The Forgiven The Fallen The Forsaken by S.M. Armstrong

the truck backed up on the cement pad he’d placed at the edge of the pond
and dumped out hundreds of channel catfish.  A previous truck had dumped a load
of trout.  He knew it was silly, but he felt very proud of this little pond.
    Helen and Julie
had taken an interest in the project and had helped him install pumps powered
by batteries charged daily with solar panels or generator.  The pumps ran to
run an artificial waterfall that would help to aerate the water.  There was
also a commercial aerator machine that was fairly loud, but was built for a
pond that size and should do the trick if run even for a few hours a day. 
    The fish would
have to be fed so he had installed a simple mechanical automatic fish feeder on
one side of the pond and purchased a few years’ supply of fish food.  If the
pumps got fried, he had many more pumps and batteries stored along with another
aerator.  Hopefully they could use plants to help filter the fish wastes.
    The girls also helped
Jim had collect plants from Lake Mary to place around the edges, and had
purchased other water plants that were appropriate for the climate.  He stocked
the pond with minnows and yellow perch initially to get things started, and
dumped in lake water to introduce normal bacteria to the water.  What a
pleasure this has been, he thought.
    The driver
finished dumping the fish and said, “Enjoy the fishing!  Good luck with the RV
park!  ” 
    Jim tipped the
guy well and thanked him.
    Inside the
greenhouse closest to the pond he had a 100 gallon fish tank with tilapia and
another with yellow perch.  These would be kept heated, so he set up deep cycle
batteries to an inverter to power the heaters.  Charging the batteries would have
to be done by generator for now, but they would manage.  Once the fish were
breeding too much, he’d dump the extras into the pond where the other fish
would make short work of them.  In spring, he would release all but a small
breeding population into the pond. 
    It was a great
project.  He just hoped it worked in the longer term.
    Julie and Helen
were busy lining up more hydroponic supplies.  In the end, they took a trip
down to Phoenix and pretty well cleaned out some of the nurseries of everything
hydroponic.  Jim asked them to pick up ammo in several calibers as available,
so they hit a few sporting goods and gun stores and a gun show as well.  By the
second or third trip, they were very popular with the salesmen in both the
nurseries and gun stores.
    Julie had
surprised everyone by having steam driven electrical generator systems
delivered.  They would have to build a boiler room and the fire would have to
be fed constantly when in use, but it would be a feasible backup system given
all the trees they had cut down on the property.
    The larger surprise
was the five wood heated hot tubs that Helen tracked down.  There was a wood
stove actually built into each tub.  Controlling the temperature would require
some work to get the hang of it, but it was promising. 
    The girls set
up the first hot tub near their RV and built a 6 foot wood privacy fence around
it, with a gate.  Just outside the fence they placed an additional 10,000
gallon water tank on a five foot tower made from rail road ties.   Julie made
three runs in the water truck while Helen finished the wood fence. 
    That evening,
they took great pleasure in demonstrating the hot tub to Jim and Susan and taking
turns using the tub, two at a time.  It took a while to get the temperature
right, but once they did, the tub felt wonderful.  
    "Here we
are preparing for the end of the world as we know it, and you two are out
scoring hot tubs," said Susan.
    Helen shrugged. 
"Think of it as additional water storage."
    Julie took a drink
from her wine glass.  "Yeah, what she said."
    The next day
they repeated the set up with the other four hot tubs, including giving each its
own water tank, but they only filled up Jim and Susan's.  The rest of the