"Where do you think we start?" Matt asked after Alan's gloomy proclamation. Fingers twirling a biscuit, Alan thought for a few moments, before speaking.

  "What do people need right now? Food, water, heating are going to be in shorter supply every day, add that to the disappearances and animal attacks, and they're going to be getting desperate. If they're offered a solution to that, we could probably build a bit of a community of people we know and trust pretty easily."

  "How do you propose managing that?" Arlee asked, sceptical but intrigued.

  Alan raised a finger, pointing straight at Matt. "With our resident wizard here. Put together a welcome pack of patches – water, heat and light. Cold for food storage. Clear out the closest empty properties and help secure them – board up windows, scavenge doors to replace broken ones. Help them get a veggie patch started. Heck, we could use one place for looking after kids while parents are working."

  Alan's eyes were sparkling as his enthusiasm gathered pace. "Think about it! We re-settle families, or groups in the nearest houses, build up the area around us so we're close enough for one of those… waddya call 'em… mutual defence thingies. Build our own walled area, with guard rotas, maybe communal farming areas, shared harvests, y'know. We could go proper apocalypse movie recovery community!" He paused for a breath, looking around eagerly at the others.

  The grand plans for the future were considered, each unconsciously remembering all the problems that seemed to plague these survivor communities in movies. Hopefully zombies weren't going to be a thing.

  Arlee was the first one to speak. "I think we need to start smaller, but your idea for a welcome pack of Matt's patches would be a big draw for people, and safety in numbers will convince others. How do we decide who to invite in though?"

  Alan laughed. "Easy – our mates! We've all got friends locally that we know well enough to be pretty sure they will be good additions. The families of Kira's school friends that you get on with…" His face dropped suddenly at the reminder of the recent tragedy that had befallen such a family, but he rallied and carried on, turning to Matt. "…team-mates you could always rely on, local tradesmen we had good relationships with. Heck, find out if there are any physios around from that place by the crossroads, you know one of them don't you Caz?"

  Looking around, Alan could see that even if they weren't totally convinced, the seed had been sown of an idea that could change everything for them. It was hard to imagine anyone doing better than they were at this time, with the different members of the human and feline group providing protection, medical attention, practical skills, magical effects and knowledge. Bringing people together would add to responsibilities in the short term, but down the line would make everyone's position more secure – maybe even put a foundation in place for the village to get back on it's feet.

  "I like it." Matt announced, prompting nods from the others. "I think Arl is right, let's start slow, focus on finding out who is out there that we think might make good additions, and find out if they are… still around." No one needed an explanation of what he meant. "We can try the closest ones first, then move further out as we go."

  He thought for a moment. "I reckon that I can put together enough patches for a house-worth each day – maybe more if I can find any more loci to attune to; I have to think about where there might be others. If we're going to go wandering around the village and escorting families back, we'll need some more defensive capabilities though."

  Alan grinned. "I had a thought about that, after you told us about how you roasted that big snake. Gimme an hour or so and I'll have something for you to test out."

  Arlee and Carry shared a look. "We can start putting together a list of people who would make good neighbours, write down their addresses and get them into an order of who is closest." Carry said. "I've got an old OS map upstairs so we can start marking up the local pages to show where everyone is."

  Matt stood up, stretching out his back gently. "I'll check on the girls, remind Kira about getting the cats out of the way until Lara is comfortable with them, and start making some more patches."

  The group headed off to their tasks, the renewed purpose putting bounce in their steps after the trauma of the morning wake-up. Alan unlocked the back door and headed out into the yard, followed moments later by some metallic clangs and some swearing. The ladies headed upstairs, pausing by the living room door to look in on Kira and her sleeping charge.

  Matt entered the living room, kneeling down by Kira's side and putting an arm around her. "Has she woken at all?"

  Kira shook her head, eyes not leaving her friend's face. "Every now and then she squeezes my hand, but apart from that she is just sleeping. How long is she going to stay like that?"

  "It's impossible to tell." He said affectionately. "Aunty Carry says that what happened earlier was a good sign that she will recover – eventually. All we can do now is be there for her and make sure she feels safe. Which reminds me, we need to make sure she knows about the cats before she meets them for the first time. After what happened to her family, meeting any animal – particularly giant ones – could really terrify her. Can you make sure that they don't spring out on her as soon as she wakes up?"

  Kira nodded, speaking that strange hissing language. "Hassara, hassara."

  "What does that mean again?" Matt asked. "I remember you told me before, but I don't recall."

  "Something like 'watch from the shadows' – I don't think it's exactly that, but close enough." She said absently.

  "Do you need anything? I'm going to make some more patches – Al had an idea about getting friends to move into the road so we can be safer together, and a welcome pack of patches would be a nice gift for people. Who do you think we should ask?" Matt enquired, curious to hear what his daughter thought.

  At this she did look up, a hopeful expression facing her father for the first time since he entered the room. "If we could get Sarah and Lizzy, that would really help La', I think. Their parents are nice as well, you liked them when you met at the school play."

  Matt thought back, a vague picture building of two couples, younger than he and Arlee by several years, faces beaming as their respective daughters performed a song and dance routine at a school production.

  "Do you know if your mum has their addresses?"

  "I know where they live, but she probably does, you know how organised she is." She paused, swallowing briefly. "Do you… do you think they're going to be alright?"

  Matt tried to keep a positive face. "That's what we're going to find out. I'll let your mother know to add them to the list. Do you need anything before I get started?"

  A small, wry smile crossed Kira's face. "Anotherhand maybe, La's not letting go of this one and it's gone all tingly. A drink and something breakfast-y would be nice thanks. I don't want to leave, in case she wakes up."

  She looked down at her sleeping friend, stifling a yawn after a mostly sleepless night watching over Lara’s still form.

  Matt patted her shoulder, moving back through to the kitchen and gathering up some breakfast, adding enough for Lara in case she woke up. Returning with the plate, he set it down by her before handing a biscuit to Oswald, who was perched on the back of the sofa, looking down on Lara's troubled face. The small dragon looked up in surprise, gripped the biscuit in both hands before taking an experimental bite, looking scandalised as crumbs rained down the back of the sofa. That didn't stop his enthusiastic crunching though.

  Matt settled down into the armchair opposite the sofa, taking up his loom and supplies and falling into the focused state he was now quite used to. As Kira munched quietly, he started the process of the next patch.

  Some time later, he was removing this latest finished creation when Alan entered the room, chugging down a glass of water. He looked down at the two girls and their dragon companion, stationary apart from a page occasionally turning as Kira looked through her book for some unknown subject.

  "How is Lara doing?" Alan asked.

  "No change yet." Matt replied, setting aside his loom and placing the new patch on the table. "Have you finished my surprise yet?"

  "Absolutely mate, I think you're going to like it. Come outside and bring your fire patches."

  Matt raised an eyebrow at this, wandering what his friend had in mind. The bursts of flame were impressive no doubt, but relied too much on lucky placement and timing to be really effective weapons. He gathered the two patches and followed Alan through the kitchen to the back garden.

  On a rickety patio table, Alan had sawed a foot-long length of shiny aluminium scaffolding pole, with another curious cut half-way through the pole at one end. Also on the table were several shiny disks with holes roughly cut through their centres. Matt recognised them as the hammered flat tops of tin cans, ringpull still attached and standing out from the metal circle at right angles. He turned a questioning look at Alan, looking forward to an interesting explanation. He was not disappointed.

  Stolen story; please report.

  "So, after our encounter here with that giant bird, and how you used the patch to get away from the snake, these could be really powerful weapons, but the trouble is getting them to fire the way you want. I thought back to that Summer when we chucked a load of mints into those bottles of cola and got the massive foam fountains and it hit me – we need a way to direct it, focus it."

  He picked up a tin disc and length of tube. "You put the patch on this tin lid, and slide it in through this slot in the tube, holding the ringpull to keep it in place." He lifted the tube and demonstrated sliding the tin circle in through the slot, locking it in place with his thumb. He mimed poking through the hole cut in the disc and pointing the tube away from himself. "What do you think?"

  Matt took the contraption from him, looking it over before turning back with a grin. "I guess there's only one way to find out!"

  Sliding the tin circle out, he attached the first fire patch he had made, which when tested previously had produced less flame and for less time. Matt was no different from any other male, there was a tiny shred of pyromaniac just longing to make things go boom. Feeling much less concern than he knew he should, Matt slid the patched circle back into the slot, clamping his thumb over the ring pull and looking around the garden. Despite the imminent fulfilment of boyish stupidity, he hadn't completely lost all sense of responsibility and wanted to make sure that he wasn't in danger of burning down a tree, fence or new vegetable patch. Moving into the centre of the yard and backing up a couple of steps, he aimed the tube across the remaining garden grass, braced his shoulder and gingerly tapped the back of the patch through the cut hole.

  The results were impressive.

  With a whooshing roar, a tongue of concentrated flame about six feet long erupted from the open end of the tube. Matt was shocked that there was no noticeable recoil, and there seemed to be no real instability in his aim. The expected kick that goes with all modern firearms was absent, the roiling flame remaining more or less steady for a second, before cutting out abruptly. He looked over at Alan, a goofy grin on both their faces, before Matt suddenly swore and dropped the tube to the ground, running over to the half full water barrel and dunking his hand in, wincing at the sting.

  Alan hurried inside and came back out wearing an oven glove, which he used to carefully pick up the tube. He could feel the warmth through the glove, but no more now than when pulling a baking tray out of the oven. He walked over to Matt, testing the ring pull lightly and confirming it was cool enough to touch. Satisfied that the heat was not dangerous, he slid the patched tin lid out of the slot in the side of the tube and held it up, examining it for any burns or other marks. Matt had extracted his hand from the water and was drying it on his hoody, a little gingerly with a bright red palm, but one which seemed not badly burned.

  "Mate, that went much better than I thought it would! What was it like? Was it difficult to aim?" Alan's imagination was quite literally fired up at the possibilities demonstrated by their test.

  Matt flexed his fingers as he spoke. "I was expecting a load of recoil, but there was nothing, no kick at all. Aiming was easy, but the tube heated right up. What is it like with the oven mitt?"

  "Warm, but that's it. Maybe we make the tube a bit longer, cut the slot more toward the middle, so the part you're holding is behind the patch. If you use an oven glove to hold it there shouldn't be any issue at all, hopefully even when using the more powerful version." Alan was all business, planning version two out as they spoke.

  The pair discussed other potential changes, but settled on cutting another length of pole about six inches longer, with the additional length all behind the slot for the patch, with a rough square cut into the side to allow a finger to reach in and tap the back of the patch. Donning the oven glove, Matt slotted another tin lid with the more powerful fire patch, into the new and improved aiming tube. Remembering the awesome burst of flame that had scorched the huge avian hunter, he backed right up to one of the border fences, waving Alan far off to the side.

  "Al, keep a count for me of how long it lasts for, will ya'? That first one was about one second, but I made it when I had only found one of the loci – the magical batteries." He smirked at the term Alan had coined. "This next one was made with two of them, and I'm pretty sure it will go for longer."

  Alan nodded and gave a thumbs up to show his readiness. Matt braced himself once more, aimed the tube across the garden and tapped the back of the patch. As before, there was no noticeable kick as a larger tongue of flame burst out of the tube, licking across the tips of the long garden grass. Over the roaring mini-inferno, he could hear Alan start to count, and on a whim slowly changed the point of aim from side to side. A widening fan of flame waved out, and he was extremely glad for the foresight to back up and give himself more room as the destructive force piled out of the tube and across the rapidly blackening grass.

  The lance of fire cut out suddenly, and Matt heard a loud "four!" from Alan. He could feel warmth through the glove which increased the further forward his hand moved, but thanks to their design changes his gloved hand had no problem keeping hold of the tubing. Alan came over to him, at the same time as the back door opened and Arlee poked her head out in curiosity.

  "What are you two children up to out here? We could hear Al shouting and some other noise – what are you up to?"

  "Designing, testing and iterating, my lovely. The core tenets of good project management."

  "Uh huh." She replied, not for a moment believing that terrible, evasive answer. Her eyes unerringly landed on the large scorch mark reaching across the garden grass – thankfully missing the vegetable patch – and they narrowed as they turned back on the pair. "I just hope you're being more careful than the last test you ran. Try not to burn the neighbourhood down, right as we're planning to build it back up again.

  "No problem Arl." Alan offered in reply. "I'll make sure Matty here is the very soul of responsibility."

  The pair hid smirks as Arlee threw up her hands in semi-mock frustration, an exasperated "men!" being the last thing they heard before the door closed, and they were left to their very extremely totally safe devices. Neither man would later admit to there being an exuberant high-five, but the sound of palms smacking together echoed off the nearby walls as their whoops of childish glee went long and loud.

  "I need to go and get started on more patches, Al." Matt said as they tidied up the bits of tube, tin can and tools. "What are you up to for the rest of the day?"

  "Caz looked me out an old hourglass egg timer. I'm going to time how long it takes each of these magical badges to recharge, so we know what we're working with. I figure that the more info we can provide to people we want to join us, the more likely they are to say yes." He replied, as the last tools were put away in the small shed.

  "Good idea, drop me a text when… " Matt started, then chuckled, reminding himself that phones were no longer a thing. "Write it all down for me, will you?"

  "Sure thing mate, Kira's got a bunch of paper she's been scribbling notes on from her book." He paused, thinking to himself. "It does feel weird that phones have gone from the centre-point of everyone's lives to just another hunk of plastic and metal, doesn't it?"

  "Damn straight. I reckon that a pretty big percentage of the country – maybe the world – were holding a phone when the weirdness started. If everything electric is now junk, I wonder if they're all stuck with something useless, or if it actually does something useful. There were a few useful aspects on top of all the crap that phones got used for."

  "Behold, my mighty magic device for making annoying ring tones!" Alan declared expansively, getting a laugh from his friend. "Gods, I'd be pissed if magic made it into the world and all I got was a 'machine that goes ping'!"

  After a few more chuckles, the pair headed back inside and went about their tasks. Matt sitting down with his loom, and Alan collecting a notepad, pen and hourglass, spending the next couple of hours reading a book, between sessions of running around various rooms, scrabbling notes occasionally looking in on the ladies upstairs.

  Arlee and Carry had spent their time well, pinning sheets from an old OS map onto a large cork noticeboard in the Brands' spare room. Showing the whole of the village in detail, coloured pins showed addresses where their friends lived – and hopefully still did. They had discussed a number of options for who to visit first, but had largely been overruled by Kira, who was adamant that Lara's recovery and wellbeing absolutely depended on having her other friends close by. A whispered conversation conducted over Lara's as yet still sleeping form had displayed quite clearly how determined Kira was on this point, and with the two families living reasonably close by, it wasn't something worth causing a big fuss over, so the Neal and Chen families were firmly ensconced at the top of the list.

  There were a number of other names – largely friends, a couple of work colleagues, as well as one of the local policewomen, who lived on the East side of the village. They didn't know her well, but enough to chat when they met around and about. Whether she was still… available – both ladies were avoiding talking about the possible alternatives – and wanted to join them, they both felt that she might be the best chance to see if there was any form of government still functioning. Travel in any form had all but vanished, and with all modern forms of communication now worthless, trying to establish contact with other groups would be vital in the long run if any form of widespread recovery was to be possible.

  The two organisational over-achievers now had a list of a dozen local families and individuals who could be considered by the group, and they turned their thoughts to more local logistics.

  "We really need a couple more water patches, so we have a full bucket ready to flush the toilet with in each of our houses, as well as building up a stock of drinking, washing and cooking water. We're going to be rationing for the next month until our first crop of vegetables is ready, and we need to find a way to expand our food production – can we work on your garden tomorrow?" Carry was checking items off a list in a notepad, nibbling on a biscuit. "I need to get Al to find a way to cut the grass as well, it's getting really bushy out there."

  Arlee nodded, having noticed this as well while outside to check on what their men were up to. The barely concealed grins and delighted whoops which they clearly heard through the window indicated that at least it wasn't something terrible, but she hoped that they were exercising at least a modicum of common sense. She sighed at the memory.

  "Penny for your thoughts Arl?" Carry asked with a smile.

  "It's the boys." Arlee responded, setting down her notebook. "Caz they were incredible when we went to the shop, fighting off those spiders, the way they dealt with the rats those first few hours. But it terrifies me that we now need them to be almost literally knights in shiny armour, standing between us and… monsters." She shuddered at the memory of the twisted, massively oversized beasts they had encountered, as well as the sheer alien nature of the statue they had been lucky to defeat at the garden center.

  "I know Arl, I feel the same. Whenever they – or you all – head out for one of these trips, it eats me up inside that I can't go along with you because of this blasted knee." She slapped the offending joint lightly. "But I also see how they are flourishing! Look at Matt when he shows us one of his new patches – when was the last time you saw him that happy about a meeting at work, or a new project just starting? And don't get me started on Al – I swear that he was probably celebrating when we got our heads around what was happening.”

  “He's always saying that the world could use a good zombie apocalypse to hit the reset button on society, and – while I'm pretty sure he was joking before – now it has actually happened… not the zombies, thankfully… now it has happened, he's so alive!"

  The two ladies linked fingers, sharing comfort as Arlee absorbed the wisdom that Carry was laying out. Matt's love of fantasy stories and games probably had at least a part of him feeling the same way as Alan – rejoicing at the chance to live one of the stories himself, divest himself of the administrative responsibilities of normal life.

  She just hoped that their story would have a happy ending. Tomorrow they would start looking for others to join them.

  I hope they’re still alive.