on the road again

I've travelled for eight days down the winding roads.... taking what shelter i could sleeping with one eye open...... the gentil slop of the road makes it easier. each morning i mark my map. scavange the abandoned cars for food or drin, yesterday i found a can of coke so sweet so good i used to hate that but its something........ I guess their had to be people for them to become undead.... at night its as if i am alone the only one in the world...... the only one left.... i've heard nothing except the animals..... squirls russling and the few remaining birds who have not yet flown south ...... the squirls ..... when i lived in the city ...... i thought them such a nucence ........... everywhere....... their final serch for food before the winters sleep comforts me .... they will survive......  I check every car to see if it runs ........ but the vehicles are abandoned, broken or out of fuel.....  the cars are few and far between... but they offer shelter..... rationing everything except water to the extreme .... as streams crisscross the landscape....... I've aquired 2 empty popbottles and carry them filled..... a broken truck yeilded my best treasure to date a large roll of duct tape ...... using some of this ive taken the fabric from cars and made a heavier coat insulating it with the foam from the headlines .. taped and tied with wire....... i look funny but i am warm.....  my work gloves are always on..... the days grow shorter....... i find myself traveling more at night........ from dawn to midnight i walk down the blackend road.......  my rations do nothing but ease the pain of hunger.......... i'll eat anything i can scavange ..... even packets of sugar and ketchup  that seem to accumulate in glove boxes....... the nights have been clear, cloudless, beautiful....... the cold must be slowing them ...... otherwise....... I just dont know. Its getting so cold i can't risk a fire ... i've wrapped the end of the chair leg in the remainder of my canvas in strips ...... it will be a torch but for now....i still need pitch ........  a few small other things ...... checking the cars i come across a desile pickup it has working battery no fuel........ a pitty ....... the roadslopes downward for several miles ....... i wonder.... hopping in the car i place my gear in the back seat... i manage to hotwire it and break the collum lock allowing the transmission and steering  to be unlocked ... i begin to push the car with my left lef as i shift the car into neutral ....... sucess..... rolling down the slope slowly building speed. gravity as the engine....  the trees whip by as i pass nothing without power steering its a struggle to keep it on the road..... as the highway turns to go up again i turn off road driving on the hard packed dirt rolling to the base..... the highway remerges after its detor arround the rocks  back on still rolling the terrain levels out i coast for several more minutes ........ reaching the outter limits of a truckstop...  a good place to scrounge..... i turn in ...... pulling the emergency break ......  i took this gamble because i've seen it contstantly .. fuel depots on the flatlands after hills ..... the rocky wooded terrain is predictable so it was worth the risk ......... not much other places to build them .....  even iof this wasn't here i still didnt have to travel the road on foot...  i manage to possition the truck facing the garage  .......... and pull the emergency break...... time to scout. leacing the bulk of my equpiment except my sword   and mace inside the truck i dart arround listening checking ........ squirls in the old pine growing in the center of the  give me a little comfort.......  rummaging behind i notice drums of old vegitable oil  fry oil from the truck stop greasy spoon .......  discarded trucks...... broken cars.... anythign that could have fled did so long ago .... but there are useful things.......... one of the dead trucks yeilds a small amount of desel fuel........ not much ill have to come back to this truck..........  that good old early 80's f150... a rural truck.... long past its prime. forest green anda bed cover it was just blind luck that i found it...... This will take me a few days...... But i should really look for supplies ...... should really. I enter the truck stop skimming for supplies....... its trashed...... plates on the tables still uncleared ..... it must have hit here quickly they just abandoned everything mid  ... they had to get away....... i  scan the layout of the building . large glass windows....  open concept ........ a doorway in the rear to the kitchen ...... a small staircase off to the leading to a small hallway .......... the office i suppose..... it may not have any windows...... the building is mostly steel and cinderblock........ i can work witht this ... steel doors  The office room is a small concreet block room backed by steel doors .... a small window at the top will provide escape...... if needed...... i can the office... nothing special, outdated 70's furniture........... rifling through the drawers in the steel desk i find several boxes of shotgun shells and an unopened bottle of rye. i move all the furnature to one side of the room  closest to the door ..... i retrieve my supplies from the truck and grab a small table from the cafe...  this will doo...   i put my bag in the office  on one of the wooden chairs and  begin to pile supplies... whatever i can scavange ........  into groups............  empty my bagand sort that as well..... from the  supply closet i grab a few heave garbage bags and  fill them with whatever i find....... i'll sort them later...... keeping only food and chemicals seperate .......  i return the bag to the room when filled...........  in the small convience section i find a box of twinkies numerous bags of corn nuts and dried candied fruit.......... personal hygene products, toothbrushes and basic medicine ......  I only leave the autoshop untouched......  my greatest find was two shotguns one under the counter of the cafe the other in the attendents hut of the gas station...... rifling thought the kitchen i finded dehyrdrated onions and varrious canned foods  and a full first aid kit  a fire axe and discarded potato sacks   a total of eight bags worth of supplies not including those to bulky such as cases of water or juice to haul fit in the bag..... i move all these supplies into the office room  ..  day is half over its early afternoon now ........ i have to prepare for tonight....... i check one of the shotguns an old double barrel two shot model ....... and place it aside....... grabbing thepump action shotgun ....  and check it for ammunition ..... four shots.........  loading it with 9 more bullets  and stuff a few extras in my pants pocket...  keeping my sword on my back .. i venture out  i force open the garage and push the old truck into the bay..... and venture into the back and retreieve the fryoil barrels rolling them into the garage...... i notice a hunting knife under the counter and clip it to my belt ..... after grabbing a hacksaw and the fire axe i start resealing the garage ... i pop one of the discarded vehicles into neutral and move it in front of the shop door then i strip one of the wheels from it and lock the emergency break .......  placing the car in gear i remove the shift handleimobiling the vehicle.....   venturing to the rim of the property i choose a live tree and cut a pole about 8 feet long and 16 inches wide and drag it into the building ...... a perfect door lock  ....  place the pole across the room it is  about five inches too short..... excellent ...... i then grab two log fragments from a pile of firewood and notch using the axe i cave impressions into each and place the log betwen the two  lashing one end with rope the other is left wrapped but untied  ..... so i can open the door  at will  the logs are aprox 4 feet high  so the brace lied in thedead center of the doorway........ i block the window with  the table top lashing to the exposed metal in the wall  and retrieve another pole to act as its lock  the final thing i do in the room is build a bed......  i leave my small fortress  gun in hand  and begin to knock over empty shelves and tables ransaking the rooms  to make no human enter and to make scilence and impossibibility.......  i return to the office room as the sun sets ........ locking myself in for the night