Chapter Two: A Well Fortified Position

Scott carefully collected and inspected his gear. He stood at the waist high work table he had set up next to his front door. It held most of his arsenal. He began appropriating it all, setting each tool of destruction on its appropriate part of his body.

The combat knife was first. He slipped it into the sheath on his right hip. While he wasn't ambidextrous, he had taught himself to use his left hand decently well. The knife was sharpened each day.

The pistol was next. A Swiss SIG P210. He'd hunted around for quite a while before he'd found this weapon, in the beginning. He wanted to have one main pistol, and stick with it. Of course he'd taught himself how to use others, two other models as back ups and pistols in general. But he wanted to make sure he learned one intimately, and kept it on him, no matter what, so that he would always have the weapon he was most comfortable with. He trained daily with the 210. It was a beautiful thing. It was a sleek, dark sidearm. Heavy, but not too much so. He'd grown used to its weight. Unfortunately, he'd had to purchase it illegally, since he wasn't twenty one.

As if that mattered now. When he got the thing, it had been black with an ugly brown handle. He'd painted the handle a brilliant silver color. He'd also added in a laser scope and a silencer. The weapon was fairly common in most gun stores, Scott had found. That had been part of the deciding factor. Obviously, keeping this weapon meant that several areas would have to hold clips of ammo for it and the proper bullets.

One of the other deciding factors was that it took twenty twos. In The Zombie Survival Guide, Max Brooks had stipulated that twenty twos were the most common bullets in America, and should be considered number one on your list of bullets. It was true. Every store sold them. The only drawback, he had said, was that they didn't have much in the way of stopping power. That didn't seem to be a problem in this particular outbreak, however.

Scott noted that most of the 'Common', as he called them, undead seemed to have a rapid state of decay. While they ran 28 Days Later style, they lacked the strength of any other Zombie he'd seen. And, interestingly, they didn't adhere to the number one rule set by George Romero in 1968: shoot them in the head.

The average Common could be taken out with a handful of shells to the body. The reality of surviving a Zombie Apocalypse had become much more realistic when Scott had learned this. Unfortunately, the Infected seemed to make up for this with the Specials. He'd seen three variations so far. He had heard names for them, over the radio waves. The Hunters. The Smokers. And the Tanks. In his travels, he had encountered them, but rarely. And the Tank only once. That was an instance he never wanted to repeat.

The Zombie Survival Guide did not cover a Tank.

Securing his 210, Scott picked up the next weapon. Those Specials? They were the reason he carried the Desert Eagle. The military seemed to love it enough that he'd managed to find a perfectly functioning one and clips for it everywhere in the streets. It took forty-fives, an impressive caliber of bullet that had amazing stopping power. He had added a small flashlight and laser scope to the barrel of this handgun.

And that was the arsenal part of his inventory. It was all he had needed so far. As for clothing, he followed one rule: tight clothes and short hair. He kept his head buzzed and invested in clothing that was tight without being uncomfortable. He only wished there were women around. For once in his life, he felt confident about his appearance. Before his change, he had always gone with loose fitting, baggy clothes and a big hoodie that covered his frame. He never felt very confident in the looks department. Never felt confident about much.

That thought snagged on Scott's mind as he prepared the rest of his meager inventory: a lighter, a tiny flashlight and a well packed first aid kit. A woman...For the same reason he had moved away from his parents and friends, Scott had never looked for a girlfriend. He found the idea of such impossible. There was likely no woman he could let close enough into his life that would understand his fixation.

But now that it had happened? Well, that was a whole different story. No one would think he was out of his mind for being obsessed with a Zombie Apocalypse, because it had already happened! Now, if only he could find just one living, attractive woman...

Scott cleared his head and finished gathering his gear. He double and triple checked everything, then headed for his door. It was a reinforced metal door that he'd stolen from a hardware store and lugged to his apartment after the dust had settled. He unlocked the padlock and stepped outside, locking the corresponding padlock on the other side, and then pocketing the key. It wouldn't stop a Tank, but it would keep anything else at bay indefinitely. Scott was pleased by the fact that so far, nothing had even made it into his apartment building yet.

Speaking of the apartment building...Scott mentally reviewed his specifications and progress on the defense of the structure as a whole as he approached the stairwell. He made his way through a second metal door he'd installed at the top of the stairwell next to his apartment. There was another one just like it down the corridor, at the other stairwell.

Since the town was abandoned, Scott had immediately begun work on fortifying his position. He had completely closed off the first floor. One of the reasons that Scott had chosen this apartment building in particular was that it was built with very strong and durable material, so that the average Zombie could not break through weak points in the structure. He double reinforced all of the windows with a layer of brick and mortar, and then a large piece of furniture over it. He was surprised, once more, at how fast he could move.

Each floor held six apartments. Each floor was designed exactly the same. After bricking up every window and exterior door, Scott would then thoroughly hunt over every square inch of each room and empty out any supplies he thought he might need. Weapons, food, bottles of water, clothing, random supplies. After that, he bricked off the front door to the apartment, as a sort of double insurance that even if something got inside the apartment, it would have that much more trouble getting into the main building and ultimately up to him.

He had completed this process nine times now. The bottom floor was completely secure. The second floor half way finished. There were only two ways into and out of the apartment building now. The front and back doors had also been replaced with thick, secure metal doorways. As he made his way down to the second floor, he double checked everything.

Three apartments had been cleared out, bricked up and blocked off. At first, he had questioned bricking off the second story windows. But then he had heard and later witnessed how well the Hunters could climb, and even heard of the Commons doing the same, and then it was no question at all. Today, he hoped to finish up a fourth apartment and begin on a fifth. Eventually, he would have them all cleaned out and bricked off, save for his own. He also planned on bricking off the second stairwell. He wanted as little ways in and up as possible.

Eventually, the only window left not bricked off with be the one with the sniper rifle pointed out of it. That one led to a fire escape. His only real means of escape if the unthinkable occurred and something broke into his apartment. He had planned for this, and had a ladder connecting his apartment building to the next one over. Eventually, Scott planned on fortifying that one in much the same method.

He continued to make his way down through the building after making sure nothing undead was hiding in the second story. Each stairwell had a metal door at the base. It was a long and slow process of going down to the ground floor, but it was worth it. Scott eventually came to rest at the first floor, and slipped his 210 out of the holster. He kept the safety off. He checked what little open space that was left in the area, namely, the laundry room, the lobby and a communal bathroom. He had bricked up the small windows, but left them open for their obvious use as sources of water in case, for some reason, his stopped working.

The city still functioned, but Scott didn't know how long that would last. There was still power. There was still running water. Nevertheless, he had a pair of solar powered generators on the roof, ready to go, and a hell of a lot of water stored in the bathroom and laundry room. After making sure that the area was thoroughly clear, and everything was just as he left it, Scott pressed on, coming to the lobby of the building.

He glanced through a small slit in the metal door and peered around. Nothing had shown up since he'd taken out the local Zombies. He waited a few moments, then unlocked the door and stepped outside. After triple checking the area, he locked the door again, pocketed the ring of keys and put both hands on the pistol.

He mentally reviewed his list of things to do outside the apartment building today. There were two places he meant to check out. Scott had a map of the city, a very thorough map that clearly labeled each building. He had begun checking out each for supplies, and marking each off the list either once he had looted it completely, or found that it had already been cleaned out. He made sure he only did two a day, since much time was needed for each search, and being outside was quite dangerous, even despite his preparations.

Scott approached his vehicle of choice. A military issue HumVee. It was still in great shape, a well maintained piece of driving technology. He'd picked it up, keys still in the ignition, a few streets down, not too long ago. Again, he marveled at all the things the military just left lying around.

Feeling prepared, Scott slipped into the vehicle, started it up and began to drive down the road, deeper into the city.