LeRoy Clary - Humanaty's Blight

“Lots. Dried. Dehydrated. Even cases of MREs.”

“Water?”

“Dozens of cases bottled. The meter above the sink says we have two fifty-gallon tanks, both full.”

Someone else had been doing a thorough inspection while I learned to sail.

She continued, “There is a shower, but even a quick one will use up the water reserves in no time. I think we should wash with saltwater. Yuck.”

The GPS showed our progress and despite Sue flipping screens, I let her keep at it. She might find out another critical bit of information or a screen that would help us. We were using power with the electric furler, water pump, GPS, and probably a dozen unknowns. Power had to be my next task. How much did we have, how much were we using, and how fast did we charge our systems when the sun was out? Could we use more power, or did we need to reduce consumption? How could we help ourselves?

If we used little, would the solar cells recharge enough to replace it? Maybe I could get more batteries off another boat and store extra power. And more freshwater storage? Large water cans? And if we found another sailboat or any boat, for that matter, could we raid it for more food and other supplies?

Sue exclaimed, “Got it!”

“What?”

“GPS Destination. San Juan Island okay with you? Then we can decide later where to go?”

“Sounds good.”

She typed on the keyboard screen and a course was plotted by the unit. She pointed to the screen and a squiggly line. “Just follow that.”

She leaped to her feet, went into the cabin and returned with two fishing poles and a box of tackle. She talked as she worked, saying nothing of importance, but her chatter told everything of being happy and satisfied. Her smiles were unconscious, simply outward expressions of being relieved of worry that someone was going to shoot us from behind the next tree, track us home, or sneak up on us. For the first time in over two weeks she breathed free—and so did I.

Despite all we had to learn, for the moment, we had full bellies, relative safety, and were doing what we wanted, not what we were forced to do. It seemed we might have a future. We might expect to live at least another month, which was a huge improvement over our prospects two days ago.

Meanwhile, as I tried to share her exuberance, I realized that we would seldom be out of sight of the mainland during the entire time to sail there—and that knowledge both relieved me and worried me. Relieved, because I was not a sailor. Worried, because of pirates. I’d decided of all people who were a danger to us, pirates were the new one we had to be careful of. They could see us during the daytime, then come after us at night.

All motorized boats were faster than ours, and I suspected all other sailboats with experienced sailors at the helms were too. I saw no way to hide from them or outrun them. We presented ourselves as a huge and helpless target to anyone on the shore with access to a boat. I remembered the small open boat with the three drunk men earlier today. They had not intended to be our friends. They were the new pirates.

On the positive side, there had only been a few other boats spotted so far. I considered putting down the sail to hide and relented. I still had five bullets in the rifle, Sue had at least fifteen shells for the shotgun, and between us, our nine-millimeters had over a hundred. The rest had remained with the motorcycle. True, the pistols were no good for anything over forty yards, and probably less with the motion of the boat to consider, but a hundred shots fired at them would deter most people.

The truth was, every time we seemed to solve one problem, three more emerged. Out on the water, I felt like a single speck of gold on a black sheet of paper. People couldn’t help but notice us.

Sue sat quietly beside me, her fishing lines trailing in the water behind. I had no idea of how she’d rigged them, nor of how she should have. The boat took constant care to work the wheel against the wind to keep us sailing in a fairly straight line. I unfurled more jib as if I knew what to do. The boat picked leaned over to one side, as we sped along. A pan left on the stove clattered across the floor as it fell.

I actually had a vague plan for later. I wanted a small island to anchor beside for the night, to help hide us. If we found another boat, and nobody was around, I wanted to turn pirate and raid it for food, water, ammunition, clothing, diesel, and anything else we might use. That almost made me laugh. We’d become pirates when we’d stolen Truant .

I didn’t consider myself a bad person. Maybe less than a good one, but not a bad one.

I have been telling myself that over and over.

Sue hooked a salmonin the late afternoon, near Fort Casey, an old military installation built around nineteen-hundred that had served through two world wars. Huge guns were positioned to fire across a narrow channel to sink ships on their way to Seattle from the Pacific Ocean. Any enemy ships would have had to pass it. Just in case, there were two more forts located across the channel. Ships sailing past would be pounded by huge guns from both sides.

The salmon bent the pole in half, taking the tip nearly down to touch the water, the barrel of the reel screamed in protest as line fed out. At the time, we were both napping in the rare sunshine, me trying to remain awake enough to keep the Truant on course after a nearly sleepless night. We leaped to our feet and Sue started reeling in her fishing line.

“What can I do?” I asked.

“I got this,” she cried, as more line stripped out.

I hit the button to furl the jib half-way. That slowed the boat to a crawl, so she was not contending with the speed of the boat while dragging the fish. She fought the salmon for ten minutes until it tired enough to allow itself to come nearer the boat. Once she had it at the side of the boat, she hesitated. The thing was close to two-feet long. “We need a net.”

She had the still struggling fish on the line right next to us. Lifting it free of the water would probably break the line or the fish would flip off. I kept the wind in the sail and waited, not knowing what to do. My job was to keep the boat going steadily forward.

“I said, we need a net!”

“You want me to go get one?” I had no idea what she wanted or where to get it.

“A dip net, silly. With a long handle. In the storeroom, the one on the right side.”

I let the wheel go, felt the change in the motion of the boat instantly, but rushed below. Inside the door to what had been a bedroom were racks and shelves like in a library, repair parts, spares, oil cans, supplies, clothing, and hundreds of other things. In one corner stood a pole with a net a yard wide.

Back beside Sue, she guided the fish that had ideas of its own about entering my net. Finally, her efforts and my frustrated scoops met with success. We brought a fish aboard that weighed an easy ten pounds.

“Salmon for dinner,” she shouted as she tried to dance, despite standing beside me in the confined area of the cockpit.

For her, it was the culmination of selecting the lure, setting the pole, letting out the right amount of line, and reeling in the fish. For me, it took on a more esoteric victory. For the first time since the flu struck, we were not consumers of the leavings of those who came before us. We had provided for ourselves, much as the original settlers of the area had done for thousands of years.

Before she carried her catch inside, Sue used her knife to cut the head off the fish, which meant sawing through the backbone, then cutting the belly open and scooping out the insides with her bare hand. She threw it over the side. In no time, she had twenty seagulls feasting and calling for more. She tossed stringy pieces high into the air and the birds caught them.