Mike grabbed his messenger up and sent a short message to the entire Joint Chiefs panel and the advisory board.
“Please exercise restraint.”
He waited a few minutes, and got no reply. He sent another message.
“They're waiting to nuke us. Exercise restraint, please.”
Mike didn't know if those dots had been nukes. He didn't know if anyone he was sending messages to was alive. Amanda was trying to find information, and hopefully video, of what had been hit. As she was finally getting in information, a message came in from Admiral Miller.
“We will hold for forty-eight hours.”
The video feeds began to come in from all across the continent. New York City took four missiles. The New Jersey entrance to the Holland Tunnel, and the Manhattan, Brooklyn, and George Washington bridges were all hit. There were reports that several, and maybe all, of the bridges crossing the Mississippi River being hit. Then even Mike started to tear up as more reports of damage came in.
“They responded in kind,” he said. “with attacks on our infrastructure. They... We... I don't know how we'll ever recover if this is as bad as it looks.”
Amanda blew up a video of the mountains from Bakersfield, CA. At the bottom of the screen it said several missiles had caused a breech in the Isabella Dam. A ticker below that was scrolling more information.
“More than one-hundred and eighty million gallons expected to rush over Bakersfield, CA from Lake Isabella... Flaming Gorge Dam has collapsed from Missile strikes... St. Louis flood walls destroyed by missile attack... Kentucky Dam attacked but still standing... Canyon Ferry Dam in Montana has collapsed... Garrison and Oahe Dams on the Missouri River both struck in missile attack... Wolf Creek Dam in Kentucky has collapsed...”
Amanda began to switch to other video feeds. The Missouri River flooding was expanding rapidly, and rather than stack more and more sandbags, emergency evacuation warnings were given for it's entire two-thousand, three-hundred mile length, and for the Mississippi River from St. Louis, south.
“Amanda, fire up that brain of yours. How many people are about to be killed or displaced?” Mike asked.
“I... I... um... I don't... I don't know how many millions,” she said. “Nashville will be gone, under twenty or thirty feet of water, before many people realize what's happening. Memphis, St Louis, New Orleans, Omaha, Kan-.”
Amanda stopped and yelled “Oh my God!” as she clicked on the mouse. A massive wall of water was starting to come out of the Sierra Nevada Mountains rushing towards Bakersfield, CA.
“What's this?” Amy asked, pointing to a small window on the screen.
Amanda clicked to blow it up. “It's Green River, Utah. Oh my God these people are pointing their damn cell phone cameras up the canyon. What the hell is -”
“They have no where to go, Amanda,” Mike almost whispered. “Damn, this means Glen Canyon Dam is going to be over topped easily. No way it's going to survive that,” Amanda said.
“There's a whole lot of dams everywhere that won't survive the water coming from the collapsed reservoirs upstream. Billions, if not trillions, of gallons are about to flood out of already overfull rivers.”
“Are you saying that Lake Powell is about to be gone?” Amy asked, fighting back the tears as she remembered frequent trips to there with her family before they were attacked by the Guard.
“Yes, Amy. I'm sorry. Lake Powell is about to be gone,” Mike answered softly.
Amanda voice became more tense as she went on, “When we checked in to all this, we never figured out if Hoover Dam would survive over topping. We just didn't think about it. Lake Mead was so low.” She was clearly angry at herself for not investigating every possibility.
Mike put his hands on her shoulders to try and comfort her. “You could have never anticipated the lake filling back up,” he said. “And then getting rushed with several million more gallons.”
“Several million?” She said inquisitively with a look of concentration on her face. “No, try more like around ninety-five to a hundred billion extra gallons. This is going to raise the water level in the Grand Canyon to around five-hundred feet deep, all rushing to Hoover Dam. I don't... I don't know if Hoover can survive that.”
Other than crying, everyone sat quietly watching the devastation unfold on the screens of the SatLinc. Jessica eventually took the kids to try to play, hoping to get her mind, and theirs, off of what was going on. Mike and the other three just couldn't pull themselves away until they couldn't see anything else from the darkness of nightfall. Amy hugged them all, and hugged Amanda the tightest to show her she was no longer holding a grudge over the death of Jason.
The next morning, April 15th, there was a conference call with the Joint Chiefs. Mr. Ivey and Mrs. Chapman were the only other advisers who logged in. The others either had no power, no home, or were no longer alive. General Laub was the first to speak up.
“I know I speak for us all when I say I am absolutely devastated. I overestimated our missile defense system, and underestimated our enemies. For that I am -”
Admiral Miller cut the General off. “We have to act, and we must act swiftly and sternly. The people all across our great union are working together as if we were still one nation. We must find justice for them!”
Mr. Ivey put his head in his hands. “Please don-”
“We made a commitment to a balance of powers, and as tempted as I am to just take action -”
“Nuke those bastards!” Mrs. Chapman cried out.
Mr. Ivey shook his head. “We're going to regret this,” were his final words as he logged off.
“May I speak please?” Mike asked more nicely than anyone had ever heard out of him.
Admiral Miller and General Laub both nodded.
“Please reconsider this. We all know that right now, they have everything in their arsenals aimed at us and our ships out at sea. Anywhere and everywhere we have any form of assets, there are nuclear warheads aimed. They're just waiting to see the first nuke leave our land, or one of our ships or subs, and just like you would do if you saw that coming from them, they're going to push that button. Please don't do this. It was called 'Mutually Assured Destruction' in the Cold War for a reason. Please, please let this end.” Mike finished and logged off without waiting for a response. His messenger beeped about ten minutes later, just reading the word “Justice.”
Mike scrambled everyone together. “We've got to get the radio equipment, solar panels, and anything else electrical up to the cave now!”
“What's going on Mike?” Amy asked. She and Amanda knew nothing about the cave.
Amy stayed with the younger kids while the rest all worked feverishly to pack up everything they could into the trucks, trying not to break anything in their rush. They tore the soggy ground beneath the tires speeding up to the cave to get all the electronics in there. Mike pulled his messenger and a radio out to keep with them, and then they sped back down to the house, hoping to get the last of the solar panels and batteries loaded up and taken to the cave.
They all stopped to take a short breather on the porch, exhausted from their fast pace work and heavy lifting. Taylor turned on NANN as they sat to rejuvenate before finishing the heavy lifting the rest of the solar system would require.
“Breaking News,” they heard come across the still-active state-run media. “Nuclear explosions are occurring all across the The People's Republic of Pacific States, the Soviet Union, and their allies. Reports are that several detonations occurred hundreds of miles above their largest cities as well.
“The enemies who levied such deadly devastation against us just yesterday no longer exist. I can say with confidence that World War III is now over.
“And this just in. We're receiving word from the Pentagon that... What! Holy Sh..! Um, Oh my God! Ladies and gentlemen. Fellow Americans. I've just been informed that this will be our last broadcas...”
Death Of The Dollar
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