Mike Mullin - Sunrise

“If I can get the windmills running,” Darla said, “it might be easier to move the town to the windmills.”

“Why not run power lines to the town?” I asked.

Ben answered, “Your solution would leave the power source vulnerable. The windmills could be attacked—or the power lines cut—leaving the town completely at the mercy of a besieging army.”

As Darla turned the truck into the parking lot at Dr. McCarthy’s clinic, Ben added, “Whether we move to the windmills or not, the town must adopt a better defensive posture. We should not have been able to come this far unchallenged.”

“I’ll talk to them about it,” I said.

Dr. McCarthy and Belinda were at the counter in the clinic, reading by the light of an oil lamp. “Slow day?” I asked.

“Yes, thank God,” Dr. McCarthy replied. “Only three rooms occupied. Two cases of pneumonia and a reinfected wound. Hope you aren’t bringing me any business.”

“Nope. Everything’s okay out at the farm. Well, except for Mom.”

“What are her symptoms?”

“She’s not sick, really. Just hardly ever sleeps. Spends a lot of time compulsively sorting old pictures.”

“I’d prescribe an SSRI if I had any or refer her to a specialist in cognitive behavioral therapy, if there were any in Warren.”

“What’s she got?”

“Maybe post-traumatic stress disorder? I’m not an expert. Maybe she’ll get better with time.”

“There’s nothing we can do?”

“Wait. Reassure her if you can. She was a big help with the hospital and Mayor Petty. I think she’ll pull through.” I slung my backpack off my shoulder and pulled out a large bag of kale. “For your patients. Anyone showing signs of scurvy?”

“Not yet, but they’ll be starting to present symptoms soon.”

“Don’t tell anyone he gave you that for free,” Darla said. “We’ve got a bunch more we’re going to try to trade.” Dr. McCarthy nodded.

“Who’s in charge now?” I asked.

“Bob Petty. Same as always.”

“What? Really? After the forked-up mess he made of retaking Warren?”

“Yes. Really. Soon as he was getting around okay in that wheelchair, he picked up where he left off. Seems more determined than ever to run things. Couple of people suggested holding elections, but nothing came of it.”

The mayor’s office was a three-room brick building across the railroad tracks from Warren’s tiny downtown. The front office was deserted, but I saw a bustle of activity in the conference room. Eight women sat around the table, laboriously copying a notice about food distribution. The mayor chatted with the women from his wheelchair at the head of the table.

The mayor looked up as I stepped into the room. “Alex, pleasant surprise. What brings you to Warren?”

“Glad to see you’re on your… feeling better, I mean.” I felt my face flush at my near-gaffe.

“Doc’s a miracle worker.”

“Yeah, he is. I’ve got a list of stuff we’d like to trade for. Our kale came in—we brought some to trade.”

“Already? Our kale’s barely sprouting.”

“How long did it take them to plant?” Darla whispered scornfully.

Evidently Mayor Petty overheard her. “The town’s greenhouses were badly damaged during the occupation. Folks had to clean up their own homes too. And not everyone has as fine a green thumb as the Halprins. Your aunt could grow turnips in the tailings from a coal mine if she put her mind to it.”

“Not anymore,” I said quietly.

“Yes,” Mayor Petty replied in a similar tone. “Sorry. What were you looking to trade for, anyway? Got plenty of pork.”

“Darla’s got a list.”

Darla pushed past me and handed the list to Mayor Petty. He slid a pair of reading glasses over his nose and peered down at the paper. “Believe Abe Miller, outside town, might still have a snowmobile. Don’t know if he’ll give it up or not, though. Should be plenty of bicycles around—city doesn’t own any, of course. I’ve got no idea where you’d find all this electrical stuff.”

“You should check your inventory,” Ben said.

“What inventory?”

“You must have taken an inventory of all supplies available in the town. It would be a basic survival preparation.”

“Now, son, we don’t go messing with making lists of people’s private property. I don’t know what kind of big city you come from, but around here folks’ stuff is their own, and we don’t go making lists of it. Don’t tell them they can’t have Big Gulp sodas either. You want that stuff on your list, you’ll have to ask around, see if they want to trade.”

I groaned inwardly. Warren’s population had shrunk by almost eighty percent since the eruption, but that still left several hundred people. And what did soda have to do with anything, anyway?

“You are not sufficiently prepared for another attack,” Ben said. “You need to inventory all town supplies—pri-vate property or not. And you must begin building a wall immediately.”

“You want to build a wall, be my guest,” Mayor Petty said. “People around here are just struggling to survive. They don’t have the time or energy for a project like—”

“If Stockton attacks again,” I said, “you’ll—”

“We beat them so bad they won’t be back for more.” Wait, what? I’d beaten the Reds and gotten Warren’s food back. Mayor Petty had gotten his ass kicked, his legs shot off, and my Aunt Caroline killed. While I was trying to think of an appropriate response, Darla spoke up. “What’re you going to do for heat when all the timber’s cut? We could use your help rounding up these supplies— we get them all, we might be able to rig a wind-powered heating system.”

“Got that covered. Going to eminent domain abandoned houses and grant salvage rights. Plenty of burnable wood in those.”

Darla said, “Even that—”

“Look,” Mayor Petty said, “I’d love to chew the fat all day, but we got ourselves a project here, getting ready to publicize the new food distribution rules. You’re welcome to trade with anyone who wants to or build yourself a wall if that’s what you feel like doing, but I’ve got real work to do.”

We wound up going house to house, knocking on doors and trying to trade our kale. We bought two bicycles fairly easily and then trekked a half mile out of town to buy what appeared to be the only remaining snowmobile in Warren. Lots of folks were willing to trade electric water heaters—they were useless without power, after all—but we could only fit two of them in the bed of the truck alongside the snowmobile.

I complained about Mayor Petty to Mom and Uncle Paul over the dinner table. “He’s doing the best he can,” Mom told me. “We’re all overwhelmed, and most of us still have two good legs.”

“I think Ben’s right,” Uncle Paul said. “He should be building a wall. And we should be living inside it and commuting to the farm. We can’t defend ourselves effectively here.”

“Maybe we could build an ice wall around the farm, like they had in Worthington,” Darla said.

“We do not have an adequate population on the farm to patrol or defend our own wall,” Ben said.

“If Warren gets attacked, everyone’s going to wind up right back here again,” I said.

Uncle Paul speared a slice of ham. “Nothing we can do about it.”

“What if he had an accident?” Max said.

“What?” I asked.

“Yeah, like the brakes on his wheelchair could sort of accidently fail, and then he could roll off a cliff.”

“So you’re going to sabotage his brakes, drive him somewhere there’s a cliff, and then push him off?” Anna asked. “Maaaaaybe,” Max replied.

“Maybe you’re an idiot,” Anna said.