Stewart and Tom drove the point car, Stewart's police cruiser about two hundred yards ahead of Max in the mini van, which had Amelia and the kids in it. Amelia switched off with Nick from time to time and kept all the kids in line. All of the group had seen enough horrors over the last two days of travel to remove any doubt that this was a full blown catastrophe. They were tentatively traveling to North Platte, where Tom's parents lived on a ranch out about a few miles from town. After that Max wanted to move on to Iowa, where he had a friend with a large house and some land. They had not received any news from anyone so far. Their cell phones had stopped working two days ago, and they could get nothing but static on any televisions they tried or on the car radios.
Tom was proving to be a handy resource in an odd variety of ways. He had come up with a pump and hose that operated off of the electric power of the vehicles, more and more often the electricity was completely out wherever they stopped for the night. No electricity meant, no way to pump fuel. An hour of poking through the zombie infested remains of a small prairie town brought Tom out with the electric pump. Tom said he learned all about such things on the farm growing up and was now very glad he has some practical knowledge that could help them out. They could keep the cars fueled, so long as they could find a gas station and get the storage tanks opened. They also grabbed a dozen two gallon fuel cans from a big box store and had them filled up and strapped on top of the van, with two more in the cruiser. They had a tarp strapped over the ones in the roof rack, but Max was still nervous about driving around with all that fuel over his head.
After North Platte, where Tom planned on staying, Max planned to continue traveling with anyone who wanted to go with him and his kids to his friend Bill's house. Bill went way back with Max, they grew up on the same street when they were kids and attended the same schools, albeit Max was four years younger and had not ever gone to the same school with Bill at the same time. As the the only two boys on a street full of girls the two were bound to become friends, despite the age difference. The friendship born in primary school continued through high school and even prospered into college and beyond. After college Bill had moved around a lot, only returning to Denver to find and marry his wife. Still he visited Max once every year and the women they had married got along well too, which made things easier as everyone looked forward to the annual visits in the fall.
Unlike Max, Bill had started his family early, barely out of college and he had five children now, the oldest was seventeen and they alternated in gender down from there every two years. Max had kidded Bill that he and his wife were like machines, you could set a clock by the birthing of their children. Bill worked in technology as a computer programmer, but he was always spouting off about Armageddon and being prepared for whatever life threw at you. He was heavy into Boy Scouts of America as well, his oldest son had made Eagle Scout a year early and his other boys were involved in camping, hunting and fishing all year round. The only complaint Sarah, Max's wife, had about Bill was that he seemed way more focused on the boys of the family than the girls. On more than one occasion she had heard Bill say he took care of the boys and his wife, Trisha, took care of the girls.
Max knew Bill would be ready for the storm of zombies. He knew with the financial markets fluctuating so badly over the past few years that Bill had been planting large gardens on his land, learning how to preserve meat by drying it out and teaching the boys to hunt and fish as more than a hobby. Max was hoping his perception was not off, that his friend would be the rock in the storm that he needed him to be right now. Somewhere in the back of Max's mind there was a little nagging thought that things might not go as planned, Bill could get fickle when his families welfare was on the line, would he treat Max as family or as a drain on the family resources? It was a small disturbing thought and Max resolved to show up to Bill's house with as many resources as he could cram into the van, if that meant driving seven hundred miles with gas cans on the top of the car, then that was what he would do.
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