Jed Bailey (jokerandthief) wrote in the_colony, @ 2009-12-16 23:55:00 |
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Entry tags: | ^ week 01, alice munroe, jed bailey, | alice and jed |
Week One, Saturday
Characters: Alice Munroe and Jed Bailey
Location: Home Depot.
Summary: Alice and Jed go shopping for paint so they can put up signs. They want to set up meetings with any other survivors who may be out there.
Rating: PG a little cussin'.
The weather was starting to get better, but not by much. Thunder and rain storms for three days put Alice on edge, making her wonder how long it would be until she needed to kick the generators on. It had crossed her mind several times during the earlier months that all it would take would be one good lightning strike to one of the power lines leading into the city for everything to go dark in the city. She was prepared for it, but only because of said paranoia. What about others in the city, like Cody or Mason?
She'd gone to talk a little about it with Mason in the hopes of getting him out of his funk, but when she knocked on the door there was no answer, and opening it resulted in an empty house. He'd left. She didn't mourn his loss so much as hope he'd at least had the common sense not to do anything stupid, and that he would find whatever he was looking for. That thought, along with the concern about loss of power or worse, lead to more thoughts. Jack still hadn't returned either, and searching the city for her was proving fruitless. They needed to utilize more methods. It was with that thought that Alice put in the "call" for Jed to come meet her at the nearest home improvement store, with the hopes of picking up spray paint and whatever else they'd need to put up some signs.
"Think we should get some of this glow-in-the-dark stuff?" Jed called down the paint aisle. "I mean, I know the lights are always on, but just in case."
He grabbed a couple cans, bringing them back to her to toss in the grocery cart. The sound seemed to echo for miles, almost as bad as the Costco. He liked Alice's idea, though. At least it meant doing something that might actually help. Not even finding a sign of Jack around had made things tougher, but there had been other places where it was clear someone else had been there recently. People were around, they just didn't know where to go.
"Couldn't hurt," Alice said, contemplating the sole plastic zipbag that contained a California King bedsheet set. Most of the other ones had been taken, and the one she held showed signs of being chewed through by a mouse, but it appeared to still be intact. "Do we wanna do more than one location? Actually no, nevermind," she amended, shaking her head to herself as she put the zipbag into the cart and moved on a bit further down the aisle. "That would be kinda silly anyway. We'd have to split up to do it."
"Yeah, juss keep it to one place," he said with a nod. His brow furrowed in thought as they walked. "You ain't gonna put up your address as the place to go, right?"
"Hell no," Alice said with a bark of a laugh. "No friggin' way. It'll have to be somewhere public, but out of the elements just in case this shit weather continues. Fuckin' thunderstorms."
Jed grinned. "Yeah. Should be pretty easy to find, too, in case folks don't have a map. Like that pyramid place. The lobby's real big an' open."
"The Luxor?" she said, stopping the cart near the regular paint aisle. Spray paint was all well and good for smaller signs, but if they were planning to put a bigger sign up somewhere on a billboard or something, they were going to need rollers and cans. It would last longer anyway. "It's... I'm a little leery to stay too close to the strip. There used to be gangs down there."
He was about to point out that the key phrase was used to be, but held his tongue. Nothing ever good came from bringing up the end of the world with Alice. "Alright, you know this town better'n me. Where's a good open spot to meet up?"
Alice picked up a few cans of white, making sure they were outdoor, before grabbing a few black as well for outlining. It would make the letters stand out better on the darker buildings. "Maybe a museum?" she replied, her tone thoughtful as if she wasn't completely sure herself, or even which one. "There's a couple in town that aren't on the strip. Or the zoo? But... well, no," she added with a frown. "Not the zoo."
"Jesus, yeah, that place prob'ly reeks," Jed said, making a face. "Besides, you said indoors. Which museum's the biggest?"
"It probably doesn't have to be that big," she replied, chewing her lower lip for a moment as she went through her mental rolodex. "It's not like we're gonna live there. Nevada State Museum might work. What color should we use for the lighter buildings, red?"
"Yeah, red would stand out real good," he said, a bit absent-mindedly. Something else she'd said was sticking with him. "That'd ain't a bad idea, livin' together."
"Yeah, no," Alice said, sounding hesitant as she put a few cans of red in the cart. Her arms were starting to strain a little in effort, just a faint shudder as she lifted them but it was still there. "No offense, but I'm not leaving my house."
"No, yeah, I get that, juss an idea," he said with a shrug. Then, after a moment, "It's not like you'd have to give up your place. There'd juss be somewhere else. Where folks could be together, an' relax, spend the night if they wanted. Livin' alone juss, well, get's lonely."
Alice reached for the bottled water she'd put in the little kid's seat of the cart, flipping up the top and taking several long pulls of it before she finally spoke. She was starting to get tired. "I'm not lonely. Far from, actually."
"That a hint you're gettin' sick of my company?" he asked with a grin. "C'mon, you'd be lonely if it weren't fer me."
"I'd be more bored if it weren't for you," she corrected, hipchecking him lightly as she put the bottle back in the cart. "Now we need rollers and paint pans. Next aisle, I think. Was there anything else we needed here?"
"N'aw, think that's it fer now." He knew he was dangerously close to thin ice, but the more he thought about it, the more he liked the idea. "It could be like a town hall. For meetin' and things. When we need to make decisions as a group, or if somethin's going on that everyone should know about."
"As a group," she echoed, pushing the cart along. The wheels squeaked a little, sounding over-loud in the large, empty space. "There's only... four of us? Five, if we find Jack. What wold we need to decide on, exactly?"
Even four was stretching it, really. "But there's gonna be more," Jed said, gesturing at the cart. "That's what this whole thing is for. We should have some sort of system in place now, before more people get here an' it's harder to set the rules down."
Alice frowned thoughtfully, turning the cart into the next aisle and grabbing a couple holey bags of clean roller covers, a couple rollers, and a few paint trays as they passed them. That done she lead them toward the front again, slapping the check-out counter with her palm. It had become a ritual, something she'd found herself doing the first few times she'd raided public stores.
"I dunno," she said at last. "Not everyone coming through here's gonna be... y'know. Good people. I don't think I could be responsible over a lot of people. Being a manager of a store isn't the same as, y'know. A mayor or something."
"Well, that's another reason to get things straight right now. We can decide who stays and who goes, dependin' on if they're good folk," he said, his speech speeding up a bit. "And nobody's got to stay who don't want to. It wouldn't be a town, juss... a group of people, workin' together. Helpin' each other."
"And what if they don't wanna help?" she said, holding the door open with her shoulder as she pushed the cart through. "What if they just wanna do nothing but sit around and use our water, and our food, and not help?"
"Then we kick 'em out," he said, following on her heels as she struggled to push the cart along. "We could even confiscate guns and things when people join, so that's limited to only the folks we trust. Once you prove yerself, you get access, but before then yer on probation."
"And people would want to live in this society of 'we have guns and you don't'," Alice replied skeptically, stopping altogether as the wheel got stuck. "Goddamn-- are you just gonna follow me around or are you gonna help me for Chrissakes--"
"Oh! Jeez, sorry, wasn' thinkin'," he said, hurrying forward and taking over control of the cart. "So what were you plannin' on doin' with people once we met 'em?"
"How should I know? I've never done this before." When they arrived at his truck she started unloading the paint cans, leaving the bags for last.
He tried to keep his smile to himself, grabbing a few as well. "Well, maybe you should start thinkin' on that, seein' as we're paintin' up 'hey, wanna meet people, come here' signs today."
"I was doin' 'em for your benefit, mister we-should-all-start-a-club," she grumbled under her breath, letting him take over the rest as she grabbed her bottle of water and headed for the passenger seat. The overcast sky was darkening, and it had started to sprinkle again. "Dammit. I knew we should have left earlier. C'mon."
As Jed hopped into the driver's side, the sprinkles rapidly turned into rain, and then buckets. "Shit. Alright, maybe we got one more day to come up with a plan."
"It'll let up in an hour. We can at least get the one by the 'Welcome' sign done in the meantime."
Jed glanced over at her, feeling a little impressed. Alice hadn't struck him as the kind of person willing to act first and deal with the consequences later, but this was certainly that kind of situation. Always something new with her. He only hoped the whole plan turned out alright in the end, and didn't bring out the psychos. On that happy thought, he put the car in drive. "Sounds good. We got enough time to swing by the hotel and free Rocky."
"Put on that 80's mix you had on yesterday, I liked that one," Alice said as she leaned back in the seat, her eyes moving out the window as the rain poured on.