The Walking Dead, Survival Rule Of The Week: Friends Become Enemies

The Walking Dead: a close friend can make a dangerous enemy

It’s been said that the people closest to you are the ones who can hurt you the most. That statement becomes literal in an apocalypse, perhaps more so than any other situation. The reason for this is, should someone close to you become an enemy in the apocalypse, not only do they know you better than any hostile stranger would and know how to hurt you, but, because it’s the apocalypse, they can hurt you, in the worst ways imaginable.

Think about the things you might share with a friend that you might not share with anyone else — Your hopes, your fears, what’s important to you, your true feelings about other people — all of these things become weapons that can be used against you in the hands of a former friend. A friend turned enemy will use whatever they have at their disposal to defeat (If not destroy) you.

Worse still, there are things that a friend, especially if they have been around you long enough, will notice about you that strangers may not know. Things you yourself may not realize, things which belie flaws or weaknesses. While these might have been things they ignored or accepted when you were friends, they become points of attack as enemies.

How can you protect against this? Remain closed off to everyone around you? While that might avoid some problems, it will only create different ones. The best thing that you can do is avoid having such a break with your friends in the first place. In the event this isn’t possible, you may have to be the one that hearkens back to the weaknesses you may have noticed in your friend-turned-enemy and use them to eliminate the threat they pose before they get the chance to do that to you.