by Sage du Toit
Sam gave a head jerk toward the door and said, “Come on ya’ll” and they all headed out to the dining room to wait. She led her squad over to an empty table, near where the kitchen staff had moved to, in the front dining room. There were plenty of windows in this area so there was no need for flashlights. Not long after she saw Green Eyes come back out and he went to help as more soldiers were coming in the door.
She had her squad keep the noise down, but as each squad progressively came in and sat down the noise got louder. SPC Meyers told her that the hot water had run out about half-way through second squads’ showers, and Sam was thankful that her squad had got to go first, but she knew there would be some complaints about the water and the towels too. Especially when forth squad came out, they seemed to have the unruliest of all of the soldiers. Hot mess Hanson was in that squad, Sam wondered how she was doing. Sam quietly spoke to some of the other people and found out that everyone’s phones had stopped working when the lights went out. She wondered if that meant an EMP had gone off.
The Drill Sgts had all gone to the back together and came out washed. While they were washing the Green berets had closed the front doors and sealed them over with the garbage bags. They then sprayed the whole area. Then each of the Green Berets had gone in and washed too, but it looked like they each had a change of clothes with them. When everyone was done washing the Drill Sgts conferred with the group of eight Green Berets while her platoon sat around trying to comfort each other. They whispered quietly to each other, wondering what was going on and what was going to happen to them. It hadn’t occurred to them yet that this might be happening all over the Unite States.
After conferring with the Green Berets, Drill Sgt Davis announced that it was an EMP that knocked out the power. There were 3 Drill Sgts, 34 soldiers in the platoon, 8 Green Berets, and 5 civilian workers that came out of the kitchen, 50 people that would need to survive for who knows how long without electricity in the heat of summer. Sam thought, well at least there would be food. Then she thought about the number of soldiers again. She hadn’t seen them bring Hot mess Hanson inside...did that mean she was dead? Drill Sgt Farmer was talking to the civilians that had come out of the kitchen and Sam could see that some of them looked to be in shock but they all got up and headed to the kitchen with him. Not long afterward they could smell food cooking.
✽✽✽
16 December 2020
Douglasville, GA
Sam peeked out the corner of the bedroom window, the sun was down and she thought about going to bed and saving her candles. Just then Lucky came out and was rubbing herself around Sam’s ankles. She smiled and got a can of tuna and set it down for Lucky to eat. She knew tuna was not the best diet for a nursing cat, but right now that was all she had to feed her. She grabbed the pot of cooled down water and filled two canteens and then filled up Lucky’s water bowl with what was left. She then checked on the kittens in the closet and found one of them had squirmed its way out of the nest of clothes. She picked up the small black kitten and lightly stroked it’s soft fur. She then replaced it in the nest and wrinkled her nose at the dirty pile of clothes. She spent a little bit of time picking up and stroking each kitten, checking them over and making sure they were all healthy. She found herself partial to the black runt. Which seemed to be having a hard time finding a place to lay in the pile of kittens and was making quiet mews.
She decided to get a fresh blanket out of the hall closet for Lucky’s kittens and seeing the other empty tub under the table she lined the bottom with the blanket and carried it into the closet. She carefully placed the kittens on the clean blanket, then scooped the dirty clothes up and threw them away. This tub was also a little wobbly since it was sitting on the edge of the rug so she decided to roll the rug up and move it out of the way completely. She folded the end over and started rolling and pulling it toward herself as she rolled, when she was about halfway done she looked at the empty floor and froze in place. There was a keyhole in the floor! It was a hidden trap door!
Excited by the find Sam tried to find a way to open it but couldn’t find a latch or handle to pull up. The board blended in with the floor perfectly, the only thing that stood out was the keyhole. Just then she remembered the key that was hidden in the sock and got it off the dresser. The key fit the lock perfectly and she turned it and pulled up hoping it would open the door, it did. The hidden door was perfectly blended in with the floor boards and had hidden hinges on the inside. Looking down into the floor she found a hidden cache of guns and ammo.
She wondered why they were so well hidden, it’s not like Georgia had a strict no gun law. Her parents' gun safe was down in the basement, and even though she didn’t have a key to get into it she knew where her parents hid an extra key. Maybe these people didn’t trust their kids as much or were concerned for other reasons. The floor safe was deep and long and the door she opened was heavy, but the hydraulic arm locked open when she pulled it all of the way open. Inside was a removable box on top with a handle for pulling it out. It looked like there were three pistols in the box along with some extra magazines and bullets for the guns. The pistols were stored in their holsters and she reached down and pulled one up. Taking the gun out of the holster she saw it was a Sig Sauer. Her Mom had one like this and she had fired it before. She knew it was a 9mm pistol and her mom had even shown her how to clean it. She pulled the magazine out and saw that it was loaded. She pulled the slide back and made sure there was a round in the chamber and that the safety was on.
It felt good to have a weapon again, she felt safer with the gun in her hand. There were gangs out there looking for girls and woman to use and abuse and she wasn’t planning on being one of those girls. She looked through the rest of the guns in the safe, under the removable portion there were two semi-automatic rifles and a shot gun with boxes of bullets all lined up in a separate section above the rifles. She removed the rifles and shotgun, looking at each to make sure she was familiar with operating each type. They were all unloaded. When she had all of the guns out she saw the second level of the safe was also removable in two different sections. She removed the section where the rifles were and saw more rifles below it. This was more than a cache! It was a full armory! No wonder they had it locked up and hidden.
It was too far down for her to reach down and pull up the guns when she noticed there were recessed areas in each side of the case. She sat down on the end and she put a foot in each recess. There was one at each level of the case. The case wasn’t very wide but it was long and deep. She was wondering just how deep. She got the gist...there were a lot of guns here, but where did it stop? With this level of firepower and all of the things she had found in this house she might be able to make it back to Texas on her own.
Yawning widely, she decided to put everything back now and explore the depth of the case later. She closed the case back up and removed the key. She thought about keeping the key on her but then decided to hide it again...but where? She put it in her rucksack. She moved the rug all the way over and down and rolled it back out. It was no longer centered in the closet, but it was back down covering the keyhole and didn’t interfere with the cat’s tubs. She looked in the dirt litter box and saw that Lucky didn’t seem to have a problem using it, there were several piles where she had dug and covered it up. At least the closet didn’t stink as bad anymore. Sam said good night to Lucky then blew out the candles and crawled into bed.
✽✽✽
Chapter 5
-----------------------------------------------------
10 July 2020 N-Day (Continued)
Fort Jackson, SC
After everyone was done eating their hamburgers, Drill Sgt Davis called a meeting and had everyone come out to the dining area and sit down, including the civilian kitchen staff and the Green Berets. Drill Sgt. Davis’ dark lined face was always serious but now he looked utterly grave. Even though he was stripped down to his t-shirt, boxers and socks it didn’t detract from his air of command. He paced
back and forth as he talked. Sam could tell that he was worried and she knew that he had a wife and two kids at home and she was sure he was worried about them too. He told everyone that he wanted to have a group discussion but he made it clear that it would be a calm and organized talk among equals. He requested that if someone had something to say they should raise their hand and he would let them speak. He advised them that before all of the electronics went down he had tried to contact his chain of command, working up the list he was not able to reach anyone. He was uncertain of the state of things outside but since they had sealed themselves inside they had seen no movement through the windows.
He thought that they would be relatively save inside, no one else had gotten sick so far thanks to the quick action of Staff Sgt Fisher of the Green Berets. The SSgt. had flipped the breaker off on the air conditioning unit and sealed the recirculating vent and air vents with garbage bags as soon as he realized what was happening. His fast action is what saved the civilians and gave them a safe haven. Drill Sgt. Davis told them that he didn’t know how long they would have to wait until it would be safe to go outside again and the mess hall might not be the best of accommodations but at least they had plenty of food to feed everyone for an extended period. There was a big “hooah” at this from everyone. Army soldiers liked their food.
One of the civilians raised her hand and asked if he thought the electricity was going to come back on. Davis explained what an EMP was and that without knowing how far spread this incident was he couldn’t determine when it would come back on...or even if it ever would. Pvt Hernandez from Sam’s squad raised his hand and told everyone that before his phone died, he had checked his twitter feed and all of his friends back home in California were saying something bad was happening there and people were falling down dead all over the place. He said they were using #EndofWorld. This struck Sam as odd since that is what she had put on her Facebook. Several other soldiers put their hands up and as Davis called on each one, they confirmed that they saw the same thing on their twitter and Facebook accounts for each of their home areas.
The Green-eyed Beret raised his hand and when Drill Sgt Davis said, “Go ahead SSgt Fisher”, Sam was surprised their savior was the Green-eyed Beret. He also confirmed that before his phone died, he was seeing reports of the same thing happening all over the US and in Canada as well. He said that they would have to assume that all the United States and Canada had been attacked with a deadly nerve agent and EMP. He also said that it was most likely they were on their own. If anyone was lucky enough to cut the circulating air off in time, depending on where they were at when it happened, they would need to have enough supplies to last several weeks or maybe even months and that no one would be able to go outside without complete hazmat gear for at least that long. They would have to wait for it to rain at least two times before it would be relatively safe, and even then, they would have to continue to use their gas masks for safety.
Everyone was quiet as they all processed what SSgt. Fisher had just said, including the Drill Sgts. The same civilian worker from before raised her hand and asked if that meant no one would be able to go check on their families? Fisher answered her question and said they would work on it...but if anyone left this building they would need a complete hazmat suit and to come back inside they would need to go through the same process all of the soldiers just went through. And then even if they reached their destination they would risk exposing the people on the other end to the Nerve agent. Plus, without working cars they would have to walk to wherever they were going.
Several of workers and soldiers started crying and Davis quickly got everyone's attention again to hopefully stop the panic before it started. Addressing the kitchen staff, he asked them to make an inventory of the foods in the kitchen with perishable food listed separately from non-perishable foods and to start planning meals for all 49 people using the most perishable foods first. Davis then called out the four squad leaders and told them to get with Drill Sgt. Farmer to make a 24-hour guard rotation with someone monitoring all visible approaches to the building, looking for any movement outside at all! Including birds or animals. Wildlife movement would be their first key to when it would be safe to go outside again. Fisher raised his hand and said his soldiers would help with the guard rotation and motioning to the table where they were sitting, he showed that they all had their kits with them and he stated that they also had several pairs of night vision goggles and scopes that could be used to watch the area for movement.
Davis then directed Drill Sgt. Torres to pick 15 soldiers and take down all but 5 of the tables closest to the kitchen and stack the tables and chairs out of the way on the side of the room. He then asked the kitchen staff if they needed help doing inventory and when they said yes, he picked 5 of the remaining soldiers to go with them. Davis dismissed everyone that had been assigned a task and explained to the remaining 16 soldiers, including the 7 Green Berets that he would have additional tasks for them as well.
Drill Sgt. Farmer called the Squad leaders and SSgt Fisher over to the side table closest to the kitchen, where the kitchen workers had been sitting. Drill Sgt. Farmer pulled out his small spiral note pad and mumbled, “This just isn’t going to do!” He then excused himself and headed toward the kitchen. Sam guessed he was going to find a bigger note pad. Sam was sitting close to the end of the table facing out looking over the room, SSgt Fisher was sitting on her left side and SPC Meyers was on her right. PFC Jackson, who was 4th squad leader was sitting across from Sam complaining to PFC Green, the 3rd squad leader, that they had to talk cold showers and use wet towels when some other people got hot showers and dry towels. She thought that her squad should have been able to go first. Sam was trying to ignore her and she turned her head toward SSgt. Fisher and she rolled her eyes. He bumped her knee under the table with his knee and winked.
Sam looked out over the dining room, it was a large area with about 25 long tables with 10 blue plastic and metal chairs at each table. Drill Sgt. Torres’ group was quickly taking down the tables and stacking up the chairs along the wall. This left a wide-open space at the front of mess hall, which was a long rectangular building with a covered brick porch area on the front and solid floor to ceiling windows around the front and two sides with the kitchen at the back. To the side of the kitchen were separate men’s and women's bathrooms.
As she waited for Drill Sgt. Farmer to return she listened to what Drill Sgt. Davis was telling the remaining soldiers. He picked two of the soldiers, a boy and a girl, and told them to go make mop buckets with bleach and to come mop the front area where they were clearing the tables out. He then asked one of the Green Berets if he would take four soldiers back to the kitchen and find as many cardboard boxes as he could and break them down flat, he explained that these would be our beds for the foreseeable future.
Drill Sgt. Davis then asked the Green Berets if they thought it would be possible to decontaminate the gear they had all removed and placed in plastic bags. Almost as one they turned around and looked at SSgt Fisher. He had also been listening in and he nodded his head and said they needed hot water and bleach or vinegar and hydrogen peroxide if you didn’t want to ruin the clothes. He also said that they should probably do the clothing first so the soldiers will have something to wear. He bumped her knee under the table again but didn’t even look at her this time. He called out four of the Green Beret’s names; SSgt Stevens, Sgt Jones, Sgt Garcia, Sgt Cooper and told them to get their MOPP gear back out and check in the kitchen to see if they had what they needed to decontaminate the soldiers gear and get the biggest pots full of water on to boil.
There were two Green Berets left and three soldiers. Drill Sgt. Davis told the Green Berets to each take one of the soldiers and thoroughly check around the inside of the building and tape over any areas where there was a possibility of the Nerve agent getting inside, with one duo starting at the front of the building and the other at the back. He then told the remaining soldier, which was Sam’s battle budd
y Rebecca, to follow him and they headed back to the kitchen. Sam knew Rebecca would tell her later what her job ended up being. Sam had always liked Drill Sgt. Davis, he didn’t beat around the bush and he never showed favoritism, even if the other soldiers claimed he showed it toward her. It wasn’t that she was his favorite at all, he just didn’t yell at her as much because if he picked her for a task she would listen to his instructions try her best to get it done without whining or asking a hundred questions.
Drill Sgt. Farmer came back to the table with a yellow legal pad and a pencil in hand. He then passed the pad around and asked SSgt Fisher and each Squad leader to write the names of the people in their squad below the names of the Drill Sgt’s. He then explained that they would have four guard points. They would make eleven teams with a Drill Sgt or Green Beret on each team and three soldiers, the kitchen workers wouldn’t do guard duty, they needed to be free to cook the meals. They would then set up a simple rotation schedule of four hours of guard duty for each team. Which meant that the teams times would constantly shift one down so that no one team had the best guard duty time, all the time. During meal times it would be the team leader's duty to make sure his team got to eat. They all nodded in understanding and went to work dividing the soldiers into eleven teams.