by Bruno Miller
When Vince reached John’s room, the door was closed, and so was his window. He wondered if John had even been outside today. Vince knocked on the door and waited.
“Yeah?” John answered after a few seconds.
“Hey, it’s me, Vince. I brought you some food.”
“It’s open.”
Vince opened the door slowly and struggled to see into the room as his eyes adjusted to the darkness. The curtains were still drawn, and other than a few thin rays of light, the room was pitch black.
“It’s like a cave in here,” Vince said. John was sitting at the edge of the bed with his head in his hands. As Vince entered and set the plate of food down next to him, he looked up. Vince took a seat on the bed across from him. John looked rough, like he hadn’t gotten much sleep. Then again, they all kind of looked that way.
“You should step out and get some fresh air. It’s decent today. Actually, better than decent. It’s pretty good.” The room was musty and dank, and Vince wondered if his room felt the same but he hadn’t noticed. John eyed the food but left it on the bed next to him.
Vince was going to have to motivate John to break out of his funk. He wasn’t discounting all that he had been through, but the food and a change of scenery were what John needed most right now.
Vince stood and walked over to the window, where he proceeded to part both curtains in one swift motion.
“Ugh,” John grumbled as he turned away from the blast of sunlight. Vince opened the window and felt an instant influx of fresh air. John must have felt it, too; he turned his head toward the window and held up his hand to block the light as he attempted to look outside.
“It does look a little better,” John admitted reluctantly.
“It’s a lot better. Why don’t you eat and get cleaned up and then join us outside? I want to get started on that wall today,” Vince said.
“Yeah, all right. I’m moving.” John sighed as he stood up slowly. “Give me a few minutes.”
“All right then.” Satisfied that John was on his feet, Vince left him to get ready, making sure to leave his door open as he exited the room. Fresh air and a change of scenery weren’t going to fix his friend, but for the time being, they would provide a measure of relief. Still, Vince would have to keep a close eye on John for a while. He couldn’t afford to lose him. None of them could. Not that they could afford to lose anyone in their small group, but John was someone Vince could depend on when the going got tough. Hopefully, that would remain the case.
Within fifteen or twenty minutes, most everyone that was heading out on a project had assembled in the motel parking lot. Vince filled Sarah in on what was going on and told her to have Bill drive his truck to the Chevy dealership when he was feeling up to it.
Vince and his team would take the radio since they were going the farthest from town. Mary and her crew would stick around the motel for the first part of the day as they prepared an enclosure for her chickens, ducks, goats, and pigs.
They swapped the Ford pickup with the newly acquired Lincoln Continental, and Mary, Reese, and her dad loaded up the truck with their things and climbed in. Buster let out a pitiful bark as he watched through the screen on the motel room window. Reese had opted to leave him behind today, figuring he would most likely chase Mary’s animals rather than help round them up. They had Nugget with them to help with that. The little dog seemed pleased to be going solo today. Standing tall with her front paws perched on the rail of the truck bed, she all but ignored Buster’s yelps and whines.
The other day, Vince had cleared the debris from around Mary’s store so that the outdoor area of her place was accessible. They’d have more than enough supplies and fencing to close off the small openings in the courtyard. Vince figured that it wouldn’t take them more than an hour to prep it for the animals. They were only going to secure it for the time being, so they would put more time into something permanent later.
While Mary’s team was prepping the courtyard, Vince and his team would head out of town to the car dealership. He would run the loader while Cy and John followed behind in John’s Bronco. The dealership and Mary’s house were in the same direction, and Vince planned on driving most of the way to her place in the loader to make sure they had clear roads. There was no need to go all the way out to her house. He just needed to make sure there was an open route through the denser neighborhoods.
His biggest concern was the sections of town with toppled houses covering the roads. The day the EMPs hit, he and Mary had barely escaped with their lives, and he knew firsthand that there were some impassable sections. Once he cleared the roads and there was enough room for them to get through, Mary would have no trouble driving to her place, other than the occasional wreck. Then he and his team would be free to head out to the Chevy dealership.
As they prepared to head out from the motel, the looters were never far from Vince’s thoughts. Splitting up like this made him feel exposed and paranoid. But what choice did they have? What he told Fred was true. They couldn’t afford to sit around and wait for the next attack. Survival was about being proactive and taking action, and now was as good of a time as any. They had severely handicapped the looters. It would be foolish not to capitalize on this opportunity. They had a few cars and four-wheelers left, but Vince reckoned they wouldn’t attack in small numbers next time they came.
It was a double-edged sword. Vince felt like he had some time before the looters attacked next, but it wouldn’t last long. When they did come again, he had no doubt that they would come with everything they had.
Chapter Seventeen
The roads in the densely built neighborhoods weren’t as bad as Vince had expected. The narrower streets and tightly packed houses meant that practically everything had burned to the ground and the streets were blocked. But the debris from the collapsed houses had been reduced to nothing more than ash and charred wood. The loader easily cleared it away, and since they weren’t trying to accomplish anything other than making the roads passable for Mary and the others, it didn’t take much time at all. The only thing that took a little effort was pushing the burned-out cars off the road, but there weren’t many of those to deal with.
Once the roads were clear and Vince was sure that Mary wouldn’t have any trouble driving out to her place, John radioed the motel and let the others know they were good to go. With the roads cleared, they were free to make their way out to the Chevy dealership.
The dealership was just on the outskirts of town and no more than five miles from the motel. Of course, they could only go as fast as the loader and the roads would allow them. The roads weren’t too bad, but there was the occasional wreck to deal with. Unfortunately, most of the vehicles on the road when the EMPs hit were delivery trucks making their early-morning rounds, so the wrecks they did come across were substantial.
It was worth taking the time now to clear these trucks off the roadway. Although it wasn’t difficult to drive around some of them as they were, Vince knew that the trip back from the dealership would be a different story. If things went according to plan, they’d be towing vehicles, and navigating the obstacles on the road would be much more challenging.
He hoped they could find an intact car carrier, the type that would normally be towed by a semi truck and could hold several vehicles. The dealership usually had one or two parked out back. The loader would have enough torque to pull the trailer—at least he hoped it did. Hooking the trailer to the loader would be a challenge, but not one they couldn’t handle. Vince brought along a few sections of heavy-duty tow chain from his garage as well as a good assortment of tools.
The process wouldn’t be easy, and it wouldn’t be fast, but if they could move at least five cars at a time, he would be happy with that. All in all, he figured that building the wall would take them a few days at least. The most important part of the perimeter would be the front and the rear entrances.
They needed to use new cars in those two locations to allow for quick entry and exit from the perimeter. He
reckoned they would use a pair of Chevy Suburbans as a gate. While none of the new cars would run, they could be easily pushed or pulled by one of their working vehicles.
Weight was another reason to use new vehicles where the wall would likely see the most action. The wrecks he had placed across the road with the loader to form the current barrier were burned-out shells. They didn’t weigh much at all, and he suspected that a vehicle could ram its way through with a direct hit. The ramming vehicle would sustain major damage, but it would certainly make it through and open a hole that other cars could then use to gain access to town.
The new vehicles would be heavy, and with their tires still intact, they would offer far more resistance if rammed. Vince wasn’t opposed to stacking the cars two or three high in places he wanted to be more permanent. In those areas, he also planned to let the air out of the tires in order to make it more difficult for a person to crawl under the wall.
Building a wall out of cars would be no small feat, but it would be well worth the peace of mind. Fearing the constant threat of an attack was no way to live. The wall would also provide a very defensible position. Unlike before, when he and John were pinned down behind the two-car roadblock, they would be able to move along the cars in either direction during an attack. That would be a huge advantage in a gunfight.
John and Cy had driven up ahead in the Bronco to scout the road out for Vince. He had lost sight of them temporarily, but now he saw the Bronco headed back his way. John pulled up next to the loader and waited for Vince to open the door to the cab.
“What’s up?” Vince shouted over the diesel engine.
John shook his head. “Big mess up at the intersection on Boone Street and Main. Big truck, all the way across the road.”
Vince nodded and pulled the door closed while John pulled away and took a position behind the loader once more. It must have been pretty bad if John couldn’t get around it. When Vince came around the corner, he laid eyes on the remains of the eighteen-wheeler.
The truck and trailer were stretched horizontally across the road, almost like it had been put there on purpose. The rear of the truck was wedged against a metal overhead light pole, and the front end was partially embedded into what was left of a burned-out building. It couldn’t have happened at a worse location, as this was probably the narrowest section of Main Street in the older downtown area. There wasn’t even enough room for a person to squeeze by on the sidewalk at either end.
Vince considered leaving it in place and using the side streets, but he abandoned that idea when he thought about how hard it would be to navigate a large trailer on the even tighter back roads through town. No, they needed to move this off the road and out of the way. Besides, going the back way to the car dealership would take too long and add a lot of extra work to an already complicated process.
Vince lowered the bucket on the loader as he squared up on the truck and attempted to push it off the light pole. Black smoke poured out of the loader’s exhaust stack as the diesel roared. The noise was deafening, even inside the enclosed cab. He throttled the big machine up as much as he dared, but he wasn’t moving, and neither was the truck.
“Come on,” Vince grumbled. He let off the pedal and let the RPMs drop back to idle before he backed up a few feet. He didn’t want to risk blowing any seals or hydraulic lines. They needed the road cleared, but they needed the loader more.
“Come on. Think this through for a second. Work smart,” Vince said out loud as he studied the truck. It was a logging truck—or at least it used to be—and by the looks of the ash and charcoal, it had been carrying a full load. The only thing that remained was the trailer’s heavy-duty steel framework with its upright supports and cross members.
Vince could see all the way through to the clear road on the opposite side, only adding to the frustration of it all. To make matters worse, the light pole at the back of the truck was bent from the heat of the fire, he assumed, and leaned into the steel framework of the trailer, preventing him from pushing the back end out of the way.
He was going to have to concentrate on the front end near the cab. That was something he had hoped to avoid, mostly because he didn’t want to find the driver but also because it was several feet into a large pile of debris that had once been a brick building. It was the old bank, and it had collapsed around the front end of the truck, burying most of the cab in brick and charred timbers.
There was no other way this was going to work, so Vince stopped trying to overthink the situation and began the tedious process of removing the debris bucket by bucket. After he had removed a few buckets full of brick from the bottom of the pile, the remainder of the rubble fell away from the truck, exposing the crushed cab and what was left of its occupant.
A bloody and mangled arm, pinched between the truck’s caved-in roof and the top of the door, protruded from the driver’s seat. Vince tried his best to ignore the gruesome sight, but it was hard. Each time he came into contact with the pile of debris, it shook the truck, causing the arm to dangle back and forth.
He worked as quickly as he could, and as soon as he thought that enough of the pile was cleared, he made another attempt to move the truck. This time it worked, and the truck began to pivot on the light pole. He could hear the steel groan over the diesel as the metal bent and gave in to the loader.
The dangling arm swung from the window, taunting him the whole way. It was directly in front of Vince and impossible not to notice as the truck cab contorted and twisted under the pressure of the loader. Just when he thought it couldn’t get any worse, the bone snapped, causing the arm to fall off and land on top of the loader bucket. Vince was disgusted at the sight and swore he could hear it land, even though he knew that was impossible.
He forced himself to look away and checked over his shoulder to see where John and Cy were. Cy gave him a thumbs-up from the Bronco, blissfully unaware of what Vince had just seen.
Finally, Vince had the bulk of the truck off the road and onto the opposite sidewalk. He pushed it a few more feet for good measure before letting off the pressure and raising the bucket up far enough to tip it. The arm rolled off the bucket and disappeared into the remains of the truck. He refused to look at the truck as he backed away. John and Cy sped by in the Bronco and resumed scouting the road ahead.
Vince was glad to get away from there and tried to think about Mary and the others. He hoped they were making good progress and were heading out to retrieve the animals by now. Mary had her doubts about the pigs’ survival, but even if they only managed to save the chickens, ducks, and goats, that would be a huge win for them all. As long as the animals were fed and taken care of, they would provide a renewable resource of eggs and milk.
A few minutes had passed when Vince spotted the Bronco returning once again. His heart sank as he imagined another blockage up ahead. John passed the loader this time, though, and made a U-turn, then eventually pulled up so that the passenger side of the Bronco was closest to the loader. Cy leaned out the window as Vince reluctantly opened the cab door and braced for the bad news.
“It’s all clear,” Cy reported. “All the way to the dealership.”
“Glad to hear that,” Vince said.
“We’ll run up ahead and have a look around. See you there.” Cy waved as they pulled away. It was about time they caught a little break. They might actually accomplish something today. Vince watched as the Bronco drove off and disappeared. He had to admit that seeing them go on without him made him nervous. Vince pushed down on the throttle a little bit more as he told himself they’d be fine and that he’d join them in a couple of minutes.
Chapter Eighteen
As Mary pulled up to what was left of her hardware store, she couldn’t help but reminisce about better days. She hated that the store had been reduced to a pile of charred debris. There was a time in her life when the store was all she had. Or at least it had felt that way. After her husband passed, it was the only thing that kept her going at times. It had given her a
purpose in life and a reason to force herself out of bed and keep moving forward. And now it was gone.
She wanted to be more upset about it, but she felt foolish every time she started to give in to the ugly feeling of self-pity. She might have lost her store, but compared to a lot of people, she was extremely lucky. For starters, she was alive and her house had survived the EMP surge. She had her friends, and she had Vince and of course Nugget. She was concerned about her daughter in Florida, but she had made peace with the fact that her daughter was okay.
Mary’s daughter lived in southern Florida, where she and her husband operated a citrus grove and small farm. They were fairly self-sufficient and ran the majority of their operation on solar power. If the solar power system had saved Mary’s house, it stood to reason that it would be the same for her daughter. And someday, whether it be two months from now or two years from now, they would see each other again. That was what her gut told her, and she believed it with all her heart. She had to.
Mary considered the possibility of traveling to Florida to find her daughter, but she wasn’t willing to make a trip like that alone. And she didn’t think it was right to ask Vince to go with her. Besides, they had their hands full in Cloverdale right now. Maybe if things took a turn for the worse here or if this coming winter proved too difficult with limited supplies, she would bring it up. These were some of the thoughts at the back of her mind, but she didn’t dare dwell on them out of fear they would become reality.
“All right, girl, you stay put. We don’t need you cutting your paw on anything.” Mary scratched Nugget’s head as she moved her to the cab of the truck. Nugget whined and immediately filled the vacant driver’s seat as Mary closed the door.
“That’s a good idea.” Reese kicked at something on the ground, and a small charred piece of metal skittered across the concrete. “There’s all kinds of junk on the ground,” she added.