Thank you! I certainly shall! I've done something yesterday that I hadn't thought of previously. I asked my wife to write a piece about where Lacy and the kids went to, and what she experienced on her way to there. Depending on how that goes, or how much my wife puts into it, we could possibly put together something from Lacy's perspective. Would be an interesting way to either add another book, or flesh out this one. Of course, if it's in this book, it would have to be either in therid person, or written as maybe a journal entry. I'm very interested in what my wife comes up with LOL.

I'm going to keep writing as it is becauseif I wait on my wife to do something, I very well may be waiting for years! LOL. Busy woman, busier than I am!!

8

The long winter and the new world



Over the next 3 years, nearly 2/3 of the worlds population would die from the cold, starvation, and disease. Governments vanished, borders no longer meant anything, and many smaller communities ended up completely isolated from the rest of the world.

3 weeks after the war ended:
Homecoming wasn’t much to fret about. When we got to the Res, we found only the sick and dying, and the old. We were told the Military had come and taken everyone else, and no idea where to. Lacy wasn’t around, and neither were the kids. And, of course, I was upset. I wanted to immediately set out and look for them. But there was nothing that could be done, for the most part. I did ask around and found they had been taken east, but not much information beyond that. Winter was looking to set in hard and most knew it would be a long, cold one. Many knew about nuclear winter. Many were afraid and did not know what was to come, or if they would live through it.

After resting Cody, Angel, Corpse, Alien, and Dakota decided to stay around and look for their families. They would stay in the area. Josh, Luke, and myself decided to move on. We went east through Enumclaw, which was near abandoned. We spent some time salvaging there, driving the 5 ton, having taken what we needed and leaving the remainder to the others. After spending a few days in Enumclaw gathering what we could, we moved south to Wilkeson and took up residence in the Sunset Lake Quarry east of town. Wilkeson had a population of 425 people, and just to the south, Carbonado, had a population of 610. Just 20 miles, as the crow flies, north west of Mount Rainer, these were small, quiet places where American Values seemed untouched. Wilkeson was built in 1877 as a village for the Coal Mines (South in Carbonado) and the sandstone quarry. Most of the buildings there remain exactly as built in 1909. Mostly brick, the main part of town has an old gas station with the gas pumps unchanged since the 1950’s.

As we approached Wilkeson, we noticed a couple trucks and some fellows with firearms blocking the highway. “Josh, stop.” I said. “How many you see? I count about 5” “Looks about right to me” Luke said. “No, there’s 2 more in the trees on the left and one more on the right” Josh pointed out. “Well, anybody got something white?” I asked. Luke produced a white T shirt. I wrapped it around my AK barrel and stepped out of the truck. “Hey! We don’t mean no harm here, was just passing through” I said as I began to walk up. I was stopped at a hundred paces from the road block “That’s far enough mister” said a big bearded man with a shotgun. He was dressed in wool clothes and had a bit of snow on his beard and jacket. “Look, like I said, we just need to pass through. We’ve some stuff to trade if you’ll let us. Some tools, a bit of military equipment, some bullets we won’t be using. We need some firewood and such” I told him. “My names Dan”. “I’m Jimmy, and you’re not getting through here. May as well turn and go back Mister, I don’t want to have to shoot you and we don’t want any trouble.” “I understand. Who’s in charge of you guys? Got a mayor? Can I talk with him?” “She’s busy right now, just turn around and leave”. “Jimmy!” I heard from behind them. It was a strong female voice, and then I saw a plump woman with graying hair and a heavy coat and blue jeans, and a knitted stocking cap. “You leave those guys alone! I told you, if folks are passing through, let them through! I’m sorry sir, what was your name?” She ask me. “It’s Dan, and you are?” “I’m Mary, I’m the Mayor here. You just passing through huh… Military?” “Used to be ma’am. That’s done with now, war’s over. Just looking for a spot to restart. Got some stuff we can trade, and then we’ll move on” I said. All the while I was looking at the way these guys were spread, and looking for what I’d use for cover, knowing Josh and Luke had my back and already had spotted, and divided up who to shoot first. “You’re pretty ballsy to just walk up to these guys like this” Mary stated. I replied “Well, somebody’s gotta start trusting somebody or we’re all in a heap of trouble. Besides, I doubt any of these guys have ever shot a man, it’s pretty rough to do when face to face, at least the first time”. Mary chuckled “You got that right, come on through and pull up at city hall. We’ll see what ya got and give you a spot to stay for the night. You don’t seem so bad, we’ll see.” And with that, Mary turned around and walked back the way she came, yelling behind her “Jimmy, you let those folks though or I’ll have you locked up, I mean it!”

Josh and Luke got back into the truck and pulled on up and I hopped in. I tipped my hat to Jimmy as we passed through and I had us stop at City Hall, just as Mary directed. We got out and stretched our legs and Mary invited us in for coffee. “Nice little place” Luke commented. “Yeah, Lucy and I were considering buying a spot out here once we were able to sell the house in Federal Way. Came out to see the area a while back. We liked it. The School is the oldest in the state, looks creepy in a why. But I thought it was cool!”.

Once inside, Mary handed us our coffee and said “We don’t get people out here. Been a very long time since we’ve had anybody pass through here. Where are your families?” I told Mary what happened, to the best of my knowledge, with Lucy and the kids. Josh and Luke said they had no family besides me. “How was your time in the war? We’ve had no news of it out here. I’m guessing since you are here it’s over with, unless you’re deserters.” “War has been over with for about 2 weeks. Nukes knocked everything out” “Yeah, we saw about the nukes”. “Well, we had them all the way to the coast when another wave was on it’s way in, one of our nukes knocked that fleet out, which is what started the whole nuke business.” “I see”. “After that, we mopped up what was left that didn’t desert their units, the Chinese knew it was over and there was no way home. Then Luke, Josh, a few others, and myself decided if it’s over, lets go home. So we did, but, like I said. Everyone was gone.” “I take it you plan to go find your wife and kids?” “Yeah, but no idea where they went.” Mary looked into her cup for a long minute. Mary was about 50 years old, and sort of a hippy. By that I mean she had a sort of “Earth Mamma” persona about her. She was no idiot, however, and I could tell she had strength in her.

“So what’s up with that Jimmy guy” Luke asked. “Oh don’t worry about him, he’s a useful idiot. Half the time drunk, but keeps security around here. We’ve no police or anything. He’s head of the militia, if you can call it that.” Luke, Josh and I looked at each other. We knew that if we had wanted to, we’d have eaten them alive. “I’d say you’re lucky you’ve had no visitors then. A halfway decently trained few men could have cleaned this place out.” Mary looked up “It’s what I had available. We weren’t ready for all this.” “Nobody was, to be honest Mary” I reassured her. “You guys have any liquor around here?” I asked. “Nothing not home made” Mary replied. “Josh, go get that stuff out in the truck, will ya?” “Mary, you like Jack Daniels?” “Now you’re talkin!” She smiled. Mary said she hadn’t seen real whiskey since just after the crash, so I told her we’d stock the bar for her. “Well, I don’t know what else to do, so do you mind if I vent a bit?” “Sure! Shoot” And Mary mentioned that they didn’t have much food stocks in town, or to the south in Carbonado. No one had been out of the area since the war started, not having been seen by Chinese or any violence at all, they simply stayed quiet and hoped the world would pass around them. It seemed to work. So there would be a food shortage. All local farms had bright their food in to town, what was surplus, and they worked to preserve it and it’s kept the town fed so far, but would run out eventually. They had no real medical ability, no police, and no real militia to protect the towns. So far, Mary told me, they had simply survived on luck.

“Sounds like you’ve got your work cut out for you” I said. “I don’t know where to start. I’ve been telling the town folks that there’s a plan and everything is fine, but they’ll only believe that for so long”. I looked at Josh and Luke. From the look I got, they were on the same thought wave as I was, we may as well stay and help if we could. “Mary, suppose we could help out a bit. We could recruit and train up a proper militia, and set a couple guys for law enforcement, which in my opinion would be from the militia folks, and get out and show folks where to salvage at. We could go and see if we could bring in livestock from abandoned farms, if they’re still alive and healthy somewhat, rig up a truck to plow the roads around here as the snows fall, and generally help you guys become a whole lot more self sufficient.” “You can do that? What about going to find your wife and kids?” “Those passes are clogged up with snow and will be for a while. There’s no way I can get through for a while. I may as well stick around and help out, Luke and Josh I think agree, you can use it and we could use a spot to stay, at least for a while.” “Son, if you can help me out, you can stay as long as you like.” “It’s a deal then.” Mary then showed us a few houses that were vacant, set back off the main road. We took up residence in them and began setting ourselves up, gathering firewood, fuel for generators, and running and forth to Buckley and Enumclaw to get food stocks and whatever ammunition we could find. We then opened the abandoned building up as a trading post, and then set about getting the rest of town squared away, using the trading post as a food distribution center.

Story not petered out, but has been many, many distractions. I WAS able to write a work, until they planted a camera in position to watch my office So we'll be chipping away at it.

Keep at it, your doin Great

please contiue the story

Jerry you are a terifing writer primarily because you don't insult your readers inteligence your scenarios are all so completely plausable. Kudos to you. I look forward to reading more.