The Horde...One
"I had to shake my head. It wasn’t easy to explain the California horde to those who hadn’t seen it or experienced a brush with the edge of its churning path of destruction. “The rails up and through the mountains are pretty much the only way to get to central or northern Cali. The caravans from Frisco and all places north use the rails or the paths next to them to move merchandise back and forth. From here there is no way to get to Cali using the old highways.”
“Why not?”
"I looked at the girl standing in front of me, I didn’t want to know just how young she really was, I made an assumption and felt appropriately ashamed by her response."
“You spend most of your life in New Albuquerque?”
"Emma nodded, “I was young, six when my daddy drove us to the gates of the city. My momma was already one of them by then. I was the youngest, nothing but a mouth to feed, so Daddy sold me to the General for enough gas to get to wherever he was going.”
“Well before everything went to shit, most of the produce and a lot of the livestock that fed the western half of the country came out of south and central California. When the plague hit a lot of ranchers didn’t have much in the way of options, their stock was nearly impossible to protect with the hordes pouring out of the cities in search of food so they set them free before they fled east or further north into the countryside. Imagine it if you can, millions of cows, pigs, chickens, turkeys, sheep, you name it, all of them getting let loose. It didn’t take them long to thin out, get eaten up and learn to migrate and graze like they used to do when they were wild. California, specially the south was one of the most populated parts of the country. You put those two things together and you get what most of us call the California horde.”
"I shrugged because I was honestly out of words. “There’s no way to describe it really. Have you ever seen a picture of the planet Jupiter?”
"Emma nodded."
“You know that giant red swirling dot on Jupiter?”
"The girl smiled, “Yeah, I read that it’s supposed to be a giant storm, a hurricane that works its way across the face of the planet, endlessly.”
"I considered the animals that followed the water ways of central and southern California and their own seasonal food sources and the hordes that constantly stalked them, “It’s an endless chain, millions of them moving and following their source of food. Everything south and often times east of New Frisco belongs to them now, it probably always will. That is the California horde, millions strong and always chasing the herds that barely keep ahead of them.”
"Emma nodded, “Then Denver it is.”