[ PI ] You 're the lone survivor of a zombie apocalypse simply because zombies are n't interested in you .

They're like pigeons. Or maybe closer to lemmings, the way they follow each other around; although I've never seen a lemming so I ca n't say for sure whether that is an accurate characterization of their mannerisms. Either way, they are definitely annoying. Perhaps I should be happy that the most extreme emotion I can muster up toward zombies is annoyance. 
 
 At first, right after the crisis hit, I was a swirl of emotions. First, there was the fear. Nights spent huddled in front of a television, watching the latest news about the epidemic, watching it spread from country to country. It hit West Africa first, and before we even really knew what it was we, the enlightened westerners, were already running to fix the problem we did n't understand. Then aid workers began coming back infected with the disease. Nobody knew how contagious and dangerous the disease was at that point. Politicians declared it was our responsibility to bring them back. Health workers promised our hospitals were advanced enough to contain it. Researchers claimed a cure was in the works. But that was just a pack of lies. 
 
 The disease began infecting nurses and doctors in the hospitals and spreading. They were placed in quarantine, along with the other aid workers, and the disease continued to defy our attempts at containment. Aided by a long incubation period and dormancy, the disease found a home inside thousands of people before we realized how misguided our attempts at quarantine were. Then the first zombies began to rise. There had been rumors coming out of Africa near the origin of the virus that it turned victims into zombies, but most of us had just written that off as African embellishment and a flair for the fantastical. The few reporters who went to investigate the claims were never heard from. 
 
 Then, there was panic. Soon the zombies began breaking out of the hospital quarantines. Their strength no longer limited by the shackles of a human mind, they were more beast than human. Their shrieks lit up the night all around the country, from coast to coast the infection spread. Not everyone was afflicted with the disease. Researchers never did have the time to figure out exactly why, but it was found that those of certain blood types were immune to the disease. I've never had mine checked, but I guess I must be immune. But those who avoided infection suffered a far more terrible fate than those who did, as the zombies feasted on their flesh. I would later discover that the zombies did not need human flesh to survive. Any meat would do for them, but in their diminished mental state they could not distinguish humans from any other animal. And from this perspective, humans presented the most abundant and convenient source of food available. 
 
 Finally, a calm set over everything. It was during a night of this panic that I discovered my gift and my curse. I had left my home, my life, and my friends in DC several weeks prior as the epidemic spread beyond control. Some stayed behind out of civic duty to man their government jobs, which had as of then become all but futile in their attempt to control the crisis. Others disappeared in the middle of the night or holed up in their houses, too paralyzed to act. I had made up my mind and was resolved to act, with or without them. I now found myself with a band of refugees in rural West Virginia. There were maybe a dozen of us, though my recollection is hazy at this point. A group of three or four military contractors, former marines who had gone into business for themselves, were the leaders of the group, navigating and providing defense. Their bearded and grizzly looks, coupled with special forces gear, always made them look more appropriate than the rest of us in our new wooded environment. Another group was composed of several college students, all male, who we had met as we pushed North along the Potomac River outside of Washington. Their appearance always had an air of inexperience and naivety, coupled with an unwavering fear that always seemed to grip them. Other groups members flowed in and out over the weeks, joining forces as their paths crossed with ours and departing when it was no longer convenient. A park ranger, a social worker, an old drifter, the list went on. I myself had the good fortune of loaning my parking space to one of the contractors, so that when he came to retrieve some of his military gear from his vehicle I was able to coax him into including me in their plans. Funny how something so simple as a parking space could have been responsible for whether I lived or died.
