Essential Beginnings Read Online Free Page A

that the world is about to plummet into ten years of winter…it’ll be people like Rat who will clean off the shelves intent on schilling his neighbors out of any chance at surviving the week while not giving a good goddamn about anyone other than himself.”
    “You’ll show me these calculations you’re talking about?” Mav asked, pushing himself off of his Jeep and falling into step beside Ernie. “I’m going to need something a little more concrete than those docudramas you keep watching, and that includes all that conspiracy theory horseshit too.”
    “We’ll make an evening of it,” Ernie promised gruffly, pulling a battered baseball cap out of his back pocket and sliding it over his silver hair. “After you come to see and believe that what I’ve said over the years is in fact the truth…that’s when you’ll sound like the zealot and not me.”
    “Why is that?” Mav inquired, not understanding where Ernie was going with this. Mav didn’t want his coffee to go to waste, so he took a drink of the now lukewarm liquid and grimaced. He tossed the cup into the trashcan when they finally crossed the road with regret, knowing he would need the caffeine later. “You think I’ll drink the Kool-Aid, Master Guns?”
    “Oh, you’ll drink it all right. Every last drop, son.” Ernie pulled open the door to Marvin’s hardware store but stopped to look at Mav. “And that’s when you’ll be calling the rest of our Marines to haul their asses back up here before it’s too damn late. By that time we’ll have to defend what we’ve got.”

Chapter Two

    H enley still couldn’t believe that Mav had caved into Ernie’s demands regarding staying for another day. It shouldn’t have mattered to her, but somehow it did. To add on to her bad day, the old coot had talked her into having dinner with both of them this evening. She would have tried her damnedest to get out of it, but it wasn’t like they didn’t know she didn’t have anything else to do. She had considered an outright refusal though, but that would have certainly have made her look like the bitch Mav undoubtedly thought she was. She did have two reasonably solid justifications for not going, but it wasn’t like she could tell Ernie she didn’t want to hear his nonsense regarding a supervolcano and she certainly couldn’t convey to Mav that she wasn’t going to deal with the underlying attraction between them right now. She was screwed no matter how this evening ended, but she could make certain it wasn’t in the literal sense.
    It was quite cool here in the evenings despite it being spring, so Henley had changed into a pink lightweight fleece sweater. She didn’t want Mav to think she was going to any extra lengths in her looks just because he was going to be there, so she purposefully didn’t put on any make-up and used a hair tie to secure the long strands in a semi-bun on top of her head. She took one last look in her bathroom mirror before she was satisfied with her appearance.
    Henley made her way into the living room after having closed the blinds in her bedroom and turning on her small bedside lamp. The sun was just now setting, but it would be dark by the time she returned. The small cabin was only one of two out of twelve cabins that contained a modern indoor bathroom. Ernie claimed the other at the front of the property. Her cabin was the last in line uphill from the main lodge. The remaining ten cabins were for guests and they used separate two-hole outhouses behind each unit. The idea was that log cabins provided a rustic and primitive experience, yet each had electric power and a natural gas heat pump. The outhouses also used a shared septic system and were heated since they were also equipped with a shower stall and sink—so much for truly roughing it.
    Ernie had capitalized on the fact that people wanted the facade of primitive camping, but without the inconvenience. Two 400kw military surplus generators, converted to burn