One Second After

John smiled at that and knew it was true. He could remember Tyler calling Swannanoa a “poor white trash” town with its trailer parks, auto junkyards, a town that had essentially gone to hell ever since the big woolen and blanket mill closed down years ago. What had once been a thriving small downtown area in Swannanoa was all but abandoned, especially after the big mill burned several years ago. Route 70, which went straight through Swannanoa, was lined with aging strip malls, thrift shops, and repair shops. It was finally starting to turn around, at least until last week, as more and more “outsiders” came in looking for land with the spectacular views the region offered. The area north of the town was developing, with high-priced homes, but that was now a tragic loss; half a dozen old farms had been chopped up into “McMansion estates” over the last few years.

In the old trailer parks there were a lot of cars that a week before anyone in a Beemer or new SUV would have given a wide berth to on the interstate. Some of those rolling heaps were now worth a hundred Beemers.

“Folks, this is Carl Erwin,” Tom interjected. “Chief of police for Swannanoa. I invited him here today to talk about a proposal we have.”

Everyone nodded politely. Carl definitely had their attention with Tom’s last statement.

“And the proposal is?” Kate asked.

“An alliance.”

John smiled. Again the historian in him, picturing kings of the ancient world, riding to a meeting in chariots to discuss water rights, the exchange of daughters, to band their armies together.

“Carl and I have been talking about this for days,” Tom interjected. “It’s ok with me.”

“What’s ok?” Kate asked.

“That we band our towns together for the duration of this crisis.”

“For what purpose?”

“Defense,” Carl said. “We hold the door to the west; you have the one to the east. We cooperate, we survive; we don’t, we are all in the deep dip.” Charlie stood up and pointed to the county map pinned to the wall.

“We have the bottleneck for I-40 and Route 70 in our town on the east side; that’s up just past Exit 66. Just west of Exit 59 there’s another bottleneck where the Swannanoa Mountain range has a spur that comes down. The two highways, the railroad, and the creek are practically side by side over there in Swannanoa. A defendable position only a couple of hundred yards wide. We have the front door; they have the back door.”

“Maybe it’s the other way around,” Carl said, a bit of an edge to his voice. “Remember, we’re closer to Asheville and they’re still trying to force us to take five thousand for my town and five thousand for yours. I’m holding them back and it’s getting ugly real quick. We’ve had half a dozen deaths at the barrier the last two days.”

“From what?” Kellor asked.

“Gunshot, that’s what,” Carl replied sharply. “There’s people that walked down here told they’d find food, we’re telling them there ain’t none, it’s getting bad. I understand it’s chaos on Old 70 and the interstate back towards Asheville.”

“Why in hell didn’t those idiots in the county office just tell people to stay in place?” Charlie snapped bitterly. “They just started this move even when we told them not to.”

“Because they want to survive,” John said, “and the numbers are not adding up.”

“It’ll be a die-off,” Kellor interjected. “A bad one, and Asheville wants it to rest on us, not them. Can’t blame them really.”

“I sure as hell do,” Charlie said coldly.

“Well, if you want to keep them out of your backyard,” Carl said, “then we better get cooperating real quick.”

“A smart move,” John said.

“That sixty head of cattle you folks was talking about. If Asheville comes in here, they’ll be gone in a day, and then what?” He paused and smiled.

“Besides, we’ve counted over a hundred and twenty cattle in our town and three hundred pigs.”

In spite of the horrifying severity of the crisis, John smiled. It truly was like ancient kings negotiating.

Carl looked around the room and all were silent. He had played his trump card and just won with it.

“There’s one other back door,” Carl finally continued, “that’s up by the

Haw Creek Road, but we can seal that off as well. Our numbers, you have about a thousand more people here than we do, not counting all those that already wandered in.”

“Will you share the cattle?” Charlie asked.

Carl hesitated, looked over at his companion.

“You have three pharmacies in your town; we only had one. You open up your medical supplies to us, we’ll consider a transfer of some cattle and pigs.”

“Consider?” Kate asked, and suddenly there was a shrewd look in her eye.

Carl looked at Charlie.

“Ok. We’ll share them out, as needed,” Charlie said. “But it’s full sharing on both sides, medicine, food, weapons, vehicles, manpower.” Charlie looked around the room and John caught his eye. “Governance,” John said.

“Go on.”

“I’m sorry, folks, but I feel like I’m in an old movie, set in medieval or ancient times,” John said. “We’re like two kingdoms here negotiating.”