Lock the doors and board up the windows. The power grids are down, food is scarce, communications have been reduced to short range transmissions, and the only sound on the radio is a killer’s heavy breathing.After a catastrophic incident, Eddie Slate, a local car salesman, finds himself spiraling into an apocalyptic world where the only rule for survival is self-preservation. Alone, frightened and barricaded in the house, Eddie spends the empty hours on a ham radio searching for a friendly voice. Nobody ever answers, at least not until a mysterious drifter starts transmitting and takes a dark step into his life. The time is now. The place: your hometown.See what happens to Eddie Slate the day the oil runs out.From the author’s cellar, in his own words… (From Rainstone Webcasts) In the end, CRUDE isn’t so much about a disaster as it is about the human condition pitted against extreme circumstances. The story deals with two forms of life. The one is the Eddie Slate’s of the world, that everyday guy who rolls along through life, gets up in the morning, grabs a takeout coffee, maybe stops by the local pub for a beer after work. Then one day disaster strikes. Everything falls apart. He’s alone, cold and hungry. It’s the equivalent of pulling someone out of a Malibu beach house and setting them in a ghetto; either they learn how to fight or they doesn’t survive. All Eddie hangs on to is the hope of rescue and memories of a past life, all the while struggling to maintain sanity and a sense of moral values. On the other side of the street sits that narcissistic person, sort of the human version of a jackal or a coyote. Put them in a place where social values are gone and law enforcement is failing, it’s like leaving the cage door of a lion open in downtown New York. Someone becomes hunted. In CRUDE, both personalities are in full swing and barreling headfirst towards each other. It’s just a question of who survives. J.L. Davis