In Altura, Estes is
leading the funeral series for the dead after the attack. They have a
fascinating funeral rite of preserving the blood of the dead in a wall for all
time so their DNA is kept for all eternity
10k and Red attends
the ceremony, but 10k is deeply traumatised by the loss of his hand and the
loss of his ability to shoot. He’s withdrawn, angry, snappish and demands
impossible things like Sun Mei sewing his preserved hand back on - or that he
get a prosthetic - any prosthetic - that will allow him to pull a trigger. Red
tries to get him out of his funk but can’t - and 10k won’t even look at the
stump of his wrist (which does not seem to be healing well)
Sun Mei is still
experimenting on Talkers to isolate what causes them to be Talkers… including
one deeply traumatised Talker (which has some uncomfortable messaging about it
being better to be dead than living as he is - which is uncomfortable since his
injuries have removed his legs: the idea that this kind of disability is not
worth living is problematic. Yes he’s grieving for his dead family - which
means he has ever reason to wish for death himself - but it does not fit for
other people to think someone who is GRIEVING is better off dead). She is still
not making any progress - but she is doing some odd experiments on the blood at
the wall
She also has a time limit - Estes warns her that if they don’t find a way to deal with the Talkers and synthesise more brains they may run out of Biscuits - and zombies need to be treated like zombies, whether they can talk or not.
I do think someone
needs to tell us where these biscuits come from - where are they coming from, how
are they made? And why are they not being delivered? Is there a shortage? We
need more answers
Ominously, Estes is
also speaking to the other outpost leaders - and there are more rumours about
other outposts being attacked
Warren & co are
heading to Pacifica, another outpost and one where Citizen Z and Kaia have set
up there home. It’s a former university campus and has a large library of
books. George describes it in extremely glowing terms and when they run into
Henry, one of her former professors who also lives there, he adds that it’s a
wonderful equality utopia
Warren is more
cynical about this. She’s also increasingly doubtful about George’s unerring
faith in Dante’s innocence but diplomatically simply points out if the vigilantes
find him it won’t matter and they need to get him first - they also find a dead
Talker, who has had their brains eaten
When they arrive it seems Warren’s cynicism is right. Initially it looks good with Warren & co meeting Kaia for the first time and Citizen Z and Kaia’s child and seeing there’s a Talker child in the nursery. And Pacifica has a beautiful mural that traces all the people and families of the people who live there - living, dead, zombie and talker.
And then they find
out that a town meeting has been called - one that is human only, no Talkers
allowed with two factions - those who hate the Talkers and those who value
their Talker friends and family. George and Warren go in to speak passionate
peace and justice and equality, countwering every argument that the Talkers are
dangerous (by the rhetoric in the room, so are the humans) that they can’t be
trusted (pretty sure the Talkers don’t trust them either). George leads with a
lot of hope - while Warren shoots the ceiling to get some quiet so she can
throw her own passionate speech about the kind of country they want to build. I
think there’s a definitely difference in tone between the two: George speaks
personally about these people, these people she knows, about friends and family
and neighbours. While Warren, perhaps aware that friends and family and
neighbours can and do turn on you and not knowing these people, speaks less on
how good people are and more on what they want to build, what future they want.
George is personal and aspirational, Warren more focused on them making
something better than what they are
People calm down but
there’s no grand changes of heart and Beth, one of the humans, removes her
child from the creche because there is a Talker there, much to Kaia’s
disapproval and disgust
They turn in for the
night with George insisting that she’s holding on to hope and building
something better and Warren continuing to be impressed by her and giving her
hope and support when George admits how tired she is - as Warren puts it, you
keep fighting because you know no-one else is going to. And how they didn’t get
to doubt because hesitation is death
But the next day they
discover the Talkers have left Pacifica (I can’t say I blame them?) to hide in
the forest. Beth and her cronies are still there showing the exact hate behind
why they left. Despite this, George insists they’re safe in Pacifica than in
the wilds - Kaia is doubtful
But Warren, Doc and
Henry head out to try and find them - and run into a captain from Altura
looking for Dante. He insists that Dante needs to be brought to a court (Estes
has appointed himself a judge) for breaking the law and that the law says that
all Talkers should be quarantined and that any human help hiding them is also a
criminal. This shows Estes stretching his power to Pacifica but, as George
questions - what law? Who gets to make law? The whole constitution and laws
they were voting on failed when the bomb went off - so who is making these laws
and what right do they have to do so?
Ohhhh the hours of philosophy on “what is law?” that can come from this. Of course, the simple answer is, even if they’re not laws, rules are made by those in power - and Estes has the power
This gives them
another incentive to find Dante asap - and they look for the symbol of the
Talker groups (a kind of three rayed sun) to find them - but as they’re
tracking a large horde of zombies attacks (they seem to be spurred into it by
someone with a cattle prod. Warren also notes all the zombies were from the
same place) and they have to fight
In the fight, Henry
is bitten - but he hides it.
And as they finish
they hear that Pacifica is under attack. They hurry back, Warren urging George
to be careful, and find a dying Beth telling them that a horde of zombies
attacked. Which sounds bad - but there’s also a lot of explosions which doesn’t
strike me as a zombie attack
From a rise over the
city, Dante and his Talkers watch
I do like that Warren
and Kaia, two women of colour, are the ones who are just a little cynical about
the whole idea of a perfectly egalitarian society. When George says “this isn’t
us” Warren quietly says that it is “exactly us” because she has every reason to
be leery about the idea that people value equality and justice et al. Because
yeah, no. Really no. At the same time Warren is equally clearly invested in
having this equal society - because creating a new world that lives up to these
ideals is something WOC are going to be far more invested in seeing. George
brings hope - but Warren has a distinct cynical determination to both make this
world happen but tempered by a very real understanding of how terrible people
actually are
However, while I
think it’s well done and Z Nation has only drawn direct parallels
between anti-talker prejudice and, say, racism or homophobia a few times, there
are still those shades and we still have an issue that Talkers, without their
biscuits, are dangerous zombies which, as
we’ve said multiple times before, means parallels between them and say, POC or LGBTQ
people are fraught.
I do like the
depiction of 10k and his grief - because developing a new disability,
especially one that drastically changes your lifestyle and certainly your
self-identity is a grieving process. Ultimately, 10k is defined by how he well
he can fire a gun - this is who he is, this is even what his name means - it
was actually jarring to hear Red call him Tommy. It’s understandable that he
would be deeply shaken by this.
