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She hung up and resumed her power walk.

She showed identification at the gate on the northern side of the building. The guards let her in without a second look. Carly thanked them with a smile, even though she had no time for such pleasantries.

The storm approached.

Carly found her way to the mayor’s office. She didn’t even knock. She walked right in.

The television blared reports from Washington, with a picture-in-picture showing devastation from Denver; the picture was fuzzy, most likely a web-based camera. Every eye in the room stared at the footage, not knowing someone else had joined them until Carly cleared her throat.

“Can I help you?” the receptionist asked after she turned.

“My name is Carly Simmons. I’m an aide to the president. I must speak with the mayor at once.”

“He’s in a meeting right now –”

“Meeting’s over,” Carly demanded. The receptionist jumped. “I’ll be directing the planning for the coming refugees.”

“That’s what they’re meeting about, though.”

“Which way?”

The receptionist pointed through the closed door.

Carly didn’t wait for an invitation. She walked past the woman and barged in.

Around a conference table, people argued. Fingers pointed every which way. Maps and blue prints littered the table, along with Styrofoam Dunkin Donuts cups and slivers of strudel.

Carly sought out the only well-known face, that of the mayor. He sat at the end of the table, amid the hubbub surrounding him. He’d clearly given up trying to control his own meeting. He rubbed his temples, as if a headache settled on the sides of his skull.

I came just in time, Carly thought. She walked to the table and slammed her briefcase on it.

Everyone jumped. The mayor groaned a tad.

“I hope I’m not disrupting something important,” Carly said. A slight grin crossed her face.

“Who the hell are you?” the mayor said.

“I’m Carly Simmons from Washington. I’m here to direct refugee movements. The rest of you can skedaddle; you’ll receive orders soon.”

The others began arguing to her – not with her, for Carly disregarded each in turn. She finally whistled, cutting off their bitching and moaning.

“This is officially a federal matter now, boys and girls. The president requests you follow my lead. Homeland Security is aware of what’s going on, and they’re monitoring the flow of traffic headed east. People are coming, a lot of people, and Boston has to be ready. They’ll need places to stay, and no, they can’t afford a hotel for the rest of their lives. Now if you’ll excuse the mayor and I, we have a lot to discuss.”

A lot of grumbling followed the department heads out the door. The last one turned and flipped her off.

Carly simply waggled her fingers up by her face as the door shut.

“Thank God you came when you did,” the mayor said. He walked to his desk, took two aspirin, and chased them with water. “Those people were going to be the death of me; or at least my mind. What’s the situation?”

“Survivors are coming in droves. Highways are clogged. Intel suggests people will try to get off the highway at the first exit that isn’t backed up for miles. That means Sturbridge, Auburn, maybe even Millbury. It’s possible to close the exits and corral as many as we can into Boston. The president is on the phone with the governor now, and he’s trying to do just that. There’s loads of open space here: City Hall Plaza, the Public Gardens, Fenway Park, the Garden. We have to set up tent cities in the open areas and cordon off areas inside the Garden. We want to avoid any Katrina-esque incidents.”

“It’ll be like 1978 all over again,” the mayor muttered, referring to the unexpected February blizzard that stranded fans inside the old Boston Garden during the Beanpot hockey tournament. “What are we going to do about food? How are we going to feed all these people?”

Carly frowned.

“The first few weeks will be a stretch. Meat will go quickly, I suspect. So will other standard essentials.”

“That usually happens here; New Englanders hit the grocery store and clean out milk and bread when the weathermen call for snow flurries.”

“But this isn’t just snow flurries, Mayor D’Angelo. This is a storm of not only people, but ash and rock that will change the fate of this country.” Carly paused, as if choked up. She took a deep breath. “As I was saying, the first few weeks will be a stretch, but as soon as we get a full count of how many people survived, we can re-route government-supplied food to the areas that need it most.”

“You’re talking about a completely new census. That could take months, Miss Simmons. These people will starve within six weeks.”

“We’re hoping it won’t take that long, which means we’ll need to recruit people to handle the proper counts. That must be done immediately. We can’t let anyone settle in. Those counts are imperative. And until we can figure out which areas need the most food, it’s going to be strictly on a rationing system. Grocery stores are going to be shut down for the time being; hopefully not more than a day or two.”

“That’s not going to work. We’ll have riots on your hands if you close the grocery stores. Bostonians are going to go nuts when they find out.”

“They’ll behave. We won’t give them a choice. The government is taking a firm grasp; we’re not going to let this disaster get out of hand. We’ve learned from prior mistakes, and we’ll make sure it’s peaceable. The president has ordered all divisions of the military on stand-by; the governors will probably follow the directives of the president and ready their respective National Guard units.”

D’Angelo sighed.

“Where else did the president send people like you to?”

“Every major city on the eastern seaboard will have a federal liaison.”

“They obviously have reservations about what’s going to happen.”

Carly nodded.

“Mister Mayor, I’m going to be frank with you. We are just as scared about what’s going to happen as everyone else. This ash cloud has already killed millions of people, and it’s going to kill more. Every farm in the bible belt is gone. Our ecosystem is in ruins. Food is going to be hard to come by; hell, even a packet of Skittles and a cup of coffee will soon be considered a luxury. We’re going to have riots over this, that I know, and the president knows that, too. Martial law will rather quickly become the norm on the east coast; what remains of Congress won’t like it, especially the Republicans, but he’s having his people draft a bill to vacate elections for the time being. We have to calm the people and tell them they won’t starve, but –” Carly paused, biting her tongue.

“But what?”

“We’re hoping that some people do starve, and that the ash cloud buries more cars on the eastbound highways. That way, there will be more food for everyone else.”

D’Angelo’s eyes widened, his mouth opening and closing, as if trying to find words.

“That’s despicable,” he sputtered at last.

“It is, but it could be the only way we’ll control the food distribution. We were lucky to get government-issued cheese and meat out of Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle before the ash cloud fully covered the west coast; those ships are taking a very long way to get around the globe. It may be two or three weeks before they get here, if they get here at all. Who knows what will actually be edible by the time they arrive. We can’t trust they’ll have safe passage through the Indian Ocean. One of the ships that left Los Angeles may stop in Miami, if the captain chooses to take the Panama Canal. After that…” She let the thought hang perilously in the air.

“Has the president reached out to other countries for aid? What can England or our allies do to help us?”