by Patrick Shea
Sam said, “Dad, I told you yesterday that I’m not planning on leaving you. Jack Sweeney said seven to ten days and today is only the sixth day. I’m ready to go through this with you and Ned, but I’m not ready to go on without you.”
Ned had spent the last week at the Blue Wolf Ranch, and had been showing symptoms since the day after Will. He now said, “Sam, your Dad’s right. This is no time to get stubborn on us. Everyone we know is showing symptoms and some of them started last Thursday, that’s nine days now. I know you don’t want to hear this but we have to start planning.”
For the first time Sam started crying and said through her tears, “This isn’t fair. I don’t want to be a survivor, I want to be with the two of you and I want it to end for all three of us at the same time. For the first time in my life I want to be like everyone else.”
Will smiled to himself at the irony involved in Sam’s wish, but he said, “Sweetheart, I know this is hard for you, but I don’t believe I could stand to see you die. I’m so happy that you’ll be one of the survivors and I know you’ll do well in the future. But we need to talk about what options you have and how Ned and I can help before we leave you. You can’t do anything to help us except to let us help you. It’s all we want and I think it’s all you can offer us that would make any difference at all.”
Sam sat quietly for a few minutes and said, “I know you’re right, I know it’s needed, I just have such a tough time thinking about losing the two of you. I’ve spent my life understanding that if I was going to run a Montana ranch I was going to need to be tough, and I think I’ve done okay in that regard. But I don’t want to be tough now. I just want to be with the two of you. This one is just too hard.”
Ned spoke up again and said, “Sam, you’re the most sensitive person I know. You’re as tough as you need to be and you’ve never let that take you over. You actually care about every living thing. I can’t think of a better person to help build a future. You’ll get to use every skill you’ve ever learned, and then some. And you’ll get to make a difference in the lives of other survivors. They’ll need people like you who are independent, tough, and sensitive.”
Will added with a wry smile, “Sam, you know Ned is right, the world needs people like you a lot more than it needs a broken down cowboy like me.”
Samantha almost smiled at that. Her Dad had been claiming to be a broken down cowboy for so long now it had become a private joke between the two of them. She just couldn’t bring herself to smile or laugh, not even for her Dad.
She did say, “Dad, give me a little time to myself. You know as much as I hate it I’ll do this for you and Ned. I’ll clean up the kitchen and then I’m going to ride Black and Blue to the south end of the box canyon and back. I’ll be home for lunch and I’ll be ready to talk by then.”
Will said, “That’s good Sam; Ned and I’ll use the time to get ready also.”
Sam hadn’t realized until then how hard this was going to be for the two men and she felt a hint of guilt about being selfish. She said, “Okay Dad, I’ll be back around noon and we can talk over lunch.”
After cleaning up the kitchen Sam saddled her stallion, whom she had nick-named Black and Blue because the horse had given her so many bruises in the early days or their relationship. She and the horse were now fast friends, but Sam remained the only person to ride him and she didn’t think he would ever allow another rider. The horses’ actual name was Steel, and he would answer to either name, but only to Sam. Steel was five years old now and was as good a horse as Sam could hope for.
The two of them rode into the canyon south of the ranch at a steady pace. Steel would let her know when he wanted to run. He normally waited until he reached the canyon floor and then sprinted until he began to tire. He seemed to love the exercise as much as Sam did.
They rode to the end of the canyon and Sam dismounted at the small spring to let Steel drink and graze a little on the sparse fall grass. She sat on a downed tree trunk and looked at the watering hole. She clearly saw the tracks of a pack of wolves. She often saw wolf tracks here, but not always. The wolves ranged for a lot of miles and spent most of the summer in the high country. This time of the year they were more apt to be seen in the higher canyons and valleys, but by late December they would move even lower; like everything else trying to survive the hard Montana winters.
Sam thought long and hard about what she needed to do. She had watched the news reports diligently and had searched the web nightly tracking the virus. In the beginning many of the local ranchers, farmers and townspeople had thought that the virus would take a long time to reach this remote area of Montana. Some of them had even packed up their families and moved to cabins in the high Rockies thinking they could miss the virus for months or even longer in the more remote areas. They were soon proven wrong and many of them had already returned to their homes and friends. The virus was simply unstoppable. The winds had brought the virus from the west and spread it across the entire region.
The first outbreaks in the country were in the large cities, which surprised no one. Air travel had spread the virus to these population centers. The west coast cities and towns were right behind the population centers, and within days people across the mountain states and the Great Plains were showing symptoms. The speed at which the virus had spread was shocking, even to those who understood how quickly the virus had spread throughout Europe and Asia. Now there was almost no area left that was free of the virus.
There were still a couple of mountain towns who were virus free, but there were only a small number of these remaining. Each evening the national news broadcasts would report on the number of these towns and each evening there would be fewer. As for local news, there weren’t many local stations still broadcasting. At least they weren’t broadcasting anything live. Many had simply looped a series of programs that played the same three or four hours of programming over and over again.
One station out of Denver had taken the time to loop Discovery Channel survivor programs covering a twenty-four hour period. This loop played over and over again, but was directed towards helping survivors. Some of the other stations and cable networks were starting to do the same thing now. Fortunately they were trying to air different but pertinent programs. The National Geographic station was going to loop all of its recent programs regardless of length. Sam wasn’t sure if any of it would be helpful but she knew none of it would hurt.
She knew she had to come to grips with what was happening in the world but she didn’t know if she could. She would play along for now just to satisfy her Dad and Ned. She didn’t know what else to do. She didn’t have a single positive thought about anything that was occurring or her role in it. Well, she would have to do her best to keep her men happy, and when the end came she’d do what she felt she had to. With that thought she mounted Steel and rode slowly back to the ranch.
Ned had made lunch for the three of them and as they sat down to eat he said, “Your Dad and I made some phone calls this morning. Quite a few Montana cities and towns have prepared RVs for survivors. I called Lewiston and was told they have a couple of them. I told them who you were and they know your ranch, and your Dad, and they’ve reserved an RV for you. It’s got four wheel drive, and I asked them to outfit it to pull a horse trailer. I didn’t think you would want to leave Steel behind.”
“Thanks Ned. Of course Steel will go with me.”
Will said, “We’ve talked about where you could go for the winter. The snows haven’t started yet down here but the high mountains are already covered.”
Sam said, “I haven’t thought too much about it, but my first thought is to go south and winter in or near Yellowstone. I like the thought of the hot springs providing heat for me and the animals throughout the winter. That will also make it easier to care for Steel during the winter. If not Yellowstone, I’d head for the Pacific coast I guess.”
Will said, “I like the thought of Yellowstone also, I’m just not sure you can still get in this la
te in the year. But you can try and if it doesn’t work you can reverse course. But you’re going to have to cross the mountains somewhere and there won’t be any snow plows out there clearing the roads for you. The bottom line is you need to be prepared to winter in Montana and wait for the melt next spring. Remember, we’re talking about a complete melt since no snow removal equipment will be working the mountain passes. It could be mid-May before you can get through any of the passes.”
“Yeah, the more you talk the more convinced I am that I need to plan on driving to the coast in the spring; the only other option is to go east and then south from here, but I think I’d rather spend the winter in Montana than in one of the southern states, especially if I can get into Yellowstone.”
Will said, “Why is that, it seems to me you would want to get to where the best weather is?”
“Well, I’ve been doing research the last couple of nights and I found that Southern California and the southwest states are going be one of the first places with an energy problem. The electrical plants are almost all gas fired and they’ll be shut down any day now. Add to that the problems with fresh water and I think in the beginning survivors will be better off in Washington and Oregon. Eventually all of the electrical plants will shut down, but the hydroelectric plants ought to be able to last for some years before mechanical failure shuts them down. Plus there is more fresh water than a person could hope for. It doesn’t make sense to drive to good weather now, just to turn around and drive back in the spring. I’m not sure how much fuel will be available or how easy it will be to find.”
“You have been busy.”
“Yeah, I’ve been wondering where the survivors would go. I never planned on joining them but it looks like my curiosity is going to pay off for me anyway.”
“It does sound that way. Have you found out anything else that might help.”
“Not really. I’ve been doing some reading but my biggest concern was where people would congregate. That’s how I came up with Yellowstone as my first choice.”
“You know more than either Ned or I at this point. For now let’s plan on Yellowstone as your first destination and if that doesn’t work out there are any number of options between here and there that would be okay as a winter camp.”
Will continued, “That begs the question of if, how, and when you are going to contact other survivors. I don’t like the idea of meeting up with one or more people without having a feel for what those people are like. Have you given any thought to that?”
“Actually I have. Again out of curiosity about how survivors would react. I don’t think I want to contact anyone until I get to my winter camp. I don’t particularly want to winter alone, but that’s a better option than getting hooked up with a couple of crazy men who want to drink their lives away, or worse. There are going to be some mean people in amongst the survivors, and I need to avoid them, especially at the outset.”
“I agree with that. I don’t like the idea of you being alone either but you and I have spent enough winters here on the ranch to convince me that you’ll survive isolation well enough.”
“Okay, I’m glad you agree. I’ll set up winter camp and start trading emails first and then cell phone calls with other survivors. Some of them will be in this region I’m sure. Others will be out of range but we may be able to help each other. And sooner or later the survivors are going to need to gather in a limited number of places and work together to start new towns.”
Ned added, “I agree with that, but I know here in the Northwest there are a lot of really independent folks, and some of them are going to prefer to be by themselves, or in very small groups, so don’t be surprised if that happens. Most of them will come into town after a year or two since living without any other people around is really tough.”
Will continued, “I agree, there are some tough old cusses out there, and there are some that aren’t quite as tough as they think they are. Most of them will want some company after a while.”
Sam said, “That’ll happen as it will. The part that I have a tough time thinking about is that there will be absolutely no formal rules or laws to control folks.” Will answered, “You should worry but maybe not as much as you think you should. Remember in the days of the Wild West there were few laws and few lawmen around to enforce them. Even with that, the reputation of the west being wild was built on the actions of a handful of outlaws. The overwhelming percentage of the population respected unwritten societal rules because they knew that was best for everyone’s survival. I believe you’ll find the same thing occurs in the future. People will understand the need to work together.
But you can’t lose sight of the fact that the United States and each of the individual states will cease to exist. The congress and the courts will disappear. The stitches that hold together the fabric of society as we know it will no longer exist.
“Your biggest problem will be in dealing with criminal deviants. You need to think long and hard about that. If you have to deal with someone you’re convinced is mean, or even evil, you have to do something about it. Billy the Kid survived because ordinary citizens were afraid to deal with him. They chose to wait for the law to deal with him, and before it did people even more people died.
“In your future there won’t be any lawmen to start with. People like you are going to have to enforce rules that are unwritten or the bullies of the world will rule and the bad guys will get rid of the good guys. You can’t afford to let that happen.”
“Dad, are you saying I should be prepared to kill someone if I think they deserve it? I don’t know if I can do that.”
“It would be better if there was a group of people who got together to decide the fate of the deviants, but you can’t count on that happening. Some people will be afraid to take any action, and some will want to be lenient. You have to decide what you’ll accept and what you won’t accept and then act. As a group if you can, but alone if you must.”
“For example, if someone kills another person I think you should consider executing him or her on the spot. No talking, no debating and no hesitating. Be firm and fast and expect other people to understand what you did and why you did it. Life has always been precious and it needs to be protected in the future.
“Lesser crimes will deserve lesser punishments, but you won’t have any jails or any jailers to care for someone you lock up, so that won’t work in the near term. Ostracism may be suitable but if you throw someone out of your town and put them on their own you’ll have made an enemy, so you need to be careful with that. I think the best thing to do is to make sure your group talks about what to do as early as possible. If everyone knows what the rules are at the outset, and what the consequences might be, your life will be easier. But until that happens you can’t be afraid to act appropriately.”
“Thanks, Dad. That’s a lot to think about, but being prepared will make it easier. I can’t imagine needing to shoot someone so I think I’ll push that one to a back burner for a while. And like you said, almost everyone will want to do the right thing so maybe I’ll never have to worry about it.”
As Will, Samantha and Ned talked throughout the afternoon Sam understood how difficult life was about to become for her. She also realized that the challenge was beginning to excite her. No one had ever been asked to do anything like this. She didn’t think the challenge was as great as that faced by the pioneers, but it would be second only to that in terms of difficulty. She also found that the conversation during the course of the day had taken her mind off of the horror that was to come.
And, she realized it had given her men something new and exciting to think about, and had relieved them of the pressure of their own pending deaths. She was glad she had agreed to do this and she knew she would want to continue to plan with the men for the remaining days, or as long as it seemed to help them and her.
It was late afternoon when the ring of the phone surprised them all. Will stood up from the kitchen table and walked into the living room to an
swer the phone.
He walked into the kitchen a few minutes later and said, “Ned, that was Mel Withers, the guy you talked to earlier about the RV He asked if we could come by tomorrow morning, take a look at the RV and meet a couple of people. One of them is another survivor who just surfaced. I told him we would be there at nine o’clock.
Sam looked up and said, “Dad, this is a real twist. What does he expect us to do?”
“He said he didn’t expect us to do anything except meet the person. The survivors name is Ben Mason, and he’s apparently the grandson of a store owner in Lewiston. I don’t really know what to think at this point but I did tell Mel we weren’t planning on joining up with anyone.”
“Mel knows you by reputation of course, and he knew what I was saying. He said he agreed with me and he would help insure we went our own way if that was what we wanted.”
“Wow! What a surprise this is. Okay, I’ll be happy to meet anyone but the thought of being thrown together doesn’t work for me. I appreciate your warning to Mel. We’ll just have to play it by ear.”
The next morning the three of them took Will’s pickup into Lewiston and met Mel Withers outside of City Hall. There were four RVs parked in front of the building and a small group of people gathered on the sidewalk.
Ned said, “The large man in the gray Stetson is Mel, I’ll introduce you.”
They walked over to the group, all but one who was showing symptoms, and Ned introduced the three of them.
A gray haired man with a beard said, “I’m Wiley Mason and this here is my grandson Ben Mason. Ben’s sixteen years old and his father and mother were killed in a car accident eleven years ago. Ben’s father was my only son.” Wiley smiled fondly at the young man as he continued, “Ben and I have been together since then. We’re from here in Lewiston and I own the gun shop here in town.”
Will looked at Wiley and said, “I remember you now, we’ve met before. You repaired the stock on my 30.06 years ago.”