by D. Gideon
Simon looked back down at the irate woman. “Ms. Stapleton, I’ll make you a deal. You answer all of the Mayor’s questions and I won’t contact your superiors in Baltimore with photos of their stolen property. Otherwise, I’ll have Frank here charge you with robbery and put you in a holding cell until we can find a county judge to set bail for you. Which might be a while, considering I haven’t seen Judge Walters since this all went down. I think he took off for his daughter’s house in Kentucky. And did I mention the toilets in the cells aren’t flushing? Your call.”
“This is coercion,” Sharon said. “Bribery.”
“In my profession, we call it a plea bargain,” Simon said. “Ain’t that right, Mayor Wilhelm, Attorney at Law?”
The mayor smiled. “I negotiated a lot of plea deals before I became Mayor, Ms. Stapleton. I know a good deal when I hear one. Give us ten minutes of your time and all of this goes away.”
Ms. Stapleton glared at everyone for a minute, then anchored her gaze on Pastor Flannigan’s collar. “You’re a clergyman?”
“I try to be,” Bill said with a smile.
“You can stand in as my legal counsel, right? Make sure they hold to their word and take me back when they’re done questioning me? Because I guarantee you, they’ll want to go back on that.”
“Ms. Stapleton, I assure you-“ the mayor started, but Sharon held up a hand.
“You had me kidnapped. Your assurances mean nothing,” she said. She looked back to Bill. “Can you do that?”
“I can be your counsel and your witness,” Bill said. “I can’t be your lawyer, but I’ll make sure you get back home even if I have to drive you myself. I won’t leave your side. I give you my word.”
Ms. Stapleton was quiet for a minute, glancing back and forth between Bill and Dotty. Her gaze dropped down to their clasped hands, and she nodded.
“Fine,” she said, turning to Mayor Wilhelm. “Let’s get this over with. Where’s your office?”
“Right now, you’re standing in it,” Wilhelm said. He looked to Bill. “I’ll let you know when to bring her up.” He turned and headed for the little stage.
Sharon turned and looked at the crowd of residents, then back to Sheriff Kane.
“He can’t be serious. He wants me to do this in front of your whole town? Is he insane?”
“We told them we’d have some information for them this evening,” Simon said, shrugging. “They’re already pretty worked up; no use making them wait when they can hear it straight from you.”
Sharon shook her head and looked back to Pastor Bill. “Please tell me your car is close.”
“It’s about three blocks away,” Bill started, but Sharon shook her head again.
“Get it here. NOW. It needs to be right here, and it needs to be running. Either there’s a car waiting to get me out of here, or I’m not saying shit.”
Simon’s brows furrowed and he frowned. “Really, Ms. Stapleton, there’s no need to be so dramatic-”
“The power’s not coming back!” Sharon hissed. “Not for years! How do you think that crowd’s going to react when he makes me tell them that?”
No one said anything. Bill’s hand clenched Dotty’s hard enough that it hurt. Dotty looked out at the crowd, and up onto the stage where Mayor Wilhelm was waving his arms, trying to settle them down. One part of her wanted to rush home and lock the doors, and another part wanted to stay just to see what would happen.
“Damn,” Simon finally rumbled, breaking the silence. “You’re sure?”
“No, Sheriff, I was torpedoing my career and stealing all the food and toilet paper I could get my hands on because our men are working hard and will have this fixed in a matter of hours. Have you seen any power trucks on the road? No, you haven’t, because I sent everyone home myself Sunday afternoon after we’d run damage assessments on every substation in the territory. Yes, I’m sure!”
The Sheriff put his hat back on and blew out a heavy breath. “Ms. Stapleton, I suggest you…tone down your answers here, and tell the Mayor the full impact in private.”
“That’s not right, Simon,” Dotty said. “Everyone here needs to know the full truth, so they can prepare.”
Simon shook his head. “Look at this crowd. They’re already angry. They might riot if she just says the power will be out for a few months. They will most definitely riot if she tells them the truth. Once they get started rioting, I don’t have the manpower to stop them, Miss Dotty.”
“I understand, but it’s still not right,” Dotty said, shaking her head.
Simon frowned, looking out over the crowd. He looked back to Sharon. “Ms. Stapleton, you guys have done studies on this, right? About the consequences of a long-term power outage?”
“The government did one, and we had to participate,” she said. “Why?”
“How many people die?” He asked.
“Excuse me?”
He leaned closer and spoke slow. “How many people…die?”
She crossed her arms and glanced to the side. “Ninety percent.”
It was his turn. “Excuse me?”
She swallowed and took a deep breath. “Everyone on support systems at hospitals, nursing homes, and the like as soon as the generators run out of fuel. A million every week or so when their prescriptions run out. Millions more in the first two months from starvation, dysentery, and infections. None of that even figures in the violence and rioting. And once winter hits, with no heat? Forget it. Ninety percent of the population in the first year.”
“Lord Jesus,” Dotty whispered, her hand finding the little cross on her necklace.
“That can’t be right,” Cindy said. “That’s gotta be worse-case scenario.”
“This is the worse-case scenario,” Sharon snapped. “The only thing worse than this would be all-out nuclear war.”
“Keep your voices down,” Frank warned.
The Sheriff adjusted his hat and looked towards the east. The darkening sky there was already turning a deep red.
“Okay, you’re going to tell them a few weeks…up to five or six,” he said. “But no more. If they can prepare for that long without power, they’ll be prepared to go longer.”
“It’s not the preparation, Simon, it’s the idea of the thing. These people are already without food, with no way to buy more,” Pastor Bill said. “There was a crowd at City Hall earlier chanting and demanding that the Mayor bring in food trucks.”
“And the National Guard,” Dotty said.
“The National Guard already knows. They knew Friday morning. If they were going to help, they’d be here already,” Sharon said.
“Friday morning?” Simon repeated.
“Yeah. They sent us an emergency memo Friday morning. Said a CME was most likely on the way, and we were to make up a reason to shut everything down at 6am on Saturday. If it was going to hit, they said, it would be around noon Saturday,” Sharon said.
“That makes no sense,” Bill said. “NASA watches the sun twenty-four hours a day. How could they have gotten the timing so wrong?”
“The question isn’t how, preacher, it’s why,” Sharon said, turning to him. “Think about the power a government would have with a totally helpless, starving society and an excuse to put the military on the streets.”
“You can’t be saying you think they actually gave you the wrong information on purpose?” Bill said.
“Send out a notice, so you can spin it and say you tried,” Sharon said. “But make sure the notice has incorrect information so you get the result you want? Nah. No government would ever do that. Silly me, right?”
She turned back to Simon. “I’ll say five or six weeks, but it won’t help. I want a car or I’m not setting foot on that stage.”
“Frank, get the lady a car,” Simon said.
“On it,” Frank said. He kissed the top of Cindy’s head and jogged off.
“I suppose you ladies will scalp me if I suggest you go home?” Simon asked, looking back and forth between Dotty and Cin
dy.
“The people need to see me here,” Cindy said. “Kenny thinks if they see all of the community leaders here with them, working to solve this, they’ll stay calm.”
“Miss Dotty?” Simon asked.
Dotty shook her head. “I need to see how the townspeople are gonna react so I can know what to do next,” she said. “Do I offer everyone on my street some seeds and get them started on winter gardens, or do I load up my shotgun? I need to be here.”
“Trust me, lady, load your shotgun,” Sharon said. “Then load your car, and get the fuck out of town.”
On the stage, Mayor Wilhelm had finally quieted down the crowd and was thanking them all for coming.
“We’ll try to answer all of your questions. We’ve been working very hard to get some information for you, and get the town through this predicament. If I could get our community leaders up here on stage?” He pointed out into the crowd. “Council members, too. Come on up. You’re politicians, so don’t act shy now!” There was a small spattering of chuckles in the crowd.
Wilhelm looked over at the group next to the stage and gestured for them to come up.
“Showtime, everyone. Let’s go,” Simon said.
Bill gave Dotty’s hand a final squeeze before letting go and mounting the steps.
Dotty tucked herself up next to the stage, where she could still see everything that went on, but she could duck under the platform if things went crazy. Her gut was telling her to go home, but she needed to see how her little town was going to handle this news.
On the stage, the Mayor introduced Ms. Stapleton. The crowd fell silent, waiting for the news.
“Guess I ain’t got no good sense either,” Dotty whispered, shaking her head at herself. “God help us all.”
THE END
SUNFALL Book 2: Arrival will be released early 2017
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Drew Gideon spends most of her time arguing with the characters in her head—the characters usually win. She lives with her “I’m an enganeer engeneer enginear…I’m good with math!” husband and the three coolest kids in the world in the sweaty armpit of the United States. She’s proudly owned by two cats and a dog, all of whom adopted her when she went to the shelter in need of a friend.
Drew longs for a time when she’ll have a self-sufficient homestead and cozy writing cabin in the mountains, where she can utilize her own personal shooting range clad in nothing but a good set of cans and her pajamas if she wants. Of course, she’d really prefer to dump the cans and use a nice suppressor.
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Table of Contents
Copyright
Preface
Epigraph
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Afterword
About the Author