by Ellis, Tara
“Now, I’d love to know what’s tumbling around inside that stubborn head of yours.”
Patty snapped out of her memories and began busying herself with arranging the food on the table. “I should be thinking up the clever remarks I need tonight in order to sway Gary to vote the right way.”
It was the first Thursday of the month, which meant it was Patty’s least favorite day. As mayor of Mercy, she was required to preside over the city council meeting. Determined to make something good come from it, for the past eight years she’d made a formal sit-down lunch to enjoy with her husband before stepping into the lion’s den.
“The only thing Gary responds to is how something is going to profit him,” Caleb snorted. “Good luck finding that, unless you can convince him the water from a new city well would be pure enough to bottle and sell.”
Patty froze with a pitcher of lemonade hovering over the table and tilted her head thoughtfully to the side before breaking out into a wide grin. “Caleb, you’re a genius!” She sat the pitcher down with force for emphasis, the ice cubes clinking. She was already contemplating how best to present the possible business endeavor. “We have the test results proving the spring well would produce three times the amount of water Mercy needs.”
Caleb slowly cut the roast, frowning. “You know as well as I do that by the time you took all of the production cost into consideration, you’d need a lot more than that to turn a profit.”
Setting the last of the food on the table, Patty sat down and shrugged. “Yes, well, that wouldn’t necessarily become apparent until long after the well was in place and we attempted to move forward with the idea.”
Caleb sat opposite his wife and stared at her with mock surprise. “I never thought I’d see the day you sounded like a true politician.”
Patty barely resisted the urge to throw her roll across the table. “You know better than anyone that I didn’t want this second term. But in spite of all of my protests, I was re-elected.” She busied herself with buttering the possible projectile. “This town needs that well. For the past two years, we were on the brink of a drought and resorting to trucking water in from Helena. If the only way to get Gary to jump onboard is to dangle a water carrot in front of him then that’s what I’ll do. I don’t need you playing devil’s advocate on this one,” she added, waving the butter knife in the air.
Caleb chuckled, always entertained by his wife’s quick wit. “I never doubted your intentions, Patty, I just don’t want to be kept up at night when you’re wrestling with your conscience.”
Patty harrumphed and took a bite of her roll, not ready to forgive him yet for the politician remark. Even if he was right. Glancing at the clock, she noted it was only a little past one and decided to eat quickly and then spend some time on how to present the idea without actually lying. If she could just—
The window over the sink exploded with light.
Caleb spun in his chair at the same time that Patty pushed back from the table, staggering to her feet. The house filled with odd popping sounds, like cork guns being shot, and the light over the table flashed once before exploding. Yelping in surprise, Patty threw her hand up to shield her face from the small shards of glass.
The odd light was already fading, making the house appear dark in its wake. The smell of burning electronics hung heavily in the air and an odd silence intensified the moment, like a build up to an even larger event.
Patty and Caleb stood frozen, perhaps waiting for the pregnant pause to fill with whatever else lay in store. When nothing further happened, Caleb finally went to the window and Patty joined him, moving up silently to his side. He wrapped an arm around her shoulder and she leaned into him.
“Are you okay?”
Patty nodded and studied the hillside behind their house for any sign of things that were out of sorts. Other than being slightly brighter than it was only moments ago, the world was still there.
“What was that?” she finally whispered. “Some massive power surge? Could it have been the transformer?” She knew realistically it wouldn’t account for what they’d experienced, but she couldn’t think of another explanation.
“Come on.” Caleb took her by the hand and led the way to the front door. The radio sat dark and silent in the front room and the one other light that had been on, in the foyer, was in pieces on the floor.
Stepping around the glass, Patty walked outside on weak legs. Their twenty wooded acres sat on a hillside that overlooked the town of Mercy, nestled in the foothills of the Lewis and Clark National Forest. It was an oasis of ponderosa pines and clear mountain streams.
The one-story rambler had a huge wraparound porch and they walked hand-in-hand to the edge of it, where they could see the power pole stationed at the base of the long gravel driveway. The transformer looked perfectly fine.
Except everything wasn’t fine. Up until that moment, Patty hadn’t really been afraid. Concerned, yes, but they were well prepared for power outages and had been through some massive winter storms. This was different. Something was wrong…off. She tilted her head, expanding her senses and focusing on the silence. An unnatural stillness that she’d compare to the muffled quiet of the woods right after several feet of snow fell. Only, this went beyond that, silencing even the birds. And while the town of Mercy had only a four-block main street and one traffic light, they should have been able to see some movement of vehicles in or on the surrounding roads.
It was as if someone or something had flipped a switch and she and Caleb were the only ones left. Patty shook her head, unwilling to let her imagination or fear push her into a dark place. “I’ll call the sheriff and see if the power’s out in town.” Patty made her way back to the kitchen, where they still had a landline phone. It was an old style that was attached to the wall and had a cord. Patty found the turquoise eighties relic at a thrift shop a few years back and decided she had to have it.
Lifting the handset, she knew right away that it wasn’t going to work. There was a black smudge of residue on the mouthpiece, like something had burned, and she confirmed its demise by placing her ear to it and noting the lack of a dial tone.
Meanwhile, Caleb had gone to their bedroom and retrieved his cellphone. He came back to stand in the arched entry of the kitchen, his handsome face becoming more deeply etched with worry by the minute.
“The phone isn’t working,” Patty told him while turning the handset to show him the evidence. “Do you think the house was struck by lightning?” She knew how ludicrous that sounded. There were hardly any clouds in the summer sky and the house was well grounded.
“No. Not lightning.”
Caleb tossed his phone at Patty and she dropped the handset to catch it. She frowned at the dark screen. “Wasn’t it charged?”
Caleb nodded. “Right next to yours, which won’t turn on either.”
Patty noticed a flashlight clasped in his left hand. “It’s not going to be dark for another eight hours. Hopefully we’ll have this sorted out by then.”
Caleb answered by raising the Maglite and toggling the power switch on and off several times, without any effect. “It’s not just the power supply, Patty. Something has wiped out all of the electronics.”
Patty blinked several times. All of the electronics? Her heart beat faster and her mouth went dry. “Well, crap.” She had to move, had to do something. Feeling like she was trudging through a dream, Patty began going through the practiced motions of cleaning off the table. She put the leftovers in a fridge that would be useless by the next day. She removed the half-baked apple pie from the cooling stove and placed it on the counter, her hands starting to shake slightly as it became harder to ignore that something unexplainable had happened.
Finally, wiping her hands on her jeans, Patty turned to face Caleb, who was watching her patiently. “I guess we’d better get to town.”
Chapter 5
DANNY
Salt Lake City, Utah
The airport runway looked like some bizarre mo
vie set that was supposed to be a war scene but left out key elements. There should be gunshots, screams, and the sounds of vehicles. Instead, there was an eerie silence that prevailed, emphasizing the lack of anything mechanical. Danny could feel the heat from the plane wreckage that was still burning and had to fight the urge to go looking for survivors. There wouldn’t be any.
“Come on, this way!” Sam ordered Danny, tugging at her arm. They were trying to keep up with the pilot, who was moving at a brisk jog.
Danny shifted her backpack and broke into a jog. It was her only carry-on, aside from the purse slung across her chest. She was relieved to be off the small plane, but as she side-stepped a piece of twisted metal, she wasn’t convinced it was the best move. They’d waited for over two hours, until nothing else had fallen from the sky and it was apparent there wasn’t a rescue party coming anytime soon.
They were still a couple hundred feet away from the terminal and the tarmac was scattered with stalled planes and vehicles. Most of the planes emptied out right away and there weren’t many people left on the runway. Those still lingering were clustered together, and Danny wondered briefly if they were groups traveling with each other or if they simply felt safer that way.
There should be fire trucks, ambulances, and police cars. Where were the rescue workers? At least two planes had plummeted from the sky, while several others had slid off course during take-off. The only explanation was that whatever had affected the planes and their phones wasn’t limited to the airport. It was a terrifying thought.
Danny suddenly stopped, causing Sam to look back questioningly. She pointed beyond the terminal, where the main roadway was visible. It was decorated with motionless vehicles in various stages of destruction. Fires burned and the smoke was coalescing into a thin film over it all. “None of the cars are moving.”
Sam pulled again at her arm. “Right. Some sort of magnetic pulse correlated with the light.”
Danny stumbled forward on shaky legs, past a motionless cart hauling luggage that would never reach its destination, and an airport security car that sat empty. As they neared a door marked with an ENTRANCE sign, she saw an older woman on the ground, cradling a man in her lap.
“Can I help you?” Danny knelt down next to the woman who was staring into space with a vacant expression, clearly in shock. When she didn’t answer, Danny gently pulled at the man’s shoulder, turning him face-up. He’d been dead for some time already but there was no obvious injury. Danny dealt with death often but for some reason she reeled backwards, sitting down hard. Perhaps it was because her emotions were already tapped out.
“What happened?” Sam squatted down next to them and set his hand on the woman’s shoulder.
The woman blinked a few times before focusing on Sam, and then quickly looked away. “We were on our way out to board the plane.”
Danny noticed a small aircraft not far away with a set of boarding steps pulled up to it.
“There was that light, and then—” she swallowed and looked down at the dead man in her lap. “I don’t know what happened.” The woman pulled at the top of her husband’s shirt to reveal a neckless with a cross. She gripped it in her hand.
Sam reached out and gently moved her hand to the side before undoing another button. Danny didn’t understand what he was doing at first, but when he pulled the shirt aside it revealed a small scar and lump on the left side of his chest. A pacemaker.
“Come with us,” Danny said, getting to her feet. She reached a hand out to the woman, who ignored it. “Please. We’ll help you.”
The pilot had already disappeared inside the building. Sam stood next to Danny and shook his head. “We need to go.”
“I’m staying with my husband,” the woman whispered, and went back to rocking his body.
Danny knew enough about shock and grief to understand she wasn’t going to get through to the devastated wife. Her own anxiety escalating, she reluctantly left her there and followed Sam into the terminal.
The interior of the airport was a stark contrast to the runway. The unnatural silence outside was replaced with the cries and sobs of a panicked mob, all intensified by the concrete and glass the huge open space was made of. The resulting echoing chaos was overwhelming while also oddly reassuring. At least they knew they weren’t alone.
There was a heavy metallic smell and Danny could see smoke lingering up in the rafters. After going a short distance, she saw a spent fire extinguisher on the floor near a burnt-up kiosk.
A man bumped into her and she stumbled forward, almost falling to the floor. The jostling crowd was full of displaced people from all over the country, stuck far from home without any answers as to why. Seeing a woman in an airline uniform, Danny moved in front of her, forcing her to stop. “Do you know anything?” The woman shook her head and tried to get around her, but Danny mirrored her steps. “Please, someone from outside the airport must have made it here by now.”
The stewardess looked around nervously, her face pulled into a grimace. “Don’t you understand? We’re totally cut off. From everything and everyone. No one knows what happened. No one. Now get out of my way. I have to get home!” She lowered her shoulder then and shoved past Danny, a sob escaping her as she scurried away.
“Get back!” A gunshot rang out, causing the throng of people to all duck at once.
When another shot didn’t follow, people began moving again and Danny searched for the source of the argument. Nearby, two police officers stood with their weapons drawn, blocking access to a pair of doors marked restricted access as they faced off with a group of angry men.
While Danny suspected a lot of the people in the airport at the time of the event had already fled, those remaining had nowhere to go and terror was setting in. The small stores lining the corridor were full of looters grabbing whatever they could. Danny watched a woman leap over a fallen shelf, clutching a souvenir coffee mug, her face a mask of blind panic.
“We need to get out of here, now,” Sam urged.
While most of the tarmac-facing wall was made of windows, a good portion of the interior was in shadows. Stationary escalators lead to darkened pits and Danny fought with her imagination at what might be making their way to the surface as they skirted around them.
“Where are we going? I don’t see the captain anymore,” Danny moved up close to Sam to be heard over the noise. It would have been just as easy to go off on her own, but the older man had somehow become her last connection to anything normal. They hadn’t talked much while waiting it out on the plane, but she knew he was fifty-five, taught at a high school in Helena, and was on his way back from Florida where he’d been visiting his in-laws. His wife was still there since he’d had to leave early for a conference the next day. Although he looked nothing like her large Samoan father, he had the same confidence and intelligence. Danny trusted him.
“There,” Sam offered, pointing at a car rental sign and an arrow that pointed down another side corridor.
“You think the cars might work?” Danny’s brief flash of optimism quickly faded. If, by some chance, the rental cars worked while all of the other machinery at the airport didn’t, then waiting for so long to go inside would have eliminated any chance of getting to them before they were all gone.
“No, I don’t think they’ll work,” Sam confirmed. “We need a map if we’re going to figure out the best way to escape the city before everything falls apart.”
They were jogging past a makeshift first aid station, where several people were laid out on the bench seats of a waiting area. There were varying injuries, from burns to lacerations, but there were also a couple of bodies on the floor without any signs of trauma.
“Danny, I know you want to help.” Sam took her arm yet again, though he didn’t pull. He knew she was a paramedic and that it was in her nature to want to do something. “But look around you. If this is widespread, it’s only going to get worse. There isn’t anything you can do here that will make a difference. We have to get out.”
Danny nodded but still didn’t move. Instead, she gestured to the bodies on the floor. “These people. That man outside.” She turned to face Sam. “An implant like a pacemaker or defibrillator wouldn’t necessarily kill someone right away simply by stopping. However, a surge through the device could.”
It was Sam’s turn to nod and then he gently guided Danny toward the darkened corridor and rental car area.
“I don’t understand,” Danny continued as they approached a set of doors marked EXIT, RENTAL CAR PARKING. “What could send a pulse strong enough to affect an implant?”
“Nothing from the Earth.” Sam pushed the doors open and stepped out in the late afternoon light.
As thankful as Danny was for the fresh air, she still hesitated at the threshold. Her skin didn’t feel burned from the walk to the terminal, but Sam’s theory he’d shared earlier about ultraviolet radiation causing the pilots burns made sense. He also figured that the aluminum siding of the plane offered a little protection, but the cockpit was basically one big window.
Sam was already trying the doors of the nearest vehicles without any luck. He must not travel much.
Danny went to the abandoned attendant’s station and ducked behind the counter. There was a large box affixed to a shelf that had been left open and inside were about two dozen keys. Randomly picking one, she lifted it out and pressed the unlock button on the fob. “Duh, Danny,” she muttered, scooping up two handfuls of keys.
Sam grinned sheepishly at her when she tossed him several sets, and they both began trying various cars. Danny got the first one, a small Ford Escape. “Bingo!” she called out, thankful for the moment of joy no matter how small it was.
Sam jogged over to the car and immediately went for the glovebox. Grunting with satisfaction, he pulled out two road maps. “Bingo again,” he said, waving them in the air. “Open the trunk.”
Danny used the keys to do as directed and began to understand Sam’s train of thought when he happily pulled out a small first aid and roadside emergency kit. “You aren’t thinking short-term,” Danny said, watching him go through the bag’s contents. They had already determined she had two changes of clothes, a couple of snacks, one full water bottle, and some other useless things in her backpack. Sam’s bag was checked on the plane, so all he had was his computer bag with more useless stuff.