No Easy Hope - 01 by James Cook Page A

tonight, read that email I sent you. It should answer a lot of questions for you.”
    “About what?” I asked.
    “About me, about my life, about the things I’ve seen, and about what lies ahead for all of us. About why I helped you buy all those nice toys of yours, and why I let you know about the bunker I built here on my property. By the way I’m glad you decided to get a couple of your own.”
    “Do you think I should go ahead and drive up to Morganton? My shelter there is just as good as the one here.” I asked.
    “I would stay in Charlotte for now. If things get bad, people will quite literally head for the hills. Your place up here is too close to town, people might get funny ideas. You’re better off where you are for the time being, assuming you stay in your damn shelter like I told you to.”
    “Will do. I’m gonna let you go so I can finish up around the house. I’ll give you a call in the morning.  Try to get some rest tonight.”
    “I’ll do my best. Talk to you tomorrow.” He hung up.
    I put my cell phone back down on the coffee table and considered what to do next. It was only a little after three forty-five in the afternoon. I had plenty of daylight left, and I needed to make the most of it. I made a few passes through my house trying to find anything else I should take down into the shelter with me, and decided I had everything I needed for the time being.
    When I had the house in Charlotte built, I purchased a sophisticated security and closed circuit camera system for it. There were contact alarms on the windows and doors, as well as motion sensors and hidden cameras in every part of the house, both inside and out. The windows and doors were set into reinforced steel frames. The doors looked ordinary, but were actually made of steel and were extremely difficult to break down. Instead of glass, the windows panes were thick plates of a clear polymer that was strong enough to stop a pistol bullet.
    I lived alone, and owned many valuable possessions. Being that I had little else to do with my money, I figured it would be a good investment to make my home as secure as possible. After the house was finished, Gabe inspected the security company’s work and pronounced it ‘serviceable’. For Gabe, that was high praise.
    I armed the security system from my computer, and then went to the kitchen to get something to eat. I had taken most of the food in the house down to the shelter, but there were still cold cuts in the fridge and some bread in the cupboard. I made myself a sandwich and ate it standing by the kitchen counter, too hungry to bother taking it into the living room. After I finished, I turned the TV back on and watched with growing concern as the situation in Atlanta continued to deteriorate.
    It soon became clear that everything Gabe had told me about the Reanimation Phage was terrifyingly true. News footage repeatedly showed the infected attacking anyone they could get their hands on. The networks brought so-called ‘experts’ on their programs to provide explanations for why the awful violence had spread so far, so quickly. The explanations varied, and covered everything from mass hysteria to airborne diseases that affected the brain. A spokesman for Homeland Security suggested it could possibly be some kind of neurotoxin released by terrorists, prompting an entirely new round of speculation and debate.
    I would have laughed at all of them, if the implications weren’t so dire. It was obvious that no one had the faintest clue what was really happening. If the scientists, doctors, and government officials that the public depended on to handle situations like this did not understand what they were facing, then it was unlikely that they would be able to do anything to halt the spread of the disease. I began to understand why Gabe was so afraid of this thing.
    I turned off the TV and went down to the basement. I pulled the dryer out from the wall a few feet and pressed a hidden switch