Chapter 2

“That was fun!” Chanelle opened the pickup’s door and hopped down to the ground. She’d navigated the truck along the empty streets to the industrial building I’d picked as our new home after a short lesson from me on how to drive it.

The three of us had worked for four hours, loading two pickups, one trailer, and my delivery van with everything useful I had in my house. Fortunately, the new building was large enough to fit all the loaded vehicles inside the vehicle bay.

“Well, that was not fun,” Abby said as she walked up to me. “Do we have to unload all this now?”

I leaned back into a stretch. “No, I think we need to find places to put everything, first. Let me show you around.” I took the ladies through the facility. The rooms were stuffy, since the HVAC was off, but there was plenty of room for us and anything we’d reasonably want to carry up the stairs.

“It’s hot in here,” Chanelle said. “How can we sleep?”

“There are literal tons of big batteries in some of the equipment here. I’m sure we can set up a few fans to help with that at night,” I replied. I’d seen at least three electric pallet jacks in the warehouse section of the building, plus a large selection of wire and other components. “I don’t know a lot about wiring, though.”

“I do,” Abby said. “Just point me in the right direction.”

“Seriously?” I held up my hands as she glared at me. “Okay, sorry, not trying to be macho here.”

Abby relented and grinned at me. “I picked up a lot of stuff at home, and in the Air Force. I’m decent with computers, cars and trucks, and good with all kinds of electrical things. I have a Master’s degree in education, but it’s heavy on the physical sciences.”

I smiled at her. “I’m really happy to hear that, because I’m just self-taught on most things. It comes with running a business, I had to learn to do things myself rather than pay for them.”

“Okay, then, what do we do next?”

“I think we should set up our housekeeping so we can stay here. If it won’t cost us too much power, maybe we can run a small fridge for some frozen food, if we can find any. Cold drinks and water would be nice, too.” I shrugged. “It’s an extra, but a nice one.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

By nightfall, we had power run to a set of outlet strips where we could run fans and a few lights. At Abby’s suggestion, we covered the windows with tarps to keep light from showing through to the outside. Just because we hadn’t seen anyone else didn’t mean that there weren’t other people out there, and we couldn’t afford to take chances. The facility’s emergency generator also ran on propane, which was fed from a large storage tank. We ran it long enough to recharge all the batteries we could find, and then shut it down.

After dinner, we sat down to talk. Chanelle kicked things off. “Are we going to live here for a long time?”

“That’s a good question,” Abby said thoughtfully. “I’ve been considering a few things as we’ve worked today.”

“Tired of me already?” I quipped.

“No, not yet,” she deadpanned while Chanelle giggled. “Seriously, though, we do need to consider some things.”

“Go on,” I said as I sat back and enjoyed a cold soda.

“The first thing is, how many people really are left alive? From what I saw, the Internet reports were saying that whatever hit us happened all over the world, and all at once. What can do that?”

I shook my head. “I have no clue. All the bodies just turned to dust, too. I think we’re safe, but I don’t know that, either. I saw reports of people wearing gas masks and all kinds of other stuff, and they died, too. Maybe the submarine sailors survived, and the Space Station astronauts?”

“Anyway, that’s our biggest issue. More people are both good and bad for us.”

“Why?” Chanelle nibbled at a snack cake as she listened.

“Mostly because there’s nothing to stop people from doing whatever they want,” Abby said quietly. “If Norm had wanted to hurt us, he could have, and there would have been nothing to stop him.”

“That’s true,” I put in. “You took a terrible chance in approaching me.”

“And you took the chance to trust us,” Abby returned. She looked back at Chanelle. “Anyone else we meet has to take the chance to trust us, and they may not want to do that. And, we would have to take that same chance on them. It’s human nature to be selfish, and that can mean people will hurt others who can’t stop them.”

“So, what? We just stay here until we die?”

“I don’t want to just sit here,” I put in.

Abby lifted a hand for emphasis. “I’m not saying we should. We can, yes. There are enough supplies around here to last us, until they expire, at least. Unless there are people around to stop us, we can go into any building we like. There are libraries and schools with books on how to do everything, hospitals, stores that sold anything you can think of, and any kind of vehicle we might want.”

She continued. “The problem is, most perishable things like food, medicines, and gasoline have probably gone bad by now. Diesel fuel will be good for a few more months, as will jet fuel and fuel oil. That’s why Norm is working so hard on his delivery van; it uses propane, and that doesn’t go bad.”

“Right,” I confirmed. “And, the smaller tanks are available everywhere.”

“There’s another thing about staying here that concerns me,” Abby went on, “and that’s the weather. Specifically, the flooding we get when it rains, especially during hurricanes. Even if our building doesn’t flood, the stores and other things we depend on can get ruined, and we can get trapped in an area until the flood waters drain off. We get some bad thunderstorms, too.”

“Where could we go, Dallas?” Chanelle asked.

‘It gets cold in Dallas in the winter,” I replied. That’s more fuel for heating, and more trouble getting around.”

“Right,” Abby said. “I’d suggest either Austin or San Antonio. They’re far enough south to not get much ice and snow, and they both have huge springs that feed rivers, which means fresh water. The hurricane rains, which are rare, can cause flooding, but there are only a few places that flood, like creeks and rivers. Bad thunderstorms are rare, as are tornadoes.”

“It gets hot in the summer, but that’s true anywhere in the southern US,” I commented.

“Yes, there’s no getting around that,” Abby acknowledged. “There are ways to stay cool without air conditioning, though. It’s just that most buildings and houses depend on electrical power to run their cooling units.”

“I don’t think we’re ready to move, yet.” I talked as I thought. “I’d like to have plenty of supplies, and that would be easier with a larger truck. Of course, we’d have to feed the thing for the trip.”

“That’s true.” Abby stood, walked to a nearby desk and sat down. She rummaged in the drawers for a pad of paper and a pen. “Let’s map this out, shall we?”

“Yep.” I scooted my chair to face the desk, and Chanelle copied me.

“Supplies first,” Abby began. “What do we need?”

Two hours later, we had a rough plan worked out. Since hurricane season started in June, we wanted to be in Austin by the first week of June. Allowing for a week’s travel, just in case of problems, that timetable gave us six weeks to prepare for the move.

Moving all of the supplies we wanted led to a discussion about how we would move all the stuff. “Trucks,” Abby said. “We use trucks.”

“The trucks we have aren’t big enough,” I replied.

Abby gave me a look she probably reserved for her smartass students. “Tractor trailers, Norm.”

“I can’t drive one of those,” I protested.

“You have a month to learn, and there is a truck driving school right down the road. I don’t think they will mind if we borrow their facility.”