In the early afternoon the move was complete. They were in the shelter and the refugees were in their house. The last thing they did for the move was lock up their new underground home and hike back into town to go over the house one last time and officially welcome the refugees in, give them a tour, and do what they could to help them get settled in.
Then they returned to the shelter to do their own settling in, exploring the space, doing a bit of cleaning, cooking dinner on the new stove, and finally preparing to sleep in their new beds. Matt was a bit disappointed to realize that even with heavy curtains too much sound got through for him and Sam to continue their usual habit of staying up talking quietly, and everyone ended up going to sleep earlier than usual in a sort of uncomfortable silence interspersed by the occasional goodnights. The boys even made a game of it, shouting goodnights loud enough to be heard everywhere in the shelter until their mother scolded them into silence.
The next morning Matt went over the route his dad had taken, making sure Sam and Terry knew it as well as he did, and then they loaded up their wagons with food, tarps, and camping equipment for the trip, along with their weapons and ammo, and headed out. He’d worked out a deal with Catherine to acquire an AR-15, something between renting it and purchasing it, along with a couple hundred rounds of .223, a spare magazine, and the equipment to clean it. He’d pay for the ammo with food when they got back, and the rifle itself he’d use for his duties protecting the town once he resumed them.
It was a generous deal he was happy to accept, and he felt a lot more comfortable about the trip with the assault rifle slung across his back and his Glock at his hip as they set out, with Terry carrying his shotgun slung on his back and Sam with her revolver in a holster on her belt. They were well armed, their route was isolated and fairly safe, and they were all in fairly good shape.
Fingers crossed if they were careful and made good time they’d all be back soon with every single bit of food in the cache.
For all their worry the trip was a fairly uneventful one. The weather turned cold, the days were long and full of walking that tested Matt’s injured leg until it grew stronger, and the hills they passed through seemed oddly deserted no matter how carefully they searched. They saw no sign of any of the people his dad had encountered, either hidden or no longer there.
They did see a few deer on the way up, and there was quite a bit of debate about whether to bag one. Matt argued for it, while Terry argued that they’d end up transporting the meat all the way up to the cache and back and it would be nearly as much work as benefit. Not to mention that even in the cold weather there was no guarantee it wouldn’t spoil. Sam had a more pragmatic argument, that none of them knew how to field dress or quarter a deer even if they brought one down, and learning might take a lot of time and risk providing less meat and possibly even tainting it.
In the end they left the deer behind to hopefully wander closer to Aspen Hill for the town’s hunters to bag. Matt agreed that their focus should be moving as quickly as possible.
The trip up didn’t take long. They reached the cache on the third day and checked the highway, which looked eerily abandoned of any traveling refugees. Small surprise in the cold. Matt almost thought the state of Trev’s car was funny at this point, when every time he saw it it was in worse condition. His dad was right that someone had burned the interior, leaving it a gutted hulk.
The cache remained hidden, and it didn’t take long to dig it up and load everything that remained in the wagons. Matt was a bit concerned to see that after what had already been taken from it what remained wasn’t quite the limitless bounty he’d hoped for. Still, with care and finding other ways to supplement their diet it would hopefully be enough to last the family through the coldest months.
It would have to be.
They split the food between the wagons so each carried about two hundred pounds, not an impossible weight but certainly one that required extra strength to pull. Especially over long periods of time over rough roads. Sam was able to manage the weight with a bit of effort, however, which would make a difference on the trip back since they’d have three people to pull the wagons instead of two.
There were other things in the cache that Trev left behind, either by accident or because he didn’t think he’d need them and they were heavy or bulky, including various useful camping items and a few blankets. They took those as well.
The trip back took longer, slowed by the wagons and their muscles getting used to constantly towing the extra weight. They also paid even more attention to their surroundings in case of attack now that they had precious food to steal. The trip that had taken about two and a half days to get up there took almost six to return to Aspen Hill, but considering how long his father had been gone Matt called that a good pace. Thanks to good meals and careful rest their strength also increased as they towed their weights, and before the end Sam was more easily handling her wagon when she towed it.
Matt made his fiancee blush by complimenting her toned muscles on a rare warm afternoon when she removed her coat, and she insisted he return the favor and take off his own coat to do some flexing for her. Terry ended their banter by threatening to throw a bucket of cold water over them, and although his brother-in-law was just joking and the day was mild Matt still had no desire to get wet and chilled. They kept going, mood lightened but not forgetting their urgency to get home.
On the eighth day, still several miles from home, their good luck ended and the snowstorm that had been dumping in the mountains looming to the west for the last few days finally made it down to where they were in the foothills. They kept going through the heavily flying snow for as long as they could, as wet slush caked on the tires of their wagons and forced frequent stops to knock it off. But finally near sundown they gave up on reaching the town that day, if it was even possible, and decided they’d finish the trip in the morning.
The first snow of winter had arrived, giving them a taste of what they could expect in the coming weeks. Matt was just grateful it had waited until they were almost home.
Just before noon they reached the shelter trudging through almost a foot of wet snow that clung to the wagon wheels, their feet, and the trees on the slopes behind them and the houses in the distance in front of them.
When they arrived they were pleased to discover that Matt’s dad had brought down a deer after all, not while waiting in the observation post while it wandered within range but by sighting it in the hills and going after it, a chase that lasted almost two hours. He’d had his own adventure getting the animal cleaned and quartered and the meat brought home with only a passing knowledge of how it was done.
Still, they had venison to go with other food at the celebration dinner that evening, almost as joyous as Thanksgiving had been. While it was cooking Matt had sought out the Mayor and Chauncey, who’d taken over for him while he was gone, about resuming his duties and offering whatever other aid he could. Terry came as well to do what he could for anyone who’d fallen sick or been injured in his absence. They spent the afternoon in town pitching in, coming back to the shelter for dinner chilled and with the snow still falling thickly.
The next day Matt returned to work, almost surprised at how quickly the duties that he’d held for only a week, most of it while off his feet, became routine and things got back to normal. Or at least as normal as possible after the attack. Which wasn’t to say they were good, at least not for the town.
But for Matt it meant no more journeys. No walking to Antelope Island and back for April’s family, no skulking along backroads with wagonloads of food hoping not to be attacked. Just patrols and more to look forward to in the coming days, weeks, and months, as winter gripped the town and the suffering of its people became more and more real.