Adrian's Undead Diary (Book 6): In the Arms of Family (2 page)

I am not going to copy Gilbert’s letter into the journal. For some reason, I feel like that would be violating the last bit of trust he and I shared. I can’t do that. I just... I just can’t.

What I can share is his feelings on what was happening here at ALPA. Gilbert said that one way or the other, if we succeeded here, then humanity could survive. We as a species would make it through this apocalypse, and we would, and could start again. A new beginning.
 

Gilbert said that my quest to be a better person, and to help others was too important to fail, and was the main reason why I was being targeted by evil. As long as someone was leading us to a better way of life, evil couldn’t win. Remove me from the world, or turn me into a shit bag, and evil wins.

Guess what?

Fuck you.

Kiss my pasty, sweaty ass.
 

You think I’m quitting because you’re out to get me? You think I’m fucking scared now? You think for one minute I’m not going to do what is necessary because I might die?

Step the fuck up.
 

If you think for one fucking minute I’m going to give up now, you’ve got another thing coming. I have never been more certain that what I am doing is the right thing to do. I KNOW I need to protect these people. I KNOW I need to feed them, clothe them, and try to give them a better life as best I can.

And now... I KNOW trying matters. Even if I fail, I know it matters that I tried. Gilbert fought the Devil for as long as he could, and when he’d had enough, he told the Devil to kiss his fucking ass, and he checked out on his own terms. The role of the pawn no more. Gilbert is now on the other side, where the dead live, and when he reached out to me the other night with Gavin in The White Room, I was never more certain his choice to sacrifice himself was the right thing to do.

What scares me is he died to protect me, and to open my eyes. The only thing serious enough to make me consider the reality was him checking out.

He climbed up on that pile of wood and set it on fire, just to make sure he couldn’t harm me, and to make his point. I have started a dangerous trend. Two people have willingly died to save my life, and I don’t even know how to react to that idea. That reality. I know when I was active duty and deployed I’d step in front of a fucking tank for the men in my unit, but that seems different than this. This is… too much man.

God I’m rambling.

I just don’t know. Abby said she’d die for me too, and I mean… fuck. Is the point of this bullshit to save all these folks, then let them die protecting me? That doesn’t seem right at all. There has to be more than this.
 

I believe now that there is more to this life. When we die, that is not the end. My dreams are proof of that. The walking dead are proof of that. The fact that the people around me have hope again is proof of that. They are smiling, laughing, eating, fucking and raising their children again. Yes, they’re scared, yes they still might die, but really, how is that any different than it was before?

It isn’t. What we’re scared of now is a little different, and what might kill us is a little different, but the bottom line is we’re living.
 

We are living.

And as long as we’re living, and trying to be better people, and trying to help others, then we’re winning this. Fuck you evil.

One of Gilbert’s last gestures was to tell me in his letter that he and his wife still owned a business. Not only did they own that string of restaurants, but they still owned a distribution company that supplied other local restaurants. A wholesale food warehouse. Gilbert said the building was about 20,000 square feet, and if that’s the case, we’re looking at 3 or 4 truckloads of food.

Gilbert said if it was still intact, we’d be fed for a year or two. Clearly, this needs to be a priority for us. The warehouse is about five miles east heading towards the city past where STIG was. It’s in a strip of businesses slightly out of the way in a suburb of the city.

During winter he checked on it, made sure it was locked up, and said it was intact. He used the snowmobile. Ballsy old fuck doing it alone. The fact that it is so close to the city scares me. After the stories of the city I’ve heard, I’m fairly certain that by now the place will be overrun by the dead, or possibly raided and looted clean already.

The other major factor is the plumbing supply place in the same mall. In Gilbert’s note, he said that there was a very high likelihood that place would have the equipment needed to start a full on hydroponics set up for us. We need to get in there, and get that shit. Zach and Ryan can feed us for months on end with little work if we can get that damn setup running.

It’ll be dangerous. But in order for Gilbert’s last grand gesture to make our survival happen to matter, we need to do this. I need to do this. I have to do this on faith. I have to do this knowing that Gilbert is not lying about it. I need to restore my belief that Gilbert was a good man. I need to do this. I need to show that I know.

I haven’t worked a plan out yet, but when I do, we’ll make this happen. In the meantime, we still need to return to MGR, get the hydro gear and everyone’s shit, and return to finish the wall here at campus.
 

Another troublesome note, Blake and Kim haven’t returned, and Mike hasn’t come back for water yet. It’s been some time, and that has me worried.

Gilbert, wherever you are, thank you. You taught me so much, and no matter what you may think about your failings, wherever you are, even the smallest bit of you that made it through to me made me a better person. I love you, man.

Your fight isn’t over, is it old soldier?
 

De Oppresso Liber Post Mortum.

-Adrian

June 29
^th

I visited the grave that Gilbert dug for himself yesterday. It’s unmarked.

I don’t think that’s right.
 

He dug it about four feet deep from what Abby said, and it sits right against the tree line in the backyard of the house he and his wife bought with the money they made off their restaurant business. That house was meant to be the crowning jewel of their retirement, and instead it was a symbol of desperation, and finality.

Sad really. I’m going to do something about marking Gilbert’s grave. I might make something in our woodshop. Maybe I’ll ask Martin to weld something as a grave marker. I don’t know yet.

We emptied out Gilbert’s place yesterday as well. Abby and I. I was surprised to find that the old bastard was indeed sandbagging me, but not quite to the extent that I’d hoped. He had more food than we’d realized. Lots of large tins of restaurant stuff from his warehouse I’d guess. He also had a few cases of MREs, jugs and jugs of water, and probably thirty flats of canned goods.
 

Weaponry wise, he was also surprisingly well stocked. Asshole had a thousand rounds of .45 cal, and a thousand rounds of 7.62mm. He also had two more Russian AKs packed in grease, and ten spare magazines. In a gun case he had a couple bolt action hunting rifles in .270 and .30-06, as well a couple hundred rounds of ammo for those as well. He had a .38 snub, a Walther ppk, and a Marlin M60 .22, which I got a laugh out of. Would’ve been a good plinker to use during our big sieges.
 

Gilbert had dozens of bottles of vitamins, advil, water purification tablets, iodine, alcohol, hydrogen peroxide, bacitracin tubes, you name it. He had a mess of shit. Just a mess of it. His fucking basement was stacked to the ceiling.

I wonder if he held back on this stuff to save his own bacon, or to do the work of evil?

I might never know. I’m not sure it matters really.
 

He also had that wood shop in the basement, which was decent, but nothing better than what we had. He had some good skill with the tools he had, as evidenced by the fortifications he built on the house, but really, he was making great stuff with just meh tools. Shouldn’t be surprised I suppose, he had a long history of making the most out of nothing.

Emptying Gilbert’s place of good shit took almost all of yesterday for Abby and I. While we were away everyone else busted ass on the wall, and despite the crap weather off and on, they made some massive progress. Martin’s a fairly big guy, and he was able to get everything manhandled into place as well as keep the crew organized. He reminds me a lot of a lumberjack, despite being a welder. Big, strong, wide. Deep laugh. He’s got almost pitch black hair. Paul Bunyon minus the giant fucking ox.

Anyway, they probably put up fifty feet of wall yesterday, which was an astounding gift to return to campus to. At that rate, we’ll be able to finish up pretty frigging quickly. It seems like we’ve been working forever on this goddamn wall. Forever.
 

Is it weird that I am pissed Gilbert didn’t live to see it finished?

Today we returned to MGR and got all the other folk’s shit out. It was a major fucking process. As I said before the bottom floors were welded shut by Martin early on. They used the rope ladders to exit, so there was no way in from the ground floor without ramming the damn doors down.

Martin said he had the gear inside the building to cut the doors back open, but to do so, we had to insert ourselves using the ladder truck again. When we returned to MGR this morning, there were about fifty undead surrounding the building. Clearly, that was an issue.

From the end of the street near the auto parts store, we pulled up and opened fire. Abby, Patty and I were the primary shooters, and we took down as many of the bastards as we could. I think we’d dropped about three quarters of them by the time the remainder got within “scary close” distance, and we managed to get the others in the group involved to drop the crowd. I was hesitant to ask the noobs to go melee on the undead, but Martin waded in with one of our halligans and went to fucking town. I think he dropped maybe eight of them before I could ask him to be careful, and by then, it was more or less a done deal.

After that, it was just mop-up detail. We brought a huge fucking crew and the spare tractor trailer we got from the industrial complex, and amazingly enough, we got everything moved out in about eight hours.
 

It was made mostly do-able only because of Martin. He stored a few canisters of acetylene and a cutting torch in the building, as well as his basic welding gear. He also knows where to find more, and honestly, that’s a huge boon to bring to bear. Anyway, he fired up the torch, and after maybe a half hour, he got the bottom floor entrance freed up, and we were able to run the shit right down the stairs and out to the waiting truck.

 
We had one toe-pusher moment when I was coming down the stairs and walked right into a fucking zombie. It somehow didn’t get dropped during the building clear the other day, and frankly, I blame the women. Noob mistakes. I was carrying some of the hydro gear, and walked right into the fucking thing. The floor was still smelly as hell due to the gore and death, so I didn’t notice any additional smell from a moving undead. Luckily I had just come down the flight of stairs, so I had some good momentum, and blasted the thing right off its feet and onto its ass.

I think I screamed something along the lines of, “Oh fuck a potato!” Then I dropped the hydro gear as softly as I could while keeping my asshole shut. I drew the Glock, and bucked a hole in the dead guy’s head before he could get to me. I wish I’d thought about it more before I shot the thing, because the goddamn brains went all over the linoleum floor, and twice after that happened someone slipped and ate shit on the greasy grey stuff. What a shitty way to fall down in a shitty place. Luckily no one got hurt falling, and I don’t think anything was broken.

Zach and Ryan were amazingly helpful during the packing and move. They kept everything remarkably organized, gave astoundingly clear instructions to everyone as far as how to handle shit, and despite all my misgivings, they were professional, and held their shit together. The one thing that did go down that was a little sketchy, was that they really wanted to carry guns during the operation.

I said no. Flat the fuck out no. Until I saw them at a firing line, and could gauge their demeanor and professionalism with a firearm, there was no fucking way they were carrying. They both put up a fit about it, but Abby started yelling at them to, “Grow the fuck up,” and they clammed up. She scares the beejesus out of them.

So I told them after Abby’s stern ass-whupping that I would take them to our makeshift firing range, and get them some trigger time and if they did well, they could earn the right to carry. Now the real irony is that Danny Jr. carries, and he’s about five years younger than them. I guess it pays to have a cop for a dad, and not sell weed like a bunch of social derelicts out of your small town apartment.

All my bitching aside, Zach and Ryan did great today. Especially after we returned and they got everything set up in our new hydroponics facility. The gymnasium. It’s going unused, and frankly, we get so much motherfucking exercise just living now the place will never see use except in winter, and even then, it’s more important to turn all that space into food production.

Of course now, we need to get some juice to it. Our new priority is to clear houses, and find some generators, or solar panels to make it happen. The panels on the roof of the MGR can be cut in half. There are quite a few up there, and if we switch it to just a small outpost for three or four people, then the amount of energy needed there will be minimal.
 

Hooking them up might be an issue, but we’ll figure it out.

It took us several hours once we returned here to get things all set up. I helped the stoners get the hydro setups done, and even though there’s no power running to them, they claim they can be run manually using spray bottles and buckets and stuff, and we have those in spades. We also have cow shit all over campus now, which is a much more appropriate fertilizer than the dude poo they were using, so I’m led to believe.