Grimm

It's been fifteen years. Fifteen long, hard years, since everything went to shit. It started off small, a company in Texas was doing biological warfare research, and they stumbled across something terrible. The outbreak happened much quicker than we could possibly have imagined.

Within the first few weeks reports started to trickle in, we all thought it was some new street drug making people act crazy. Only the lunatics used the words zombie, or undead. The local news station coined it some new, advanced strain of rabies grown in a lab. Riots broke out in some cities in front of research centers.

Things died down for a little while, things seemed to go back to normal, except for the internet. Theories erupted, spreading like wildfire. Eventually the news picked it up again.

It was worse now, in the low thousands here in America, and reports were beginning in other countries as well. Infected Americans carrying the virus on ships and planes, no doubt. A lot of countries closed down their borders in an attempt to save their people, a lot of good that did.

As reports grew and we started to see the infected roaming the streets at night, we were told to stay indoors. Don't come out, don't get close, don't try to take them down alone. They were dangerous, out of their minds. Some people listened, others didn't.

There was a big push for the border, both Mexico and Canada, though Mexico was completely overrun, there was too much poverty there, people were too close, too dirty.

Canada wasn't as bad, especially with winter setting in, the cold seemed to effect these people. Military had been dispatched all over, but there just weren't enough troops to cover everywhere. They were quickly overwhelmed.

As the death toll climbed, so did the hysteria. News stations went off air, television stopped, the internet was completely accessible in some areas. Using a phone was worthless, they were constantly jammed with calls.

The worst part was watching someone you knew, maybe cared about, die and then having to kill them half an hour later when they reanimated. The word Zombie became common in those days.

America was great once, China, England, Germany, Japan, Australia, Canada. People everywhere were overrun, it just spread too quickly for us to contain. No cure was ever developed, we figured the scientists gave up and fled. There's rumors all the important people are on an island somewhere, or a sub maybe, but that's just whispers.

About ten years ago the panic had worn off. People didn't expect help anymore, they helped themselves. We were outnumbered about two to one at that time, and it was frightening.

You didn't have friends at that point, you didn't get close to people. They just died, they'd disappear, you'd never see them again. Or worse, you would. You'd see them shuffling towards you in the street, reaching for you with a dead look in your eyes. That was worse.

The government disappeared at some point, it wasn't overnight, it was slow. Troops got turned, or died, people abandoned their posts to search for their families. Or they turned on their own men and took over military bases. Those were safe for a while, if you could put up with whatever whackadoo decided he was in charge that week. They eventually broke down, too, when the supplies ran out.

When food and water got scarce, that's when the panic really set in. You'd get shot over a bottle of water, or a can of food. That stuff was gone after a while, though. At least, the stuff you could find. There's always rumors of stockpiles underground somewhere where millionares are living it up, but no one has ever found anything to back up those claims.

It got worse after that, I didn't think it could, but it got worse. That's when the gangs got bad. You'd find a place, clean it up, move your group in. Get settled, start making a life there, dealing with the dead when you had to. A few months later someone would come in and take over. You could either give it to them, ir they'd kill you. Most of them were ex-military, or they'd been near the bases when it all went to hell.

Fuel became scarce, too, eventually. You stopped seeing people driving around, and saw them walking, running, or riding a bike. Solar energy became the new thing, and everyone tried to find a way to harness it. Unfortunately for most, without prior knowledge of how that all worked, it wasn't easy to do.

It's been years ago now, though. Most people are gone. I haven't seen another group in a while, and the ones I have seen only had a few people. We decided a couple years ago to head north, to see if we could etch out something resembling what we once had.

It seemed like the further we went north, the less dead there were. There was evidence that people had survived here longer, but there were few remaining when we arrived. We thought it out, we found a place that would work for us.

We found an old wildlife preserve, a place where it got cold enough in the winter that the dead would freeze, a place far enough north that there was little threat here. There were other threats, of course. For nearly fifteen years these animals had roamed freely, in complete control of the territory, and that would not be easily changed. Still, it would be worth it.

We took over the old reserve building,