A Change of Major (Chapter Eleven)

I stepped out and stretched trying to get the kinks out from driving combined with adreniline fueled stress. I was feeling pretty worn out and depressed from the enormity of the situation. When I walked out of the shelter this morning. I was certain I would be most of the way back to Dallas by now. I had no idea what would happen to Chuck or Curtis, I just assumed I would drive up 35 to Dallas, go my folks house and figure things out from there.

Secretly, I had wished I would drive up to the house and find my parents at home with my sister and this whole nuclear war thing was a mistake. I knew after looking at College Station and the area around Bryan, nothing could be further from the truth. My parents and my sister were probably dead and that was something I was going to have to deal with one day at a time.

We stood around in the fading light of the day made worse by the constant haze in the sky. When I asked Chuck about it he said it was theorized that nuclear detonations would cause so much debris to be thrown in the air and when mixed with the smoke of out of control, wide ranging fires, would make the skies hazy and darker for some time afterwards. When I asked for how long, he shrugged.

We pulled my tent out but decided to make some food first as we had not eaten (maybe we didn't want to after seeing town) since this morning. We planned on using the hot plate mounted on the tailgate of the truck and we would heat up some canned stew or chili. We still had a few sodas left over which we planned on enjoying before they were all gone when we heard someone coming on foot.

From behind some low bushes on the edge of the field, a young guy, around our age, walked out. He held up his hands and said,

"Hey, I'm not a bad guy I just need some help, please."

Curtis spoke up first, "It's cool dude. What's up?"

I kicked myself for not having my shotgun out of the car, but while Curtis was speaking, I made my way to the front seat and picked it up all while checking the area around to make sure this guy was alone. I had to remember to never leave my gun unattended and to never walk around unarmed.

"Um, you're not gonna use that thing, are you?" the stranger said pointing at my shotgun. "We don't have very much left and we aren't gonna do this anymore. We will fight back this time and we don't care what you do to us."

"Huh?" I said. "Dude, I don't know who you are but things are starting to get nasty out there and we don't want to get jacked up either. Who is "we" and what happened?"

I noticed then the guy was staring at the pot on the hotplate and our soda cans on the back of the truck. He looked like he was mentally trying to absorb the food straight from the pots and cans before I interrupted him.

"Are you like hungry or something? You look pretty bad. You want something?"

"Sure, um no, the others. Todd, he needs it worse than I do. He's in pretty bad shape, worse than me. That's what I need your help with" he answered.

"Where are the rest of your people? Where are you staying" Chuck asked.

"Just over there in the field away from the road. There is an old barn we are staying in for now. Todd could not keep walking and we couldn't carry him"

I looked at the scrub bushes and figured my truck could make the ride cross country a ways. Besides, I did not want to leave my truck so near the road unattended. I did not trust this guy and worried this might be some sort of ambush so I told came up with an alternative.

"Chuck, how about you are Curtis get the stuff back in the truck and I will walk over with... what's your name, guy?"

"Bill, but everyone calls me Billy at school". he answered.

"OK, Billy, why don't you show me where you are staying and then I will come back and get the truck and we will come over, deal?"

"Sure, if you have some clean water and some spare food, that would be great, but I don't want to be a bum or anything, we just don't have much and I wanted to ask." Billy said.

"We'll see," I replied.

We cut through the scrub and cross the field which looked like it had not been tended in some time or maybe was only used for grazing. There were a fair number of scrub bushes and an a good amount of live oak and mesquite dotting the landscape. The barn was easy to see once we walked down a short rise into a natural hollow.

It was an old barn with a rusty metal roof falling off in places. There was an ancient car body sitting off to the side along with a two metal watering troughs. A lone abandoned refrigerator, missing its door, stood sentry in the hard pan in front of the long ago used structure. As we approached, I could see smoke coming from inside the barn. Someone had made a fire to keep warm or to cook but did not do a very good job.

We entered through the open big door on the other side of the barn and I saw who Billy was talking about. There were three other young guys, half of who were wearing University of Texas sweatshirts, sitting around a badly laid fire. A fourth figure lay on the ground, covered in an old blanket, his head resting on a balled up shirt.

"Hey guys," said Billy, "I found this guy and his friends down by the road. They were driving the car we heard a little bit ago. They are getting their stuff together and are coming over in just a second."

"Is this everyone?" I asked.

Billy nodded and looked down, "Yeah, this is it."

I could tell there was a story there but that would have to wait for now. "I am going to get my truck and the others and be right back. Hold tight"

I quickly cut back across the field to the truck and found Chuck and Curtis ready to go. "What's up with them, Mike?" asked Chuck.

"There's four of them plus Billy, They look pretty bad. No food I could see, only a few things with them, One guy is laying down and looks like he is sick or something"

"I packed first aid supplies in my bag. Not much, but its sounds like its more than what they have" said Chuck.

"Where did they come from?" asked Curtis as we got into the truck.

"Two of them have UT shirts on so maybe Austin. I didn't ask" I replied.

We drove the truck into the field and worked our way over to the barn without a problem. As we pulled up, Billy and two others came outside the barn. One was limping.

Once we stopped, we got out and gathered our stuff together. We left the tent in the truck but brought the duffle with the food and the other containing water bottles, drinks and other stuff. I planned on getting that fire ship shape before we did anything though.

"Guys, I am Mike, this is Curtis and that's Chuck. We go to A&M, well we did. I don't know if that is gonna be in the plans for now. We got some stuff we can share with you. Not much, but I think we can manage"

Curtis handed each a bottle of water while Chuck pulled a protein bar out for each of them. I swear one guy tried to eat the paper along with the bar.

Chuck knelt down next to the guy on the ground and asked what was wrong with him. Billy spoke up,

"He got beat up pretty bad a few days ago. I think its his ribs, but I don't know."

Chuck's first aid training consisted of reading a first aid manual while were in the shelter so that made him the doctor. He asked some questions and then got a couple of ibuprofen for the kid, whose name was Todd.

"There's not much you can do for cracked ribs other than rest and take it easy. I think if he had a full break we would be dealing with some other symptoms and I don't think he has any internal injuries. I don't know, I am just working off what I read. He really needs to be in a hospital or at least at home in bed." said Chuck.

While Chuck was checking Todd, I dug a shallow hole in the dirt closer to the door and surrounded it with some loose rocks from outside. Then I carefully collected some dry wood from outside and built a more stable, less smoky fire. I scooped up the remains of the old fire with a piece of sheet metal and dumped it into one of the troughs out front.

Then I got my steel pot out and put water on to boil. As soon as we had a rolling boil, Chuck dumped a couple of packs of noodles into the pot with some salt. We opened one of our few cans of Spam and cut it into small cubes and added it to the drained noodles with a can of peas, some garlic and onion powder, salt and pepper. I think our five new friends inhaled it. I used the left over boiled water and made ramen noodles for Chuck, Curtis and myself. For Todd, we made some chicken stock with a bullion cube and gave him some hot tea as well.

After we ate, we shared two candy bars between all of us before I asked how these guys ended up here. It was a story all too common in those days.

Billy and his friends attended UT and the day before the attack, they along with two other guys and two girls they knew, loaded up into two cars with the plan of dropping everyone off in a round about path through the area. They dropped off one guy outside of Conroe that night. The plan was to head back up to Navasota in the morning. They ended up sleeping in next morning and then got on the road. The second guy lived in a rural area outside of Navasota and when they got there, the nuclear attack came.

The family had the group of kids hunker down in the tornado shelter outside while they would shelter in their basement. Billy's group had brought food but the mother of the family gave them a couple of boxes of canned goods and water to hold them. So for the next week or so, Billy's group of five guys and two girls were crammed in this outside shelter trying to make the best of it.

Around that time, they heard some shooting outside and Billy opened up the door to see what was going on which turned out to be a mistake. A group of convicts who escaped from a local jail had invaded the house and killed the family for their supplies. When they saw Billy, they wrenched open the storm shelter and dragged all seven kids into the house.

The boys were tied up which is how Todd ended up injured. He knew what was going to happen and two of the convicts worked him over pretty good after he fought back. Billy was also beaten as was the kid with the limp, Randy. Afterward, they were tied up at gun point and forced to watch as the two girls, Colleen and Taylor, were abused numerous times by the four convicts.

This went on for days until the convicts had run through all the alcohol and food in the house. They then took the two girls and loaded up into an old car they had and took off but not before setting fire to the house hoping to kill Billy and his friends in the process.

Randy managed to get his hands untied and through dumb bravery, dragged everyone out with their hands and feet still tied. The house burned down and they were left with whatever clothes they had on and what few things they were able to salvage from the storm shelter. After trying to get Todd in good enough shape, they started walking towards the home of whoever lived closest. Naturally, with hardly any food, injured and traveling on foot, they had not made it very far.

I can't imagine what these guys went through and I was sick thinking about those girls. It was probably like that everywhere with the collapse of society. For the first time, I hoped my sister had died right away so the same thing would not happen to her wherever she was.

As for us, I know we have to be more vigilant than we have been. Chuck and Curtis and I drove off campus like we were going to Padre for Spring Break. Around every corner, people like those convicts are waiting and are probably wining. We saw no sign of cops or any sort of authority back at college and I assume that is the way it is everywhere now.

A Change of Major (Chapter Ten)

My truck started up after a few tries so we did not need the spare battery, but kept it all the same. We were loaded down, but with the food, our gear and my camping stuff, we were in pretty good shape for at least the next week or so until I checked the gas gauge and realized I only had about a half a tank.

"Guys, I only have about a half a tank of gas in the truck:" I announced. "That won't get me back to Dallas so I am going to need to get some more"

"Fat chance of that, Mike." said Chuck. "Was the power on at the dorm? It wasn't in the Science Building and I doubt it's on at the Shell station either."

"So what do we do?" I asked.

"Go to the parking garage. My car is there and we can siphon the gas out of it. Curtis, where is your jeep parked?" said Chuck.

"Uh, its in the shop. I kind of backed into some chick's car the other day and messed up the bumper and stuff" he said from the backseat.

"Just go to the parking garage, Mike. I filled up two days ago and I have a spare gas can in the trunk we can use as well" said Chuck.

I drove slowly over to the parking garage and with the looks we got from the few people on campus it seemed we were riding around in a flying saucer. Nobody did anything, they just looked. Later, I realized that most of these people were either in shock or too concerned where their next meal would come from to be worried about an old truck with three guys in it.

We pulled in the garage (no barrier was down, it was broken off) and drove down two levels to where Chuck said his car was. Sure enough, his old Toyota was where he left it and by all accounts had not been touched.

I parked next to Chuck's car on the side where his gas cap was to make it easier. Chuck hopped out, opened the trunk with his key and removed a siphon pump and a two and a half gallon gas can. He opened the gas cap on his car, inserted the hose and then put the other end into my gas tank after opening the cap. Working the pump, it was a few moments before the gas started flowing.

He filled my car and there was still a small bit left which he put into the gas can. I put the can in the back of the truck away from our other stuff as best as possible. Then Chuck wrapped up the siphon into a large plastic bag and put it in the truck as well. He checked his car for anything he wanted to keep, but could not find anything worth taking up room in the truck.

We started up and pulled out of the garage and decided to run down the main drag to check things out. What we saw was a cross between a third world nation and the leftovers of a hurricane.

Nearly every store or restaurant or any other place which could be associated with food had its windows broken and doors off hinges. There were people walking in and out of shattered stores picking through the same rubble hundreds of others had numerous times before them, each hoping to find something forgotten and discarded.

There was trash everywhere. Bags were piled outside of houses and buildings as if the owners thought garbage service would resume momentarily. We also saw people digging through the dumped trash looking for food and in the process making more of a mess. We knew they were looking for food because we saw it several times the worst of which was being carried out by a small group of children around an overflowing dumpster.

Cars were abandoned in the road with many with their hoods up, glass broken, gas tanks open and tires missing. In the same streets lay bikes, grocery carts, suitcases and other debris left behind by a panicked populace.

Everyone either stared at us as we drove past or had a blank look on their faces. There was no sense of order or structure anywhere we went. No police, no city workers, no FEMA or Red Cross volunteers. Just people standing around burn barrels, poking through buildings or moving furtively from place to place.

"Let's just get out of town" I finally said. "I am going to head north and work my way towards Dallas. We will figure it out as we go along, OK?"

While everyone agreed, we did not get far. On highway 6 just north of the campus, a road block had been setup across the road and manned by some guys wearing fatigues with many of them carrying rifles or shotguns. Judging from their appearance, they looked like a bunch of middle aged guys with hunting rifles trying to close off their neighborhood, but I have been wrong before. Besides, I did not like the way they perked up when we came into view so I stopped a half a block from the barrier when I saw it and pulled a U turn without saying anything.

"Hey, maybe that's the army or something!" said Curtis. "Where are you going?"

"That group of guys are not the good guys, Curtis. The good guys would be out handing out supplies, getting the streets cleared, helping folks. Nope those guys look they are stopping people and probably telling them to go away. Or worse." I said looking in my rearview mirror to see if we were being followed.

I went around the campus and down south, but again on the main road, saw that there were a group of people being unloaded from several school busses up ahead and decided to go west instead. They looked like the same type of people we saw in my dorm and with us being loaded down, would probably generate some interest I did not want.

"This stinks! I just want to get out of town" I complained.

"Chill out," said Chuck. He then took out a map from his bag and consulted it briefly before instructing me to keep going west and then turning on 12th and then to take another turn on Brazos. He said it would lead out of town and take us eventually towards Austin, but we could turn north in several different places before we reached the capital.

It took awhile, but finally reached the outskirts of town and were forced into a south by southeast direction towards Wellborn and eventually towards Navasota. I really didn't want to go that way and I told Chuck to keep an eye out for a route which would take us west. I figured we could cut down toward Brenham, then work our way towards Austin but cut up 77 to avoid that whole area.

The problem was the roads we took were all two lane country roads and there several broken down cars blocking the way. At each car, I had to slow down and carefully approach and go around them. More than once, cars had been abandoned and were blocking both lanes so we would have to slow to a crawl and go around on the shoulder or the grass along side the road. And I won't kid you, I kept getting the feeling that each road block would be an excuse for someone to get the jump on us. With no authority or semblance of law and order, crime was a high growth industry in post-nuclear Texas.

Twice, we had to leave the state roads and take farm to market roads as our way was blocked. Once it was a giant wreck involving four or five vehicles while another time, a roadblock outside a one light town, again manned by several armed people. We did not stop to find out what they wanted we just beat feet the other direction.

All in all, we were only able to travel about twenty miles from the school with all the delays and backtracking we had to do.

It was late morning when we pulled out of the campus and it was afternoon and getting late so we would need to find a place to stop. As miserable as it sounded, we were going to have to find an out of the way spot and sleep in the truck or setup my tent. Along the last farm to market road we were on, we came upon a metal cattle shed on the side of the road. I pulled the truck over and drove behind the shed and parked.

SHTF Fiction: A Change of Major (Chapter Seven)

Chuck and Curtis argued about everything. Chuck would make a rational discourse completely based upon facts such as radiation decay, or calories burned per hour by the average twenty year old male or the infallibility of numbers.

Curtis would rebut with happenstance, conjecture, and conspiracy theories all framed within a compassionate appeal to Chuck's emotional side. In short, their arguments would devolve in to "Yes" "No", "Says you" and "No I'm not but what are you?".

This time, the argument was about how many days we had been in the shelter. Chuck kept a record based upon his regular readings of the ampere hours of the batteries combined with number of recharges thereby deducting the number of hours divided by twenty-four to determine that we had been underground for roughly seventeen days.

Curtis on the other hand, used a stop watch countdown function on his iPhone which featured a big eyed Japanese character holding a time bomb, depicted as a big cannon ball with a fuse, set to go off after fourteen days. Curtis was not sure when he started his "time bomb" app, but was sure it was the day after we cleaned out the toilet but before he and Chuck argued about who was going to drink the last orange soda.

I intervened and determined it was an average of the two which meant it was time to look around and check the radiation readings.

Chuck retrieved his survey meter and a large flashlight while I got my shotgun and another flashlight for backup. We carefully untaped the door and opened it up a crack and took a reading. There was nothing more than background radiation ("If it has been calibrated correctly" the ever positive Chuck added).

The smell in the stairwell was awful which we attributed to the four or five bags of waste we had tossed out. I pointed the flashlight up the stairwell and said to Chuck,

"Well, here goes" I said, but then paused, "What if open up the door and everything's fine. No war, no fallout, no radiation, no end of the world. I know I'm going to feel dumb".

"Yeah, but what if you go up there and that room is full of radioactive brain-eating zombies? Huh? What are you gonna do about that?" said Curtis behind us.

I rolled my eyes and Chuck and I headed up the stairs while Curtis stayed behind. We reached the top landing and paused. "OK, here goes" said Chuck.

He carefully turned the door knob and opened the door a few inches. Then the smell hit us. It was the smell of death.

SHTF Fiction: A Change of Major (Chapter Five)

When I woke up, Chuck and Curtis were arguing about something. Something about food. Curtis was on his third or fourth candy bar from the vending machine all while planning on plowing through a couple of cans of ravioli from the Allen Stash.

Chuck was lecturing Curtis on how we needed to make our food last and ration it appropriately. Curtis was calling Chuck a stuck up old worry wart who only wanted to be a fascist dictator over everyone in his "bunker".

We had been in the shelter a few hours and already the fighting was underway.

They stopped fighting when they saw me stand up and get a coke from the pile. I ignored them as I opened and drank about half the can before going back and start unpacking my gear. While I rested, i came to the conclusion that my parents and sister were dead and I hoped that they had not suffered too much.

I also decided that when things settled down and we were able to leave the basement, I was going to get back to Dallas and my family's home. Once there, I would make my decision about what to do next.

"Have you guys gone upstairs to check?" I asked looking at the door.

Both shook their heads.

"Chuck," I said without looking up while I unrolled my sleeping bag over my sleeping pad, "tell me about fallout. How long will it be dangerous and do you think we actually received any here?"

Chuck paused before speaking, "I think there is a good chance we could receive immediate fallout from Houston, but also eventually from San Antonio or Austin if they were hit. we could also get some from places further west, it all depends upon the wind. Fall out starts to decay right away. It starts losing its efficacy within 24 hours but that depends upon how much is received at your location."

"Do you have one of those devices that can read radiation like they have in the movies?"

"A survey meter? Yes, I grabbed one from one of the labs upstairs. But that is only good for measuring the radiation in a single spot. What we need is a dosimeter. A dosimeter reads the amount of radiation received over a certain time period. The best I can do is measure around the basement and make sure we fallout particles are not getting in".

"What about air? Surely, we must be getting air in here or we would be suffocating"

Chuck walked over to the far cinder block wall where there was a small door whose base was a foot off the ground and which could not have been more than four feet tall. In the middle of the door was a crudely cut hole stuffed with a really large brillo pad or soemthing like it.

"This is the door to the steam tunnel system" said Chuck. I cut a hole and filled it with several air filters which should catch any charged dust or particles. This fan can be placed in front of the hole and operated with this handle.We can draw air into the shelter with it should it become necessary" A battery operated fan sat on the floor next to the door.

The only thing we can't measure is what it is like outside. The general rule is to wait one to two weeks in a shelter to make sure the radiation level has fallen far enough and it is safe to go out".

"Can we last that long down here?" I asked.

"IF we monitor our supplies we should make it for a few weeks at least" Chuck answered looking over at Curtis, "What will get us will be boredom and routine. I tried packing books and magazines, but even those will get boring after a few days"

So we started unpacking food and water and tried making it somewhat organized. At least Chuck and I were. Curtis kept playing with his iPhone or digging through the snack when weren't watching or poking around looking for another diversion. It was at this time he spotted my gun case.

"Dude, what's in here? What is it? Like a gun or something? Let me see..."

Without asking, he unziped the soft sided case and started to grab my shotgun out. I put my hand on his and carefully extracted it from the case making sure his was nowhere near the trigger. I was sure the shotgun wasn't loaded, but all guns are loaded in my book. Especially when there's an idiot around.

"Don't ever touch this without asking." I said.

"Don't be such a d*ck, dude. I'm not gonna break your little gun."

Chuck inserted himself in the conversation before it became more heated. "Come on, Curtis, cool it. Guns are dangerous. Um, what kind of gun is that Mike?"

"Its a Remington 870 12 gauge shotgun. It's nothing special just a normal shotgun you can buy at any sporting goods or guns store. You can use it for hunting, skeet shooting or home defense. I have two barrels for it and have the shorter one so it fits better in the case and in my truck. Say, have either of you ever handled a gun before? A real one?" I said specifically looking at Curtis.

"Never" said Chuck emphatically. "My parents never kept a gun in the house and did not believe in having them around"

"So what made you ask if I had one? Do you share your parents beliefs? What changed?"

"If what happened, happened like we think," said Mike waving his hand in the air at nothing, "I think there will be some people who will resort to violence. In that case, having a gun around might be useful. I like to think I look at things logically and it stands to reason that bad people will take advantage of this situation. I am hoping that this conflict was not widespread and the authorities have things in hand when we come out, but I don't want to take any chances".

"What about you Curtis?"

"I have shot plenty of guns in Call of Duty and Medal of Honor. They got this chain gun that is awesome..."

"Curtis, in real life. Have you ever handled a firearm of any sort?"

"Nope," turned red and looked down. "Hey Mike, I'm sorry for calling you a d*ck. You know what? Maybe when we get out you can take me to shoot skeets or whatever they call those things. What do they taste like? Do you like pull the feathers off and eat them or something?"

Curtis is clueless and says things like that but he's like a little kid and you can't help but like him. I had always wondered why his parents were such jerks leaving him at school for the holidays.

I laughed. "Curtis, skeets are clay disks you shoot in a contest or just for practice. Sure, when we get out we can go skeet shooting. You'll probably be good at it with all those video games you play".

I put the shotgun back in its case and set it next to my sleeping bag. The next few hours were spent setting things up for our time "down below". Besides the water, power and toilet facilities, we had to check our food supplies and come up with some sort of planning, We didn't want to eat too much too soon and spend the last few days rationing a bag of Cheetos.

Chuck had cleaned out his checking account and purchased several bags of groceries the day before. Besides his own money, his brother had "Paypaled" him three hundred dollars before shipping out while his parents had sent one hundred dollars by Western Union.

With that money and his own, Chuck had actually bought quite a bit of food. Most of it was in the form of canned and dry goods. He did, however, pack an ice chest with bread, cheese, lunch meat and some fresh fruit. His reasoning being that a couple of days of normal food might help us all adapt to our new surroundings.

With Chuck's purchases, The Stash from my dorm and the contents of the vending machines, we probably could make it stretch four weeks or more. Chuck decided to pull a number of candy bars, protein bars and some of the single serve cans and earmark them for travel food when we left our underground confines.

The subject of how Chuck came to be in possession of so many keys was revealed as well. First Chuck and some of his friends wanted to find out what the mysterious steam tunnels under the school were like so they poked around the building until they found the entrance in the basement study lounge. Then they made duplicate keys and explored the tunnels between the nearby buildings. Some time later, using their key making skills, the same group copied the ones for the vending machines. The intent was not to steal sodas or food, but to store pizzas in the cold soda and water machine for late night study sessions.

Back in our underground quarters, another subject came up; What to do when we got out?

Chuck wanted to find out how the local area was doing and if things were "bad", then he wanted to work his way back north to Minnesota. His parents had told him they were leaving Minneapolis to go stay with a rural relative near the Canadian border. Curtis assumed he would go back to California, but he was also hoping he could just go to Austin and catch a flight home. I, of course, had already decided I was driving back to Dallas. I didn't know what I would find there or even if Dallas was still on the map. I needed direction and a plan just to keep going.

Both places Chuck and Curtis were a long way away and I had hope they weren't thinking I was going to drive them home and be on my way. That would be a bridge we would burn later on.