Survivors – A Novel of the Coming Collapse

The airport was on the northwest side of town, just west of I-15. Upon landing there, they were surprised to find 100LL avgas was being offered for sale at the airport. The FBO operator told Ian that he’d recently taken the gas out of hiding, because word had come that they’d soon get a fresh supply coming from Oklahoma. “I might as well sell off the last 110 gallons of my old gas, since the new stuff is coming in from the Provisional Government,” he said.

“What Provisional Government?” Ian asked.

“Fort Knox. Haven’t you heard?” the airport manager answered.

“Nothing solid, just some rumors. So that’s for real?”

“Sure it is. We’re going to have some kinda UN regional administrator. But they’ve promised us local autonomy.”

Ian cocked his head and asked, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“We don’t know yet, but hey, any government is better than no government.”

Ian gave his wife a glance and then commented, “Well, in my book, there is only one rightful form of government-a constitutional republic-or I’d rather have no government. One of my college professors was a heavy-duty Libertarian. He wore a lapel button that said, ‘There’s No Government Like No Government.’”

Blanca chimed in, “I second that motion!”

In the end, Ian traded an Olin 12-gauge flare gun kit, one hundred rounds of 9mm ball ammunition, and twenty dollars’ worth of junk silver for forty-three gallons of gasoline.

The FBO manager let them sleep in a mostly empty hangar, next to their planes.

The next day, grossly overweight, they took an extra long roll and took off. They followed I-15 and occasional GPS fixes to the long paved strip north of Brigham City, Utah. Aside from some bumpy air, the flight was uneventful.

They carried with them a brief letter of introduction from the FBO manager in Cedar City. This was handed to his cousin, who ran the airport at Brigham City.

Their reception there was friendly, but it was obvious that food was in short supply. One of the men at the airport confided that Mormons from all over the country had descended on Utah just as the Crunch set in. “They all had relatives here, so it seemed safe. The problem is that Utah consumes more food than it produces locally. So even though a fair number of families had stocked up, in accordance with the church guidelines, all that stored food is gone by now. People are gardening like crazy, but a lot of places have very limited water. So unless those big Albertson’s and Safeway grocery trucks start rolling again soon, there’s gonna be starvation here, plain and simple. That’s why everyone’s so anxious to see the Provisional Government.”

Ian and Blanca spent two days in Brigham City. In three separate transactions they bought forty-one gallons of gas. This cost Ian eleven dollars in junk silver, two hundred rounds of 9mm hollow point ammo, a hammer, a pair of snap ring pliers, and a Fluke brand volt-ohm meter. Ian was troubled by the quality of some of the gasoline, which had not been stabilized. There were paraffin streamers visible in it. So he laboriously took all the gasoline and filtered it though a chamois car polishing cloth into a large drum. He then added a bottle of Gold Eagle brand “104+” octane booster and part of a bottle of alcohol. The alcohol, as he explained to Blanca, would absorb any water in the gasoline. They let the gasoline settle overnight. The morning before they departed, Ian pumped it out of the barrel-again through a filter-and filled their various tanks, bladders, and bottles. They left the last two gallons of the gas behind in the bottom of the drum just in case it was water-contaminated.

The next day of flying brought them to Grangeville, Idaho. Seeing the patchwork of fields on the Camas Prairie reassured Ian. He toggled his mic switch and said: “Ay, mira, conchita. This is big time agricultural country. I don’t think anybody is starving up there.”

The airport sat at the north edge of town. After several inquiries, they were able to barter for just twenty-three gallons of gas. For this, Ian spent their last ten dollars in junk silver and traded another 120 of their 9mm ball cartridges. Again they spent the night in a hangar. Blanca mentioned that their breakfast brought their food supply down to just a couple of days. “You know, Ian, at the rate we are burning through our silver and ammo, we are cutting this little venture pretty close,” she warned.

“I know, I know. We just have to pray hard and trust that The Fongman and Todd are still there.”

The next day there was foggy weather, but the fog looked thin. They climbed into brilliant sunlight and continued north over the Camas Prairie and then over the Clearwater River Valley to Bovill, Idaho, on the eastern fringe of the Palouse Hills.