by Sally Six
***
The hour passed quickly and it was time for Ann to punch down the bread and get it ready to go into bread pans. She said goodbye again to Rachel and starting getting the dough finished for baking. Then she got dinner going. It would be Sloppy Joes tonight with frozen corn and a salad.
Ann looked up at the clock after the bread was raised and in the oven. It was 4:30 PM. There was time for it to bake before she went back out to give the geese fresh water and collect the chicken eggs. Not all the chickens were laying yet so she only got 30 eggs. More and more of the distant neighbors were buying eggs from them now. That helped with the expense of buying layer feed. She had made a sign to stick on the post at the gate of the driveway and one to put in the post office on the bulletin board.
Burr it was 33 degrees outside now. The clouds and wind had moved in. She looked at the clock 6:30 PM, Michael should be on his way home by now and making his way up the mountain.
Dinner was all cooked and sitting on the electric stove on simmer. The bread was out of the oven as the clocked ticked 6:45 PM. The electricity went out. As it was already dark, she found her way to one of her filled oil lamps. One of the many that were on the book case. She had grabbed the matches by the wood stove on her way to the lamp, got the lamp lit, picked it up and sat it on the dining room table. She went to light another one and put it in the living room. Then she went to get the pans of food to bring into the living room and sit on the wood stove on the upper level to stay warm. It was a Scandinavian cast iron woodstove with 2 levels.
She didn’t think anything of the electricity going out as this was a normal occurrence out here in the boonies especially when the weather was bad or when the wind blew hard enough. At 7:15 PM, she went over to the living room door and walked out into the enclosed porch. She opened the door to the outside and called for Tank. She noticed as she waited for him, that snow was starting to fall. She decided that she best eat before she got way too hungry, but she didn’t like eating without Michael. But at times like this, it just couldn’t be helped.
Ann looked at the clock again. 7:30 PM came and went on the battery run clock and still no Michael. All she thought is there must have been a problem at work to keep him there late. He sure was going to be hungry and tired. There would not be much time before it was time for bed again at 9:30-10 PM. There was no way for him to call her. She had checked the phone and it was out too which was unusual.
They didn’t usually lose everything at the same time.
With no electric, the well pump wouldn’t run, but luckily she kept a five gallon container with a spigot on the back porch in the winter for just these occasions. They had hoped to buy a generator, but just didn’t have any money for that luxury. They saw their electric company had them. They even asked if they could buy one from them on time as they were $4000.00 for the cheapest one. The company said no. Cash on the barrel head is all they would take. So there went that.
Ann sat down and did some spinning to lamplight. She needed more yarn for a scarf that she was knitting and that passed her time. She looked at the 200 year old, small grandfather type clock on the wall that they inherited when Michael’s mom passed away. It was ticking away as well. It was now 8:00 PM and she was getting pretty worried about Michael.
Tank was lying down beside the wood stove in his favorite spot asleep. “The life of cat.” she said to him. She continued to spin her wool until 8:30 PM and called it quits. She was just too nervous and worried now to even do that. Spinning left her way too much time to think.
She looked out of the window and saw they must have at least 4 inches of snow by now. The wind was blowing about 20 miles an hour and the snow was drifting. When she shined the flashlight on it, the outside thermometer showed 25 degrees.
She decided to pick up a book. Maybe that would take her mind off things for a little bit. She liked science fiction. They usually had enough going on in the stories for the time to pass quickly. She liked to pass the time and keep her mind occupied. It was 9:30 PM and she heard someone on the front deck. She got up off the sofa quickly. She had her 38 pistol on the living room table and grabbed it up. The door to the porch opened and she saw it was Michael with his extra winter clothes and boots on that he kept in the car along with his 72-hour backpack. She rushed onto the porch to help him take off the pack.
“I didn’t hear you drive in. Why in the world do you have your pack on?”
“I didn’t drive in. The car is half way back towards town on State Route 129.” He told her as he took off his coat, gloves and wool scarf. He then reached down to unlace his boots.
She looked at him surprised. “The car is half of the way back towards town. Why? What happened? Did you hit a deer or something?”
He looked up at her. “You mean you didn’t hear. Didn’t you have the TV on?”
Ann looked at him and felt a bit bewildered and scared. “What do you mean didn’t I hear? What happened? What didn’t I hear? I didn’t have the TV on tonight as the electric went out at 5:35 tonight. I checked the phone and it is out too.”
“It was an EMP Ann. We were hit at 5:35 PM. I was listening to talk radio on my way home a few minutes before everything hit the fan. They came on the radio from Washington D.C. saying a Nuke was about to hit D.C. and many other cities across the country. They also said that North Korea, China and Russia were the culprits. They had sent a message that they were going to also send Nukes to do a high level EMP burst to wipe out our grid. The last that I heard we were retaliating.”
Ann sat down with a whoosh on the sofa. She could hardly believe it had happened. It seemed like no matter how many times that they had talked about the possibility of North Korea or China striking them first, it just never seemed to really happen.
“Michael, you mean we’re on our own now? It’s really happened?”
She sat on the sofa in shock for a few moments. Then shook herself. “You must be starved honey. No matter what has happened. Right now you need some warm food in you and get you warmed up.” Mike was standing by the wood stove with his back to it facing Ann. “Yes I am. Some warm food sure sounds good about now.”
The one thing going though both their minds was, “I wonder how the children are faring with all this.”
With Michael fed and warmed up, they decided to turn in for the night. Michael stocked the stove with wood for the night. As he did so, he thought. “We will have to start having to take turns against intruders. This may be one of the last nights both of us are sleeping at the same time for a while.” Then he headed off to brush his teeth with stored water and head to bed. Mike thought another thing to worry about was water. At least we have 10 of the 55 gallon barrels of water we know is good stored in the spring house. This is going to be a real battle. We’re just not as ready for this kind of thing as I had hoped that we would be.
Chapter 2
Dad Was Right
The state of Virginia same day:
Matt was thinking about the possibility of moving back west again and what it would mean for the family, in some ways it was good and some ways bad. It was just things were getting to bad out here in Virginia. All the people that were moving into the small towns from the city, housing prices going through the roof, things just getting more and more expensive, including food because of trucking costs. That was just some of the bad, the good thing was he had a good job but it was taking even his overtime pay to keep them afloat these days. They were paying 1300 a month just for rent and they didn’t live anywhere near the big city.
Matt was still on the road coming in from a job up in Maryland, the big concrete pump truck he drove hummed down the road, he would be home early for a change today. By the time he rolled in the driveway at home it should only be around 9 PM, the kids would still be up and he could help them with some homework if they weren’t done with it, get ready for bed and tuck and them in tonight. Something he didn’t get to do very often anymore with all the long hours he was pulling these days.
&nbs
p; At that moment he saw a flash off to the southeast, he knew immediately what it had to be, then the sky flashed. Matt’s truck stopped running and he fought to control it, he slowly came to a stop, along with the rest of the traffic, there were also a lot of accidents happening because people could not control their cars and trucks. One car narrowly missed hitting his truck, which wouldn’t have hurt the pump truck one bit, but would have totaled the car. He crunched a few cars coming to stop as well. He saw no one was hurt to his relief.
“Crap, I just can’t believe this.” he said to himself as he was still 30 minutes driving time from where he parked the truck in the lot in Winchester Virginia. He knew what had just happened, an EMP it couldn’t have been anything else, and he looked at his wrist to see his watch had stopped at 8:25. Matt didn’t think this would ever happen, his parents had told him be prepared always for things like this. He hadn’t really listened that much at the time, at least he thought he hadn’t, the world seemed to go on its way no matter what and he figured it always would. Well that’s what he thought when he was a teenager, after his brains had leaked out.
He had begun to rethink a few things after he saw how the people down in Louisiana, Mississippi, Florida, Georgia, and Texas hadn’t been prepared and what had befell them and how many had suffered because they neither had food nor water for even a few days after huge storms had hit them.
So in the last few months he had begun to collect a few extra things here and there like two - 44 magnums hand guns, and a 30.06 rifle and he had stopped at one of the places in Baltimore that sold MRE’s and dried foods, his wife Cass had looked at him like he was crazy. He had explained to her what he was thinking, if something did happen he didn’t want them to be found with their pants down like those folks in the south. They had heard horror stories of those that had been attacked in their own homes and robbed of almost everything they had.
Matt grabbed his BOB (Bug Out Bag) took his 44 and holster out of it and strapped it on, he smiled to himself and silently said thanks mom and dad for at least getting a little of this into me and teaching me to shoot and hunt. Even though he hadn’t hunted in years living in the city, he knew things were going to get ugly before too long. He did remember his parents talking about what would happen in a case like this, “boy was I stupid for not listening to their advice.”
He opened the door of his truck and saw a few people gathering here and there around their cars as he climbed down out of his truck, he didn’t know why he did it, but when he got out he locked the door of the pump truck, “just habit I guess,” he thought.
Matt slipped on his BOB backpack, clicked and tightened the waist strap and started on his way down the highway. He heard voices of people exclaiming, “what’s wrong, what could it be for all the vehicles to have all stopped at once?”
He broke into a road-eating trot, he knew by foot it would be more than a simple 15 minutes now to his old van. How long would it take to get home? If he could get his old 65 Chevy van running, not as long as it would be on foot to get the rest of the way home once he to it. He slowed to a walk for a few minutes to catch his breath, he wasn’t used to this much exercise anymore, so he spent the time alternating running and walking.
He was finally rounding the block about a quarter of a mile from the company lot when he heard several shots ring out. Two young men turned the corner coming around the back of a gas station toward him, they were running for all they were worth with a plastic bag in the bigger ones hand. The other one in the blue sweat shirt had a pistol and turned and shot behind him, chips of brick flying off the building corner where the bullet hit. Matt stepped back behind a building. Looking around the corner he saw a woman with a rifle stand out from the back of the gas station and take a shot at the crooks. Mr. Blue Sweatshirt dropped yelling and holding his left thigh. Mr. Moneybags just kept on going, without a look back at his friend. Just as Mr. Moneybags was going past the corner where Matt stood, Matt stuck his leg out in front of the kid and the kid went flying, scraping his face along the concrete.
Bam thump, the kid went down for the count, “Groan moan, oh man,” said the kid.
“Did that feel good?” Matt asked him as he looked down at the young man.
Matt by that time was standing over the punk kid; he saw the kid was about 15, 16, the same age as his son Leroy. Matt looked over at the wounded one a few yards off and the women was kicking the gun out of the kids reach, she then backed up to the gun, picked it up and stuck it in the waist band of her jeans. She then headed in his direction, her rifle now pointed at him.
“You in on this mister?”
“Now if I was in on this, this young punk wouldn’t be laying here on the ground moaning and groaning now would he? He and I would be long gone,” Matt said in disgust.
“No you’re right, sorry this just ticks me off,” and she lowered the rifle to point at the kid on the ground.
“My name is Lacy, Lacy Battles, and I run that Star gas station, these two thought they could get away with robbing me because I am a women and I can’t call the police. Something seems to have taken out the electricity and the phones.”
“You’re” she asked.
“My names Matt Graham, I was just headed to my van when I heard the shots and saw these two run out from behind the gas station.”
“I figured it wouldn’t hurt to give you a bit of help stopping this one, you did a great job stopping the other one.”
“Thanks Matt thanks a lot.”
She looked down at the ground. “Now you little piece of scum, get your butt up off the ground,” growled Lacy.
He thought they hadn’t noticed that he had stopped moaning around and was thinking about taking off as fast as he could, he was slowly trying to get up.
“I see those things you call brains trying to work,” she told him as she kept her gun pointed at him.
“Now up or get a taste of what your friend over they’re got.”
The kid slowly got up off the ground and she shoved him in front of her, “move it kid, back to your so called friend.”
The kid had a fat lip by now and half the skin on his right cheek was missing, blood dripping down his shirt, he started to pout, “I’m hurt lady, I needs a doctor, I have my rights.”
“Rights, you have rights, why you piece of scum sucking, dirt bag, low life,” and she shoved him with the barrel of the rifle in the middle of his back and none to gently at that.
Lacy turned her head, “Thanks again for the help Matt,” and she marched her charge over to the other one, had him help his friend up from the ground and began to march them back to the gas station.
Matt wondered what in the world she was going to do with them, but he shrugged his shoulders and headed off to his van. He rounded the company building a few minutes later and saw the boss coming out of the office door; Calvin Lenz was the boss’s name. Calvin saw Matt and waved at Matt and yelled for him to come over.
“Glad to see you’re okay Matt, but where’s the pump truck?”
“Thanks boss and the truck is over on the freeway 15 minutes driving time from here, I locked it up, but I don’t know if that will do any good.”
“Why didn’t you stay with the truck until the electricity came back on and we could get the repair truck out to you?”
Matt looked at his boss like he had a screw lose, and said, “Cal there’s no getting that pump truck started for a long time, in fact I think you best go and find food and water and maybe even try to stay here at the office, better yet Cal, come home with me.”
“What Matt, why would I want to do that,” Calvin looked at Matt with a strange look on his face.
“Boss, we’ve been hit with EMP, that’s an Electromagnetic
Pulse but out by a nuke being detonated above the land and I think D.C was nuked.”
Cal just got a glazed look on his face, and said, “I need to work out next week’s schedule,” and he turned and went back into the office.
Matt was surprised, Ca
l always seemed like such a level headed man, now he had to be out of his ever loving mind. Matt was shaking his head and headed over to his van, he unlocked the door and sat behind the wheel, he put the key in and turned it, nothing, which he thought how it would be, now what?
“Okay,” he thought to himself this is an old van; it shouldn’t need much to get it going. He got back out of his van and started to head down two blocks over to the AutoZone parts store, he and Gary Lopez the owner were good friends. He got to the store and tried to open the door and found it was locked tight. He knocked on the door, and he saw Gary peek around the storeroom door. Gary had a look of relief when he recognized Matt. Gary came over and unlocked the door with a shotgun in his left hand.
“Matt am I glad to see you, do you know what’s happened? I haven’t been able to get anything on my radio or anything, the electricity went out and after it didn’t come back on after a while I locked the store up. I can’t work the cash register anyway; all computers and the phones are out. I have an idea what it is but I just haven’t wanted to believe it.”
Matt looked at Gary, “Gary, I hate to tell you this but the power isn’t coming back on, maybe for a long time, we were nuked.”
“NUKED, you have got to be kidding, crap and two is eight, I was hoping it wasn’t something like that.”
“I wish I was kidding Gary, but I saw the flash in the distance and I think D.C. was nuked, I saw a large flash from the south.”
“Oh my gosh! It really is true then?” Gary got a very scared look on his face at first then it seemed to smooth over.”
Matt wondered if Gary was going to flip out like his boss did
“Gary I need some parts for my old van and I will pay you for them cash.”
“If someone has really gone and done it Matt, you take what you need, that’s what friends are for, you may need that cash soon for your family, now what do you need. Matt explained the problem with his old van and Gary told him it would be no problem.