EMP Survival In A Powerless World | Book 19 | EMP Ranch

by Walker, Robert J.

  “I’ve got all the preparation I need right here,” Wyatt growled, holding his .357 up in front of his face. “Let ‘em try mess with us again. Just let the bastards try…”

  “Everyone needs to have their guns in their hands from this point on,” Phil said. “Get ‘em out, and let’s keep moving. We’ve wasted enough time standing around talking.”

  “But, uh, Dad, you haven’t said which way we’re going from here,” David said.

  “We’re going to stick to the river as far as we can,” Phil said. “As long as we stay under the cover of the trees, we’ve got some protection from the bikers and any other enemies we may encounter. In here, we’ve got cover we can fire behind, and because of the trees and bushes, they can’t swarm us.”

  “But that’ll take us well over four hours, closer to five by my reckoning, to get to the truck,” Wyatt said. “Going around the big bend in the river will add a couple of difficult miles to this trip.”

  “We’re not going to follow the course when it gets to the bend,” Phil said. “River’s Edge High is there, and if we cut through the school, it’ll take a few miles off our trip. By cutting through the school, I’m hoping we can get to the truck in just under three hours.”

  “You don’t think it might be dangerous to cut through the school?” Alice asked.

  “It’d be about as dangerous as walking along any of these suburban streets,” Phil said. “I don’t think that anyone will be in the school, though. Besides looting the cafeteria and kitchens for food, there isn’t much there that raiders would be after.”

  “They might want computers and TVs and stuff,” David said.

  “I doubt the kind of people we’re worried about would be going after computers, son. The most dangerous ones will know that all electronic items are nothing but dead weight now. There might be some low-level idiots stealing computers and TVs there, but a few warning shots should be enough to keep morons like them away from us. Come on, enough arguing now; let’s go.” Phil’s tone was firm and authoritative, and everyone knew that it was pointless to continue arguing. Without another word, Phil set off, heading back into the pitch-black darkness of the trees at a brisk pace, and the others followed wordlessly behind him.

  After fifteen minutes of fast walking through the darkness, they heard the sound of the motorcycles again—but this time, the sound was clearly coming from across the river. The bikers, it seemed, had stayed inside the city. While this realization brought a measure of relief to the group, they were careful not to let down their guard, for there could well be many more dangers in store for them here in the suburbs.

  It didn’t take too long for their eyes to become accustomed to the darkness, and while they certainly couldn’t see like cats, they were at least able to make out obstacles in the path and perceive their surroundings with a degree of clarity. Even so, everyone tripped over bumps and other small obstacles in the path regularly, although none of these stumbles were bad enough to send anyone crashing to the ground.

  They half-ran, half-walked in silence, their eyes and ears peeled for any hint of danger. Across the broad river, the city was burning. There were more fires now than ever, and it appeared that at least a quarter of the city, perhaps even more, had been engulfed in the spreading inferno. The sluggish river sparkled and gleamed in tones of orange, red, and yellow, quietly reflecting the terrible chaos the group had managed to escape from. Distant sounds of gunfire and screams and shouts resounded across the water like eerie echoes of a nightmare. There was also a deep and frightening roar, like the faraway sound of ocean waves crashing against a shore—the sound of a huge crowd rioting.

  From the suburbs just beyond the narrow strip of trees that lined the side of the river, there were also scattered echoes of gunfire and the occasional shout or scream, although, for the most part, the suburbs were shrouded in complete darkness and silence, with the odd building on fire here or there in the distance. Phil suspected that most people here were hiding out in their houses with all the doors and windows locked, and those who owned guns were no doubt gripping them in their hands. In a few windows, they saw gas lamps burning, but most of the houses were completely dark.

  After around an hour and a half of steady walking, they reached the big bend in the river. From that point on, they would need to head out of the cover of the trees and cut through the large high school.

  “Let’s stop and have a quick drink and a snack,” Alice suggested. She also wanted to take a look at her wound, which she felt had gotten worse. She was light-headed and woozy and suspected she was losing blood. She didn’t want to alarm Phil, though, and knew that they needed to keep going until they reached the truck.

  Phil was also of the mind that it would be a good idea to stop and have a quick snack to replenish their energy. After cutting through the school, they’d have to hike through the woods in darkness for half an hour before they got to the truck. He was feeling weary, even though he was very fit, and he knew that everyone else would be feeling quite worn-out too. “Good idea,” he said to his wife. “We need to keep our energy up, especially for this last push.”

  While the rest of them ate, Alice excused herself from the group, saying she needed to use the bathroom in the bushes. She went behind a large tree, then took out her Zippo and flicked it on. Her eyes were so accustomed to the darkness that even the weak glow of the flame seemed almost blinding, and she had to keep her eyes half-closed until she got used to the light.

  When she was able to open her eyes fully, she looked down and was alarmed to see that the lower front half of her blouse was soaked with blood, as was the top part of her jeans. The stitches had definitely burst, probably during the motorcycle chase, and the wound had been bleeding since then. She now understood why she was feeling so weak. She lifted up her blood-soaked blouse and saw that the dressing was dark and wet, soaked with blood. “Shit,” she muttered. In her haste to escape the apartment, she had left her main medical kit there, and wouldn’t be able to stitch up the wound again, at least not until they got to the truck, which had another large first aid kit in it.

  Alice didn’t know what she was going to do. She doubted she could make it all the way to the truck without passing out, but she couldn’t rest here. They had to get to the truck, but how, if she was growing ever weaker? She couldn’t very well ask any of the others to carry her; they were all exhausted enough already. She thought briefly about cauterizing the wound with a hot knife, but quickly realized that this would likely cause more damage than it would solve; it didn’t work in real life the way it did in movies.

  Then the answer came to her: the school. If they could get into the school buildings, she could find the nurse’s room, where there would almost certainly be the equipment she needed to stitch the wound up again. The only question was, however, whether Phil would be willing to take the risk of breaking into the school building when his plan had only been to go around the buildings and across the sports grounds. Either way, Alice knew she had to tell the others about the seriousness of her wound.

  She kept the Zippo burning and walked back to the others. “Guys,” she said, “there’s something I have to show you. Let your eyes get used to the light again and tell me when you’re ready.”

  The others squinted against the brightness of the flame, which felt as piercingly bright to them as it had to Alice a few minutes ago. After a while, though, their eyes became accustomed to it. Alice lifted up the bottom of her blouse, and everyone gasped when they saw how much blood she’d lost.

  “Oh my God,” Phil murmured. “Why didn’t you say anything sooner? You can’t go on. You’re going to have to make camp here tonight, and Wyatt and I will head into the suburbs to try to find a medical kit somewhere.”

  “No, we can’t do that,” Alice said. “There’s a better option anyway, although there’s some risk involved.”

  “Go on,” Phil said, a grimace of deep concern on his face.

  “The nurse’s room in the school will h
ave what I need to stitch this cut up again. I know there’s some danger involved, but if we can get into the school, I can fix myself up well enough that I’ll be able to get to the truck, at least.”

  “Are you sure? You’ve lost a lot of blood, honey,” Phil said.

  “All the more reason to do this,” Alice said. “If it gets to the point where I need a transfusion, we’ve got the equipment to do that on the ranch, and if I’m unconscious by then, Doc Robertson will be able to do that. But for any of that to happen, I need to get to the truck so I can get to the ranch.”

  Phil nodded grimly; he understood now just how important it was to break into the school and get Alice to the nurse’s room.

  “All right,” he said. “It’s going to be risky, but I don’t see what else we can do at this point. Come on, everyone; we’re going to have to break into the school.”

  Alice put out the light, and everyone put their backpacks on again. Then they headed out of the cover of the trees, crossed the street, and hopped over the school fence, then they headed into the dark, ominous-looking grounds of the sprawling institution, praying that they would be able to navigate its shadowy corridors without running into any more predators of the night.

  21

  Like everywhere else, the school was shrouded in darkness. The parking lot was full of abandoned vehicles, adding to the dreamlike surreality of the place, given how dead and utterly silent and deserted everything felt here. The windows of the school buildings were little more than inky-black squares on charcoal-colored canvases, hinting at intense and impenetrable darkness within. Phil knew that they’d have to at least use Zippos inside the school buildings to see where they were going, and he hoped this wouldn’t attract the attention of any prowlers who might see the lights from outside.

  Phil’s sense of unease grew as they approached the first of the buildings. “Davey, that friend of yours, what’s his name again, Zack, right? He goes to this high school, doesn’t he? You ever been in here?”

  “Yeah, Zack goes to River’s Edge,” David answered. “I’ve been here once or twice, but I just waited for him outside, so I don’t know much about the layout of the building.”

  “Do you at least know what this building is?”

  “I’m pretty sure this is the main entrance, and inside to the right are a bunch of classrooms. I’m not sure what else.”

  “It’s as good an entry point as any, I’d guess,” Wyatt suggested.

  Phil sighed, his reluctance obvious, but then he looked across at Alice. Even through the gloom, he could see that her face was pale, and he could see the pain and suffering she was silently suffering through writ plain across her pretty features. He knew that they had to do this and get her to the nurse’s room as quickly as possible. “Come on then,” he said, shoving aside his reluctance and replacing it with grim determination. “Let’s head inside.”

  They walked up the concrete stairs to the large twin wooden doors. Phil tested one of the handles, and, as expected, it was locked. While the EMP had hit during the middle of a school day, the kids had presumably been sent home and the place locked up instead of merely being abandoned.

  “Locked,” Phil said. “We could try to batter the door down or smash the locks, but that’d make a bunch of noise, and we don’t want to attract unwanted attention. I think we’d best look for another way in.”

  “Agreed,” Wyatt said. “Let’s look around the back and side of this building. There’s gotta be other doors, or maybe some big windows we can get in through.”

  They walked around the side of the building, looking closely at all the windows to check if any might provide a viable point of entry. Nothing on the front of the huge building seemed suitable, though. All the ground-floor windows were almost six feet up, which would mean Alice would have to climb up through them, which would likely tear her wound open farther.

  Around the side of the building, it was the same story. They walked along, keeping their eyes peeled for any possible point of access but found nothing suitable. Around the back, though, Davey noticed that a third-floor balcony door had been left ajar. A large tree stood next to the building, and some of its boughs hung over the balcony.

  “There!” he said, pointing up. “It’s open, and that balcony has a fire escape ladder. If I can get up there, I can lower the ladder, and we can all get in that way.”

  “Let me guess,” Phil said warily, “you think you can climb up the tree to get onto that balcony?”

  “I don’t see why not,” David said. “It’s not that high.”

  “Son, if you fall out of that tree, which you probably will, given how dark it is, I’m pretty sure you’re gonna break a few bones, and the last thing we need is another person with life-threatening injuries. No, forget about it. We’ll keep looking and find another way in.”

  “Come on, Dad, we’ve got those headlamps, with a bit of light it’ll be an easy climb.”

  “Have you forgotten how bright those headlamps are? And what about if—no, when—someone sees a headlamp flashing around in the tree?” Phil said. “It’ll be like a bonfire on a hilltop, calling out to all the wrong sorta people. Just forget about it, Davey. That’s the last I’m gonna say about this. Now come on, we need to keep looking. We’ll find a way in that doesn’t involve risking breaking anyone’s neck and sending up the equivalent of a signal flare to every prowling scumbag for miles around.”

  “All right,” David said with a disappointed sigh. “We’ll keep looking.”

  They moved on and headed around the back of the building but found nowhere there whereby they could gain access to the school.

  “Dammit,” Phil muttered. “This place is locked-up tight.”

  “Except for the door on the balcony…” David said cautiously.

  “Your boy’s right,” Wyatt said before Phil could respond. “Short of breaking down a door or smashing out some windows and climbing through ‘em—which might mean we cut up on broken glass—there isn’t gonna be an easy way to get in.”

  “But the headlamp is gonna be seen for miles around,” Phil protested. “I’d rather just make some noise by breaking down a door; it’ll attract less attention from afar.”

  “You’ve got some extra clothes in your bags, don’t you?” Wyatt asked. “All you need is a T-shirt, really.”

  “What for?” Phil asked.

  “To dim the headlamp. Davey can put the headlamp on, then wrap a t-shirt or something around his head over it. It should dim the light enough that it won’t be seen by anyone outside, especially given how thick the tree’s foliage is, but it should also give off just enough light that Davey can see what he’s doing.”

  Phil had to admit that Wyatt’s idea was a good one. “Okay,” he said. “I’ve got a spare shirt in my backpack. But Davey, you have to be real careful up there in the tree, okay? Don’t try any Spiderman crap. I seriously do not want to have to deal with any more serious injuries.”

  Davey grinned, his teeth bright in the murky gloom of the night. “I’ll be fine, Dad, don’t worry.” He put on the headlamp, and Phil handed him a spare shirt from his backpack, which Davey tied around his head like a bandanna.

  Since they were around the rear of the building and couldn’t be seen from the street, this was as good a place as any to test Wyatt’s theory. David turned the headlamp on, and its usually bright glare was greatly dimmed by the shirt wrapped around his head. The light that now came from the headlamp was a gentle, almost candle-like glow.

  “Perfect,” David said. “Just enough to see by.”

  “Turn it off until you’re in the tree,” Phil said sternly. “It might not be bright, but it’s still a light, and it can be seen in this darkness from a long way off.”

  David turned it off, and they headed back to the tree. Phil and Wyatt gave David a boost so he could reach the lowest of the boughs, which was quite high off the ground, but once he was on it, he was fine. He turned the headlight on and scampered up the tree, moving with simian-li
ke agility through the branches.

  “He always was a great climber,” Alice said, watching from the ground.

  Phil noticed her voice was sounding softer and weaker, but he didn’t say anything. Instead, he just reached over to her and squeezed her hand gently in his.

  David got onto the long bough that hung over the balcony. He had to straddle it and shimmy his way along for a while, but after some time, he found himself directly over the balcony. He lowered himself off the branch until he was hanging fully from it, with both arms straight up above his head, and then he let go. It was only a three or four-foot drop from the bottom of his feet to the balcony, and he landed with acrobatic grace.

  “Nice going!” Phil yelled from below, “but turn off that light now! Anyone could see it!”

  David hurried to turn off the light, and then he got busy with setting up the fire escape ladder, which, after a few minutes, he lowered to the ground.

  “You good to go up the ladder?” Phil asked Alice, and she nodded. “Okay, honey,” he said. “Just take it real easy. And I’ll come right up behind you.”

  Alice went up the ladder first, and Phil followed closely behind her. Wyatt brought up the rear. Alice ascended the ladder slowly and carefully. Each step she went up caused a shot of sharp pain to rip through her midsection, but she gritted her teeth and bore the pain in silence because she didn’t want to make anyone else worried. It took quite an effort for her to get up because she was dizzy and light-headed, but she eventually got to the top, and David helped her up onto the balcony.

  Phil and Wyatt came up quickly behind her.

  “Best pull the ladder back up,” Phil said. “Just in case anyone else is out there. We don’t want to make it easy for any of the wrong kinda people to come in here after us.”

  David and Wyatt pulled the fire escape ladder back up, while Alice sat down for a while to rest. She was praying that they would find the right supplies in the nurse’s room; if they didn’t, she didn’t know what she would do.