How Zombie Tribes, Lineage, and Hierarchy Might Be Established

[Litmaster]

Ok look: I've tried my best to skim through previous theories to see if this has been said already, and to the best of my knowledge it hasn't been. If you already got to this one first, just reply and link your original post below and I'll defer to your Most Supreme Bad-Assedness...

This thread is an attempt to float a theory that answers such questions as:

- WHY TO THE ZOMBIES SEEM TO FORM TRIBES (i.e. 'cliques') UNDER ONE 'LEADER'?
- HOW DID 'INK' (et. al.) ASSUME SUCH LEADERSHIP?
- IS INTELLIGENCE THE MAIN FACTOR THAT QUALIFIES A ZOMBIE FOR LEADERSHIP?
- HOW DOES ONE ZOMBIE 'JOIN' A PARTICULAR TRIBE?


So here it is in easy-to-scan bulleted format...

THE ZOMBIE LINEAGE THEORY
- The 'big bang' goes off in many places around the world, possibly originating from this Raydon labs, etc. Maybe it's bio terrorism gone wild, or a radiation leak, etc. (I am not attempting to answer the origin of the zombie virus in this thread)

- All around the world, those closest to the 'bang' get infected via direct (radiation or whater), thus being morphed into first-generation zombies

- The 1st gen zombies freak out and start attacking people. Each person who gets bit by a first gen zombie thus becomes a 2nd gen zombie

- Because of the nature of the zombified genetic mutative genes or whatever, the 2nd gen zombies automatically look to the first gen zombies with a certain relational allegiance. In other words, the bites not only represent an attack within one generation, but the newly bitten zombie becomes a kind of genetic descendant of the one who bites!

- So in a weird mutated genetic way, the zombie victims in effect become 'offspring' to the ones biting, and thus regard each other as part of the same genetic 'family'

- Via social order, this slowly manifests into zombie tribes, each originating from a certain zombie 'ancestor', to whom they look to for leadership, etc.

- Perhaps the gene mutates as it is transposed from zombie to zombie, thus making a 7th gen zombie much stupider than a 1st gen zombie... (?)


THE CASE OF 'INK'
- Serial killer Bill Roberts was being transferred in a vehicle which was driving past Raydon Labs at the exact time of the 'bang'

- So he gets infected as 1st gen zombie

- So how does he end up taking over most of LA? I think simple natural selection: Being a first gen doesn't make you invulnerable, so I imagine a lot of 1st gens end up getting killed off. Maybe their leaderless tribe gets killed off, too (this could explain Skittles observing zombies attaching other zombies)

- So by natural selection, only the smartest and strongest zombies survive (just like humans... remember the line about how all the passive people are dead?). The smartest and most successful then live longer, with their zombified progeny going on to infect others....

- ...and growing exponentially into fewer, but larger, zombie tribes, each led by seriously Bad-Ass Pimp Daddy Zombie Ancestors.



This isn't perfect, I know, and probably will turn out to be about half wrong, but I hope it moves the discussion forward.

[Cabbage Patch]

I like your theoryl Here are a couple of "issues" from the story that need to be taken into consideration.

1. In one of the early chapters the question is raised how the zombies decide which humans to turn into zombies and which to kill. It would make sense that the first, smartest generation of zombies would be better at exercising discretion, but they must have been biased toward turning humans in order to boost zombie numbers.

As humans become more scarce, and they encounter later generation, less intelligent zombies, I would expect the zombies to be driven more by hunger, with their bias shifting toward killing and eating humans. But that's the opposite of what we see. Kalani, Samantha, Datu and Tanya are all taken alive, sometimes at great expense to the zombies. I think this can be explained by the fact that the zombies in these cases were working in groups with an older, smarter zombie in the lead. We know that was the case with Tanya. It's possible the leader zombies could compel their group to take prisoners. It would be interesting to see how a confrontation would go between a human and a single, leaderless zombie.

2. Where did the behemoths, runners, jumpers and little ones come from? Were they a first generation variety, caused by exposure to the radiation? That would explain why we see fewer and fewer runners and jumpers after the outbreak, but it doesn't explain the late appearance of the little ones.

[Adventureless_Hero]

I dig it. The big bang is still a mystery, but I like the idea that each person bitten from a previous generation becomes a new generation of zombie. It's a speedy natural selection of sorts. This could explain how the zeds Michael ran into on the free way the first time he encountered them, they were like moths before a flame. But later they seemed more specialized. Kudos. I was about to say, "Hey, I totally suggested the zombie clique thing!" But you took it a step further...and shhhhmarter.

[Osiris]

For me it makes more sense for the zombies to become smarter with each successive generation 'born'. Accumulated knowledge of that which came before [not dissimilar to the hundredth zombie theory]. That somewhat supports the idea of hive intelligence/collective consciousness, as well. It would be interesting to find a way to communicate with them.