There is nothing like the Apocalypse to bring out the whack-jobs. So of course, when new people happen along, we are pretty suspicious. Don’t get me wrong, we do let people join us –  we need new people; for labour, to prevent inbreeding – that kinda thing. Dad has always been wary of strangers wanting in, asking them his ‘three questions’, giving them trial periods etc. It was a process but it wasn’t foolproof – I mean, how can you really know what someone is like?

Then there was this one time that pretty much all but shut our gates for good. They seemed like a nice group. Hayley and I were excited cos there was a boy, Joshua. A new kid to hang with was better than Christmas, even if he was a little timid. Six whole weeks they were with us before they did it. Gotta give it to them, they were patient, and ruthless. After the chaos, it didn’t take us too long to figure out what had happened. They had done a thorough reconnaissance of everything – our food, weapons, general equipment. While we were feeding them, clothing, housing them and bonding with them, they were screwing us over.

We dubbed it a Zombie Bomb. We guessed there were three out of the eight of them who did it. We dunno how; a pill, or poison maybe? While they turned and massacred us in our sleep, the others took as much as they could and melted into the night, leaving us to die.

So when those two bedraggled kids stumbled out of the bushes, it wasn’t going to go well for them, no matter how doe-eyed and orphaned they looked.