Lethbridge County, Alberta, Canada.

I sit in what is the breadbasket of an entire nation, fields of grain and pasture land stretch on for as far as I can see, only interrupted by slight rolling hills, a copse of trees, or the odd farmhouse in the distance.  The quiet of the evening only disturbed by the far off sound of a combine bringing in this year's harvest.  I smile in appreciation as my host allows me first choice of the steaks he has just taken off the wood grill.  My first ribeye in years, properly dry aged, it brings tears to my eyes to taste the nutty beef flavor again.

We live a lot better than most up here.  You wouldn't know it from just a year ago, but we got things together pretty fast once we got Zack all sorted out.  I remember a pre-war study that said Alberta workers were amoung the most productive in the world.  I believe it now.

The entire family sits down to dinner, my host's wife, his mother and father, sister and brother-in-law.  Its nice to see one family more or less together, you would think things were almost normal in the world.  Reluctantly, I take my attention away from my meal and to the matter at hand.

Mr. Ravenwood, how would you describe the first days of the infection?

First of all, its just Ravenwood, understand?  We don't stand for title up here.

The first days we didn't really worry about it at all.  Life went on, we had already dealt with swine flu and it didn't change things any.  Fuck, Avian flu, SARS, Swine flu, it was like every six months there was a new black plague that was going to ravage the planet and kill everyone on it.  We knew something was going on and that it started in China.  Gee whiz, cram a few billion people into a country that has little infrastructure, poor sanitary conditions, and a government that didn't really care if its people lived or died, what did you think was gonna happen?  We really didn't care until they started closing down the border and turning aircraft back, then we figured something was up.  Sure there was the news, but every government in the world was doing its best to play down the threat in order to avoid general panic, it wasn't like they were going to tell the truth or anything.

So you weren't really worried at all?

Hell yes I was worried, but I was worried because everyone was doing exactly what they were told to do.  Take the swine flu vaccine for instance.  When Health Canada told everyone they should get the shot, even healthy people lined up in November outside clinics waiting an average 3-5 hours to get a shot.  That makes sense, mixing with the most at risk to be sick, in sub-zero temperatures outside, in order to avoid getting the flu.  Didn't really make sense to me.  It was no different with Phalanx.  Health Canada ordered enough to vaccinate everyone in Canada, but most of it never showed up, probably still sitting in a warehouse in Ontario right now.  But thats a socialized Medicare system for you.

When were you aware of the first contact with Zack?

Well, I knew something was up.  I always liked playing with radio scanners, listening to what the cops were up to around us.  I had a really nice setup to, top of the line digital scanner with trunking capability.  One day I heard some local cops chattering about refugees running the Alberta-Montana border crossing.  By now we had an idea of what was going on down south.  Most of us were home from work since martial law had been declared and a curfew had been set up.  Apparently there was civil unrest in most of the major centers, including Calgary and Edmonton, however, it still wasn't all that clear that we were dealing with the undead.  Oh sure, there were rumors, but who was gonna believe that?  At any rate, martial law didn't really mean much around here, there just weren't enough cops or military to enforce it.

So there was no attempt to evacuate or contain the infection?

You have to understand, the federal government didn't give a shit about the west.  As long as money from our oil revenue and agriculture kept coming in they did what they wanted and took care of their own.  The seat of government was 3000 fucking kilometers away.  I don't even think they remembered we were here as long as they were cashing our checks.  Civil authorities did what they could, but there just wasn't enough for an area this big.  Lethbridge was our closest city, 90,000 people and a police force of just over 200 members if you added in all the surrounding settlements.  One reserve military unit, about the same numbers.  They had small arms, but were light on vehicles, only six LAVs and a dozen trucks.

You and your wife lived in one of those other settlements, didn't you?

Right, Coaldale.  Small town, about 5000 people.  Anyway, the shit finally hit the fan in Lethbridge.  I was on the scanner that night listening in on the police bands.  Apparently a food truck came into a city grocery store that had a few Zeds in the reefer.  The municipal government workers that were handing out supplies didn't last long and the police couldn't contain the growing numbers, pretty soon you had a full scale epidemic on your hands.

Surely the police and military could have handled it?

Remember, this were mostly small town and rural cops.  They hadn't had to put anyone down in the city for more than ten years.  They were great for handling the drunken college parties on the weekends and hassling the drunks out of Galt Gardens, but these weren't big city cops you would find in LA or NYC.  The military, well, I spent a few years in the reserves myself.  These were just scared kids, a few may have got deployed to Afghanistan, but the bulk were just putting themselves though school.  Sure they had plenty of range time and our soldiers are pretty good marksmen, but how many actually had dropped the hammer on anyone?

So thats when you decided to get out?

Right.  The wife and I had done this once or twice before.  We would get a bad storm on the way, well, power line were easy to knock out around here.  We didn't want to stay in our rented home and freeze, so we would head out to my parents farm.  They had a wood stove, and a water cistern separate from the local supply.  We knew if there was an emergency to head for the homestead, as we called it.

There was a sense of panic when we packed.  A couple changes of clothes, My wife wanted the picture albums, especially the wedding album as we were only in our second year at the time, and of course the guns.

The guns?  I didn't know you could have them up here?

Oh yeah, a common misconception.  They were really a pain in the ass to own legally, but I was quite the gun nut and had all my permits.  We got the car loaded up, a dozen rifles, half a dozen handguns, a few thousand rounds of ammo.  Weighed the truck down with all our stuff, but got it all.  Of course the most important was my reloading supplies.

Reloading?

It had been a hobby of mine for some time.  Dozens of pounds of powder, thousands of primers and bullets, and the dies of course.  I always knew the government might try to jerk us around someday, so I loaded up on supplies.  I left the press since my dad had one at the farm.

We got on the road and it was like a mass exodus away from the city.  Crossing the highway to get on the back roads to the farm was a nightmare.  Hundreds of cars leaving and no one really knowing where they were going.

Didn't the government had something set up?

Oh no, we were on our own out here.  Thats the thing, the majority of people in Lethbridge lived off the government, either retirees or welfare/disability bums.  Now that their gravy train had been derailed, they had no idea what to do.  They just packed up and headed away from the threat.  Most Canadians were liberals who just had no idea what to do unless someone was there telling them how to do it.

Anyway, we made it to the farm.  We were only 20 miles from Lethbridge, but the surrounding area was so sparsely populated we really never had that much of a problem with zed.  We strung extra barbed wire around the property and they just didn't have enough coordination to get over the fence.

Really?  No Zed problems?

Well, we reinforced the fence and barred the windows.  My parents had built an earth shelter house.  The walls were reinforced concrete and we had plenty of open ground between the fence and the yard, so any that made it though, well, my M4 took care of them.  Shooting generally brings more in, but I think alot of them followed the refugees.  It wasn't easy, okay? We had close calls and we lost alot of good people.  Generally a dozen or more every spring, a few more in the summer, but we survived, took precautions.  Everyone had a good dog, we relied on them.  They took care of us and we took care of them.

The key was a low profile.  We ran the stove intermittently to conserve wood.  We had a good supply, at least a years worth.  Water wasn't a problem as irrigation water was plentiful for washing and bathing, and the cistern was kept topped off.  Getting snowed in for a couple weeks twice a year had forced us to be pretty self reliant.  Durring the warm months we only went outside when we had to, and never at night.  It was enough to maintain a small garden and not die of scurvey, but cabin fever when it is nice outside is 10 times worse than it ever was during the pre-war winters.

Food was a problem.  We had a good amount stored, but when Zed came through he wiped out the cattle population.  There were a few gaunt winters, but we always managed.  During the winter, Zed froze and we could venture out, raid grocery stores from nearby towns, harvest winter wheat, kill what little livestock remained.  I was a butcher in the pre-Zed world, so my skills were pretty useful, and I could always take a cut from what I butchered for other families.  The farmers saved our asses, since almost everything they produced went for export they had huge reserves of grain on hand.  Quite a few would pay other families in grain for a few hours of chopping firewood, or in my case, well, 100 rounds of reloaded ammo went a long way foodwise in those days.  Hell, it was better than just letting it go mouldy in the silos.

By now we were getting organized.  Forming hunting parties, going out and killing Zack while he was frozen.  A little cooperation went a long way for us, but we Albertans were always an independent bunch.  The real problem for us were the refugees.

Refugees?

Yeah, all the people that headed for colder climates to escape the threat.  You should have seen them, young, old, all starving, all looking for a handout.  We had limited resources, all we could really do was send them on their way.

You didn't do anything to help?

Look, it wasn't like we didn't want to, okay? We helped out the first and second wave, gave them what excess food we had, even let them stay with us for a while, but Jesus, they just kept coming.  It was obvious that they were just going to consume everything in their path and then move on, and we would be in the same boat as them.  I had to do things I won't ever forgive myself for.

Such as?

Well, most often the worst was squeezing off a couple rounds over their heads to convince them sticking around was a bad idea.  But these people were desperate and we had to be more... direct.

I'm not defending what we did, okay?  But this was a matter of survival.  We were prepared and they weren't.  Shitty deal, but thats the way it is sometimes.

I changed the subject.  And then the army showed up.  Tell me about that?

Whats to tell?  Elements of the remaining Canadian Forces, Army Group North, and the UN passed through to push Zed north.  We helped.  Spent more ammo that year than anytime before that.  Killed a lot of the bastards.  It was a small area, you know?  Everyone knew everyone, it was common for me to recognize some of these former people before lighting them up with one of those PIE rounds we were supplied with.

We helped the Army all the way up to the outskirts of Calgary, over 200 kilometers north, after that it was time to come home.

But that wasn't the end was it?

Hell no, next thing you knew we had these Goddamn government “facilitators” coming out of the woodwork, telling us that the government had been restored and that we could all start taking orders from it immediately.  These were the sons a bitches that had all but abandoned us to begin with.  Do you know what the pre-war emergency advice they gave was.  “Keep a 72-hour supply of food and water for your family in case of an interruption in government services.”  What the fuck is that?  72 hours?  It had been three years!  No mention of how to stay warm, a firearm to defend yourself, medical supplies, no learn a valuable skill, nothing.  Typical socialist, nanny-state bullshit that had gotten us into this problem in the first goddamn place.  Anyway, I think a lot of us liked how things were, a fully functional economy, no taxes, everyone took care of himself, and pitched in a hand when needed.  Not surpirsing people are willing to help when their winter food supply depends on it.

But these guys, they were worse then Zack.  They kept coming around, looking for supplies, equipment, fuel.  Telling us how they were gonna “Make this country work again!” Seemed to me that their plan involved me giving up a lot of my possessions and time to “Make the country work again!”  Either way, we figured out a way to deal with them.

My host glances at a shovel leaning up in the corner.

Last year we got the oil flowing again, so now we can run our combines and feed our population.  We can sell the excess and have plenty for ourselves.  It wasn't easy, a lot of the skills had been lost, but we got it figured out without any goddamn “government help”.  I don't doubt they will be back, before the war I always said that the UN was the biggest threat to freedom and prosperity the world had ever seen,  but were a little more ready this time around.

I decide against asking him if he's talking about Zack, or someone else.

So, how ya like them steaks?