Gilbert - Beginnings (Book 1): Future Apocalypse

Copyright 2019

Barbara J. Gilbert

Edited by: Carol Rushing

Cover Design by: Christian Bentulan

All Rights Reserved

Future Apocalypse is a work of fiction. Names, places, etc., are products of the authors imagination. Any resemblance to actual people living or dead, locations, or events, is entirely coincidental.

No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without written permission from the author.

Dedication Page

To my boys:

Marcus and Thomas who accidently inspired me to write.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements

First and foremost, I want to extend my thanks to everyone at NanoWrimo for their encouragement, support and willingness to inspire everyday people to write those stories that lie within their minds.

I want to thank the following author friends for their great advice and help.

Lisa Ackers for pointing me to a book on how to write blurbs.

Tom Abrahams for reading my book and giving me some sage advice, which culminated into a few rewrites and added sections. Thank you!

Boyd Craven for sending me to his cover designer.

Douglas Hogan & G. Michael Hopf for offering to promote my book once it was published.

Robert Wilson, a new author himself, for dinging me on chat every so often and checking on my goals and progress, and for telling me to get up with T.L Payne. Thanks for the added push.

T.L Payne for giving me great advice on how to market and promote my book, and for sending me to a great Facebook group with tons of good information. BTW Im still combing through it all.

Patti Glaspy for telling me about her aunt who is a great editor.

Chris Pike & G. Michael Hopf for TOC help.

Austin Chambers for giving me good writing advice.

Kyla Stone for helping me with KDP select questions.

I want to thank my beta readers for taking the time to read and help catch issues in my book.

And most of all thanks to my friends and family who supported me during this process.

Prologue

Wilmington, NC

She wasnt your typical little girl, one who played with Barbie dolls and learned how to read in kindergarten. Oh no, she was much more! What made her different began before she was born, when her mother, Mary Brown, was struck by lightning. Mary was slim and beautiful, with long, blond hair and sparkling blue eyes, and loved working in her vegetable garden .

One day she was so deeply engrossed in her gardening that she hadnt noticed a bank of dark clouds in the distance. Suddenly, the sky turned dark, and the angry clouds began spitting out heavy rain. Before Mary knew it, a bolt of lightning had slammed into a nearby tree and, as if it were alive, cast a small finger of energy out, striking Mary and knocking her to the ground.

Marys husband, Richard, was handsome, muscular, and usually had to bend over to get through most doorways. He happened to glance out the window at just the time his wife was falling to the ground. He ran out of the house, carefully picked her up, took her to their car, and laid her gently into the back seat of their red Ford explorer. Hopping into the front seat, he peeled out of the driveway, spraying gravel far into the air, and headed toward the local hospital. By some kind of miracle, Mary and the baby survived the lightning strike, and the doctor told them both would be fine.

Little Paulette Brown was born two months later during one of the most intense hurricanes that had ever hit North Carolina. Even though she came into the world screaming and yelling, she never spoke until she was three. Doctors believed it was because of the lightning strike, but little Paulette would prove them wrong. When she finally spoke, her words were more like a soliloquy of knowledge than a normal three-year-old. Her parents couldnt believe what they were hearing and realized that she was indeed a gifted child. They no longer had doubts about their little girls abilities, but they were now left with new concerns what to do with her genius, how to keep her a little girl, and how to prevent her from being turned into some freak show. They made the decision to keep her at the appropriate grade level for her age so that shed be treated like a normal child.

Paulette didnt like being held back and continued to learn everything she could. Even at the age of ten, her favorite subjects were math and physics.

Her favorite place to go after school and on the weekends was the library. She loved going in and being surrounded by rows upon rows of books books like Quantum Physics or Advanced Math, and even Huckleberry Finn. She could then choose any book she wanted and sit down in a comfy chair and read to her hearts content, basking in the silence that was only occasionally interrupted by a quiet whisper at the front desk or a pencil that slipped away from its owner and fell to the floor. She needed that place of refuge in her life since her school days were long and boring.

Paulette was growing up fast. She had entered the eighth grade and still hated every minute of school. She spent her days working on science projects. One project involved time travel; and, although she still couldnt quite figure it out, she enjoyed the challenge. Her parents let her experiment because they assumed that fantasy would soon pass. But Paulette didnt think of it as a fantasy.

The Browns lived in a modest, three-bedroom home, with a living room, kitchen, and den. The one thing that stood out with their home was the storm shelter that Paulettes dad had built in half of the basement. He always believed in being prepared. He grew up in a family of preppers, those people who always prepare for the worst that seems to never happen. Because of his upbringing, he was a little burned out on the whole SHTF Shit Hits the Fan mentality; but living in a hurricane, and sometimes, tornado zone, he decided a storm shelter, with at least a weeks supply of food and water, would be good enough.

On October 8, 2020, a hurricane warning was issued for the entire Wilmington area. Hurricane Jackson was packing winds of one hundred plus miles an hour and would arrive in a day or two. The Weather Channel assured everyone it would hit land as a high CAT 2 or low CAT 3, but the government wasnt taking any chances after what had happened from Hurricane Michael in Florida two years earlier. So, they ordered people to evacuate the city and outlying areas.

Richard, being a stubborn and self-assured person and determined that they could take care of themselves, refused to leave. He was certain that a measly CAT 3 hurricane wouldnt hurt them any more than any of the other hurricanes of the past.

Paulette and her parents prepared for the hurricane as they always had. They boarded up the windows, checked to see that the animals could get free, made sure there was plenty of water and food in the storm shelter, and took their pets to the shelter with them. They had always come back up from prior hurricanes to find the house was fine, so they hadnt bothered to take any important documents or anything else they wanted to keep safe.

As the hurricane drew closer, the weather forecasters became more and more concerned. They stated that the hurricane would hit the coast of North Carolina just slightly south of Wilmington, and it would pack sustained winds of two hundred plus miles an hour, with gusts as high as two hundred fifty.

The storm worsened quickly; but it was long past time to evacuate, so Paulette and her parents went down to their shelter. Paulettes dad decided that maybe he was wrong and should get their important papers and a few other things. Paulette and her mom urged him not to, but he insisted he would be okay and that the hurricane wasnt that close yet. Paulettes mom couldnt convince him otherwise, so off he went with instructions for them not to open the door till he returned and not to come up for any reason. Paulette and her mom cried as her dad left to go upstairs.