“Yeah, I can see that. But last night we talked about the journals; I’m keeping one. Kate is too. Lydia said she would. Something to leave when we leave.”
“It’s not a bad idea,” Bob agreed. “I’m not much for writing myself, but Jan might like it.”
Mike nodded. “Well, Lydia liked the idea. She didn’t say she’d go, but she might. So, hate me or not, she might be with us.”
“Oh,” Bob said. “I see that. Maybe she’ll be okay. She’s a kid; maybe she’ll change.”
“Guess we’ll have to see,” Mike agreed. “Guess we’ll have to see.”
Bob worked the truck up and over a huge slab of up-tilted asphalt and followed along behind the other two trucks as they made their way down Arsenal Street.
“What did you think of the idea that Tom had of fixing up one of the new trucks?” Mike ventured after a few minutes.
“Won’t work. Or at least it won’t work without a lot of trouble. The new engines are computer dependent. We could probably find ourselves another motor, maybe even a new crate motor at a parts store somewhere around here,” Bob said.
“What’s a crate motor?” Mike asked.
“It just means a new motor, all crated up when it was sent from the factory. They sell them. Race cars, old rebuilds, like that. But, even if we couldn’t find a crate motor, we could find enough parts to rebuild anything we would need to rebuild on nearly any vehicle. So really, when we’re done, we’d have what amounted to a new vehicle. Tom wants to oversimplify that. He thinks we can just find the parts and swap them out on the motor that’s in the truck. Maybe we can. I’m not that good though, and I don’t think he is. I think we should stick to what we can do for sure, utilize what we have - the new parts.”
“That what you think we should do? Build a vehicle?”
“Yeah. Maybe two. Four wheel drive, of course. Go right through them top to bottom, everything new. It would take a few weeks, but we’ve got that and more. Meantime, you could work on your Ham radio idea, “Bob finished.
“Can you get electric? Those big Ham radio outfits need regular power.”
“Yeah, that’s not a problem. We’ll just find a generator. That will give us all the power we need. We could even hook up a power inverter to give us one twenty in the vehicle,” Bob added.
Mike nodded. “So we’re going to jump right into this thing? Get ready to go?”
Bob nodded. “I’m with you. I’m not spending next winter in a cave unless I have to. There's a place in Tennessee, maybe Kentucky.” He closed his eyes for a split second as if seeing something only he could see. He shook his head, frowned and then continued. “If not, I’m thinking the coast. Southern or western, either will do. Whichever one looks to be the better bet. And who knows how hard it’ll be to get there, so the sooner we’re ready to go, the better.”
“I agree,” Mike said. “I’ll talk to Kate.
“And I’ll talk to Jan. But we already talked.”
“So did we,” Mike agreed. They both laughed.
Bob angled the big truck around a final piece of asphalt and into a cracked and buckled parking lot. The two other vehicles sat silent, waiting for them.
As they left the truck, Mike noticed that the store hadn’t seemed to incur any more damage since the last time that he had been there. The roof was bowed inward; it had been before, but there were plenty of upright pillars that supported
the roof and they all appeared intact. At least the ones he could easily see. The supports were spaced about every sixteen or so feet.
“Safe?” Tom asked.
“Looks the same as it did the last time,” Mike allowed. Kate and Bob looked at him, and he shrugged. “I’d say so. It looks the same as it did the last time I was here. It doesn’t even look as though anyone has been here.”
The scattered, powdered snow seemed undisturbed around the shattered doorway that lead into the building. Mike snapped his flashlight on and led the way inside.
The inside of the store told a different story. Someone had been there during the time Mike had last been there. Several of the glass display cases that held the weapons had been damaged. They were locked. Who ever had made the attempt had made it halfheartedly. The glass was safety glass of some sort. It had cracked and spider webbed, but it had not broken and caved in.
“Guess someone tried to get in,” Bob offered.
Tom held up a discarded crow bar. Even in the weak light they could see the streaks of scarlet on one end. Tom let it fall to the floor. The clatter was loud enough to make Lydia draw in a quick breath in the broken silence that followed.
“Jesus, Tom,” She sputtered. Tom only grinned.
“Why does someone go through all of that when they could’ve taken a simple screw driver and just popped the locks?” Kate asked.
“Well,” Tom started.
Kate had walked behind the counter, taken a screw driver from her pocket and began to jimmy the lock mechanism. It was a cheap sliding set and easily bent to one side far enough to slide the glass door open. Kate smiled.
“Learn that up in the big city, Miss?” Mike asked with a smile.
Kate smiled back, reached inside the case, careful of the glass that had sprayed in small slivers from the spider webs in the top, and withdrew pistol after pistol, setting them on a wooden topped case next to the cash register.
“Forty five caliber, Nine millimeter, a cheap one though. Three eighty, kind of nice, though small. Here’s a much nicer Nine Millimeter.” She set several more guns on the wooden top, looked up with a crooked grin and asked, “Well, gentlemen, lady, what’ll it be?”
“You really know about this kind of shit,” Lydia asked in an awed voice.
“Obviously well enough to know what’s what,” Tom said.
“That’s right. Obviously well enough,” Kate agreed. She gave no further explanation.
“What do you think, Kate?” Jan asked.
“Yeah, what would be the best?” Mike asked.
Kate shrugged. “It depends on what you like. I like a three eighty myself. It’s small, not as heavy as a Nine millimeter.” She pulled her own Nine Millimeter. “This was my Dad's. A good gun, but I liked the Three Eighty I had. A Three Eighty won’t really knock somebody down, not like you see in the movies. But a nine millimeter won’t always do that either. It’ll just make a bigger hole. If you want to knock somebody down, you need this.” She held up the bigger forty five caliber pistol. She held the mostly black pistol easily in one hand. “This will knock somebody down and kill them. And, on the off chance that your aim was bad and you didn’t immediately kill them, believe me, they are not going to feel like getting back up.” She grinned. “It’s still not like the movies. You know, where you see them flying backwards through the air. But, it will knock them down and keep them there.”
“Jesus, Katie, I’m like in awe,” Lydia said.
“Kate,” Kate said, “and thank you.”
“So how do you know all that? Like for real, how do you know all that shit?”
“My dad was a cop, not in Syracuse, before we moved there. He had a thing for guns. I just caught it. When he knew I was going to be like him when it came to guns, he sent me for training, safety stuff mostly, but I liked it so much I started buying my own weapons. I took the test. Eventually I would’ve had my foot in the door in Syracuse. That’s a good department. I would’ve been in already if not for the economy.“
“The thing is, I love to shoot. I’m good too,” she sighed.
“So… What’ll it be?” She let the smile return to her face,
reached over and began to jimmy another of the locks on the sliding glass doors.
They spent the good part of two hours in the store. Camping gear, rifles, pistols and ammunition, Mike began to feel like they were equipping there own private army before they were done. Even so, by the time they left, everyone was carrying at least one pistol, and several rifles and boxes of ammunition had found their way into the back of the pic
kup truck. Kate, Mike noticed, had added a matte black forty five caliber pistol to the Nine Millimeter. She wore them in webbed holsters on a wide leather belt.
“I thought you preferred a Three Eighty,” Mike said half jokingly as he replaced the Nine Millimeter he had decided on into the side holster he had chosen.
“I do,” she said, “For shooting. But like I said, a Three Eighty can’t knock somebody down.” Her eyes met his.
“Yeah… There is that,” Mike agreed quietly.
They spent a short amount of time looking through a small convenience store in the same parking lot. There was very little left. Most likely cleaned out, Bob voiced, by the same folks who had tried to take the guns. This was evidenced by smears of maroon on the counter tops. Even so, they managed to find boxes of stuff in the storage area. They finished filling the backs of the trucks with basic First Aid stuff and several boxes full of candy bars and junk food too.
The sun had been standing overhead for what seemed like hours. Bob spoke.
“Hotter,” He said. “You can feel the heat. And,” He motioned with his hands, “the snow is melting faster also.”
“Got a theory on that?” Mike asked.
Bob shook his head.
“Maybe the whole process takes time,” Kate said.
“Maybe,” Tom agreed. “Maybe it’s not so easy to start something spinning in the other direction. And we don’t know if it really stopped or not. The sun’s coming up in the north, or it was, but that seems to be changing too. I don’t think it stopped all the way. I think it’s just got a different spin now, and maybe a different path.”
Bob nodded, as did Mike. “I guess we’ll leave it for the scientists... long as we don’t fall off the Earth.” He chuckled a little.
“Call it a day?” Mike asked.
“Yeah,” Tom agreed. “We still have to unload all of this.”
There were a few halfhearted complaints, but everyone piled into the trucks, and they made their way slowly back towards the heart of the city and the cave that lay behind the Public Square.
Janet ~ March 14th
We are six people who have managed to stay alive through whatever it is that has happened to our planet. My husband Bob and I were fortunate enough to be protected by our spirits and brought through all of this.
I am Janet Dove; my husband is full blooded Blackfoot and a very proud man. A very good man as well. And not just to me. He treats all people well.
My mother was Cherokee and my father was French. I don’t mean French transplanted to this country. My mother met him in France. We are looking forward to whatever the Great spirits purpose is in this.
We have many young people with us. Michael Collins. He’s mixed race, like many of us. He probably doesn’t realize it, but he is in fact our leader. He’s in his early twenties. I guess the mixed race stuff doesn’t matter anymore, but I lived with it for so long that it’s hard for me to let it go.
Bob has suffered worse with those prejudices. Many other people besides me. Maybe the world is at that place where all of that stuff can be let go now? I hope so.
Kate Loi is a beautiful young woman. Her father is African American, her mother Asian. She has her father's dark skin blended with her mothers features. Striking. I enjoy her company. She reminds me of my daughter. I don’t know how she fared in all of this. I suppose we’re all wondering similar things.
Tom. Thomas Evans. And, Lydia, Marcia George fill out our party. We are planning to leave here in a few months and head south, or west. The direction isn’t decided, only the realization that we need to go. The thinking is that we should head south, somewhere warmer. After all, there is no electricity here, and we are living in a cave. It’s not a bad cave, and we’re lucky to have it. Almost the entire city has been destroyed. The buildings are unsafe to live in.
When we leave, we’ll leave all of that behind us. This is who we are. We will most likely continue to the south. We are currently looking for a Short Wave radio set to try to get in touch with others around the world. You, whoever you may be, may be able to reach us where ever we have gone to now.
Bob believes in the Nation. That the people will once again live on the earth the way they used to. Bob believes it, and so I believe it. I’ll continue to keep this book up while we’re here and include any useful information we can pass on to you before we go.
Kate ~ March 14th
I guess I should start this the right way. I hadn't thought about it when it was just me to think about. But it's more than me or even those of us that are here now. It's the ones who might come. Or will come after. So even if you figured out almost all of what I'm about to write, I'll write it anyway.
I read back over what I wrote and it doesn't even seem like me, like I wrote it, like those things happened to me
My name is Kate Loi. I was living here when all of this happened. I'm not from Watertown. I actually did live here for a while last year, but that’s a long story. The point is I'm not really from here like the others are.
My man is Mike Collins and we are with two other couples; Jan and Bob Dove, and Tom Evans And Lydia George. I came here with them; Mike was on his own then. I was too, even though I had people around me. I guess if you've read all of this diary you know what I'm talking about. I had Jan as my friend, this diary and my father's gun. I Thank God for what I had, especially Jan.
Jan and Bob are older. They are really good people. Tom and Lydia are younger. Well, Lydia is. Lydia’s even younger than I am, but Tom is quite a lot older. I don’t think anyone cares about that anymore though. At least nobody here does.
We are going to leave here sometime in the next few months and try to make it down to the Gulf coast. We don’t know for sure how that will go. I’ll keep this updated though until then. We’re going to leave these behind us. Hopefully they will be useful to someone. But I think I'll keep my little Notebook. It means something to me.
Things we know: You can get trucks and cars to start as long as they are older ones that don’t have electronic brain boxes, as Bob put it. That is how we intend to go before winter or just after winter really lets go. Otherwise we’d really have to wait for summer to settle in before we could chance travel.
There are several sporting goods stores in the area. We’re all carrying guns now. It seems smart to do. Maybe I should say it would be stupid not to. We think it only makes good sense.
This cave we are in seems stable, but many of the other structures in the city aren’t safe to live in. We don’t know how deep these caves go.
We’re going to try to reach others with Ham Radios. We’re also trying to find a battery powered television set just to see if anything’s on the air. We’re hopeful. We’re also going to pick up some hand held F.M. Radios. Walkie Talkies, Bob calls them. That way we can speak to each other when we’re separated.
The sun is rising in the north. Really the North West. The days were long, then short, now going back towards long again. We don’t know what that might mean, where it will end or even where we will be when it does end. And maybe end is the wrong word to use. We don't know what began or ended; might begin or end.
I re-read that, I guess it seems melodramatic, at least to me, but it's honest.
I’ll write more as we go along.
~ March 15th ~
Early morning darkness held the road that fronted the cave. The moonlight, sparse, reflected off the rapids of the Black river.
A shadow moved by one of the pickup trucks. Another moved by the Suburban. The sound of sand gritting beneath the sole of a shoe came clearly in the shadowy darkness. The door of the pickup squealed loudly as it was carefully opened. The shadow paused, looking towards the Suburban. The shadow there appeared to be fighting with the door to no avail. The shadow next to the pickup gestured quickly with both hands, and the shadow next to the Suburban gave up on the door, crossed to the pickup and quickly climbed inside. Once they were both inside, silence returned to the small patch of asphalt that fron
ted the cave. A few seconds later the pickup roared to life. The headlights snapped on, the wheels turned hard left and the driver launched the truck down what was left of the shattered roadway.
Voices were raised in alarm from inside the cave, and within just a few moments everyone inside was outside. Lydia, gun in hand, unloaded a full clip at the fleeing pickup truck. Both Tom and Mike snapped off a single shot, more in startled response to Lydia’s’ shots than with any real hope of hitting the retreating pickup truck.
“Jesus,” Lydia said breathlessly. “They stole our truck!” She turned and looked at Mike with wide, frightened eyes. “They stole our Goddamn truck,” She repeated. “How could they steal our truck?”
Tom headed for the suburban and pulled the keys from his pocket, preparing to unlock the door.
“Tom,” Mike called. “Where are you going, Man?”
“That’s our Goddamn truck. I’m going to get it.” His eyes were wild, the truck keys in one hand, a pistol in the other, no shirt, sock-less shoes, laces trailing.
“It’s an old truck, Man,” Mike said.
“It’s my old truck,” Tom said defensively. “And if I catch that fucker…”
“Fuckers,” Lydia said.
“Huh?” Tom asked.
“Fuckers, as in I saw two heads. Two of them. Not one,” Lydia said. Her voice held a breathless, excited quality to it that Mike didn’t like. She was dressed in jeans and a thin T-shirt. She shivered slightly, whether from the cold or the excitement, Mike couldn’t tell.
“Either way. One, two, how would we catch them? And then what? Are we going to shoot somebody for stealing an old truck? Is that what things have come to?” Mike asked.
“Look, don’t get moral on me,” Tom said. He leveled his eyes at Mike. “I do things my way. You take from me, you pay for it.”
Mike just stared back at him.
“You’re soft,” Tom said. But his fists, still clenched, dropped from the truck door and he walked away from the Suburban and back into the cave.
The Rising of the Dead Page 7