We Hate Zombies

Scenario:
Holy shit! You fell off the grid for over a month because you moved to Mon-fucking-tana (as your friend Daniel so delicately put it) and everything is unfamiliar. It is a true zombie survivalists nightmare because there is no escape plan. There is no safe fortress. Hell, there isn’t even a goddamn Steak-N-Shake in sight. In fact, you’ve just realized that there are mountains in every direction, making a quick escape unlikely. Then you hear it. The scrape of a bloody stump, flesh and bone, scraping across the sidewalk. Zombies. What do you do now?

What you should do:
Well, you’re boned. You’ve unknowingly moved into a giant bowl with side too steep to climb out of without the use of the interstate, which is closed by the way because of the 100 mile long line of cars going nowhere. It’s a buffet for zombies. The only chance you have comes from a movie widely regarded as the survival oasis of the new century.

The International features a scene where a world class assassin needs advice from some boy he is playing Go with. I believe the quote goes like this: “If there is no way out, find a way deeper in.” Because this makes more sense than the alphabet, I made it my mantra and so should you. Head into the heart of town, into the zombie jungle. There you will find safety.

This is what I like to call the Montana Paradox. You would think that getting out of town would be the best way to save your ass, but in this case it isn’t for you. You can find safety in the heart of zombie land. But how? Easy, head that way in your car because that side of the road will be empty of cars. Once you get to the heart of town, find a safe place to hide and pray that you don’t shit your pants. Zombies love the smell of soiled pants.

What I would do:
I would actually just drive on the wrong side of the road. I would drive to safety and then start a forest fire that would hopefully burn the entire place to the ground. Then I would rent a redbox at a Wal-Mart, grab a six pack of cold beer, pick up a forty oz for the road and have myself a good time in Wyoming. NOTE: Must stop at a Wal-Mart before Wyoming. There isn’t shit in Wyoming.

Scenario:
Like a badass, you have a game room in your basement oddly situated next to a bunch of tools across the room, including a crowbar, hacksaw, and some battery powered shit. Maybe you have a garage in your basement, maybe your wife just hates your things and wants it trapped in the downstairs, whatever. Also, you have a computer down there too, which you only ever use just for watching pr0n while you play a game of pool. Which is what you’re doing.

But then something in the back of your mind triggers a heightened sense of awareness, and you begin to hear the sounds of distant screaming. Oh baby, this is what you’ve always dreamt of, time for some action! Except you can hear they’re already in your house. And they’re already infecting your wife. Holy shit! They’re already coming down into your man cave and are between you and all your possible weapons! What do you do?

What you should do:
Pull your pants up and fasten your safety belt, cause it’s time to rock! As a reminder to everyone who doesn’t remember every word that I’ve ever preached, there’s no such thing as being separated from all possible weapons. As soon as you stand up, you should immediately become aware that all your junk no longer has meaning beyond what damage it can inflict on an infected rotten turd muncher.

At your desk, you understand the world is over and that the computer will soon lose power forever. First weapon: the computer. Without a computer, the desk is nothing. Second weapon: the desk. Then you realize you don’t have time to sit down anymore. Third weapon: the chair. And you never really played pool anyway cause you suck really bad at it. Fourth weapon: pool sticks, the cue ball, America.

Without knowing the meaning of fear, you should smash that sticky keyboard into the teeth of the first blood-thirsty zombie, knocking him backward onto his ass. Then throw the chair across the room and trip up the three zombies still coming down the stairs. The pool balls are worthless to you, but grab two pool sticks and overturn the table onto the toothless downed dead bastard still struggling to get up.

Two wooden spears in hand, all that’s left is to dance a dance of everlasting death, spearing the lifeless eyes of those cursed fuckers until you reach your wall o’ tools. I won’t even list the different weapons you’ve suddenly found for yourself, but I think you won’t have any trouble cleaning up this mess and getting the hell out of Dodge.

What I would do:
No ex-Major League pitcher turned nine ball pro would be able to resist spinning onto the pool table and beaming zombies straight in the face with a rack of balls…which is exactly what I would do. For a little bit anyway, because it would be fun, like Shaun of the Dead throwing records at zombies kind of fun. I guess what I’m trying to say is Family Fun. Unlike what was on the computer.

After having my bit of fun, the rage would inevitably settle back in, and there would be nothing left to hold back my wrath. Any zombie still standing would immediately get a face full of CRT monitor, followed by a desk full-body-slamming. Keep in mind that none of these things are likely to put a zombie down for the count, at least not like poking them through the eye with a wooden stake, but it helps me control my penchant for burning fury — by adding gas to the flames.

Immediately I would begin dismantling my stairs one board at a time, taking each one and beating the moving corpses until it splintered into fragments and the sons of dead, motherless goats really stopped moving for good. The blood and gore would be epic and fascinating, the kind of phenomenon mathematicians might someday study for fractal splatter analysis.

I would probably need to take a shower, then run to the nearest Taco Bell and see if they had been overrun yet. Booyah! Say hello to my Burrito baby.

Thanks to Tyler for submitting this scenario.

Scenario:

You’re walking down the street in a busy part of town munching on some Krispy Kreme donuts at 2 in the morning on a Wednesday night when suddenly the floor drops out from under you and you tumble down with a comical face and a sound kind of like “lurp!”  As you’d been walking down the street, the sewer grating underneath had collapsed from wear, tear, and negligence, leaving you 10 feet below the sidewalk, alone, with only coffee soaked pants and half a donut to your name.  Fortunately for you, there’s a faint light coming down a branching tunnel, so you stand up, curse the day you were born, and walk quietly towards the light hoping to find an exit.  Instead, you stumble across a circle of hooded figures chanting, and there in the middle you see two things: a dead body and an unconscious woman.  The dead body starts to wake up; they’re bringing it back, and that woman is the first snack!  What do you do?

What you should do:

Whenever confronted with a strange cult situation, always check yourself before running in to battle.  The problem with cults is that they are sometimes headed by a very charismatic back-stabbing whores, like cheesecake and eclairs, so enticing and mind-blowing.  Like snakes in the grass, the leader might surprise you and render you into a pile of shit and steal your power and  turn you into zombie food.  That’s not what we want, so check yourself, clog your ears, then go in swinging.

Also, don’t make the mistake of trying to rescue the female snack.  More likely than not, she’s part of this whole debacle and would just slit your throat as soon as you turned your back.

So the first thing you do is wait for the zombie to come to life.  This will hopefully work to your advantage while also giving you a moment to relish the kill.  As soon as the zombie stirs but before it’s gained a target, throw the rest of the donut-yes, I said, the rest of the god damned donut-at the farther side of the ring.  Unless you suck at throwing things (in which case you should begin practicing now), you should hit your target or at least get close enough to cause a disturbance.

This will be like hitting the jackpot, because then they will probably not freak their shit out, but they might, and if they do you should run up and pull the hoods over their eyes like hockey players fighting on the ice.  Then knock them down toward the zombie and run into the darkness.  Dart in and out like this a few times and I’m sure you’ll have turned them all into dumb zombies.  That’s when you’re trapped in the sewers with the undead.  While typically a bad idea, I think it might work out for you just so long as you find a weapon.

Good luck.

What I would do:

Sometimes people are born legendary, uniquely American, with a sense of suave built into the hair and some sort of alluring man-essence that smells like something everyone is familiar with but no one can place.  Sometimes a man like that is born, and sometimes grows up being popular and eventually becomes president or something like that.  Other times they stumble across zombies early on in their teens and their life changes forever so that they spend all their persuasive powers convincing the public to prepare against a threat most are too dumb to even rationalize.  What a real fucking waste. Still, some listen, some know, some prepare, and it’s those few that make something out of nothing.

If you hadn’t guessed by now, I am just such a man, a man of raw power and intellect and cunning, a man who’s only fault is that he can’t think highly enough of himself.  Like Gandalf the White I would throw off my dirty, coffee soaked rags and show the true brilliance of my being.  (Someone cue the p-uhrrm-elevator music.)  Then, while everyone is stunned, in the time it takes their pupils to adjust, I would have splashed words of solid liquid gold upon their ears, and they would realize nothing but agree with me anyway, and they would pull out their hidden daggers and cut out the brain of that zombie, and then they would turn the daggers on themselves and pass out of existence.

After that, the rest is kind of a boring let-down.  Wandering the sewers for a few hours, getting arrested as a vagrant, being beaten by an insomniac officer suffering from paranoia who believes everyone is sleeping with his wife, and finally being released by the city’s up and coming police chief with coupons for free tacos.  Pretty much just the standard stuff.

Scenario:
Do you know what happens every four years in this country? Certainly not the World Cup! No, it’s the Presidential elections! This is a serious time for zombie-survivalists because the elected President will be in charge of preparing the nation against the threat of zombie invasions world-wide. The President’s policies could make the difference between eternal apocalypse and everlasting glory, and it’s up to you as a good citizen to make sure you know which candidate is the best for the job.

Unfortunately, no candidate likes to talk about their zombie contingency plans, so you decide to go to a campaign rally and ask in person. You get up real close to the front, so they can hear you, and just as you’re about to ask, you see what you figured you would see and realize that it’s too late and the country isn’t prepared because the current President didn’t do a very good job of many things. Zombies, of course, eating away at the edges of the crowd you’re in the middle of. What do you do?

What you should do:
Well, you should have brought some damn weapons, but either they checked for those at the door or you forgot or who knows what the hell. If you have weapons, you still have your work cut out for you because there will soon be zombies all around you. Depending on your weapon, I would suggest frightening those nearby so they give you space, then try and cut a path away from the nearest zombies. Keep in mind that certain candidates have certain kinds of protection that might shoot you in the head if they see you with a weapon before they know what’s going on, so keep that in mind less you want to die young.

Now, if you don’t have weapons, you still have a couple options. For instance, you could attempt to hide under the podium/stage, gambling that the zombies will chase people fleeing for their lives and leave you enough room to make a quiet exit. You should not, however, get up on the stage unless you are following the candidate through a secure back exit, acting like everyone showed up just to hear you speak, or sniping zombies from above the crowd. Which makes me want to point out that every candidate will always have a secure back exit, and even though you may not immediately be allowed to go down that exit, it will quickly be cleared once the poo hits the house.

Once outside, do whatever you do best, which I hope is killing zombies (as opposed to calling your mom).

What I would do:
Do you know what security guards generally don’t consider weapons? Energy drinks and chairs. Every campaign rally of any size always has some kind of portable chair because the stage is in the middle of the stands and the candidates need to have normal, every-day kinds of people sitting real close so the cameras can get some footage of the politician being down amongst the people. Then it starts to get hot under the lights and all the people breathing hard and some people start to sweat and hallucinate and get a little light headed and then they maybe hear screams and start slamming down cans of highly-caffinated liquid sugar like there’s a run on the bank and then they stand up and reach for their chair and black out and the next thing you know the IZRM¹ wears off and it’s very quiet.

What was I saying? Oh, yeah. Not many people know this, but I have two dogs. One is a tank covered with a dog chassis and the other is some breed of tangible lightning. I can call on them from anywhere in the world and they will magically appear at my side to assist me. When the zombies start to attack, I send out a subsonic whistle that penetrates the earth and calls the war-hounds to my side (sometimes other dogs too). Then I order the tank-dog to blow through the water main and the nearby water pipes until the whole area is covered in water. This gives lightning dog the opportunity to work some white fire into the mix, electrocuting everyone too stupid to get out of the wetness (which would be all the zombies). After enough electricity, the zombies’ charred remains will eventually degenerate into ash and crisps, completely safe to wash a baby in.

Also, I have a shotgun, and no one has yet taken that away from me.

¹Instinctual Zombie Response Mechanism, basically a self-defense response to zombie or zombie-like threats. Just FYI in case you haven’t heard.

Scenario:
Hurry up, dammit! It’s 11:58 at night and you’re exhausted, tired from a day of busy procrastination, and now you’re busy waiting. All that’s left before you can go to bed is Woot… sweet, sweet Woot. You have to know what tomorrow’s Woot is going to be, otherwise you’ll never get any sleep. You tried going to bed early, once, and all you could do was worry that you’d missed another bag of crap. Never again! 11:59.

Click for the full effect

So tired, eyes bloodshot, you open the computer clock just to watch the second hand. It’s painful. Midnight! You rush to hit refresh over and over until the new Woot pops on the screen.

On no… this is bad. T-Virus, two for Tuesday, $4.99. Woot’s unknowingly selling the zombie plague. What do you do?

What you should do:
Run to the dirty clothes pile and rummage through the weeks of ketchup stains and stiff socks until you find your zombie hunting Woot shirt. Wearing your zombie hunting shirt will show the world that you are one that others can rally behind and look to for support and guidance, kind of like a lighthouse but with a gun. It will make people think twice before considering you a zombie, and everyone will know that you never have to think twice about anything. It’s shirt.Woot.solid, guaranteed.

Next, place an order for as many of the T-Virus Vials as possible. Don’t think about budgets or money, because you can’t put a price tag on saving the world. Use a credit card, or all your credit cards, or all of your friends’ credit cards, until you have enough buying power to buy out Woot. Do I know how much that will take? No. Does anyone? No. It’s such a secret that no one knows except Woot and occassionally that mystical Woot-Off bar. Sirens? Oh yeah, I hear em too.

It doesn’t even matter if you can afford the tall order, you just need to buy some time and keep the world from inadvertently falling into chaos like a screaming monkey pissing on a leak frog. When you’ve done the best you can, it’s time for damage control. Start shooting out emails to Woot staff, flood the message boards, flame dissenters, and engage in lengthy one-line wars of wit with ten year olds. The message must go out, and who better to spread the word than a million people capable of shopping only at a store that sells one item a day. No one, that’s who, because it takes focus to shop a single item and it takes focus to spread the word.

Oh, and if the world lives long enough for you to get your shipment, burn the entire lot immediately, then make a YouTube video with stage props showing how the stuff turns people into zombies. After that, there’s nothing left to do but find the Brave Woman. She’ll know what to do.

What I would do:
First things first, gotta find that zombie hunter t-shirt. Good thing I keep it on top of my bullet proof vest, which happens to be right on top of a box of dynamite. You know, just in case I feel the need to keep things lively. Oh, speaking of which, I’m going to need that dynamite, because it’s not going to be midnight forever.

After I don my vest and shirt, I would pack my dynamite into the car, then call up the Brave Woman, number 6 on speed dial. With any luck she would give me permission to pass through her territory and maybe even give me info on movements between the Robots and the Monkeys. Those rival gangs are always going at it, and despite the urgency it will pay to be careful if I can avoid being caught up in the middle of one of their battles.

Then I would hit the road. I know it’s midnight my time, and I know that in as little as 5 hours Woot is going to be opening those warehouse doors for a full day of dealing out death, unknowingly of course. That gives me five measily hours to get to Carrollton, Texas, and sweet Jesus do I need to fly if I’m going to burn down the warehouse in time to stop the first shipments from going out. Fortunately, I went to stunt driving school and got practice as the lead driver for Talladega Nights. Talk about going fast… I wanna go fast. Still, it would be a lot easier if the warehouse were with the rest of Woot.

If Google Maps has anything to say for accuracy, that’s 640 miles of driving. Luckily, I only have to average 128 miles per hour to make it on time. Unfortunately, that doesn’t give me very much time, not even time to stop. I would set the car on cruise, light whatever explosives I had left, then jump out of the car as it hurtled towards certain glory. After the bullet proof vest absorbed most of the trauma from hitting the ground at high speed, I would stand up and hide behind some bushes to watch, waiting. Legend has it that if enough bags of crap burn in a hot enough fire, a green burst of light will shoot into the sky and grant wishes to all who see.

Ironically, I would wish for a bag of crap. Those things are so damn hard to find! Dammit, I missed another one!