Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Sixth Entry: Hangover

July 10

Wow, that was melodramatic of me, wasn’t it? I’m feeling a bit better now. I had a good cry, and I got really drunk. I heard that there was some sort of 4th of July presentation in the park last week, but I didn’t go.

From what I heard, the whole council was there, there were speeches and music, but no fireworks. I don’t know if this is just because we didn’t have any, or if they were afraid it would draw too much attention to Mallville from the roaming zeds out there. I’d say they were afraid of some of the living too, but it’s not like we’re a secret here anyway.

I should point out that Hashmir has banned alcohol from Mallville. I really cannot argue with his reasoning; that drunk people already under stress might do dangerous things, and all it takes is an unnoticed accidental death and suddenly we have zeds in here with us. This is perfectly reasonable, but then again so was prohibition to a point.

I know some of the scavengers smuggle in alcohol from the runs, and sell it on the sly, although God only knows what they sell it in exchange for. I have snagged myself a small personal supply, and it was a half a bottle of Crown Royal that knocked me out on the fourth. On the bright side, I did get to see fireworks; they were in my head the next morning.

We’ve now stripped the Tyranno Mart completely of food, and so have moved on to other things. Alex is still sending scavengers to the T-Mart to collect other items like clothes, toys, tools, and other mostly non-essentials. Apparently there have been some fights among survivors, and Hashmir is hoping that distractions like books, movies, and games will help keep people a little calmer.

My crew moved on to a Rex’s Club a couple of blocks away from the T-Mart. You know Rex’s Club, it’s that warehouse store where you have to be a member. Unfortunately it was not sealed up the way T-Mart was.

Someone had been living in the Rex’s Club, but they were either gone or undead before we got there, and they left the back door open when they left. It’s a shame, from the front the store looked like it was sealed, the big shutters were down, blocking the entrance and everything, but when we got to the back we not only found the door sitting open, but two zeds standing by it, almost like guards. Without even getting out of the SUV, Maria put the two zombies down with shots to the head.

The inside was a nightmare, not only did it stink due to the freezers full of rotting food, but it was infested with at least a dozen zeds (I lost count, Maria would know though). In the money count room we found signs that at least three people had been living there; there were three sleeping bags, some candles, a propane lamp, and some cans of food.

It looks like things went badly for the people there though; one of the sleeping bags and the area around it was covered in dried blood, and the other stuff was scattered around like a tornado had spawned in there. In the room I found a torn piece of notebook paper next to the coin scale on the counter in there. I am guessing it came from a diary much like mine. I did not find any other parts of the diary in there, so maybe the author took it with her (I am guessing it’s a her by the handwriting).

This is what the piece of diary said:

Tyrone’s bite is still infected, and he’s getting worse. The antibiotics don’t seem to be helping at all. I think he’s turning into one of them, but T’Nesha won’t let me put him down.

It’s not like I want Tyrone to die, but I’m not sure there’s even any of him left in there. He doesn’t respond when I talk to him anymore, and his eyes are all cloudy… he looks like one of them.

I’ll give it two more days, but if he’s not better, I’m putting him down. He wouldn’t want to become one of those things out there. Why did he have to be so damn careless? Why did he let that thing bite him?

Why couldn’t it have been T’Nesha inst


That’s where it ends, the paper is torn there.

We loaded up on sacks of dry good, rice, flour, sugar, stuff like that. Food is being pretty strictly rationed in the food court now, but even with our scavenging runs we’re going to run out eventually. I’m not looking forward to that.

In slightly more cheerful news, Alex told me that there are talks of turning Mallville’s internet server back on. Not that there’s necessarily anything outside the mall to access, but they want to redo the mall’s website to use it to distribute information more efficiently than trying to spread it through the mall’s PA system and word of mouth.

I’m not sure how I feel about this; I mean I cannot even listen to my iPod without wondering who on my playlists are still alive, so how am I going to react when I try to visit a website and nothing comes up? Of course what if stuff does come up? I can only imagine what’s on people’s VFlat pages now….

I think I’m going to go down to the store and see how Bud is doing. He’s been really down lately, not knowing what happened to his family and all. Maybe I’ll bring the rest of that bottle with me, and see if he’s up for some gaming. A little Pokemon and Crown Royal might make us both feel better.

Or at least it might make us forget for a bit.

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