It was cold, but the roads were clear. I grabbed the keys to my car and headed out just that quickly. I opened the door, and the cold air slapped me in the face. And just that fast, that world was gone again, and I found myself sitting up on the mattress in the slightly musty smelling Motel room. Cold air slipped past my bare chest and I shivered involuntarily.
Kate finished closing the door and then turned, slowly making her way to the bed in the nearly absolute blackness, her night vision ruined by the bright moonlight and fires outside.
“A little to your left, Baby,” I whispered.
“I woke you up,” she whispered back as she readjusted her path and found the bed, slipping across the mattress on her hands and knees. I caught her and pulled her into my arms.
“Not you,” I answered.
“I was trying to be quiet,” she said as she snuggled down beside me, her cool flesh setting my own on fire. “What was it?”
“What?”
“That woke you, Baby.” Her cool hands slipped over my back and pulled me closer to her.
“The old world... You... Nothing at all,” I told her. My lips found hers and we stopped talking.
CHAPTER THREE
All In
~ March 28~
Mike awoke before dawn. He lay quietly, feeling the heat from Kate's body where it pressed up against his, and thinking about what the future might be.
The first thing he had thought was that whatever had happened to the world would be made right. That somewhere there was someone still in charge, and eventually that person would get everything back on track. The world would be fun again. Television, phones, electricity, the Internet, the mortgage on his house, all of it. That turned out to be a pipe dream. The whole idea had dissipated quickly. Even so, when they had finally started out, he had held out some hope, and they hadn't come far, but Jeff and his people had, and it was the same everywhere. There was no man sitting in an office somewhere waiting to get everything back in shape, and if there was, he would have to be a complete idiot, because he'd be waiting an awfully long time.
The dead woman Jeff had told him about bothered him a great deal. He had remembered a day he had gone out, after things had fallen apart. He had heard airplanes in the night. In the morning, there was some sort of blue liquid they had sprayed all over the city. He had wondered about that. Why? What was it? And the bodies in the market... Had it been dogs? Had it been dogs that had been... eating them? There was no nice way to look at it, or put it.
If Jeff was crazy... But he wasn't. He seemed as sane as any of them did. No. He couldn't write it off to crazy or not crazy. He obviously believed what he saw. He had to mark it down to... To what? He asked himself. To...
Kate stirred and pressed closer to him, and then settled back down. Gray light began to creep into the room. He could see the outline of her body.
The movement, the light seeping into the room, sent his thoughts along an entirely different line.
For the last two days he had found himself thinking in an entirely new direction. All the old shit is gone, and that's okay. He didn't care at all if he never saw electricity again. In fact, he'd rather not have it, and even if there was a way to fix it all, he didn't want to go back. He was positive, in fact, that they couldn't go back, none of them, was positive he wouldn't be able to live that way again, when less than a month ago his entire life, his entire focus, was wrapped up in the old way. Hadn't he been watching the countdown show for the end of the world? Reality TV every night? The big party for the end of the world? And really, that had simply been a joke.
Nobody, at least most people, didn't believe the world was going anywhere. It was just another thing to occupy the head. Even the terminology, World Ending, was bullshit. The world did not end. We think so highly of ourselves that we believe that the end of society means the end of the world, and I guess it did for us... some of us. But the end of the world? No. The world will go on and on when we are nothing at all but dust upon the ground.
Now it really was gone, and not only didn't he miss it, he didn't want it to come back. He didn't want to chase across half of what had been the United States looking for some semblance of the old world. His mind was at rest; he was happy. He allowed one hand to stroke the length of Kate's body. Very happy, he decided. Kate stirred again. One of her own hands came down his side, across his abdomen, searching.
"Hello," she said, finding what she wanted, "No fair, you're awake."
"I was just admiring," he said. He felt himself grow hard in her hand.
She turned towards him, planting little kisses on his chest and stomach as her head disappeared below the blankets.
~
Most of the camp was up and awake by the time Kate and Mike came out, got some coffee and set down at one of the tables.
"You two hungry?" Janet Dove asked.
"Starved," Mike said.
"Yeah," Kate agreed.
"How would you like your eggs?" she asked.
"Oh, sunny side up," Mike said.
"Uh, eggs?" Kate asked. "Where did you get eggs, Jan?"
"I must be slipping," Mike said, "I didn't even realize what you said."
Janet smiled. "Tim and Annie. They were running around yesterday, testing something on one of the new trucks, and found a barn up the road. Most of it is standing. I know, I went myself to look. There's a well, and deep I would guess, because it's still got water. A little wind mill pumps the well. The water runs down the troughs to the cows. No cows, but the chickens love it. They moved in. Eggs everywhere." She took the lid off a cardboard storage box full of packed straw and eggs.
"Wow," Kate said. "Sunny side up too. I'll dip one of those biscuits into the yolk. I love egg yolk," she confessed to both of them.
"Best part of the egg," Mike agreed. "Man, this is a good life right here."
"It is," Janet Dove said. She left them to their coffee as she left to prepare their eggs.
~
The morning passed quickly for Mike. He, Kate, Patty and Ronnie spent the morning searching the store room of the small mom and pop store Janet had spoken of, and another that was diagonally across the road from it. Between the two, they found all sorts of useful things, besides just the flour and Bisquick she had told them about.
Batteries, disposable lighters, key-chain can openers. Ronnie spent a few minutes with a small battery powered video game, and then set it aside.
"No need to start that shit again," he said with a grin as he tossed it onto a stack of old newspapers.
There were bundles of the local newspaper near the front door, everyone looked at them twice, but in the end no one felt tempted to cut the string that held them together to read one of them. And back against one wall, the mother lode of seeds, apparently ordered for Spring and not yet put out. There were several large boxes, and a couple of boxes of books on gardening apparently meant to be put out of the same time.
They carried everything out onto the pavement where one of the Suburbans was parked. A small, black metal ladder lead from the heavy duty rear step bumper to the large metal rack that had been mounted to the roof. The rack had sides that stood about one foot from the deck of the rack. Designed to form a long metal box to pack things into.
Mike and Ronnie filled the rack as Kate and Patty filled the rear cargo area, and the two five gallon gas cans mounted on the rear tire carrier that also held a spare tire. The ladder to the top rack was incorporated into the swing out tire carrier. The whole unit worked well and was problem free, swinging easily out of the way to allow access to the rear double doors and the interior of the Suburban.
They were both surprised how much the rooftop rack could hold. They had lined the bottom of the rack with a blue waterproof tarp and then wrapped the whole load with more of the same when they had finished. Bungee cords pulled tight kept everything in place.
"I wouldn't have believed you guys could put that much stuff up there," Patty said.
Mike grinned at her, "Believe me
," he said, "neither did we."
"You know, you're right about the vehicles," Ronnie said.
"How so?" Mike asked.
"Gives us more stuff to drag around. But I have to admit, stuff we will need," Ronnie said and laughed.
"Wait until Bob and Janet hear about the seeds," Patty said.
"Hell, there's everything we could possibly need to grow right there," Mike said.
"We should still look for hybrids," Kate said.
"What kind?" Mike asked.
"Any kind. They have genetically developed corn, tomatoes, peppers, you name it. Grows faster, resistant to this and that, grows bigger, higher, more protein," Kate elaborated.
"Where could we find it?" Mike asked.
"I don't know," Ronnie said.
"I bet Janet or Bob would know," Patty said.
Kate nodded. "Probably one of them, what do you call it, feed stores? I've seen them in farming communities, you know, on A&E," she finished.
"Yeah, I've seen those shows too," Patty said.
"Like small towns," Kate agreed. She hesitated, “So... what did you two think about what Bob had a say?" She asked at last.
"We wanna do it," Ronnie said, "but..."
"We were wondering what you were going to do," Patty said. She looked at Kate and then Mike.
"I think it's good," Mike said. "But I won't go anywhere Kate wont. So I can't commit until she does."
"She does," Kate said. "I wanted my man and my best friend too. I got what I wanted." She smiled.
"We're going," Patty squealed, launching herself at Kate.
"I can't believe it. We'll get to raise our kids together," Kate said, every bit as excited as Patty.
Mike and Ronnie stood back, arms folded across their chests and watched as the two hugged, squealed, and congratulated each other.
"Dude," Mike said.
"Dude," Ronnie repeated grinning.
"Don't you two pick on us," Patty said. Her eyes were bright.
"Wouldn't think of it," Mike said.
"Me either," Ronnie said.
"Sure you would," Kate said. They let go of each other and turned to the men.
"You're sure?" Kate asked Mike.
"Yep," he said.
"You?" Patty asked Ronnie.
"Yes, ma'am," Ronnie said.
"Yes!" Kate said and grabbed Patty again.
"Yahoo," Patty said as they jumped up and down.
"Yahoo?" Mike asked.
"Old cowboy thing," Ronnie said.
"You," Patty said slapping Ronnie's shoulder softly, then pulling him to her and kissing him.
"And you too," she said giving Mike a sisterly kiss on the cheek.
"Come here," Kate said. She kissed Mike and then gave Ronnie a kiss on the forehead. "I guess we're pretty happy," she said.
"I guess you are, Babe," Mike said and kissed her back.
~
At midday, Mike and Ronnie left Kate and Patty, who we're still going through the two smaller mom and pop stores, finding all kinds of surprises, and headed over to the garage area. Molly and Tom were finishing up bumpers on the last of the trucks, while Bob was helping to remount the last two tires on the last of Jeff's Hummers.
"Ronnie and I want to take one of the pickups down the road a bit, Bob," Mike said.
"Sure," Bob said. "Anyone but that one," he pointed at the one Molly and Tom were working on. "But that one will be done in an hour or so if you want to wait."
"Nope," Mike said. "One of the ones outside will do just fine. Can we take you with us, or are you really busy?" Mike asked.
"Can if you want me. Sent Tim and Annie off to spend some time alone. We're almost done. There's really nothing left but that bumper and a test drive, and Molly and Tom can take care of that."
"Good, we need your opinion," Mike said.
Bob put some muscle into the last lug nut he was tightening and then handed off the lug wrench to Jeff.
"Jeff, you want to come along?" Mike asked.
"Let me finish these lug nuts, and I'll be right along," Jeff said.
A few minutes later the pickup truck pulled out, followed by the hummer, and headed down the road following Jan's general directions.
About a mile down the road, Mike spotted the old partially collapsed barn and pulled down off the broken pavement and headed towards it. He stopped the truck and backed around, facing the road.
"Stiff, but it walked right down off the pavement like it was nothing, and in two wheel drive no less," Mike said.
Bob and Jeff walked up "What have we got here?" Bob asked?. He looked over the barn, picking up on the faint clucking sounds coming from the interior.
"Guess you found Jan's chickens," Bob said.
"Yep, and that's what I wanted to talk to you about... chickens. I don't know anything about them," he said, "or cows, or horses, or... What else is there I should know about, Bob?" Mike asked.
"Um, well, what for?" Bob asked.
"For everything. All of it, because me and Kate, Ronnie and Patty are going in with you on this wilderness idea. We talked it over; we're going to do it," he told him.
Bob's face lit up, "Really?" he said.
"Really," Mike said. He looked over at Ronnie. “Watch him in case he starts jumping up and down," he said.
"Did you tell Janet?" Bob asked.
"Nope. Thought you would, should," Mike said. "But I was wondering if chickens can travel. If, since we will need chickens, we should take these," he said.
"We could," Bob said, "but we'd probably lose an awful lot of them, we got quite a ways to go. Plus, they'd stop laying almost immediately."
"Why?" Ronnie asked.
"They don't like change, noise, different, and anything else that upsets their normal routine," Bob told him. He paused. "We're going to have to change our direction of travel," Bob continued. "If we're going to the place I picked. Who all is going?" he asked.
"All of my people want to," Jeff said. "I was going to get with you about it myself. But, well, this seems to be a good time for it."
"I can't speak for anyone except the four of us, but, Sandy and Susan made it clear they want to go as well," Mike said.
"Tom and Lilly also want to go," Bob said.
"That leaves Nell and Molly and Tim and Annie," Mike said.
"No, Tim and Annie said they want to go to," Ronnie said. "And last I knew Nell wanted too. So really that's all of us, except the little ones. That's twenty four people. Wow," Ronnie said.
"We should discuss it further tonight," Mike said.
"So animals, how are we going to do it, Bob?"
"Well, to be honest, I hadn't thought quite that far. But I've been thinking cattle trucks," Bob said.
"What's that?" Jeff asked.
"They're just big trucks with a stake rack. You can run twenty cows up in one, I wouldn't try it with horses. But we need that kind of space. I think we'll have to drive them, cows and horses together. They graze with each other, they should herd with each other," he seemed to be thinking out loud.
"You lost me, Bob. Drive them in trucks?" Mike asked.
"No. Drive them on the ground, as in cowboy style. I don't think we'll be able to get those trucks as far back as we want to go. It's pretty wild country. But, even if we did, we have no fences. We have no homes. We have crops to plant. It would be better to go with what we need, seed, food, tools, get ourselves established this year, get a crop in the ground. Next year we could come out and get horses, cows, other animals. Or, drive them in with us and, well, turn them loose. Most of them will stay near us, some would go wild pretty quick though.” He shook his head slightly “We're going to have to sit down and talk this out... all of us... and also make sure everyone wants to go," Bob said.
"If we kick it open, we'll probably get some more good feedback," Ronnie said.
"That's the best way to do it," Jeff agreed.
"I like both ideas. Maybe we could take some animals with us then come out for more in the Spring?
Most likely by then there will be a million and one things we need anyway," Mike said. "But yeah, we can't discuss it like this. Everybody needs to be in on it."
"Well, we can't take these chickens with us, but it's early, I bet we could get a bunch of them ready to eat," Bob said.
"Never did that before," Jeff said. "How's it go?"
"Me either," Ronnie said, looking a little nervous.
"Ditto," Mike said.
"Well, gotta learn some time," Bob said. "Ain't hard."
~
By the time the four men had gutted and plucked the feathers from twenty chickens, it was well after noon and everybody was covered with blood and feathers.
"Let's get these back to Jan," Bob said. "then we'll get down to the stream.”
"I second that," Mike said. He was trying to blow a small downy feather off his nose, reluctant to touch his nose with his hands which were blood sticky, and looked themselves to be feathered. "Hey, didn't Janet say there was a well here somewhere?" he asked hopefully.
A few minutes of searching found the water where it bubbled up fresh and cold and ran down into the trough. They all got cleaned up before they left.
~
Janet gratefully accepted the chickens when they handed them over to her.
"I had thought of that as well, but I couldn't find two men willing to take me down there," she said.
Bob kissed her on the cheek. "We saved you the drive," he said.
"Why, Bob," she said, embarrassed.
"Everybody's going," Bob said, "With us. They're all coming with us."
Janet grabbed Bob's face between her palms and kissed him hard, pumped one fist in the air and said, "Yes!"
"Jan," Bob said, surprised. Then they both laughed and hugged. "We are going to talk it over tonight. We're not sure of Molly and Nell. Other than that, everybody else is in... including Jeff's people."
"I'm so happy," Janet Dove said. Her face glowed. She couldn't have smiled wider if she tried.
"Thought you would be," Bob said.
"Go get some clean clothes and get cleaned up," Janet said. "I'll take these from here," she said indicating the chickens.
America The Dead (Book 2): The Road To Somewhere Page 6
