Brian

There has been another zombie attack within the walls. It's a sad truth, but our strongest hope against them has always been that they tend to attack in numbers. No defense is perfect, and it's much easier for one of them to get in unnoticed than for any large group to succeed in an attack on the walls. The New Breed are damn clever when they set their minds to something, and this decision to work individually goes against every behavior we have seen in them. Without a doubt, they're the most dangerous zombies we've ever seen.

This attack wasn't fatal. People are being a lot more cautious inside the walls since Brianna--the first guard who was attacked--died. This go round it was a bite on the arm rather than a neck shot, and the citizen (a leatherworker named Matt) still had his apron on. The one with all the tools. Nothing like losing a couple fingers to put you in the mood to drive a leather punch through the skull of a zombie, I guess. Phil had to cut off Matt's hand, of course, but it could have been worse. At least it was his left hand, Matt being a righty.

Which reminds me about Brian. He's Brianna's son, and for right now he's homeless. He can't stay alone so soon after losing his mother...twice.

Brian had to kill the zombie that killed his mother, driving his blade into its mouth and upward even as the thing tried to chew the wet meat it had torn from Brianna's neck. On top of that, he knew as all children here do that you can't leave someone in her condition alone. She bled out fast, and Brian...

He did what he had to do. That poor little boy made sure to tell the people who ran too late to his mother's screams that he cleaned the blade of his knife off first. More than anything, he wanted them to know that he didn't put five inches of steel into her brain without removing the gore from the zombie first.

Kids think in ways that defy logic, or at least operate on a level that we puny adults can't understand. Hearing that nearly broke my heart, and I've offered to let him stay with us as much as needed. Right now he's not here. He's under observation at the clinic to make sure he's stable (as much as he can be, all things considered) for a little while, but after that he'll crash here if he wants to. I know as much about dealing with that kind of trauma as anyone.

I won't lie to you. I feel a lot of things right now. Proud of Brian for doing as he did no matter how hard it was, angry and upset and sad that his mother was taken from him. Disgusted that a child not even ten years old did something that the Strangers seem unwilling or unable to do themselves: face the enemy head-on.

It makes me sick, all of it. But maybe I can do a little good for the kid, if he decides to stay here. We aren't forcing him, he gets to choose where. There's no shortage of folks willing to take him in. So long as he's comfortable, I can't complain.