Chapters

Prologue

            The scavengers had returned to Garrick Fork. They circled around the towns' outer walls in the tramped-down fields; they dismantled their semi-trailers and parked the tractors out of the way. Then they set out big tents and awnings, tables to hold their wares, lawn chairs out of the late August sun.

The town of Garrick Fork was a fair size for the mostly-empty plains around the Texas-Arkansas border. About three hundred people came out from town to browse the selection, which would only be there for three days, and not back for another eight weeks. They picked over every table, every corner of the open trailers, for something worth having – be it something useful, frivolous, or simply unique. Children saved their allowance for these days or otherwise begged for toys and pretty things. Mothers scoured bins and tables for children's boots of the right sizes. People looked over furniture, parts to cars and guns and electronic machines. Some trailers were stacked with dishes; tables held packs of white and lined paper; blankets were laid with tee shirts and pairs of jeans in varied condition.

Everything that the people of Garrick Fork could want was there in some amount. The scavengers themselves, in their neat market-clothes, made scrupulous notes in their ledgers about what was bought, what should be restocked. Every town was different, and while clothing, parts, hard-to-find unperishable foods, and household goods were all safe bets, good money could be made hawking the unusual and the rare. Everything, however, required care and attention before being sold – clothing had to be washed, parts cleaned or proven workable, dishes checked for cracks, shoes checked to be in sound condition. Anything overlooked could mean a loss in profit.

As any of them would tell you, there were many reasons why scavenging was a good profession. Scavengers enjoyed freedom, travelling from town to town, often with small families. Their products cost them nothing. The community to which they belonged was small and close-knit, and scavengers looked out for one another.

Yet most people – people of the towns and cities scattered over the remains of America – would never consider scavenging. It was dangerous, lonely, and could drive men mad.

The decrepit houses they entered to find their quarry, remnants of a lost world, were scattered with the bones of the people they were stealing from. Street upon street of silent, lifeless structures – tombs.