Zombie epidemic survival *GAME*

[StarTrek1701]

Let us presume that on Monday right after all of us TrekBBS'ers have woken up for school/office/whatever we get to the internet and see the world has had news of its first zombie attack. For reasons unspecified the infection is spreading, it started from England (lets say Greenwich, where mean time is set) and is spreading... fast. Just as everyone's panicking, news RSS feeds just say there has been an attack here in the USA.

The rules: zombieness is very, very fast. And these zombies drink the blood too. You have to die to be zombified, but you are zombified within 5 minutes after cardiac/neurological arrest or whatnot. And the hunger strikes the infected to the point they start looking for food 'immediately'.

Story: YOU, the TrekBBS'er have spent 30 mins getting to know all that you've known. Govt's over the world have gotten the news and there are national/international 'holidays' immediately. 'Experts' are weighing in, but you (along with your family, friends or single) know its survival-for-the-fittest time.

Game: What do YOU do? Go!

I'll start: make sure my wife and I have our general survival packs in check. Call both our parents (hers in Canada though) and tell mine to high tail it to my house immediately. Have my basement ready with two Shelf Reliance packages already, so no problems there. Check my weapons (two shotguns, three handguns, woodcutter's axe, machete and a chainsaw) status and keep them ready. Check traffic sites for status around my immediate area and make a run for other general essentials. Once done, I barricade my home with immediate wooden boards on the windows and reinforced locks.

And wait it out I guess lol.

Now give me your ideas!

 

[Myasishchev]

Preparation is irrelevant. Nuclear weapons have already sterilized the epicenters. We get back to life and on the plus side some job opportunities have opened up.

 

[Rarewolf]

Head to a Shopping Centre ala Dawn Of The Dead makes the best sense to me. They had everything they needed right there if they'd just stopped to think about it.

But then I'm in England so I'd have less time. And no gunshop round the corner either. I suppose try and get to a ferry. Food and protected from all sides.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

I've decided that Darryl on The Walking Dead is exactly the sort of person who is in the best position to survive a zombie apocalypse.

First up: Hit up sportings good stores for crossbows and arrows. I am steadfast in my philosophy that one should never engage in hand to hand combat with zombies. If you let them get that close, you're dead.

Second up: Get away from any population center. Head for someplace with decent weather and a water supply, but not a large population who of course are doomed to mostly become zombies. Hmm...Oregon?

And no gunshop round the corner either.

Which reminds me, we need to clarify whether gunshots = zombie dinner bell in this situation. If not, I'll get me a few guns too. Regardless, I prefer crossbows because the ammo is reusable.

I suppose try and get to a ferry.

More clarification needed: are these the type of zombies that can walk along the bottom of oceans, lakes, etc? If so, water poses more of an obstacle to the living, and I'd avoid being on an island.

 

[captcalhoun]

Breaking News: The British military has the infestation contained in London and is employing automatic weapons and armour to destroy the infected.

I live 100+ miles away from London. I'm fine. I just hope the Cabinet got infected and get taken out.

 

[sojourner]

Everyone that posted some iteration of "go to a store and stock up" has died in riots from the millions of people that had the same idea.

Would you like to play again (Y/N)?

And no gunshop round the corner either.

Which reminds me, we need to clarify whether gunshots = zombie dinner bell in this situation. If not, I'll get me a few guns too. Regardless, I prefer crossbows because the ammo is reusable.

Crossbows are fine when there is one zombie, but too slow to reload if there are more. If there is already a group you need the multiple rounds of a gun more than you need to worry about noise.

 

[Bob Karo]

What about suppressors? They are legal in many states with the right paperwork. And they're really fun.

True, they aren't hollywood quiet. Then again, neither is the crossbow.

An intergrally suppressed Ruger .22 would be really quiet and Zombies don't seem to go down easy with a head shot and not at all with torso hits anyway. If bleeding out won't work, centerfire handguns have lost every advantage except a small edge in reliability. .22 is light, plentiful and easy to carry. It's got fast follow up shots and accurate enough at ranges you'd need to use it.

 

[Admiral James Kirk]

Bludgeon my noisy neighbor to death claiming he was a zombie and then steal his brand new big screen TV. Go back to bed and wait for the epidemic to end while watching it all on television. I don't even need to go shopping because I just raided my neighbors pantry.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Everyone that posted some iteration of "go to a store and stock up" has died in riots from the millions of people that had the same idea.

Meanwhile, you died holed up at home without supplies, waiting for your zombified neighbors to bash down the doors.

The crossbow will work just fine for me because I'm not sticking around population centers where the zombie hordes will congregate.

That said, I refuse to play this game without further clarification of a) what decibel level will ring the zombie dinner bell; b) are aquatic zombies allowed; and c) we're talking about normal, shuffling zombies and not the type that runs, right? because if they're the ones that run, I'm taking my crossbow and going home to sulk.

Also, I am unclear about the implications of blood-drinking zombies. Are we actually fighting a vampire plague and if so, how sexy are they and do they sparkle?

 

[timothy]

hit the pawn shops if there is no gunshop in the area they usally have fire arms.
grab some kina blunt or sharp weapon from the garage. either take a bike or stay on foot don't trust traffic. and stay in the alley ways when you're in the residential areas. <(shaun of the dead) all so try to have a first aide kit.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

So, how hard would it be to get your hands on a flamethrower?

Anyway another advantage of a crossbow is that it's a sure bet that everyone will be going straight for the firearms section. I'd love to have a gun as a backup, but I think I might just wait and take them off corpses or off the ground where people leave them after being zombified.

 

[StarTrek1701]

That said, I refuse to play this game without further clarification of a) what decibel level will ring the zombie dinner bell; b) are aquatic zombies allowed; and c) we're talking about normal, shuffling zombies and not the type that runs, right? because if they're the ones that run, I'm taking my crossbow and going home to sulk.

Also, I am unclear about the implications of blood-drinking zombies. Are we actually fighting a vampire plague and if so, how sexy are they and do they sparkle?

The zombies can run but not that fast. They are brainless in the sense that they just want food, but once their bellies are filled they don't run towards you but keeps their eyes on you. No they cannot swim or walk under water. But gunshots will get their attention.

 

[sojourner]

So, how hard would it be to get your hands on a flamethrower?

So standard zombies aren't dangerous enough? you want to have flaming zombies chasing you?

 

[timothy]

So, how hard would it be to get your hands on a flamethrower?

all so check abandon police cars for shot guns and amo.

hairspray and lighter would work all so ascetalin torch would come in handy to. but that would be a last resort kinda thing would'nt it

and make sure to watch out for those zombies that are cut in half.

 

[Caliburn24]

Assuming that all Army Reserve and National Guard soldiers would be called up, I'd report to Ft. Lewis and take my orders from whichever officers I find myself serving under.

The underlying premise of almost every zombie scenario is that governments collapse and the only survivors will be those lone wolf(or just lucky) random people.

Wouldn't happen. No random food hording survivalist is going to outlast the government. Do you have any idea the amount of ammo, fuel, food and water that the military has stockpiled? As well as hundreds of thousands of people who are already trained to shoot people.

Civilization has weathered plagues and disasters before. Just giving up and going lone wolf is the most idiotic thing anyone could do. I survived fighting against smart insurgents in Iraq who had modern weapons. Zombies without weapons or intelligence or the ability to bypass simple obstacles? They are going to be contained within hours.

 

[Vendikarr]

On the usenet group rec.arts.sf.tv, a poster named Ubiquitous made this post on possible origins of a zombie apocalypse:

I think this is a pretty good answer to how a ZA could happen. Basically, as outsiders looking in, it's easy to say we'd just immediately realize what's going on and blast out zombie brains.

But in a world with no Romero et al, or even in this world if this actually started happening, I'm not convinced people would be immediately comfortable with blowing other people's brains out - even if those people are lumbering towards them looking mighty hungry.

How long does it take before you decide that these walking, moaning humanoid corpse thingies are something you can just kill. How long until you decide there is no hope for a cure, so locking them in a wing of a hospital does you no good. And not everyone will agree on this. So *you* may think it's okay to kill them, but does your next door neighbor? Bring on the arguing. By several months in, I'm sure more people would be in the blow their brains out camp. But one day, a week, or a few weeks in? With I think 30ish% of Americans opposing the death penalty?

And then there is the whole people do dumb things issue. I'm bit? Oh *I* won't turn... I'll be the exception. I just won't tell anyone... It'll be okay... Honestly, if people are selfish enough to scam senior citizens out of their pensions, they are selfish enough to cause a lot of havoc during a ZA.

Add to that the whole how long it takes to figure out that whatever is happening spreads through bites and can only be stopped by destroying the brain (not generally a common target - from what I've been told most people are trained to aim for the chest since it's an easier target), and you have a recipe for chaos. Then if the actual re-animation time varies it would be even harder to trace.

So imagine, you have Patient 0, who stumbles "drunkenly" into a bar moaning (after being bitten by a radioactive spider from the planet Krypton who had been caught in a transporter beam and ended up spliced with a platypus or something - but don't worry he squished the spider after it bit him). Bartender says, "I can't serve you". Patient 0 moans again, staggers forward and starts grabbing at some lady at the bar.

Lady screams and tries to shove him away, punching him in the mouth, and nicking her knuckle on his nashing teeth. Always ready for a brawl, bar patrons start pulling the man off, and as the brawl gets out of hand (the guy just won't be knocked out afterall, no matter how many punches), the police are called. Some people have sustained scratches or bites - who knows if it's from Patient 0, a random patron, or a random patron already bitten by Patient 0.

Police try to arrest the guy, one of them gets bit in the arm, but not badly. The guy seems drunk and out of it, so they take him to the hospital, thinking he's on something. Because who would suspect he is actually dead/un-dead?

So Patient 0 is restrained at the hospital. Meanwhile, bitten Lady gives a statement to the police and goes home. Maybe some bar patrons go to the ER for stitches, maybe they just go home. It's not the first time they've been in a brawl. Several of them wake up "hungover" the next day. Man, they've never been this sick.

Should lay off the sauce. Maybe some go to the doctor. Maybe they stay home. But unless they all live alone, at least some of them are near new victims. Some probably get sick enough to go to the hospital, but some probably just die at home - especially depending on just how fast this thing spreads. Guy bites his wife, wife freaks out and runs out of the house, he's been drunk before, but never attacked her like that! Wife goes to stay with her sister. Yum. New victims.

Meanwhile, Patient 0 is at the hospital, and everyone is confused. Does he have a heartbeat? Brain patterns? Well this is fiction, so we can say what we'd like. But whatever is going on, I'm sure more and more experts are being called.

Maybe some suspicious information has been reported by the news by now. But certainly nothing concrete. That wife that went to stay with her sister? Yeah, she's not feeling so well now... Sister thinks she's just upset about her husband. Next thing you know sister's kids are zombie chow. Sister comes home from work and flips out finding blood and a badly bitten and bleeding child. She immediately calls 911. She can't find the wife, doesn't know what happened and is hysterical.

Perhaps a few more "patients" have ended up in the hospital by now, but still, now one is really sure what's going on. Maybe someone has started to notice they all have bite marks, but if some are in less noticeable places, it could take awhile. Plus, since human bites aren't necessarily a well studied disease vector, it may not jump to mind immediately. Bottom line: more confusion.

Eventually, someone will connect the bites to the fever to the reanimation. But by this point, I think there could pretty easily be hundreds of zombies, especially dependent on how fast the fever works and reanimation times. If any of those caught a bus or plane out of town, you are in even more trouble.

But now, the battle is only just begun - how do you stop these things? They don't seem to respond to pain. You can shoot them in the heart, and they just keep going. Meanwhile, should you kill them? What if there is a cure? Doctors aren't generally in the business of killing their patients. So Patient 0 could just be there for awhile. Along with other people showing up with bite wounds. Maybe they come up with some place to hold them, kind of like a quarantine, while they work on a cure. Fantastic. Until whatever quarantine security they have fails. Now there is a *mass* of zombies loose at the hospital. Meanwhile, there are those that never made it to the hospital wandering around causing problems.

Eventually, we call in the military. But how long before the president gives the kill order? How long before he authorizing shooting American citizens in the head. Without a trial. Without them necessarily doing anything wrong? Can you imagine the flack he would take if he was wrong? (Of course the president is a he, because this is a zombie scenario, and only men are leaders in a zombie scenario) So while congress is arguing, the zombies are gaining ground.

My guess is that in a real world scenario, there would be a pretty thin line between the threat being nipped in the bud with only a few towns/cities being affected and an all out outbreak.

But that level of confusion and the ethical struggle and the politics aren't an easy thing to portray in an entertaining way - hence why they are generally skipped :-)

I think this narrative shows how zombies could get a foothold, and be difficult to eradicate.

 

[sojourner]

And it gets scarier with a longer incubation time. imagine if it took a week to turn after a simple bite. There would be outbreaks all over the world thanks to air travel.

 

[Caliburn24]

Even if zombie footholds were established all over the place it would not get out of control as long as they have to bite victims to spread the disease.

Or as someone else once wrote...

If we look at zombies as a species, they are pretty much designed for failure. Their main form of reproduction is also their only source of food and their top predator. If they want to eat or reproduce, they have to go toe to toe with their number one predator every single time. That's like having to fight a lion every time you to want to have sex or make a sandwich. Actually, it's worse than that: Most top predators are only armed with teeth and claws, meaning they have to put themselves in harm's way to score a kill. Humans have rifles.

http://www.cracked.com/article_18683_7-scientific-reasons-zombie-outbreak-would-fail-quickly_p7.html

Most zombie scenarios rely on the slow and ponderous response of government as a backbone element to how the zombies manage to spread.

Most zombie authors have little firsthand knowledge of the military or first responders(or the medical field). We're not going to wait for some kill order from the president. The Army alone has over a hundred thousand sergeants(many of whom are now combat veterans) and seventy thousand odd officers all trained in a tradition that stresses initiative and taking action in the absence of orders. We're not going to just roll over and die as zombie hordes sweep over us. Soldiers, police, firefighters, EMTs, nurses and doctors are not going to fail and die leaving a world where only rednecks, survival nuts and conspiracy kooks manage to survive.

Not unless zombie-ism becomes air-born and just randomly infects say...90% or more of the population(that would break down any organized response).

 

[sojourner]

Yeah, the biggest advantage we have ironically is all of the zombies in the media. Practically everyone in the western world has been educated on what to do in case of a zombie outbreak.

Now, if an outbreak occurred in some alternate reality where zombie fiction was never introduced, it might go much worse.

 

[Vendikarr]

If you postulate a functioning military, then in the U.S., the military is forbidden from acting domestically without orders from the President due to the Posse Comitatus Act. So all the military bases across the country can do is seal themselves and await orders.

National Guard units however can mobilize when called up by their state Governor and are free to act as necessary.

If you believe a zombie uprising is little more than an annoyance, they you have to believe the military will follow the law of the land and have to wait for orders from the Commander in Chief. Otherwise action can be seen as breaking the law when things settle down, and those commanders who took action better be ready for punishment.