Father's Advice

C'meer son, set a while.

Now, I know you be bored stayin here all the time. No real boy could stand a place without a proper baseball diamond or video game LAN for long. You work long hours in the fields for what - seventy percent of what you planted and borrowed time with solar charger and a computer? What kind of proper education can we give people without teaching software, without guided administration to know who is behind the curve or who's ahead. Don't even know what to prepare you for anyway.

You're thinkin bout leaving. Don't try to deny it. I ain't deaf, and frankly, I'm thinkin it too. Sometimes. Its all the rage amongst your friends to talk about going out, finding something great or exploring a new surface like Louis and Clark, Neil Armstrong, of Cheng Hu on Mars.

I'm not one to go out there. Blame age, comfort, or old fashioned cowardice, but this is my place now. As for you... I'm not going to let you go.  Not like that anyway. I respect you for wanting to go, but not for being so stupid as to think you can sneak off with friends. If you're going to do it, do it right.

I bought you this. Highly recommended by the traders who passed through. Twelve gauge, six round box fed, switches between pump or semi-automatic fire, three inch magnum shells. They said the slug rounds will shatter a car's engine block, or at least turn its batteries to junk, stopping it shortly.

Now I also made sure to ask about these reanimates, and when the trades will be back. It might not be as glamours as settin out alone, but at least for a start, you should join a caravan, and I argued long and hard to get them to agree to take you along next time.

For you go out, some advice they gave me. First of all, they ain't blind, and not easily blinded. You don't see many reanimates during the day - not because they hate the light, but because they love how the darkness makes it easier for them to catch us. Go inside, and those things will rip you apart, night or day. Bright lights and flash-bangs don't seem to phase them that much - you have to physically cripple or bar them.

Not much else stops them either. They've crawled out of toxic places, lurched forth practically glowing from radioactive contamination, and marched up swoled river banks from the bottom. Most of them aint to fast, true, but enough are, and they can come from any direction - some climb, some crawl, and many can use doors, so don't trust anything less than a brick wall cause they will smash through stuff too.

Always have a back up. That .380 I taught you to shoot with - you can take it too. Its no great air-loom pistol, but that rifle is long and heavy, it don't fit in your pocket or follow you everywhere.

That goes double for plans. Think before you leap, than think again.

Finally, there is another bit of advice, from a far older source. "Better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt." Mark Twain said that. You let the others speak, and don't go using your mouth to write any checks your ass can't cash.

Go get some practice with that new gun now. Two weeks will pass faster than you think.