Part 3 - What Remains

  Seven weeks of work around NorthStar had worn paths into the valley floor – paths that led to the crops, around the stone corrals, and out to the river where the fish trap waited. The four of them knew every rock, every tree, every animal by name. This was home now, and they’d decided to put a wall around it, too.

  The wall wouldn't stop a determined attack – it wasn't meant to. Ten-foot beam tripods lashed together, filled in with branches and scrap wood. Ugly, functional, and just enough to buy them time if someone came looking.

  The question of ‘what was outside?’ was beginning to weigh on all of them. They’d hiked north 6 miles, up the slope as it ascended toward the Pike Range; they’d hiked 3 miles southeast to the Eastern Spine, where the Pike River emptied out of their valley through a small gap in the craggy spires and crashed down a rock fall to some place below. They’d even hiked 6 miles south into the ElderDeep Forest, down rolling wooded terrain; in all their exploration, they’d found nothing. No people. No signs of civilization. No answers.

  There were no condensation trails in the sky left by airplanes, and no GPS signal on any of their phones. Rob had found an old satellite phone stuffed away in the EarthRoamer, and after they’d put a charge to it, he had tried to establish a connection; they had tried at morning, noon and night on multiple occasions. “Network Unavailable” was the result every time.

  For a week, they'd talked about going back out – finding survivors, building a community. But now, the night before they were to actually leave Star Valley for the first time in seven weeks, the fear finally caught up with them.

  They sat around the kitchen table, the fire crackling in the hearth behind them. Sarah had her notebook open, pencil tapping against the page. No one was eating. No one was smiling.

  “We haven’t seen anyone since we left that gas station, and that really means we have no idea what is going on outside of Star Valley,” she said.

  Maria looked around the table. “What if the…..the world is back to normal?” she asked. “I mean, is that possible?”

  Lisa and Rob both shook their heads, but Sarah leaned forward. "I was one of twelve Executive Assistants for the CEO of ViralStrategies. When they tried to evacuate us from Calderna, they were planning to move us to the Hadley Complex."

  She paused. "At the Dugway Proving Grounds."

  Lisa looked at Maria, then back at Sarah. "Where?" she asked.

  Rob's jaw tightened. "God almighty." He looked at Lisa. "It's where they send people when the country's about to collapse. Top-tier government bunker."

  Sarah nodded her head, while Maria just stared at the table.

  Lisa looked at Sarah and Rob. “What does that mean for us,” she asked.

  Sarah flipped through her notebook. "Best case scenario? Military's restored order in the major cities. FEMA camps are running. Power's coming back in phases. Some kind of government is functioning."

  She looked up. "That's what I'm hoping for."

  Lisa tapped the table with her thumbs. “There were government and military vehicles on SR-49 when we passed,” she said. “They were on fire.”

  Sarah left the notebook on the table and leaned back. “I know they were,” she said, crossing her arms.

  Maria turned to Rob. “What do you think,” she asked gently.

  Rob rubbed his face. "I don’t know. If you take any city and cut the power, the water, the food supply – even with police and government still in place – it goes to hell in days. Maybe hours. That is without some virus spreading."

  Sarah nodded. “He’s right. That is the worst nightmare of ‘Public Planning – 101’.”

  Rob looked around the table. “I think the government was trying to respond – same with the military, but they weren’t immune to whatever horror caused Eastport and SR-49. Even the office building you three were in. If that was really caused by a virus, then government and military are just as susceptible.”

  Maria looked up. “Those scavenger women – they said they escaped a government train.”

  Sarah tapped the table. “Well, if they thought they needed to escape, then they must have had a reason.”

  Lisa looked at each of them. “Are we really talking about total societal collapse? Mass starvation? Warlords running cities?”

  Sarah looked at Lisa. “That’s the thing; we just don’t know,” she said.

  “Then why the hell are we even thinking about wading out into that swamp?” Lisa asked.

  Rob leaned forward. "Because we're one broken solar panel away from the stone age. No power means no mill. No lights. No refrigeration. No tools."

  He looked at each of them. "And the first time one of us gets a bacterial infection? That's a death sentence."

  There was silence around the table until Lisa looked up. “We need to become the scavengers,” she said.

  Rob nodded. “Exactly – material resources and human resources,” he said, looking at Lisa and then at Maria.

  They all sat in silence for a while, each going over an outcome of tomorrow’s planned trek in their heads. Finally, Lisa looked up. “Yeah, we have to go,” she said. “Rob’s right about the resources.”

  Sarah nodded. “Even that gas station – it’s got wires and lights and all kinds of things we could strip; tubing, shelving, pipes, hoses. There is probably a tool box somewhere,” she guessed.

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  She turned toward Rob. “Maybe we should bring the haul trailer.”

  Rob nodded, then Maria leaned forward. “What about engagement?” she asked. “How do we approach people?”

  Rob leaned forward. “First off, never separate, and we should not allow ourselves to be ‘taken into custody’ by anyone. Period. I think we have to treat tomorrow as a fact-finding mission. Intelligence,” he said.

  All three women nodded, and Rob looked at them each. “I think about that woman in the median along SR-49 often; I’ll never forget that scream. We might find more of that tomorrow; if we do, we have to make sure we keep the four of us safe before we help anybody.”

  Lisa smiled and looked around. “What’s that military saying about plans,” she asked.

  Sarah and Maria looked at her, but Rob laughed. “Something like, ‘no plan survives first contact with the enemy’,” he said.

  Maria put her hands on the table in protest. “They aren’t our enemy,” she declared.

  Lisa nodded. “I hope so. And that begs a good question – what guns are we bringing?” she asked.

  The following day, they left at dawn. The four of them rode in the front seat of the camper truck with a few meager supplies and a small arsenal of weapons. Sarah and Maria each had a 9mm, and Lisa had the AR-15. Rob had his Benelli M4, his custom-built Remington 700, and his ranger-finder scope. They decided leave Ranger and Shadow behind at NorthStar to protect the animals and keep watch over everything.

  The group drove carefully down the mountain, following the same path they had taken during the ascent along the route Rob had cleared and leveled in places. The haul trailer clanked behind them, but the descent was much smoother than the near-disastrous ascent had been.

  Rob kept a close eye on the odometer, and at about 15 miles west of Star Valley, the truck bumped over something in the road and the trailer clanged behind them.

  Maria looked up. “We just went over railroad tracks,” she said, her eyes wide with surprise. “How the hell are there railroad tracks out here?” she asked, as Rob came to a stop.

  They piled out and just behind the trailer, they saw the tracks, which were nearly buried in the dirt and gravel of the road.

  “These look narrow,” said Sarah, as she looked off to the south where the tracks disappeared into the hills.

  Rob measured them with a stride. “These are short-gauge tracks,” he said. “Probably for mining or logging. These things look like they’ve been here for decades, and it looks like it’s been decades since anything ran along them.”

  Lisa looked up. “Where do you think they lead,” she asked.

  Rob shook his head. “Hard to tell – maybe some logging mill or something,” he said. “Maybe we check that out on a different day,” he smiled.

  As they piled back into the truck and started west, a figure watched them through the scope of a military-grade sniper rifle from a ridge high above to the north.

  After an hour and a half traversing the dirt road, they were finally back on Dog Town Road and headed west toward Reston.

  Maria looked over her shoulder toward where they’d seen smoke before. “That town down there in that big open valley – it’s not burning any longer.”

  Lisa looked at her. “Either order has been restored, or there is nothing left to burn,” she said.

  Maria just shook her head. “If I didn’t sleep with you every night, I’d think you were always this bleak,” she said, nuzzling her nose into Lisa’s neck.

  A short time later, they passed the dense oak forest around Oakborough and they all looked. “No fire here, either,” said Maria. “It’s a cute town.”

  Rob looked to the right, and then up ahead. “Let’s check the gas station and then Reston,” he said.

  A few miles later, they came to the gas station and it looked even more looted than the last time they were here. Rob parked the truck near the diesel tank cover and he and Lisa checked the gas station and store for any danger, then Rob set to pumping more diesel into the EarthRoamer.

  The women made their way around the gas station, looking at the carnage and looting. The gas station was stripped, and the store was gutted, but on the walls, they saw graffiti that had been etched in with rocks and knives.

  Most of the graffiti was gibberish – FUCK THE FEDS, JENNY WAS HERE, crude drawings of dicks and skulls. But one phrase stopped Maria cold.

  She grabbed Sarah and Lisa. "Look."

  Scratched deep into the concrete:

  THE SKULL OWNS THE SOUTH

  Lisa looked at Maria, then at Sarah. “What the hell does that mean?” she asked.

  “Let’s get the hell out of here. We can scavenge on the way back. This place freaks me out,” grimaced Sarah.

  After they’d done a quick strip of wiring in the gutted gas station and store, they loaded back into the truck and Rob just shook his head. “THE SKULL sounds like some end-of-the-world gang,” he said. “Who the hell knows. But I don’t think that means law-and-order,” he said, turning to the women.

  They made their way south from the gas station, and about three miles later, the sky was filled with tendrils of diesel smoke and that acrid smell of plastic burning. As they crept along, they passed a sign:

  “Welcome to Reston; Home of the University of Reston”

  But the sign was more optimistic than the surroundings. The landscape shifted from oak trees to burned-out husks of buildings. They slowed to a crawl and made their way carefully, as the ravaged buildings gave way to more intact structures, all of which looked abandoned.

  Suddenly, Maria pointed ahead, her voice sharp with urgency. "Rob, shit! Do you see that?" Up ahead, blocking the narrow street, was a makeshift barricade of overturned cars and scavenged sheet metal. Armed figures moved behind the barrier, their postures tense and watchful.

  Lisa looked up. “It’s like this destruction is a buffer, like a no-go zone,” she said.

  Rob stopped the truck and pulled out his rangefinder and scoped the area – what he saw looked deadly. He passed the rangerfinger along and pulled out his Remington 700 and dialed the roadblock in with the scope. It appeared to be a camp of some sort, and the armed guards did not look inviting. They wore makeshift uniforms, ominous black bandanas covering their faces from the eyes down, and they were whispering into walkie-talkies. "This is not good," he said, as the women leaned in to get a better look.

  A warning shot cracked in the air and 50-yards in front of them, the asphalt sparked and chipped.

  "We need to get out of here," said Sarah, peering through the rangefinder. "Oh god, they just shot at us! Back up, Rob! Go, go!" she shrieked as the men at the barricade began gesticulating wildly, and more shots rang out, bullets whizzing past them.

  Rob accelerated into a tight turn, the trailer hitch squealing behind them, and he tried to keep debris from buildings between them and the hornet's nest that had just come alive behind them.

  Bullets cracked past them on either side until they were finally up the road far enough. They sped onto the main road, took a few quick turns, and came to a stop ten minutes later. "Fuck, that was close!" he exclaimed. "God, this world is turned inside out."

  Maria had been hyperventilating, but she finally looked up at him. “Oh my god,” she breathed. “What is happening,” she begged.

  Sarah looked across. “Well, I can scratch ‘society is recovering’ off my list,” she said with a defeated shake of her head.

  Rob looked across at the women. “That wasn’t SR-49-type madness. They were organized.”

  They regrouped alongside the road, and as the adrenaline began to leave their bodies, Maria pointed to a small hand-drawn map she’d been working on. “This is horrible,” she said. “I guess we can either try that town near the dirt road, or we can give Oakborough a try,” she suggested.

  Sarah looked around. “I think we should try Oakborough if we are going to try either. If it goes bad, that town closer might be able to find Star Valley – Oakborough feels far enough away from home to be a safer place to take a chance on.”

  Everyone nodded, and Rob headed in the direction of Oakborough, back into the wilderness of the deep oak forest.