Nathan Jones - Fuel

In fact, as he’d walked across campus he hadn’t seen any sign that the students and faculty around him realized that their fuel-dependent society had fallen off the razor’s edge it was balanced on, and barring a miracle or government foresight that didn’t seem to be in evidence they were about to plummet into a very dark place. Aside from being a bit subdued by the refinery attacks people were going about their daily lives.

He saw nothing like the psychological impact of the nukes a year ago, which he supposed wasn’t too surprising since that had been the first event of a nuclear attack since WWII. Still, the Gulf refineries attack had hit much closer to home and was going to have a much, much greater impact on their lives, so they should be acting more affected. Didn’t they realize this could potentially be nearly as bad for the US as the nukes had been for the Middle East?

Trev leaned forward, lowering his voice. “Listen, that was most of the nation’s fuel reserves and refining capability that just blew up. Things are about to become really bad, and I think you should take some steps to prepare for it.”

Matt smiled slightly. “Surprise surprise, the preparedness nut wants to talk about being prepared.” At Trev’s glare he quickly held up his hands. “Look, I know it’s a problem but who cares if we don’t have gasoline for a while? I was barely using my car anyway.”

“We have no diesel either, which means no trucks bringing in food,” Trev said pointedly. “Probably no natural gas, either, which means no electricity, stoves, or heating. No electricity means no water, no flushing toilets or other waste management. And you’re about to find yourself in an area populated by millions of people who also don’t have food or water and desperately need it.”

His friend’s smile faded. “I don’t think it’s quite that bad,” he argued. “And anyway what about your grades? If you take off now you’ll have to do the entire semester over.”

Trev couldn’t believe his friend still wasn’t getting it. “In a week, a few weeks at most, our college educations are literally going to be the least of our worries.”

Before Matt could respond two hands clapped down on Trev’s shoulders. “Hey, man! Catching us to talk about what went down last night?”

The new arrival was Matt’s roommate, Chad. Trev had played pick-up basketball, volleyball, and even video games with them and a few others around the dorm and knew the group pretty well.

“Trev’s heading home,” Matt said. Trev did his best to suppress his annoyance at the blunt admission. “He thinks things are about to turn bad.”

“You’re leaving just a few weeks into fall semester?” Chad asked, voice thick with disbelief. He moved around so they were all standing in a sort of triangle off to one side of the hallway. “You’ll get incompletes in all your classes. And because what, gas prices will go up a bit more and prices in stores might go up too?”

Trev just shook his head. Chad was one of those people who liked to argue about everything but never actually changed his opinion, so explaining would probably just be a waste of time. An annoying waste of time.

Even if he’d wanted to, what would he say? The economy had been hovering on the brink for a year now. A lot of people had been betting on the nuclear war in the Middle East being what toppled everything and sent them back into pre-industrial society, but a miraculous recovery had been pulled off by people on all sides. They’d all limped along for months now, pretending it was business as usual and willfully blind to the fact that things couldn’t continue. And maybe some believed that after the Middle East Crisis the American way of life was indestructible and nothing would bring it down.

Trev knew better. “Listen,” he said, directing his words mostly to Matt. “You know this area has become one big sprawling line of cities, a dense population cluster filling most of Utah and Salt Lake valleys. That’s millions of people packed into a small space, and how much food do you think is actually kept on hand to feed all those people? Most businesses trim their operations so they don’t have any surplus stock cutting into profits, meaning delivery trucks usually come every week or even every few days to restock grocery stores, restaurants, bakeries, and everything else. Now that all those trucks don’t have fuel we’ll be lucky if the cities have one or two weeks’ worth of food. And that’s not counting the inevitable rush as people try to buy up as many supplies as they can before everything’s gone.”

Chad opened his mouth to argue and Trev hurriedly kept going. “Now think about all the newsworthy riots of the last ten years, and the comparatively minor events that set them off. Compare that to millions of people knowing there’s no more food being brought in and what they’ve got is quickly running out. Even before the cities start running out of food rioting and looting will run rampant.”

“But you can’t know any of that for sure, right?” Chad argued. “Maybe knowing how serious the situation is will bring people together.”

It was hard not to laugh at that, although nothing about the situation was funny. “In small, tightly knit communities maybe. In cities? People riot over soccer losses.” He turned back to Matt. “Anyway I’m just saying you should keep your ear to the ground and be ready to leave in a moment if things start looking bad. I think you’ll be surprised at how quickly that happens.” He offered his hand for his friends to shake, then turned and hurried back the way he’d come.

Outlining the doomsday scenario had got him feeling antsy, and even though he doubted rioting would start immediately he still wanted to finish his business in Orem and be gone as quickly as possible.

But before he’d gone a dozen steps the loudspeakers throughout the building crackled. “Attention students. Be prepared for a message from the President of the United States, all channels. Teachers, please prepare for the broadcast.”

Trev turned and exchanged curious looks with Matt and Chad, then moved to rejoin them as they started for their classroom, which happened to be the nearest one. Whatever his urgency it couldn’t hurt to get information from a more official source and find out a bit about what they could expect.

As long as it didn’t turn out to be the Presidential equivalent of reassuring hand-patting.

It looked as if some students had used the excuse of the attack to ditch class, so there were plenty of seats available as they waited and stared at the Seal of the United States being broadcast on the projector screen at the front of the class.

Trev used the time to ask his friends a few subtle questions about how they and their families had prepared for a disaster like this. It was a bit of an intrusion of privacy, but at the same time Trev had been pretty frank with Matt about his own preparations and he was genuinely concerned about how the Larsons would be able to handle this disaster.

Matt didn’t seem to mind the questions, although the only good news he really had to offer was that his mom kept a well stocked pantry that should last them a month or so, and Matt himself shopped in bulk to save money on food and had enough for another few weeks that he could share with his roommates.

During their discussion Chad was surprisingly forthcoming, announcing that even though his folks were the weekly grocery shopping type they had enough savings to last them a long time if need be. Trev tried to be circumspect as he advised his friend to call his parents and suggest that they go to the store today and purchase quite a bit more food than they usually did. As much as possible, even. He extended that advice to Matt as well and admitted that while talking to his parents last night they’d already promised to go to the store and empty their bank account on nonperishables.