BETTER ANGELS ━ the walking dead ¹

i. southern star

    

    

   

BETTER ANGELS

chapter one ; southern star
[ season 1, episode 1 ]

    

    

    

    

Some trees branches grow in the Fibonacci sequence of numbers. One branch at the top, then two, three, five, eight, thirteen, and continue almost infinitely. Josie passed time by counting branches at the top of an evergreen, on and on and on in the blistering sunshine, counting them, counting the leaves, consuming numbers to fill her head so that she didn't have to dwell on the ache in her heart.

Ever since the dead rose to walk among the living, things had been different. Things had been worse. Homes destroyed, families torn apart, souls ripped from bodies and left to become heartless shells. Children became orphans left to die an agonizing, solitary death. Parents lost their sons and daughters to bloody teeth and rotted nails. Wives were separated from their husbands, siblings were torn apart by the desperate crowds. Buildings burned. Houses crumbled. Streets cracked. Factories upturned. People were forced to either step up or die.

Josie had chosen to step up. When the sirens wailed and the world collapsed, she wasn't quite fourteen years old, yet still she drove a kitchen knife through the skull of the body that had once belonged to her stepfather. It was not something she remembered easily; usually she was prone to bouts of senseless hysteria when she woke in cold sweats from dreams that made ice of her in her sleeping bag ─ but the point was: she prevailed. For days, she ran until her feet bled and slept in closets while the dead stalked the grounds around her. By the time she found her way out of Atlanta, she was starving, tired, and dead on her feet. She was ready to be done. She had nothing left. By the time she was found by survivors, huddled alone on the outskirts, she had lost all hope.

Each and every one of the lone survivors thought they were the last people on earth. Knowing they had each other was less of a comfort than they would think. Rations and supplies became a problem. Sleeping quarters grew tight. The world did not stop spinning. Laws of science and nature would not halt in their tracks because of a plague.

This was the truth: they must learn to live through their new complications. They must adapt. Living had become a luxury ─ not something to be taken for granted. Fun and games came to an end. Children were forced to grow up before their time. Work was harder, days were longer.

But those who fought for their lives had something the others didn't ─ hope. They had grit. They survived because they had the strength to step up and believe.