Misdirection

Well, I might have lied a little bit.

I thought maybe that somebody was passing information from this blog to the looters, and I was right. They expected us to do something last night, using the cover of darkness to make up for lack of numbers. What I was hoping for was far more simple: outnumber them.

I just had to go find the numbers.

It took a while to gear everyone up. Jess, Pat and I were the only ones who had ever worn a Gi before, and it took a while to get them fitted onto all of us securely enough that we could be sure zombies wouldn't be able to pull them off. All of us were covered, head to toe. We needed to be, when we made our way to all of the penned off areas we could reach.

We were already gone when my post hit the internet, cutting fence and leading the zombies where we wanted them. Our observations gave us a good idea of where they went, what routes they took...which told us exactly which routes to lead the zombies toward them. From half a dozen locations, we teased them on. By the time we had them within sight of the hotel, the zombies were moving of their own accord, already seeing the mass of people around it.

In the big groups we were pretty much invisible to the looters. We all peeled off from our herds of zombies, killing the few that followed us with hammers, axes, and the like. You know, silent weapons.

The idea wasn't to kill them all, because it had become clear to us that they were keeping captives. We wanted them outside and fighting, distracted, while we made our way into the hotel. If they did die--fine. But our goal was to help those that they kept inside.

I can't believe it worked. We figured the reason they kept the area by the highway fenced off was to escape town quickly if they needed to, as they parked all of their vehicles pointed that way, and it turns out we bet the right way. When they fled, that's the way they went.

Right into about a thousand zombies. Mom and the second group had timed it just right. Only a few looters were left at the hotel, and they were no problem to take care of. More than fifty men, murderers and rapists for the most part, and no great loss to the human race. Even those that weren't either of those were at least complicit in the acts, so I have no mercy for them. Any shred of guilt I might have felt vanished when we found the captives.

All told, we now have an additional twenty women living in the compound. Five men were also found, fellows who had joined up for survival initially, but had refused to commit some of the less tasteful acts that so appealed to the others. Barely alive, but happy to join us right along with the womenfolk.

The bonus for us was that watching them bring in truckload after truckload to the hotel gave us the right idea: the place was stocked to the gills with everything you can imagine. Weapons, of course, but it looks like they hit big places, places we had planned to go, like the police stations and the national guard armory. Not to mention the out of town targets, lumberyards and masonry supply outlets, every sort of thing you could imagine. There are ten of us still working just to catalog all of it. We expect it to take several days.

This isn't the only group of them out there, but we are fairly sure this was the main camp, and the biggest one. As soon as we can, we'll move all of the stuff we want to keep to the compound, and stay there for the most part. We still plan on grabbing equipment when we need it, but Pat and I cleaned out the large equipment rental place down the road, so most of what we need, we have.

This place will truly be a compound before too long. My block is getting a makeover, all of the backyards on it combined into one, mostly for farming, though we will have a practice area for firearms, and one for martial arts and hand held weapons, a play area for any kids we can bring in. All of it will be surrounded by a wall eventually, sort of a central keep within the larger compound. Every fantasy geek's dream, if only realized in world fallen to someone's vision of hell. The houses on the block stay, but all will be connected, a great circle defined by the wall, or so we plan.

I want to feel bad for driving those men to their deaths, of for no other reason than the loss of genetic material in what is a pretty small pool of DNA hereabouts. But after watching them, and hearing the tales of the rescued prisoners, none of us, not even my gentle and nonviolent mother, have any guilt at all. None of those filthy excuses for men should have fathered children, and in the world we live in now, such people deserve no mercy whatsoever.

If what you are is what you do when crisis comes, then they were monsters, worse than the shambling dead that surround us at all times. And monsters deserve no hesitation.

We are here, and we are stronger every day. With the food we have already hauled in from the hotel, we can feed double our current number for at least six months. More is being found in every room. So anyone out there that feels as we do, come and join us if you can. Our doors are open.

If you have ill intentions, then go in any direction but this one. Men and women who would do the things these looters do will only find disaster here.

Fair warning.