The Event: The Beginning by Lee Thomas Page A

hoped, so we loaded back up and started driving again.
                  The highway twisted through Memphis, and luckily we had no more roadblocks, even though we passed many wrecks, or stalled vehicles. Once on the other side of the city, we moved fairly quickly until our next exit. One of the group had family in Brownsville they wanted to check on, and it was only a short detour. We took the exit and headed north. It was a small, two lane highway to Brownsville, and it was slow going as there were multiple wrecks along the way.
                  We made our way north until we found the town, and it looked to be a small farming town. There were businesses lined up and down the street, cars parked or wrecked all over the place. Some buildings had boarded up windows, some were busted out. There was glass and trash all over the street, but we didn’t see any bodies, or blood. A few stray animals here and there, but they mostly stayed away from us. Jeff found a grocery store with a nice sized parking lot to pull over into, and we all stopped to assess the situation. Once all the vehicles had pulled in and stopped, I got out with a radio and my weapons. Roger, Jeff, and a few others joined me.
                  "Ok. Dave, take a few men and go look over the grocery store. I don’t have high hopes, but maybe we will get lucky. Jeff, Roger, and you three will go with Eric and myself to search for his family. Let's take two of the cars off trailers so we won't waste so much gas. I want hand weapons mostly, swords, crowbars, etc. The less noise we make the better." I told the group around me. One of the men named Steve ran back to the RV to get Eric and his weapons, while Dave gathered his men to search the store. Jeff and I went to unload the two cars and make sure they had gas.
                  Once the cars were fueled and ready, Jeff took some men with him, and I took the rest. Eric was in Jeff's car in the lead, showing us the way, while I had Roger, Steve, and one of the other guys with me. We each had radios, and I hoped they would reach the convoy too, just in case.
                  We rolled through town, taking turns as Eric described, looking at various places they could be on the way to their house. We tried city hall, with no luck. It didn’t even appear that anyone had ever holed up there. Next we went two blocks to the city jail. It was a sturdy building, and would have been a good place to go, but it too was empty. We did find a few more weapons and some ammo there, as well as some riot gear and bullet proof vests to add to our armor collection. By the time we had searched those two, and made it to Eric's family's house, it was pushing noon. I was hoping to be further along than this by now, but we weren't too far behind schedule.
                  Eric had us stop in front of a two story, nice house. The yard was becoming overgrown, and there were no cars to be seen, but there was a large three car garage in the back. It appeared that the windows on the ground floor were boarded up, but not the second. There was also a privacy fence around the property that someone had placed barbwire coils on top of. Obviously someone at one point had tried to fortify this place. I could only hope that Eric's family was still alive.
                  We got out and looked around. There was no movement that we could see, and no noise but the wind. I formed the group up in one formation so we could keep a view in all directions, while Roger, Jeff, Eric, and I took point. We started by heading up the driveway towards the garage. It too looked boarded up. There was no door on this side of the house, so I could only assume that there was one that lead from the garage straight to the back yard, and then into the house.
                  Roger checked the fence, but of course the gate was locked, as we expected. I motioned for two of the others to come