by James Hunt
“Give that back!” Joey said.
“You don’t talk to me like that!”
“You don’t get to tell me what to do anymore!”
Beth brought her hand to the side of Joey’s face. The slap silenced both of them, and each looked shocked at what happened.
Joey’s lip quivered. Beth’s mouth dropped. She reached out to him, but he backed away. Tears formed in the corner of his eyes.
“Joey, I…” Beth said.
Beth could hear his footsteps thump along the steps as he ran up the stairs inside the house. She looked down at the gun still in pieces on the porch. She bent down and finished cleaning the parts of the rifle Joey left and reassembled the gun.
Beth’s hand was on the handle of the screen door when she heard it. At first she thought it was just a bug buzzing around her ear, but when she realized what it was her eyes found the road.
The truck was slowing down as it approached the farm. When it arrived at the front gate it idled there for a moment before it finally inched forward onto the dirt road leading up to the house.
The dust from the road flew up and swirled into the summer sky. Beth couldn’t see the face of the driver because of the glare of the sun, but from what she could tell it was a military vehicle of some kind.
The tires were large and ribbed for different types of terrain. There was a mounted machine gun on the top and heavy armored plates protecting the whole vehicle.
Beth kept the rifle crooked under her arm. She knew it wasn’t loaded, but whoever was in that truck didn’t know that.
The door to the truck swung open and Beth brought the rifle up to her shoulder. A boot hit the gravel followed by another. The man that spun around from the door wore beige army fatigues, aviator sunglasses, and had short crew-cut hair with a clean-shaven face.
He also wore a 9mm pistol holstered on each hip, held together with a belt and additional ammo. He kept walking toward Beth, but neither of them said anything. She was still in shock at the sight of a working vehicle in her front yard.
Beth examined his uniform. There wasn’t a single fiber out of place. She looked back inside the truck to see if there was anyone else, but the sun’s glare still blocked her view. If there were others inside they didn’t step out.
“I can wait for you to grab some bullets to reload if you’d like.”
“Who are you?” Beth asked.
The soldier kept his hands behind his back as he walked up the porch steps. He took off his sunglasses and two piercing blue eyes examined her.
“My name is Cain. I’m a part of the Cincinnati scouting division,” he said.
“Cincinnati? You’re quite a ways from home.”
“Not as far as you’d think,” he said.
“What do you want?”
“Are you here alone?”
Beth took a step back and held up the rifle between them out of instinct, forgetting there wasn’t any ammo in the gun.
“I’m here to help,” Cain said.
“Help how?”
Cain stepped forward, the barrel of the gun pushing into his chest. He leaned forward as far as he could, looking Beth straight in the eyes.
“I can help get back what you lost.”
***
Fay knew something was wrong when she inserted the key into the door for Jung’s room and saw that the chain lock had been set.
“Jung? Jung, open up,” Fay said.
She tried to peek through the small crack in the door, but she couldn’t see anything. She pounded her fist on the door.
“Jung, this isn’t funny.”
That’s when she saw a hand limp on the floor. When the sunlight from the cracked door hit Jung’s hand it shimmered red.
“Jung!”
Fay took a step back and kicked the door in, breaking the chain and flooding the dark room with sunlight. She rushed over to Jung, who was unconscious on the floor. His wrists were cut and blood was everywhere.
“Oh my God, Jung, no.”
She checked his pulse, but couldn’t feel anything. She bent her face down to check his breathing, but there was nothing. She tore the sheets off the bed, wrapping them around Jung’s wrists. She wasn’t sure if there was any blood left to stop, but she couldn’t think of anything else to do. She tied the sheets as tight as she could.
Fay placed her hands on Jung’s chest, trying to remember the CPR course she took a few years back and what she needed to do to try and restart his heart. She placed the heel of her palm on his sternum in the middle of his chest. She pressed down hard, hearing the crack of bones. She didn’t stop though. She counted to thirty and tilted his head back, clearing the airway, and pushed two breaths into his lungs.
“C’mon, Jung, c’mon.”
Fay kept her arms rigid, pressing down on Jung’s chest. She was in the middle of the compressions when she heard Billy running up the stairs. She panicked.
“Billy, don’t bring the kids up here!” Fay shouted.
Billy rushed into the room. Fay looked around for Claire or Jung Jr., but they weren’t with him.
“Don’t worry; I put them in a room downstairs. What happened?” Billy asked.
Fay gestured to the sheets around Jung’s wrists. Blood covered her hands and the carpet.
“He wasn’t breathing when I came in. He was passed out on the floor. I couldn’t feel a pulse either,” Fay said.
“Jesus.”
Billy started messing with the sheets around Jung’s wrists.
“What are you doing?” Fay asked.
“Making a tourniquet.”
Billy rewrapped the sheets, twisting them with one of Fay’s spare magazines she had on her.
“He’s lost a lot of blood,” Billy said.
“He’s going to make it.”
Billy grabbed her arm, but she shoved him off. She wasn’t going to let him die. She couldn’t let him die. This was her job. If she failed, then the kids downstairs wouldn’t have anyone.
The thought crossed her mind that the kids might be better off without him alive, but she didn’t want to believe that. She knew Jung was only a shadow of the person that he used to be, but she didn’t think that all of him was gone.
She finished another thirty compressions and when she put her mouth over his and blew Jung coughed.
“He’s breathing. Jung, can you hear me? Jung?” Fay asked.
Fay shook him, but there wasn’t any other sign of life. She checked his breath one more time to be sure.
Billy placed his finger on Jung’s neck and held it there, still as water.
“It’s faint, but it’s there,” Billy said.
“Thank God.”
“We need to get fluids in him fast. Do you have any first aid equipment stored anywhere?” Billy asked.
“Whatever I found is in my room. You stay here with him. I’m going to go check on the kids and then bring back some supplies. What room did you put the kids in?”
“One twenty-three.”
“Okay, I’ll be back.”
Fay headed down the staircase and when she made it to the bottom she stopped. Her head felt dizzy, her legs turned to jelly. All of the adrenaline rushed out of her. She grabbed the staircase rail to steady herself and shut her eyes. She focused on gathering her strength and when she felt sturdier she found room 123.
Jung Jr. and Claire were huddled together on the bed. Both of them looked frightened when she came inside, but as soon as they recognized her they both ran to her.
“You guys all right?” Fay asked.
Neither of them would let go of her legs. Fay reached down and picked up Claire. She grabbed Jung Jr.’s hand and walked to the bed.
“Did you guys hear me yelling?”
Jung Jr. nodded his head. Claire wiped her eyes. Fay didn’t know how she was going to explain their father’s condition. She knew Claire wouldn’t understand, but Jung Jr. was probably old enough to grasp it.
“Your dad’s…”
She trailed off.
The two faces looking at her had lost their mother, their father was trying to take himself out of the equation, they were stuck in a place incredibly far away from their home, and there wasn’t any guarantee that they’d ever see it again.
Fay figured they had other family somewhere. She just had to keep them safe long enough to find them. That would be the first thing she’d speak to Jung about when he woke up. She wasn’t going to take any more chances with him.
“Your dad isn’t feeling well,” Fay finally sputtered out.
“Is he dying?” Jung Jr. asked.
“No, he’s going to be fine,” Fay replied.
Jung Jr. buried his face in her stomach and Claire started to play with her hair. Whatever Jung was going through Fay had to snap him out of. She couldn’t let these kids lose the only parent they had left.
Day 23 (Cincinnati)
Both Colonel Cadogan and Sergeant Blake escorted Mike to Bram’s apartment. He was patted down three different times: once before he entered the building, once before he was allowed in the elevator, and one more time before he was ushered onto Bram’s penthouse floor.
Mike stepped out of the elevator and was escorted into Bram’s living room.
The furniture was simple, but modern. There were a few paintings and pictures placed on various walls. The wood floors were shined and glossy.
There was a table set with fine silverware and a four-course meal. The meal consisted of ham, mashed potatoes, salad, fruit, bread, and green beans, all with steam rising from the plates. Mike let his hands run across the fine lace of the tablecloth.
But everything else failed in comparison to the view that the apartment granted. The entire south wall was a window giving a panoramic picture of the city and the Ohio River.
“It’s nice to see civility again, isn’t it?” Bram asked.
“The pat downs on the way up suggested security over civility.”
“Well, one has to be careful these days as I’m sure you’re aware.”
“I’m aware.”
Bram gestured to the couch.
“Please, have a seat,” Bram said. “How has your family adjusted to their new home?”
“We’re fine.”
“I hear your daughter has an aptitude for the military.”
“Who are you?”
Two crystal-stemmed glasses sat on the small table between them. Bram picked one of them up, pinching the thin stem between his fingers. The rays of sunlight coming through the windows filtered through the crystal’s glass, separating the sunlight into different colors on the floor.
“Prisms are remarkable,” Bram said. “If you take white light and point it through a crystal prism, the light will separate into all its natural components. Now the degree of separation depends on the angle in which the light enters the prism. It takes a precise measurement to disperse all of the white light.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“Who I am and what I do is much like this prism. I help breakdown matter into its purest nature.”
Two waiters entered the living room and filled the crystal glasses with water, which they served along with a plate of pierogies.
“I’m told they’re a Pittsburgh staple,” Bram said.
Bram picked up one of the Polish dumplings and popped it into his mouth.
“Delicious,” Bram said.
“You obviously brought me here for something. Now, it’s either because you think I’m a threat, or you think I can help you. So which is it?” Mike asked.
Bram grabbed the napkin on the table in front of him and wiped his fingers harshly.
“Should I be worried about you, Mr. Grant? From what I hear about your group you’ve been through quite a bit, seen a lot of violence. Are you planning on continuing that trend here with us?” Bram asked.
“Not if I don’t have to.”
“Good.”
Bram pulled a phone out of his pocket and placed it to his ear.
“Bring it in,” he said.
A few moments later Colonel Cadogan returned with Sergeant Blake. Cadogan carried a briefcase and the two men joined Mike and Bram.
Cadogan opened the briefcase and pulled out a laptop. When he turned the laptop around for everyone to view, there was a picture of Dr. Wyatt on the screen.
“Do you know this man?” Cadogan asked.
“No, I’ve never seen him before,” Mike replied.
“This is Dr. Quinn Wyatt. He worked for the EPA before the blackout. About seven months ago he was in front of a Senate hearing involving his research on the vulnerability of our country’s utilities,” Blake said.
“The Senate hearing never finished and Wyatt was branded a lunatic,” Cadogan continued.
“Before the blackout I was CEO and president of a microprocessor manufacturer. I read Dr. Wyatt’s research and he mentioned that one area where the country was susceptible to attack was an EMP. Due to my business interests his report caught my attention,” Bram said.
“What happened?” Mike asked.
“I brought him on as a consultant in hopes of developing a new processor that could withstand a high-powered EMP attack like the one described,” Bram said.
“What was in it for you?” Mike asked.
“If we could prove the danger of an EMP attack and successfully patent an EMP-resistant microprocessor, it would be worth billions,” Bram answered.
“So, what went wrong?” Mike asked.
“Dr. Wyatt was still hell bent on making Congress pay for branding him a lunatic. Instead of developing a prototype, he used Mr. Thorn’s facilities to manufacture an EMP device strong enough to take out the entire country,” Cadogan said.
“Even high-powered EMPs have a limited range. The only way it would have worked was if the device was detonated in the atmosphere,” Mike said.
“I’ve had some military contracts in the past. Dr. Wyatt forged paperwork with my signature telling the Pentagon about the work he was performing and how it could be used for military applications,” Bram said.
“He then used those military connections to have a mercenary unit sneak into a missile silo in Kansas where he launched the device,” Cadogan said.
“We didn’t find out that he was involved until after we arrived in Cincinnati. One of my manufacturing plants was located here and we had started producing some first generation EMP-resistant chips at this location. We installed them in certain public and private buildings, which is why we were able to get most of the city up and running so quickly after the blast,” Bram said.
“I’ve been in contact with Washington and we’re home base for now until we can ship out repairs to the rest of the country. We have a three-month timeline right now of getting power back on in all major cities,” Cadogan said.
“So what does all this have to do with me?” Mike asked.
“Dr. Wyatt’s still in Cincinnati, and he’s been trying to undermine our operation since he arrived here,” Blake said.
“He’s held up south of the Ohio River and he’s been preventing us from getting supplies to the southern states,” Bram replied.
“He’s surrounded himself with extremists who are using the EMP attack as an opportunity to establish a new government. We believe he’s running out of resources though,” Cadogan said.
“The biggest advantage Wyatt has right now is the river. There’s only one working bridge and he has a stronghold on it. If we can take control of the bridge then we’ll be able to hit them on their turf,” Blake said.
“And we want you, Kalen, and Sam to be a part of the raid,” Bram said.
“Aside from a few military personnel, most of the members of our units are civilians with limited combat experience. You and your group, however, have quite a bit of experience,” Cadogan said.
“No, my daughter will not be a part of this. No one from my group will,” Mike said.
Mike rose from his chair and headed to the elevator. He didn’t have to take orders from these people, and he s
ure as hell wasn’t going to put his daughter on the front lines of a war.
“You realize what this is, Mike?” Bram asked. “We don’t stop him and everything we have is in jeopardy. And not just for your family, but every family in the entire country.”