How could I be so stupid! With all the packing that I did before I left for Terre Haute, why didn't I grab a few extra battery cells for the car? For starters, the car was almost drained this morning, and we had a late start letting the car charge up with the solar cells a bit before leaving. We made it a good 100 miles until the batteries were so low that we couldn't go much farther. To make matters worse, when we pulled over to let the car charge back up in the sun, the skies went overcast and now the damned thing wasn't charging at all! I'm so stupid! I should have anticipated something like this.
We're in the northern part of Champagne, IL right now. We left the car on the side of the highway and we walked down the road to look for some shelter. We didn't have to go very far until we ran into Baytowne Apartments, a complex that surrounds an amoeba-shaped pond. There was also clear evidence that it was attacked by a horde some time ago. There are several mostly eaten corpses lying on the ground, but only a few draggers were still lurking around the place. Their state of decay was so advanced, they tripped and fell trying to move towards us and just crawled along the ground. Wallace and I stomped their skulls in while Hector stayed back with Temperance to make sure no draggers snuck up behind us.
The leathers must not have found this place, because I haven't seen any sign of them. It's nice to know that the vivensmortua virus doesn't just spontaneously mutate. A mutated strain needs to be transmitted to other hosts via actual contact in order to propagate. This means there should be pockets across the country where the zombie population is nothing but draggers. If they didn't find any humans to eat, then they could simply rot to the point where they become immobile and pose even less of a threat.
It makes me wonder if there aren't more settlements like Rhinelander within these pockets. I know there's a website that lists some settlements, but I'm sure it doesn't contain every one of them. There has to be some places where they have no access to the internet at all. Doesn't really matter, though. The only interested settlement I care about right now is Rhinelander, but it we're not making it back tonight. Kat's got to be worried to death about me, about the rest of us. She expected us back by now.
We planned on taking up residence in the first unit, but we were hit in the face with an overwhelming smell of mold and mildew. Something must have happened in this building, maybe a pipe burst or there was a fire and the sprinklers came on to put it out. Whatever the case, with so much mold, it wouldn't be healthy for our respiratory systems to spend the night here.
We ended up settling in Unit B just off to the right. It smelled dusty and the air was stale, but at least it was dry. We decided just for safety reasons, we were all going to spend the night in the same apartment. Luckily, the one we picked had a fireplace, so we looked for things to burn. We broke off legs from tables, and I hacked at the table itself to break it into smaller pieces and threw them all into the fireplace, but then we had a hell of a time getting the fire to start. Wallace went Boy Scouts and started rubbing two sticks together over a wad of crumpled up newspapers until we got an ember to light the fireplace.
The fire was a real treat to have. It was also getting extremely cold. Wallace wanted to be left alone with her wife for a bit, so Hector and I went to explore the rest of the complex to see if we could find anything useful. Of course, the very first apartment we search, we found a box of matches. If we ever need to start a fire again, though, they would definitely come in handy. We also found food in one apartment's cupboard - some baked beans and canned mixed vegetables. That would be our dinner, and we could even cook them in their cans by placing them in the fire.
I talked to Hector a bit while we continued to search, asking how he was adjusting to not having his right arm, and he said it was incredibly difficult at first. He's right-handed, so its made some things harder for him to do. I told him I was worried about him snapping and killing Wallace, even Temperance, for what Wallace did to him, but he said that desire long went away. It honestly was just a horrible accident. He considered himself fortunate to just be alive. I'm glad to see he's been able to keep his sanity putting my worries about the virus making him crazy to bed.
When we returned to the apartment, the bedroom door was shut and either they didn't hear us come in, or they simply didn't care, but they were making love noises. Some may find that sick, a pregnant couple having sex, but not me. I find it beautiful. Kat and I have already done that but of course, she's not showing yet. When she gets as big as Temperance, that won't affect me in the slightest. I'll still find her beautiful and I'll still want her, because I love her. Hearing them in that bedroom simply puts a smile on my face, because I know they love each other. It's something this world needs a hell of a lot of right now, even before it all went to shit.
They came out about 30 minutes later, and they saw us looking at them. I smiled, and they became embarrassed as they looked at other's red faces. Temperance asked when we got back and Hector started to speak, but I nudged him and said just a few minutes ago. She just gave an "ahh" and Wallace coughed and asked if we're ready to eat dinner yet. So, I pulled out the canned food Hector and I found and we put in the fire to heat up. Once we started eating, I told them more about Rhinelander, and the defenses they had and how awesome the solar panels were. I said how much they were going to love it. We also played some poker with Hector's deck. Yes, he still has those cards. He even found a way to shuffle one handed. He said so long as he still has one hand, he'll be playing cards. If he loses his other arm, he'll play cards with his feet! I chuckled at that.
And now it's snowing outside. The flakes aren't all that large but they're many of them, and they're being whipped around by the wind. It's almost as if we're in a snow globe and someone's just shaken us. I'm not one to pray, but I really do pray it doesn't become a blizzard, because that's all we need with more than 400 miles to go in an electric car that needs solar energy to charge. Regardless, I'm going to get up before dawn and clear the snow off the car so the sun can hit those solar cells.
Twice in a row I'll be sleeping without Kat. Heh, it's gotten me thinking about why I've been writing this journal. It started out as a record of events and a list of survival tips to keep whoever's reading this alive, but it's become more personal than that to me. I know at times it sounds like a love story, and well, it's both a love and survival story. Kat's a major reason why I'm still alive today. Of course, who knows what my life would have been like had I not met her. She was the reason my life was in danger to even begin with, but I could have also found myself in a different situation without her, a much more dangerous one. I could have even stumbled into a river and drowned. Or, I could have gone insane from being alone and who knows? I might have become another Rampert. Yeah, if you can, let yourself fall in love with someone. I haven't given you survival tips in a long while, but that's a really good one right there. Let yourself fall in love. Just remember to be smart about it.
Until tomorrow.
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