Dark Recollections (27 page)

Pull into driveway, honk horn repeatedly. Exit vehicle without shotgun or rifle drawn to illustrate my non violent intentions. Make a grand showing of myself and holler in that I am here to help them if they need it. If they do not want help, open a window and tell me so. I do this for 5 minutes. After that, I assume the house is unoccupied by the living, I get the .22, and clear the surrounding area. I check all entrances, outlying sheds, barns, garages, etc. I also check in all the windows to see if anything is moving inside. The first house I checked was completely empty of living, dead, and undead, which was a nice start.

Pictures on the walls showed an older couple with two teenage kids, and the bedrooms confirmed that. They had a boatload of good food. The house smelled awful though, especially after I opened the fridge. Big mistake there. No more checking in fridges. The rotting, moldy food inside was almost acidic in smell and I shut it as fast I could. It was so vinegary and nasty my eyes actually watered for a few minutes.

The second house I cleared was a little smaller than the first. One floor ranch with a two car attached garage. No cars in either yards by the way. Honked, hollered, checked the yard, found nothing dangerous. I did find a dog chained in the backyard though that had clearly died from starvation. That really hit a nerve with me. I started to think about how many pets were left behind just like that. There must be millions of dead animals that starved to death, or died of dehydration out there after their owners died. God that makes so frigging sad. Just imagining it makes me half angry, and half heart-broken.

The shed had a bag of concrete, which was awesome, and I could see some movement through the bay window in front of the house. I’m loathe to break windows now so I didn’t shoot the zombie I saw standing inside. It was an older man that looked like a suicide, or perhaps a stroke or something. He didn’t look bitten or anything, so I just made an assumption. Maybe he starved like his dog.
 

I backed the Tundra up on the lawn right in front of the bay window and laughed as he continued to try and climb through his window. He kept falling down on the couch that was against it, getting up, trying again, and falling again. It’s like that Greek dude who keeps pushing the rock up the hill over and over. Zombies and their never ending journey for meat.

I turned on the stereo in the truck and blasted a CD. My selection for this house was a Pat Benatar CD that the previous owner had in there. Not really my bag, but the music wasn’t really for me anyway. I made a big show to the dead guy inside of walking right up to the window, then lowering myself out of sight so he couldn’t see me slip around the back of the house. I snuck a peek through a side window to make sure he was still going at the truck, and once I saw he was, I went around back and tried the door. Mercifully it was unlocked. I slipped inside, found my way through the house, and popped him once in the head from behind.. I was sort of pissed though, because the frigging bullet went through his head and broke the damn window, which was exactly what I was trying to avoid. Oh well. Guess he’ll have to file a claim on his homeowners insurance.

The house had one hallway leading off the living room and as I started down it another zombie came out of one of the rooms. It was an older lady who was butt ass naked. Her arms were ripped open from what looked like self inflicted wounds. Just gaping rents running from wrist to elbow. I shuddered a bit, backed up a few steps, and shot her twice. First bullet hit her in the head but didn’t kill for some reason. Small brain? Thick skull? Who knows? I’ve seen people shot with AK-47’s that hopped up after like it was a bee sting. The world is filled with weirdness.

Turns out she had come out of the bathroom, and when I went in there the tub was half filled with coagulated blood. My guess is she took a bath, slashed her wrists, and that was it. Another sad story that doesn’t fucking matter. I dragged their bodies out into their yard near the dog’s body, killed the Pat Benatar soundtrack, and went back inside to scavenge their shit. Not nearly as much worth taking, but still good stuff. Lots of Spam. Don’t laugh Mr. Journal. It’s a refined and classy meal when the world has fallen apart.

Third house was larger, and was totally empty like the first. This house belonged to a fairly good sized family, and it was pretty well stocked. I was really pleased with the haul of just food crap I got out of it. I think I added maybe 20% to my existing food supplies just from these three houses. Very exciting. Not too dangerous either. There was a note on the kitchen table that was written hastily that explained that the family had gone to their in laws up north, and that anyone looking for them should go there.
 

I packed up, made sure everything was good to go, and headed back up here. Doing all that took up pretty much every bit of daylight I wanted to spend down there, which worked out perfect. Once back I got everything inside and organized.

Major items of note that are cool: 120 cans of various foods. Lots and lots of the canned pasta crap, which is pretty yummy, and surprisingly nutritious for shitty food. I got the concrete, 20 more blocks and a handful of bricks, as well as 8 sheets of plywood from the 2
^nd
house. Major score on the plywood. He also had a handful of 4x4’s and 2x4’s.
 

Toiletries were a heavy score as well, and someone in the third house was a nurse or something, because their hallway closet upstairs looked more like an emergency room than a place to store linens. I was a little bummed I didn’t find much in the way of medicines, but between the three houses I did get a lot of pills like aspirin, Ibuprofen, ex-lax etc. Lots of rubbing alcohol, bacitracin, and hydrogen peroxide too, which is great. Household remedy stuff. I got a bunch of razor blades for shaving, extra socks out the ass, some properly sized boxers for my ass, and best of all, about a hundred new CDs and DVDs.
 

Mr. Journal, a wonderful day. I secured all those supplies and cleaned out three houses using only 3 bullets. I plan on doing more of the same the next few days. If I can keep this pace up, I will have the entire neighborhood clean in 14 more days. Mmm… doubtful.

Well, I gotta get something to eat here, and Otis looks hungry too, so I am off. I’ll write more entries in the next few days as I get time and energy. Hopefully things will go well and I can talk more about some of the other crap that happened before I started writing in this diary. There’s a few good stories left in me still. Plus I haven’t even scratched the surface with anything about me really. Although I’m not a terribly interesting guy.

Have a good night Mr. Journal.

-Adrian

November 22
^nd

Guess who is Oprah-rich?! Mr. Journal I bagged a motherfucking deer. Right out the second floor window of Hall E as I was getting my frigging shoes on this morning! I sat up, scratched Otis’s head for a minute, got my feet dressed, stood up, looked out the window and saw a good sized buck at the stream. Snagged the hunting rifle, slowly cranked the window open and about 15 seconds later I was balls deep in venison.

Mr. Journal I hope you aren’t a Bambi fan because venison is fucking delicious! After I dropped it I got all geared up and headed out to gut it and get it back here to dress it up. I’m not an expert at dressing deer, but I did a great job all things considered. It’s frigid out right now still so I think the meat will freeze if I get it outside and leave it in the shade. That means most of today will be spent getting the meat preserved, and finding a way to store it.

Fresh frigging meat. Omfg. Seriously.

-Adrian

November 22
^nd
(2
^nd
entry)

I am doubly Oprah-rich. Got me some potting soil today! Oh man, what a day though. I turned one of the small brick sheds into a smokehouse. Pretty easy really. Got everything out and stored in a different building, then strung up some of the wire I found months ago to hang the meat off of. I made sure to cut the deer up into small enough chunks that it’d smoke/dry a little quicker than normal too. Hung all the meat from the rafters, then went out and found a maple tree. Conveniently maples are more or less everywhere up here, so I didn’t have to go far to find one.

Unfortunately I had to use the little chainsaw again, but campus has been empty of zombies for a long time now. I haven’t seen shit on my patrols lately, so I’m thinking it’ll be okay. Anyhow I got the maple down, chopped it into logs, got some in the center of the brick maintenance building, and started a really slow smoldering fire. Now wet, fresh wood burns smoky, and that’s exactly what I want. I want a little bit of heat, but mostly just the smoke to seal the venison and preserve it. Plus the maple flavor will get into the meat too.
 
Mmmmm.. maple flavored venison. Boing, boner.

I had enough salt in the cafeteria tubs as well to brine up a few of the venison chops. Those will last a few weeks too and it preserves a lot of my variety in what the venison choices are. I don’t want all the venison to just be maple flavored. I can’t remember exactly, but I think it’s 2 or 3 days of smoking will preserve the meat. Brining is done already, so that meat should keep in a plastic bag in the cold outdoors indefinitely.

Enough of that. Before I went off campus today I dug out the propane grill from staff housing and cooked up a venison steak. I really don’t have words. It was transcendent. I gave Otis a few little bits too and he was rolling around and rubbing up on everything. I think he got his own kitty sized boner. We were the happiest people in the whole world earlier. God that was good. I mean so good. I could theoretically have fresh venison for like 4 or 5 weeks easily. Straight to January, assuming I live that long. I’m going to have an erection over this for days. I am fucking tent poling it. I need sweatpants.

Feeling positive though all things considered. I have meat now, and I got some potting soil earlier which means I can start a little indoor garden in some pots. Fresh tomatoes and herbs sound pretty sexy. Gotta figure out what to do about growing shit tomorrow night after I get in from clearing houses. I am typing 900 miles an hour right now. So excited.

After I got the smokehouse set up I ate the shit out of that venison. I don’t mean that I went out to the deer corpse and ate the poo in the deer’s butt, what I mean is that I voraciously and eagerly ate the venison I cooked on the grill. I felt that needed a little extra explanation. After that I had enough time to clear one house. Sticking with the plan, I went back down to the area of the gas station, and went to the house next in line to the one I did last yesterday. Speaking of yesterday…..

Cleared 3 more houses on the 21st.
 
I previously mentioned there are 15 houses around the gas station that needed clearing, and I had already done 3 of those. I cleared three more yesterday, which leaves 9 remaining on Route 18 coming into today. Yesterday’s haul was decent, but not as overwhelming as the first day. Little bit of food, bunch of cleaning supplies and minor medical crap. The best thing that came out of yesterday’s clearing was two five gallon spare gas cans. That’ll improve my gas runs. Speaking of which, I should probably do one soon again. I’ve had to run the generator much longer during the day than I would like to keep Hall E warm. It has gotten very cold very quickly this year.

So yesterday I didn’t encounter anything dead, undead or alive. Just empty dusty houses. I think the three families or residents or whatever cleared out and took the majority of their shit. Lots of stuff missing from the houses that you would expect to see. Picture frames, lots of office drawers open with paperwork missing, and empty fridges. Yes I know I swore I wouldn’t check fridges again, but two of the three houses had the fridges open already, and I couldn’t resist opening the third one. Refrigerators are my Pandora’s Box apparently.

Anyhoo, moral of the story is I didn’t kill anything, but I also didn’t find much of anything. They can’t all be winners I suppose. Did I tell you I got venison? Win!

Today was different on both counts. I knew from looking around yesterday that one house had several zombies in it, and I kinda made a plan to hit that house today. I thought it was a good idea to remove them before they broke a window, or managed to get a door open. Contained zombies (at least on paper) are a little easier to deal with than the roaming ones. Less likely to sneak up on me.

So the house with the zombies, the one I went to today is a cape. It’s got a detached two car garage, and has cedar shingle siding. Dormers on the second floor, very nice really. I would even say it’s upscale. There were four zombies inside that I could see. Two adults and two kids. I tried the truck plan again, but it didn’t work for shit. Backed it up into the yard like normal, and jacked up the Pat Benatar music, but I couldn’t get them to come my way and stay that way. I’d get one or two over at window, but after a bit they’d walk off, or when I tried to slip away, they’d follow me around the house. Kinda sucked. I even brought a small selection of CD’s with me from the other day, and tried a few different bands. They were not fans of Chevelle, Crosby Still & Nash, or Rihanna. Sad really. No taste these dead guys.

Plan B was to set the house on fire and say fuck it. But once again I realized that the only thing that scares me more than zombies is zombies that have been set on fire. I could just picture the house burning down enough that the zombies would escape, chase me down, set me on fire, and then eat me. Sort of like what happened to that deer this morning.

Sooo… plan C. I did not have a plan C. Plan A worked to so well up til now that I hadn’t really developed a way to deal with this. The dead family was wandering around on the first floor, so smashing out a window and having them fall seemed decent, but not as effective as when I did it on Hall C back when I was clearing campus. I thought of ramming the house with the Tundra, then letting them come out and running them over, but I didn’t want to risk damaging the truck. I also thought of opening the door, backing away, and hoping they came out single file.