The problem with Zombies is what the hell?
I'm practical. I really am. If I wake up and there are zombies stumbling amok, I'm going to accept it. It's not going to do me any good to yell at the Zombies,
"Hey, you make no sense. You're decaying matter; you have no fluid coursing through your veins. How the hell do your joints and muscles work without lubrication?"
I know people want zombies to be the living dead and think that 28 Days Later was not really a zombie movie since that was just sick people, but I think that's about the only way we'd ever see zombies for real.
That being said, the not-making-sense aspect of zombies also would be a key factor for me if it turned out there were in fact zombies. "Okay. This shouldn't be happening, but it is. The laws of science are out the window. Time to propitiate God."
I'd be pretty damn religious is what I'm saying.
Religious does not mean stupid though.
Viral or Wrath of God, the way to deal with zombies/survive are the same.
WEAPONS
BLADES- You're going to want a good blade. I'd recommend a hatchet. Yes, an ax might work well, but I think the length might be a problem. You want to make sure you don't miss and that you have enough heft to get into the skull, which is why I like a hatchet/axe over a machete or sword. The human skull is really damn hard.
I might even carry a spear too. You laugh, but how the hell is zombie-ism transferred? Lore has it that it comes from a bite, but I'm not taking the chance that it comes from a scratch if I don't have to. Get a nice long spear and aim for the mouth.
It's important to have a stabbing weapon to go along with swinging weapons because if you get stuck in a contained area, say a hallway, you might not have the room to swing. You know how much good an ax does you when you don't have room to swing it? Dick. That's how much good.
GUNS- There are many, many reasons to have the blade be the weapon of choice for Zombies. First of all, no ammo, so you don't have to worry about running out and then being screwed. So long as you have strength left, you can keep killin' zombies. TV shows and books never ever talk about ammo. Bullets are made out of lead. Lead is damn heavy. I wore 210 rounds of ammo on me in Iraq and that was a bitch. 210 rounds, by the way, is probably what you shot within the first 3 minutes of one of the Call of Duty games you played. In real life, you are a hell of a lot more careful with your ammo because you don't want to be stuck in the middle of people/zombies trying to kill you with an empty gun.
You do need a gun though. The blades will only work one with onesies and twosies coming at you. You'd be idiotic to waste a bullet on a onesie or twosie. First and foremost, guns will make noise and draw more zombies, so you don't want to use them if you don't have to. Guns are when there isn't a swarm, but there are enough that you couldn't stab enough of them before they overwhelmed you. You get in that situation, whip out the gun and blast an exit. Don't shoot all of them, just enough to get out of the bad situation.
I'd have two guns. One would be a heavy revolver. Those don't jam. The problem is that they have six shots. Reloading a revolver when zombies are coming at you is horrible. That's why you use it as the trusty backup. Always save the last bullet of the revolver for yourself.
You use the automatic primarily. You can carry clips/magazines and kill way more and reload very quickly. Don't be like Hollywood and just drop your empties on the ground. An automatic without a magazine/clip is worse than a revolver. Hell, it's probably worse than a sock with a sack of quarters in it. Keep those empties for later.
Guns really aren't for zombies. You need to make sure of your surroundings so that you don't have to get away from blades. If there are, say, 10 zombies coming at you, see if you can get yourself to a position where they are coming at you from the same direction. Get behind a door and stab them in the head one at a time as they try to come through or run down a hallway, turn around, and wait for them to come at you lined up and then stab, stab, stab. Again, unless you have gotten yourself into a position where you absolutely have to use the gun, don't. Guns are for the other human survivors roaming around competing with you for supplies and shelter.
FIRE- Unless your zombie apocalypse is one where God made zombies fireproof, fire will be your failsafe. You have to think about zombies in numbers. A few zombies, you can handle with a blade. A few too many zombies and you need the gun. A vast zombie horde of hundreds/thousands/millions? You need fire.
Prep work is key to zombies. You want to get somewhere that you can control/contain their numbers. If you're going to have an above ground sanctuary (which I wouldn't but that's just me), then you need to funnel zombies towards you so you can manage them.
The Walking Dead just had the survivors living on a farm. A farm! They know there's a zombie apocalypse and they just tra-la-la-la-la around like there's no issue. You always have to think that the zombie horde is just over the horizon. You have to work under the assumption that if one comes, you will not be able to escape and will have to fight it out to survive. How the hell were they going to do that on that farm?
Fire. Fire's how. Well, fire and a shovel. It would suck, but what you would do is dig a huge, huge ditch/moat around your sanctuary. The dirt you took from the ground, you'd put on the sanctuary side so form a makeshift wall as well. I'd reinforce that wall with logs so that if somehow the zombies crawled out of the ditch, they couldn't get up the logwall or tear through it.
Anyway, they shouldn't be able to crawl out because I would have set sticks and branches in that ditch. I see the horde coming, I'm waiting as long as I can. I'm waiting for them to come and fall in the ditch and get stuck in there in their thousands, then I'm spraying fuel on them and chucking a torch on them. They're all packed in like sardines. They'll go up nicely, and it should take long enough that more zombies will just keep packing into the inferno.
It'll smell like hell, but that's the best way to take care of a horde.
MOTHER EARTH
As I said, I sure wouldn't pick my sanctuary above ground if I didn't have to. I'd find some bunker/cave system. The key is that you want a defensible entrance where they can't overwhelm with numbers. If you chose a castle, thinking you were safe, well, even if your walls are 40 feet high, if the zombie horde is big enough, they can just trample each other and slowly make a zombie ramp, at which point they pour over and you are screwed. Yes, it would take a metric shit-ton of zombies for that, but, you know, you're supposed to think of these things.
I'd want a bunker with a door (steel) that was wide enough for a man. I don't care if a million zombies are pushing the one at the door as much as they can, they're not pushing through that. Sure, you're trapped, but you're safe.
That being said, while starving to death is not as sucky as being torn limb from limb and eaten alive, it still sucks. That's why you must have a backup/escape tunnel. That outdoor sanctuary surrounded by the fire ditch I told you about? Yeah, you better be digging an escape tunnel there, for if the zombie horde is fireproof/attacks on a rainy week. They manage to get over the walls, you don't want to be standing there holding your pecker and whistling dixie. You want out. Your shovel is going to be as important as your weapons.
PERFECT SANCTUARY
I know I said underground, but that's if I'm on connected land. An island with a fresh water source would be great. One with high cliffs would be best. Bunkers/sanctuaries are great on mainland, but there's always a risk of running out of supplies. On an island, you should be able to handle the smaller amount of zombies, if any. Then you have the ocean to feed you. Of course still dig your ditches and walls and whatnot, but food and water and wait for the zombie bodies to decompose to the point that they can't move.
Unless the angry God who made the zombies allows them to continue on as skeletons, or worse, zombie-ism transfers to sealife too.
In which place, you're probably in hell already and just don't know it.
I'm practical. I really am. If I wake up and there are zombies stumbling amok, I'm going to accept it. It's not going to do me any good to yell at the Zombies,
"Hey, you make no sense. You're decaying matter; you have no fluid coursing through your veins. How the hell do your joints and muscles work without lubrication?"
I know people want zombies to be the living dead and think that 28 Days Later was not really a zombie movie since that was just sick people, but I think that's about the only way we'd ever see zombies for real.
That being said, the not-making-sense aspect of zombies also would be a key factor for me if it turned out there were in fact zombies. "Okay. This shouldn't be happening, but it is. The laws of science are out the window. Time to propitiate God."
I'd be pretty damn religious is what I'm saying.
Religious does not mean stupid though.
Viral or Wrath of God, the way to deal with zombies/survive are the same.
WEAPONS
BLADES- You're going to want a good blade. I'd recommend a hatchet. Yes, an ax might work well, but I think the length might be a problem. You want to make sure you don't miss and that you have enough heft to get into the skull, which is why I like a hatchet/axe over a machete or sword. The human skull is really damn hard.
I might even carry a spear too. You laugh, but how the hell is zombie-ism transferred? Lore has it that it comes from a bite, but I'm not taking the chance that it comes from a scratch if I don't have to. Get a nice long spear and aim for the mouth.
It's important to have a stabbing weapon to go along with swinging weapons because if you get stuck in a contained area, say a hallway, you might not have the room to swing. You know how much good an ax does you when you don't have room to swing it? Dick. That's how much good.
GUNS- There are many, many reasons to have the blade be the weapon of choice for Zombies. First of all, no ammo, so you don't have to worry about running out and then being screwed. So long as you have strength left, you can keep killin' zombies. TV shows and books never ever talk about ammo. Bullets are made out of lead. Lead is damn heavy. I wore 210 rounds of ammo on me in Iraq and that was a bitch. 210 rounds, by the way, is probably what you shot within the first 3 minutes of one of the Call of Duty games you played. In real life, you are a hell of a lot more careful with your ammo because you don't want to be stuck in the middle of people/zombies trying to kill you with an empty gun.
You do need a gun though. The blades will only work one with onesies and twosies coming at you. You'd be idiotic to waste a bullet on a onesie or twosie. First and foremost, guns will make noise and draw more zombies, so you don't want to use them if you don't have to. Guns are when there isn't a swarm, but there are enough that you couldn't stab enough of them before they overwhelmed you. You get in that situation, whip out the gun and blast an exit. Don't shoot all of them, just enough to get out of the bad situation.
I'd have two guns. One would be a heavy revolver. Those don't jam. The problem is that they have six shots. Reloading a revolver when zombies are coming at you is horrible. That's why you use it as the trusty backup. Always save the last bullet of the revolver for yourself.
You use the automatic primarily. You can carry clips/magazines and kill way more and reload very quickly. Don't be like Hollywood and just drop your empties on the ground. An automatic without a magazine/clip is worse than a revolver. Hell, it's probably worse than a sock with a sack of quarters in it. Keep those empties for later.
Guns really aren't for zombies. You need to make sure of your surroundings so that you don't have to get away from blades. If there are, say, 10 zombies coming at you, see if you can get yourself to a position where they are coming at you from the same direction. Get behind a door and stab them in the head one at a time as they try to come through or run down a hallway, turn around, and wait for them to come at you lined up and then stab, stab, stab. Again, unless you have gotten yourself into a position where you absolutely have to use the gun, don't. Guns are for the other human survivors roaming around competing with you for supplies and shelter.
FIRE- Unless your zombie apocalypse is one where God made zombies fireproof, fire will be your failsafe. You have to think about zombies in numbers. A few zombies, you can handle with a blade. A few too many zombies and you need the gun. A vast zombie horde of hundreds/thousands/millions? You need fire.
Prep work is key to zombies. You want to get somewhere that you can control/contain their numbers. If you're going to have an above ground sanctuary (which I wouldn't but that's just me), then you need to funnel zombies towards you so you can manage them.
The Walking Dead just had the survivors living on a farm. A farm! They know there's a zombie apocalypse and they just tra-la-la-la-la around like there's no issue. You always have to think that the zombie horde is just over the horizon. You have to work under the assumption that if one comes, you will not be able to escape and will have to fight it out to survive. How the hell were they going to do that on that farm?
Fire. Fire's how. Well, fire and a shovel. It would suck, but what you would do is dig a huge, huge ditch/moat around your sanctuary. The dirt you took from the ground, you'd put on the sanctuary side so form a makeshift wall as well. I'd reinforce that wall with logs so that if somehow the zombies crawled out of the ditch, they couldn't get up the logwall or tear through it.
Anyway, they shouldn't be able to crawl out because I would have set sticks and branches in that ditch. I see the horde coming, I'm waiting as long as I can. I'm waiting for them to come and fall in the ditch and get stuck in there in their thousands, then I'm spraying fuel on them and chucking a torch on them. They're all packed in like sardines. They'll go up nicely, and it should take long enough that more zombies will just keep packing into the inferno.
It'll smell like hell, but that's the best way to take care of a horde.
MOTHER EARTH
As I said, I sure wouldn't pick my sanctuary above ground if I didn't have to. I'd find some bunker/cave system. The key is that you want a defensible entrance where they can't overwhelm with numbers. If you chose a castle, thinking you were safe, well, even if your walls are 40 feet high, if the zombie horde is big enough, they can just trample each other and slowly make a zombie ramp, at which point they pour over and you are screwed. Yes, it would take a metric shit-ton of zombies for that, but, you know, you're supposed to think of these things.
I'd want a bunker with a door (steel) that was wide enough for a man. I don't care if a million zombies are pushing the one at the door as much as they can, they're not pushing through that. Sure, you're trapped, but you're safe.
That being said, while starving to death is not as sucky as being torn limb from limb and eaten alive, it still sucks. That's why you must have a backup/escape tunnel. That outdoor sanctuary surrounded by the fire ditch I told you about? Yeah, you better be digging an escape tunnel there, for if the zombie horde is fireproof/attacks on a rainy week. They manage to get over the walls, you don't want to be standing there holding your pecker and whistling dixie. You want out. Your shovel is going to be as important as your weapons.
PERFECT SANCTUARY
I know I said underground, but that's if I'm on connected land. An island with a fresh water source would be great. One with high cliffs would be best. Bunkers/sanctuaries are great on mainland, but there's always a risk of running out of supplies. On an island, you should be able to handle the smaller amount of zombies, if any. Then you have the ocean to feed you. Of course still dig your ditches and walls and whatnot, but food and water and wait for the zombie bodies to decompose to the point that they can't move.
Unless the angry God who made the zombies allows them to continue on as skeletons, or worse, zombie-ism transfers to sealife too.
In which place, you're probably in hell already and just don't know it.
4 comments:
The island is great, only assuming that zombies can't walk on the bottom of the ocean.
Yeah, I hadn't considered that until I read World War Z. That's why I say that one with cliffs would be best, and that it would be important to still have the ditch/palisade.
I would take a good shotgun over the automatic. My revolver actually holds 7 rounds, so I've got six for zombie mayhem and one for the doctor. Also, I'd go for one of those mid-sized camping axes over the hatchet...the hatchet is too close for me.
I think I'd just venture out as far from population centers as I could get. I'm thinking I wouldn't see a whole hell of a lot of zombies up on the Art Loeb trail.
My choices/thought process concern weight and a balance of utility in open and tight spaces. Too many long weapons (Ax/Shotgun) and you're going to have a a) hard time maneuvering and b)near impossibility in tight quarters. I'll grant you the shotgun if you make it sawed off with some sort of holster like Ash in the Evil Dead. The hatchet might very well be too close. I was trying to think of something that had good head piercing while still being usable in most environments.
The Art Loeb is fine, so long as you set to digging. Sure, the horde of zombies from the Northeast corridor MAY not ever find its way towards you, but if it does, you need a way to handle possible MILLIONS of them. Of course, the forest fire you could start would definitely help you in that regard.
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