Chapter 2: (Chapter 2) James & Sam
The following interview was transcribed verbatim from a recorded session and written alongside several personal observations.
My first interviewees from this survivor village enter the room, they're both somewhat nervous but they look friendly enough. The first is male, around six foot three give or take, dark hair, glasses, well built. His friend is also male, standing at about five foot nine, bald, also with glasses. Both men are in their late sixties from what I can see, look like they've been hard at work all day but are well-groomed all things considered.
AA - Morning gentlemen, thank you for making time for me, I appreciate you must be quite busy, sit, please.
JC - Erm, thanks, it's a quiet day so far, to be honest.
SN - Be quieter if that generator didn't keep packing it in.
(He slumps down, somewhat tired.)
AA - I can imagine, working with what you can salvage from however many years ago now.
SN - Well, make do with what you have, I guess.
JC - Yeah, if we have to live this far away from...well anything, we have to make it work really.
(Both men seem relatively at ease, allowing for a little discomfort at the change of routine I've brought to their town.)
AA - Well, we'll just dive straight in shall we?
(Something of an awkward pause.)
AA - Please relax gentlemen, this isn't a tribunal, just an interview for the history books.
JC - Weird thing to think of really.
SN - Yeah, we'll be in history books. Always thought I'd just...fade.
AA - Well, on that rather optimistic note, why don't we start with your names? Less drama in that.
(They speak over each other)
AA - Why don't we start with you.
(I gesture to the taller of the two)
SN - Right, yeah, erm, Sam Nicholson, hi.
JC - That's it? Oh, James Cove here.
AA - Perfect, a racing start here. And what is it you two do here?
SN - We're JOATs.
AA - Wonderful, now I-wait, what?
JC - Told you it wouldn't stick.
SN - Gimme a break, he's new here.
AA - If someone could explain?
JC - Sammy boy here made it up, JOAT. Sounds like a venereal disease-
SN - Jack-of-all-trade, that's what it is. Nothing complicated.
AA - Makes sense, I'd imagine saying that several times a day would become tedious.
SN - Hah! Exactly, see James, he gets it.
(Sam looks rather pleased with himself.)
JC - Don't get me wrong, it makes total sense...if we lived in a town where everyone didn't know the comings and goings of everyone else in the place.
SN - You never know, Rog keeps saying he'll knock up a town charter at some point.
AA - Excuse me, Rog?
JC - Oh, Roger, he's kinda the guy in charge around here.
SN - Though he insists he's not. Heard him say he'll have to take a census or something soon, with the rate the place is growing and all.
AA - Fair enough, he's on my list but as you can imagine he's very busy with...well everything. So, getting back on track here, you're both...JOATs. What does that entail exactly?
JC - Well, as you'd imagine it's a little bit of everything.
SN - We've got skills in most manual tasks, though we are somewhat specialised in some regards.
AA - Such as?
JC - I focus more on the engineering side of things.
SN - Whereas I tend to be more on the construction side of things.
AA - Two handymen to have around indeed, I imagine you're kept busy.
SN - We've got teams who handle a lot of things.
JC - I suppose we kinda just figure out what needs doing and make sure it gets done at the end of the day.
AA - I'm surprised to find that there's a big demand for engineering, whereas construction makes more sense.
SN - Oh, ouch.
(Sam smiles at James wryly.)
AA - Oh, my apologies, no offence intended of course.
(They both laugh reservedly.)
JC - It's fine, I get where you're coming from. But with the expanding rural areas around here, plus all the vehicles the construction teams need, and then there are the scouts…
SN - Demanding group they are.
AA - I imagine they're high on the list of priorities.
JC - They have to be really, but it doesn't make my job any bloody easier.
SN - They don't have a particularly complex set of needs since they go around on foot for the most part.
AA - What is it they need exactly?
SN - Trucks.
JC - Yeah, they just need the trucks to get them to and from their sites. Some groups use motorcycle outriders but there's less demand for them since the...mutants left.
AA - Mutants you say?
SN - Oh come on, you must've seen them on your travels from...actually, where are you-
AA - I've seen them, but they seemed to keep to themselves for the most part.
JC - They tend not to bother you unless you get too close to their homes, then it gets very ugly very quickly.
SN - Last I heard they were spotted heading north, every single one of them.
AA - Have you ever had an encounter?
(They seem relieved somewhat.)
SN - No, thankfully.
JC - I think Steve and Gary have though, they were really shaken by the ordeal.
(A brief pause, both men seem to be lost in their own thoughts.)
AA - So, you mentioned something about a generator acting up earlier Sam?
SN - Hmm? Oh, erm, yeah, petrol generator keeps packing in when we use it for long periods of time.
JC - Knew we should've gone with renewable energy.
SN - You'd burn garbage if you could, remember that game?
JC - Man, you go garbage power generators one time and it doesn't go away.
AA - You seem to have quite a pristine memory of your previous lives.
SN - Only certain bits, to be honest, silly little memories like that.
JC - Yeah, I remember handfuls of stuff sometimes, some of it really good, some of it...well…
(JC's brow wrinkles in thought and SN's eyes seem far away)
AA - Well, yes. Back on track again, you mentioned using renewable energy?
JC - Yeah, it'd be much easier in the long run.
SN - Trouble is, this country wasn't exactly known for its abundance of sunshine before everything collapsed.
JC - The wind though, my word.
SN - Oh yeah, excellent wind. Trouble is we don't have parts for wind turbines around here.
JC - We've put in a request for the wind farm over the hill to be put to better use for us.
SN - They don't move anymore but a good helping of grease and cleaning should fix them up.
AA - You plan to move the turbines?
(Another laugh.)
JC - Oh no, we're not at that stage yet.
SN - Still, shouldn't be too much of an issue to redirect the power lines to our town here, I figure with this being a motorway and all there are bound to be some connections under the concrete somewhere.
JC - Yeah, there's a few access points we need to check out, but luckily most of the power runs above us.
SN - Change a few cables here and there, boom, power.
JC - Hopefully without the boom.
SN - Couldn't deal with that again.
AA - Again?
SN - Long story.
(He smiles wistfully.)
JC - But yeah, solar power would be good. If we were closer to the coast, wave generators could be really good too.
AA - Yes, I noticed the coastline here was a little...unruly.
SN - Always has been, it's a wonder the government never invested in the renewable energy side of things. Well, this is where it got us I suppose.
JC - Well, we can start from scratch now at least.
AA - If you don't mind me saying, that's a very optimistic attitude considering your situation.
SN - Has to start somewhere, we're finally in a position to make a real difference here, do things to proper way without nonsense politics interfering.
JC - Man, having no government around sure speeds things along.
AA - A healthy outlook to be certain. Do you think it's a direction that should've been taken from the start then?
JC - Definitely.
SN - I can kinda get why it never happened on an industrial scale though, at least for this country.
JC - How so?
SN - Well, using fossil fuels was all we ever knew really, burning heaps of coal for steam generators, trains, factories, you name it. After that it was petrol. Just using what we had, I guess at the time it would've been too much of an investment to move everything over.
JC - Crazy that so much global politicking was held up in the production of fossil fuels, especially oil. Man, just thinking about it...makes my head just hurt to be honest.
SN - Yeah, same here.
AA - So, you two had a problem with that in general before everything happened to the planet?
SN - You mean the whole 'end-of-the-world thing'? Yeah, we did but we were never in a position to do anything about it.
JC - You can join as many protests, rallies and social media pages as you want but at the end of the day you're attached to the grid, there's not much more you can do.
SN- Unless you own a parcel of land and can build your own self-sustaining house on it.
JC - Which, don't get us wrong, is the dream. But…
SN - How many people are lucky or rich enough to pull that off?
AA - I see your point. But now…?
SN - Well, now we have the opportunity to start from the ground up I guess.
JC - We have the benefit of knowing it all, essentially.
AA - How do you mean?
(They both shrug.)
SN - Just in terms that we know, in general, what's good for the environment and what's not.
JC - So we're burning as small amounts of fossil fuels as we can get away with and putting a large chunk of resources into reclaiming some of the natural power generators around here.
SN - We're setting off with a scout group next week to a spot where some solar panels should be located. Get those set up with the wind turbines and bang, renewable energy.
AA - I sincerely hope it works out for you both.
JC - And the town, truth be told now that we're in a position to make a difference I don't think we could live with ourselves if we don't pull it off.
AA - That's a lot of pressure to put on yourselves.
SN - Just the fate of the world, where's the pressure in that?
JC - We knew it was bad before...well before everything happened.
SN - Ice caps melting.
JC - Ozone layer depleting.
SN - Global warming in general.
JC - Wars over oil deposits.
SN -Rainforests being decimated.
JC - Species going extinct daily.
SN - We would've joined them if we kept going on that way. But, we go to sleep for a few years and here we are.
JC - Yeah, everything grew substantially quicker when humans weren't around to mess it up.
AA - You raise an interesting point, the environmental catastrophes aside. Did you mention there, going to sleep?
SN - It comes and goes.
JC - Yeah, we can seem to remember snippets at a time, but nothing major.
SN - Same with everyone in the town too, no one remembers much before...waking up.
(Both men shuffle in their seats, casting sidelong glances at each other nervously.)
AA - You can relax here gentlemen, as I said before this is not a tribunal, I'm just getting some history down.
SN- Well, I can remember things started to get really bad.
JC- The world was sliding toward another war and fast. Relationships between countries were gone and there were no more resources to keep everyone civil.
SN - So we went into hiding, just heard about this bunker network that...erm…
(He trails off, eyes distant.)
AA - ...do go on.
(He snaps back into focus, memories gone.)
SN - I...erm...yeah, sorry. We heard about this bunker network and we packed and bailed basically.
AA - And your families? Friends?
JC - Not much time to think about them...which seems odd. But we were told they'd found their bunkers and were safely tucked away.
AA - Then you...fell asleep? Is that right?
SN - I erm...I think so. Something like that. My head hurts.
JC - Mine too, I remember going in then coming out later and being decades older. The world was...well it was like this and we had to make the best of it.
AA - So how did you end up here?
SN - We wandered for it bit, tried to find other survivors.
JC - Eventually we got my old car working and took to the roads for a while.
SN - Mm, we saw some crazy stuff before we went in though. Zombies, riots, protests, wars…
JC - But when we came out there was just...nothing. Cities and towns were still there, either bombed out or overgrown with nature.
SN - Trees bigger than anything I'd ever seen, vines engulfing houses and tearing up roads…
JC - Yeah it was nuts. We never encountered any of those mutant things thankfully.
AA - And getting here?
SN - Oh yeah, sorry, lost on memory lane there for a sec.
JC - We bumped into another group at least, you should've seen how happy we all were.
SN - Damn-near had a party with the supplies we had.
JC - Said they were headed south so we tagged along.
SN - Came across this place a couple days later.
JC - Then there was a party, man.
SN - Fireworks even! That sergeant fellow wasn't too happy about it, but with the look on his face, he never is.
AA - Yes, he's another on my list to interview.
JC - I wouldn't bother.
SN - Bit of an arse to be honest.
AA - Oh? Interesting. Well, I think I have about all I need for now so thank you, two gentlemen, for joining me this afternoon.
JC - Yeah, thanks for having us.
SN - See you around!
(END)
A few notes here, both candidates seemed incredibly nervous during the interview for obvious reasons. It is possible that recounting the events that lead humanity to this dark place at the end of all times shakes their confidence somewhat. Who knew?
The people of this settlement seem to lose themselves in their work, rebuilding a fraction of what was lost. I've seen a few smiles and heard trickles of laughter throughout this new town, but everyone is still on edge. The guard patrols are regular, even though the town is surrounded by the field for miles of vision in each direction.
There was a brief mention of 'zombies' and 'mutants' here, but I will touch upon that in a later interview. You can find all of my notes on this time in human history, though I warn you it is not a joyous one.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Alex_Ahmed
Alex_Ahmed Should I have more descriptions of the characters actions? I'm trying to balance storytelling with the transcript style I'm going for.
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