[b]April 5 2022, Tuesday -- Sunrise
162 Perry Street 
(between the Hudson River and Washington Street)
The West Village, Manhattan[/b]

The present location of [url=https://i.imgur.com/xboG9j1.jpg?1]the Henderson Family -- Viola and her children, Ben and Angela[/url], wasn't their home; it wasn't even the home of a friend or acquaintance; they lived in Greenville, which was the southern most portion of Jersey City, several miles away and on the other side of the Hudson River.

They'd been in Manhattan with their church group the day of the Blackout to visit the Children's Museum of Manhattan clear up north on West 83rd Street. A misunderstanding with Uber, followed by another one with Viola's bank -- the holders of her credit cards -- left her and her kids without easy transportation home.

A Docet at the Museum came to the rescue, however, inviting the three Hendersons to come home with her. Viola's husband -- a driver for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) -- would be off shift about 10:30 pm, and -- as a veteran driver with a compassionate boss -- he could [i]borrow[/i] one of the mini-buses usually used for handicapped and elderly groups to get his family home.

Everything was going to work out just fine.

Then, the lights went out.

The Hendersons had made it to the Docet's house easy enough, and just before 11pm, Robert Henderson made it there as well. But they'd only gotten a couple of dozen blocks when the world around them -- and the vehicle they were in -- went dark. They stayed in the vehicle for almost two hours, the rioting, looting, and vandalism growing about them. After a randomly thrown Molotov Cocktail struck the bus, setting its engine compartment on fire, Robert pulled his family out and led them south through the mayhem, heading for the Holland Tunnel, which he'd hoped would be secured by the National Guard or NYPD, as they always did during power outages.

They never made it, though. They were heading down the narrow, cobblestoned, and tree lined Perry Street -- typically an idyllic looking, upper middle class, urban neighborhood -- when three men came out of the shadows to attack Robert with bats and pipes with plans to rob his family and rape his wife. Robert tried to fight them off but was quickly overwhelmed. Viola tried to flee with the children when she realized that she couldn't stand up to the men.

She and her children were quickly surrounded, and Viola was sure the worst was about to happen when suddenly gunfire fired the night. One of the attackers screamed out in agony; an instant later, the other two ran off into the night in opposite directions. Viola watched them until they were gone, then turned to find an older man standing on the steps of the entrance to [url=https://www.google.com/maps/@40.7347062,-74.0090368,3a,75y,190.23h,104.56t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sn-mft47YUp2IDoFTPVFCNg!2e0!7i16384!8i8192]162 Perry[/url]. He jacked another shell into the pump 12 gauge shotgun in his hands as he calmly told her, "Why don't you get your kids inside. My grandson and I will get your husband."

Viola didn't want to leave the father of her children just laying in the street, but the man and his son -- Peter and Taylor Williams, whose ages Viola would later learn were 74 and 19 -- moved out into the street to retrieve Robert. Inside the home, Ginger Taylor -- who it would turn out was a Registered Nurse -- set about tending to the male Henderson's wounds while Viola calmed her children and explained what had happened to them this night.

"You're safe here," Peter Williams reassured her, his English accent very obvious when he spoke. He and his grandson -- who had no old-world accent in his voice -- made beds in the living room for the children and got everyone hot cocoa or coffee as was appropriate for their ages. When Viola asked about the [i]dead[/i] man on the streets, Peter laughed. He pulled a shell from his jacket pocket, stuck a steak knife into the crimped end of it, and opened it, spilling out its contents: "Rock salt. I have no interest in killing anyone. Did enough of that in Nam."

Viola drank down her coffee while sitting anxiously nearby her husband; Robert hadn't regained consciousness since being carried inside by the men. Not meaning for Viola to hear it but failing at preventing it, Ginger told her husband quietly, "He needs a hospital. He has a nasty concussion. He could be bleeding in the brain, and I'm [i]sure[/i] he's bleeding in his torso."

Peter car wouldn't start; neither did his scooter or Taylor's Pedal-Assist bicycle. The younger man said, "I'll just have to pedal him to the Urgent Care over on 6th." They argued about the logic of going out into the mayhem of the dark and risking one man's life to save the life of another  man who might not need saving at all. Peter asked his grandson, "You saw [i]Saving Private Ryan[/i], didn't you?"

"I'll go with you," Viola offered, standing to find her coat. "He's my--"

"No, [i]no,[/i]" Ginger insisted. "I'll go. I need to stay with him."

There was more arguing amongst the Williams's, but ultimately Taylor and Ginger got their way. They used blankets and pillows to make the deliver cart comfortable, loaded Robert into it, and -- with Ginger on her own bike -- headed off into the dark of the night.

That had been around 3am Sunday morning; it was now 6am Tuesday morning, and not only had no words been received about Robert's condition nor Taylor and Ginger's safety, but yesterday afternoon Peter had left to go to the Urgent Care that was just a dozen blocks away and hadn't come back either.

Viola and the kids stayed indoors, even avoiding the windows and remaining in the back of the house to remain inconspicuous to the looters who were still running about the streets. They used candles to gain a little light, allowing Viola to read to her children from the Williams's extensive library; to keep warm, they huddled close together in multiple layers of blankets while wearing stocking caps and sweaters borrowed from their hosts' closets.

Twice since Peter's departure, people had tried to get into the 3 story (plus) basement home, only to later give up. Before he'd left, the homeowner had lowered the steel [i]roll down[/i] gate that protected the entrance of the attached apartment, part of the property but at the moment empty; he'd also shown Viola how to secure the front and rear doors of the home, which had protected not just the Hendersons now but the Williams's during past blackouts. Peter had told Viola, "The irony is that this is a relatively crime free neighborhood on a typical day, but on the [i]atypical[/i] ones, it seems like all the scum balls come here 'cause they think we have better shit to steal."

Peter had used his barbeque the day before to cook all the perishable meats and such in the fridge. This morning, Viola fed her children what remained and hand-opened some cans of fruit and such. They preferred cold cereal dry, which didn't surprise their mother at all. 

Around noon, Viola -- who'd been inconspicuously watching the street from behind the sheer drapes -- began to notice a steady flow of people passing by westwardly. She braved going outside to ask what was happening.

"They're evacuating the island," a passerby told her. When Viola asked [i]who[/i] was doing it, the man told her, "The government: National Guard, Police. They're saying the power isn't coming back."

"For how long?" Viola asked, concerned.

"For [i]ever![/i]" another passerby said. The woman -- with a fully packed hiking pack -- was riding an adult sized trike that pulled a wagon filled with food and other things. 

Viola came out to the steps several more times during the day, asking people who she thought might have more information if they indeed did: a man in an Army uniform, a woman in FDNY clothing, and others. Much of what she heard was unhelpful; even more of it was contradictory. The basic story as she could figure it out was threefold: that Manhattan wasn't going to be able to support its more than 1.7 million residents; that even if it somehow could, the mayhem and violence which the Authorities either couldn't or weren't trying to contain was simply too much for most here; and that if she wanted to do the right thing for her son and daughter, she [i]too[/i] had to [i]get the hell out of Dodge.[/i]

"Let's figure out what we're taking with us," Viola told her kids. "We'll leave tomorrow morning, just after we wake up."