Chapter 12

Angela followed me as I sprinted for the box truck.

Yes. I kept the box truck after the plague. The motel manager survived and sold me the truck for such a small amount of money that it made sense to keep it. So, I spent a little getting it in better condition and now had it when I needed it most.

We chugged down to BJ’s Warehouse and bought everything in sight that we might need in a prolonged period of governmental collapse. The bunker I’d built in the cave already had all the weapons and ammunition we’d ever need, but we stocked up on several hundred, five gallon jugs of water, sleeping bags, air mattresses, clothing, sterno, or whatever it’s called these days, and other camping gear, batteries and flashlights, all kinds of kitchen gear, and everything else we could think of.

It all went into the cave, through the garage, where I’d built a hidden set of doors through into the main area. I sent Angela back in the pick-up for feminine needs, throw away razors, over the counter medicines, and first aid supplies. The internal well would provide all the water needed, and the hot spring would handle those needs, so we stocked up on towels, linens, blankets and dish towels, among other things.

While she was gone I hit the Farmer’s Co-op and bought enough feed and supplies to care for our stock for multiple years, and ordered it all delivered by end of business. I then bought a handful of one-thousand gallon fuel tanks and had the co-op fill them with diesel and deliver them, too. While all this was going on I briefed Zeke and told him where to find the entrances to the cave. He promised to stay with the stock until things completely fell apart, and then gave me his word he would seek shelter underground with us.

We were both done and off the road before supper. Angela wanted more details, so I shared my experiences with the girls and teachers, during the plague. “We were attacked twice and I killed a bunch of those raping, killing bastards. Some of them are in shallow graves around here, but with all the cattle decomposing chemicals I poured on them a few months later, there is nothing much left but bones and some teeth.”

Though the expected arrival of the asteroid was weeks away, we kept the television tuned to the news and listened to the news people report on how the government was trying to keep the lid on things. It wasn’t working. They showed film of gangs already looting in the cities, with people being shot, raped, and otherwise brutalized. The National Guard was out and doing their best, and a lot of the troublemakers were being rounded up, with others shot on sight. That should have tamped down the violence, but it seemed to have no effect.

Angela walked down with me and I activated our security gates, fences, and backup systems. It cost quite a lot, but it was money well spent. My contractors installed all kinds of protective measures to keep marauders away from the house. Once the systems were activated anyone approaching the house would find that they had to defeat electric fences, two-thousand watts surging through the gates, and walls built against the hills to make circumventing the gates almost impossible.

Once everything was online, we tested each section, and then powered everything to maximum performance. The hands all knew to avoid those areas or get seriously injured, if not dead. Zeke promised that he would double down on my warnings in the days to come.

Hawk was on television when we returned. It looked like he was broadcasting from Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado. Things must be serious if the President is already hiding under a mountain. At least he was close to NORAD should he need to deploy the military quickly, or fire missiles at some enemy that lost control of their military installations.

That was good.

Zeke joined us for supper and we talked about when and how to make sure the cows got fed when we had to retreat underground. He surprised when he said, “Cowboy is not going into the cave. He is terrified of being underground and refuses to even discuss it with me.

“You can try but I’m telling you, right now, that boy is staying out of the cave, so let’s get him up to speed and let him handle the stock as long as it’s humanly possible.

“We can move a couple dozen into that concrete barn you use for the tractors. Cowboy can hole up in there, and we can stock it to the rafters with feed and the pumps will supply water from the deep well underneath the barn. It won’t be the Hilton, but it will, by God, keep us in some beef for as long as it takes for people to stop all this foolishness and get back to work.” He was right. We planned it out, then rousted the boys and got to work getting it done.