1.1 The Day the World Changed

Abby's Story

Abilene Gentry is a country girl from Texas. Her parents named her for the city where she was conceived. Abby, as everyone called her unless she was in trouble, was the middle child sandwiched in between two boys. 

Abby's father died when she was still in grade school so her brothers became her protectors.  She was scrappy and didn’t want them protecting her but they made it their mission in life. She worked hard to keep up with them. That is probably where her competitive nature came from. Of course she figured she learned to be an inappropriate slob from them too. At least she was friendly enough and a borderline genius which made up for being a slob. 

After Abby’s father died, her mother moved her little family to the small little community in west Texas called Viper Valley for a fresh start.  This was where Abby and her brothers grew up before going their separate ways.

Abby was living across the state engaged to be married to an oil man in Houston when she got a call from her brother. Her mother had a mild heart attack and needed open heart surgery to repair the damage. Abby kissed her fiancé goodbye and told him she would see him next week.  Abby would never see him again.

She met up with her brothers and together they went to see her mom in their childhood home.  That is when the world as she knew it fell apart.  The chain reaction of explosions caused by a massive earthquake destroyed most of the continent as the cloud of poisonous debris spread and wiped out the sun.  Millions were killed as the infrastructure was destroyed.  The water supply was contaminated as was the very soil. Virtually all farmland was rendered useless. No plants could grow and those that did were poison. The power grid was damaged beyond repair. 

Because Abby’s mom was unable to have her surgery, she died only a week after the clouds and explosions rocked Viper Valley. Gangs began to take over what little resources were available and were becoming very powerful.  No one could be trusted.  People were scavenging to survive and afraid of their own shadow.

There was a small military contingent that came through town to gather survivors to take to a training camp they had hidden outside the city. They gave everyone willing to go an aptitude test and only the most fit and brightest were taken. No one really knew what that meant, so not everyone wanted to go.

Unfortunately for Abby’s brothers, the military arrived too late. Her brothers were fighting off the gangs that were trying to take what little they had left and were killed just a few hours before the military arrived to break it up. Abby had nothing left. She knew in her heart that her fiancé was dead. It had been reported before the power was lost that Houston was the hardest hit and there were literally no survivors. 

Since Abby had nothing  to lose she took the Military’s test and was chosen.  She wasn’t sure if they felt sorry for her or if they really thought she would be an asset. She hoped the latter. She didn’t want anyone’s pity.  

Abby grabbed what few things she owned took one last look around the Valley and jumped in the truck along with a handful of others that ‘passed’ the test.

Week 1: Boot Camp

Abby arrived at the ‘barracks’ that she would share with several other recruits.  She was the first one there so she claimed the best space, close to the bathroom. 

She found she didn’t know any of the recruits when they finally arrived. No big surprise and she really didn’t want to get to know them anyway.  She wasn’t ready for any relationships beyond necessity. She had just lost the four people she loved the most in the world in the space of little more than a week and she hurt.  No love no hurt. That was her motto.

The recruits were getting a crash course in survival skills which apparently meant she had to clean the latrines that stayed gross since 8 people were sharing one.  

According to her instructors, the military had pegged her to be their eyes and ears in the Valley.  When her training was complete, she would go back to the Valley with a job working for the newspaper.  She would interview and report on various inhabitants so they could learn who the good people were versus the crooks and take out the crooks. She would be able to do this without suspicion as a newspaper reporter.  This was the first step in many that the survivors would take to rebuild the city and take it over from the mobsters.  At least she had a purpose and was always ready for a challenge. 

At the end of her first term, she was doing okay but was going to have to work harder on her people skills. She also needed to up the ante with her writing. She had to learn how to write the articles and stories but more importantly how to approach and make friends – ugh – she didn’t WANT to make friends right now but she understood the importance. She figured she would just fake it. 

Then she had an idea for the writing part. Well, she thought, I can’t blog anymore since there is no internet or electricity.  But I can use a typewriter.  I will document everything. It will help develop my writing skills and give me something to do.

So she started writing….

Dear Diary:   No – that’s lame she thought and marked a line through it and started again: 

Abby’s Accountings

I am writing these ‘accountings’ as I am calling them to chronicle what has happened to me in the past few months and will continue to update these accountings into the future.  If I don’t write this down, no one will ever know about my mother, my fiancé and my two brothers that died trying to save me and why . . .

She continued to write everything that had happened and continued....

. . .And then I was taken to the Boot Camp.

Boot Camp

The first term at the boot camp was tough. No one knew what to expect.  There are eight of us living in each of the barracks scattered around the facility. There is little electricity or running water.

I take sponge baths every day so I won’t be offensive to others. Personally, I really could care less, but alas, I have this journalism thing and need to learn how to befriend people so they will tell me all their secrets, so, well I need to be as inoffensive as possible. 

As for food, I just let the others cook. It makes them feel like they are contributing.  When no one is looking, I grab the leftovers and stash them in my room so I don’t have to eat with everyone else. I probably need to get over that and start being more social. I have no idea what their future roles are. Everyone is so secretive about it. 

Yesterday, one of the stupid morons caught the stove on fire and ran out of the barracks so he wouldn’t get in trouble. He just left me standing there. I had no choice but to put it out alone. “They” thought I did it so I had to pay for a replacement.  So now I am doing odd jobs here and there to make money.

  

Then they dropped the bomb on me about my home in the Valley. It was no longer standing. It had been scavenged by the townspeople to build and furnish their own shelters. So the military bulldozed everything. However, they were holding my property for me. Small consolation. Now,I will have to build my own shelter myself when I return using the money I will earn from the job they are placing me in IF I do well enough during the remaining weeks at boot camp and I don’t have to pay for any more burned appliances! I do have a secret stash to help, but it is going down fast. That freaked me out a little and I got desperate so I volunteered for an experimental operation at the science center and got paid quite nicely - $3,500. Apparently I only need one kidney. 

   

I have a couple of days off. Will update next semester – or if anything noteworthy happens.

Abby.

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