saliva-dripping infected cannibals in the teeth isn’t a good idea. Nor is wrestling them to the floor and hoping they tap out. Point is, I had to have a weapon. Anything that could help me keep them away from me. Anything I could hit them hard with. Anything that could maybe break a jaw from a distance.

I started scavenging the house. I came across a small knife that was razor sharp, but I would have to get uncomfortably close to them to attack. I did notice my camera tripod which had a  nice long reach, but it was so delicate it barely bore the weight of my camera. I found a nice heavy hammer and it sure could break jaws and skulls, but the plastic handle had often slipped under my sweat laden palms. If only it had a nice rubber grip… wait a minute! Then it struck me. I did have a nice long heavy weapon in the house, and it was something I was used to bashing with. I have had years of practice wielding it and it even had a rubber grip where you hold it.

So I headed out the door, my cricket bat in hand. I quietly tiptoed down the stairs, watching out for any sign of damaged or broken-through doors. All of them seemed intact, other than the one on the 2nd floor which looked like it had been clawed at for hours. But that had happened years ago, when the old man had forgotten to let his black Labrador in, and the poor thing had scratched away hoping to carve a hole through it.

I continued heading down the stairs. As I neared the building entrance, I raised my bat over my shoulder in anticipation (or probably more out of habit, if you’ve seen me bat). I stayed in the shadows and surveyed the street once, twice, over ten times. I was chicken, but made myself believe I was just being cautious. When I was satisfied there were no infected sneaking behind a parked car or blending in the shadows or peeking through a window, I stepped out into the sunlight. Standing alone in the street I suddenly felt so vulnerable. These things moved fast (think of Resident Evil: Afterlife, I am Legend), had no inhibitions using their teeth or nails in a fight, had just one aim in life (anti-pun?) – to feast on my insides without even caring for whether I was still alive when they started their happy meal.

I shook my head vigorously in an attempt to shake my fears off and started walking towards the grocery store a few blocks away. Regularly looking over my shoulder, seldom slowing down, I thought to myself – Would I really be able to defend myself when attacked? As if in reply, I heard a dull growl. The hair standing on my neck must have looked like my dog’s fur-brush. I froze and my body refused to listen to my brain telling it to turn my head. Only my eyes darted all around trying to narrow down the source of the sound. I saw movement from the corner of my eye, a blur that was getting closer. I turned around to face the inhuman thing running towards me, hands outstretched like it was trying to strangle me remotely.

Time seemed to slow down. The infected was just half a dozen feet away from me, but in that time-stretched instance, it seemed like it would be an eternity before it would reach me. I couldn’t help but notice how much it bore a resemblance to my late uncle. He too had eyes that looked like he was shocked by everything he saw all the time. He too often had drool running down the sides of his mouth. He too wore unwashed, stained clothes that frayed at the edges. He too used to come after me with that same aggressive determination when he saw me use crayons on his walls (I was just 6 then!) But my uncle was at least five times as heavy as this infected, who looked so hungry that its stomach might have started digesting itself. No wonder these things’ lives revolved around eating.

The eternity passed a lot faster than I had thought it would, and the thing was almost onto me. Now I have never had a first-hand experience of how these things work, but learning from the movies, a well-aimed hit at the neck or head seemed to stop them right in their tracks. I steadied myself, raised my cricket bat and took a baseball batter stance (blasphemy, I know). As soon as the thing was within striking range I swung hard, the bat connected at its lower jaw. The impact felt dull and heavy like those times when we had practiced with an old and wet leather ball. The thing was knocked back a good couple of feet and for a second it looked like it would drop dead. With its jaw twisted in a horrible way, mucousy blood streaming down its chin, its eyes were still locked on me. Darn it! I had failed to break its neck, I had to hit harder. It pounced again. This time, I was unprepared and didn’t have time to swing or even aim right and managed to only clip its shoulder. It must have connected well though, because I didn’t see it raise that hand, ever again. But it was still standing, and to my horror attacked again with just one hand.

Six solid whacks later, it was lying at my feet, seemingly dead (again?). I bent over cautiously to have a closer look. Its skull looked shattered, its face was bashed in, its neck was bent at a very unnatural angle, but I still feared it would attack me as soon I turned my back to it. Just to make sure it had no surprises for me, I broke both its knees with well placed front-foot attacking drives. I turned away and continued walking.

I was pleased with my effort and might have even managed a smile if not for the thought about my bad choice of  weapon. Already the handle seemed a bit loose like it could give way at the splice. The wood showed damage at the places where it had impacted. A splinter was jutting out and if that blood covered wood penetrated my skin, I was done for! The movies always showed the survivors downing these things with 1-hits, but it had taken me 6 hits to get one of them down, and another 2 to make sure it stayed down. If I ever had a couple of these infected attacking me, would I have the time to get in 16 hits? I seriously doubted that. On retrospection, I should have probably duck-taped a meat-cleaver to the bat or at least hammered a few nails into the bat. That would have done more damage, would have had a higher chance of amputating their heads  and would have definitely taken lesser hits to get them down.

I mentally modified the first tip.

Survival tip 1# Get hold of anything you could use as a weapon. Preferably not completely wooden and definitely not with smooth rounded edges.

In this series:

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6