Story After The Plague. Attempt #3

[Charmer153]

After The Plague.

The Main Characters.

My Family.............. Name....... Age... Description.

Mom.................... Sandy....... 65... Widow. Born and raised in the country, lived in town from age 19 to 39, then moved back to the country. Invested money from husbands life insurance into real estate since she was able to buy foreclosures from the banks at the advice of a friend who worked at one. This enabled her to buy house is for as little as 5% of the market price on a few of them, although most were between 30% to 40%. She now makes several thousand dollars a month from rental income every month. She used the money to buy silver coins as an investment for retirement, when she would partly turn over the responsibility of the properties to us kids, while she traveled the country.

Main character......... Jonathan.... 43... Electrical engineer, and self-taught electrician. Refuses to "accept the testimony of those who will not even try" so is able to do things others say can not be done. Lost his job at age 34 when the company he was working for went out of business. Moved his camper to Sandy’s farm to save on rent and bills while looking for work in the nearby towns. Got a part-time job, but since the job did not take much time, decided to stay on the farm to help take care of the animals and gardens when Sandy hurt her back and could not do heavy lifting. Not having to pay rent and utility bills was also part of the decision.

Brother................ Daniel...... 33... Moved to the farm with Sandy when he was seven. Raised on the farm. Does odd jobs to earn money. Can make up to $750 on a good day. Anything from cutting and hauling firewood to helping tear down an old building on someone's property. Country boy through and through, but also the best mechanic in the county with many 'junk' trucks he is repairing. Can drive a truck through a riverbed as easily as others can drive on asphalt.

Daniels’ wife.......... Gennie...... 35... Born and raised in the country. 3rd generation herbalist. Grew up helping her mother grow a medical herb garden, now grows her own and has been helping Sandy grow one for 5 years. Knows how to survive even when times are hard.

Gennie’s daughter from a previous marriage.....Amanda.......16....Born and raised in the country. Tomboy. Can swim, climb, shoot, and fight, as well as any guy her age, and better then many.

Daniel & Gennie’s son...Tim...........9....Loves to swim and climb trees. Good with BB gun. Extremely competitive with his brother, but will not hesitate to stand with him if others bother him.

Daniel & Gennie’s son...Jim...........9....Loves to swim. Usually follows daddy around the house, and tries to do whatever he is doing. Extremely competitive with his brother, but will not hesitate to stand with him if others bother him.

Daniel & Gennie’s Daughter................Sophia........4....Typical 4 year old. Takes her giant teddy-bear everywhere she goes.

Sister..................Jeanette.....45....Born and raised in town. Got the good looks from Sandy side of the family. Was cheerleader in school, and married into money when she was 25. Quickly got use to living in luxury, having maids and butlers to do all the work. She used to go camping with her best friend's family when she was a kid, but they always brought food so she never learned how to find her own food. Never lost her love for camping and still does when she can talk her husband into it. Knows very little of subsistence farming, but she does know how to find dry kindling even after a rain and everything is wet, and she knows how to start a fire without a lighter or matches.

Jeanettes’ son..........Christopher..19....Born and raised in town. Used to the convenience that comes with money. Used to getting whatever he wants since he grew up in luxury. Knows nothing of country life. Internet and video game fanatic. Video game champion and at his high school, and has even made his own video game. Probably knows more about computers and computer programming than the people who build them.

Jeanettes’ daughter.....Crystal......17....Born and raised in town. Used to the convenience that comes with money, and the prestige that comes with being cheerleader captain. Honor-roll student, and second in line to be valedictorian of her class. Knows nothing of country life. Main focus in life is school and dating. Wants to go to college to be a veterinarian. Loves small furry animals.

Other People.

Name....................Age..........Description.

Benjamin Anderson........48..........Goes by the nickname Big Ben. Native American man, about 7 feet tall. One of the founding members, and currant leader, of the local volunteer fire and rescue group.

Mr. Davis.............Adult..........Father Of The Davis Family. Widower. A good and honest man who tries to do all he can to help other people.

Mrs. Davis............Adult..........Mr. Davis’s second wife. Born and raised in the UK. Does not like to talk about her past, but it is known. She was born into a Amish-like community, where their station is set by your gender. Girls learn cooking, cleaning, sewing, spinning wheels and loom, that kind of stuff. Boys learn carpentry, farming, metal work, and that kind of stuff. She was not satisfied with only learning the girls stuff, she wanted to learn all of it. When she refused to except her station she was labeled a heretic and banished from the community. She then was on the streets with no useful education or knowledge of how the world worked. That was when Mr. Davis found her, and took her in. He was there on vacation, and felt sorry for her. She returned to the USA with him, and eventually they fell in love and got married.

Stephen Davis............18..........Older of the Davis Brothers. Plays on the schools basketball and baseball teams.

Samuel Davis.............17..........Younger of the Davis Brothers. Since society focuses so much on sports, and he is no good at sports, he always felt that he was living in his big brother's shadow, and tries to prove he is equal to his older brother in other ways. Refuses to see that he does not have to prove anything.

Samantha Davis...........15..........Sister of the Davis family. Used to blame herself for the mother's death when she was born, till she was 7 and finally understood that it was the fault of the hospital.

Mark Scutter.....Early 50's..........Short wave radio operator and communications director. Was a communications officer in the Navy. Never saw combat.

Jason Ford........Late 30's..........Mechanic in charge of maintaining school buses. Not quite right in the head due to a head injury when he was a child, but knows everything there is to know about bus engines, so he is the perfect mechanic. There is a ongoing joke that he knows the buses so well that he even knows when there's going to be a problem before the buses do.

John Peterson.........Adult..........Was High school principal. Now in charge of how High school building is used as long as he does not do anything to permanently damage it.

Ms. Watson.........Mid 30’s..........The local store/gas station owner. Never married. No kids. Born and raised locally, then went to college for business economics, then returned to buy and run the local store when the previous owners decided they wanted to retire.

Brian Rhodes..........Adult..........Father of Rhodes Family. Moved his family here about 4 years ago. Believes that communism means everything is communal, everything belongs to everyone equally, and everyone has equal access to everything, so everyone is equal, and only when all are equal can people live in peace and unity. Lived in New York City before moving here. Since the plague wiped out all corporations, he believes that it was a divine punishment for those that embrace capitalism, and corporations. Ironic since he does not believe in God.

Diana Rhodes..........Adult..........Mother of Rhodes Family. Born and raised in a Christian family, till she met Brian in college. Did not know that he was a communist. He was very charming and hid his communist beliefs very well. Married him after 7 months, when she realized she was pregnant with his child. After they were married, he revealed that he was a communist, and that he would not tolerate any other points of view in his house. After he put her in the hospital two times for disobeying him, threatened to kill her if she ever disobeyed him again, and told her that his brother would kill her if she tried to report him and get him locked up, she became a willing slave, doing whatever he tells her to do in order to avoid his temper.

Brian Rhodes Jr..........19..........Older son of Rhodes Family. Loyal to his dad, but extremely lazy when working for other people. Has fully embraced his father's communist mentality. He sees no reason to try to work hard, and have to share the benefits, when he can do no work at all and still get the benefits from other people working. Suspected of many burglaries, but daddy always says that the family was at home with the burglaries took place so he could not have been him.

Mike Rhodes..............17..........Younger son of Rhodes Family. Has fully embraced his father's communist mentality, and obeys his father's orders without doubt or question. He would even kill if his father told him to, in the firm belief that doing so was for 'the greater good' of the community.

Stacy Rhodes............15..........Daughter of Rhodes family. Was 11 when the family moved here, and not yet fully brainwashed into accepting her father's communist mentality, partly thanks to her mother secretly teaching her that communism is bad. After moving here she learned that her father's communist mentality is not only bad, he is totally wrong about what communism is, but she is absolutely terrified of his temper, so she pretends that she has accepted it until she can get out on her own. Even though her father has forbidden her to make friends with anyone who rejects communism (which would be everyone outside of his family), she secretly is friends with many girls in school, and wants to get away from her father, but is scared that he would hurt her, or even send her to live with his brother in New York City, if he knew.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 1.

Survivors.

Hello, my name is Jonathan, and I am a survivor. I would like to tell you how my family and I survived.

I live on my mother's farm, taking care of her animals because she is no longer able to do it herself. This day started out just like every other Saturday. I fed the dogs and made sure that they had fresh water, threw feed out for the chickens, we prefer to let them free range, but sometimes they still need help when there are not enough bugs around, Watered her garden, and my small garden. School had been out for two weeks, and was due to start again the following Monday. The official name of the vacation was "spring break,” but everybody around here knew that the real reason the school was out was because so many of the teachers and older students wanted to go hunting, that there would not be enough teachers in the school to teach anything. I had the television on for the background noise, but I have no idea what show was on, when the emergency broadcast interrupted the show. That got my attention.

“We interrupt your normal programming to bring you this emergency broadcast. All television and radio stations will relay this broadcast to the general public, both here and abroad. Here is the president of the United States of America . . . ” “My fellow Americans, and those that are not fortunate enough to be born and raised in this great country, it is my sad duty to tell you of reports of a viral outbreak in every major city in the world, and confirmed cases in the major cities of Canada, Mexico, and the US. No one knows where the virus came from, or how it got started. By the time the virus was known about, it was all over the world, with hundreds of thousands of confirmed reports in every country. Thanks to the national health Association, we have been able to learn a few things. This virus seems to be airborne and is extremely contagious, passing from person-to-person within just a few hours of original infection. It seems to have a seven-day incubation period before symptoms manifest, and then fatality within 24 hours after the first symptoms appear.

The first symptoms are a minor headache. After the onset of the headache, they begin to feel queasy in the stomach. A few hours later they begin to feel extremely dizzy. The final stage makes them extremely sleepy. After they go to sleep, the brain releases a chemical called serotonin; it seems that this chemical causes the virus to mutate into a form of flesh-eating virus. It then attacks, and destroys the cells of the cerebral cortex, stopping the impulses going to the heart. This causes the heart to stop beating, and the victim dies. The serotonin then breaks down in the blood till it is gone. The absence of this chemical then makes the virus mutate again, into some sort of super flesh eating virus, which proceeds to eat the dead body.

The fact that virus has such a long incubation period ensuring that it is widespread, the symptoms are extremely rapid, once the first symptom appears, that the mutations are so exact, different stages triggered by different changes in the human body chemistry triggered by previous mutations of the virus, first a prolonged period of no signs, ensuring that is spread before you know you are sick, then sickness, then death. it is strongly believed to be a man-made virus. It has been confirmed that I, the Vice President, and all elected members of Congress, are infected, and we will all be dead within the next 72 hours.

Because of the severity, and how rapid the virus seems to be able to spread, I am here by activating emergency quarantine laws. These laws order that all cities to be quarantined. Anybody attempting to leave a city will be shot, and the bodies burned on-site. Those that are not in the cities should remain in their homes with the doors and windows shut for the next seven days. I ask that the American people remain calm. If you are already infected panicking will not help, and if you are not infected there is no need to panic. I ask that all Americans accept a self-imposed quarantine to prevent spreading the virus any further than it already has. Thank you.” The EBS symbol appeared on the TV again and the announcer says “we now return you to your regularly scheduled program.”

After the show returned, I was paying even less attention to it. I went over to Sandy’s house to ask her if she had seen it. She was already calling my younger brother, Daniel, to see if he had seen the news report, and ask if he'd been to town recently. He said that they were watching DVD’s, so had not seen it but he would rewind the DVR to watch it, and that he hadn't had any salvage jobs recently, so he hadn't been in town for almost 2 weeks. He would call back after he’d seen it, if he thought he needed to. Sandy said that if they hung up, he might not be able to call again because the phone system would be so busy, so it was better just to stay on the phone while he watched it.

After he watched it he said that it was a good thing he had not been to town for two weeks, but they were running low on food, and they did not know what to do about it since it is not possible to go into town and get more. Sandy told him that she had plenty of food here, thanks to the big food garden, (Mine is a small garden, just to give me something to work on that is actually mine) so they could stay here. Daniel said that they'd be over in a couple of hours. The rest of the family is down at the creek, at the back of the property, probably checking the fishing lines, or swimming, and he’ll have to wait until they come back before they come here.

Although I would never tell him this, the way he set up the fishing lines was pretty smart. At a narrow part in the river he strung five lines across, about 5 feet apart down the length of the river. He secured multiple fishing lines to each of these, with “flashy” lures attached to them. The moving water causes the little pieces of metal to turn, causing the flashing effects from the sun. All he, and his family, had to do was go out there twice a day, once early morning, once early evening, and remove any fish that was caught, if they caught any then. They did not always catch some. They did not eat all of the fish that they caught, anyone trying to eat that much would get burned out on it. Sometimes, they would dehydrate it, to save for when they wanted fish, and had not caught any. Usually, if the fish were still alive, they were released. If not, the local cats enjoyed it. About three years ago the family that moved in next door to them had got a few cats to get rid of the rats and mice in the barn and house. Now there are more cats then rats, so there is no shortage of eager fish eaters.

Shortly after they arrived, my brother Daniel, his wife Gennie, their daughter Amanda, the twins Jim and Tim, and the baby Sophia, we realized that there was going to be a problem with the sleeping arrangements. Since Sandy lived alone in her house (I have my own place on her property) the other 2 bedrooms had been used for storage, and there was no room for beds. After discussing it for a while we decided that the best solution was for them to sleep in their house tonight, and then tomorrow, early in the morning, they would all come by to work on clearing out one of the rooms.

After we got started cleaning out one of the rooms, we quickly realized that this is going to be another problem. Since everything that came out had to go somewhere else and since those rooms had been used for storage for many years there was nowhere else to put anything. Daniel suggested that since our step dad was gone (he had died 3 years earlier) we could clean out the big storage room in the barn, and put the stuff from the rooms in there.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 2.

Research.

What after calling Daniel, Sandy decides to call her parents to see if they heard the news, and how they're doing. It took over a dozen tries to get through to them, but she finally did.

When she was finally able to get hold of them, her dad answered the phone. He told her that they had indeed seen the announcement of the virus. It was on every television channel, and every radio station, at the same time, and has already repeated one time. Since they live in town, they probably have the virus, but they are not worried about it. There destiny is in the hands of God, as it has always been.

Through hardships before, she asked him if he had he in the advice for her and her family. He said to expect the power to go out, he gives that will be anybody to maintain the generators. We should probably go online and look up how to make a solar powered water heater. We should dehydrate as much meat as we can before the power goes out, and look up books about how to build a dehydrator that doesn't need electricity. Basically we should look up anything that we will need to get by without electricity. We should know what that is better than he does since our electricity goes out several times the year.

He said that after the virus had run its course, and it is safe to return to the cities, she needs to get up to their house if at all possible. They of several books that Sandy will find very helpful. Books that tell how to cook without electricity, how to use a refrigerator as an ice box, how to make ice without a freezer. Recipe books that tells how to cook things with food from a garden, and/or animals. Her sister Martha had actually taken all of the old family recipes, that it been handed down for generations, and wanted to preserve them. Since many had actually been hand written on paper, they were fading away, so Martha redid all of them and put them together into cookbooks. They have recipes such as how to make peach cobbler 100% from scratch, how to make bread using nothing but eggs, how to make chicken and dumplings without anything from the store.

Sandy asked if Martha would want those books back, but dad said that Martha had kept copies for herself, and had already given a copy to both of her daughters, so there was no one left to get the copy except for Sandy.

Sandy would spend most of the next three days on the Internet, looking up everything she could think of that would help us to get by when the electricity would finally be out for good, and the stores would no longer get resupplied.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 3.

Memories.

None of us had been in that room since he died. After his death, Sandy did not want to part with any of his stuff, so we just shut the door and forgot about it. As we were cleaning it out, Sandy did not want to part with anything. Every time she saw something she said “we had to keep that”, because of the memories attached to it. Things like the box of cards with the helping hands symbol on it, they came from a “assisting the poor” center where he had done some volunteer work, his medals and awards from high school, they showed that he was a good athlete, and probably could have gone pro, a menu from the restaurant he use to work at, they actually met at the restaurant, and miscellaneous other stuff that would have no value to anyone else.

We quickly realized that we would have to find a way to break Sandy’s attachment to everything, so we tried pointing out to her that this stuff had been in storage for years. If she did not need it during those three years she does not need it now. She said that she needed to keep all those things, as a way to remember. Gennie told her that she should get a camera and take pictures of all the stuff she wants, that way she can have that memory on a little memory stick instead of having to fill up a big room for it. Although she did not like this idea, she knew that she needed to find another way to keep all the memories, because we desperately needed the storage room empty.

We found a few things that we could use and decided to keep, including a six pack of FRS radios, with a 15 mile range once they were fully charged, a shortwave radio that could scan the frequencies, and some books on how to use bullet reloading equipment. He had sold the equipment when he was no longer able to go to shooting ranges, but he had kept the books.

We had to borrow a trailer from a friend a few miles down the road in order to be able to haul off everything. We needed this particular trailer because of how it was built. He had built it himself. It was 6 feet wide, 20 feet long, the wall in the front, by the tongue, was solid, with 45 degree supports on the sides to prevent the front wall from falling, but the walls on the sides and back were on strong hinges, and could fold down, covering the wheels and giving you access from the side, or wider hauling size if need be. It also had a built-in ramp, about 10 feet long, which slid in under the floor in the back of it. They hinges for the back wall was lower than the ramp. The first time I saw that, I asked him why he did it that way, instead of having the ramp under the hinges. I was thinking that if the ramp was below the hinges, it could be pulled out a little bit and used as a bench, with the back wall as the back of the bench. He laughed at the idea, saying that it did make sense if you wanted to have a bench, but with the hinges below the ramp the gate holds its shut so it can't slide out well going down the road.

Daniel called him to ask if we could use it. We all knew that he probably would let us use it, provided he wasn’t using it, but it was still better to ask. He said that we could use the trailer if we were willing to unload it. He had gone to town 2 days ago, the day before the announcement, to buy a bunch of feed and hadn’t unloaded a yet, and now he is scared that he might have gotten the virus, and brought it to his family. We can use the trailer if we will unload the feed and keep it, for either the next eight days, till they know that they are not sick, or if they do die, at least they know that the food will not go to waste and we will use it to feed our animals. We were reluctant to go get it after he told us he might be sick, so he suggested that he will take it to one of the properties between ours, to the one where nobody has lived for a few years, and park behind the house where no one would see it, then call us and tell us it’s there.

Later, after we feel enough time has passed to be safe, we can go get it. That way we would know that we will not be exposed to the virus, but we still get the trailer and the feed. We agree to this.

It took 2 full days to clear out the storage room, even with the trailer, but it was worth it. After getting everything out of the storage room, we realized that there was enough room in there to put all the stuff from both bedrooms, so there will be plenty of room for Daniel and his family.

Since Amanda didn't want to have to share a room with the twins, it was decided that Daniel and Gennie would have one room, the twins would have one room, Sophia could sleep with Sandy, since she had a king-size bed and only use one side, and Amanda could sleep on the sofa.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 4.

Into The Dark.

Three days after the announcement of the virus(V-Day), the power went out. Normally this would not have been a problem; the power goes out several times a year in our area. It's usually only out for a few hours. This time we knew that it would be a problem, because there was no one we could call to find out what the problem was, or when it would be fixed.

We had been expecting it though, so we were a little prepared. Thanks to Sandy’s desire to have the well pump converted to solar power; we had an inverter that was capable of handling the power requirements for the motor. With the batteries from three of Daniel's old trucks, and some ingenuity, we were able to keep the well pump running. Even with three batteries we would only get about seven or eight hours of use before the inverters suck the batteries to low to use, unless we recharged them somehow.

Daniel said that he could make a small 12 volt generator that could maintain the batteries, using the lawnmower engine and an alternator from one of the trucks at the art-yard, since the man who lived there is not there now, and probably would not be coming back.

The art-yard was what locals called the field were a metal-sculptor had his “art”. He built giant people, animals, statues, giant wind-chimes, some things that are useful, like a 6 feet tall working Holland-style wind-mill (11 feet tall counting the blades), that can actually grind a small amount of grain into flour, and many more metal pieces of art, some that could not even be identified. He always has a few partly intact, and mostly intact, cars and trucks that he buys from a auto-scrap-yard, that he had not yet taken all he wanted from, so it would probably be easy to find the part Daniel needed. When he came back, he said that he not only found the part he needed. He found 2 of them, and 7 more batteries, all working. We would not have a problem with the power for the well.

Without electricity from the grid, the hot water heater in Sandy’s house did not work. The water heater at my place is propane, but I didn’t have much propane left, so it would not last long. Fortunately I remembered how to make a solar powered water heater. Sadly, we did not have all that we needed to make it. To make a good one, we needed many garden hoses. We only had three, so we would only get about 7 gallons of hot water, before it turns cold again. (3/4 inch hose is about 2.3 gallon per 100 feet) The more hoses you have the more hot water you have. The correct way was to put the garden hoses in a spiral on a flat surface, using fishing line, or other strong line, to tie down the hose. (Stapling the line to the board between the loops of hose, or drilling holes through the board to tie the hose to the board, are good ways to secure the hose and prevented from coming loose.) Three 90 degree elbows for the hose. These prevent strain on the hose. A hole in the middle of the board for one of the elbows to go through. Another elbow connects the first hose to that elbow, and the third is behind the board, connected to the “through” elbow so that the “input line” can be connected without strain on it. As the sun shines on the spiral of hoses, the water in them gets hot. Unfortunately, we did not have anything that we could use for the backing, or the elbows, or enough hoses. We did have fishing line. After discussing it we decided to just lay the garden hoses out on the ground and let the sun warm it that way.

Since we did not have a way to tap right into the hot and cold water lines, and we were concerned that the water in the hot water heater tank would cool off, making the hot water not so hot, we closed the valves to the water heater to prevent the hot water from back flowing into it. We connected the hoses at the hot and cold water lines for the clothes washer. Since we needed to secure it on to the faucet at both ends it was a good thing that the hoses to the washer had the right kind of connections that we needed. We would not have much hot water, but at least we would be able to adjust hot and cold so we would not freeze or burn when we take a shower.

The next day, one of the Davis family came by and asked us if we needed any help with water. We thought this was odd, till we saw the 2 big plastic tanks on the trailer behind their truck, and realized that they were taking water to those who needed it. Sandy said that we were good. We had a inverter, batteries, and a way to temporarily maintain them, so we had water for now, and if we had to, Matthew would probably let us get water from the creek.

I asked how long he could keep giving water before he ran out of gas, and he explained that he is not the only one doing this, his entire family is, and they are not giving away the water; they are selling it, 1 gallon, per person, per house, for ½ gallon of gas that they could siphon out of the cars/truck/esc.., or monetary equivalent ($1.75) in food, or money. They preferred the gas, to make sure they would never run out of gas. Most of the sales were on credit, and they know that they will probably never get paid for those, but as long as they got enough gas to cover what they used, that is what was important.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 5.

Increase.

At this point I feel I should tell you a little bit about how the properties are laid out here, so they you can understand how we had such an increase.

Originally the man that lived to our right, his name is Matthew, had 120 acres of land here. However due to health issues, he had to sell half of it to pay for an operation. He decided to split the land and sell them as 15 acres each since he thought it would be easier then trying to sell it as the full 60 acres. My mother bought one, and a man named JT bought the other three, so that his property was beside, behind, and catty-corner, to us. The properties were on a dead end street. Before Matthew had to sell half of the land, the northern border ran along the main road. The trees, and bushes, along this border were so thick that even though it was less than 50 feet, no one could see through them. The road went down the West side of the property then the long the length of the southern border. Matthew’s house was on the south east corner of the property. Since this road was a dead end, the only reason anybody would be on it would be to visit one of the three families.

Immediately after the announcement of the virus, JT got in his vehicle and left. He stopped at the local store/gas station to get gas and told some people that he was going to the city where his son lived to get his son and bring him here. They told him that is a very bad idea for two reasons…

1) What if he's already infected? By bringing him here, you bring the virus here.

2) The military is no longer letting people leave the cities.

He said that he was not going to let his son die in some "scum infested cesspool of criminals who have no decency, and even less respect for human life. I will bring him here, and he will be fine!" I do not know if he died getting into the city, trying to leave the city, or if someone here shot him trying to leave, or trying to return. All we know for sure is that he never returned.

Since he was buying the land from Matthew, Matthew repossessed the land. Matthew knew that because of the virus, all the pharmacies were gone, so he would soon run out of his medication, and would probably not live long after that.

Since Sandy had already fully paid for her 15 acres, it was extremely unlikely that JT would ever come back; Matthew knew that he would be dead within a few weeks, and that his children were probably already dead or dying of the virus, he told Sandy to make him an offer for the rest of the land. With the first offer she was kidding, and offered a dollar, thinking that he would tell how much he wanted. Much to her surprise, he took the offer. When she asked why he would sell it for so little, he said that since there are no more pharmacies, and is medicine is almost gone, he would soon be dead, and the money would not do him any good then, and since all of his kids were dying in the city there was no one to inherit the land. By him selling the land to her, she had a clear and legal claim to it, should anyone ever challenge it.

Before he had sold half of the land, when this was all his, the road had been his drive way, the gate that was on the road at his property, had been up at the main road preventing others from coming down the driveway. Now that it was all Sandys driveway she could move the gate back up to the road if she wanted to keep unwanted visitors from coming down.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 6.

Surprise Visitors.

Four days after V-Day, life on the farm had settled into a routine. I still took care of the animals since they knew me, and I still take care of my small garden, but I no longer was responsible for the big garden. Daniel and Amanda had been working on it like crazy. Enlarging it since it will be the main source of food for an additional 5 people, and extra for barter. Gennie worked inside helping Sandy do things that are hard for her to do.

A red car pulled up in front of the house, and my sister, Jeanette, got out. She had never been here before, and I was surprised that she knew were the farm was. Sandy called across the front yard for her not to come any closer. Jeanette yelled out that her and her two kids had been at their vacation house on the river for the past two weeks and have not had any other human interaction, so they knew they were not sick. Sandy called out to ask where her husband was. Jeanette said that since he had meetings in the city, he had left the vacation home to go to the meeting the day before the announcement of the virus. After the presidential announcement of the virus, he called her and said that the cities was locked down, and he couldn’t leave. She assumed he is now a victim of the virus.

None of us were willing to take any chances and told them that they could not stay here until we knew for sure that they were not sick. Jeanette insisted that they were not sick, but we were not willing to take that chance. Finally, after seeing that she could not convince us to let her and her kids stay here, she asked where they were supposed to stay, since they can't stay here. Amanda asked Daniel's “Since our house is empty, is there any reason they can’t stay there?” Daniel and Gennie agreed to it. Jeanette said that they did not have any food. After the announcement of the virus, and the lock-down of the cities, they stayed at their vacation house until the electricity went out, then came straight here. They did not want to risk exposure to the virus, so they did not stop anywhere. They had been driving for seven straight hours, with no food, water, or restroom breaks. How were they supposed to get by for the next week, without food.

Gennie, remembering how we solved the problem of getting the trailer, without having to interact with another person, offered to drive some food over to the house and set it on the porch, and Jeanette, or one of her kids, could pick it up after Gennie left. Jeanette was reluctant, but since she could not find any other solutions, she had to accept the offer.

When Gennie took over some food, Jeanette yelled at her through the door asking how they are supposed to get water, or use the oven, or take showers, or even just watch TV, when there is no electricity. Christopher could be heard in the background complaining about the electricity being out, because he could not recharge his laptop battery. Gennie said that they would just have to remove the electric pump, and use a bucket and rope to get water. They could bath in the swimming hole out at the creek, and eat any fish that is caught on the fishing lines about 40 feet down river from the swimming area. Jeanette had never had to use a rope and bucket to get water from a well, so did not know how to do it. She had always had running water before. Fortunately, Crystal had seen how it was done in a movie, and remembered enough to figure out the rest of it.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 7.

Learning.

During the next week, Daniel and Amanda were enlarging the garden, again, because we would have three more people to feed.

Matthew was teaching me how to use the automated milking system, and other equipment used for making dairy products. I had never been in his milking barn before, and was surprised at how advanced it all was, in my opinion, and asked Matthew why he had to sell property to pay for his operation when he could afford this. After laughing at me for a few second, he explained that this equipment is almost 20 years old, and he got it when he sold the 45 acres to JT. I was surprised it would take JT 20 years to pay off his land until Matthew explained that JT did not trust banks, so they decided to do a '20-year rent-to-own' for the land. JT only had another 16 months to go, but he is gone now, so Matthew repossessed the land. He was able to use the down payment to pay for the operation, and had enough money left over to buy all of this.

The setup was very simple. Twice a day, at 8 AM and 8 PM, a bell would ring. The four milking cows knew that the bell meant it was time for them to come in and get milked. The building was set up for 10; Matthew was planning on getting more, but would not be able to now.

In addition to the milking machines, there were also two walk-in coolers, machinery for turning the milk, and/or cream, into butter, cheese, and other dairy products.

Originally it was all connected to the power grid, but when the price of electricity started going up so high he had a water-wheel connected to the creek just outside the building for the electricity. Since the creek never goes dry, and never stops moving, it is the perfect solution for electricity. It is the same creek that Daniel and his family were swimming and fishing in, 5 miles upstream.

Matthew said that he is getting about 12 gallons a day from the four cows (1.5 gallons from each cow, twice a day). Up till now he is always used it for making homemade butter, and cheese, that he sold every two weeks at the farmers market in town. That would no longer be possible, so we were free to do whatever we wanted with it since the cows, the building, and all of the equipment, were included in the sell of the land.

I quickly realized that since this building now belonged to Sandy, and I would be the one most likely taking care of it, I could build a bridge across the creek, and then bring over the FRS radios, and other rechargeable electronics, to recharge them.

The milking equipment also has smaller size teet cups, made for milking goats, if we ever decided to get any. He was planning on getting some, but could never find any close by, at a good price.

I suggested to Sandy that they take down the fencing between the three fields since she now owned all three of them. She said that we might do that later, but right now she wanted to keep the fence up, to keep the cows out of the garden.

Amanda said that they could put a fence around the garden, and then Daniel asked where the fence would be, since the garden keeps expanding, and nobody knows for sure how big it's going to get. If they put the fence at the size that the garden is now, what happens when they need to expand the garden? If they figure on expanding the garden, and put the fence out, what happens if they do not expand, or have to expand beyond that point? It would be better to just leave the fences where they are for now.

I suggested that she could at least take down the fence between the 60 acres that she just bought and the 45 acres that JT was buying, while keeping up the fence around the 15 acres to keep the animals out of it. She did agree with that idea.

...

After a week had passed, Jeanette, and her kids, were still alive and well, although in extremely bad moods. After two decades of living in luxury, and having everything they could ever want, they were now forced to live with very little, but they were still alive. They were then invited back to the farm.

Since Christopher and Crystal were younger, and able to get around better, they were assigned the job of milking the cows. One would do it in the morning and the other in the evening. This meant that I would have to show both of them how to do it. Although Christopher and Crystal did not want to have to do this, after Sandy explained that they would get to sell all the dairy products that they made, that the family did not need, and keep the money, as long as they divided it equally between the two of them. They were happy to do it after hearing that. That was pretty sneaky of Sandy. She knew that since the federal government was gone, it would not take very long for all money to become worthless. We would probably be using dollar bills as toilet paper within a few months. However Crystal and Christopher had always had money and did not realize that it could become worthless. Sandy saw this as a way to slowly teach them how the financial system worked, and how to barter with people. I pointed out that since the milking building had electricity, Christopher could recharge his laptop. He was very happy to hear that.

Jeanette tried saying that this was not a good idea, and she would not let her kids do it, because the milk had not been pasteurized, homogenized, sterilized, and other required steps to make sure it is safe. Amanda said that she would be happy to do the work, if she could keep the money. Sandy had to explain to Jeanette that people had been using milk for thousands of years before the government required all those "safety" steps be taken, and even before the US government existed. Christopher and Crystal quickly said that they wanted to do it since they would get to keep the money they got, then Gennie pointed out that it is going to happen, the only question is who will benefit from it. Jeanette reluctantly agreed to let her kids do it?

Christopher ran to his camper and grabbed his laptop, saying that he was going to plug it in and get online. Those of us who had lived there for a while, just smiled. When he plugged in, he found that he could not connect. He thought that the metal walls of the building must be blocking the Wi-Fi, and he would be able to connect after the battery recharged, and he was outside again.

A few hours later, he stormed into Sandy’s house, demanding to know why he could not connect. After making him apologies for demanding something from the people there, Amanda told him that we do not have Wi-Fi here since the power grid went down. If he had a cell phone with a hot-spot, he could try to connect to a cell tower, if he could find one that still worked. He sadly realized that he wouldn't be able to get online.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 8.

Going To Town.

Now that Jeanette, and her kids, was staying on the farm, we again had the problem of where everyone would sleep. Gennie said that she had sleeping bags, and a tent, that they could set up behind Sandy's house. At night, this worked, but it caused a problem during the day when people were moving around. They thought that the others should work around their schedule, as the maid, butler, driver, and other servants, had done. The others did not agree.

Sandy finally told Jeanette that she had to be up, and have the tent “out of the way” by 7 AM each morning, so that the people trying to get the work done, can get the work done, without having to go around it all the time. The first two days, Jeanette did not get up and around by seven. On the third day, I, Daniel, Gennie, and Amanda, decided that we would fold up her tent, and put it away, and she could try to find it the next night. After that she made sure that she was up and had the tent put away by seven each morning.

On the morning of the 17th day after the announcement of the virus, the shortwave radio announced that there have not been any reports of virus caused deaths for the past 5 days, and the virus seems to have run its course. According to reports from a military ship, using thermal imaging satellites, say that although many cities are totally burned down, those that did not burn down, are now nothing more than ghost towns, with nobody moving around. Amanda asked if it's safe to go back to our local towns. Daniel said that it probably was, but everybody still had to be careful. The first trip would just be a scouting trip with only two people going, and they were to stay in the car, with the windows up. If they saw any other people they were to turn around and get out of there, fast.

After the scouting trip, and no sign of any other people, it was decided that it was safe for us to go into town again.

We decided that since there were eight people that were old enough to drive, three were still too young; seven of the eight people would go to town in two cars, Gennie remained behind to take care of the younger kids. Our first stop would be the automotive dealership with five of the seven would get pickup trucks, and then go to the RV dealer to get camping trailers since the camping trailers was basically a large box on wheels, and could hold a lot more than the trucks.

Christopher and Crystal said that since they do not have drivers license they could not drive the trucks. Amanda almost fell over laughing at that. Daniel, almost growling, told them “This is an emergency, so those laws do not apply right now. If you know how to drive, you can.” They both said that they had taken drivers ed, and knew how to drive. They just hadn’t got the license yet because their chauffeur drove them wherever they wanted to go. At this comment, a deaf person would have been able to hear the anger in every syllable that he said “Get! In! The! Trucks! NOW!!!!” They did not need to be told again. Jeanette started to tell him not to order her kids, but the look he gave her stopped her mid-sentence.

The two that still had the cars, Sandy and Jeanette, would go to the police department of each town to get the handguns, pepper spray, tasers, and anything else that could be useful. Those that had the trucks and campers would go to the stores, and pawnshops. Our objectives were all the 6-volt flashlights and batteries, 12-volt car batteries, battery cables, inverters, food, generators, and all the guns and bullets that we could get. Those going to the pawnshops would also be looking for all this and any precious metals, such as gold, silver, platinum, other precious metals and old coins. Daniel would also be getting enough hoses, boards, and connectors to make 3 solar water heaters. Since we had no way to know how big a spiral of 5 100-feet hoses would be, we decided to make sure he had hot water by making more then one solar heater, so if we could not fit all the hoses on one spiral, we would be able to make more then one.

Since each person was going to a different location, they were alone, so it took a full day to load the campers. After we got back to the farm we decided to wait until the next day to unload everything. The next morning it was decided that five people, me, Daniel, Gennie, Jeanette, and Christopher, would take five trucks, without any campers or trailers back into town, while the rest unloaded what we got yesterday. We knew that Sandy would not be able to do much; however Crystal, Amber, and Tim and Jim, could carry stuff from the campers to wherever she said to put it, and Sophia could do simple jobs, like unwrapping, and connecting, all the hoses, so they will be ready to use.

Those that were going to town would get flatbed trailers from a farm dealership just this side of town. Those going to town would be going after the lumber, which we would stack up on the trailers and secure with tie down straps. The day before we discovered that not being able to communicate with each other is a problem, so we decided to take the FRS radios with us. Four of us then went to lumber yards, there were 4 yards, and one returned to the tractor supply store to get large plastic containers that we could put gasoline in, and a forklift to quickly unload all the lumber back at the farm.

I had figured out a way to get the gas out of the ground even when the power was off, by lowering one end of a garden hose, we got a few new ones, down into the underground tank, with the other end connected to a plastic barrel, and using a air-pump to create a vacuum in a plastic barrel. After the barrel was full we opened a valve under it and let the gas poor into the big containers. It took a while to fill up all the containers, but we had no reason to hurry. We were sure there were no other people around now. After we filled all of the containers, we refill the tanks on the trucks. We ended up with several thousand gallons of gasoline. We decided this would be enough for today, as it was already 4 o’clock in the afternoon, so we decided to head back to the farm.

Upon returning, we saw that not only had the others unloaded the campers, but they had set up four of them to be lived in. Although they were not hooked up to the water, they had not had the extra garden hoses to connect to them, or splitters to connect multiple hoses to one faucet, or the electricity, there was no electricity, the stabilizing jacks were down with cinder blocks underneath them to distribute the weight and level the trailers.

Amanda had gone over to their house and got some of her stuff moved into one, Crystal had moved Christopher’s stuff into one while he was gone, and moved hers and Jeanette’s stuff into another, and Daniel and Gennie said that they wanted the fourth one. Only one camper was not yet set up to be lived in, but since we were not expecting anybody else this was not a problem.

We now had enough food, guns, generators, gasoline, batteries, and inverters. We thought we could handle almost any problem they came our way. Oh, how little we knew. Some lessons can only be learned the hard way. We knew enough to know that it would be very foolish to assume that we were ready for everything. Eventually outsiders would begin scavenging our area and if we did not already have everything we needed before that happened we would never get what we needed after it happened.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 9.

The Search.

On the morning of the 20th day Sandy seems to have a problem. She had no hot water. No water would come out of the hot waterside. After looking outside to see if there was a problem with the garden hoses, we found that it had been disconnected from that house, and connected to Christopher’s trailer. Judging from the size of the wet area at the drain, he had let the water run for quite some time. After asking him about this, he said that he had let the water run until all the hot water was gone so he could get a drink of cold water. I thought Sandy was going to kill him. Her temper exploded. She informed Christopher that the hoses had to be connected to the house so that they would have hot water, and now there was no hot water to use. He tried to claim that he needed running water to drink.

Jeanette and Daniel was saying that they did not get running water in their campers, so why should Christopher. Christopher’s said that they could have hooked up the hose anytime they wanted to, just like he did. At that comment Daniel went out and disconnected the hose from his trailer to reconnect it to the house. After the water problem was solved, we all had breakfast and Sandy said that after thinking about it, she thinks it would be better to error on the side of caution and go overboard with our preps, rather than get caught unprepared. It was decided that day, Daniel, Gennie, Amanda, Christopher, and Crystal, would all be going back to town.

Daniel would be going to the car parts stores to get more batteries, more terminals, headlights, which we would use for yard lights, and get all the 12 volt light fixtures from the RV/camper place, even the ones already in the campers, if need be, so we could put them on the walls inside Sandy's house, my place, the well house, the barn, and anywhere else we thought we would need lights. The campers all had 12 volt lights already built into them. They simply had to be connected to a working battery.

They did not need to take them out of the campers. There were 2 crates full of replacement lights in the back room.

They would be taking four vehicles. The plan was that they would remain together, going house to house, street by street, looking for guns, food, rare coins or precious metals. We could think of two reasons to do this.

1) When outsiders finally did reach this place, we wanted to make sure that they found no reason to stay. No food, guns, precious metals, or anything else for them to use here. We hoped they would decide that there was nothing here for them, and they would move on.

2) We wanted to make sure that we would be set up for anything, including having enough extra that we could barter with our neighbors in the future for skills and/or material that we could not get now.

They decided that they would only search the house is within five blocks of the main Street, because they knew that searching every house in both towns would take months, and they did not want to spend that much time searching. Most of the houses only had a little bit of food in them, a few had some guns, may be a dozen had precious metals, but they were not finding much in most houses. The ones that did have precious metals seemed to belong to prepper's, because they did have some food stockpiled. Anywhere from a few months, up to a year's worth, for one person. These would help us, but since we had 11 people, they would not last us as long as they would have lasted the people in town.

In one house, in the ritzy side of town, Christopher found a projector that had RCA connections. He quickly realized that if we could find a way to get stable power, this could be used to project DVDs onto a wall, for family movie night. After showing it to Daniel and telling him the idea of movie nights, Daniel said that he had seen 2 more, but had not realized what they were. They quickly got all 3, in-case one got broke.

 

[Lake Lili]

Thanks!

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 10.

Great Treasure.

It took a few days to check all the houses within the areas that they were searching, and then they started checking the houses outside of town. In most, they found what was expected. A couple of weeks worth of food, and maybe one or two guns, but at one house, 3 miles outside of town, they found what can only be described as A GREAT TREASURE.

This house appears to have belonged to a prepper. There was a 2500 gallons water tank on scaffolding beside the house, with pipes running into the house. Clearly the water in the house was a gravity feed system. A windmill driven water pump was pumping of water up to the tank. The overflow from the tank flowed through another pipe into a very large barn, where it poured into animal watering systems.

In a large room in the back of the barn there were big machines. Two forklifts, three tractors, three harvesters, three planters, three backhoes, and one homemade log trailer, with a chipper shredder at the back, and a log grabber above the shredder. Secured to the ceiling were ten 1,000 gallon plastic containers, with a PVC pipe right in front of them, a “T” connecting each one to the pipe, the end of the pipe connecting to a hose. At the end of the hose is what could only be described as a “do it yourself” nozzle. It was a short piece of pipe with a valve at one end. It was assumed that this was used to refuel the machines.

In the barn there were rabbits, chickens, goats, cows, and a few horses. The rabbits were in a fenced in area about 60’ x 60’. Thankfully they were able to eat grass and the auto watering system gave them water.

There were four rooms on the side of the barn. The first one was open, and had a horse-drawn wagon. The second, third, and fourth, had locked garage doors.

Inside the house, in what we assume was the study, in the basement, was a large safe built behind a bookshelf. The door was open, and a note taped to the inside of the door explained this. "Hello to whoever finds this. My name is Scott Sanders, and after hearing the news about the virus, I know that this headache and queasiness I am feeling means that I, and my beloved wife, are going to die very soon, so we will no longer need any earthly things. I have opened the safe/vault, and placed a metal bar blocking the door from shutting, so that you may have access to what is in it. I hope whoever finds all my stuff is able to use it wisely. I pray to God that it is found by good people. Inside this safe is over $250, face value, pre-1960 silver coins, over 200 pounds of pure silver, and 20 pounds of gold in various forms, over a-half-a-million dollars worth at today’s current stock market price, non-hybrid\non-GMO seeds for carrots, lettuce, celery, corn, potatoes, onions, and many other foods, including some simple spices. The rabbits are for wool for spinning if you know how. The goats are for meat and milk if you know how, the chickens are for the eggs, the cows are for the milk if you know how, and the horses are trained to pull the wagon. There is a laptop computer with a list of addresses, and yard maps showing where fellow prepper’s who live in town have buried barrels of silver, guns, and bullets, in their yards. On the side of the barn are three locked rooms. One key will unlock all three. The key is hanging on a hook by the back door.

In the first room it looks like the only thing in there is a forklift, with a CD player sitting on the seat. However there is a small remote control in a cloth bag, hot-glued to the underside of the seat, out of sight so it would not be easily found. If you put the batteries from the CD player in the remote, then push the center button, there three buttons, the entire floor of that room will descend through four levels into a large underground room. Do not press the first or third button, or the controls to the elevator will be destroyed, and he will never be able to go down. In these underground rooms is the reason we have taken such extreme security measures. You will find enough food to feed 20 people for 10 years. We were planning for about 100 people to come live on the farm should shtf day ever arrive. The food would have lasted two years if we had not been able to grow our own.

The second room has enough PVC pipe and UV resistant plastic to build five greenhouses 40 feet wide and 200 feet long.

The third room has everything needed to build a methane digested, and five composters. Step-by-step instructions on how to build each of them are on the laptop. May God bless you. Amen."

Nobody could believe what they had found. There was far too much here for them to take back to the farm with only the trucks they had with them, and they were too far for the FRS radios to be able to reach us. They decided that they would load up as much as they could and return to the farm telling the others what they had found so that the others could take more trucks and trailers to get more of it. Even with five trucks and five trailers, we still did 3 trips, and did not get even 1/10th of all the food before deciding that since we had the remote, and the safe/vault was closed, the remaining food would probably be safe there. Two trucks and trailers made a fourth trip to go into town and get the barrels that were buried. It took two days of continuous nonstop work to get all of this moved to Sandy’s farm, the stockpiles of food locked up in the barn where nobody would see it, and the barrels were buried so no one would know we had them.

At 25 days after V-day we had enough wealth to buy half of the county, enough guns and bullets to hold off an army, enough preserved food to last us for almost 2 years, and we knew were to get more, plus by using the windmill powered water pump and gravity fed water system we were able to supply water to all of the campers, and thanks to the thick trees, and bushes, blocking the view of the property from the main road, no one knew what we had, or so we thought. By using a few of the solar panels to make a battery bank, separate from Sandy's house, we were able to supply 12 volt power to all of the campers so the lights would work. The 110 power still would not work, but at least the lights would turn on.

Although the powerful inverters had been use on Sandy’s house, and at my place, we still have smaller inverters that we could use in the trailers for things like refrigerators. The problem was the solar panels did not produce electricity fast enough to maintain the refrigerators, so we needed to find a faster way to produce electricity.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 11.

Power For Free.

We knew that we could connect alternators to the batteries to charge them faster, but we needed a way to run them without burning up our gas on small motors. I had seen videos on the Internet about people hooking up powerful electromagnetic motors, such as from a grinder, to multiple alternators. This always resulted in a self-sustaining generator. Unfortunately we only had 2 alternators, and no powerful motor. Thankfully there were three automotive scrap yards in town, one in the first town and two in the second. Going by the RV dealer again, and getting a motor from a camper water pump, we were able to build one of these generators. The motor was only powerful enough to turn three alternators, but it was enough to maintain the batteries and supply power to the motor. Also since the pump motor was a 12 volt, we did not need to use another inverter for it.

We were concerned about the power from one alternator feeding into another and trying to turn it as a motor, so we decided that until we could get some diodes, each one should be connected to a separate battery bank, and each battery bank would be connected to a different trailer. This would mean that we would have to build another self-sustaining generator, since each one could only supply power to two campers, and we had four.

After discussing it, we all agreed it was better to get the parts to build many of these self-sustaining generators, which we could later use to recharge batteries for neighbors, or even trade to a neighbor for use of equipment that we do not have.

Up till now everything had been family oriented, but we knew that would not last. Sure enough, the morning of the 29th day after the announcement, Mathew came over and told us that while we had been gone to town yesterday, one of the Davis family visited him, and told him about a community meeting that was going to be held at a local church at 2 PM the next day, and it is requested that at least one member from every residence attend.

After discussing it for a short time, we decided that three people would be going. Me, Gennie, and Daniel, since we had lived in the community so long, and were known. Sandy and Amanda would stay behind to watch the kids, and make sure nothing happened to our stuff while we were at the meeting.

Jeanette, Christopher, and Crystal, had taken three of the trucks, and trailers, to a resort that they had loved to go to, about 4 hours from the farm. They were going after the electric golf-carts. We all agreed that it would be better to use electric vehicles to get around local, instead of using our gasoline.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 12.

The Meeting.

We got to the meeting, probably 5 minutes early, and noticed that most of the vehicles were leaving. At first we wondered if we had the time wrong, and we had missed it, so we asked somebody that was getting into their truck. He explained that the meeting hadn’t started yet. The reason why the vehicles were leaving is because so many people showed up that they couldn’t fit them all in the church. At most community meetings, only a few people show up, maybe 5% of the community, if that much. This time over half of the community is showing up, so they are moving the meeting to the school parking lot since it’s the only place they could think of to fit so many people on such short notice.

After all the cars and trucks got to the school, they realized that it was too crowded to have the meeting, and did not know what to do, till someone suggested parking the cars and trucks in the big field across from the school, behind the teachers apartments.

Many of the teachers lived in a single story apartment building, across the street from the school. The apartments were too small for a family, but one person could live there with no trouble, and since they came with the job, the teachers did not have to pay rent.

Once most of the vehicles were out of the way, four trucks were set up, parked beside each other, with the space between the third and fourth one. They setup a generator in the back of the second truck, put one speaker in the back of the first and fourth truck, and put the microphone in the back of the third truck. We then realized that the space between the third and fourth truck would make a space between the person talking and the loud speaker.

At 2 o’clock, Big Ben got in the back of the truck, to start the meeting. “My fellow community members, welcome to the first of what we hope will be many meetings. Many of you know me as Big Ben. My name is Benjamin Anderson, and I am in charge of the local volunteer fire and rescue group. As you all know, 1 month ago a virus swept through the populated areas all around the world. As far as we know, only those that live away from populated areas survived, and not all of them did. There has been much talk recently about people running out of food and medical supplies. A few have had the foresight to see that we could not survive this as individuals. If we do not come together as a community and help each other, it will not be long before we, as individuals, come face to face with insurmountable problems. After discussing this with Preacher Brown, myself, a few of the people in the community which have medical training, and Miss Watson (the local store owner), it was decided that we had to find a way to bring the people together to work as a community. In that hope, we have set up this meeting, and have scheduled more meetings every day this week at 2 PM. By then, we hope to have all the critical issues settled, and can go to only one or two meetings a week.” Then with a small grin he said “weather permitting”. “Since it is no longer realistic to expect food to be delivered to the stores, electricity in the lines, or to get gas from the stations, we must become self-sufficient. As we all know, without electricity there is no way to pump gas or diesel, so unless Miss Watson can get a generator to power the gas pumps, what is already in the tractors and other machines, or other storage containers, are all that we can have. It is our hope that we can get a list of people that have tractors, plows, harvesters, and other farming equipment, and people that have diesel fuel, that they could donate to be used. This is not… ”

At this point, the members of the Rhodes family spoke up, loudly, saying “All of the tractors, plows, harvesters, diesel fuel, and other equipment which could be used to help people should all be gathered up and put in one location, for anybody who needs to use it. That way the poor people that could not afford to spend tens of thousands of dollars to buy all this equipment will still be able to use them, instead of only the rich being able to survive, while the poor starve to death.”

Many people started yelling “That is not right, that is communism. It is not right to force those that have to give what they have to those that do not have. Also, there are people that do not know how to operate the tractors and other heavy equipment, so expecting them to use it would be foolish. And what would the rest of us do after they broke the tractors? That may be how things are up in New York, but not here.” At this point Ben quietly sat down on the tire cover, and let the argument go.

After three or four minutes, there were a few loud bangs, as gun shots were fired up into the air. The argument immediately stopped, and Ben was able to continue. He tried to explain that the people, who had the tractors, plows, and other tools, did not have to give them to the community for anyone to use. The people who came up with the original idea just wanted to have a list of names of people who had the equipment, so that those who needed the tractors, plows, and other equipment, would know who to talk to, to make arrangements to use it.

We thought that we could keep quiet and no one would know that we had the equipment. Again, we were foolish. We should have realized that there was no way we could have spent days moving all of that equipment without being seen. Thankfully nobody knew how much we had. They did ask us about the tractors, plows, forklifts, bulldozers, and backhoes, but didn’t say anything about the food, green houses, or other material that we had found at Scott’s house, or any of the houses in town. We said that if they could put fuel in them, and show that they knew how to operate them, they could use them. Many did not have any diesel fuel, and were very upset by us requiring that they supply the fuel. We quickly realized that this could be a problem. We had plenty of fuel and did not need more, plus we had the gas-vac, as I called it, that we could use to get gasoline, or diesel, out of the underground tanks, so we had no immediate shortage.

Daniel was about to say that they didn’t need to supply their own fuel, just show that they could operate the equipment, when 17-year-old Mike Rhodes interrupted him. In a low whisper, just loud enough for us to hear, he gave us what we considered to be a thinly veiled threat. We were told that if we were not willing to help others, they would have no motivation to help us when we needed it. And now that there are no police, what is there to stop someone from coming by one night, and just taking our bulldozers, tractors, and other big machines?

Daniel quickly slammed him to the ground and very loudly informed him that threatening us is not a good way to get us to help people, and he was about to say that he could supply the fuel before this loudmouth had interrupted him, and if anybody did try to come by and take what we had, the only thing they would be leaving with was a bullet. Instantly the rest of the crowd was as silent as a tomb. A few people wanted to know what he had tried to threaten us about, so Daniel told them. Many quickly stated that he did not speak for them. They would not refuse to help others in need just because those in need do not help them.

A lot of people were talking about the problem with water. The Davis family had been a tremendous help, but eventually they would have to stop, because all the gas would be gone. I quickly realized that this could be in our favor, since my gas-vac idea could be used to pull water out of the ground, and it could be powered by solar panels, this was a good chance to help others.

When Big Ben asked if anybody had any ideas that could help people, or any questions, would stand up, six people stood up, including me and Daniel. Big Ben called on Daniel first, and Daniel offered to use the bulldozer and backhoe to help others to enlarge their gardens if they needed it. Many people were very grateful for that. He then called on me, and I told him that I had a design for a device which could be used to pull the water out of the ground.

At first many wanted to know how I knew my design worked, and I said that I knew it worked because we had used it, but I did not tell them what we used it for. They accepted that, and started requesting that I make some for other people to use. I told them I could not make that many, but I could show the one I had, and let others see how it was made, so that they can make more. They accepted that.

The third man was a older man, and he asked how he was supposed to grow a garden, since he and his wife lived alone, had a hard time getting around, and did not have any young, strong, people to do the work for them? Immediately several people offered to help them with the plowing, and planting of the garden. All the old man would have to do is water it, and let someone know if it needed the weeds removed. He was extremely grateful for this.

The fourth asked about the people that could not grow food because they did not have the space, such as the teachers. After a few minutes of thought and discussion, someone suggested that we not only grow food for personal use, on all private property, but also grow gardens in properties where no one lives, such as the 15 acres where the cars are currently parked. One of the teachers said that after it is plowed, they can take care of the planting, watering, assuming that they could find a way to get water, the weeding, and everything else until it is ready to harvest. However it is a good idea to plant and grow as much as we can as a community so that if one person’s garden fails they will not have to starve. Big Ben asked for a show of hands for everyone who thought that community gardens, to help those who cannot grow a garden, would be a good idea. Every hand went up. He then asked how many would be willing to use their tractors and plows to set up and help maintain such gardens. About 45 or 50 hands went up.

Big Ben looked like he was going to cry. “It is so great that so many people are willing to help those in need.” Then although he did not address them by name, he looked straight at the Rhodes family and said “In order to prevent this from being abused I believe that we should set a rule that the community food will be for those who cannot grow their own food, whether it be limited space, health problems, or any other legitimate reason. However, those who can grow their own food, but simply won’t, because they expect others to take care of them, don’t get anything from the community food bank. Can I get a show of hands of those who agree with this?” With the exception of the Rhodes family, every hand went up.

Someone then asked where the food would be stored. Another said that since the school is not in use, has lots of rooms, is centrally located, is solar powered, and is eco-thermally cooled, it would be the logical place. People asked what the many different rooms had to do with it. The person that suggested the school then said that the different rooms could hold different things, such as one room could hold fruit, and another could hold vegetables, etc... Those who have, or have used roots cellars know that there are some things they cannot be stored together, such as onions and bananas, because the fumes from the onions will ruin the bananas.

Again the Rhodes family spoke up saying that what the school is used for, and what can and cannot be put in the school, is controlled by the school board. People cannot just decide on their own to use the school for storage. At this, John Peterson, the HS principle, announced that five members of the school board are dead, and the two that remain have already told him that as far as they are concerned school is out for the year, and if he wishes to use the school for another purpose, he's welcome to do so. And again the Rhodes family spoke up saying that only those two cannot decide. The school board is seven people. and until another election is held and the number is restored to seven again, things must continue as they have been, with the kids going to school. At this the two remaining members forcefully informed the Rhodes family that there are no rules, or laws, in that area that tell how many people must be on the school board, and the kids had already been out of school for 6 ½ weeks. Even if they went back to school now, summer vacation starts in less than a month.

Again someone asked “what about the people that are already out of food? It takes months for food to grow, what are they supposed to do?” Ben asked if anybody had been to town yet and could verify that it was safe? We did not want to have to admit that we had been to town, but we knew that we were probably the only one who had, and if we did not tell them that it was safe, some of them would probably starve to death before going to town. Gennie said that after she had heard on the shortwave radio that the virus had run its course, and the cities were now ghost towns, she went to town, and had not seen any other people, so it should be safe for a group of people to go to town and get food from the stores to put in the community food bank. At first I wondered what she was doing, giving that we’d already been to town and I thought we got all the food. I would later realize that there is no way we could have gotten all of it. We did not even get one quarter of it. The campers could not hold all of the food in the stores, so there was plenty left for other people.

The last two had remained standing during this, and they both offered to help plow gardens for those who needed it, but would not allow others to use their tractors. They were concerned that someone who did not know how to use the tractor would break it, and then they would not have it anymore. A few grumbled about this, but no one tried to argue with them about it.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 13.

After The Meeting.

Immediately after the meeting several people came up to us and asked when they would be able to come by and see the device I had built for getting water out of the ground. I told them they could see it now if they wanted to, however since we did a rush job on building this one and it is not very solid, only a few people would get to see it at a time. Once they saw how it was built and understood how it worked, they would be able to make their own.

Explaining it was very simple to the people because it was a very simple design. A 5 gallon bucket, with a facet at the bottom, a piston driven air pump at the top to create a vaccume in it, and a garden hose attachment at the top to suck the water/gas into the bucket.(NOT TO READER. This probably could work IRL for water, but only a idiot would try to use it for gas since there is a risk of a spark from the motor igniting the gas fumes and making it explode. But since this is fiction story........)

When Miss Watson came up to see the design, she recognized the smell of the gas. I guess since she had been running the store/gas station for years, she would know what gas smells like better than anyone else. She quickly realized that we had used it to get gas out of tanks in town, and that it could be used to get the gas out of her tanks to help the community. She asked us if we could build a stable one, using a 5 gallon bucket, with a space under it for her 5 gallon gas can, and somehow put a lock on it so that others could not turn it on and off but she could. She could then get the gas out of her tanks; 5 gallons at a time, to help people in the community grow food. I told her that I could easily do that, but the gas would not help everyone, because some tractors use diesel. She laughed at that and asked if I could build 2, one for gas and one for diesel. I said that I probably could.

It took a few hours to show the water-vac to everybody who had come to see it. Many said that it was a brilliant design. I simply said that it served its purpose.

Benjamin Anderson a.k.a., Big Ben, saw the campers and asked why we had not set up one or two of them by the milking building since we could plug in the campers and get full use of them? I immediately felt like a grade school dropout a.k.a. an idiot. After they all left we decided to move two of the campers to the building, one on the north side for Christopher, and one on the south side for Crystal. Although this would use the fifth camper, which had been empty up till now, it would let Jeanette have a camper all to herself, and make it easier for them to milk the animals since their homes would be right there, beside the milking building instead of on the other side of the creek.

Sandy made it very clear to Christopher and Crystal that having the electricity and the running water that comes with that location is a reward for doing the job, and if they did not do the job, that reward would be suspended.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 14.

Movie Night.

That night we decided it would be fun to have time to just relax and watch a movie. Thanks to the projector that Christopher had found we were able to show the movie on the side of the barn. There’s nothing like watching George Burns pretending to be Satan, and God, on the big screen, and this screen was about 8 feet tall.

Again, we had lessons to learn, and this was one. Since the electricity was out, there were no yard lights (we have not yet hooked up our 12 volt “yard lights”) and the projector put out a lot of light. Before the movie was half over, people were coming by to see what the flickering lights were, many thought it might have been a fire. When they saw that we were watching a movie, they asked if they could stay and watch it to. We realized then that we would not be able to keep our lights a secret, especially after we put up the 12 volt “yard lights”, so instead of trying to pretend that we did not have anything, we invited them to watch, and decided to make it look like we had less than what we really did have.

After the movie was over, a few people asked how were we able to power the DVD player and projector, and where did we get the projector. We said that since 2 of the campers were now plugged in, and no longer needed the batteries, we used those batteries, and a inverter, for the power, and we got the projector at a pawn shop a few years ago, but it had never been dark enough to use it outside before because of the lights.

Many wanted to know if we were going to show movies on a regular basis. Sandy said that she had not thought about it. We just decided to show one tonight because we wanted to see one. Many of them said that watching television is one of the things they miss most, and getting to watch the movie was a wonderful treat. Sandy said that she would think about setting up movies for the community, maybe once a week and on special occasions.

A few asked if it would be possible to borrow the projector, batteries, and inverter, so they could watch some of their own DVDs at home. Sandy said that we did not want to loan it out, because if anything happened to it we could not replace it (She did not want to tell that we had 3 of then), however if we do start having community movie nights, other people will be permitted to bring their own DVDs to show. She would think about it tonight and if they asked her tomorrow, after the meeting, she would have an answer for them.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 15.

The Loss.

The next day, before leaving for the meeting Daniel said that he was going over to see if Matthew would like to ride with him to save on fuel, and he would meet us at the meeting.

When the meeting started, Big Ben asked if there were any questions, or suggestions, that should be brought up today. Daniel said that he had just been over to Matthew's house, and Matthew is dead. He seems to have died in his sleep. For a moment everyone was silent, probably in shock. Daniel said that he would be willing to use the backhoe to dig the grave, but didn’t know how to make a coffin.

One man said that if he could use a generator for power in his shop he could build a coffin. It would not be a fancy box like you see in town, it would just be a plain wooden box, but it would be a coffin. One of the men of the Davis family offered the use of his generator for this. This death caused many to realized that just because we survived the virus does not mean we will get to enjoy a long life. We can still die of other problems.

In a choked voice, Big Ben asked how long it would take to build the coffin, and dig the grave. Daniel said that he could dig the grave with the backhoe in about 10 minutes. The man who said he could make the box said that it would take him about 20 minutes. Big Ben then asked if anybody had a problem postponing the meeting till 4 o'clock so that they could have the funeral. No one seem to have a problem with it, and many thought it was a good idea.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 16.

Tuesday, The Second Meeting.

The funeral was done quickly, but still respectfully and everybody was again back at the school parking lot. This time instead of having four pickup trucks they had one flatbed trailer with the speakers, amplifier, generator, and several seats on it.

As the meeting was starting, five people went up and sat in the seats. Big Ben opened the meeting. Again he asked if there is anything anybody would like to announce, or any questions they would like to discuss, at the meeting.

Since nobody had any questions or comments, Big Ben said that we shall move on with the meeting. He then introduced one of the people in the chairs as Stephen Davis. After stepping up to the microphone, Stephen said that since Gennie had announced that it was safe to go to town, the Davis family had put camper shells on the back of three of their trucks, and went to town that morning. They had gone to three of the stores, and fully loaded all three pickup trucks with shelf stable food, and are just waiting to know where they should take it to, so those who need it can get it. Another person said that they had decided yesterday to use the school for the food bank, so they should unload at the school, after the meeting. John Peterson said that he would unlock one of the doors so they could carry the food in.

Again the Rhodes family interrupted trying to claim that the only way to make sure that people were not hoarding food in their homes while taking food from the food bank is to take all of the food from people's homes and putting it in the food bank for community use. Again people were calling out that is not right, that is communism, and there was very little chance of people trying to do that because people in this area just don't do things like that.

Stephen had returned to his seat, and after the interruption settled Big Ben introduced Miss Watson. She said that thanks to the two the vacuum devices that I had built for her, she is now able to get fuel out of the tanks for those who need it, but only for those who need it to help grow food. She will not give up her gas for people to "drive around just because they want to." I thought my ears would explode from the applause.

Next Big Ben introduced Jason Ford's, a man I had never met before, but most others did know. Jason announced that he was the man responsible for keeping the school buses running. After discussing it with John Peterson of the school, it was decided that one of the buses would have all of the seats removed. This would be used to transport's food to those that were unable to come to the school to get any. A few people asked why people would have a hard time getting to the school? Jason explained that eventually people are going to run out of gas, and since the gas now coming out of the tanks is used primarily for farming equipment, the people that are out of gas may not be able to get more. There are other problems that could prevent them from getting here as well. Jason then returned to his seat.

Next Big Ben introduced the fourth person, Mark Scutter. Mark had a shortwave radio that was capable of receiving, and broadcasting for hundreds of miles, but he currently had no way to power it. If a way to power it could be found, we could communicate with people in other parts of the country. Thanks to Gennie we now know that there are other groups of survivors. John Peterson immediately asked if the shortwave equipment could be set up and one of the classrooms, and use the power from the school's solar panels. Mark said that would work, and since the school is centrally located, and going to be the food bank, it is the reasonable place to put a communication center.

After Mark, Big Ben introduced Samuel Davis. Samuel said that he had been one of the three to go to town, but had been unable to get any food from the store, because someone was guarding the store that he went to, but he had been able to get food from other places. After Samuel told his story, he returned to his seat.

Mark again took the microphone and asked if there is any questions now. Two people stood up. One was a teacher, and the other was Sandy.

The teacher asked when the field behind the apartment would be plowed. The man who had offered to plow it said that he could do it at any time, but he did see a problem. Once it was plowed, and planted, where could the cars park. For a moment nobody was able to answer this, and then Mark said that would not be a problem. Starting tomorrow, the meetings would be held inside the gym. A stage would be placed on the far end of the gym. This would also make it possible to have chairs there for people to sit on, instead of them having to bring their own chairs, or sit on the hard ground, and we could leave the sound system set up all the time instead of having to set it up and take it down each day. Everybody was happy to hear this.

Mark then asked Sandy what she'd want to say. She said that in response to people asking her about showing community movies, she has decided that she would like to do that one or two times a week, on Tuesday and Saturday nights, however she does not want the big crowds on her property. There was some talk amongst the crowds about the movies. Not everyone had known about the projector. That quickly changed, and many people started asking where the movies would be shown. Sandy said that she did not know where they would be shown, but she did not want the crowds on her property so it would not be there. John Peterson offered to let her show the movies in the gym, since the gym was as tall as a two-story building, and there would already be chairs and a sound system in it. Everybody thought this was a good idea. Someone asked what kind of movies would be shown, and Sandy said that they had not thought about that yet. They would have to have a variety for different people who like different things. I suggested that a list of different movies could be taped on the door to the gym, and people could put a mark beside the one that they wanted to see. Then the movie that got the most votes would be the one that got shown that time. Many people liked this idea, however the Rhodes family asked what was to stop people from voting many times and tampering with the results. Many people started yelling that unlike the people in the cities, the people in the country are still honest. That seemed to placate the arguments.

After Sandy sat down, Mark asked again if there were any more questions or suggestions that need to be brought forward. When no one stood, Mark closed the meeting.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 17.

What Happened In Town.

When Samuel had gone to town with the other two, he was supposed to go to one of the three grocery stores to get as much food as he could. When he got there, he found a truck parked sideways in front of the doors, with a sign on it warning off trespassers. The sign said that the store was being watched over by the owner, and any theft would result in the death of the thief. When Samuel tried approaching the store, a voice from inside told him to leave. He decided it was better not to argue.

He decided to go to the bigger store, to tell Stephen about the man guarding that store, and to help him to get the food faster. Stephen was using a motorized dolly, and did not need his help. He told Samuel to go around the rest of the store gathering up any guns, bullets, and other stuff that they would need. It did not take Samuel long to return and tell Stephen that all of the guns and bullets were already gone, but there was still some bows and arrows.

Samuel said that he had an idea where he thinks he could get some food, and left the store. After checking many of the houses close to the main street, and finding no food in them, he decided to go away from the main street into what would be considered the bad part of town. Here, he found some of the houses still had food in them. Many looked like they had already been searched, but not very thoroughly. He was able to fully load his truck.

After getting as much food as his truck could hold, he was going back to where they were supposed to meet, when he saw a group of people walking down the street. Many were carrying shotguns and rifles. At first he was worried that they might be looking for trouble, but after they saw ham and all stepped up into the grass of the houses across the street from his truck, he realized that they did not want any trouble, they were trying to scavenge to. When he got even with them he stopped his truck and called to them asking if there was a leader. A man who appeared to be in his mid-30s, stepped forward and said he was the leader. Samuel asked why they did not have vehicles to carry the food they were trying to scavenge. The man said they were not just looking for food, they were also looking for working vehicles. Samuel quietly chuckled at this and told them there were many vehicles around, they were welcome to take their pick, since none of them belong to him, then smiling at his joke, he drove away.

Upon reuniting with his brothers, and telling them about the group, they said that he had gotten lucky they did not take his truck. He explained that was not luck, he had his AR15 during the entire conversation. Even though there were more of them then he had bullets, they probably knew that it would have been foolish to risk getting shot over a truck and food when you can get another truck and more food with no trouble.

Originally, the plan was to load up the trucks, return home, unload the trucks, then return to town from more food. However now that they knew other survivors were moving around, it might not be possible to return and get more food, because the food might not be there when they returned. After discussing it they decided that they would go by the farm store to get livestock trailers, and fill them up with as much food as they would hold, so that is what they have done. Now those trucks and trailers are here waiting to be unloaded.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 18.

Setting Up In The School.

Immediately after the meeting finished John Peterson, and several of the teachers, got with the Davis brothers to unload the groceries into the rooms. They realized that since there was no cabinets in the rooms all the food would have to be stacked on the floor. John Peterson said that he would bring this up at tomorrow's meeting and asked if anybody could build cabinets to keep the food on.

A few minutes later Mark Scutter returned to the school with his shortwave equipment, including the antennas that would be set up outside. When he was asked if the intent was need to be in certain places he said that as long as they are up high the exact place does not matter. He had them secured to an old flagpole that he had bought several years ago. Since the school flagpole was right in front of the main door, and there was a classroom window right by it, he could set up in that classroom, and that would become the communication center.

Mark asked if there had been any thought about who would monitor the shortwave. John Peterson just shrugged and said that everybody probably just assumed that Mark would do it. Mark smiled at this and agreed that he could do it some of the time, but he also had to sleep, and work on his garden at home. John Peterson said that could be something to discuss at tomorrow's meeting.

It did not take Mark long to set up the radio, but without a way up the flagpole he could not secure the outside antenna to it, so the range was very limited. After the Davis's unloaded all the food Samuel offered to climb up on the roof and secure the antenna as high as he could. This greatly increased the range, but still not as far as it could be.

Jason Ford saw Samuel setting up the antenna and realized that they had not got it as high as they needed it. He went over to the window, and seeing John Peterson, and Mark, in their, he said that there was a ladder in the bus barn that could reach the top of the pole if they placed it on top of the building. John Peterson was unwilling to do this since it would be extremely unstable, but the Davis brothers said that if two of them hold it on each side it should be safe for Samuel to go up in the ladder. Again John was reluctant, till Mark pointed out that the range of the radio, with the antenna where it is now, would be less then a third of what it is if the intent is at the top of the pole. Reluctantly John agreed to let the Davis brothers use the ladder.

Mark asked if he could rearrange the desks so that he would have more room. John Peterson said that as far as he is concerned this is now the communication room and Mark can set it up however he chooses. Mark then started moving all of the students desks against the back wall and put the teachers desk by the window with the radio equipment on it. He then asked if he could get a map of the country and some plastic tacks, different colors. John Peterson said that he did not know if they had any, but he could look. One of the teachers said that there is a map in the History class, and the tacks are probably in the art room. She would go get them. A moment later, she returned with the map. She said that there were plenty of tacks in the art room, but since they are in a cabinet secured to the wall, she could not get to them. John Peterson said that he had a master key and would get them. A moment later he returned with a large plastic drawer, with many difficult attacks mixed together in it.

Once Mark had the map and the tacks, he sat down to listen to the radio.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 19.

Communication With The Outside.

After about 45 minutes the scanner locked onto a broadcast. It was two people talking about a program called "Voice of hope". Mark got on, and after giving his radio ID, ask them what the voice of hope was. One of them said that he must be new to shortwave if he had not heard of it, because it is mentioned several times a day. Mark explained that he had not gotten on the shortwave very much before the virus, and since the power went out he had not been able to get on the shortwave until now. He was hoping to get updated information on the rest of the country. One of the two others identified himself as a prepper who had lived in a small town in California until the broadcast of the virus, and then he, and his 2 brothers, moved to their shelter. Now that the danger has passed they have returned to the small town and are living off of the food that others left behind. They are able to power their house with a generator using the gas from the cars. The other identified as a woman from central Illinois who had lived her whole life on a farm. They had been in communication with others and could probably answer most of Mark's questions.

The first question was "What is the voice of hope?" California explained that the voice of hope was a broadcast that came over the shortwave at 6 PM Eastern time every Friday. They claim to be a military ship docked 5 miles off of what used to be LA, and are broadcasting through the military satellite to a solar powered satellite-receiver/shortwave-broadcaster that has been placed on top of one of the tallest buildings in Kansas City. From there the broadcast can cover the entire nation. No one knows for sure who, what, or where, they are, but they do seem to have information that only the military, or the government, would have.

Mark then asked if he could get a list of confirmed cities destroyed. California could be heard laughing as he tried to ask if he wanted the list in order of the fires or alphabetical order. Illinois said that she could give him a list of the major ones, but she did not know all of them. Mark said that the major ones would help he is just trying to get a general idea of the state of the nation right now. Illinois told him that Chicago, New York City, Miami, Las Vegas, Washington DC, and LA, all burned down. Many think that when the national power grid went down and the water pumps stopped working, the pressure in the water lines bled off, so when the fire started, the sprinklers that were supposed to put the fires out before they spread did not have any water in them. Dallas, Detroit, Kansas City, Phoenix, San Francisco, and Memphis, are empty, but still intact. As for the state of the nation, shortly after the announcement of the virus it was barely contained panic, but now that the virus has run its course, and people are no longer in danger, it is much calmer. There are confirmed survivors in every state. Some are worried about how long they can survive without help from the government. A few keep broadcasting asking where is FEMA and other government agencies that are supposed to help them. Apparently they can't even tie their own shoes without a government agency telling them how to do it. They probably will not survive much longer. Others are saying that they see this as a blessing, because now they can live free. A few have gathered up the survivors around them and are trying to re-create the dark ages where people lived in walled villages, and each village took care of their own with no help from the outside. While I do agree that we should become self-sufficient, I do not think that we should shut out other people. It is possible that one of those who are shut out could have knowledge that could be used to make life easier for the people in the closed-off village. We have about 180 survivors here, and have take in another 15 who have skills that we need. Most are adults, but about a quarter are kids, so we expect to survive.

Mark went over to the map and placed a red tack on places that were burned, a black tack on places that were confirmed wiped out by the virus but did not burn down, a yellow one for places where people had survived, but were not expected to survive for much longer, and a green one for places that people had survived, were organized and seemed to be doing good.

California said that their situation is the exact opposite. After returning to the small town that they had lived in, they found that everybody had died of the virus, and the three brothers are alone. They has been able to receive shortwave broadcasts from the Hawaiian Islands, reporting that there are only about 200 people alive on the big island, and it is suspected that there are no survivors on the other islands, but this has not been confirmed. Apparently about 3,000 people had been on a 2-week sea cruise when the virus happened, and the captain kept them out at sea for 4 weeks, till after the virus had died off. Most of the 3000 wanted to just put as much fuel and food in the ship as it would hold then returned to the mainland. The 200 that remained on the island are now dismantling the cities in order to restore the island back to its natural beauty. After removing all metal, and glass, from the buildings, they actually are burning the buildings, in controlled fires, to destroy all the wood, since chemically treated wood can't be used for mulch, all the fabrics, plastics, and other synthetic's. They then take rock crushers to grind the concrete, brick, rocks, or whatever else the buildings are made of, into small rocks, only an inch or two in diameter, which will later be used to make roads and walkways. All of the glass and metal is being melted down and formed into blocks, about the size of red bricks, to be saved for future use. In a few years, Hawaii will become a tropical paradise again.

Mark said that he was not really surprised about this considering how quickly people moved around and have quickly the virus spread from person to person. It was a miracle that anybody survived at all. Both Illinois and California agreed with him. Mark asked Illinois if the people there were trying to help each other or if everybody was trying to look out for themselves. She said that most of them are trying to help each other, but a few keep waiting for the government to come in and tell them what to do. Mark chuckled at this and said that they had one family here that doesn't seem to know how things should work either. They keep trying to claim that everything should be made communal, so that those who need it can get what they need. Everybody else is basically ignoring them, or just flat out telling them to shut up. Both California and Illinois could be heard laughing at that.

Mark explained that we are having community meetings every day this week and asked if there is anything that the other two feel the local community should be aware of. California said to tell them how lucky they are to have survived as a group instead of only a few surviving, because being so few is not good. Illinois said that she had heard reports from the East Coast about a group of hardened criminals that survived by breaking out of prison and taking over a small community, and now they are moving west taking what they want and killing everyone who gets in their way. She does not know if it is true or not, because the sources that told about it admitted that they have not been able to verify it, but felt that people should be warned, just in case it is true. Mark thanked them for the information and said that since he was the only one on the radio-watch right now and he was tired, he was logging off to get some sleep.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 20.

Wednesday, The Third Meeting.

At this point I feel I should explain the layout of the school. It is made of five buildings. If you were standing in the parking lot, facing the school buildings, the building to the right would be the grade school. The center building would be the cafeteria. The building to the left would be the high school. Behind the high school and cafeteria is the sports center, which contains the gym. Behind the grade school is the bus barn, where all the school buses are kept.

The sports center is out of place on a country school, but the school board felt that the students should be able to pursue any sporting activity they desired, and since the federal government was handing out money as part of an educational incentive program, the sports center was built. It contains a full-size gym/basketball court, a room for practicing gymnastics, such as you see in the Olympics, boys and girls changing rooms, complete with individual showers, and an Olympic size swimming pool. Behind the building there is a running track, two baseball diamonds, a soccer field and a full-size football field of which the football & soccer fields have never been used. Not enough students interested in playing football or soccer.

When people started arriving for the third meeting, a sign was posted on a banner draped across the road reminding them that they can now park in the school parking lot. A wooden sign with the words "meeting hall" pointed between the high school and the cafeteria. At the doors to the gym were two pillars, with a sign above them "Community Meeting Mall."

Inside, all the bleachers were pushed to the sides, and hundreds of chairs were on the floor facing the stage. On the stage was the microphone, and nine chairs, four on each side and one in the middle. In the center chair was Big Ben, to his right was Mark Scutter, John Peterson, and a Miss. Watson, the store owner.

When the meeting started, Mark asked if anybody had any questions or comments that need to be discussed. Two people stood up. One was Stephen Davis, the other was Brian Rhodes. Mark called on Stephen first.

Stephen stepped up to the microphone. "As many of you know, a few of the members of my family went to town after the meeting Monday, and found that there were other people from other areas also scavenging in town now. I believe that we need to find a way to be able to get what we need as quickly as possible, before other people get it and we are unable to. I would like to ask for volunteers to make it trip to town to load up as much food as we possibly can haul and bring it back here to the school." I figured that my family would probably be mad at me for what I was about to say, but I thought that saying it was the right thing to do. I stood and said that I knew of a way to get more food than just what the trucks could haul. Mike Rhodes scoffed at me and asked me if I had a shrinking ray hidden somewhere. I chose to ignore him and continue with what I was saying. I just had to make is seem like it was just an idea, and not something that we had already done. I said that the best way to get lots of food is to use a big box trailer. A few people said that if we had semi trucks, we could do that by we don't have any semi-trucks. I quietly laughed at that, and said that yes semi-trucks could haul a lot, but we did not need semi-trucks, all we needed were some campers from the RV dealer since a camper is just a box on wheels. You could have heard a pin drop for about five seconds and then thunderous applause. I sat back down, then immediately stood up again as another idea occurred to me. "Who says that we have to limit our searches only to the two towns that are close to us? Is there any reason why we couldn't take a couple of school buses full of adults, or at least older teens, to a town farther away, then get vehicles from those towns to carry food back here. We could even load up the buses. If we took two buses, that could be more than 100 drivers, more then 100 trucks, and possibly campers, or trailers, loaded with items for our use here. They might even be able to load a bunch of food into the buses, since they would not be needing space on the buses to come back. We would just have to make sure that the trucks, and buses, would have enough fuel to get back here. It might be a good idea to get a semi from in town and put a fuel trailer behind it. That way we would be taking our fuel with us." The applause was deafening. Stephen just smiled for a moment, and then asked if we could get any volunteers for these trips. About half of the community volunteered. Probably about 200 people. Stephen smiled, and then said "I don't think two buses will be enough, we’re going to need four or five to carry this many people." He then returned to his seat.

Big Ben did not immediately recognize Brian Rhodes. Instead, he asked if anybody else had anything to ask about or discuss. Brian Rhodes scowled at him for not acknowledging that he was standing. Big Ben then looked at him and said "I doubt that anybody wants to hear what you have to say, but you do have a constitutional right of freedom of speech, and God-given free will, so I guess we have to hear you out as well."

Brian looks like he wanted to punch Big Ben. I almost wish he had tried. Big Ben would have folded him up and used him for an accordion. Brian said that in yesterday's meeting it was decided that those who could not grow food would be able to get food from the food bank, but those who could, and would not, would not get anything. What about those that did not know how to grow food, what were they supposed to do. Big Ben looked at Brian as if he had suddenly sprouted wings, before saying "They ask for help from people that do know how to grow food. If your ground is good for growing, and you're able to water, you should be able to grow a garden."

In a very sarcastic tone Brian asked who would be willing to help him and his family with the garden. Nobody offered to help. Brian grinned and at this, and stated that apparently he and his family would not be able to grow anything, so they would just have to keep getting food from the food bank. About 40 voices called back, but the general message from each was the same. If he would actually ask for help, instead of sarcastically pretending to ask for help, somebody might actually help him, but as long as he is being rude to others, no one is going to help him, and he still is not going to have access to the food bank, because he can grow food, he just doesn't want to, and is making sure that no one else wants to help him. Brian tried to argue this, even going so far as to claim that the community is plotting against him and his family, but no one would accept that he could not grow food, and many just laughed at the thought that they were plotting against him. He was not that important in their lives.

After letting the argument run for a few minutes Big Ben called the meeting back to order. Again he asked if anybody had any questions comments or suggestions that should be discussed. When no one stood, he proceeded with the meeting and asked Mark to the microphone.

Mark said that the shortwave radio is set up but since he is currently the only one listening to it, and he has other duties, such as taking care of his garden at home, so he needs volunteers to man the radio. Unless other people would be willing to volunteer the time, nobody's going to learn anything about what is going on in the world, because there will be nobody listening to the radio. He needs volunteers that would be willing to take shifts listening on the radio. one person stood up, and he was disappointed that this is all that would volunteer until that one said he is not volunteering, he has a question about it. Mark asked him what his question was. The man asks what all would be involved in listening, and will the people that were listening get to broadcast? Mark said that the person listening will basically just be taking notes on things that they feel the community should know about, and after he has taught them to understand how people talk on the shortwave radios, they would be able to transmit, but not in the beginning. He said that he was hoping to get several volunteers so that each would only have to work for two or three hours a day, and be able to spend the rest of the time on their gardens and necessities at home. At this, his neighbor stood and said that Mark did not need to worry about his garden. It had already been plowed and was ready for the seeds, and the neighbor would take care of it if Mark was unable to because of the radio. Mark smiled at this and thanked them both said that he would still prefer to have other people to help so that he is not the only one doing it. He asked those who are interested to stand. Several people stood up, he counted 46. He said that if he could get one more volunteer that would be 47, plus him is 48. That means that each person would only have to work with the radio for two hours shifts once every four days. Three more people stood at this. Mark said that the best idea he could come up with is to train all of them, then keep two in reserve in case one person cannot do the two-hour shift. Everyone agreed with this and returned to their seats.

After Mark returned to his seat Big Ben introduced John Peterson.

John said that there was a problem with keeping the food in the school classrooms. There were no cabinets or shelves to put it on so it was all sitting on the floor, or on students desks. He would like to ask if anybody can build shelves to keep the food on. One person stood and said that instead of building shelves they should build can-racks that are loaded at the top and the cans come out at the bottom. That way the old cans would be used before the new ones. Many agreed with this idea but a few said that a better way would be to have the can racks build in such a way that they are loaded from the back, and behind them would be the shelves where the cans are still in the flat's. The ones on the shelves behind the racks would be the ones in inventory that have not yet been put out for the people to use, but the storage would not be limited to what could fit in the racks. Many people agreed with this. Three people said that they had the carpentry skills needed to build the shelves and racks, if they can get the lumber and power to the tools. John said that since the shop class at the high school required more power than the solar panels could provide, it had been on the grid, so the power tools no longer worked, however if generators could be brought in to power the tools, they can still be used.

Daniel quietly asked me if myself-sustaining generator idea could supply the power needed for the tools. I said that if a bigger one was built, using a more powerful motor, it probably could. If one was not enough to power all of the tools, many of them could probably be built. Daniel then stood up and said that he had an idea that should make it possible to power all of the tools without needing to go through the gasoline to power a generator. He explained about the self-sustaining generator, and how he knew that it would work. A few people seemed upset that we had not told them about this sooner, a few laughed, saying that it cannot work, but many said that they would be happy to help get the material needed to build one or more.

John was very happy to hear this, and said that the construction could begin as soon as all the material was collected. Two of the Daniels family said that they could go to town right after the meeting and get however much lumber is needed, and whatever is needed to build the self-sustaining generators. Everybody applauded at this.

Next Ms. Watson came up to the microphone. She said that thanks to the vacuum system she was able to get gas out of her tanks, but now realized that her tanks have very little gas in them. She wants to ask if anybody who can drive a semi-truck can go to town with her two gas-vacs, to get gas, and diesel, out of the tanks in town and bring here to put it her tanks for the people here to use. Three people stood and said that they had driven semi-trucks in their lifetime and knew how to do it, so they could go get the fuel and bring it, but it would take a while, because her pumps only pull 5 gallons at a time. I stood and said that since I had built the gas-vacs I knew exactly how they were made, and knew how to modify them to work with bigger amounts. After the meeting, when there was less people around to hear, I would explain how to set it up so that the fuel would be pumped straight into the trucks. One of them said that it would be helpful if someone else could drive them to town so that they could all three drive the semi trucks back here without having to leave the vehicle that they drove in town. Mrs. Davis stood and said that since some of her family would be going to town to get stuff, the three could ride with them. The three gladly accepted the offer.

Big Ben then took the microphone again, and asked if there is any more questions or comments that need to be addressed. Brian Rhodes stood up. Big Ben quietly laughed and mumbled "Why am I not surprised?" He decided not to try to give Brian a hard time this time, and simply asked him what he had to say.

Brian said that he would like to suggest a community rule that those that know how to do things that would greatly help the rest of the community should be required to give this information to the other people. Although he did not specify what this knowledge would be, everyone knew that he was talking about the design for the self-sustaining generator. Big Ben decided to turn this against him, by asking how much time he would be willing to spend learning everything that the local nurses know how to do, or learning how to drive a semi-truck, or learning how to filter rainwater, or any of the other hundreds of skills which will now be needed to survive as a community, but not necessarily as an individual. Almost everybody was laughing so hard they barely heard the last part of Big Ben's statement, and no-one heard what Brian said after it. After they got done laughing, Big Ben said that while he did like the idea of people being generous with skills that could help other people, he does not believe that it should be a requirement. Brian looked like he was ready to argue this, and even started to say that it was not……

That was when I interrupted him. In barely contained rage I told him that the reason I did not tell others about the self-sustaining generator idea was because I was not sure that it would work long-term, nor was I sure how big it could be made, or how much power one could put out, nor have I found a way to ensure that power from one alternator/generator does not feed into another one causing it to become an electromagnetic motor, and interfering with the purpose of the device, or any of a dozen other potential problems. Brian was about to argue with me, until he turned and saw me. Judging from his expression, I probably had smoke pouring out of my ears and flames coming out of my nostrils. Even though there were rows of chairs, I still took a half-step towards him, shaking in rage, hands made into fists, and told him to please try to argue with me. Give me a reason to beat some sense into him. He was bigger than me, and probably could have beaten me in as fight, but apparently I must've looked pretty mean at that moment because he wisely chose not to argue any further, and sat down. After I sat down at I heard a girl behind me whisper to her friend "I wish I had a bag of marshmallows right now. I could probably cook them from the heat this guy is giving off." When I heard that I just had to laugh a little. I turned to look behind me and with a forced smile said "You wouldn't want to do that. They would be burnt before you even realize that they were toasted." They just laughed it that comment, and we returned our attention back to the meeting.

After that, Big Ben asked, almost wearily, if there was anything more. No one stood up, so Big Ben asked that those that are willing to make the trips for fuel, and the further trip to town's further away, to please remain after so that those trips can be planned, and then he dismissed the meeting.

Since I was one of the people that had volunteered to go to the further towns to get food, I had to stay there, but I had to get away from the crowd for a few minutes. As I was leaving, I told Big Ben that I would be back in a few minutes. I had to calm down before the next meeting. Smiling, he said that he could understand that, and would wait a few minutes before starting the next meeting to give everybody time to stretch their legs and get some fresh air. As I was going out the door, I heard a few people talking about how they thought Brian was going to pee his pants after looking at me. They did not realize I was walking past. I have wondered if they would have said anything had they realized I was close enough to hear them.

After a moment Mr. Davis, the father of the Davis family, came up to me to ask me what was needed to build the self-sustaining generators. I told him what was need it, and where it would be the most likely place to get them. He said that since his two older sons would be going on the trip to the farther away towns, him, his wife, and their daughter, would be going after the parts, and I should be able to build the generators tomorrow morning. I explained that I would also be going to the farther away town and probably would not be back by morning, but Daniel knows how they are made, and may be willing to show how so that other people can make them.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 21.

Planning.

Since the group that was going after fuel was only three people, they met first. The meeting only lasted a few minutes. After I explained how to modify the gas-vac so that it would suck the fuel directly into the semi trailers, I explained that since it was a bigger space, it would take longer to create the vacuum, but once the vacuum was established they would not have to get a little bit of fuel then drain it to the trailer then get a little bit more. They could just turn it on, and let it go till the trailer was full. Since many people here had older cars and trucks, and ethanol destroyed older engines, they agreed to only get fuel from the stations that did not have ethanol mixed in it. Fortunately, there was still one station in each town that refused to sell ethanol gas so they would be able to do that.

Big Ben jokingly said that if I keep helping people like this I'm going to become a community leader. Thanks to me they have water and the possibility of fuel for their vehicles and tractors. Without my inventions they would not have those, nor would they have the hope of having self-sustaining generators. I told him not to even joke about such a thing. I have no desire to be a leader of any kind. I simply try to help people, as I can, and as my ideas are needed. If people start trying to see me as some kind of a community leader, they will find out just how firmly I can keep my mouth shut. He took a step back, and said that he did not mean to upset me, he simply was stating what he had heard others saying. I dropped into a seat, putting my head in my hands, and mumbled something about people getting the wrong idea about me and maybe I should stop telling my ideas. Two people very quickly told me that if I had not told others about the water-vac, and let people see how mine was made, most of the people around here would not even have water to flush their toilets, and it would not take long for sickness and disease to start spreading around here. I just brushed that off stating that I was just being a good neighbor. Very seriously Samuel Davis said that is the type of people that need to be in leadership positions. Not people that want the position, but people that don't want it, but are still willing to take it because it has to be done. That leads to leaders like George Washington. I told Samuel Davis that he's the one who should be the community leader, because he, and his family, for the ones that were taking the water to people even though they knew that they would never get paid for most of it, and they were the ones who went to town to get all the food for the community food bank. He said that it was true that they did the water, but they only went after the food after my family had already been to town and could verify that it was safe. They were not the ones who took the risk of going to town to make sure that it was safe. I decided to try changing the subject hoping that the idea of me being a community leader would be forgotten.

A minute later everyone that was there for the meeting started taking their seats. Big Ben asked if everybody could move up to the front. Since there were 25 seats per row, which would make it easy to get a count of how many people are here. After everybody moved to the front, Big Ben counted 195 people. He ask if there was anybody else still outside, finishing a cigarette or waiting for some other reason to come in to the meeting. One man in the back said that he would go to look. He came back a minute later saying that there is no one left out there, so this is all that is going. As was the protocol for the meeting, Big Ben asked if there was any idea as for how his trip should be done, or where they should go. A young woman, probably in her late teens, said that the place should probably be the Tri-states. Each one of the 3 cities are just a little smaller than NYC, together the 3 cities are more then twice as big as NYC, with the 2010 census showing a population of about 20,000,000 for all 3 cities. They are close enough they could be reached in a few hours, and there is a large river running through them, with shipping docks and warehouses. We could probably get the trucks, and the campers, or whatever we're going to use for trailers, then find a hotel to spend the night in. Load up the food and head back this way by 10, so we were back in time for tomorrow's meeting at 2 o'clock. Many people thought this was a good idea, but they did not want to spend the night in a hotel, because they were concerned that although unlikely, if anyone had decided to move into the Tri-states, and saw them driving the trucks, that person, or people, could try to steal them when the group were asleep. They thought that it would be better to gather the food at night and then leave early in the morning. 48 groups of 4, with the remaining 3 acting as scouts. It would he easy enough to work in groups of four, with 1 person always standing guard, 2 loading the camper, or whatever they were doing, and the fourth sleeps, so they can be awake to drive home. The young girl agreed with this saying she had not considered the possibility of others giving them problems. After taking that possibility into consideration, it is better to take precautions, and do the job quickly. Many of the people were ready to leave then, but I had a question that I still needed to ask. Since we would be getting the trucks from the dealership, they probably will not have much gas in them, so how are we supposed to drive around to get the food then drive for hours to get here. Big Ben simply said that they would have to take my gas-vac. I refused. If someone saw us with the gas-vac taking gas out of the ground, they would probably try to take the gas-vac from us. What we needed to do was find a way to take gas with us. An elder gentleman said that he had driven to the Tri-states several times in the past few years and he knew where we could get gas without anybody seeing us, and where the store warehouses were at. I had to accept that we were taken my gas-vac. Apparently a few others could see the crestfallen look on my face, because Stephen Davis said that I did not have to worry. Him and Samuel would be protecting the gas-vac while it was in use. We probably can not complete this trip without it, so it is far too valuable to allow it to be lost or destroyed on this trip. Now that the location, fuel problem, and security plan, were laid out, everyone was ready to go. After a moment's silence, Big Ben asked if there was anything more to discuss. Nobody could think of anything else, so the meeting was closed and we all went home to get our guns and whatever else we would need.

When I returned from the farm, with my gun, and gas-vac, we all loaded up into four buses. At a little past four O'clock we pulled out heading for the Tri-states.

 

[Charmer153]

Chapter 22.

What's Out There?

As we were all getting on the 4 buses I saw that Stephen and Samuel Davis's guns were AR15's, and they each had eight additional magazines, plus the one on the guns. I asked Samuel how many rounds each magazine could hold, and he told me they can each hold 30 rounds. I was a bit surprised that they would be taking so much ammunition, and asked Stephen if he thought they might be going a bit overboard or did he expect to have to face a mob? He said that they weren't taking so many rounds in case we ran into other people, he wanted to make sure that if we ran into any packs of wild dogs, or other wild animals, they would be ready. I suddenly felt that my little pistol was not adequate. He just smiled and said not to worry about it, since he knew that I would never let the gas-vac out of my sight, and they were the ones guarding it, the two of them would be with me at all times I probably would not even need the pistol, but it was still good that I had it.

About 40 minutes from home we saw a small gas station. The driver asked if the gas-vac could pull the gas out of the ground tanks from that station to refill the buses? I told him if someone could get the cover off of the tank, setting up the gas-vac the pull the gas out would not be a problem. It took about 5 minutes for someone to find the keys to unlock the tanks, then about 45 minutes to pull enough fuel up into my gas-vac for the buses. We had been there for almost an hour when we pulled out again.

The rest of the journey into town was remarkably boring, but I suppose that would be considered a good thing since it meant that we didn't have any trouble. As we were just getting into town somebody saw a dealership for Chevy suburban's. Because of their size, we all thought it would be better to get them then to try to get regular pickup trucks and fit four people into the trucks. We had to break the window of the dealership to get inside for the keys, but that wasn't really a problem. It wasn't the first time that I had to do that. It was my second. The first was when my family went to town to get the trucks and campers.

Once everybody had their suburban’s, the man who said that he had been here several times in the past few years told everybody to just follow his truck, and he would lead us to where we could get gas. The gas station was about 3 miles from the dealership, then another 2 miles to the RV dealership for the campers.

To say that I was shocked at the size of the warehouse would be an understatement. There had to be enough food in each one to supply a hundred stores, okay maybe not quite that much, but there sure was a lot, and this was only one warehouse of more than 200 in this area, and another 4 warehouse areas in the Tri-states.

We decided to load up the buses first. That was when I got a small surprise that showed just how well this trip had been planned. As we started putting the food on the floor under the seats, some boards were pulled out and placed on top of the seats forming a shelf above them. I had seen the boards under the seats, but I just assumed it was the floor of the bus, and had not thought anything more about it. I was wrong. The boards were small enough that they could easily be removed from under the seats, and then locked together above the seats to form a solid shelf, giving a lot more space to put stuff. After we had put flats of cans on the floor, the seats, and the shelves, the drivers got packing nets from boxes underneath the front seats, and stretched the nets down the aisles to keep the food from falling into the aisles. I had totally underestimated the planning that had gone into this trip, and I thought I was in on the planning. When I asked about this, I was told that this had been set up even before this trip was thought of. It had been set up so that the buses could be used to transport food to the people of the community without having to worry about anything glass breaking.

Even though we had almost 200 people there, only half were moving the food, because a quarter of them were on guard duty, and a quarter was asleep, so that they could be awake to drive us home. Because of this it to took more than 12 hours to load up the buses, and all of the campers, with the food, and that didn't even empty two warehouses. While we were loading the food, a few of the guards said that they were going to go check the other warehouses and see if there was anything else worth trying to get. They came back about an hour later, pushing shopping carts with small boxes in them. They kept saying that we definitely have to make another trip to the Tri-states, preferably with a few semi trucks and box trailers, because they found 8 warehouses full of solar panel’s starter kits that could produce enough electricity for people to be able to use their ordinary well pumps again, five warehouses with electronics in them, including powerful inverters, and CB radios with 12-volt cigarette lighter plugs that they brought back for the trucks to use, more than 20 more warehouses full of food, and 1 warehouse full of canning jars, and lids, and they had checked less than half of the warehouses in this area. This place is a survivors paradise. That was enough food there to feed our entire community for couple of years.

It was about 9 AM when we finally finished, and I was ready to go to sleep. We figured that we had 5 hours to get home, and it had taken 5½ hours to get here, including the hour we spent refueling the buses, only 4 ½ hours travel time. So we should make it just in time for the meeting. We did not take into account that we would have to go slower this time because of all the weight. Some lessons can only be learned through experience.

We returned at 3:15, expecting the meeting to be started, or possibly even over by now. When we saw that many of the people were in the school parking lot, just talking to each other, we assume it of the meeting was over. A couple of people ran up to the first truck in the line and said that the meeting had been postponed till we got back, or till 5:00, whichever came first. That driver told all the rest of us through the radios. Since we had 48 trucks and campers, and three buses, full of food, there is no way that the school could have held all of it. We decided to only unload the buses, and leaves the food in the campers till it was needed. Since we were only unloading the three buses, and thanks to the help of all of the people there, everything was unloaded and put away quickly, and we had time to rest before the meeting started at 4:00.

 

[Charmer153]

For now, the rest of this will be chapter?s. I know I want them in the story, just not sure how to incorporate them, so I am sharing in the hope others can help me find a way to incorporate them.

Chapter ?
Contact with other survivors?
Possible trade options?

It had been about 7 weeks since V-day, and the person listening to the shortwave heard a new person. By this time, there were always 2 people listening, in case one had to 'step away for a bit.' The new voice did not tell exactly where they were at, but the clues were enough that anyone who know the area could figure it out, and the person listening did know that area. The new contact was only about 4 hours drive from our local community, and they were stupid enough to brag about having a few stills set up to make a type of 'moonshine' that could be used in place of gasoline.
That was when the second person used a FRS radio to contact Mark and ask him to come to the radio room at the school. It took him a while since he was at home, but once he got there and heard how the new voice was talking, without using shortwave code, he knew it was a newbie. Mark was able to pretend to be a third party, and by asking a few simple questions, they learned this new community was barely surviving on what they found, and probably would not survive another 6 months without help. But the possibility for a source of fuel was too good to ignore, so he decided to mention this at the next meeting.
With just a few simple questions, they would brag about all the wonderful things their community had recovered, or built. It was almost as if they were daring others to try and invade them and take what they had. They even bragged about how they believe FEMA, or some other fed rescue group, would be so proud of the community, when the rescue group finally gets there.


Chapter?
The second visit to the Tri-states

It has been about 2 months (68 days) since V-Day, and the community is making their second trip to the Tri-states. The first time they mostly looked for food, but they did see other things they knew could be useful, so they are planing a trip to get those things, and anything else they think the community could use.
This time, they would not all stay close together, they wanted to spend a day exploring, and then meet up at sunset to discuss what they found, and decide what they should get first. By gathering the CB radioa from all the semi trucks, car batteries, and small solar-starter kits, the community could have a solar powered CB radio in every house. This would make it possible to call for help if needed, and maybe to participate in the community meetings, from home. Save on their limited fuel. They had not yet been able to establish good trading terms with the group that could make fuel.
Jeanette suggested we should also look for golf clubs, since they would have electric carts, and might have solar powered carts.


Chapter?

Community Movie Theater

After the third trip to the tri-states, someone found a place that appeared to be a bootleg DVD center. More then 500 external hard drives with every movie the people have heard of, a dozen laptop computers, each with a external DVD burner, and other stuff to making labels and DVD cases.
At first the people who found it did not see any reason to care, till someone remembers our family movie night, and realizes the computer could be connected to a RCA projector to make a public movie theater for the community. With so many movies on the hard drives, they could show a different movie every week, for several years, before they had to rerun the same movie.
....
After hearing about the idea, many wanted to erase the movies, claiming that it was immoral to keep them, while others wanted to turn the gym into a movie theater to watch movies that night. Both ideas were rejected by popular vote, and it was decided the community would build a movie theater. The projector would be behind the screen so no one would cast a shadow by partly blocking the projector. At first, this proved to be a bad idea since the right and left got revered, until Christopher showed how to reverse the right and left on the computer, making it correct on the movie screen.


Chapter ?

The Rhodes Rise To Power.

It has been about 4 months V-day, and life has mostly settled into a daily routine for the community. We have meeting about once every 2 weeks, to address issues that affects the community, but mostly people focused on growing food, crops and livestock. We have established trade with 2 other communities, and now a steady supply of fuel for cars. Things seemed to be going good, or so we thought. Then disaster hit, with a capital R.
Most people had started to feel more at ease, and stopped caring guns to the meetings. That was a mistake. At this meeting, the Rhodes boys spread out in the crowd, and at the same time, each grabbed a kid and put a gun to their head, demanding that they were taking over.
When others tried to argue, they were told to shut up or the kids would die. Brian Rhodes Jr was then told to collect all the guns from the people there, then leave the meeting and go collect the guns from the houses.
That took several hours, but he did come back, with a few hundred guns. Thankfully, he was lazy, and missed all the guns we had hidden, and probably missed guns others had hidden.
Brian Rhodes then said all the kids 13yo and under were to go to the gym changing rooms. that would be where they would stay to make sure the community did as told. If anyone refused, 1 child would be killed each time. Seeing their kids taken and knowing the kids safety depended on the adults obeying broke many of them. They were not willing to risk the life of the kids to try and overthrow the Rhodes.


Chapter ?

The End Of The Rhodes.

It has now been 2 weeks of hell since the Rhodes took over, and life has never been so bad. They took all the food form everyone's houses, and now everyone has to go to the school to get their 'daily allotment'. If a person does not go in person then they do not get any food. This makes things very hard for many, but the Rhodes claim that if a person can not come in for food, then they are to weak to work, so they are a drain or limited resources and should be removed.
One day, Mr. Davis claimed that his son, Stephen Davis, broke his leg and could not come in. The Rhodes did not care, and again claimed if a person could not work, they were a drain and should be removed.
It turned out that Stephen Davis did not hurt his lag, that was a excuse for why he was not out working. He was planning to sneak out of the community, and go to the one 4 hours away. There was no way he could get there and back overnight, so he needed a excuse for not working the next few days.
After getting there, he told them about the Rhodes, and asked if they could help. They agreed to rescue the kids. Stephen Davis asked if there a way to capture the people 'guarding' the kids, without killing them. The community wanted to put them on trial before killing them.
The other community said they could try to take the 'guards' but if they refused to surrender they would be eliminated rather then risking one of them hurting the kids.
The 'guards' that night were Mike and Stacy Rhodes. Mike refused to surrender, but Stacy did, and asked if they could somehow fake her death so her dad would think she was loyal to him. Everyone knew that she only obeyed her dad to avoid his temper. The rescuers agreed and smeared some of Mike blood on her chair before she goes to stay with the Davis family. (Since they been friends at school, Samantha Davis knew that Stacy was intelligent, and a hard worker. It did not take long for the others to also see this.) About an hour the rescue, the rest of the Rhodes family shows up and gets arrested.
Brian Rhodes, and Brian Rhodes Jr. are held separate from Diana Rhodes. The trials are meant to be the next day, but the guys do not live that long. Brian Rhodes stabs Brian Rhodes Jr, then cuts his own wrists and bleeds to death before anyone found them in the morning.
Diana Rhodes is tried, and although she was a unwilling accomplice, she was still convicted and told she could pick between death or exile. She thought all her family was dead, and picked death, till she was shown that Stacy was still alive, then she picked exile, in the hope that someday she could return to her daughter. Stacy wanted to go with her, but Diana did not know where she would go, or how she would survive. The members of the other community said she could go with them, but she would have to work.
A day after she left, Stay asked Mr. Davis if there was a way for them to adopt her, so she would be part of the family instead of just a guest. He told her there was no more courts, or adoption centers, but they could accept her as family, and call her Stacy Davis if she wanted.
Samantha could probably be heard a mile away yelling that she now has a sister, as she hugged Stacy Davis.

 

[Mr Bill]

Looks like lots of chapters to come.

 

[Griz3752]

Looks like lots of chapters to come.

One would think at least a few dozen; you know, to work out some subplots I see lurking here.