Catalyst (Book 1): Downward Cycle

by JK Franks

  Chapter Twelve

  Back inside the small house, the temperature was climbing again, so Scott opened the shuttered windows. Sitting down, he began to make a list of the financial moves he wanted to make once the power came back on….if it came back on. Scott got busy gathering all the logins and passwords so he would be ready when it happened. He was unsure of how much he could withdraw from the local bank at any one time, so he decided to check that as well once he could get online. He cleaned out the cash from his fireproof safe box—about $2,500. He had a few real silver dollars in there which he would save for later, as well as a handful of pure gold Canadian Maple Leaf coins. Each of the coins was about an ounce in weight. They could be very useful if things did get bad. He needed more cash but also wanted to convert as much of it as he could into something he could use or trade when needed. Currency of any kind would be useless if the economy completely collapsed.

  There was one more piece of gold in the box: a simple round wedding band. Seeing the ring brought back a flood of memories and pain. Looking back, he had known he was more infatuated with Angela than in love. She was sexy, confident, and, as his co-workers had said, “Way outta’ your league, dude.”

  He thought about how scared he had been when he finally got the courage to ask her out. Granted, he had done so by text message… Scott had never been sure why she said yes. Yes to the first date and yes to the awkward proposal the following year. His brother had been his best man, and in the anteroom with the preacher on that day he had warned Scott to be careful. Bobby had seen something in Angela that left him unsettled. Scott, on the other hand, was too wrapped up in finally having someone in his life. Having a love of his own.

  The marriage had been challenging almost from the very beginning, and four years later, when she left him, Scott was shattered and humiliated. He had moved back down here to get away, to hide out and just be alone. He didn’t feel he would ever trust, much less love again. The thought of her did momentarily cause him to wonder how she would be doing in all this, but the fleeting concern quickly faded into nothingness. Pocketing the ring, he knew it would be one of the first things he traded.

  He tried his cell phone again. This time, his brother's phone rang but then went almost immediately to voicemail. It was the generic voicemail greeting, not Bobby’s normal one, but he left a brief message anyway, “Hey man, it's Scott… look, you told me you were paying the power bill for the beach house, but listen… they cut me off,” Scott laughed, then continued. “Seriously, dude, I just wanted to check on you guys—that was some serious shit yesterday, and yes…you were right to be prepared and yes, I am an idiot… I’m okay… power and cell service are erratic but, uh… try and call me when you can. I could use your expertise. Be safe. Love you, man.”

  Although the brothers had always been close, they were not normally very verbal about their feelings. Today, though, it seemed important. Bobby had been there for him more times than he could remember. Only three years older, he always seemed smarter, tougher and just a cool guy to be around. Bobby had cast a protective shadow over his little brother from day one, daring anyone to ever pick on little Scott.

  Looking outside it was a beautiful day, and he wanted to go for a bike ride. Over the years, riding had become a bit of an addiction for him, although one he did not feel guilty about having. On the bike, he knew it would be easy to not think that the world was falling apart. Even on the worst of days, riding the bike cleared his mind and brought clarity. How often will I be able to ride now? he wondered. If what he feared was true, he knew much, probably all, of his time would be focused on basic survival. Maybe ride later, he told himself. For now, he had more work to do.

  To be honest, he was uncertain of what to do next, but he knew there was not a lot to be accomplished sitting around here while the power was out. Finally, he grabbed his list and laptop bag and headed to the Jeep. He decided to head back to town with what cash he had and try to pick up supplies. If the power was on in town, he wanted to get fuel. That was the top priority, then cash from the bank, some more short-term food and whatever long-term supplies he could find. He reasoned that the town may have power, and he might be able to log onto the Internet from somewhere in town.

  Scott had decided to hook up his empty motorcycle trailer to the Jeep, just in case he found stores that were open. Although he had never owned a motorcycle, he had bought the trailer as it was enclosed and a nice size for hauling a lot of things. It was particularly useful for transporting his bike and gear to some of the distant bike races he competed in. Pulling onto the main road to Harris Springs, he mentally reviewed his lists, wondering if he could get any of the items on them. As he got closer to town, he was surprised at the number of people walking and the amount of bikes out—both higher than normal—but everything looked mostly like it had several hours earlier…normal.

  Either everyone else is nuts, or I am, he joked to himself as he watched the town go about its usual day. But no turning back now… he told himself as a flush of doubt rose in his chest. He swallowed it back down as he steered the Jeep onto Main Street. Through the open windows, Scott enjoyed the familiar ocean smells, listened to the sounds of the waves, the chatter of gulls and a distant blast from a ship's horn. It all seemed so normal, his little town just waiting to wake up and start another day. The gas stations on this side of town were dark and had closed signs in the windows. Same for the big Publix grocery store. The big box builders supply store was open, although also dark. As he pulled in, Scott saw the hand-lettered sign: “Cash Only.” Walking in, he was handed a flashlight and then selected a large rolling cart. There were not many people shopping. Good. While he wanted to keep his limited cash in reserve and preferred to use credit or debit, he thought it best to take advantage of this opportunity.

  Heading to the sections with the plastic fuel containers, Scott loaded several into the cart. To that he added a stack of clean five gallon pails, several tarps, lighters, lantern fuel and as many of the camp stove fuel cylinders as they had. He found large bottles of bleach and also picked up several large bottles of granulated chlorine from the pool supplies aisle. He searched for a power generator but saw none. He added several rolls of duct tape, padlocks, some heavy duty chain, batteries, and quite a few smaller items. He also found the handy three-gallon commercial water bottles up front and added six of those.

  He noticed two workers standing in the dark with small lights clipped to their work aprons. As he got closer, he realized they were teenagers: a boy, and a cute girl. They were talking in hushed tones, but it was pretty obvious it wasn’t work related. The girl had a cell phone in her hand, as if wishing it would come back on might make it so. “He and I are just friends, ya know?” she was saying.

  “But you ain’t heard shit from him,” the boy said. Scott wondered how the younger generation would cope if cell phones or the Internet never worked again. They’ll actually have to talk to one another. Scott smiled at his private joke. He was pretty sure none of them would be able to develop the communication skills to actually talk to one another. Was it possible that writing notes would even come back in fashion? His mom would have been happy to see that happen, he thought.

  “Excuse me,” Scott said, “Do you guys have any generators?”

  They both looked up, surprised, but the girl smiled and said, “Sorry. Those were gone yesterday.”

  “That figures,” Scott sighed.

  She suggested he try the Farmers Supply nearby. “They been closed since the blackout, but usually they stock as many as we do this time of year,” she offered.

  “Hey, thanks.” Scott smiled and nodded as he turned and headed back to the front of the store and toward daylight.

  Checking out was slow as the cashier had to look up prices while the store manager punched in the price and quantity on an actual calculator. Scott handed them back the flashlight he had been using and thanked them for even being open. The manager smiled, but the cashier didn’t.

  �
��It’s our pleasure,” the man said. “We know our community needs us right now.”

  Scott suspected that the prices were a good bit higher than they were before the blackout, but he decided to stay silent. He handed over the cash, thanked them, and headed out to load up the trailer. Everything fit inside nicely, and he left the fuel containers in the back so he could get to them easily if he found a working gas station.

  As he got back on the main street, he was disappointed to see the few traffic lights were off. Still no power. On the far side of town, he did notice a few cars and a good number of people at Castro’s Place, the local sports bar. His stomach rumbled. He’d eaten there several times before; the food was good, and he figured he might as well get some lunch if they were serving. The Jeep and trailer would not fit on the street side parking, so he pulled into the empty gravel lot next door.

  As he got close to the door, he saw another “Cash Only” notice printed on the large sidewalk sign alongside the proclamation “All Seafood Half-Off!” Inside he found that the place was packed, and almost immediately he heard a somewhat familiar voice calling his name.

  Preacher Jack was nursing a beer at a high-top table with two other guys. Motioning for Scott to join them, he scooted around to make more room. Scott walked over and made an unenthusiastic effort to decline the invitation. “I can just get something to go—don’t need to crash your party.”

  “Sit your ass down,” Jack said.

  What kind of preacher is this guy? Scott wondered.

  “At the very least, I owe you a beer for that lifesaving cup of Shirley’s coffee you gave me this morning.”

  Scott sat down uneasily and studied the three men. The preacher introduced the two other guys as Todd and Bartos. Handshakes followed, and within minutes, a cold mug of beer appeared in front of Scott. Todd was a big guy, probably late forties, dark hair and a goatee just on the verge of going gray. He had a gravelly voice, weathered face and a few tattoos on his exposed arm. The other man, Bartos, was slim, bald and looked vaguely Hispanic. His dark eyes scanned the room nervously, and he spoke in a rapid-fire staccato.

  “Order some food, Scott,” Todd advised. “It’s takin’ ‘em a while.”

  “I’m just impressed they’re even open with no power. I guess cooking and selling it now’s a better option than throwing it out tomorrow.”

  “At least the cervezas are still cold, my friend,” smiled Bartos, holding up his nearly empty mug and motioning to a server behind Scott.

  Scott ordered the blackened redfish and steamed red potatoes, lamenting the fact that there were no fried dishes available. The servers were bringing out platters of free appetizers to the bar for people to share. Jack went over and filled a basket for the table. The conversation at the table picked up quickly.

  Jack continued his introductions; “Todd has a charter fishing business, and Bartos is the town drunk.”

  Laughing, he continued, “No, this idiot runs the county mechanical shop and is our resident doomsday prepper.”

  “Shouldn’t you be holed up in your bunker then?” Scott joked.

  “Don’t be a hater,” Bartos replied with a semi-serious look on his face.

  “What d’you do, Scott?” Todd asked, leaning back in his chair.

  Scott gave his standard response. “Computer consultant.” Not exactly accurate, but close enough that most people let it go, not wanting to know more.

  “I guess most of us’re out of work until the power’s back up,” Todd mused. “Except the preacher here, of course. He can fleece his flock even easier in a darkened church.”

  Jack gave a distinct, “Fuck you,” to Todd, who grinned broadly. Jack asked Scott what he was doing back in town.

  “Honestly, I was hoping to get some gas and supplies. I’m concerned this isn't a short-term problem,” Scott responded. The three other men looked at each other conspiratorially.

  Bartos leaned over and said, “It isn’t, brother.”

  Todd looked at Scott and asked, “What do you know about what happened?”

  Scott nibbled on a chip and said uncertainly, “Same as everyone else I guess; solar flare took out much of the power grid, what power is left is being rerouted to other areas, giving us these lovely rolling blackouts. Most of the Northeast and many other major cities are in a full blackout. No communications networks are working, at least not with any reliability, and they have no idea how long before any of it’s back up. Did I miss anything?”

  “Well, yes, that’s a lot of what’s happened, but we think we know a bit more.” Todd motioned to his left with a meaty hand, “Bartos here is tied into a network of amateur radio operators, and they’ve uncovered, well, let’s just say some troubling items. You may have seen some of the news footage from Atlanta this morning. It seems only about half of the more modern cars quit due to electronics failure, but in the air, that ratio was much worse. The early estimates Bartos heard were that nearly seventy-five percent of all passenger flights in the air worldwide either crashed or suffered hard landings. About 3,800 aircraft,” he finished.

  “Yeah, I think I may have seen one going down out over the gulf yesterday when I was out on my bike,” Scott said.

  Todd took a long pull from his beer, so the guy they called Bartos picked up the story. “From what I hear on the ham, and what Todd said was coming through on his marine radio, a lot of ships at sea are unaccounted for. With electronic steering, navigation and autopilots all offline, they are all gonna be in bad shape. At least one out of Port Mobile collided overnight with an abandoned oil platform. Both were listing badly, and the ship’s crew didn’t even know where they were. Couple other big ships were lost in the shoals off the coast of Louisiana. Just like the aircraft avionic systems, all of the electronics on these vessels was apparently very vulnerable.”

  “Back on land, the situation in much of the country, shit …the entire world, is worse,” Bartos went on. “Reports are that numerous nuclear plants failed to shut down right, and at least one in France and three here in the US are looking at potential meltdowns—one in Colorado, one in Illinois and one in central Texas.”

  “Oh, shit,” Scott said, then added, “I really hope you’re just fucking with me.”

  Preacher Jack looked somber and said, “From what the acting police chief told him earlier today, he’s right. The unofficial estimates are that in the first hour after the CME, somewhere between 300,000 and half a million people were dead, worldwide. If you add to that the other reports since then of looting, traffic fatalities, all the deaths in hospitals of people with no life support, etcetera… Guys, we could have a million or more dead by week's end.” The preacher crossed himself, offering a small, silent prayer.

  “Hang on,” Scott said, “something doesn’t make sense to me. If it were that bad, wouldn’t we know it? I mean, people are heading down to lie on the beach. Most aren’t even cutting their vacation short, much less panicking. People are going to work as they do every day. Hell, we’re sitting here having lunch at a restaurant. It can’t be the apocalypse; we still have beer!”

  Todd looked up. “Scott, all those people on the beach are probably looking up at the worst serial killer in history. We all may have thought that when the shit hit the fan, we and everyone else would know it. In actuality, a series of cascading failures was always the worst-case scenario. But people, government, businesses, they don’t want to think there’s no tomorrow. Many of the leaders in government and industry are out there right now trying to get everything fixed, patched up at least enough to avoid widespread panic. If this is the collapse, they lose everything.

  “I’m not an alarmist, and I don’t buy into the conspiracy theories that many do. I think if the media knew this, they would be broadcasting it non-stop. I feel sure, on the other hand, that the government would prefer we not know the full extent of the damage and possibly stay calmer.”

  Scott remembered the BBC recording that seemed to say that same thing. “My dad used to say the only ti
me to really worry is if someone in authority tells you not to worry.”

  About then the food came out, looking good and smelling even better. The conversation died down as this unlikely group began to eat. As he looked around the table, Scott realized that he found himself liking each of them. Todd had to be the oldest of the group, probably in his late 40s, and Scott figured he was the youngest by a few years. They each seemed like good people, but more than that, they seemed to have common sense. Something he valued greatly. They were also funny—irreverent even—but mainly they genuinely seemed like decent, hardworking guys. He had withdrawn from society so much that sitting here talking with these three was a surreal moment. It wasn’t that he hated people, he just generally liked it better when they weren’t around. Strangely, he felt these three would add to his life and quickly decided he wanted to stay on good terms with them.

  Without looking up from his food, Todd said, “Scott, you mentioned the Northeast was totally dark. Where did you hear that?” Apparently, that had not been in any of the news reports. Most likely there were no working ham radio broadcasts coming out of those areas.

  Scott finished his bite and was about to dismiss it as hearsay instead of admitting how he knew, but then decided that since the three of them had been open and honest with him, he should do the same. He told them about getting online early this morning right after the power came on. Each of the guys looked surprised.

  “How did you do that?” Bartos asked. “We all tried, but nothing came up for us.”

  “I have top-secret cyber-ninja skills,” Scott said smiling. “Actually, I just realized that it might be possible to see what websites were still running in another less-common way.” He glanced up to see every eye at the table on him. Scott went on to tell them the few other pieces of information he had gleaned from being online. None had heard of the Space Station disaster or most of the other news items he’d found, including the reports of celebration in the Middle East and the brief headline of the possible attacks on Israel. The lack of real information was immediate and potentially just as hard to handle as lack of fuel, food or water.