Biography[]
Early Life[]
Joseph "Joe" Calloway was born in Macon, Georgia, in 1965. A rough-and-tumble kid, Joe grew up around truck stops, bars, and backroads, picking up a no-nonsense, blue-collar attitude from his father, who worked long-haul trucking routes. With a mother who died young and a father who drank too much, Joe learned early that the world didn’t care about fairness—only strength and survival.
Joe never settled down. Instead, he spent most of his life on the road, driving freight across state lines. He never married, never had children, and had little patience for weakness or sentimentality. He spent most of his free time in roadside bars, gambling and getting into fights. He had a few brushes with the law—bar brawls, unpaid tickets, a couple of assault charges—but nothing that ever stuck.
By the time the world fell apart, Joe was already well-versed in the kind of brutality it would take to survive. He was also a part time mechanic who was fixing scrap.
Beginning of Outbreak[]
When the outbreak hit, Joe was on a long-haul job heading through Georgia. Like many, he ignored the early reports—figuring they were exaggerations or government fearmongering. But as cities burned and highways became graveyards, he quickly realized this was no temporary disaster.
Stranded after abandoning his rig near Augusta, Joe spent the first few weeks surviving alone, moving between small towns, scavenging what he could, and putting down walkers whenever necessary. His philosophy on life—strength, dominance, and survival of the fittest—only solidified.
As he traveled, he encountered men with the same desperate, ruthless mentality. One by one, they fell in with him, and a group started to form. These weren’t good men, but Joe didn’t care. What mattered was order, loyalty, and strength. With the world collapsing, it was time to stop pretending people were anything but animals.
Post Apocalypse[]
Joe quickly realized that the biggest threat in this new world wasn’t walkers—it was people. He established a strict codefor his growing group of marauders, The Claimers.
Under Joe’s leadership, The Claimers became a notorious band of marauders who raided camps, killed survivors, and took what they wanted. They didn’t just scavenge; they hunted people who were too weak to defend themselves.
Downfall and Demise[]
After raiding an abandoned house, The Claimers unknowingly found themselves on the trail of Rick Grimes. When one of their own, Lou, was strangled to death by Rick during his escape, Joe became obsessed with revenge. Tracking Rick across Georgia, the group finally caught him, along with Michonne and Carl, on a deserted road.
Confident in their strength and numbers, Joe laid out his plan:
- Daryl would be beaten to death.
- Michonne and Carl would be raped.
- Rick would be forced to watch before being executed last.
But in his arrogance, Joe underestimated Rick. Before he could finish gloating, Rick lunged at him, biting into his throat and ripping out his jugular with his teeth. Joe collapsed, choking on his own blood, dying in shock as the rest of The Claimers were slaughtered in the ensuing chaos. He would turn into one of the walkers and walks the earth to this day as a mindless husk.