THE EPOCH CHRONICLES | ✔

03. A HEIST

J O A N

Kings Canyon, California
2058 AD

━━━━

"JOAN! JOAN! Come in, Joan!"

Joan startled awake, the pin needles acting as her bed crackling and poking at her exposed skin as she slammed her hand down on the walkie-talkie.

The light grey of a slow-coming dawn only made the forest surrounding her seem gloomier, but she knew her sister had a higher vantage at the Scout Point. Joan groaned as she clicked the comm on.

"This better not be a prank, Lou."

"CCR truck incoming right for you!" The slight static did nothing to tangle up Lou's words, and Joan snapped into action, slipping her walkie-talkie down her belt and lunging for her backpack. More needles pricked her face as she landed and scraped through the objects inside, her fingers closing on a sharp-edged cylinder.

Despite the early morning coolness—the only moderate weather in Central California, Jake had reckoned, 'cause the ocean was so close and the mountains trapped moisture into their little valley; she'd been taught the whole shebang—sweat pricked at her forehead, and the last lingering fingers of sleep vanished faster than the nightly mist in a 100° day.

CCR, Joan thought wildly, feeling a tight bundle of excitement in her chest. Community in Crisis Relief. But not their community, of course. Joan wasn't one to go into politics, and now wasn't really the time, but Jake had always declared that first-come first-serve wasn't applicable in the apocalypse. Maybe it'd worked in the beginning, back when the ocean waters started to recede but the Rain started coming harder and faster.

(Poisoned rain, of course, because humanity couldn't catch a break.)

But that had been over eight years ago, and the Rain had wiped out any hope of growing crops or advancing technology... no pollution, Jake'd explained. So no more poison rain.

Then again, that wasn't the problem anymore. The problem was starvation, and the CCR truck was about to deliver a whole meal to her and the Shelter.

Don't mess up, Joan told herself as she crept closer to the 395 to her right, fixing her backpack firmly onto her spine. She clicked the comm again and spoke lowly to Lou, her hand tightly gripping the grenade.

"CCR have company?"

"A military assistance Jeep," Lou answered. Joan could imagine her younger sister straining over the railing of the Scout Point to see more, her lips pursed in determination. Maybe she'd have her tongue sticking out, too, now that Joan was too far away to call her 'Lizard'.

Joan exhaled sharply, then glanced at the discarded roadblock across the tarmac. It hadn't done much to stop the inflow of people leaving California when the ocean swept Sacramento away, but the CCR would have bigger problems than plastic legos on steroids.

"Let's hope the tree stops them," Joan murmured, shooting a glance at the massive trunk that laid across the road. It wouldn't take long for a military Jeep to pump some lead into it and make a hole to pass through, but it'd be long enough for her to cause some chaos.

Joan switched comms, looking over the road as she lowered herself into the brush, grunting as her injured knee sent up a protest. "Karmen, you there?"