Filed by Lori Kim

You might think Boston would be inhospitable to a self-sufficient community, that the natural resources necessary for such a thing, solar power, wind, heating fuel and the like would be insufficient to provide for eight large buildings worth of people, but Conrad Blankenship has done just that.

The centerpiece of the complex is Conrad tower, 31 stories of living space, cafeterias, workspace and entertainment. Conrad Tower is the home of the residents who started the community with Mr. Blankenship, a consortium of MIT professors, captains of industry and Boston elites who keep the interests of the community constantly in their plans. The tower itself is a magnificent example of late pre-apocalypse Bostonian Architecture, having been recently completed and hardly settled before things began to go wrong in the world. Conrad Blankenship took control of the tower through defaults on the mortgage to his bank.

Originally planned as a low carbon footprint green building, generating much of its own power through solar panels and a battery of wind turbines on the roof, Blankenship had the vision to continue this foundation into a self-sustaining community. Since the building was nearly all glass, he built a ring of hydroponic farming and greenhouses on every floor, at harvest time providing nearly half the food of the community. He also created a large roost for chickens, providing eggs and protein for the resident’s nutrition and fertilizer for the crops. Rainwater is collected, filtered and recycled on site.

As I said, many of the eldest residents of this community are technologists. They are responsible for much of the success and additional resource generation of the community. The building overlooks Boston Harbor, once a busy hub of commerce and international shipping. The Harbor is now idle, but it generates power via wave machines designed on site.

More power is generated from additional solar panels found by scavenging parties sent out through the city. It is one of these scavenging parties that helped extricate me from the situation with Pickman. Neighborhoods are scouted for solar panels, which are removed and added to the buildings. I said before they had a fine architectural style, but it’s only if you look past the solar panels which have been put everywhere they can get a purchase. They said they even have a warehouse of solar calculators that have been collected for the tiny panels which are constantly being built into larger devices.

He was very proud of his claim that he was getting several percent more power for each technology the his community has developed that was in use at the time of the calamity. “We’re pushing the boundaries of what could have been. We’re going to do this right this time around. We’ll be cleaner and better, live up to the promise that we didn’t get the chance to.”

Blankenship obviously wants to expand.

Additional power is generated in the health clubs. Participating in an exercise program is compulsory for the well-being and energy needs of the community. Stationary bikes, rowing machines, and other pieces of equipment are connected via belts or chains to dynamos which generate power.

As I said, there are eight buildings currently in the Blankenship complex. Some of them are specially purposed, one is solely a factory tasked with recycling and manufacturing more usable power generators and resources for the community. I saw a new wave driven power generator nearly off the line, as well as glass furnaces and machinery for metal shaping. This is the only part of the complex that ever uses any kind of fossil fuel, I was told. This is mostly a legacy from when the building was an active facility on the harbor. Much of the machinery has been repurposed or relocated to here in order to complete the task of providing for his community.

None of the buildings in the complex were originally meant to go together. They all existed separately before Blankenship took control of them, and this presented quite a challenge for the engineers. Infrastructure had to be built between the buildings, up to a half-mile apart, using technologies that hadn’t been completely implemented before the end of life as we knew it. In order to make it a complex with a common community, infrastructure had to be shared.

The community is linked by a transportation system mostly reserved for the community leaders of various small vehicles from golf carts to a couple plug in hybrids they were lucky enough to find. They have a number of vehicles they run on biodiesel which is brewed on site from a variety of sources, and a few cars that are run on whatever petroleum resources they can come up with. One of the most fortified areas of the community is a field of petroleum tanks. It has been fortified by a wall of crushed cars and the beginnings of a all made of tree trunks, giving it the look of a post-industrial frontier fort. But trust me, don’t try anything funny in this area. They shoot first, and don’t bother to ask questions.

“The more resources are shared, the more the community will work together. If you must fight with our neighbors for basic needs, only conflict can come of it,” he explained to me in an interview. It was a philosophy of R. Buckminster Fuller, whom he’d studied deeply in his education. “We certainly saw this happen as resources became scarce during the calamity. There would certainly be more of us here on earth if some of the wars over resources hadn’t been fought.”

Blankenship is a dynamic and energetic figure, he led some of my tours personally, and the community reveres him as a capable leader, a teacher and a friend. He’s tall, handsome, and always well groomed, like a politician used to be.

The accommodations I saw in Blankenship Tower were luxurious even by pre-apocalypse standards. I later saw more typical accommodations, and these were adequate, clean and secure as things go.

Family life in the community is diverse and active. The children are in school most days of the year with few breaks to speak of. Conrad believes that only an educated community is prepared for progress and survival. He claims that the children have a master’s level education by the time they would have been in college. The task of teaching students falls on the adults of the community, most of whom held college degrees or higher, and this is one of the ways in which community members pay into the community. In time off from school children may go to the beach, though swimming is not allowed unless you are wearing a full hazard suit, as the PCB contamination of the harbor is still high, and traveling away from the community might not be safe.

The community provides three meals a day, strictly rationed. Much of the cuisine is vegetarian and raw, as the scientists feel that cooking reduces the nutrition of the food and uses too much energy for such a population of this one’s current size. Every little bit of energy and nutrition must be utilized, they explain. Nothing can be wasted. Alcohol and other intoxicants are strictly prohibited for residents.

There are medical facilities available that are impressive to say the least. Health care is provided by doctors and nurses in the community, who also share their knowledge in classes. Medication is largely on the edge of expiring, and so the treatment is slipping further and further into history. They are looking into creating their own drugs, but this is a technical skill in extremely short supply in the world at large. If somebody came to them with those skills, they’d accept that person willingly.

Once a week, there is a community meeting where the leaders describe progress in their technology and their resource building. The meetings are enthusiastic and practically a revival for the community residents. New members are introduced to the group, and strategies are mapped out for the coming quarter year. A primary focus of the community is acquiring pre-made technologies and and resources. During these meetings, the real business comes down to scavenging details.

For the residents, military training and service are compulsory. Security is a significant consideration for any community of this type, and trespassers can be assured they will meet heavy resistance. This training also pays off in defense for the scavenging teams. Blankenship gave me confident assurance that in nearly 150 scavenging missions the previous month, they had only lost four people to ambush and attack and most of those attackers had been summarily tracked down and dealt with.

If you’re looking for a community where you can enjoy significant benefits in exchange for hard work and service, this is the place to go.

If you would like to apply to join, the best way is to approach a scavenging party, but be sure to do it carefully. Bring a white flag and keep your hands where they can see them.

Posted. 06-20-2012

Where to begin on these last few days? I’m alive, and I hope that matters to someone. I’m safe and at my destination, doing a little recovering while in their hospitality. Haven’t met with Conrad Blankenship yet, but I’m assured he will be available when I’m ready.

As far as where I’ve been, the story starts near the entrance of the Ted Williams tunnel. The area swarmed with people, a greater concentration of people than I’d seen since leaving school at least. I went down towards them, and they welcomed me.

I told them who I was, and flashed my press credentials, which got them very excited. Turns out they’d turned the tunnels of I-90 into mushroom farms, and this is how they made their lives. The mushrooms were traded locally, and supplied a large part of their diet. They also accounted for how they got most of their goods. They offered me a dish of Marinated Barbecued mushrooms and a Shiitake Hazelnut Pate for which I gladly traded the t-shirts I’d found the day before. These people know mushroom dishes, and these were amazing. It almost felt like we were back on our feet again, and we’d made the culinary experience a central part of our civilization. They were this good.

They then offered to give me a tour of the farms and the tunnels. The mushrooms were grown on large tables, a lane across in width and four feet across, with a few inches of soil. My tour guide told me how they’d carried in the soil by hand, and find compost wherever they can. He told me that the low lights and high humidity make for great growing conditions and even in winter, they can close off the fronts of the tunnels and keep the temperature ideal.

Got a good distance in before I noticed there were a lot more people behind me than there had been a few moments ago. The one who had been leading me stopped talking as I turned around, he’d been saying something about how many varieties they grow and how many pounds of each, and his list of varieties stopped. That’s when I knew I was in trouble.

He took this moment to explain how desperately they lacked meat. I saw the look in his eyes, a look that said he was looking at lunch.

I jumped up on one of the tables, managed to avoid his grip as he grabbed for my feet and jumped over the the next lane. There were some doors across the way, so I headed there. The rest of them were quickly gaining on me. When I dropped off the tables at the other end, I had a few steps to get going and then I hit the door hard as I could. Nothing doing. It was locked, or maybe corroded shut. It was metal either way and i’d need three of me to break it down.

So Plan B, I pulled out the buck knife I’d found earlier. This caused most of the group to slow down, but the first to reach me was too close to stop. I stabbed fast, and the person screamed, jumping away. The commotion gave me just a second to break through. A hand grabbed my shirt, but I stabbed down hard and nicked a wrist. Slipped through the hand of that one, put my shoulder down, and put it into the groin of another, dropping him to the floor. This allowed me to get away from this group.

I charged to the entrance to the tunnel, maybe 150 yards off, but there was another group at the mouth of the tunnel, waiting. There was also sunlight. Going under the tables to hide would only slow me down and get me caught and cooked, so I screamed and charged, knife out, hoping for the best.

The person I ran into lost his footing and fell, I put the knife in his leg for good measure, but as he rolled away, I lost my grip on it, and there were hands on me. I turned and twisted, but then more hands got a hold of me, ripping my shirt. Kicked one in the nose, know I broke it too, but there wasn’t much hope of escape on my own.

That is until I heard a voice calling at them to stop. They turned, but didn’t comply. Then a large man came over, and ripped their hands off me. Then he pulled me behind him. He had a .45 in his hand, and a rifle slung over his shoulder. He backed me out of the tunnel.

What he said struck me as odd.

“She’s too valuable.”

“She’s valuable as food,” the tour guide called back.

“You aren’t human.” my rescuer replied, then he walked away. He was obviously respected by the mushroom farmers, otherwise they would have given chase.

So, if you happen to be near the Ted Williams Tunnel, by all means trade for some mushrooms, you’ll be hard pressed to find better, but don’t take the tour.

I stayed with my rescuer until I felt safe. Then we stopped for a minute and I calmed down, taking the opportunity to thank my rescuer.

“What’s your name?” I asked him.

“Pickman,” He said. One word. Succinct.

I’ll have to stop here. Some people are here for me. Meal time. Pickman is another story. I’ll upload tomorrow.

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Filed june 14th

Time for the final approach into Boston. Spent an hour scavenging when I woke up. Found a toothbrush and toothpaste in packaging in a house. Also found a buck knife stashed in what was probably a teenage boy’s room. Found it with his porno stash. Then made my way to the road.

It was a couple hours to a place I felt good about getting off the road, getting close to noon. Got off 90 at the Framingham exit. Found a Country Club. Found food, a few boxes of Powerbars. Great for a hike, great for lunch. The course was a perfect place to stash the bike. Had a garage with riding lawn mowers and golf carts to park and conceal the bike. Packed for the hike in. Also broke into the Country Club’s wine cellar. Stashed a couple bottles in the bike, and put one in my backpack. Booze is always a good portable bribe.

With that I started on foot along 90. Took until evening until made it to the suburbs of the city. That’s when the highwaymen found me. I was still five miles or so from where I was supposed to be, and the area was mostly neighborhoods. Lots of overpasses to hide under. It was an amateur crew. One jumped out in front of me, and sounded a signal, but the others were too far back to get me. I gather the plan was to distract me, have them get behind me, and then, well, these days, it’s mostly about the things you carry.

Ordinarily, you ditch the bag you’re carrying, they leave you alone, but I wasn’t about to lose my sat phone and everything that allowed me to work in the third day on the job. Forget that. Without that phone, I turn into these guys but with student debt, not that it wouldn’t be easy to walk away from that.

When you have to fight a group, of men that are all larger than you, the last thing you want is to be surrounded, so I ran off to the middle of the road, and away from the two coming up behind me. Sensei always said when you’re in a street fight, if the fight lasts more than a few seconds, you’re doing it wrong. The goal of a fight is to take your opponent down, not to dance and talk. The distance that I created between myself and the two coming from behind was enough time to take the first one out. I left him behind, bleeding from the nose on the pavement. After that, they stopped coming. One of them pulled a knife, but he wasn’t too serious. I didn’t hesitate at all, took the knife out of the equation, and then the second, and the third didn’t stick around. I collected another knife and a Zippo lighter. Turnabout is fair play.

The sun was setting by this point, so I took the off ramp and disappeared into the neighborhood.

This close to the city, you couldn’t tell which of these houses might have been occupied. There was no power out here still, and so it was best to seek a place to sleep before the sun went down. It’s always tense going into a house like this. Any place could be a haven for the desperate like the highwaymen, still harboring disease, or any number of other things.

So I picked a house on a corner, where I could see for a way from the second floor. No doggie door on the back, so most likely no wild animals. Anything could be dangerous, but a worst case scenario would be an urban coyote or fox. I checked inside every window, and knocked before entering. Funny the conventions we keep.

Air was stale, so I opened all the windows. No food of value inside. Dinner was powerbars.

Tomorrow I should make my assignment.

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Filed June 13th

Caught a few fish in the lake for breakfast. Cooked them over the embers of the fire. They were small, but edible. Caught a few extra for later, put them in a jar with water and then scavenged some of the neighborhood garages for gas cans. Got enough to fill up.

Burned nearly half the day getting back to the freeway, but I managed almost 30 mph most of the way up to 395. This is where I expected the going to get smoother, and it was already getting into evening. I decided to take it easy for the first day out on assignment. No need to push myself into dangerous territory yet. The closer I got to Boston, the more likely I figured I’d run into highwaymen. They tend to keep near the cities, more traffic and a place to go to just in case. You almost never see anybody except within 30 miles or so of the city. A good day’s walk is all most people are willing to challenge the wild if you never had to in your previous life. This far out from the population center, you almost never see people.

I made it to the merge onto 90, about 50 miles from Boston where I made camp. The town I stopped in had been abandoned like so many others. Found a sign saying Attawaugen, broken and the paint practically faded on the way in. Looked like a nice place to live, once. Train tracks ran through it. I like train tracks. They keep me grounded, a little reminder of how far humans once went.

I broke into a few houses to find canned goods. Baked beans, some fruit preserves, fought a rat for some pasta. That with the fish from the morning would make as good a balanced meal as I could get. Found a good size bag of rice, too, which I stashed in the sidecar.

Sat phone’s batteries are holding up, but I gave it a good ten minutes of hand crank charge just in case. I still don’t have a feeling for how quickly they drain.

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Filed June 12th 2012

Graduation day. It isn’t what it used to be. Remember when you’d have a big thing in an auditorium that had no air conditioning? The bleachers would be pulled out and our parents would sit sweating in their finest clothes. Now we stand in a line and wait for a downloaded digital copy of the credentials, paper copies may be bought, but most of us can’t afford it. Not like I dreamed it would be. My parents aren’t alive anymore to see it. This is supposed to be one of those days, one of those all time most important days in your life, but for me, it’s a formality, a period at the end of the last sentence in a book, probably the most trivial event of my college experience.

Of course, the journalism degree course of study isn’t what it used to be either. Three years of survival training, and a little English. I can build a fire in a monsoon, find my way out of the deepest jungles or forests, survive a blizzard alone, and get out of a hard scuffle, but the actual journalism part of the degree was handled in a few classes in one term. I suppose I’ll get the rest of the education on the job. I’m one of the lucky ones. I have a job lined up. It isn’t a job like my parents had, I’m not paid, per se, I’m supported and backed by somebody I’ve never met, but who went to the Profs for a recommendation. I made sure he would pay for the paper diploma before I accepted.

After the ceremony, I went to get my things from my room. A pack had been left for me, as expected. I don’t know who dropped it off, the Resident Advisor, maybe? Inside was my communicator, basically a satellite phone with data capability, a computer in decent shape, some cash of several currencies (not as much as promised. Whoever delivered it had lined his pockets a bit) and some bargaining chips. I powered up the computer and communicator, just to see that they in fact were working, then put them back.

This and a couple other packs of my personal things were all I had as I went out in the world. I loaded them into the sidecar on my Puch and headed off. I’d like to say that I was chosen based on my winning personality or my grades, but no. Mostly it was the bike. Having transport in this job is important, and the rest of my class was setting out on foot.

Once out of the university’s grounds, I powered up the communicator again, and sent a message to retrieve my assignment. Boston. I could handle Boston, a few days of traveling, I hoped, but I had a stop to make that was only a little out of the way. I hoped the editor wouldn’t mind a little personal business. Is the GPS system still up? Does my communicator have a GPS?

I started out on 95. It’s decent still near the city, and you don’t have to worry about traffic, but once you get out of town you run into issues. You have to pick your way around potholes, then sections where the road is nearly gone. A lot of places, I only got 5 mph. When I left the highway, going got even harder.

When I made Lake Galliard, the moon was full and the sky clear, and I couldn’t have felt more miserable. The house was mostly packed up, and would stay that way as far as I could see. I didn’t want to stay there now. The memory of having a family was too close. I wanted to know the house was still standing, drop something off, and come back, I don’t know. Years from now. When it’s better.

When you grow up by the lake, Yale is a religion. My family wanted me to get into the school more than anyone ever, but we were nouveau riche. We didn’t fit in. We didn’t belong. My father designed computer chips, high end architecture stuff, made enough money to give to the school heavily. I had the grades, and I was accepted, but the early stages of the catastrophes were already underway. Both my parents died in my first year.

They were buried in a Catholic cemetery about a mile from the house. I walked there by moonlight with my diploma, a tin, and a small folding shovel. I buried it with them. They wanted it more than me.

I couldn’t deal with sleeping in that house. It didn’t feel like mine. I made a bonfire in the backyard, and slept under the stars.

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