“I wish. Those would be easy to deal with. The rest of this crap is a moving target,” Rusty replied.
Cal looked out the kitchen window and saw the others moving around in the dawn light.
“I guess we need to have another meeting this morning.”
Shortly after sunrise, since everyone was awake anyway, they gathered together to make some decisions. As they were trying to come up with a plan, Tim heard a faint sound, like loud voices echoing down the street.
“What’s that noise?” Tim asked, as he pulled back a curtain and looked out.
Everyone got quiet, as if trying to hear something. It started again and was accompanied by a rumbling.
“Attention, attention,” a voice on a loudspeaker blared down the street.
“This is an evacuation area. By order of the Adjutant General, everyone in this area is required to evacuate to designated collection areas in the city. You will take minimal possessions: a pillow, blanket, and as much food and medical supplies as you are able from your homes.
Your collection point is the State Fairgrounds on Southern Boulevard. Please leave immediately. This area is at risk of severe flooding in the next twenty hours.”
The military truck slowly rolled down the street repeating the message.
The group had gathered outside to see the spectacle.
“Things just keep getting weirder,” Cal said as he walked back inside.
“I for one, am not too interested in being herded into a place with thousands of other people during a deadly pandemic,” Tim started off.
“That sounds positively horrifying,” Charlotte added.
“Daddy, do we have to go?” Amber asked.
Cal looked around at the faces gathered in the kitchen.
“That’s not my first choice either, sweet pea. There must be somewhere else we can go,” Cal finally said.
The group had not given any thought to leaving because it never occurred to them that they would need to. Everyone felt like this whole thing was still temporary. There were a few ideas tossed out, but each idea had some sort of flaw that the group did not feel could be reasonably overcome.
“I don’t want to sound like Chicken Little here, but we all keep acting like this will just pass and we’ll be telling stories over rum drinks by the pool by the 4th of July. I’m not so sure,” Shane said out loud.
Rusty chimed in to support Shane’s opinion. “From everything we have seen, normal is long gone. The military has taken over, the hospital is teetering, law enforcement is in combat mode, stores are empty and closed, and the big lake may be crashing over the dike at any moment. We might want to consider relocating further north.”
Cal sighed, because he, too, was coming to the same conclusion.
“It is true that we are on a peninsula here in Florida. We are near the end of all the roads and power lines and we are pretty much surrounded by water on three sides of the state. If things get worse I could see a mass exodus from Miami and every city between here and Key West. We are right in that path,” Cal said.
“But where would we go? Surely every city north of here is going through the same thing as us,” Glendora said.
A voice that had been quiet so far offered an idea.
“My family has several ranches and cabin properties in Georgia and North Carolina. We could go to one of those,” Mandy offered. The group seemed to move in unison as they all turned toward Mandy. Cal was mildly shocked, he’d almost forgotten she was there.
The room seemed to contemplate the idea of going so far away, but they were starting to think that maybe they needed to put some miles behind them to escape what could be a no man’s land here in South Florida.
“Can you show them to me on a map?” Cal asked, tentatively.
“I only know where one of them is on a map for sure. But it is probably the best one anyway. It is in Georgia. My dad called it Tranquility Base. It is a 10-bedroom cabin on a lot of acres of forest with a large lake and a barn. We used to go there every spring until I started college. My mom didn’t care for it because of the whole ‘outdoors’ thing. But my dad always argued that since he paid two million dollars for it, he was going to keep it as long as he damn well pleased. He liked the peace and quiet. So that was that.”
It was Amber’s turn to look at Mandy like she had been hiding some sort of alter ego; she had no idea about her family’s wealth. Mandy seemed completely oblivious that other people didn’t have multi-million dollar cabins–why was this such a shock?
“If we went there, do you think we would be allowed in?” Charlotte asked.
“There is never anyone there to turn people away. It is so secluded that no one ever goes there so we always just keep a door key in the barn,” Mandy said.
“Mandy, where are your parents now?” Cal suddenly realized that he knew almost nothing about her and he was trying to wrap his head around this new information.
“Oh, this year they decided to go on one of those Europe river cruises for the month of December. It’s some sort of tour of all the counties over there,” she replied.
“Countries…do you mean countries?” said Amber, trying to be helpful while simultaneously holding back a laugh.
“Isn’t that what I said? Counties?” Mandy looked around the room, hoping someone would throw her a lifeline. Charlotte had her head in her hands trying to keep herself from making a snarky comment while everyone else suddenly found the floor very interesting.
Cal looked up and panned the room trying to get a feel for the mood before asking the question that everyone knew was coming. No one gave any indication that they would be opposed to the idea.
“Well, it looks like we have a decision to make. I know Mark and Clara are not here but is anyone against the idea of hitting the road and finding a safer place to hole up until this all blows over?” Cal asked the group.
There was an awkward quiet as everyone seemed to be going through their affairs.
After a minute Charlotte spoke up.
“If you think we should go, then I support the idea. I do not even recognize our community anymore.”
“The store was my life and at the moment I have no desire to be there. Not to mention there has been no power to the refrigerators with the bodies for about two days,” Glendora added, wrinkling her nose.
Tim moved to embrace Glendora when he saw her sadness as she began to relive the robbery. “Well, if you go, I’ll go,” he said to Glendora.
“I’m in. Since my wife turned out to be an assassin and half burned our house down we have nowhere to go if you all leave. And Shane will go too since he’ll need a couch to sleep on.” Rusty attempted to reach out to Shane for a high five, but both Heidi and Shane were giving him the death stare. Never one to turn down a high five, Tempest toddled over and happily obliged.
That was enough to loosen some of the tension in the room, and Cal decided it was time to finalize the plan.
“OK, are we all in agreement to pack up and head north?” Cal asked.
Everyone nodded in the affirmative. Once they all embraced the idea there seemed to be an increase in energy in the room. It was as if they all had something to do, and it was good for them.
“Sweet, we are bugging out!” Rusty said enthusiastically.
“OK, if we are doing this we have a lot to do and very little time to do it,” Cal said. “We are going to need to figure out what we need and how we are going to transport it.”
“Loudspeaker guy said the dike could fail in twenty hours. If there is any reality to that expectation, that means we have until…approximately midnight tonight.”
“I don’t think we want to be anywhere near here if a wave comes through in the dark,” Charlotte said. Heads nodded in agreement.
“Let’s set a goal to get on the road by mid-afternoon. That way we can put a few hours behind us before sunset,” Cal added.
“You better reach out to Mark and Clara to let them know what is going on,” Charlotte said.
“Oh yeah, right. Rusty, can you try to get Mark on the radio?” Cal replied.
“Sure thing,” Rusty answered.
Rusty walked away, tugging at the radio on his belt. “Doc, you there?” Rusty knew his radio license required him to use proper call signs but he chose not to. Did it really matter at this point? He figured it didn’t, but he did know that if any amateur radio operators were listening in, they would be seething at the lack of proper etiquette.
“Doctor Mark, are you on the net?” Nothing but the beep and some static as Rusty tuned the squelch knob. He was trying to squeeze in as much signal as the radio would allow. “Doc, are you listening? This is Voodoo Command.” Rusty made that part up because, well, it sounded cool. He figured why not add words just to have a better chance of being heard.
The radio beeped back but all Rusty heard was garbled static. It was a voice but it was so broken he could not make it out in the hissing and crackling.
“Doc, is that you? Squeeze the transmitter twice for yes,” he said into the microphone.
Two beeps replied. Rusty figured he needed to get to higher ground so he went outside and climbed up the ladder to the top of his RV.
“Doc, can you hear me now?” he said, in his best cell phone commercial voice.
The radio beeped and a voice replied. “I hear you now.” It was Mark. He had stepped closer to a window on the 7th floor, where he was currently working.
“Good,” Rusty replied. “We are being told the dike may fail and flood us out. We are preparing to bug-out. Do you copy.”
“I heard the news. Where are you planning to go so we can try to link up with you?” Mark asked.
“The group has decided to leave Florida and head up to Georgia to a large cabin in the woods that Mandy’s family owns. Over,” Rusty said, trying to use at least a little bit of radio etiquette.
“Who is Man-?” Mark asked, suddenly realizing he had been out of the loop on anything happening beyond the doors of the hospital. He was interrupted by a panicked voice from down the hall, “Dr. Welby!”
“I need to go,” Mark hurriedly said into the radio. “How will we find you? We will probably be here for another day or two, then I think the hospital is done.”
The radio beeped and squelched with static again as Rusty tried to answer back.
“Say again?” Mark asked.
After Rusty transmitted again, Mark was able to make out the address of the property in Georgia where everyone planned to meet. He repeated to verify he heard properly and Rusty confirmed before they signed off.
Mark was familiar with the general region where they were planning to go and figured the drive should take maybe 12-15 hours if they drove straight through.
Back inside Cal’s house, Rusty was making the same miscalculation about the travel time.
“If we leave this afternoon we should arrive up in North Georgia by sometime tomorrow morning…ish,” he said, shrugging his shoulders.
“Mark and Clara will probably be there sometime Wednesday if they leave by Tuesday. Either way, it sounds like we will be kicked back on the porch in the Blue Ridge mountains, sipping iced tea in a rocking chair pretty soon. Sweet. ROAD TRIP!” Rusty was clearly excited to set off on the adventure.
Cal gave Rusty his famous dry skeptical look.
“Great, you probably just jinxed us. We’ll be lucky to arrive at all.”
Neither of them had any idea how close Cal was to the truth.
With time in short supply, everyone splintered off to complete their assigned tasks. Charlotte, Glendora, Heidi, and the girls gathered everything they could use to cook and feed everyone, along with clothing and bedding. They staged all the items at the front door to be loaded by the guys, who were preparing the vehicles and collecting everything they might need from the workshop.
“What about the horses?” Amber asked.
Cal and Charlotte looked at each other.
“We can’t leave them,” Charlotte said. “Besides, maybe they could come in handy.”
“Daddy!” Amber scolded. She could see her dad was thinking about just turning them loose and hoping for the best.
“There is a horse trailer in Mrs. Joyce’s barn, remember?” she added.
“Fine, I’ll go get the trailer,” Cal said, knowing there was no way he would be leaving without the horses.
Amber and Mandy jumped up and down, clapping. Tempest saw the excitement and did the same thing, but her jump did not quite leave the ground. The girls began giggling and went back to packing up their requisite road trip snacks.
The plan was lofty but doable. Cal’s Silverado would pull the toy hauler, Charlotte would drive her SUV, and Glendora was also taking her SUV. They decided that Tim’s truck would pull the horse trailer, Shane’s 4WD would pull the small open trailer, and finally, Rusty’s Deuce and a half was coming along and Heidi would drive the RV, pulling Toadie the Jeep. While it all looked great on paper, it turned out to be a bigger effort than anyone thought it would be.
None of them had ever bugged out before and had no reference as to what they should take along. They ended up loading cases of food among the several vehicles and trailers and plenty of camping gear. Cal loaded his two ATVs into the toy hauler, along with as much fuel as they could carry in the several containers he had laying around. Tim recommended they take important tools and maintenance supplies to keep the rolling things rolling.
Some of the group went to their homes to get more personal items and returned later. Their goal of leaving mid-afternoon was completely missed and the January darkness was descending on them quickly by the time they began moving the vehicles out to the road in convoy order.
“OK, order of march,” Cal decreed as if he was still in the army and setting up a military convoy.
“Shane, you’re in front, on point with your 4WD. Next up is my truck with the ATV trailer, followed by Tim with the horse trailer, then Heidi with the RV. Charlotte and Glendora, you’re behind Heidi, and Rusty, you’re bringing up the rear with the Deuce. Any questions?”
“What about us?” Amber said, with a mock sad face.
“You two and the baby can either ride with me or Charlotte.”
“I have an idea,” Amber schemed. “How about we ride in the RV, so we can chill?”
“I doubt Heidi wants to listen to you three,” Cal said, including the baby in his calculations.
“It’s no sweat. I would love the company. Besides, Rusty is keeping the hound with him in the Deuce,” Heidi replied.
The girls high-fived knowing there was a couch and an X-Box in the RV. The fact that there was a toilet was a bonus for Miss Peanut Bladder.
It was getting dark, and the mosquitoes swarmed out from their daylight hiding places like ravenous vampires in search of blood. The larger vehicles were being moved up on the road, which was elevated above most of the properties in the area. Charlotte was in her small SUV waiting to follow Heidi’s RV up onto the road.
The door to the RV popped open and Amber jogged toward the house.
“Did you forget something, honey?” Charlotte asked as she rolled her window down.
“Tempest is crying for her baby,” Amber replied. She was referring to her little sister’s favorite doll, and Charlotte sighed at not remembering it herself.
“OK. It might be on the couch.”
Rolling her window back up to escape the mosquitoes, Charlotte looked over at her home as Amber opened the front door and felt a sense of sadness at leaving. Cal had built her dream home and it was more than just a house to her. She was in a melancholy daydream when a siren wailed in the distance. With the window up Charlotte almost missed it, and she was trying to figure out what it meant as she tapped her fingers on the steering wheel.
The siren had never sounded before and it did not register any feelings of urgency because no one connected the sound to any danger.
Glendora was walking from the house to her SUV to get ready to follow Charlotte up to the road and
Rusty was closing the big green gate to the Deuce and tying off the canvas cover when they heard the siren.
The siren continued to wail, but no one reacted until the next horrifying sound drowned it out. A deep rumble lightly vibrated the ground and was followed by a large cracking sound. Cal was walking back down from the road toward Charlotte and was the first to realize what had happened. He began to run toward Charlotte’s car, waving for her to drive up on the road, but the water got there first. A wall of water as tall as he was splashed around the walls of his house and swamped the two little SUVs.
Rusty ran and grabbed Glendora, who had been in the shadow of the house near her car, so she did not get swept away, but she and Rusty were now in rising water several feet deep, with debris racing past. They struggled to make their way up against the house for protection from the debris-covered water.
Cal was halfway to Charlotte’s car and had nowhere to hide. He sprinted back to the RV that was half up on the main road and grabbed the ladder at the rear bumper. He scurried up just out of reach of the roiling water. He looked back and saw Charlotte’s car take the whole wave, broadside.
The water pushed the car sideways for several feet until it hit a tree stump and rolled over. As was common in this neighborhood, they had a large retention pond in the yard, and his pond was a few yards away from the driveway. Charlotte’s car was pushed right into the big water hole. In only a few short moments Charlotte’s situation had become deadly–she was trapped inside the flipped and sinking vehicle. Cal screamed for Charlotte and was desperately looking for a way to get to her, but the initial wave had brought everything from trees to lawn furniture from other properties. Even his neighbor’s boat went crashing through his yard backwards, dragging its trailer by the winch.
When Heidi looked up and saw the water coming, she slammed the RV into gear and pulled the big rig up onto the road and shouted to Mandy.
“Hold the baby!” Mandy had no idea what was happening but did as she was told.
Cal was almost thrown off the RV ladder when Heidi lurched the rig forward to escape the rising flood.
Amber had been in the house for a few seconds when the rumbling started. As she headed to the living room looking for the doll, all the windows exploded in a deluge of glass and brown water. She was completely surprised, and the survival instinct of flight kicked in. She dove through a doorway and tried to use a wall for cover. The interior wall held for a few moments as the water swirled through the house, but the sheet rock began to fail under the pressure and she found herself trying to keep her feet among the thick litter of debris that was forcing her under.
The Unraveling: Book 1 of the Bound to Survive Series Page 26
