Anno Zombus Year 1 (Book 1): January by Dave Rowlands

inside the pub and eat something, or at least that we come in for a beer.  That word is like magic in Australia, even after the apocalypse.  If anything, it's power is greater now, even.  So, into the pub we went, all six of us, leaving our weapons and supplies on the bus, which had been parked directly between police station and post office.  The pub was the next building along.  We crowded around the bar as the landlady poured our beers.
     
 
     
I asked her what had been happening in the town lately, to which she replied with a shrug.  Apparently nothing had happened here at all.  This town was clear of Dead, completely.  Biker asked her if she had heard anything about the Dead walking, and the old lady laughed, saying that was just a hoax.  Apocalypse Girl assured her that it was not, and she laughed all the harder.  We thought better of arguing with her, and simply drank our beers.  One round was followed by another, and a third, and a fourth.  We were discussing amongst ourselves exactly what our next move should be when the door to the street burst open, and a pair of police officers burst in, weapons drawn.  We were ordered out to the street at gunpoint, and marched off to the station, where we were locked up in two separate cells, though across a hall from each other.  Considering there were six of us, and we were drunk, they decided against interrogating us until morning.  The landlady of the pub followed us into the station, and upon our initial, inept frisking, loudly demanded that we pay for our drinks.  When she discovered that we also had no money to speak of, she shrieked in each of our faces, something unintelligible, and stormed off into the street.
     
 
     
Of all places to end up, in a prison cell in a fucking backwater was the last place I expected to find myself three weeks after the end of the world.  After locking us up, the two coppers searched the bus, finding the belongings of several people clearly in our possession, our weapons, and our weed.  These were all stashed in the room at the far end of the hallway in which our cells were located.  Evidence locker, I assumed.  I was at least allowed to keep my journal, but other than that we were stripped of everything but our clothes.
     
 
     
“What the fuck is this shit?”  Archer demanded of nobody in particular, while he paced about our cell.  “Fucking world ended and we get locked up like fucking animals.  We need to find a way out of this place.”
     
 
     
Apocalypse Girl and I locked eyes across the hallway.  This was the furthest we had been from each other's sides since the early days in the commune.  It was clear that she felt as naked without me as I felt without her.  We reasoned that eventually the Dead would come here, probably sooner rather than later.  For all we knew a group had been following us, or had otherwise picked up our trail.  Maybe a bunch of them would just wander into town one day and eat everybody.
     
 
     
I asked everybody if any of them knew how to pick a lock, to which all but Biker replied negatively.  She just said there was no point, nobody had anything to pick a lock with.  Not one of these, anyway.
     
 
     
Fuck this.  I am going to try to get some sleep.  Will write more when something happens.
     

January 21st Year 1 A.Z.
     
morning
     
Been some noises out in the street this morning.  No idea what though.  Neither cell has any windows, so nobody could get a look.  Younger of the two coppers brought breakfast in this morning.  Never had toast that tasted so fucking nice.  He looked at us strangely, then turned away without a word and left.  After a while the old lady from the pub came by to yell at us some more.  Turned out she was married to the older copper, but the young guy was not local.  We discovered this after she had calmed down a little.  She was also intensely lonely, that much was clear.  She also ran the post office.  When we asked her if