Characters: Cass and Alice Setting: The museum Summary: Cass and Alice have a planning session for their hunt for a communal living space, and maybe touch on a reason for their current 'quest' that Alice can get on board with. Rating: P for planning and T for tentative
Jed had seemed wary after the Sunday meetup drive home, as if he knew what was coming the prior day. When they'd arrived at her house, she'd told him she'd be fine with taking her bike in the next day and to come around a little before noon to kick off. She had a feeling the only reason he agreed to it was because he still felt awkward around her after Saturday.
Truthfully, so did she. She'd thought she was getting the messages he was giving off, but when she'd finally decided to act on them a little bit, he'd looked at her with so much surprise in his expression. Maybe she was seeing something that wasn't there. Maybe all she was doing was trying to find someone to fill the empty space that Peter had left in her, and Jed just happened to fit, like a long-lost puzzle piece. Or so she'd thought.
Maybe she was wrong to press him.
Alice sighed quietly, going about the routine of set-up, one eyes on the door as she did so. Cassidy had said she was coming early, so she set up three chairs; the rest were folding, and could be opened up as others arrived, if they ever did. Up until that point, only three people had come: Cassidy, Zoé, and Searle. Four, if she'd counted bringing Cody, though he hadn't been interested in returning to another one since. While it'd only been a week since the signs went up, she was beginning to wonder if there really was anyone else that might show. Only she and Jed were coming daily.
She'd been so absorbed in her own thoughts that she barely heard Cassidy come in, and had startled a bit. Laughing it off, she reminded herself that she needed to be more careful when she was alone like this; when she was raiding she was hyper-alert and she needed to always be like that, even if the threat level had dropped.
"So," Alice said, her own city map on the table waiting for them with a notepad full of her tidy scrawl. "What've you got for me?
****
It had only been about twenty minutes, but over the span of time, Alice watched Cassidy relax a little more. She saw that the blond was naturally very confident - if a little soft-spoken - but also thorough and polite. She had clearly done her homework, and even gone out to look at a few of the places she'd put on her own map.
"They're all good," Alice said, nodding in agreement and fiddling idly with the water bottle she held between her knees. "But you gotta remember that it isn't just the building itself y'gotta look into. What if it's a great location, but we go raiding and there's nothing in that grid but junk? We'll have to travel further out in order to get everything we need. Even if we do pool our resources right now, it wouldn't be enough; we'd have to ration even more than we may do on an individual basis, y'know?"
"Well, I was going to talk to you about that, actually," Cass said, her pencil tapping on the map. She moved it and drew a little circle around a couple of areas near the Vegas outskirts. "There are quite a few outlet parks around and outside the city that we could probably hit a few times before they'd be tapped out. If we work together and liberate an industrial sized freezer we could take an awful lot of stuff on one trip. I could take the rig." Then she sat back a bit. "There's also Barstow. It's a good two and a bit hours from here but it's enormous - no way it's tapped out yet. Big enough hauls from there could keep us going for weeks at a time. In the long term..." She looked up at Alice as though wanting to mark her reaction to the words to come. "Well, in the long term we need to be self-sufficient, realistically. And that's not going to happen anywhere around Vegas. This is the desert."
Alice nodded again, a thoughtful frown on her face. She hadn't even thought of branching out of Las Vegas. Barstow was still pretty close to the dam. Maybe it'll have power, too... she mused, chewing her lower lip. The outlet malls were a brilliant idea, actually, as Alice herself had done a lot of good pickings from the Townsquare Mall near her own house. As far as self-sufficiency went... Alice hummed, trying to figure out what could be done. If they had the space, they could set up a better-controlled greenhouse, but Cassidy was right: the desert didn't provide the way other places in the world did. Even if they did have power, what did that provide them outside of creature comforts?
"We'll cross that bridge soon enough," Alice said with a slow nod. Then, with a small, wry smile, she added: "There'll have to be a lot of team-building exercises before we get to that point, y'know what I mean? But I like what you're sayin' so far."
"Well, for now I'd recommend one of the smaller hotels out this way," Cass said, pointing to where she'd circled a few blocks on the map. "It's pretty close to this mall here, and it's far away enough from the strip that if there are any gangs or troublemakers out there they're well out of the way. We should pick somewhere with only a few floors - elevators need regular maintenance, and I can't promise that I'd be able to fix one if it malfunctioned, so best to be somewhere we don't need it."
Alice's brows furrowed at that and she looked at the woman sitting across from her. "Wait... you know how to fix elevators?" she asked, head tilting slightly. "Or things like it?" It hadn't even crossed her mind that someone who could fix a big rig could fix something so different.
Cass shrugged. "Not sure. Quite possibly. I'm... good with mechanics in general."
"That's damn useful," Alice said, eyes slightly widened and impressed. She didn't feel as though she had talents that could measure up to that, even a little. She knew how to drill a tank for gas, or and how to hotwire a car with a flathead screwdriver if it wasn't a newer model, but that's about where her skillset landed. Someone electrical would be good to have, and a car mechanic even better. Eventually, everything they were all driving was going to get busted up or break down at one point. "You can weld and shit, too?"
"If needs be," Cass replied, raising her eyebrows and asking, "Why, you need something welded?"
"Not at the moment, but give me a few days," Alice said with a laugh. "I could think up a few things. Metal can be more durable than wood in some cases, and I'd rather use wood for fuel if we ever need it."
The blonde nodded. "Well, certainly I can help with that," she said. "I can figure out... most things. Anything, if I have a plan. It's just a case of finding the parts or tools needed."
Alice nodded again, with a bit more enthusiasm. This was good information. They could all use this kind of talent in some way. "Right, gettin' off topic. Most of these are outta the city limits and not in your quarter; did you want me to come along with you or somethin'?" The moment after she said it however, she figured that it was more probable that Cassidy would take Zoé along with her. They'd came to the meetup together after all, so she probably trusted the other woman a bit more.
Cass nodded. "Can do. Or," she added, seemingly confirming Alice's thought, "we can always go separately, take Jed and Zoé with us, split up and cover more places in a shorter time. I'd suggest later this week, some early morning before it gets too hot."
"It always gets too hot," Alice said, taking a suck from her water bottle to emphasize. "That's August. It'll cool off soon, but not fast enough. Not if we wanna be a little quick about this. I'm fine gettin' up before the sun does, but I dunno about the others." She bit her lip again. "Should we say screw the city and just look at your spots?"
"It's your call, Alice," Cass said, her tone measured. "Not to say that I'm not committed here - you have my promise of help. But this... community, whatever it turns out to be, it's yours and Jed's. You are the ones people will look to for guidance." She glanced up at Alice. "So it's best that this is done on the terms you like from the beginning."
Alice felt herself shying away just a little at the implication. Guidance? She wasn't the boss of anybody. Hell, ever since Jack came back from her painting-the-town-red shenanigans and the whole incident with Cody, she was beginning to wonder just how well she and Jed would do as a team, trying to direct these people. He seemed to have his own ideas on how to do things, and they were far different from hers. Her trust in him as a co-runner had started to slowly slip; he was better as the Group Muscle than as someone to handle things rationally and with everybody's feelings in consideration. Alice could do that, but she wasn't sure if she was in the right mindset to do it. It was all happening so fast.
She realized only too late that she'd let there be a long pause between them and flushed just a little, giving a weak smile. "I'll do the best I can," she said. "I'm not exactly good at this. I think the only reason I became manager at the supply store was because I had the most experience and I was the oldest on staff. That's hardly leadership material, but I'll do my best."
"Well, with any luck none of this will matter, at least for a while," Cass said. "But the day might come. Anyway," she said in a 'changing the subject' tone. "If you want to look at sights closer to the city centre, we can do that. But I would certainly suggest the suburbs as a better option."
"Honestly, I really like your ideas better," Alice said sincerely. "I think the only real concern I have is the reach with power and plumbing."
"That shouldn't be an issue. Besides," Cass added. "even in the short term food is more important than electricity, don't you think? One of the big malls, the Galleria at Sunset, has a huge outdoor supplies store, including water purifiers. Simple plumbing I can manage as long as we have clean water if the supply's contaminated."
"I can handle water purification, if it comes to having to do it by hand," Alice said easily. "It's something we had to learn about, water filters. How they work, in case people asked. Handy as hell. No, the electricity thing is moreorless about what to do about it being so damn hot and humid. No electricity means no fans, no a/c, none of that. We could probably rig gennys and stuff, though," she added. "As a last resort. Food's a big deal yeah, but... yeah. Heatstroke's also a big deal."
"People have been keeping cool in the desert without fans for millenia," Cass said with something almost approached a teasing smile. "Worst comes to the worst, we'll manage. It's certainly something we can take into account when we're looking at hotels, though - how well they'll maintain lower temperatures if they get stuck without air con."
"Well, the freezer and fridges won't do jack either, so we definitely need to make sure that we have backup gennys if and when it comes to that," Alice said, sidestepping her embarrassment though her neck had heated up a little. Cass had a point. Alice sucked down some more of her water, checking down at her watch again. "Jed'll be here soon."
Cass nodded. "I won't stay today, I don't think. I take it no one new showed on Friday after we left?"
Alice shook her head. "Believe it or not, it'd been about three hours, the whole thing. We left a little after you did."
"Right. Well. I'm sure there'll be others, in time. It's a good thing that you're doing."
Alice smiled slightly, glad that she thought so. She still hadn't felt that sure of herself and what they were doing. The whole thing had been originally to lure Jack back, and then things had changed. Isn't that just how everything's been so far, Alice thought with a hint of bemusement. "Thank you. Let's just hope this happy accident continues to be happy. A man I ran into last week told me we shouldn't keep the signs up long."
"Oh, that Leo kid you mentioned? The one I ran into at the mall?" Cass made a face. "I think he's probably a little paranoid. He's kind of twitchy, don't you think?"
"He's got reason to be," Alice replied solemnly. "And with that street gang that beat up Jack, there's no doubt in my head there'll be worse bastards lurking about out there. S'why I don't come without my gun."
"Nonetheless removing the signs might mean people who need your help don't find you."
"True," Alice said, biting her lip slightly. "But... I mean, we can't save everybody."
Cass's brows pulled together, just a little. The hand holding the pencil laid it down of its own accord, sliding across the map towards where Alice's lay before stopping short, their fingers a few inches apart. Then she cleared her throat, sitting back again and folding her arms. She shrugged, and shook her head. "That's never a reason not to try."
Alice felt a flicker of surprise at the genuine compassion in the other woman's voice. She hadn't expected it, given the stoic demeanor of the last few times they'd talked. It was more believable than Jed's gusto about how people shouldn't be alone just because it wasn't safe. Helping people sounded like a better reason. "I s'pose not," Alice said. "Mostly as a notice, I live over near East Robindale and Ranchero Destino. Number 82. It's the townhouse closest to the street."
"Noted." Cass seemed to take this as her cue to leave, pushing up from the table and reaching for her water bottle. "I'll see you soon, no doubt. I won't be over tomorrow but might later in the week."