Catalyst (Book 1): Downward Cycle

by JK Franks

  He caught several very powerful transmissions, but the voices were distorted, probably using a scrambler on each end to keep the conversations private. No one seemed to be broadcasting in the clear. He was reminded of his dad talking about the original clear channel broadcast that reached the areas of the country that had no local stations. These had originally been for emergency alert broadcasting, but as the Cold War went on, other forms of broadcast radio, and then TV, took over the responsibility of informing the nation. He wondered if any of these broadcasts would have been re-initialized now. Setting the radio to scan, he poured himself a drink and watched the light show of the storm from the small porthole window.

  The radio scanned until it locked on a strong signal, paused for fifteen seconds on the frequency, and finding nothing more, resumed scanning. With so many frequencies and bands, it was not a quick process. After about an hour of finding nothing useful, he switched from the marine bands to normal VHF/AM and FM bands. The scanning resumed, and he picked up several AM broadcasts, though most were too faint to hear clearly. He marked several frequencies to come back to, then switched to UHF, mainly military channels. The broadcast light went out on this band as it had to have a chip to transmit, but he could monitor. He was amazed at the amount of radio traffic up and down the spectrum. Of course, UHF broadcast traveled great distances and did not need to be anywhere local. Some, he felt, were aircraft checking in with their base; others seemed to be troops on the ground changing positions. They used lots of jargon and never mentioned specific cities or bases, but he got the sense some of this activity was close by as they kept identifying water-related targets.

  The pitch of the conversations was becoming more animated as he heard the report of another blast of lightning and thunder. He thought he heard a reaction on the radio to the same sound. Todd noticed that the rolling of the boat had subsided. Again, came the lighting and thunder. The storm should be subsiding but seemed to be growing in intensity. A curious thought occurred to him. Reaching into his go-bag he pulled one of the radios he had taken off the grayshirt guard back at the college. Checking each of the preset frequencies that were programmed into the little unit, he entered them on the new radio and listened.

  On the third one, he hit pay dirt. He recognized the speech patterns and even some of the lingo of a mission in progress. The voices were calm even when they stated, “Incoming fire.” The thunder and lightning were nearly continuous now, but the boat remained mostly calm. He turned up the volume on the radio, went to the rear cabin hatch, and opened the watertight door to try and get a stronger signal. The concussion wave knocked him back to the lower deck of the cabin. What he had thought was lighting was artillery firing from a trio of Navy ships about a half mile south. Climbing back up woozily, he looked again. They were firing on what looked to be another group of ships in the direction of Mobile Bay. Behind the naval ships, he could see at least two more large white ships with red crosses painted on the sides: aid ships.

  Putting the clues from the radio and what he was seeing together, he realized the smaller ships that were blocking the port from the aid ships were part of the Praetor forces, intending for the port city to fall quickly rather than hang on in a lingering death. The Navy was trying to offer help to the city via the aid ships. Todd engaged the small motor and for once was thankful the running lights had not worked since the solar storm. He slowly made his way out of the battle, which was growing in intensity. The Praetor naval ships were small and maneuverable and packed some seriously hi-tech firepower. This was the real conflict, he thought. It was not good versus evil, as both groups were trying to save humanity, just in different ways. But he could not agree with the brutal, heartless tactics of Catalyst. At heart, he was a Navy man, and he simply could not stand by and not try to help his military family out, especially knowing they were on a mission of mercy. Unfortunately, there really wasn’t much he could do, but …he could pass on the radio frequencies. The Navy could monitor those, maybe even zero in on firing solutions, assuming the ships were using the same channels.

  It was all he could do to tear his eyes away from the ongoing sea battle to go below deck and pick up the handset. Since he couldn’t transmit on any of the military frequencies, he tuned the radio back to a marine frequency he knew the Navy radiomen here in the gulf usually monitored.

  “Sailing Vessel calling for Naval Flotilla off Mobile Bay.” No response. He repeated the call and added, “To assist you, please monitor and triangulate enemy broadcast on the following frequencies.” He then passed along the specific channels from the Praetor handset. He hated broadcasting this information in the clear, but after several minutes, he heard a voice respond, “Acknowledged.” He waited, but no other transmission came through. Todd wanted Scott to be aware of this, more proof of what they had guessed. He cycled the dial over the frequency they had agreed on, planning on passing along an update on the Catalyst activity. Just as he was about to hit the transmit key, he heard a familiar voice. It was distant and sounded frightened, but he immediately knew whom it belonged to.

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Kaylie sat on the side of the bed in the small quiet house. This room was filled with memories, happy memories of family. The trips down with her grandparents had been some of her most special times as a child. She missed everything. She missed her parents. She missed her little dog, Ruffles. She missed feeling DJ next to her in the bed.

  The tears had been flowing off and on all morning. As much as she loved her Uncle Scott, she did not feel that close to him… not anymore. He had once been happy and funny, but the few times she’d seen him since the divorce, he had not been the same. She had prayed he would find someone to help make him complete, but all he seemed to love anymore was riding his bikes. She had been honestly surprised he even had friends when he showed up to get her, as she’d heard her dad express worry that he had pulled away from everyone.

  She was not naïve. She knew how fortunate she was that he and Todd had come to get her. Even though she hadn’t seen it, she knew he had killed people to rescue her…as thankful for it as she was, that part bothered her. Selfishly, though, she just really wanted to know what was going on with everyone else; how her friends and family were getting by. She wanted to update her status on Facebook. She wanted to take a hot shower, wash her hair and put on makeup again. She knew her dad was a prepper, and she had mostly thought he was nuts. “How could you make plans for the end of the world?” she had asked him so many times over the years. It was crazy…and yet, he had been right. She had been just a stubborn teenager when she went to college. Everything was apocalyptic to a teenage girl…if she had only known. The tears came again. She did not think she was a survivor. Why would you even want to survive the end? Those people out on the road, those bodies, that smell… how could anyone be okay with this? Even the people they had been trying to help seemed so angry and selfish. Or they had already checked out and ended their lives. It was all just so sad, just too much to deal with.

  She took her nearly useless smartphone and scrolled through her photos, mostly images of silly stuff of her friends, ball games or DJ. She paused when she got to pictures of her mom and dad. “I hope you guys are okay,” she whispered. “Please, God…let them be okay.” Realizing that when the phone battery finally died she would have no pictures of anyone, she reluctantly shut it down. Through the tears, she fought against the waves of despair. She wanted to be strong… she knew it was in her, but she couldn’t find it right now. Feeling weak was not something she was used to, and she knew she had to rid herself of it. The martial arts training was helping, but she wanted, no, needed to be fierce again. Do not be a victim. Her inner voice was struggling to be heard, though.

  This world, this heat was dragging her down. Everyday life was now a real struggle, and it was only going to get worse. She had always put off thinking about joining the real world. Graduating, having to work for a living, responsibilities, bills, all that had scared her before “The Big Cr
unch” as her dad had called it; now she felt the loss of a life she would never get to live. The potential she would never get to realize—at least in the way she’d imagined.

  She pulled out the little ham radio; it was time to listen for DeVonte. She doubted the radio would even reach that far, even with the long antenna. The shortwave radios her dad had were much larger. They took up most of one table in his bombproof room, or whatever the cage thing supposed to withstand an EMP blast was called. Still, she turned it on and listened for thirty minutes before deciding to put it back on the solar charger. Just as she did so, she heard her uncle’s voice coming through the speaker, checking in with her. She was relieved to hear he was okay. He had been working non-stop lately, moving supplies and doing what was necessary to try and keep them all alive. Kaylie gave him the ‘all is good’ report, and they signed off. She put the radio away and lay back down on her pillow. She drifted back to sleep, dreaming again of the life she had lost.

  The sound came again, this time much closer. She thought about the night they discovered the man standing in the yard. Was he back? Was this morning going to be like that? She was pretty sure that man had been unstable, serious mental issues. What was he capable of? That damn hair ribbon he kept holding on to. The flood of creepy memories and images flooded her barely awake brain. The chills climbed her skin at the base of her neck. She was frozen—paralyzed with fear. Her ears listened for every noise in the old house. Something faint…it was indistinct but very real. “Shit, shit, shit!” Move your ass, girl. She knew she had to act.

  The handgun that Scott and Bartos had been teaching her to fire was on the desk nearby. With what seemed like superhuman effort, she made the soundless crawl over to get it. Putting it into a holster, she then grabbed the little sub-compact assault rifle.

  "Hey, little pretty boy…” the poorly enunciated words came from the direction of the road. “I believe you been holding out on us,” the voice called again.

  Kaylie pulled the weapon from the table, slung the strap over her shoulder and rested the grip in her palm as she’d been taught. She barely knew how to use it but knew a pistol would not be sufficient. Oh, fuck I am scared!

  “Open up, motha fucka!” another voice yelled from outside.

  Kaylie cradled the rifle firmly as she peeked carefully around the sheet of black plastic covering the window and looked down toward the road. A rough looking group of armed men were lined up across the front yard. Kaylie felt her bladder letting go and the smell of urine a moment later confirmed her terror. Some of the men were moving to the left and right sides of the cottage.

  She couldn’t take on the nine or ten guys out front, even if she did know how to use this thing. The front door knob began to shake. Make that eleven.

  “Bring dat ax, Dean” a voice near the door yelled.

  “Hang on,” was the distant response.

  “Last chance,” the singsong voice that had woken her warned.

  Kaylie saw the bullet hole appear in the wall above her before she even heard the first shot. Several more shots rang out, most embedded in the solid timbers of the house. Another round found the window, which shattered, covering her with flying glass. Looking down, she saw blood appear where several shards had cut her.

  She heard howls of laughter as she crawled to her bedroom and swept up her boots and go-bag in one hand. She quickly looked to make sure none of the men were on the backside of the house yet. As she had done many times as a kid, she pushed out the screen on the rear window. She had taken the precious seconds to throw the radio and a few personal items into her big bug-out bag out, then also grabbed the smaller bright pink camo go-bag and slipped silently out, pulling the window down behind her and stepping off the brick molding and onto the ground.

  She heard the front door of the cottage begin to give way under what had been a fierce barrage of blows. Kaylie pasted herself to the back wall of the cottage as she slipped on her boots. She could hear them destroying the house now that they were inside. Her dad had built this place, and these thugs were destroying it. Just the idea of it made her livid, but she was also so terrified. She ducked down and moved deftly over to the back corner of the cottage, the farthest from the noise inside. She caught sight of a dark face looking out of the window she had just slipped through, but it disappeared quickly. Panic later, she kept telling herself. Right now, she had to think.

  She reluctantly decided to head for the road if she could slip past them. As she stealthily eased herself closer to the front yard, something caused her to stop and go rigid. The breath caught in her throat, and her mouth went dry as she saw the part of a sneaker and the tip of a rifle barrel emerging around the next corner. One of the guys was standing less than ten feet away on the front wall of the cottage. She reversed course and quietly slipped back the way she came. Oh, fuck, I’m dead, I’m dead, I’m dead. Despite all the practice in self-defense with Jack lately, she felt none of the confidence she needed. Nothing had prepared her for a football team of armed men.

  There were voices and sounds of destruction seemingly from every room of the small house now. Kaylie knew she had to be smart, but she didn’t seem to have a lot of options. Get under the house she thought. She knew the house was raised several feet—she’d carried the cement blocks for her dad and uncle when they enclosed it years ago. She looked down the smooth run of blocks. Shit, no opening.

  She crept back to the rear of the house and looked down. There, about thirty feet away, was a small wooden door that must go under the house. It was painted the same sand color as the blocks, so it was not easy to see. Just above it and a little farther down was the large double French doors leading from the kitchen to the back deck. She knew most of the guys would be there, probably looking for food and stuff to steal. She would be fully exposed if she tried for it; right now, the only thing keeping her safe was that they didn’t know about her. She had to make sure things stayed that way. Someone yelled from inside, “Tyrone, you and Marcus check the rest of the yard, see what else this shit has we can use.”

  Fuck. The only thing she could see to do was sprint from the house to the boathouse at the backside of the property. She took off, not daring to look back. She held the pistol and the pink go-bag tight to her chest and pulled the straps of the larger bag on her back tight so nothing would make noise. Her legs felt unusually large and cumbersome as the fear continued to grip her and adrenaline flooded her body. She knew she was slowed with the weight of the large pack on her shoulders, and felt it would serve as a large bullseye to anyone looking her way. She used the few small trees in the yard to shield her from the house. As she reached each tree, she would alter her path to keep the trunk of it between her and the back wall of the house. As she topped the small rise that led down to the boathouse, she felt better. No sounds of alarm had been raised—at least so far.

  Kaylie ducked down behind some of the sparse bushes that grew on the riverbanks. The house was now out of sight, but she could just see the top of a head in a hoodie bobbing through the backyard, working its way in her direction. She looked over at the boathouse; it was about seventy-five feet away. She had bad memories of the boathouse and had never liked to go in there. A large black snake had nearly fallen on her from one of the exposed rafters as a child. The panic was still there all these years later. She knew the fishing boat would probably make things a lot easier if she could ease it out, but quickly realized that the ramshackle boathouse would be the first thing to get the attention of the thug coming this way. She began to make her way in the opposite direction.

  Her dad, and now Scott, had kept the river’s edge pretty clean cut on their property, but the adjacent lots were mostly owned by the state. They were more overgrown, and as she moved in that direction, the overgrowth forced her farther down the hill. Her heart was racing, and her arms felt like lead. Moving as quietly as she could, she forged ahead, driven closer and closer to the black swampy water. The mud sucked at her boots, making progress difficult. She could
just see the man walking toward the old boathouse, as she had expected. He never looked in her direction, but she felt sure he would have seen her or the damned pink go-bag she’d loved so much when she went off to college. Kaylie mentally rolled her eyes at her past self and tucked the bright bag under her dark shirt.

  Hearing more shouts, she smelled the distinct odor of burning wood. The thug had not come back out of the boathouse, but she was even more desperate to get away now. Her way forward was blocked by overhanging tree roots dropping down the steep bank. Having no choice, she stepped into the black waters of the bayou. Her first step took her in knee-deep; the next to her waist.

  As she moved farther out, the water crept up close to her chest. The water smelled disgusting, and she could feel it rushing into her boots. Even though she knew that no gators were supposed to be up here—at least, none had been seen for years—she still imagined one with every old submerged limb she brushed past.

  The man was joined by another as he came out of the boathouse. Through the thicket of vines and cypress trunks, Kaylie could see they were looking her way. Terrified, her dad’s familiar words came back to her, telling her, “Do what is needed, be scared later.” Those men scared her more than the gators or snakes right now. She quietly bent her knees and eased down to neck level in the murky water, backing deeper into the darkness of the swamp.

  The blackened fingers of mossy limbs pulled her hair and her clothes with every step. The voices of the men at the cottage were getting louder and more obscene with every outburst. Twice she heard gunshots then howls of laughter. Whatever these men wanted, they were completely unafraid of being discovered. Guessing they had found her uncle's stash of wine and liquor, she wondered what would happen when his bike pulled back in the drive. Her legs were numb, and her teeth began to chatter. Even though the water was not very cold, from her medical training, she knew the initial signs of hypothermia. She looked for anything she could use for protection or shelter. She hoped she could get her body out of the water, and quietly.