Should I stay or should I go? While The Clash laid out the pros and cons pretty damned clearly, it remains a topic of considerable and fierce debate among zpoc preppers: Should I bug in or bug out? And the real answer to this most basic of zpoc quandaries is, as with all good questions in life, it depends.
The choice to hunker down and fortify your home (bugging in) or flee to a more remote location or even a secondary dwelling or safe house (bugging out), is a personal one and should be based on a variety of considerations: the physical location of your home, the local population density (and thus zed density), your home’s accessibility by major thoroughfare (for both alive or undead traffic), the type of domicile it is (a high-rise apartment has better potential for fortification than, say, a bungalow), the area’s climate and natural resources (water, edible vegetation, wild game, etc.), proximity to scavenge-worthy locations, and so on.
In the great bug-in/bug-out debate, many preppers advocate for the GOOD (Get Out Of Dodge) approach through acquiring a remote and secluded secondary home, which can be stocked and readied for the zpoc. A nice little cabin north of the ice line with plenty of food and fuel where one can wait out the inevitable rotting away of these reanimated menaces. Still others argue that even just fleeing with an adequate bug-out bag and a solid base of survival skills to take your chances on the run is a smarter decision than trying to hole up at home.
However, bugging in might very well be a wise choice for weathering an undead tsunami. Logistically it is far easier to bug in than to have to acquire and set up a secondary safe-house location. You can stock and fortify your own home, without having to worry about physically getting yourself to your safe house in the event of an outbreak.
The truth is, they are not mutually exclusive. Even the strongest of strongholds (anyone remember Woodbury or Monroeville Mall?) can be overtaken by enemies living or undead, forcing survivors out on the run. Or maybe after going AWOL during the initial outbreak you’ll find yourself a nice little secluded mountain fortress to hunker down in until this whole zpoc thing has blown over.
If we’ve learned anything from the creative minds of Romero, Kirkman, Whitehead, and Brooks, it’s that when the dead rise very little will go according to plan. Whether the outbreak is the result of a prion disease, a virus, or a parasite; whether caused by a bioweapon terrorist attack, a naturally occurring viral mutation, or an accidental research leak—the one thing we can be sure of is complete pandemonium and social chaos.
And so, the real answer to the “Should I Stay or Should I Go” debate is simple: You must be ready for both.