“I bet you wish you never took this job.”
“On the contrary,” Falk says, “this job has probably saved me.”
*****
“There just isn’t anything of value left there.”
Falk sighs and fiddles with the unlit cigarette in his hand as Caesar pokes at his notepad with the back end of his pen.
“We’re low on D-cell batteries, coffee, and canned food in general. We need more paper products as well. We’ve completely cleaned out the nearest stores of all those things.”
“We’re going to have to trek farther,” Falk says. “Avondale has a Wal-Mart. We should start there. It’s only a few miles.”
“We should take a larger group,” Caesar says. “We need as many people as possible to bring back more supplies.”
“Where the fuck is the engineer?” Chuck mutters.
“What engineer?” Caesar asks, turning to him.
“In every zombie movie I’ve ever seen, there was always one dude who was a brainiac. He’d be working on some solar powered car or something by now. Where the hell is that guy in this group?”
“I guess we’re not that lucky,” Falk says. “You do make a good point though. Emory might have solar cells that survived the destruction, and it would be worth the hassle of bringing them back if we could get them to work.”
“We should search through the Emory area more,” Caesar agrees. “Beck spoke about that at one point. Said there were a lot of things that could help us out there—if they’re still operable.”
Everyone is quiet for a moment at the mention of Beck’s name.
“Better transportation is something we should be working on,” Falk finally says to end the silence. “I don’t have any engineering experience though. We should think about other ways to mod the bicycles. There are also plenty of shopping carts to carry things back, but with either one of those, you still have to rely on human power.”
“What if we worked out some kind of rail system?” Marco suggests. “Something that goes back and forth between the stores?”
“Too temporary,” Falk says. “As soon as that store is emptied, the rail would be useless. That would be very labor intensive, too.”
“If there were still horses around, we could use them,” Sam pipes up.
“But there aren’t,” Marco snaps back at him, “so stop making stupid suggestions!”
“Hey! I’m the one that figured out where to dig the well!” Sam yells back at his brother.
“Enough.” Caesar stands and stretches his back. “It’s getting later as we go on about it. Let’s at least start heading to that Wal-Mart and discuss other options on the way.”
“Who’s going and who’s staying?” Chuck asks.
“Everyone who can go should,” Caesar says. “If Christine and Hannah can stay behind and keep everything going here, the rest of us should go.”
“We’ll just hang out and do dishes, right?” I roll my eyes.
“I’m not leaving them here unprotected,” Falk says. There is no room for argument in his tone. “I’ll stay. I want to keep working on the well since fresh water is going to become our first major problem. If I can make decent progress today, we should be able to get it working by the end of the week.”
Brett mumbles something under his breath, and Falk shoots him a sharp look.
“You have something to say to me?” Falk asks. His voice sounds calm, but I know better.
“Brett, you’re coming with me,” Caesar says, effectively ending the conversation. “Falk can stay and make sure nothing happens here. Wayne can stay as well since he knows more about wells than anyone else.”
“Suits me,” Wayne replies. “In case you were actually going to ask.”
“I know you don’t travel well,” Caesar says gently. “I still can’t believe you made it all the way to us.”