The United States of America is no more. The police are gone. The government dead. The military vanquished and the remaining people left alive after the plagues and disasters are on their own. Some have come together for protection and to increase their chances of survival. The Nation, as they call themselves is one of those groups living in the former forever wildlands area spread between the former states of Kentucky and Tennessee.
The Nation makes it first major foray out into the Wastelands to search for weapons and supplies. Mike leads them, and the trip is fraught with savagery and death...

The attack came fast when it came. Mike only remembered the details after the fact.

Molly had the right side, Tim the left, Mike had taken a lead of fifty feet or so right up through the middle of the tall grass. It left him blind for the most part. The grass was higher than his head in most places, unless he walked right on the hump in the middle of the old road, and that was not an easy task. He found himself spending too much time concentrating on the next footfall. So he came down off the hump and walked slowly beside it. Watching for darker shadows within the golden brown of the grass.

He turned his head to look over to the right and Molly when his eye had caught movement in the trees just over her head. There was no time for thought. He swung his rifle up and fired. He had no time to register what he had accomplished. He dropped his eyes from the woods, alerted by a yell from Tim on the other side of him and the Zombie was on him just that fast. Afterward he realized it must have been hidden in the tall grass and had sprung at him as soon as he was distracted by the movement in the woods.