ZSS Feed

A lot of talk is made about suicide in case of a full outbreak. Cyanide capsules, hemlock, sleeping pills all seem like a great way to go out on your own terms. While it may be easier to take that final nap (if you do, please do so in a way that destroys your brain), you owe it to humanity to survive.

The short term is bleak. You will have to escape the urban centers. You will have to scrounge for food. You will live in fear and your gun will be your best friend. But the payoff for your survival will be a new world.

Zombies will not wipe humanity off of the face of the planet. History proves the resilency of the human race. While there will be chaos and destruction in the beginning, the panic will eventually stop and mankind will take back the earth. The end result of a full zombie outbreak will be a human race that is tougher, harder and more disciplined than ever.

The first months after the outbreak will be utter chaos. Most of the chaos will be due to panic, hysteria and denial amongst the living. Despite our constant warnings, the world’s governments have not prepared the general population for the reality of an undead horde. Joe American or Nigel British aren’t ready for beloved Uncle Ned to jump out of his coffin and try to dine on their kidneys. So when Uncle Ned pops up for a looksy, they go into shock, panic, scream or even (ridiculously enough) run towards him. They haven’t been trained to find the nearest heavy object and smash Uncle Ned’s skull in. They haven’t been conditioned to see the abomination in front of them as a thing that needs to be destroyed. They just think “Oh dear, Uncle Ned’s going to want my inheritance back. He sure looks good for someone back from the grave.” If they think at all, that is.

This is why initial civil defenses will fail. Military and police units have not been taught to compartmentalize their feelings of compassion for an enemy that inhabits the bodies of their loved ones. They will not fight with a fierceness appropriate to the threat, and they will fall as they are overtaken.

But this will only be during the beginning. Unlike the undead, men and women learn from experience. After seeing the other 27 funeral attendees die at Uncle Ned’s hands, cousin Peter will take the gravedigger’s shovel drive it into his father’s brain. After a few months of living in a world of roving zombie hordes, the only humans left will be those who have learned the lethal nature of the zombie. The remaining military forces will be able to utilize their advanced weaponry. Militia units and other groups like Zombie Squad will begin to take the fight to the zombies.

Encampments will spring up and humans will flock to them. They will form ad hoc governments and defend their positions. These encampments will turn into small cities. Using shortwave radio, these cities will communicate with each other and once that communication is in place, society is back in business. Humans will be able to relay strike coordinates to a national command center that will control the new military. Zombies may have the numbers, but we will have the guns.

Like I said, humans learn. We will dispose of freshly dead by cremation in all instances for the sake of caution (having realized the idiocy of cemetaries). Survival skills will be taught to our children. Safe guards will be placed on science and technology. We will emerge from this victoriously. While zombies will never go away completely, their threat will be reduced to that of a wild predator to be destroyed on site.

Hopefully, we won’t develop again into the state of conceit and complacency that brought this situation upon us in the first place. This time, zombies may be nature’s natural check to the human population. There’s no telling what it’ll be next time.

So survive. Live. Most of all, bash Uncle Ned’s head until pulp comes out of his ears.