When the Power Is Gone: A Powerless World - Book 1 (9 page)

Morning brought no new news. The scavengers left without entering the Nelson house, so we felt like we might have a slight breather. Not that they may not come back, in fact they probably would, as early as tonight; but for now it was quiet on our street again. Brian wanted to make sure his place was not easily viewed from outside, after seeing the people casing the Nelsons’ place, so he, Russ, and Bob decided to check his house, the Nelson place, and the next house up from them. They grabbed their side arms and shotguns, a cup of coffee and headed out. The boys and us gals continued working on loading the trailers.

The trailers were big, 7 x 16, and almost six feet inside height. That was almost 600 cubic feet of space. The floors had been reinforced and the axles swapped out for the heaviest load capacity the guys could find. We could load them front to back, floor to ceiling with supplies and not have to worry about the weight. The challenge was getting the most use of the space. That’s where Janet and I came in.

I’m one of those people who rearranges the dishwasher when someone else loads it. You can call me OCD if you want, but it’s more about getting the most dishes in and still having them all come out clean. It was a puzzle, and I love puzzles. Tetris was one of my favorite video games. Janet was a kindred spirit as a puzzle lover, so she took one trailer and I took the other, with our respective kids doing the heavy lifting.

We started with the bulk basics – flour, sugar, rice, beans – and had them stacked and packed in the front of the trailer. We knew we needed the weight on the tongue. We had some room at the top, so we stuffed blankets, sheets, pillows and towels up there. Who cares what that stuff looks like when you pull it out? Next were cases of canned goods – soups, veggies, pastas – with bags of clothes on top of them. We left room in the back for tools and anything else the guys needed to bring. They had about 25% of the floor space to fill with their “stuff”. We could get them a bit more if needed, but we basically had all the food, clothes, linens, cooking implements, utensils, first aid, and anything else we could do without for now, loaded in the trailers. There were tents, sleeping bags, and cots, but no mattresses or beds. We had those things already set up at the farm, so what we were bringing with us was for emergencies or group growth. We had an idea of who would be with us at the farm, but that could change, as in the case of Brian. We left ourselves open to increasing our numbers. There was strength in numbers.

We loaded up most of the propane canisters for the camp stoves, leaving a few for use here at the houses. We put two of the four camp stoves in the trailers and kept two out for cooking. We kept enough food for at least a month in the house. We probably wouldn’t need that much – it wasn’t looking like we were going to be here that long after all. We did still have space in the back of the trucks, so we could throw whatever we had left in there when we bugged out. We had enough water in the waterBOBs in the tubs to cover our needs for cooking and cleaning, so we packed up the rest of the bottled water, along with all but two of the water filters. Janet and I looked around for anything we might have missed. Outside of what we were using daily, or multiple times a day, we had everything else loaded. We could bug out in less than an hour. With the big work done, we put a pot of coffee on to brew. We deserved a coffee break.

****

While we were plotting the loading of the trailers, the guys were scoping out Brian’s house. He had done a surprisingly good job of shutting it up pretty tight. They only found a couple of windows that revealed a view into the house. Brian unlocked the door, and they went in and let the blinds down all the way on all the windows. They did a quick sweep of the house, just to make sure no one had gotten in without our notice. Everything looked just like he’d left it.

“Hey guys, I thought about something I left here. Give me a minute.” Brian headed for the stairs.

Bob hollered his way. “If it’s more wine, we’ll help you carry it.” They laughed and followed Brian.

He went into his spare room, which he had set up as a remote office. He opened the closet door and pulled out a small container, like a paint can. Whatever was in it, it was heavy, because Brian picked it up with both hands. Russ and Bob looked at it with raised eyebrows. Brian explained.

“I’ve been saving change for like 10 years. I have four of these. I figure even if paper money is worthless, the silver should have some value, right?” He looked to the guys for confirmation. They were both nodding in the affirmative.

“Anything before 1964? Those are almost pure silver. Even the later stuff will have some value. What made you think of that?” Russ was eying Brian with an even more impressed eye. He really had to get this guy’s story someday.

Brian smiled at them. “There’s probably some older stuff in there, but I never really looked at any of it. I just threw it in the can. As for what made me think of it, there’s this three hours at night I’m up by myself, looking out at the dark. Most of the time, there’s nothing to see. So, I got one of Anne’s e-readers out of the faraday cage, and I’ve been reading up on stuff. Prepping, survival, homesteading – she’s got tons of books. I had no idea there was so much to learn about living without the conveniences of a modern world. I am so lucky to have been living next door to you guys when this happened. That you agreed to include me in your plans is like the best thing that could have happened to me. I want to do whatever I can to help us get where we’re going, as easy as possible. I don’t have nearly the supplies you guys have, so I am looking for any way I can find to help out. This change might be an asset at some point. Let’s get it over to the house.” Just like that, Brian already thought of our house as his. Yep, Russ was right about him. He was one of ours.

              The guys grabbed the cans and hauled them down the stairs. Brian did a quick run through the kitchen for any other food stuffs he might have missed. There weren’t any. If anyone broke in here, they were going to be out of luck. They might have a roof, but no food, or water. Hell, not even any wine – they grabbed the last six bottles, wrapped them in kitchen towels, and took them as well. There was a clothes basket in the laundry room, and they used that to carry the wine and one of the coin buckets. With each one carrying a bucket, and Russ and Bob sharing the handling of the basket, they left the house. Brian locked the door behind him, knowing there was a good chance he’d never be back. It didn’t matter. That life was gone. A new one was starting, about which he had a lot to learn, but he was excited at the prospect. And scared, to an extent. He had no idea what the future held, for any of them. No one did. They were definitely on a new, untraveled path here. At least he wasn’t on it alone.

As they were coming up on the porch back at our house, they heard a familiar sound. The old truck from the other day. Shit. Those guys were back. The question was, were they the same ones who were here last night? Was there one potential threat, or two?

I heard the guys coming in the front door at almost the same time I heard the truck. They quickly got in and shut the door, set down the stuff they brought over (did I see more wine? Score!), and went to the shutters on the front windows. Since the events of last night, or rather early this morning, we hadn’t opened any of the blinds. The truck slowed down in front of the house, then turned into the Nelson’s driveway. So, either they were a part of the group from last night, they were the ones from last night, or everybody in the area had their eye on the Nelson house. I can’t say option three was high on my list – like I said, they ate out most nights. There was no way there were a lot of supplies over there. That left the guys we saw last night, or part of a group they were all in. Either way, if they came back in daylight, they had seen something they wanted in there. Bad.

I went to Russ. “Did you guys get a chance to go over there and see what you could see through the windows?”

He shook his head. “No, we grabbed some things at Brian’s after we checked the windows, and as we were bringing the stuff here, we heard the truck coming down the street. We barely got in when it rounded the corner. What the hell could they have over there that would make them come back during the day to get it? Those two are millennials, they live in the moment. No way there is anything of use over there, is there?”

I couldn’t imagine what could be over there, but then again we hadn’t really known them well. Once we started down the prepper path, we had a tendency to keep a buffer zone between us and the rest of the neighborhood, besides Bob and Janet. You didn’t want just anybody knowing you were a prepper, or that you had a lot of supplies. A smile, a wave, a hello if you saw them outside, but no barbeques, or pot lucks, or neighborhood watch groups – in an apocalyptic event, neighbors become predators. The less they knew about us, the safer our family was. The flip side to that was we didn’t know any more about them than they knew about us.

We gathered at the shutters, and watched the truck. After a minute, the driver’s door opened, and a man who appeared to be in his mid-thirties got out. He looked around, up and down the street, then spoke to the guy in the passenger seat. He got out on his side, sporting a shotgun, and looked over the area as well. Another man got out of the truck, and all three headed toward the back yard. Well, at least they had the decency to break in from the back, instead of brazenly kicking in the front door. Those actions would come later, when things got more desperate. For now, they would try to hide their illegal entry to some extent.

As we watched, it was only a few minutes until the guy from the middle seat came back to the truck, carrying a duffel bag. While we couldn’t see what all was in it, we saw the barrels of a few guns sticking out the end. So that was it. Aaron Nelson had guns. Probably had a gun rack in the living room, with the rifles or shotguns on display. Yeah, that would have been worth risking a daylight robbery. The guy from the passenger side came out with a box that looked pretty heavy. Though we couldn’t see inside it, the guess was either canned goods or ammo – or both. The driver came out last, carrying what looked like a large range bag. From the way he was carrying it, it appeared to be pretty heavy as well. Handguns and ammo were a safe bet. They put their loot into the back of the truck, loaded up and backed out into the street. They stopped and looked toward our house. We instinctively all took a step back. No way they could see us, especially during the day, but it was a reflex. They sat idling for a minute, looking our way and talking to each other. We had no way of knowing what they were saying, but it couldn’t be good. It could mean our place was next on their list.

They put the truck in gear and headed back out of the neighborhood. Russ turned to us with a grim look.

“They’ll be back, and they’ll be coming here. We need to get everything locked up tight, inside and out. We can’t chance leaving without knowing where they are staying. They obviously aren’t walking distance close. So, we’re going to try to ride this out for now. But we need to get a few things done. As soon as we know they’re gone, we’ll get busy.” I had no idea what else we needed to do. Russ did, and he’d help us get it done.

****

We waited an hour but didn’t see any sign of any more “visitors” to the neighborhood.  Russ and Bob had been out back, checking on the trailers. They were proud of the work we’d done getting them loaded. Now we needed to make sure no one got them. When they were pretty sure we were alone, they pulled Russ’s truck out of the garage, and took it out back. The plan was to move them against the back fence, with the doors against the fence, padlocked. Then they put hitch locks on them, so no one could hook up to them and take them. Lastly, they took some stuff from around the yard and leaned it up against the trailers, so it looked like they had been there a while, at least at a casual glance. Maybe it would be enough. They pulled the distributor cap off Bob’s truck, removed the rotor button and replaced the cap, after they pulled it in sideways in front of the trailers. Pretty good chance no one was carrying a spare with them. That would make his truck theft-proof, better than The Club any day.

When they came back in, Brian spoke up. “Guys, I think we should go over and take a look at what they did at the Nelsons. We might be able to figure out what they took, to some extent. We should at least check it out.”

Russ and Bob agreed, but Bob added a thought. “Just in case they come back, we shouldn’t move anything. We don’t want them to know there’s anyone else around.”

They grabbed their side arms, but Russ went out to the garage, pulled two two-way radios out of the faraday cabinet, and brought one in that he handed to me. “Keep an eye out front. Janet, you go upstairs and watch from the boys’ room. You can open the blinds a bit during the day. If you see anything, or anybody that isn’t us, call me on the radio.  We’ll be back in a few.” He gave me a kiss, and they went out the front.

In the yard, they stopped to look and listen. They didn’t see or hear anything besides birds and squirrels, so they headed across the street. As they got closer to the house, they were looking for any signs of breaking and entering. They were pretty sure it had all been done in the back, but they wanted a full picture of what had happened. Brian went up to the window that would look into the living room. The blinds were opened enough that he had a good view of the fireplace area. Next to the fireplace was a gun case, empty. The glass had been shattered, and it looked like there were at least a half dozen rifles or shotguns missing. He called Russ and Bob over to see the mess. They all took a look, then headed around back.

The damage was immediately evident. The back door had been kicked in, with no care for the damage done. They walked through the doorway, stepping on broken glass and splintered wood. The door went into the kitchen, where all the cabinet doors were open to empty shelves. It looked like the men had flung everything out into the floor, with no care to what was destroyed. There were busted dishes all over the counter. There was a small pantry on the other wall that was standing open. It had definitely been ransacked, but surprisingly there were a few things left that would be very valuable in the coming days – flour, sugar, coffee, tea. Dumbasses. They probably grabbed all the microwave mac and cheese, not even getting that they had no microwave to cook it in. If they didn’t see the value in flour and sugar, they would probably never figure out how to cook without a microwave.

Brian started to grab what was left, but Russ stopped him. “Leave it. We have plenty, and someone may come through who can use it.” Brian nodded, and his esteem for Russ grew even more, if that was possible. He couldn’t help everyone, but he could leave things like that, just in case someone came in here needing it. Class act, man.

They went down the hall, looking into each room as they passed them. At the master bedroom, the closet door was open. It looked like they had found ammo in there, as there were some empty cartridge boxes on the floor. The jewelry box on the dresser was flipped on its side, and was empty. If Laura had any jewelry worth something that wasn’t on her, they got that. The fellas went back toward the living room and stopped at the door of one of the bedrooms. There was a large gun cabinet in there. It was locked, a combination lock. There was a good chance it was full of guns, and an even better chance the looters would be back to try to get into it. Great.

The guys headed out the back door, trying to keep from leaving any trace of their having been there. They stopped outside the back door, and Russ pulled out his radio.

“How’s it looking out there, Babe?”

I called up to Janet, who hadn’t seen anything, nor had I. I radioed back to Russ, “All clear that we can see. Come on home.”

Russ came back, “On our way.” They rushed across the road to the house.

They got inside and closed and locked the door. They told us what they had seen over there. We spent the rest of the day talking about what had happened, but more about what could happen. What would people like that do if they broke in here, with us still at home? What would they do to us, or us to them? It would not be a win for anyone. Everyone’s safety was at risk. It scared the hell out of all us. We were going to have to decide when we were going, soon.

****

Dinner was soup and sandwiches again. We still needed to use up the bread, and soup could feed a lot of folks with a few ingredients. The things in the freezer were no longer frozen, but still cold. We had cooked most of the chicken in soups. Pork and beef would last a few more days uncooked cold than the chicken would, so we were trying to finish it up. This would be the last batch of chicken soup until we got to the farm. We had more chicken that was canned and dehydrated, but we needed to use up the fresh stuff first. I think the next big batch of something we made would probably be spaghetti. We had about 10 pounds of ground beef we would have to cook tomorrow at the latest. Once it was cooked, it would last in the freezer a few more days. Janet and I were doing our best to keep from losing any of the stuff that had previously been frozen. I think we had done a pretty good job.

Russ controlled the dinner conversation. Nothing was left out, even though the boys were with us. His thinking was that they needed to know how serious the situation was, and he was right. They had to know the world was no longer a safe, normal place. It was dangerous and filling up with scumbags. Russ laid out the plan going forward.

“Effective immediately, no one goes outside the house alone. If anyone got caught out when those guys came through, they could have been perceived as a threat, and shot on sight. We are going to have be vigilant about situational awareness – that means know what is going on around you at all times. Boys, neither of you goes out without a grownup. Ladies, I’d prefer one of us guys was with you if you go out. Not that I think you can’t take care of yourselves, but in the new world that is probably developing out there, you gals have a commodity that would be worth the risk of jumping the fence and grabbing you. For that matter, the boys as well. We just can’t take any chances.”

Rusty looked at me, then his dad. “What are you talking about, Dad? What ‘commodity’? And what does it have to do with me and Ben?”

Russ glanced at me, but it was enough to see me give him a slight shake in the negative. I wasn’t ready for this conversation, not now. It’s not that we hadn’t already had “the talk” with Rusty. But that talk didn’t involve kidnapping, rape, sex slaves, or anything of that nature that could be spawned in this new rat hole in the making. Russ had a determined look on his face, and I knew he was going to at least touch on the scummier side of this situation.

“Son, there are going to be bad people out there doing bad things to good people. There are probably no cops working, so the bad guys can do all the shit they want to, with no consequences. Look at what they did at the Nelsons. Broad daylight, and they kick in the back door, break in, and take what they want. Those kinds of people are going to be out, looking for things they can take from other people. Things they can take – or people who can provide something they need. Most of these bad guys won’t care if whatever they want to take belongs to someone who doesn’t want to give it to them. That includes supplies, shelter, safety, and sex. Do you understand?”

Thank you, Baby, for trying to sugar coat it somewhat. I smiled at Russ, and looked to our son. His face was a mixture of disgust and horror – and understanding and anger. Damn whoever caused this. My not quite 16-year-old son was having to deal with the sordid facts of a lawless existence.

Janet had a look of fright as well. Had she not thought about that possibility? From the expression on Bob’s face, he had. He looked mad enough to chew up metal and spit out nails. Ben was looking back and forth between his parents, trying to figure out why his mom was scared, and his dad was pissed. 

Rusty turned to his best friend, saw his confusion, and leaned over to whisper in his friend’s ear. Ben’s eyes got big, and his face transformed into a younger version of his dad’s. Brian was sitting with a concerned, harsh look on his face as well. He didn’t have a wife or kid in this situation, but he had already adopted us as his own family, and the feeling was mutual. Who would have thought we’d be here today, sitting around the table talking about marauders and the things they might do, with a neighbor who last week we barely acknowledged? Things were changing so fast, our world was transforming into a sinister place, and the best we could hope for was to survive until we could get the hell out? Woo frickin’ hoo.