We have a group working on food and water. Do you all want to continue with that? I see people nodding their heads and no one shaking theirs. Will this work for you? Do we need any more workers?”
This went on for about 45 minutes and included going after our family pets as quickly as feasible, gathering guns where possible, and getting Marco to start to train us properly, finding heirloom seeds for future farming we would have to do, gathering motor homes and where to park them until we needed to start our move, finding clothes for the kids, and working out a showering schedule over at the senior center that was just a couple of blocks away. I decided to call a halt. “We are going to start a tradition, or maybe not, today. Kevin would you bring Baby Girl up here please? Some of you may not know but Kevin found Baby Girl crawling around in the parking mess over at Hillcrest Hospital on the day everyone got sick. He tried to find where she came from or who her parents were but he couldn’t. We looked again yesterday and there is no sign of which car she is from or what her name was. Baby Girl deserves a real name. Kevin, what names have you given to this child?”
Kevin had come to the front of the room and held Baby Girl in his arms for everyone to see. “Yes, I have named her Geraldine Charlotte Turner after her two adoptive brothers, Jerry and Charlie.” I thought the boys would burst with pride. Again, a lot of us cried. “And because Geraldine Charlotte is a rather big name to carry around all the time, we’re going to call her Dinah for short. That was my mother’s name.” All I could think was how diplomatically he’d handled honoring his mother and Dinah’s putative brothers.
“Before we adjourn, is there anything anyone would like to say?”
Several people stood up from the last row. I hadn’t recognized them but figured they were among the people who had come after I turned in for the night. One of them announced they were from some of the other groups around us in Los Angeles and Ventura Counties. They asked if we would allow them to join us when we found a place to retreat to in the next couple of days. They felt that our advice had been instrumental in getting themselves organized. They also felt that together we had the expertise to succeed better than if we all went off on our own. Then they told us how many people they represented. I was blown away to learn that all told, they already had four times our numbers. Then their spokesman said, “ I speak for all of us when I say that we happily accept your leadership for the next six month, Mr. Caldwell.”
A few minutes earlier, a group of twenty people including several soldiers had arrived at the right side opening to the theatre. Marco had joined them and stepped forward. “I’d like to introduce some of my colleagues from Camp Pendleton. They have some supplies we might be interested in. They would also like to immediately join our group, and we are all at the service of this group and also its leader, Bobby Caldwell.”
Realizing that I needed to do something about all the different groups that were represented, I put it to a vote. “Is there a motion to accept all these people as part of our group?” There was a motion and a second, and then a unanimous vote. After, announcing a meeting tomorrow at noon of only local “work groups” we voted to adjourn.
As I mentioned before, I’m an introvert. Meetings like this leave me a little troubled and tired, especially if I’m at the center of things, but there was no time to relax. As people left the room, I motioned for Anna, Jane, Kevin, Lydia, and Marco to join me. We in turn were joined by the Pendleton survivors and the people from the LA/Ventura County groups. Jerry and Charlie were still there holding Geraldine Charlotte.
“Let’s try to be as brief as we can about everything. Charlie and Jerry, will you take Baby…Geraldine Charlotte and the children from Camp Pendleton to the big reception room? Is that ok with all of you?” No one from Pendleton objected and the children appeared to be so in shock they just nodded and went along with the boys.
“How do you want to work this out? I hope we can be leaving the area soon but I’d like to have at least two more searchlight sessions before we go.”
One of the marines spoke up right then, “Sir, permission to speak, Sir”.
“Yes, but only if you agree to speak up when you need to say something.”
“Sir, how would it be if we went ahead and retreated to a healthier environment and left a contingent to maintain the searchlights until some time in the future. We have radios and can keep in touch with all the different groups.”
“That’s a great idea. What do you all think about that?” Everyone expressed agreement with the idea.
“Thanks. What is your name?” I could see Sanchez on his shirt, but for all I knew that was the name of his drycleaner.
“Sir, Corporal Enrique Sanchez, Sir.”
“I appreciate you stepping up on this, Corporal. We’ll work on a plan with the searchlight teams. Sergeant Coletti, will you work out the details for communications and protection for searchlight groups if we decide to do this?”
“For the non-Orange County groups, please keep us informed about what your plans are. Can you have some people sit in on our noon meeting tomorrow via HAM or some other communications system? We need to know specifically where you plan to put up your search light groups over the next few days so we don’t needlessly overlap. Also, does anyone know where we can find a Good Humor truck? You know one of those ice cream trucks that plays music to let kids know they can buy ice cream? I was thinking that we can drive through some neighborhoods and see if we can entice any children to leave their houses? The searchlights may not be helpful for finding kids who might be afraid of the dark. Anna, would you ask your brother to see if we can locate any ice cream trucks with the internet?”
With that I left to pick up the boys so we could pick up our dogs. Chanelle asked if she could pick up her cat and several other kids asked about pets, so I asked Kevin and Lydia to help us out. We ended up loading up several cars just with kids. At the last minute I decided to ask Marco to give each of us a guard. I was beginning to get a little paranoid. Then I put out the word that people should only leave with a companion, and that we were going out to pick up pets and that they should feel free to do the same.
Even though it had been less than twenty-four hours since I had been in my condo, it felt like days. We drove the short three minutes to my place with Corporal Sanchez was our escort. It gave me a chance to learn a little more about him, not the three-minute drive of course, that was way too short, but while we were getting things ready. First, we drove to the pet store that was about seven minutes away. We needed pet crates and cages. Depending on how many pets there were, the pets were going to have access to some or all of the central lawn area at the library. The boys and I now had four dogs and I sure hoped we weren’t typical.
Driving with Enrique I learned he was from Santa Ana and had been in the marines for three years. He’d just reenlisted and had hoped to make a career of it before everyone up and died of the sickness. Now, he wanted to be a part of our survival plan. He casually knew one of the fellow marine survivors, and they had stumbled upon each other in the midst of the day of all the dying. Both of them had taken friends to the infirmary where they had experienced the all too familiar mass death scene up close and personal.
Some of the other marines were acquainted, but none were close friends. A computer wiz had been in touch with Todd, and it was she who had brought most of them together with a siren. Most of the marine survivors were on base at the time so they were relatively easy to round up. Seven of them drove a vehicle with sirens blasting around the housing areas until they found the remaining soldiers and the grieving wives and orphaned children. They looked for survivors starting early the day before and finally decided they had exhausted all possibilities on base.
Using their own radio system they made contact with a fair number of military installations across the country. From these contacts they were able to determine that there were a smattering of men and women ranging from one or two to almost twenty at dozens of facilities across the country. They were
starting to coalesce and join in association with the various survivor groups. Most of the marines from Camp Pendleton were at least familiar with Marco who was the highest ranking survivor at Camp Pendleton.
San Diego was home to quite a large contingent of Naval personnel. Most of these were presumed to be joining with the survivor group there, at least that was Enrique’s understanding.
Enrique had been able to stop off at his parents’ home earlier this morning on his way in from the south. He’d found his younger brothers and sisters as well as his parents all at the house. His dad had a lawn service, but he hadn’t gone out that morning, or else he’d been able to make it home. When he spoke of his family he sounded almost hollow, as if he were making a major effort to detach himself from the tragedy. Most of the people we were finding seemed to have found a way to detach emotionally, and I wondered if we were only finding the people who processed grief and loss faster. I hoped that was the case since our numbers were roughly only one hundred fifty for the entire county of Orange. Orange County had just a little over three million people at the time of the sickness.
Arriving at my driveway, the boys and I hopped out and went inside. I’d left the patio door open onto what little backyard I had and surprisingly there wasn’t a mess. We’d left plenty of dog food out and it was all gone. There was still water in the big pan I’d left out on the patio. Of course the dogs were all happy to see us. Since none of them had ties to any of us of very long duration, except for Buster the beagle, they all sort of just bounced up and down around all four of us. We put halters and leashes on them as quickly as we could. Strangely, the boys didn’t spend any particular time with Buster nor he with them. They were very affectionate with all the dogs, but not with one in particular.
“How long have you guys had Buster?”
“What do you mean, Mr. Caldwell?” Jerry paused in his petting of Martha.
“Well, uh, how old is he? Did you get him as a puppy?”
“What do you mean? Buster isn’t our dog. Isn’t he yours?” Jerry looked puzzled.
“But Buster came inside with you when you got here yesterday. He isn’t your dog?”
“No, Mr. Caldwell. We thought he was your dog.”
“Hm. I guess he’s our dog now. Do you want a dog Enrique?”
“You don’t want to keep him, Sir?”
“Well, we’ll keep him. But if you’d like a very enterprising dog, you might find Buster’s your boy.” I considered Buster to be a true survivor and realized he might just be a keeper.
“How about I take a rain check on a dog, Sir. I don’t know what exactly I’m going to be doing for awhile yet.” Enrique’s logic couldn’t be faulted, I guess.
As we were loading the dogs into the van we were driving, I heard a small high-pitched yip coming from across the street. I knew I shouldn’t look, but I knew who it was and couldn’t help myself. Two retired gay guys lived almost directly across the end of the cul-de-sac from my condo. When they retired about four months ago, they got a miniature schnauzer puppy that they proceeded to spoil beyond any understanding. Her name was Nelda and she was unbelievably cute. I’d see them walking her each day, both as a couple and alone. I liked them as did everyone on this end of the street so of course I liked Nelda. The neighborhood seemed to congregate at the big dead end around five o’clock and Nelda was always there with her dads.
Like I said, I knew I shouldn’t have looked, but I did. I hoped they had taken her on a cruise or a vacation, but evidently they were home when things all came apart. There was Nelda sitting at the gate looking forlorn and trying her best to get my attention.
“So Nelda, are you alone?” I was standing now right at the gate looking straight down at her little platinum body. I knew she would die if I didn’t do anything, and I couldn’t add that to my survivors’ guilt plate. There wasn’t a lock on the gate so I pushed it open and picked her up. Nelda was small for her breed. I know that because I groomed dogs all through college to help pay for college expenses. She was only about ten pounds or so, but I figured she’d still grow a bit and would top out at twelve and a few ounces. Nelda was a wiggler. No matter how many times I had encountered her, she always behaved as if she hadn’t seen me in years. Holding Nelda, I knocked at the front door of Steve and Paul’s condo. No answer. I knocked harder. No answer. Then and there I decided to take Nelda and leave a note. I didn’t want to see their bodies.
Back at the van, I gave Nelda a little food and some water which she went to town on. Next, I put the two little gray mops in the same crate and put Nelda in one by herself. She turned around a few times and went right to sleep. Sweet little Nelda. Martha and Buster each got their own crates as well. The boys were happy, but I knew that five dogs was about four dogs more than I wanted to deal with. Maybe someone would want to adopt some once we got them back to the Library.
Our trip out for the dogs had been easy enough so that was one more thing off my plate. By the time all the dog rescuers were back we had over thirty dogs, several cats, and even a couple of birds. Someone had fenced off a section of the central courtyard and the animals were taken care of, at least temporarily. One of the young women had taken it upon herself to gather pet food, supplies, and other pet needs while I was out. In her previous life she had worked at one of the pet store chains, and even though she didn’t have an animal of her own, she loved being around them and caring for them. I immediately asked her to be the caretaker in chief for keeping track of the animals until after our move to a more sustainable area. She was to give me a rundown every couple of days of how things were going. When I told her about my needing to find owners for some of my dogs, she was happy to help, even going so far as to take Martha for her own. The boys seemed to gravitate to Nelda as soon as they saw her, so I reserved her for us.
While we were gone, Todd located several ice cream trucks, and they were already out enticing children to come out of hiding in their houses. Soon after I’d dealt with the pet situation, a musical truck pulled into the lot to deposit our first success story, a little boy, his clothes covered in gore. The two drivers were so excited they could hardly wait to get back on the road so Jane took the child who appeared to be about five and turned him over to Ms. M.
People were starting to show up in a fairly steady flow now. We seemed to be growing by about five or six newly found survivors every hour. Most of them came in their own cars, but we had some that came in pairs, including another pair of siblings. The non-sibling pairs had stumbled upon each other as they were gathering supplies. Some of them knew of our existence, but after all their losses they hadn’t been ready until now to face the world. Others had noticed one of our trucks out gathering supplies or equipment and immediately connected with one of our crews. We also were getting some pre-driving age kids on bicycles. We now had eight bike riders in total. All of them were post elementary school so Anna took them in. Thank goodness, now and then we found a baby. We found one just because an enterprising pair of teen scouts found one strapped in a car seat in car trapped on the freeway. The mother, who was still at the steering wheel had rolled the windows down or they would never have heard the poor little guy crying.
All told, on their first day out, our ice cream trucks brought in six children, three adults, and two young teens. By the time the sun was setting, we were out with five searchlight crews, and our numbers had increased to just over two hundred. Los Angeles County reported numbers at seven survivor centers with over four times that number. Todd reported that we now had contacts with groups in Europe, Asia, South America, and Africa, all of whom were having success with the siren-searchlight combo as well. Their numbers were as small as ours, but everyone was increasing as people moved beyond their initial grief stages of denial to acceptance.
As the sun went down, I decided to start reviewing some of the reports I was receiving. Amazingly things were proceeding rather well all across the country with two radio stations up and running and four more stations just hours away from
being on the air and still another well into the planning stage. For want of a better space where I could be sort of alone, I sat down in the replicated oval office. I felt awkward, but it was truly the only room that wasn’t being used for something else. I could still hear people going about their business and constant sirens. The sirens went on day and night now.
The San Diego group included several naval personnel who were planning to take a small coast guard rescue cutter boat up the coast to look for survivors and to check for immediate causes for concern. So far they had enough trained personnel, including a score or so of active, reserve, retired, and former enlisted naval service men and women. Their immediate goal was to staff a small cutter boat and then see if it was feasible to expand using volunteers. As soon as this information became known, there were volunteers from our own group as well as from the Los Angeles, Ventura, and Santa Barbara County survivor groups. The San Diegans were planning to have a boat ready in the next twenty-four hours time, at least for a run up to the Long Beach/Los Angeles harbor area. With all the volunteers, including some with past navy experience, we began planning to have several cutter boats before too long.
Another interesting development was that we were surfacing a number of people with piloting experience. Their experience ranged from small pleasure and recreational craft to fighter jets. Thinking about them and the naval group, I decided most decisions would have to be made by the different crew chiefs over the next few days and weeks since I certainly wasn’t in any position to tell anyone how to do anything involving a plane. I was just barely going to be able to keep up with developments in the short term let alone anything long term. In the meantime, we needed to develop plans so that our discussions would be based on pragmatism and not emotion. We had a lot of talent that could easily go to waste if we weren’t good at organizing ourselves.
Pandemic Reboot: Survivors Page 8