User:Joe Cool 360/My journal

07/05/09 Hodgkinson Row Fire Station, West Grayside

I emerged from the rubble on July 2nd. I have no idea how long I've been out, but there are two people here with me. They don't say anything to me and actually left me soon after I lost consciousness again. When I came to, I heard on the radio that a mob is headed for West Grayside. I reported in to the DEM and they tell me I'll have to go through training again to be able to combat the "new menace". As I look through the windows of the fire station, I can see several ruined buildings. The thing that really got to me though, was the complete emptiness. No grief-stricken civilians, no medical professionals running around, no emergency services. Just the occasional gunshot followed by a low moaning. The bustling town that I remember is no more.

08/16/09 Junkyard, Wray Heights

Since the last time I wrote here, the DEM, and specifically the Malton Fire Department have been keeping me busy. I managed to survive the MOB's visit to the Wray Heights suburb. Survive - I should qualify that. In reality, I've died four times since I awoke out of the rubble of Hodgkinson Row Fire Station. How am I alive? Either technology made a huge leap while I was unconscious or the military was very busy in Malton. Survivors are able to combat the zombie virus by injecting recently deceased or even undead humans with a NecroTech Syringe. Unfortunately, though, some survivors will lash out after being revived and attack all humans. So the Department of Emergency Management has enacted a policy of reviving only those who are either a member of the DEM or are allied with it. I've begun to really enjoy my new line of work with the MFD.

08/25/09 Podger Avenue School, Vinetown

The Academy has moved from Wray Heights to Vinetown. The vast majority of Zs in Wray Heights had moved on and so I and the rest of the DEM Academy moved to Vinetown. It's an interesting district and will be a great change of scenery from Wray Heights, which was getting rather dull. Part of me wants to return to my home suburb of West Grayside, but another part of me is eager to see new places. I'll be back to West Grayside soon, but I fear it may not be for a long while. Meanwhile, I'm enjoying working with my fellow cadets and will probably be taking the Graduation exam shortly.

09/16/09 Billet Row School, East Becktown

I need time to think.

09/17/09 Billet Row School, East Becktown

I've come to realize something very important. We are all dead and this is a game. This "life" that the survivors enjoy is something very artificial, it can be taken away and given back in less than a day. Before, before the outbreak commenced there was meaning to life, it was precious. But now, technology has turned life into a meaningless state within the game that is Malton. The survivors are fooling themselves, they cannot hope to destroy "the zombie menace" because they, like the zombies, are artificial; temporal. The zombies who believe they can win by turning all survivors into zombies, hence ridding the populace of revivers and "winning" are also fooling themselves because the survivors have so fooled themselves into thinking that they are the last hope for mankind that they will stop at nothing to keep the undead from taking over. I will not be a devoted member of either group, though I may - at times - act as one. What does that leave for me? The PKers. I used to loathe the PKer; they were the lawless, cruel, and disturbed faction of the game. Will I become one? No. I still and always will loathe PKers for they cling to a false image that they are different than the rest, that they understand the rules of the game. But they don't. They organize into groups so they can be more effective, they coordinate their attacks so they can brag about their achievements, they become outraged when targeted, and form alliances with other groups. And yet through all of this sameness, through all of this similarity to every other faction in Malton, they still cling to this false sense of disturbed romanticism made so evident in their template:

‎	Player Killer
	"One kills a man, one is an assassin; one kills millions, one is a conqueror; one kills everybody, one is a god." This user is a PKer and supports the act of Player Killing.

Bullshit.

I, on the other hand, have discovered the rules to the game. I know how to play. You do what you want. No groups, no policies, no vendettas, no trophies, no strategies, no records, no friends, no enemies. I heal who I want, I kill who I want, I break what I want, I build what I want.

I am not a Player Killer, I am a Serial Killer. Without motive or vision. Random.

To quote Ray Bradbury: "All you umpires, back to the bleachers. Referees, hit the showers. It's my game. I pitch, I hit, I catch. I run the bases. At sunset I've won or lost. At sunrise, I'm out again, giving it the old try. And no one can help me. Not even you."