I couldn’t be that. I couldn’t sit still and be crushed under the weight of that thing.

I needed to do something, and taking books off the shelves felt like it was moving backward, not forward.

I spun around in my seat, and I loaded up the webpage. Something to do. Methodically filling out details on the group I’d seen, researching, filling myself in, and letting others know what they were up against.

Something constructive to keep me occupied until the power ran out, or until I was so tired I had no choice but to sleep.

Daybreak 1.8

Daylight streamed in at a low angle as I stepped back into my office. The light was blurred as it came through the condensation on the window, spotted with dots of darkness due to the melted frost that still clung to the window’s surface in lines and constellations of droplets. Ninety percent of my books were packed up, the boxes that were still here were stacked near the door and the bookshelf, labeled in thick marker, with shorthand notes on the most interesting and essential files within written on the boxes in pen. I’d left a few of the more interesting files available. I’d put them in a box on their own, in case I needed something to read.

My phone was plugged into the computer. I checked it, and made a small and sleepy pump of my fist as it lit up. Then I saw the red number on the digital-display dial, and let my hand drop. Missed messages: too many.

It wasn’t that I cared that much about the phone. It was that the phone being on meant there was power again. That the power was on again meant I could turn the space heater on. I flicked the switch, turned on my computer, then lit the candles for what little good heat they offered and wrapped a blanket around me before settling in my computer chair.

I was freshly showered, towel around my hair, and I’d gotten dressed in a slightly musty spare change of clothes. I had a blanket, candles, and a computer booting up. I watched as it started the struggle of fighting every other computer out there that was wanting a piece of the web.

There were worse ways to take things easy on myself.

I slid my to-do list across the desk until it was beside my keyboard. I’d need a car. Plenty of people were willing to offer the use of theirs in order to pay for fuel. Food, a place to stay.