Pilgrimage_A Post-Apocalyptic Survival Story by Tom Abrahams

Author:Tom Abrahams [Abrahams, Tom]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Post-Apocalyptic | Survival
Publisher: Piton Press LLC
Published: 2018-07-16T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 40

EVENT +95:08 Hours

Sweet Valley, Pennsylvania

Steve Driggers heard the noise first. It sounded like the generator was struggling. He was in bed, his eyes open, listening to the sounds.

At first, he thought it was the generator for the main house. But the rumble was too distant.

The barn?

He checked the tablet next to his bed and punched open the security app, checking the cameras and their status. It was connected to a low-power transmitter on the property that acted as a private, narrow-band Wi-Fi signal. It was just strong enough to let the security system communicate with itself.

“What’s wrong?” Kosia rolled over, touching her husband’s back. “Is everything okay?”

“I don’t know,” he said, scrolling through to the right page. “I thought the generator surged.” He tapped the screen again and then sat up to make sure he was reading it correctly.

“What do you mean?” Kosia sat up too, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. The tablet’s bright screen made it difficult to focus.

“Somebody’s here,” he said. The security application indicated a temporary power loss. The system was running on a battery backup. But it was only one generator that failed. The others were running properly. They’d suffered no interruption. And from what the system was telling him, the perimeter fence was still electrified. “They’re in the barn.”

“Could it be one of our guests?” Kosia reasoned, seeing the red alert box at the top of the screen.

“No.” Steve shook his head. “They know the alarm is set. Plus, none of them would have a reason to go into the barn. There’s plenty of food in the main house, and James has what he needs in the guest cottage.” He touched another button to check the series of cameras. They were working. He rewound the recordings past the white noise to six minutes earlier. He couldn’t see anything in any of them until—

“See that?” He pointed to a camera aimed at the generator at the side of the main house. “Somebody just moved past the camera! Well, they did about six minutes ago.”

“What do we do?” Kosia had her wits about her now. “Do we do anything?”

“Hang on.” He switched to a camera at the northwestern corner of the property. Its lens was aimed at the generator powering the barn. He watched twenty seconds of stop motion before he saw the figure move into the frame behind the generator. “There he is again! He’s at the barn generator.” Steve held the tablet so Kosia could see it and together they watched the figure move to the wall of the barn. The glowing white image stood and opened the door to the automatic transfer switch. Then the screen turned black before the white noise replaced it for thirty seconds. When the image returned, there was nobody there.

“He’s in the barn,” he said. “No doubt. Someone is stealing from us.”

“How would anybody know?” Kosia asked. “How would they know?”

“I don’t know.” Steve pulled the covers from his body and hopped from the bed. “But I’m not letting it happen.

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