The Day America Died! Frozen Apocalypse: After the EMP- A post Apocalyptic America

by A J Newman

  Generál-polkóvnik Ivan Ivanovich dramatically lit a cigar, and after a moment used it in a gesture for silence. The room immediately fell into rapt attention to their commander.

  “Gentlemen, my plan is in three phases. Please read the plan outline and I wish to meet with you again in 72 hours to brief me on how each area of responsibility is to be carried out.

  Following this meeting, we will meet with the Division Commanders, brief them on their duties, and listen to their concerns.

  That is all.”

  The staff snapped to attention, saluted the Colonel General, and in unison replied, “Da, Comrade Colonel General Ivanovich, it shall be done.”

  Conversation among staffers began immediately upon exiting the meeting.

  The Generál-polkóvnik’s Chief of Staff, Comrade Colonel Alexi Sakkov, said, “Comrades, like you, I cannot wait to read the Comrade General’s plan. Let us each meet tomorrow morning at 0600 hours in the briefing room to discuss and begin to formalize the Comrade General’s guidance.”

  “Da, Comrade Colonel! 0600 hours.”

  ***

  Rolling Hills

  That night as I was preparing for bed Ally said, “Hon, the President scared us more than boosting our morale and I can’t help wondering what she held back. Are we in more danger than she indicated?”

  “Ally I hoped to avoid that question until tomorrow, but Davi, Mike and I think there is more to the story and we are afraid that the situation is worse than we’ve been told. Davi thinks her dad or the Israeli military will know the real story.”

  “How do we contact them?”

  “We will send a team down to Alabama to make contact.”

  “Darling, do what you have to do? Will we have to leave the USA and seek sanctuary in another country?”

  “That is the question we have to ask. I invited Mike, Sally and Davi over for breakfast in the morning. We’ll eat and then send Susie out to play while we form a plan. I want to keep this close to the vest until we know what to do. Are you nervous about me traveling with Davi?”

  “I trust you, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t jealous. It’s my problem from that lying cheating rat bastard ex-husband of mine. He had affairs with most of the women I know and even hit on my mother.”

  “I won’t betray you. Not ever.”

  “I believe you.”

  We finished our eggs, bacon and biscuits then sent Susie out to visit with the Sheriff’s daughter.

  I started the discussion by saying, “I know the President’s speech unnerved a lot of people and I think we need to discuss it and determine what action we need to take.”

  Paul replied, “Well I’m going to concentrate on killing local scumbags and not join the Army even though I am concerned that there are much bigger security problems. The President may not be lying, but she didn’t tell us all she knows.”

  “I wonder if we will be safe anywhere in this country. The east coast, west coast and southern border are all under attack. The USA used nuclear bombs for the first time in over 70 some odd years. “

  “Davi thinks her dad may have more detail about what is actually happening in this country than we are hearing. I think we need to visit him before we make any long term Bug Out plans,” I threw into the conversation.”

  Everyone agreed and then the discussion began on who would travel with Davi down to Alabama.

  Mike said, “I would recommend three of us go. I also think that Zack or I stay back to lead the team. We need three good fighters to go to improve their chance of a safe return. Davi, it is quite possible that you may have to stay with your father, which is another good reason for at least three to make the trip.”

  Everyone agreed that at least three would go and then we discussed who to bring into our confidence.

  Sally said, “Frankly I’m surprised that Joan, Lynn and Roger aren’t in the conversation right now.”

  I interrupted and said, “I wanted to keep the meeting small to make sure nothing leaked back to Prescott. We’ll bring them into the loop ASAP.

  The question is, who can we trust. I also was worried about Lynn being pregnant, Roger leaving and not coming back. Perhaps I’m thinking too much. Yeah, we’ll get them into the next meeting.”

  Davi stated, “I would not go beyond those mentioned because of your experience with Bert. Everyone is trust worthy until someone threatens their family.”

  We all reluctantly agreed and decided to meet again that afternoon.

  We added Lynn, Roger and Joan to the meeting. While we were waiting on Mike and Sally to arrive Lynn said, “Roger and I are worried that the USA might be a war zone for several years from what the President said. We are wondering if we should head to South America or Australia. We could be trapped between the Russians, Cubans and Mexicans. Not to mention Prescott and the other thugs roaming the streets.”

  “Y’all aren’t the only ones thinking like that,” Ally chimed in.

  Lynn replied, “My dad and uncle have large sailboats close to Mobile.”

  Mike and Sally joined us and I called the meeting to order, “We will continue that discussion at the end of our meeting. I think both are related. We all heard the President’s speech last night. I feel that we need to contact Davi’s father and the Israeli group to get more info on the situation with the attacks on America. I’m afraid we are not hearing the entire story and don’t have enough information to make a good decision.”

  Roger replied, “I would normally say we need to join the Army and fight for our country, but I think our country might be doomed and we’d just die in vain. I’m for getting accurate facts and making a good decision, even if that means bugging out of our country.”

  Everyone agreed so I moved on, “My proposal is that Paul, Davi and I head down to Alabama to visit with Aaron. We will travel at night to avoid trouble and should only take three to four days to get there and the same back. Mike will be in charge during my absence”

  Davi added, “Zack, please add another to our group. I may have to stay with my mom and dad.”

  “I’ll add Ben to our team and I think we should leave tomorrow night.”

  ***

  The explosions were racking the buildings with deadly accuracy raining fire and debris down on the men trying to protect the hydroelectric dam. The artillery fire was coming from the north across the river while the mortar fire was raining down from the southeast.

  “Sir, they have several hundred men ready to flood in when they have softened us up along with several light tanks and APCs. We can’t resist much longer.”

  “Thanks, tell the men to get ready to evacuate and head to our rally point in Cherokee. We’ll regroup there with the Israelis and then head on to Pickwick Dam.”

  Major North was in command of the US Army’s program to get the TVA dams back in operation. He had a mixture of Army Corps of Engineering, infantry and volunteer Israeli engineers and Army personnel under his command.

  “Aaron, we have to bug out. No one is coming to help us and the best we can do is get the hell out of here and live to fight another day.”

  “Major, this is the same group that took over Owensville up in Kentucky. We need to crush them before they grow and take over the entire southeast.”

  “I know, but my orders are to retreat and hold the Pickwick dam. We don’t have enough soldiers to fight 4-5 wars at one time. The Chinese nuked five of our Army bases and three naval stations this morning. Hell, they nuked the new US Capitol in Pennsylvania two hours ago. We think the President and some of our government escaped, but haven’t heard for sure. We retaliated by nuking all of their major military bases. The only way to stop them and the Russians is with nuclear bombs and that renders our country and theirs nuclear slag heaps. Sorry you Israelis came here; you need to head to South America or Australia.”

  “I think you are right. I’ll contact my superior and make that recommendation. Come with us. You need a new home.”

  “Before you go, let me know you
r destination. I have to fetch my wife and kids. I’ll try to bring my family and my men’s families to join you.”

  “I also have to find my daughter and her new friends.”

  ✪✪✪

  ✪

  Chapter 14

  Heading South

  We spent the next day cleaning and checking our weapons, after we loaded the Bronco with enough supplies for two weeks. I loaded two plastic barrels with food, extra ammo and winter tents, and then secured them to the Bronco’s roof rack. We were ready to go by noon and I asked the team to try to get some sleep or at least some rest.

  I could never sleep worth a damn during the day, but I forced myself to lie down and close my eyes around 2:00 p.m. and didn’t wake up until after the sun was down. Ally woke me up by snuggling up against me. She even had socks on so her cold feet wouldn’t be a shock.

  I rolled over, placed an arm around her and kissed her. She started undressing when we heard Callie yelling.

  “Dad, Ally, come here quick. The President’s dead.”

  I threw on some clothes and joined the rest of our group huddled around the radio.

  “My fellow Americans, I am Brigadier General John Keene, Chairman of the military Joint Chief’s. It is with a deep sadness that I must report that our new Capitol in Pennsylvania was attacked an hour ago with a nuclear device launched by the Chinese forces in California.

  Most of our government and high ranking military officers were killed. I was on the way to the Capitol at the time of the attack, and was only spared by luck.

  I am assuming authority for the USA until we can determine if any civilian leaders survived the blast. This is not a coup and we will place the government back in civilian hands as soon as the situation allows.

  I will keep the country posted on any significant events.

  May God watch over us and help us in our struggle to vanquish our enemies.”

  Everyone started talking at once and this was the first time that I had seen my friends panic.

  I yelled to get their attention, “Hello! Hello! ... Shut the hell up!”

  There was silence.

  “Listen. We need to bug out for the Gulf of Mexico and figure out where we are going along the way. This place is going to be radioactive in a few days. We need to pack and leave now!”

  “Zack is right. BUG OUT!” Mike yelled.

  We drilled for this very situation nearly every day and everyone was packed and ready to roll in thirty minutes except for Bert and his family. They told us that they had decided to stay with his brother and ride things out.

  “Good bye Bert. We will miss you. I don’t think we will ever be back here. We wish you well.”

  After some handshakes and hugs, our convoy pulled out just after the sun went down. There were nine vehicles in our convoy. The lead pickup had one of the 5.56 mm SAWs mounted to the roof. The trail vehicle, the Bronco, had the other SAW mounted beside a newly cut hole in its roof. The food and supply barrels had to go on a trailer.

  Ally and Joan made a canvas boot for the gunner to poke his body through to keep the cold and hopefully, rain out, while keeping the warm air in. The other seven vehicles all pulled cargo trailers filled with our supplies.

  We decided to take Highway 80 over to Russellville and 79 on down to Clarksville where we planned to stop for the day. We would then work our way south to Florence the following night.

  We intended to travel at night because we hoped that most of the assholes, gangs and criminals would be asleep with only their B Teams guarding the roadblocks.

  It was only about 60 miles to Clarksville, but we knew that most roads were still blocked with stalled cars and trucks. There were also roadblocks that towns and some gangs had put up.

  The towns just wanted to protect themselves while the gangs wanted to be paid a toll for traveling through their area. Of course, once in their clutches, if you had anything of value…well, no one really knew what happened because no one ever came out to relate the experience.

  Rolling Hills to Florence was only a three and a half to four hour drive before TSHTF. Now it could be eight hours or eight days.

  As expected, we spent most of our time navigating around stalled vehicles.

  We made it to the east side of Russellville before we had any serious trouble. Davi, Roger and I had the lead pickup while Mike, Paul and Ben provided rear security as tail gunner, or tail end Charlie.

  We were traveling at 30 MPH with the aid of our Night Vision Glasses (NVGs), when Ben spotted something up ahead in the middle of the road.

  I signaled for the convoy to stop and halted at the bottom of a hill. We saw it was a roadblock with at least two people manning it from the bouncing glow of their cigarettes.

  Davi went ahead to scout the road ahead and was gone for thirty minutes. As planned, with her red-lensed flashlight Davi signaled for us to come down to the roadblock.

  We cautiously drove up to the roadblock and saw Davi sitting in a lawn chair drinking a beer and shooting the shit with a man and woman.

  “Come on over Zack. These are great people. I traded them 50 rounds of 5.56mm for a six-pack of beer. They told me the road is clear to the south side of Clarksville. There we’ll run into a crooked mayor and sheriff who work for a guy named Prescott.

  I replied, “Yeah seems we’ve heard of him. Davi we need to hit the road.”

  “Okay boss.”

  We drove around the roadblock heading through Russellville where we turned onto Highway 79 to Clarksville.

  There were fewer cars in the middle of the road and we were able to make 35 MPH. We passed through Clarksville an hour later and were making very good time towards Dickson when Davi spotted another roadblock. We were over a half mile from the lights that she had seen.

  These guys had a bonfire and huddled around it. No one appeared to be watching the road, or for that matter getting more than a few feet from the fire.

  Davi and I advanced towards the fire by staying in the bushes on the overgrown side of the road. It had been over a year since any road crews had mowed or cut down brush on the sides of America’s highways so it was relatively easy to sneak up on people sitting around a fire not paying attention to their surroundings.

  We approached within 50 feet and saw eight people sitting around the fire drinking beer and passing a bottle of whiskey.

  Davi put her finger over her mouth and indicated for me to keep quiet and listen. We crawled up to within 20 feet of the group and found them to be talking so loud that we could have driven a semi up to them without being noticed.

  One man was arguing, “That damn Prescott and his men are takin’ all our food and extra ammo.”

  “But he protects us from gangs and criminals.”

  A woman spoke up, “We were doing fine without him. I heard he teamed up with that scum in Anderson. Hell’s bells, he ain’t nuthin’ but a danged dictator his danged self.”

  “Yeah, I can’t wipe my ass lessen one of his men is a telling me to just use 4 sheets.

  The police chief done disappeared a week after the county sheriff done went missing’. Hell the mayor and town council will be the nextuns to go.”

  “I went hunting the other day and just as I had me a small doe sighted in, one of them damnable black Humvees came roaring up behind me.

  They done scared my deer away.

  Then them squirrely bastards started playing’ twenty questions about why I was out hunting, and did I know that I was hunting on restricted property. I was on the old Newman farm. How did it get restricted?”

  “We either got to run these shitheels off, or leave ourselves, and all y’all know we don’t have enough ammo to put up a fight.”

  Davi waved for me to back away and move back to our convoy with her.

  We got far enough away to talk and Davi said, “Can I take them some of our civilian ammo. They had a couple of .30/.30s and several .30 .06 rifles. I’ll take them 500 rounds and perhaps they can wipe Prescott out, or kill off a bunch of h
is men.”

  “Do it. We have a hundred thousand .556 and 9mm rounds. I doubt we’ll miss those bullets.”

  Davi retrieved the ammo and we snuck back up to the group and waited for the leader to break away from the others. Davi slipped up behind him and disarmed him. I thought he was going to have to change his shorts until I told him why we were there.

  He began to smile like a pig in a manure pile when I showed him the weapons and ammo.

  I said, “We are friends and have some ammunition for you.

  We overheard your comments about fighting Prescott’s men and brought this little treasure to you. My friend is going to give you some brief training on how to kill as many as possible without losing any of your men. Your team can take their guns and kill more of them.”

  Davi spoke to the man for 10 minutes and then asked him the best way to get around Clarksville without running into Prescott’s men. He told us, and we left.

  The bad news was that we couldn’t get around Clarksville without going way out of our way. The least problematic route was to take Highway 12 east of Clarksville down to Ashland city, and then over to Dickson before we could get back on the shortest route to Florence.

  This little detour resulted in us losing two days, but probably saved our lives.

  ***

  Undisclosed Location,

  Near Owensville, Alabama

  Aaron knew that his daughter, Davi, would be listening to the radio every evening for a message from him. He wanted to get close enough to Owensville for Davi to hear his message. This would save several days travel for Davi and her friends to join Aaron’s group before going to Mobile to start their own journey south.

  He was driving an old truck up Highway 13 north of Savana, TN. His wife Sharon was trying the radio for the third time that evening when they heard a reply.