Eliot Strange and the Prince of the Resistance

22) Clay

Before I go check on Carli, I decide to gather some supplies for my trip. I have a gun now and a few bullets, but Steven will need more than his trusty knife. Of course, even as I'm preparing for a battle, I am not sure I could really shoot anyone. I've killed plenty of animals I ate later, but I have never killed a person up close. Steven and I have both thrown grenades, and I fired at some people at the stadium battle, but who knows if I hit them.

The truth is that killing from a distance is not the same as close up. Will we have what it takes to do what must be done? I don't know. Steven was brave at the battle when we needed him most, but we both know he is a lover, not a fighter.

Outside Torin's door, guarding him like it is the most important job in the world, is Clay. His diligence tells me he doesn't quite trust Jack Taylor either. Clay advises me to go check Leia's bedroom in the back of the house. He gives me a key.

"She's got what you need," he says. She's inventorying and coraling what the new people been bringing in. Got to keep an eye on weapons, when you don't completely know who you're letting in your camp. She's also been checking in medical supplies. She even found some penicillin. This place is turning into a full blown camp for the lost and now found."

I can tell from his tone that Clay is unsure about our new status as refuge camp too. "Got some soldiers coming in to help our fight, but a lot of 'ems just more hungry mouths to feed," he adds.

"Do you think we are letting in too many, too fast?" I ask.

"Well, yes, but at the same time. Where they gonna go? Everything around is on fire, and they're afraid. As well they should be. These are desperate times, Eliot, and I guess we are offering the one thing they need."

"Food," I say definitively.

"Well that too, though supplies in that area are thinning. Mostly what we got for people that they are looking for now is hope. They ain't seen none of that in awhile."

He's right of course, though my dad, who is ex-military too, would completely disagree. Cut your losses, he would say. No crowds. Hide your resources. Save yourself. Dad's rules of survival for the end of the world forgot to mention that the end of the world means that a lot of people are not going to make it. And we are not, not, absolutely not going to help them.

There's no room for hope in my dad's rules.