The Last Human (a novel)

It was not easy to pack up and go into the unknown. Adrian's isolated estate had thus far provided security from the breakdown of society and more importantly freedom from the spread of the disease. So there was grumbling and there were arguments about the move.

And there were the understandable disagreements about what to take to Los Alamos and then to Europe from there and what to leave. It was agonizing to have to decide, made all the worse by the reminders that they would never be coming back.

But the logic of it was clear. And they still respected what remained of the United States government. The decision had been made. They felt a duty to fall in line with it and not break ranks. That might set an example and cause other to balk, and if even a few others balked the whole seriously thought-out plan would come unraveled. There might not be time to hack out a new plan. So in the end they strapped cartons on shipping skids and put them hear the helicopter pad.

Then one day in late spring they loaded everything onto two Chinook helicopters sent from Los Alamos. The first stop was Beale Air Force Base. It's runway was wet from being sprayed with formaldehyde. A C-130 cargo plane had landed, turned around, and waited at the end of the runway.

A forklift hoisted skids and bags onto the waiting cargo plane. Idris, Adrian, Lionel, Clara, Evelyn, and Security Guards boarded. The helicopters then went on to evacuate several other estates in northern California.

"Well, this is it," Idris said glumly.

"Yeah," Adrian nodded.

"We'll do what we have to," Lionel said.

The flight went well. Pilots were being hastily trained, but the president detailed his best ones for the consolidation mission. If anything had gone wrong, some crucial people would have balked. The whole consolidation and evacuation-to-Europe program might have been over. For the moment the government had no plan B. But thanks to care and planning things went well. Everyone, every remaining human being in the world as far as anyone knew, was evacuated to and consolidated at Los Alamos. Monitoring of southern Europe and planning to evacuate to there could begin.

From its beginning in the early 1940s as a super-secret lab to create and produce atomic bombs, Los Alamos had always been an isolated quasi-military government outpost.

Its present use as a launching pad for the total evacuation of all remaining human beings from North America took on a military base atmosphere. But this was not due to excessive military presence. It was simply necessary to run a disciplined base. Discipline was not only necessary to prepare for the total evacuation of North America but to maintain the present level of effectiveness against the spread of the Baghdad virus.