by Ron Foster
“Mums the word Boss, don’t worry about me I was just curious. I really think you are on to something here. I am a player to do what you want except for that move we got to discuss later. Have a good weekend.” Hogan said reaching over in order to shake the man's hand.
“What are you doing this weekend, Hogan? Want to come see my compound and make some more suggestions over a big dinner and some relaxation?”” Boss offered.
“No, I appreciate that wonderful offer a whole lot but I have myself a little fishing trip and picnic planned that’s kind of important. Hopefully it’s going to be one humdinger of a fish catching expedition that I can get video for my YouTube channel but I don’t know if I am using the right theory yet. Oh by the way did you download the solar storm notification apps to your phone I gave you? I am curious if Solar storms affect how the fish bite and tomorrow looks like a good day to find out and do some line wetting research. I say they do but I don’t know if it will be a positive or negative thing, we already know they affect people’s health and emotions as well as cause earthquakes, so it ought to be an interesting experiment.” Hogan said as he walked Boss to the door and decided he would head on home himself.
“I forgot to ask you about those things! Those notifications have been driving me nuts. I got them turned off at the moment I was getting too far too many notifications, seemed like one an hour.” Boss said fishing around in his pockets for his car keys.
“Oh, sorry about that, I should have told you where to set the threshold on notifications. The directions are on the web page on a little scale that tells you what they affect at what level, just crank them up right under big geomagnetic storm indices that affect power grids and ignore the small disruptions. Guess you already know the latest disturbance is supposed to start hitting earth tomorrow.” Hogan said as his thoughts shifted to going fishing the next day.
“Oh I know all about that, I must have got 40 notifications telling me just that before I turned the blamed thing off. Are you worried about this particular geomagnetic storm much? Seems like only medium interference coming at our latitude.” Boss asked leaning against his car.
“No, Not really, but I am watching that big sun spot starting to turn towards us maybe stirring up the solar winds. These storms are notoriously difficult to predict. At the moment as near as I can tell from what they are saying officially is that Humanity would only have a 12-hour warning window about the arrival of a “coronal mass ejection”. I am talking about a powerful one that could damage the National Grid, pipelines and railway switching signals. For this one we got coming towards us tomorrow they already turned some of the observatory satellites away from the sun and put the shields up so they reduce the chances of damage for them in a few hours. They get messed up so does some of our early warning system.” Hogan said waving to a friend of his that was about to head into the double doors of the bar.
“I am not so much worried about the radio telescope satellites and losing GPS on the navigation ones for awhile but I can see how lack of weather satellites and navigational aids can cause other problems.” Boss said starting to open his car door but closing it as he saw Hogan’s female friend approaching.
“Satellite communications are also essential to many daily activities you are not considering that would be at risk from solar storms. Think about it, every time you purchase a gallon of gas with your credit card, that's a satellite transaction." Hogan said before reminding him that this mega disaster plan he was trying to write also included cyber hacking of such.
“Who’s your friend? You been holding out on me and find you someone in this big city?” Boss asked as a pretty smiling young woman approached.
“Just a friend, we live in the same complex. Annie, I want you to meet Mr. Frank Salsec my boss that hired me for that business continuity plan I have been telling you about.
The two shook hands and exchanged pleasantries and Annie explained she was meeting some coworkers inside and before excusing herself asked Hogan if he was coming back in.
“I will be back in shortly; glad I bumped into you because I was making an early night out of it and heading home since we were going fishing in the morning.” Hogan said before Boss started asking questions.
“Does he have you buying into his solar storm fishing theory too?” Boss said snidely kidding with Hogan.
“Doesn’t have to. Actually, I am the one who asked him how solar storms affect fish since it confuses the hell out of bird’s migration flights.” Annie said beaming.
“Uh yea, I got to give her credit for that one, hadn’t considered it until she brought it up. Guess who might be coming to dinner at the Country Club, boss? You see Annie is one of those preppers I was telling you about I might recruit to assist me.” Hogan said before Boss started gushing about he didn’t know preppers wore pretty dresses instead of decking out in camo, etc.
“What’s this about a Country Club dinner?” Annie asked perplexed but evidently happy about the notion.
“I will tell you about it later, I suspect that gaggle of girls approaching is part of your entourage?” Hogan asked as a carful began bailing out and happily chattering at each other.
“No they don’t belong to me; actually, we got more guys than girls coming here tonight from that marketing meeting I gave today. Now, back to the Country Club thing, what is it and why am I going?” Annie said with a disarming smile.
“Mr. Salsec here thinks he can drum me up some business if I can convince them the sky is falling at a little dinner party he wants to put on.” Hogan began before Annie interrupted.
“Are you going to give a talk on the Kessler Syndrome? I wouldn’t miss that for the world! What’s the dress code? Hope it’s not too formal I don’t have the clothes for that!” Annie said suddenly looking dejected.
“Just regular nice business clothes are fine but no frumpy grey or black wool skirts, colorful evening wear if you know what I mean.” Boss began before Annie started asking specific clothing questions he dodged by giving her his business card and telling her to chatter at his personal secretary for details.
“What the hell is the Kessler Syndrome, Hogan? The sky can’t actually fall from a solar storm can it?” Boss asked as one eyebrow rose, studying him intently.
Before Hogan could get a word out of his mouth, Annie informed him that it didn’t even need a solar storm to cause satellites to fall from the sky and was happening naturally now as they spoke but Hogan was researching the effects of State or country sponsored hackers being able to do it with a cyber attack.
“Briefly, The Kessler Syndrome is a theory proposed by NASA scientist Donald J. Kessler in 1978, used to describe a self-sustaining cascading collision of space debris which in turn causes more collisions and wipes out all the satellites like one big pinball bumper game. Everything in low earth orbit is starting to do it and they are doing projections on a 5 yr increase in occurrences. Oh I am sorry Hogan, you got me babbling about that new planning theory you told me about I wasn’t supposed to mention yet. I am just fascinated about it because you don’t see it in the news much and what with all the hacking going on it wouldn’t take much to make satellites start spinning into each other and starting a cataclysmic space war.” Annie said looking at him sheepishly.
“Take her with you! If you need another dress just tell the secretary and the two of you can go shopping on me. Don’t be crazy Annie, and refuse a free dress now, it’s an investment for me to have you dress for success for this meeting. Hey, did Hogan tell you he was going to get a haircut tomorrow?” Boss said congratulating her and teasing Hogan before saying he must really be getting on home to his wife but Hogan better be ready come Tuesday to give him a small briefing paper before going to the party he was planning.
“He has a niece he sponsors in the dress store business.” Hogan offered.
“What did I just do?” Annie asked as they waved goodbye to Mr. Salsec as he pulled out.
“Got you a pretty new dress it sounds like and increase
d the hell out of my work load on a subject I know little about.” Hogan fumed.
“I am sorry, I didn’t mean to over talk you but that is one hell of an interesting subject you are working on. If you don’t want me to go with you, I will understand.” Annie said looking crestfallen.
“Oh hell no, you are doing me a huge favor by going. Actually I was kind of worried you wouldn’t want to go and hang out with all them stuffed shirt non preppers. Just try to stay off the gun talk and don’t bring up the militia. We got to spoon feed these turkeys and put the polish on the preparedness message. You know as well as I do that the bad press on Doomsday Preppers and bunker dwelling survivalists will give us an uphill battle before we even get started. As far as these folks are concerned I am an Emergency Hurricane Planner turned business continuity expert and keep it in that context as hard as it is. You might still not want to come because I don’t want to be hearing conversations from you about bug out bags and beans and bullets to them hoity toity folks. Just pretend you’re the weather girl or something saying get ready for a cold front and wrap your water pipes and bring in the pets, if you know what I mean.” Hogan warned.
“There is nothing wrong with being a member of the militia; it’s in the Constitution but I get your drift, Hogan. I won’t embarrass you, I will be good, I promise!” Annie said looking puppy eyed at him.
Hogan laughed knowing he was probably shooting himself in the foot by holding her to that promise but the vivacious prepper woman could more than likely hold her own and then some with that high society crowd better than he could. That is if she tried minding her enthusiasm and Ps and Qs on what some considered politically correct prepping. He did have his doubts and pauses about her though and would try to be listening out and rein her in if the subject of community defense or something other than hunting rifles came up.
“Let’s go have a drink and meet your people from work.” Hogan suggested ready to go have some more fun.
“Ok I agree but only if you don’t start chattering about solar storms!” Annie said giving him a playful poke to the ribs to remind him that he wasn’t no angel when it came to keeping his own big mouth shut particularly when he already looked a bit tipsy to her.
2
The Day The Sun Brought Darkness To The World
Beep! BEEP! Hogan’s computer started droning the second he turned the audio volume on when he woke up blurry eyed and hung over at 7 am. This just after a song called “In A Gadda Da Vida “by Iron Butterfly had already loudly blasted him out of bed on his clock radio alarm this morning.
“What a terribly shockingly LOUD way to wake up! ARRGH! Coffee first and then I will see to the daily news.” Hogan thought to himself as he struggled to drag his oversized throbbing head to the stove and turn the kettle on.
He came back to his dining room table and managed to settle down in his chair while trying to view a dizzying array of apps flashing and a full email box as well as a slew of people trying to direct message him on Face Book. He had a hard time trying to focus on just where to start first as evidently something major must have just happened between the time he had drug himself and Annie back from the bar at 3 am this morning and now. We can do this without the sounds!” Hogan thought and muted them entirely.
Annie didn’t drink much and Hogan often joked that he drank enough for both of them although he rarely showed any hangover effects for doing so, today was different. After only four hours sleep and a very loud wakeup speaker blast had jarred him out of his slumbers, his eyes didn’t want to seem to focus and his head had him hurting’ for certain today. He had actually tried to call off this fishing trip until a better day or got Annie to consider for them to go much later in the day than planned but she was having none of it. She insisted they get going no later than 7:30 AM and he begrudgingly had agreed.
The prospect of a new dress and country club dinner where Hogan was to be the featured speaker and her to be his honored guest was just too much for her. She could have probably talked about the invite until dawn if Hogan had let her.
Hogan had also promised to show her his newest secret he was keeping regarding the river. He had been as tight lipped as a clam as to what exactly that was but regretted mentioning it at all now as the light of day hit him. The alcohol he had consumed last night had loosened his lips just enough to bring up the subject of showing her something special on the river and now he was going to be paying the early morning price for that indiscretion.
“What in the world did all these flashing tray icons mean on this computer?” Hogan thought as he fuzzily hit the most recognizable one as a space weather alert. Best to know how it would affect his solar storm fishing theory today, he reckoned.
“Holy Crap! This ain’t good!” Hogan said out loud as he leaned forward hurriedly to read a number and began to read the first message that came up. Coronal Mass Ejection alert!
“Uncool! Unfreaking cool! This is bad, oh this is very bad!” Hogan mumbled to himself and then hurried to un-mute the sound on his audible warnings on his business cell phone which was sitting on the kitchen counter.
According to a quick perusal of immediate action warnings, it appeared NASA had just recently issued a 24 hour warning of a CME hitting earth and that all electrical producing companies were supposed begin to power down their reactors and turbines by 10:00. He no sooner just had started to register that fact and reach for his next button app when a heavy pounding started on his door that sounded like the cops wanted to come in while his phone also immediately started ringing.
“Hang on a second!” Hogan yelled as he grabbed his phone and tried to make sense in his mind what he had done with his pants last night before going to bed and located his personal cell phone and answered it.
“I’m coming!” Hogan yelled as he fished his phone out of his jeans change pocket and said hello while trying to fit one leg into them at the same time.
“Hey it’s Frank Salsec! Do you know what’s going on?” The excited voice of his Boss said through the receiver.
“Just got up buddy, but yes I do! Shit is about to hit the fan right? Hang on a second I got to answer the door.” Hogan said as his befuddled brain tried to get his other pants leg on while evidently Annie was trying to break down his door and in his haste to get dressed and answer it he wound up falling on the bed.
“Damn boots!” Hogan called out as he tripped over those too and stepped on a pebble that evidently the aggressive treads of those things had picked up and left in his path for his bare feet to find.
“Are you there?” Bosses voice called in his ear from the phone he had jammed to his head.
“I am working on it, hold tight, Boss.” Hogan called back to the receiver and the voice outside his door.
“Hogan, its happening! Let me in, watch out!” THUMP! THUMP! The loud knocking resumed as Annie called to him as she rushed by his disheveled looking self and went to turn on his TV where the emergency broadcast system had begun to blare its warnings as soon as it had warmed up a second.
“Turn that crap off or at least turn it down a bunch Annie, I got a call here I am on!” Hogan yelled out as she pranced between the TV and his computer to see what news he had up on screen.
“Hogan, we got less than 12 hours to prepare for lights out!” A distraught Boss hollered into the phone with a couple expletives added to tell him he needed to get his hungover butt in gear.
“Boss, I got to call you back. Sorry but I don’t know up from down or what’s going on until I get to my computer for a few minutes.” Hogan started to say before the TV and all the lights went out.
“Wouldn’t you know it? Power just went out; stay on the phone I don’t know when the cell towers will quit. Tell you what, go to the store before the panic sets in and get groceries.” Hogan began to say before Annie said give me your wallet, evidently offering to help him with that advice.
“Both of you quit talking for a second!” Hogan bellowed trying to wrap his head around what was happening.
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br /> “Zip your zipper.” Annie advised ignoring his request and went to look in his kitchen cabinets evidently thinking more clearly than he was.
“I take that back Boss, you need to stay indoors, don’t get out on the roads at all because you already got enough food stored to see you through.” Hogan managed to get out before the line went dead as millions of people nationwide started calling their friends and relatives overloading the phone system.
“Crap, I will try calling him back later, what did you hear on that emergency broadcast?” Hogan asked as Annie flitted around looking out windows and looking more nervous than a rattle snakes tail as Hogan tried to take in what all was happening.
“What do we do, Hogan?” Annie asked beseechingly.
“Hell I don’t know! Quit yelling at me for one thing. So I am not dreaming and this is the real deal emergency I been warning folks was going to happen someday, right?” Hogan asked knowing it was but wanting confirmation.
“I just got up this morning a short while ago also but the TV emergency bulletin had an official space weather emergency warning on it that said that the electricity would be turned off in a few hours and tune to our local emergency broadcast stations for future notices. I guess they meant radios because the cable channels said they would be going off line after updating shortly.” Annie said looking like a baseball player trying to think about stealing second and doing the half move in that direction thing between Hogan’s desk and the front door. Where she wanted to go Hogan didn’t know exactly but figured it was to the grocery store but it soon became apparent she wanted to get back to her apartment and load more of her preps into her car.
“I got my bug out bag ready and emptied my pantry into pillow cases. What should I do next, Hogan?” Annie asked as she checked the pistol he hadn’t noticed she was wearing at her side under the long shirt tail of a Khaki shirt she had on.