From the journal of Manny Stone, June 24

June 24, 2017

     We left this morning to scavenge the little town we found ourselves in. I made sure to read the journal to everyone and we all agreed it would be safer to take the truck. That way, if we did run into a group of undead, we could get away easier. It's a good thing we did! I know I said we avoid downtown, but I just had to see if the whole town was down there.

     We pulled the truck into the alley behind the buildings on the main street and found a business with an unlocked back door. From there, we made our way to the roof and looked over the edge carefully. Sure enough, it looked like the whole town was down there, undead and waiting for something to stimulate them and bring them back to un-life. There had to be around 40-50 of them and all of them were in that weird, hibernating state we've seen a couple of times. From what I've gathered, if there is nothing around to smell, see or hear that they want to eat, they hibernate. They stand there, swaying slightly, and sometimes, they slowly walk around in circles. Now, if they get stimulated, all of the ones near will snap out of it and start that moaning and growling thing they do. Then, they all move toward whatever got their attention, usually something alive.

     The others decided to go see if they could get into any other back doors of the businesses and scavenge what they could. I stayed to keep watch so if the undead below started to notice my people, I could let them know with the walkie-talkie. We agreed on a signal of me clicking the button three times in a row. On their end, they would hear static three times and know to get out the back into the alley right away. When the others had headed down, I watched the undead below.

     This is the best chance I've had to observe the hibernating state and it's fascinating! Some of them milled back and forth across the street, like they were window shopping in the stores on either side. They didn't change direction or head further down the street, just slowly back and forth. Others just stood and swayed in a circle slowly, while others formed little mosh pits and slowly moved in a circle together. I watched on of them start. One zombie went from slowly swaying in a circle, to moving forward and still going in a slow circle. Then, a couple of zombies right next to it joined it in going in a circle and within five minutes, there were at least 10 of them moving in a circle. From above, it looked like the eye of a hurricane with the rest of the undead either going around them, ambling by them and a couple of them, even joined the circle.

     Then, a dog barked down the street somewhere to the left. It was like someone threw an electric switch. All the undead raised their heads and their eyes lit with an unholy light. Then, the sound started. The ones nearest the where the dog barked started first, and it moved like a wave from that end of the street, past where I was watching, and down the other way. All the undead started moving together, heading towards the sound they'd heard and the street emptied in less than ten minutes.

     I used the walkie-talkie to let the others know what had happened, but waited until the undead were all our of range, first. They told me what building they were in and I joined them to scavenge the rest of the businesses on the street. Then we headed back to our little gingerbread house. We didn't see any undead on the way.

     Tomorrow we had planned to head out, but I think we're going to stay here for a couple of days. We haven't even looked in the other houses yet and this was an upscale town. They must have good stuff. We'll look around here a couple more days, then head out again. Hopefully, we can stay away from the mob of undead towns people while we're here.

As a writer and artist, I appreciate any readers and their comments. Thank you for taking the time to read this blog. Please, come read the other blog I write for our artisan collective, Raven's Castle Creations, on our website at www.ravencastlecreations.com. It includes posts on art, the mythology of symbols we use in our art, history and more! Also, come see the art we produce in our Etsy store at etsy.com/shop/RavenCastleCreations. Follow us on Twitter at @ravencastleart and on Facebook at @ravencastlecreations.