Chapter One: The Beginning

I sit down on a soft sofa in the comfortable parlor of the large farm house. Aside from the steel bars over the windows, thick metal doors, and tactical assault rifle propped beside the antique chair across from me, the entire house, decorated in largely Victorian style, looks more like a wealthy plantation home than the center of one of the most successful groups of survivors in the United States. It's also hard to believe that the man sitting in front of me, now in his late 30's, is Drake, the legend of East Kentucky I have come to interview. His long, black hair, tied in a ponytail speaks of his partial Native American ancestry. Wearing camouflage military pants, knee-high moccasins, and a black tee shirt, he looks more out of place in his house than his house does in post-war America.

You're thinking that I look nothing like the hardcore, zombie-killing, feudal warlord that all the rumors make me out to be, right?

[He smiles, and I detect a hint of slyness] I've heard a lot of rumors about you, and all the stories about the small civilization you built during the war. I just wanted to hear your side of it.

That's cool. No one's ever really asked me for the truth. Me or anyone else that would tell the truth. I guess that's why I'm up there with Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett, you know. That's why I'm glad you decided to write this book about me…about us.

So you're saying it was no big deal that you and your people survived, right?

Oh, it was a big deal. For us at least. We had to fight for everything…food, water, life. But I guess you want the story from the beginning, correct? I mean, you would rather have it laid out in chronological order.

If you don't mind.

First off, I've read your book. Your collection of stories and anecdotes from all these people, saying how "unprepared" and panicked they were when the thing went epidemic. You talked to teachers and politicians, soldiers and suburbanites. I noticed how you failed to mention the pre-war zombie-freaks1, many of which actually survived.

I'm sorry…

No big deal. [He gestures as if brushing away the apology] You see, years before the war, there were groups of people who actually thought zombies might rise someday. Call us crazy, I guess we kind of were…watched too many Romero movies, I suppose. Anyway, I was one of these guys. I never took the whole "zombipocalypse" thing very seriously, but I was a survivalist by any means. Heh…I thought it would be the ChiComs2 that hit us…that, or we'd screw the pooch ourselves. But zombies? That was always kind of a "what if" thing.

So you were prepared for an eventual calamity anyway?

I already had a couple years worth of food for me and my fiancée. We had gas masks, firearms, ahospital's worth of first aid supplies, and enough ammo to supply a regiment. I had already bolted bars over my windows, and installed heavy doors. I figured the more prepared we were for everything, the better the chance we had at surviving anything. I had even infected some of my neighbors with my paranoia. [He grins again] I had learned any kind of armed or unarmed fighting technique that taught flexibility and adaptability, rather than rigid, dogmatic moves. I had some training in everything from field medicine to guerilla tactics, from wilderness survival to hand-to-hand combat. I even trained in ninjutsu. I wasn't just some armchair Rambo either. I'd been a merc for a while, and my camping trips were like one of those wilderness survival shows that used to be on TV, so I had real world experience. I guess when the zombies came, I was more prepared to deal with it than the army3. I had a copy of your survival guide too, and it really gave me an edge, so I should be thanking you.

You're quite welcome.

Anyway, believe it or not, I was blissfully unaware of the beginnings of the epidemic. We had no TV, phone or internet at our house, and I rarely listened to the radio, if you can believe that. I was "under a rock" for a week and a half. I finally saw the news reports on TV while visiting a relative. The so called "African Rabies" was getting the limelight then. When I heard about the infected attacking and trying to eat others, my mind went straight to Defcon 5. I hit the net right away, and ignoring all the official party lines, went straight to the boards and blogs catering to survivalists. They had been gathering and posting intelligence on the situation for a week, and most of them agreed that we were looking at zombies here.

It had to be a surprise for you.

Barely. It's not like I was one of those yuppies in your book, caught with my pants down. I was prepared for survival, and I was trained for survival. From the time I was 16, I had eaten, breathed, and dreamed combat and survival. There was no time to feel anything. I had to make my preparations for this thing. I think my brain dredged up every tidbit of intel I had on zombies, and every rational plan I had made for the situation in about 3 seconds. I posted my ideas on the boards, hoping to aid everyone I could in remaining calm and thinking their way through it. "Get some place isolated, stockpile food and medicine, reinforce." That was the gist of my advice. I went to the site of a popular zombie-survival group, and found that they too were on code red. I knew them well, and sent a short, cryptic e-mail I was sure they would understand. It read something like "Looks like it's finally happened. Will fortify a position in East Ky. Comms limited to 30km C.B. transceiver. If overrun, bug out to my 20. Hope you don't have to send S&R. Good luck…we're all going to need it." I included my GPS coordinates.

I then gathered up every dime I had, even borrowing from relatives, and drove into town. I think I cleaned Wal-Mart out of every Mountain House meal they had, and bought enough vegetable seed to plant the county twice. I went to the local gun store and bought more .22, 12 gauge and 7.62X39 ammunition. I gave my neighbors a call…the ones whom I said actually bought into my survivalist ideas,and informed them of the situation. They too bought a good amount of seed, and gas…plenty of gas. Some of their relatives began moving into the hollow, bringing food, weapons and in the case of one guy, two muzzleloading cannons. My last stop was at the automotive store. I bought two marine batteries.

Marine batteries?

For backup power. I had already invested in some solar panels and batteries, and had a small solar powered backup system. Nothing big, but enough to keep a few lights on and a C.B. going if I needed it. Since my relative's house had TV and internet, and one of my neighbors had a key to our house, I had him watch the place while my fiancée and I stayed put to gather more information. We traveled back and forth for two weeks, supplying and reinforcing our house, and learning everything we could about what was happening. There was that Phalanx B.S., and the first outbreaks here in the states. The closest town had 5,200 residents, and was 120 miles from Lexington, the nearest population center. I had already planned for viral outbreaks, and knew that it would take a while for anything to reach us.

So you weren't concerned that something might happen in your area for at least a while?

Logically, no. But I still was as prepared as ever. I carried this everywhere. [He holds up the assault rifle] SKS, Soviet Design. 7.62X39 cartridge. I customized it with this AR-style stock, flashlight, laser sight, tactical scope and fore-grip. It was my favorite out of my entire collection, and turned out to be the best zombie-killing gun anyone in the group had. I probably have more confirmed kills that anyone in the state4. Anyway, I had taken the liberty of stringing barbed wire fences around my entire farm. I knew it wouldn't keep them all out, but would be better than nothing. Everyone else in the hollow was doing similar things to fortify their land as well. By now the cat was out of the bag, and most of my neighbors were stocking up on anything they could. Another week passed, and things started going to hell. The Great Panic broke out, and the nearby town started seeing people filtering in from Lexington and Louisville, no doubt trying to get somewhere isolated to ride this thing out…fuckwits.

Why do you say that?

Common sense…you have an isolated, sparsely populated area, right? And these morons all think that the best place to go is an isolated, sparsely populated area, so they all go there. Now, you have a well-known, crowded area. I lived 15 miles outside of town anyway, and everyone on the hollow had agreed we would seal the only road in from outsiders, so it still wasn't that big of a tactical SNAFU. The stores were cleaned out by now…except for the gun store…heh heh.

What about it?

They stayed open a while, making a ton of money off everyone buying guns and ammo. When the first outbreak happened in town, these three guys that owned the place and their families come in with trucks loaded with food and supplies, and seal the shop up like a damned fortress. You should have seenthe bodies outside that place. Zombies and people, a great, fucking wall of corpses, 12 feet high. So many people thought they could break in and take what they wanted. Too bad those bastards in the shop didn't make it, but it was like the Alamo up to the last.

But yeah, there were outbreaks in town finally. I was still running supplies and coordinating efforts to prepare my hollow. Like most survivalists, everyone around me knew me as some kind of weird gun-nut, Rambo guy. About half of them listened to me, and we were able to make a good defensive plan. I hadn't fully settled in for the duration though. I was still trying to hold out to the last, get as much information as I could, and hopefully through the net, save as many lives as I could. I saw the evacuations and refugee trains, and still have no pity for those irrational hordes of people that got themselves and their families killed because they popped off from fear and just stared running, with no idea where they were running to. The local news reported that Lexington and Louisville were now heavily infected. The first ones in the area were put down pretty quickly…probably infected people who made it here and then reanimated. Then it got worse.

I guess more infected started arriving in the area, or maybe zombies just started making in from the surrounding area. My fiancée wanted to evac to our house, but I insisted we stay put a little while longer. I wanted to be able to figure out exactly how bad it would get here, so that I could plan accordingly. I got a call from one of my neighbors. There had been two Z's in the neighborhood. They didn't last long. It was then that I decided to punch out. My fiancée and I drove back to the hollow. On the way, we passed a few of them, walking along the road. Fucking ugly things, you know? I think that's what got most people, even the soldiers and cops…fighting a person is one thing, but Z's look like something out of a horror movie.

Anyway, we get back to our house, and I called in all the neighbors who were "loyal" to me for a community meeting. I say "loyal", because we had a few bad apples in the neighborhood. Thieves, druggies, and plain bad neighbors. There were 15 people at the meeting. I threw out information, they threw out ideas, and we hammered out a plan. It seemed out of all present, nearly everyone was good at something. That was really the basis for the plan, division of labor. The government likes to think they were the first to come up with this brilliant idea, but [smiles] I beat them to it by a few years. Behind those closed doors, in my parlor where we're sitting now, we also hammered out the details of not only how to survive by agriculture, hunting, scavenging and whatnot, but also our defenses against zombies and looters, and…[clears throat]what would have to be done to insure our survival from ourselves.

Meaning?

Like I said, there were a lot of good people there, people who knew how to garden, how to raise livestock, how to hunt, fish, shoot, build, everything. But there were also people whom we knew would be dangerous. People who would steal, and maybe even try to kill for supplies right here among us. Redecker was a genius, so I read. Unfortunately, coming up a plan like his wasn't entirely feasible. I came up with the idea, and we put it to a vote. It was unanimous. Everyone would be given a chance to help. Those who couldn't farm or who weren't possessive of needed skills that contributed to everyone's survival would pull security. Sounds fair, right?

Yes…

But you'd be amazed at the reaction! People who had very little food and supplies were refusing to join the group to save their own lives! I remember, 5 of us went to one guy's house and told him of the neighborhood agreement. He blatantly refused to do anything for anyone, and threatened to shoot anyone who came near his house again. Here's a guy…with a family, being offered the chance for food, water, supplies, medical care, and security, in exchange for helping to keep his neighbors from being eaten. I said something to him to this effect, and he simply closed the door. I make it sound like a civil war. In reality, 4 people chose not to join. One had a lot of land big enough to plant and feed at least three families. We'd counted on this happening, and that's why the plan had a second part. Cut these people off completely. No aid, no supplies, nothing. The way the arrogant bastards wanted it. At least a few more actively jumped on the wagon.

It was fall. The rest of us had enough food for the winter, so the important thing for now was to post guard. The power was still on, I don't know how, unless they had found a way to guard the coal mines and power plant. Hell, it stayed on until January. That first little bit was a test for us all, a learning experience.

1In pre-war America, several "zombie survival groups" existed

2ChiCom: Slang for "Chinese Communist"

3It is a fact that the "zombie survivalists" suffered about 70% fewer casualties per 100 than the military

4This title is claimed by at least 50 Kentuckians, including the famous John Lee Davis, who reportedly killed 708 zombies with a 30-06 hunting rifle and a .22 pistol, and lived in his mobile home during the entire war.