"Ooh, lets try that then, actually, I'll go get a bike then we can get to the terminal store twice as fast." He hurries off to do that.

Walta goes back to spreadsheeting about peoples' food preferences for the minute or two until he gets back, then.

He arrives back with a pair of bikes that he's awkwardly managing. One of them falls while he's trying to maneuver them through the door. Alice walks over and helps him untangle himself. "I thought someone might want to come with, we can get a third bike if more than one person does."

Alice laughs. "If nobody else wants to I'll go with you."

"I kind of want to come along. Making a better catalogue of the stores, so I can estimate how much preserved food is out there."

"Works for me." He brings the two bikes into the elevator and waits for her to come in. "Can you read out the code for me?"

She does so.

And they're off. They're between the upper levels of Sports Authority and Crate and Barrel. Zahn guides them down through the store with the less fragile merchandise. "Ready to go?"

She notes down the number of visible displays on various things. "Hold on, taking data."

"Sure thing, whenever you're ready."

Soon enough.

And she doesn't do more than glance into most of the other stores they pass, so they won't be too delayed.

She sighs at one point. "I think everyone's going to get antsy and touchy over the next few days. Especially when we have any kind of finality about Earth."

"Well unless literally nothing reaches Earth from this whole thing, the satellites we're getting TV from will go down, still I think a lot of people will be watching TV at zero hour. We might get just enough of an answer."

"Either kind of answer won't necessarily help."

"Yeah, true."

"Eh, enough of that. Let's ride faster."

"Sure." Zahn starts biking faster and soon they're coming up on the Massive Bed Bath and Beyond. Zahn stops biking and starts walking to the second story.

She follows, looking for anything out of place.

There's a few places where merchandise has been taken so it doesn't look like they're the first to reach this particular store. The back wall is mostly covered with various mounted products though some areas of it are blank or have signs up. And in the center of the back wall is the elevator and a call button. Zahn gets out his notebook and walks over. "You have your notebook too?"

"Yep."

(She's pocketed a few things along the way. Soap, for one.)

He presses the call button and steps in and holds the door while they each write down and confirm the code. He sighs, "And now we have to bike back to the skybridge. We should have brought a phone with us so we could have someone use the one in the lounge to activate this one."

"Exercise is good for you," she jokes.

"True enough. I was more frustrated that I forgot we now have phones."

"I think Nick is setting up a few dozen for people. And probably exploring places some. He's been outside all day."

"Thank you for helping him, he seemed in really bad shape but I didn't think he'd let me try."

"Yeah, that's Nick for you. He doesn't need anybody, until he really, really does. I'm glad he's dealing with it, at least."

"That could probably also describe me to a degree. I'm really glad Alice is here and not just because of the whole everyone on Earth is probably going to die thing."