A/N: Thank you for all the reviews, I love them and apologies as my geography and spatial awareness are hideous. Otherwise please continue to enjoy!
Chapter 22
"Lime Syrup?" Kara said in disbelief as she could understand not being able to find fresh limes. She also knew lime cordial would be a hard ask though bottled lime juice she would have expected to be the easiest. Not Lime dessert topping used for milkshakes and ice cream sundaes in fact she'd never heard of it until Tex brought the bottle home with all the other ingredients. Though his idea of cream was something that came fresh and direct from dairy farm not what came in the supermarket after being homogenised and pasteurised in a factory. So it was definitely going to be very interesting. She definitely wasn't complaining in fact she was just grateful to have whatever Tex could scrounge.
"Yeah, can you make it work?" Tex asked her.
"I can try, thank you for this." She said sincerely.
"No problem, the people at the farms needed some welding done. So it's quid pro quo." Tex said with a shrug, downplaying the fact he'd been gone all day and came home exhausted but with nearly everything Kara had on her list plus some extra food. He'd gone to the supermarket realising their money wasn't going to stretch far so he drove out further outside the city to where the farms were. He figured he could trade skills for food and it had worked out well.
The farmers didn't have soft hearts as they heard every sad story invented but they were happy for Tex to do some work on the farm. Given they'd lost a lot of their skilled staff, they looked at his past experience as a blessing. So he'd spent most of the day fixing engines and welding pipework to get the farm back into working order. He and the owner struck up a friendship and given how efficient Tex had been the owner gave him some extra food as incentive to get him back out the next day to keep working on repairing the farm.
"Well, I still really appreciate it."
"Had to sweet talk a cafe owner out of that syrup but I do have a job offer that will keep us in milk, cheese and whatever is ready harvest." Tex said, mentioning what he felt to be good and bad news. Good news meant they'd have a steady supply of food not enough to keep them well fed but enough to stop them from dying from starvation but bad news meant it'd slow down work on Kara's house.
"Do you want to take it?" Kara asked out of curiosity than concern for her house.
"Yeah, I think it's a smart move for the time being." Tex said, it was a long commute but he felt it was worth it as long as he could find a steady source of petrol. He figured he could hit up the Air force yard or the dockyard where the Nathan James was for it given he was going to supporting Kara and Larrin who were technically dependants of both Australian Navy and US Navy.
"Then do it." Kara told him as she didn't want him to feel beholden to her when him renovating their home was a favour not work. It definitely wasn't going to keep Kat and the rest of them fed.
"Means delays on your home." Tex told her.
"I know but we all have a roof over our heads because of you. The fact you'd bring in food now is more important than my house getting renovated. As long as you don't mind Danny and I being in your granny flat for a little while longer." Kara said with a smile.
"Not at all, as long as you make my lunch. Can I have it in a brown paper bag with those little notes in them?" Tex asked her.
"Well, what do you think, Sir?" Miller asked as they had to divert from their original course of travelling parallel to the wall as they encountered roads cluttered with abandoned cars and buildings that had fallen into disrepair. It looked like riots had torn through the places surrounding the wall as a lot of the houses were sprayed with red 'x' signs, many were burned out and others just smashed windows and broken doors.
What was unnerving was the lack of people and the wall. So they had headed south of the wall hoping to find a clear path before they encountered a small group of 10 people. They had been wary of them, it was hard to see why as the people were filthy and half starved. They didn't have much supplies with them except for the clothes on their backs, gas masks, gloves and small backpacks.
Miller and the others gave them some food and water but it was hard listening to their stories as they told them how the scavengers had attacked their safe zone and ransacked all the supplies before leaving them to die. It had taken them days to scrounge what they could to trek to Milwaukee as they heard from other travelers that it was a safe haven. The way people talked about the place one would believe it was the land of Milk and Honey. By seeing the state of the country the day and half Miller could understand why Larrin saw St Louis as some kind of wonderful dream. He just couldn't imagine living through the hell that destroyed their country.
Either way the people were kind enough to give them directions to a check point before they continued on. Danny had made the call not join the small group of strangers as he wanted to be more prudent and see what they could find out first instead of walking in blind. It turned out to be a good move given that he , Danny and Alisha stood on the 40th floor of an old business building about 4 blocks away from the check point. They had to walk the flights up but they had a bird's eye view looking down at the point and what was beyond.
"I think that we need to contact home, these people look fairly well set up. Maybe we can cut the queue with a well placed radio call." Danny said as there was a long queue to get into the safe zone. The check point was one shipping container gap in the wall, it had a barbed wire fence. Just inside the fence was one lane road going in and some kind processing centre as it had more shipping containers that acted as doorways or as Mrs Miller had called them 'Quarantine rooms' as they were labelled as such as he saw people in Hazmat suits conversing with the people coming in and directing them to go inside them. It was patrolled by at least six police officers dressed in riot gear and armed to the teeth. There were snipers inside the safe zone on buildings nearby directed at the checkpoint.
"I have to say that I don't want to end up in quarantine for 96 hours." Alisha commented as she looked through the binoculars watching the scene below. She waited months and sure 4 more days would be nothing but she didn't want to wait anymore. She didn't want to sweat it out in a shipping container to find out Sarah was not there or worse dead.
"Maybe if they are open to it, they'll accept an allotment of the cure. There's an airport 40 minutes away. They could fly it up and we can get your Mom to hitch a ride back to St Louis." Danny added as he liked the idea more than trying to get into the safe zone the long way and having Miller's mom safely transported to St Louis definitely held it's own appeal.
"I'm sorry but we can't give you a job. I have a few that would be perfect but I can't." The recruiter said as she looked through the pages of the survey Larrin had filled out in the waiting from with about 50 other people and they were just the first ones through the door. She'd been up since 6am and made the rounds of all the hospitals and the university to find work to be redirected to the employment agency that was helping people get work in St Louis. Now it was the afternoon, she hadn't had anything to eat since breakfast and this woman was telling her 'No'.
"Why not?" Larrin asked her.
"You're illegal immigrant with no way of backing up your claims of being so highly educated or your job history." The woman told her, Larrin frowned at the choice of language.
"I didn't purposefully break laws to come or stay here. I'm stuck here because of the pandemic. There aren't any ships or planes to get me home. I'm a refugee" Larrin said getting upset as she didn't like the insinuation that she was trying to steal work away from a legitimate citizen of the country.
"You don't have any official paperwork to show that you have asylum or anything to prove you have rights to apply for a work visa or even the reciprocal citizenship the Senator is installing for people like you." The woman said, Larrin's eyes narrowed in annoyance at the phrase 'people like you'. But she kept her opinions to herself and took a deep breath to remain calm.
"How do I get the paperwork for any of that?" Larrin asked in a patient manner.
"You'd have to go to your consulate first where they do everything that they can do to establish that you are in fact a'refugee' though they'd us the term 'displaced citizen' and that they can't get you back to your country of origin. Then they apply to our government on your behalf to stay and it goes on from there where you'll be given a temporary social security number and benefits until you've found employment to support yourself." She explained to Larrin in an quick and harassed manner as she didn't care what happened to Larrin and just wanted her out of her office.
"Has anyone managed to get this mythical 'citizenship' or 'refugee' status yet?" Larrin asked her, it seemed to tick off the woman on the other side of the desk as she clasped her hands together and leaned forward giving Larrin a no nonsense look.
"Look, I know it's unfair but we're rebuilding our society, we have to prioritise those-"
"Who are American." Larrin finished for her, the woman gave her a dark look as she obviously refused to admit it as it would mean the US government was alienating innocent foreigners caught up in a global disaster. Which wasn't good for their image.
"People who are already established in our databases with social security numbers and identities we can verify. People who pay taxes to support the services that we need to function as a society." The woman clarified.
"So what am I supposed to do given there is no Australian Consulate that's currently operational anywhere in the US?" Larrin asked her, trying to remain calm even though she was thoroughly frustrated and ready to cry.
"There has to be one somewhere. So I suggest you find it and until then I wish you the best of luck." She said as she pulled the survey form from the clipboard and handed it to Larrin; dismissing her.
Larrin took the papers and tore them in half leaving them on the desk. She knew it was a petulant move but she was angry. She left the office feeling like she'd wasted her time and a little depressed as she couldn't catch a break.
Once she was outside of the building she started walking home, she was just glad she hadn't mentioned what she was up to this morning with the others. She could now pretend there was still hope when there wasn't frankly she'd rather been seen as lazy for not trying than an failure because no one was willing to cut her a break. She was halfway down the block when she felt something drag across her back. She turned and in a blur her bag was off her shoulder as a guy running away with it.
"Oh hell no!" Larrin said as she took after him. She push through the crowds and saw him duck into a corner she followed him but when she rounded the same corner he had, she came to a stop. It was a dead end.
She looked around the area and moved slowly into it but as soon as she made two steps, the thief popped out of his hiding spot and rushed her. He pushed her over and she fell hard, so hard her head bounced on the pavement, her vision clouded over with sparks and stars as a wave of disorientation washed over her. She tried to get up but froze in pure fear as the thief straddled her. He leaned over her and she finally saw his face. It wasn't possible, she'd escaped him in Colorado.
"I have to say, I never thought we'd cross paths again mon petit Lapin." he told her.
