The next morning Charlie rousted them from their slumber. The first glow of sunlight was peeking above the trees on the eastern horizon. He carried three cups of hot coffee on a small tray. “Something I thought of after we parted last evening. You won’t be entirely alone back at that remote cabin; a man named Brodie roams the woods and lives out there somewhere. No one knows where for sure. He’s like a ghost, a local legend. He and Thaddeus visited occasionally, but nothing is known about the man except Eli Brodie graduated high school in Kalispell before joining the Army; he apparently re-upped for several enlistments, don’t know how many. At some point he came home, but his parents had died, and he just disappeared. Must be pushing mid to late thirties by now. After that no one knows anything about him except for occasional sighting by hunters and hikers in the area. I would have liked to have met the man but never did to my knowledge. Rumor spread that he was in one of the special forces branches and never chose to fit back into so called polite society.”
Charlie extended a package. “This shopping bag has the last of the frozen food from my freezer. Please take it. Shut the ice maker, well water pump and generators off after you top off your coolers this morning. Here are the keys to start the generators. I’m off. Best of luck to both of you.” The couple shook Charlie’s hand, wished him well, then watched the red Jeep pull onto the highway and head east.
Sam and JR backtracked to Marion. The small town had fewer than eight hundred residents before most fled. As they entered the town, a pack of five dogs was attacking two zombies. Smokey snarled at the sight of the undead as JR restrained him. He stood on the seat and lunged against her arm and barked. As Sam stopped the truck, the largest creature grabbed a large cur dog and threw it at least ten feet where it bounced off the rear end of a parked car. The dog whined pitifully as it limped away. Sam quickly put both zombies down. As they passed through town, they saw only a few people. Most of those hurried to load cars and trucks as if they were leaving the area. Most were armed. Sam stopped to tell the people about head shots.
JR said, “They've waited far too long. I wonder where they plan to go. They're already in a remote area. Where could they go to be safer? Everyone thinks Canada, the Yukon or Alaska, but this area is about as remote and a whole lot warmer.”
“It’s like that old saying; the grass across the fence always looks greener. The way they’re packing I bet they plan to cross into Canada. A better plan would be to follow Charlie’s lead and try to sneak into Canada and then continue further north to the Yukon.”
“But that would be tough going because they’d not have transportation, food, or any other supplies needed to live in a harsh environment that far north.”
Sam added, “Yeah, many will likely die this coming winter. Poor planning on their part driven by reacting to their fear. If we later decide to go on to Canada, we’ll need to cross in early spring, so we have time to gather supplies for the next winter.”
“Even that will be difficult,” JR said, “most canned goods are packed in water and will freeze and burst even in a mild Canadian winter. I think we may decide we’re better off here if this works out.”
They followed Charlie's directions out of town and were soon turning right off Pleasant Valley Road onto a dirt road that was little more than a wide, rough trail. Sam ran slowly in four wheel drive and bounced over the heavily rutted roadway. Twice he stopped and shoveled dirt and gravel into deep and wide washouts across the road so the equipment wouldn’t bottom out and get hung up.
They reached the road's dead end as Charlie had described it. Back several hundred yards they’d passed the trail Charlie described as going to the remote cabin.
Sam parked in the small turnaround and shut the engine down. He said, “I’ll ride to the cabin to see how the trail is and see if it’s still unoccupied. If it’s available, I’ll get a look at what shape it’s in. If it has already been claimed, we’ll have to go to plan ‘C’ for a place to settle.”
As they unloaded the Yamaha from the trailer, JR asked, “What’s plan C?”
Sam grinned. “Don’t know yet haven’t got that far. Think about it while I’m gone and see if you come up with something.” She shot him a stern kiss my ass look.
Brush and small saplings slowed his progress on the narrow, overgrown trail as he twisted and dodged the bike around them or powered through. After reaching the cabin he was sure the Kubota could traverse the trail if he cleared the scrub brush, saplings, and three large tree trunks laying across the trail. The primitive log cabin was deserted and looked abandoned. Inside it would require a lot of cleaning and some rather major repairs, especially to the roof. He had tools to do the repairs and would go back
