Living With the Dead: The Bitter Seasons (28 page)

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7:47 AM
 

Friday, December 24, 2010

Doctor Who?

Posted by Gabrielle

It took me a while to convince him that people knowing his first name wouldn't be such a bad thing. It brings me great pleasure to finally be able to call him something other than "the new doctor" or "the other doctor". His name is Phil.

That's right. Doctor Phil. 

We don't call him that, of course. We never call Evans "Doctor Evans". It'd just be weird. Thinking about it, though, makes me wonder if he didn't want us to tell people his name just so no one would make that stupid joke...

We've been doing a lot of work around here lately. People are still coming in here and there, some staying while the majority move on or go back home. We've had patients from as far as three hundred miles away come to us. I wouldn't have thought so many people would have the resources to make it so far, but one thing about being able to look outside and see the dead walking is that it greatly increases your ability to handle surprise. 

And trust me, we 
can 
see them walking out there. A lot of people were living out in their cars or in tents before the large groups of cold-proof zombies started to show up. The parking lot for this hospital is walled in, so none of them were in too much danger, but I get why so many of them wanted to have more brick between themselves and the undead. 

We've picked up some interesting facts from the people that come to us for treatment. Phil has an amazing bedside manner (which is strange considering that most doctors are...well, that's just the nurse in me coming out...) and people tend to open up to him easily. For instance, there is a farm about forty miles south of where we are that has almost as many people as the compound did before we fled, and the people there have managed to stockpile truly huge amounts of food. Also neat is the tip we got about a small oil refinery a hundred miles down the road, one that has plenty of gas ready for the taking. 

We've gotten dozens of nifty tidbits like that thanks to Phil. He's sort of the opposite of Evans. Where Evans is, and I say this with love, sort of a surly bastard, Phil is gentle and caring. The flip side to that coin is that while Evans has forty years of practical experience with trauma and emergency medicine, Phil is racing to relearn the basics of those things. He's not an idiot or anything--it's just that once he specialized in working on cancer, he didn't need to keep up with much else. 

I really don't want to make it sound like Phil is doing anything wrong or isn't pulling his weight. He's working ten or twelve hours a day with patients, then spending at least two hours with Evans and a few of the students learning surgical procedures, treatment options, diagnostics...he's actually pretty amazing in his work ethic. 

We're doing a good thing here, no matter what else is going on. Thinking about how things have gone in the last weeks makes me wonder if running from the compound doesn't have its major upsides. If we hadn't, we would never have met most of the people we've been caring for, never built what connections we have made. Our group has achieved communication and a lasting good will with so many other survivors since we left home, and I don't think that should be dismissed. 

I would like to think that eventually, we would have trained enough people that we could have sent some out into the world to do exactly what we're doing now. The truth is that I doubt it would have happened. Risking a resource as limited as a person who has the knowledge, gained over years, to cut you open and fix you, then sew you back up? It's a hard leap to make, at least for me. 

I wish the soldiers from Richmond hadn't done this to us. In a way, I'm glad they did, because I don't know that we could have reached a point of stability in my lifetime to make the citizens of the compound willing to take the risks we're taking now. It took the threat of total destruction or complete oppression to put us on this path. 

And as long as we're forced to be on it, I will take solace in the good we're doing. It's that easy. 

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8:21 AM

Posted by Patrick

This is just a quick post to let every one out there know that for the moment I'm still alive. Though what I've seen and done in the last couple of weeks makes me wish that I wasn't. The only reason I continue to fight and draw breath is all that is left of my family, my two nieces and the daughter of my oldest friend. These three little girls are all alone in the world except for me.

My phone is getting ready to die again and I'm feeling faint from the blood loss, so please know that as soon as I find some power, and signal again I will try to post more. I just pray that happens. We are on foot and with out any real weapons, just blunt objects.

Please know that if I don't make it, that I had to do this and numbers wouldn't have made any difference. The only reason that I made it this far is I was alone. When you remember me I really hope that it brings a smile to your faces. Sorry for being so macabre but the odds can only be so long before you have to face reality. Will continue to fight though, you aren't dead until your dead, and even then you don't get to rest any more.

Well from the way the girls are staring at me the dead have caught us up again, the cold has slowed them down a lot but they don't have to rest, must get going.

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8:37 PM

Posted by Josh Guess

What do you say on what's supposed to be one of the best days of the year to a world of people that have lost so much?
On thanksgiving, I talked about trying to find the hidden good in the situations we find ourselves in. The zombie plague has taken most of what we are, but at the same time it's burned away the dross and left us stronger and more pure.
Christmas is different. It has so many meanings. For Christians, it is a celebration of the life of Jesus. For others, a time to give generously when the world is cold and harsh. Yet others simply celebrate togetherness and the warmth of being a family.
For me, on this Christmas, I think about the real gifts we've given one another. Regardless of the season, we now live in a world as hard and sharp as the dead of winter. We've given each other the gift of life--fighting for one another to protect. But violence, even when it is meant to preserve, is so integral to who we are as a species that it's an easy gift to give.
We've given each other that gift of life in other ways. We've buckled down and learned to farm, working our fingers in the earth until our muscles protested and our bodies became weak. We have learned to make things to preserve life, people with no experience at all striving to understand the workings of armor. It may seem strange or silly to you to think of these things as gifts, but they certainly are. It would have been much easier for so many of us to become marauders, to take and take from others. I see the gift of honest effort as one of the greatest that has been given to us by each other, and I thank you for it.
The single greatest treasure that we've shared is also the one that surprised me the most. Seeing my fellow citizens of the compound, both before and after the other refugees and I fled it, find moments of real normality. Watching people tell jokes and invite others over for dinner. Seeing two sentries have a friendly disagreement about what NBA team had the greatest legacy. Watching a young boy and girl share that same first peck on the cheek that one of them would call their first kiss for the rest of their days.
We have been changed in ways that may take years for all of us to fully understand. We can't do the things we've done, make the decisions we've had to make, and remain the same people. The world as it is has shaped us and removed the complications that used to clutter our everyday lives. It has made us grim and frighteningly realistic about the risks we face on a daily basis.
But it hasn't taken the core of us. Everything I have seen makes me believe that there is something inherently good in people, powerfully so. When the worst case scenario came, we struggled and suffered, we cried our tears. Instead of falling into the instinctual behavior to kill and take, we found ourselves sharing compassion and love. We allowed ourselves to feel completely at ease with the way life is now, to take small pleasures and pass them on to others.
That's a gift that can't be measured. You have all given it to me, and I to you. Today, let's celebrate being alive and together. Remember with a happy pride that we've accomplished that by treating each other as we wished to be treated, and acting like the civilized people that we know ourselves to be.
Merry Christmas. Happy Hanuka. Whatever your reason for the season, enjoy today. You made it happen.

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7:31 AM

Posted by Patrick

When I read Josh's post to day, it hit me like a hammer that today is Christmas and it brought me great sadness. I look at the three girls sleeping on the floor, and I listen to them whimper and cry in their sleep, the exhaustion to great to give them escape from their nightmares, and wonder how? How do I tell them it's Christmas?

I don't believe that I can tell them, even though where we are is sort of a Christmas miracle in it self. We stumbled into a place that is well fortified against the dead and was well stocked. The girls got canned veggies for the first time in months, which may have saved their lives as much as the protection this place offers. Their gums have been bleeding badly and most of their teeth are loose with some missing. That and with the ease at which Alice broke her arm makes me think that they have scurvy.

While Alice talks a little both Alysa and Kylie have yet to say a word, considering where I took them from and the thing I saw there I'm surprised that they're still aware of the world at all. Even though Alice is only six and thankfully dosn't understand half of what she saw and heard, she paints a bleak picture of what mostly Alysa endured to keep them alive.

Yet those girls amaze me at how tough and strong they are, today they helped me cauterize my stump with out flinching. Good thing too because the tourniquet was turning my stump a little smelly, and I've already had to cut more of my arm off twice in the last two days. Guess thats what I get for making a rookie mistake buy putting my hand in reach of a zombie that I thought was down and out.

At least it was my left hand so my love life won't suffer. Sorry lack of sleep is effecting me, will try to post again soon.

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5:42 PM
 

Posted by Josh Guess

We've managed to make it to where Gabby and her group are staying. I didn't want to tell anyone our destination in case any of our enemies had managed to figure out where she was. I didn't want to be intercepted on our way here.
So, we made it. I'm frankly kind of shocked at how organized and ordered everything here is. Everyone has food and shelter, there are people on sentry duty here and there. It's nice to see people outside our group again. We had a hard time getting here between the constant snow and random groups of zombies drifting across our path. One thing that I really miss? Road crews. You never really think about what they did for society until you don't have them anymore. Driving along pretty much any road with five or six inches of snow on it and patches of ice sucks in ways that I can't even describe.
I'm pretty exhausted from the trip. Getting here was frustratingly slow, and now that we've arrived I don't think we'll be going anywhere for a good long while. That is, we'll be staying as long as it's safe for us to do so. You might call me paranoid since I've seen no actual evidence that any of them have come after us at all, but I'm still worried about what would happen if the bastards that took our home from us figure out where we are.
It's not that this town isn't fairly defensible or that we lack people willing to put up a fight if one is brought to us. It's just that right now we're not at full fighting strength and we need time build ourselves up a bit. We have canned and packaged food, but right now no long term solutions for growing our own. All of that was left behind. We've got ammo for our guns and handheld weapons, but the shop we set up back at the compound to cast bullets and make our own shells is lost to us.
Right now, I'm thrilled to be around people, and ecstatic to be in a group that is big enough to ward off smaller threats. I love the safety and sense of community. It's just a fragile thing right now.
I recognize, of course, that almost no community anyone builds in the world as it is now can be stable or safe in the ways that used to count. Look at the compound--we had a decent population, armed to the teeth and as prepared as it was possible to be. Sitting on a stockpile of food and weapons, ready to die or kill to preserve it.
And all it took was one man to take it all away.
As I walk around this place, assisting where I can with first aid needs, I keep that simple fact in mind. We're nowhere near as well protected as we were at the compound. We're in a delicate situation. Yes, we are alive and together, which is a beautiful thing. We can pool our resources to do more than any of us could individually. And all it would take to ruin what good we have here is one person telling the Richmond soldiers where we are. Or anyone that has a jones against us, for that matter.
Hmmm. A parable just popped into my head that pretty accurately describes the situation:
A man is hanging from the edge of a cliff. In his haste to catch himself, he grabbed on to the only thing he could--a strawberry plant. As he hung there watching the thin roots slowly come out of the ground, he realized that he wouldn't be able to pull himself up. He resigned himself to his fate, knowing that he would surely fall, and at that moment he noticed a delicious berry amid the leaves. So, he ate it. 
I've always loved that one. I don't think our situation is as bleak as the man in the story, but there is a ring of truth to it nonetheless. I'll enjoy what we have while we have it, and keep an eye out for anyone taking aim at the roots...