When Darkness Falls: An EMP Thriller

by Ryan Casey

  I’d not only ignored his wife when she needed help. I’d smashed his car window and stolen his A-Z.

  How did that make me any different from the looters I chastised and judged?

  I closed my heavy eyelids and imagined how things might’ve played out differently if I’d decided to help the woman back in the supermarket. She would’ve thanked me and told her husband I’d helped her. The three of us would’ve got out of there together. Sure, I would’ve had to share some of my supplies. But they might’ve stuck by me. They might’ve even helped me try and reach home.

  I’d made a choice. I had to live with the consequences of my actions.

  And I’ve gotta be honest… the consequences of my actions were a literal pain in the arse right now.

  I opened my eyes again as the shouts and the cries continued. I heard smashing glass. Somewhere in the distance, I smelled smoke; the smoke of many fires that had no doubt been lit. Maybe it would be better if a helicopter crashed down on me and ended my life right here before I had the chance to muse on what I’d be missing out on.

  But no.

  Not while Sarah and Bobby were up north.

  Not while I still had them to get home to.

  Sure. I might’ve helped. And things might’ve played out differently. But that didn’t change the fact that I hadn’t helped. And because I hadn’t helped, I was without supplies now. All because of my attitude. Shit. Maybe Sarah was right all along.

  Maybe my problem was I looked out for myself too much. I looked out for my family too much.

  But then… it was that same attitude that had got me to the position I was in at work. It was that self-determination that had got Sarah and me together. That had helped raise Bobby. It was that looking out for those dearest to me that had got me so far in my life. I couldn’t just abandon it because of one mishap.

  Family comes first. That’s the way it always had been, and the way it always would be.

  I took a deep breath and cracked my knuckles. I moved my neck from side to side, easing the pain from my beating. I had to take things step by step. I couldn’t mope about what I’d lost. There would be failures in this new world. Many failures.

  If I wasn’t prepared to ride them out and to learn from my mistakes, I wasn’t going to get anywhere.

  I looked at the A-Z. Slowly, I went through the pages, figuring out the best way to go, the places that would likely be busy, the places to avoid.

  And slowly but surely, piece by piece like some kind of jigsaw, I figured out a route.

  It might not be perfect. It might be completely wrong. But it was something. And based on the measurements in the A-Z, the journey home was going to take me around twenty hours.

  I had to account for the problems that would get in my way. And they would, no doubt about that.

  But nothing was going to stop me.

  I was going to keep on going.

  I had to.

  I closed the A-Z, stood up and pulled back my shoulders.

  I was going to find my family.

  And on my way, I was going to get some supplies, and this time, I was going to keep hold of them.

  No matter what it took.

  I swallowed a lump in my throat and looked beyond the trees at the pandemonium ahead.

  Then, I walked.

  Chapter Twelve

  Three hours into my journey and the reality of the situation I was in was only just beginning to truly dawn on me.

  It was mid-afternoon. The sun had hidden itself behind a thick layer of cloud. There was a bright light still peering through those clouds though, a constant reminder of the distinct ridiculousness of this entire turn of events. Thunder rumbled. I hoped it wouldn’t rain. The last thing I needed right now was a torrential downpour just as I was getting my journey started.

  Honestly, the road I was on felt eerie. It was a country lane. I’d managed to work myself out of the centre and the suburbs and onto this road. It immediately struck me just how quiet it was, not just because it was devoid of traffic either. There was just a general feeling of silence in the air. I never thought electricity was something a person could hear. But now I was in this electricity free world… yeah, there was a strange quietness to everything. It was eerie.

  I kept my head up and walked down this empty country lane. Other than the silence, it could just be any normal country lane in truth. Part of me allowed myself to get lost in the fantasy that things were normal here. I was just on a normal walk through the country, listening to the song of the birds, the breeze brushing against me, carrying pollen along with it and making me itch my eyes.

  But every now and then I would see a reminder that the world was far from normal now. I saw telegraph poles, fallen onto the road. I’d see the occasional car, abandoned, the doors left open. And every now and then, I’d see a body of an unfortunate soul who had been in contact with a high surge of electricity when the EMP—if that’s what it was—had hit.

  I had to keep on going, though. Sure, I’d realised the danger of not communicating in this world. But at the same time, I needed to keep my wits about me. I couldn’t let my guard drop, or someone would be there to step in and punish me for it.

  I wasn’t sure how much longer I’d walked when I saw the village in the distance.

  I stood still. A village. It was a quaint place, cut off from the rest of England—even more so now the power was gone. Honestly, I didn’t imagine villages had fallen down the pan quite as rapidly as cities. They were little communities within themselves anyway. They were more self-absorbed than the cities, and relied less on the outside world.

  That could be a good thing. After all, there would be a natural sense of order here. The people running the village shop would be known to the community. There wouldn’t be the impersonal nature that sparked the looting and the fighting in the towns and cities.

  I got closer to the village. And at first, I could be forgiven for thinking everything was okay.

  But then I saw that this village had been affected just as much as everywhere else.

  There was a child on the lawn on one of the houses. His mother was cradling him, wailing, paying no attention to the outside world.

  By his side, a fancy new electric bicycle.

  It looked like the battery had fallen to pieces.

  I swallowed a heavy lump in my throat. Poor kid. He’d just been having fun, like so many other kids would’ve been. Just going about his business and then… bam. Everything changed.

  It wasn’t fair. None of this was fair.

  But if it was as bad a situation as I thought it was—based on the evidence I’d seen—then there was an even harsher truth to it all.

  The worst had yet to come.

  Hell, the worst hadn’t even started yet.

  Leave people without the ability to use electricity for a day and they might just go mad.

  But leave them a week…

  A month…

  A year…

  Two years…

  No matter whether the power was restored or not, after living in a world like that for a while, there was no going back to the old way of doing things.

  I kept on making my way towards this village shop, hopeful of finding even just a few supplies, when I saw the bicycle.

  It was perched against a window right in front of a house. It looked in good condition, well-pumped tires, decent looking chain. And as I looked at it, I felt the niggling idea growing inside me. I could do with some transport. Something to get me back to my family quicker. A bicycle would be perfect.

  But could I steal it?

  It was someone else’s property.

  Did I have it in me to steal it from them?

  I looked up and down the street. Eerie silence. Nobody watching, even though it felt like I had eyes on me at all times.

  Part of me knew I shouldn’t steal it because stealing was bad karma.

  But then what good was karma in this world anyway?

  If it was the choice bet
ween a bike and no bike, surely I had to opt for the bike, right?

  I licked my dry lips and cursed under my breath.

  And then I started to walk towards the bike.

  “Here goes nothing.”

  When I reached it, my stomach sank. There was a chain wrapped around it. A combination lock. Shit.

  I started twiddling with the lock when I heard someone coming down the stairs of the house behind the bike.

  “I dunno, Mum. Nobody gives a damn about your bloody straighteners.”

  Shouting in return.

  I kept totally still as I listened to the footsteps reach the bottom of the stairs.

  As I heard the handle of the door begin to creak open.

  As the door began to move…

  “Alright. Alright. I’ll give you a hand. Just a sec.”

  The door stopped moving.

  The footsteps disappeared again.

  I let go of a long shaky breath. That’d been close. I didn’t want to get caught in the act of stealing, that was for sure.

  I looked back at the combination lock. And as I looked at it, I realised something weird.

  The three numbers at the end. “999” The first, a 1.

  It couldn’t be, could it?

  The fool hadn’t actually made his code “9999” had he?

  I turned the first of the numbers to a 9.

  The lock clicked.

  The bike was free.

  Adrenaline filled my body. Sweat pumped down my forehead. My heart pounded. I’d done it. I’d actually managed to break the bike free.

  I started to climb onto it when I heard the footsteps again.

  When I saw the door open.

  And this time, it was too late.

  There was a lad opposite me. He was dressed in a white vest and grey jogging bottoms. He was well built, muscular.

  And he was looking from his bike to me and back again.

  “Get the hell off that.”

  I knew I had two choices. And I knew the easier, more moral choice would be to get off the bike and leave it here.

  But I did something else.

  Something miraculous.

  I spun around, staying on the bike.

  And then I started to cycle away.

  “Hey! Come back!”

  I pedalled my way out of the driveway. I pedalled full pelt, the lad not far behind me. I kept on going as fast as I could, knowing full well that one slip would mean the lad caught me, and I wasn’t looking forward to explaining something like this.

  But I didn’t slip.

  I kept my focus.

  I kept my pace.

  And even if I had passed by the village store, I kept on going.

  I looked over my shoulder.

  The lad was in the distance, hands on his knees. He was shouting something. I wasn’t sure what.

  I took a deep breath and turned ahead, allowing myself to ease on the peddles, a smile of victory on my face.

  I was a looter now.

  I was a looter, just like the very people I judged so much.

  And the worst thing?

  I didn’t even feel bad about it.

  Chapter Thirteen

  It wasn’t long before I came across another shop.

  And this time, I knew I couldn’t miss my opportunity to take whatever I needed.

  It was mid-afternoon. The clouds had cleared, and the sun was blistering hot. I didn’t know whether it was anything to do with the EMP or the solar flare or whatever had caused it. In truth, I didn’t know if the EMP was solar—or if it was an EMP at all. There were lots of ways for them to be caused, though. The sun’s natural coronal mass ejections were one of them. But there were also ways of weaponising EMPs. Believe it or not, it’d been many western governments’ biggest fears for a long time. A rogue state getting their hands on a weapon capable of detonating an electromagnetic pulse and using it to destabilise the western way of life.

  But again. Most people just dismiss things like that as fiction or fantasy.

  Maybe they won’t be so quick to jump to that dismissive conclusion in future…

  I put my bike against a tree, making sure there was nobody else around in the immediate vicinity. I knew just how much of a prized possession a bike would be in this world. I’d seen the way some people looked at me when I’d sped past them on my way out of the village and over here. They wanted what I had. I’d planted an idea in their minds; a seed. I just had to make sure they knew that what was mine was mine, and I was good with them cycling as long as they didn’t try to take my bike away.

  But hell. I knew people were going to try.

  I crouched down and crept to the edge of the long grass at the opposite side of the road to the shop.

  I had to assess whether the place was safe. And honestly, I liked what I saw so far. Not many people around. No sign of any real trouble. Relatively quiet. But I’d need to watch a little longer just to be sure.

  There was another concern of mine. The police car a bit further down the road. Sure, the police car was just as knackered as every other car. But I didn’t like how the police had dealt with each individual situation I’d come across them so far. After all, who was in control anymore, really? And how were the police going to react to the knowledge that people were taking matters into their own hands?

  They were going to do what was natural to them. Attempt to restore order. Even if their idea of “order” was very different to the reality now that the world had changed so much already in just a matter of hours.

  But I knew the police car was likely abandoned, and to be honest, I was probably just being paranoid. Not all police were like the ones I’d seen already. They were human too, after all. They had their own concerns, their own fears, their own families to worry about and attempt to get back to.

  I couldn’t let that car get in the way of what I knew I had to do.

  I took a deep breath, swallowed a lump in my throat.

  Then I started to walk towards the shop.

  It was then that I felt a hand on my shoulder.

  “Don’t want to do that.”

  I jumped, almost out of my skin. I hadn’t heard anyone creep up to me. Clearly, I needed to get better at this whole laying low thing.

  The man was gaunt and ginger. He had bulging brown eyes which peered right at me. He was smiling, which was probably intended not to intimidate me, but actually had the reverse effect.

  “What the hell?” I said, sounding panicked. It was about all I could manage.

  “Hey,” he said, lifting his hands. “I’m just saying. I wouldn’t go into that shop right now. Not with the people who’re in there. Nasty types.”

  My heart was still racing. I was still taken aback by how much this man had made me jump.

  “I’m Paul, anyway. Paul Smithers. And you are?”

  I didn’t say a word. Just looked back at the shop.

  “Huh?”

  “What?”

  “I said I’m Paul—”

  “Oh. Alex.”

  Paul offered out a hand. “Hi, Alex. Nice to meet you out here. Although I’ll be honest. I would rather be anywhere than here right now.”

  I nodded and took Paul’s hand, which he seemed to appreciate.

  “So what brings you out here?”

  “Huh?”

  “Jeez,” Paul said. “You are a shaky one, aren’t you? What brings you out here?”

  I took a few deep breaths, tried to calm myself. Paul seemed alright. I couldn’t assume that everyone was hostile. That’s what’d got me into this mess in the first place.

  “Well if you aren’t gonna speak I might as well. Was on the way home from a music festival down in Devon. Hate the journey. Awful. Anyway. Got on the final stretch, home in sight and… bam. Everything goes out. Almost lost my life in the crash. Luckily still here to tell the tale.”

  “Sorry to hear that.”

  “You will be when I tell you I was only rushing home from the festival early ’cause my mu
m’s had a fall.”

  The taste in my mouth went sour. I turned and looked at Paul. Somehow he still had a smile on his face.

  “No, I don’t know how she is. But I figured I’d better stop off and grab some supplies for us before I go back. No point me getting there and us both being screwed. Might as well sort it so we might survive. Hold up.”

  I turned around and saw four people, hooded, stepping out of the shop.

  “They don’t look clever, for what it’s worth,” Paul said. “Look dumb as hell. But sometimes dumb is nasty. Especially when it thinks it’s king of the world all of a sudden.”

  I watched them gather around each other, bags of supplies in hand.

  And I watched them walk away.

  Paul and I stayed put for a while, watching the shop some more, watching those thugs move further away.

  When we were totally sure everything was clear, we looked at one another.

  “Ready?” Paul asked.

  I swallowed a lump in my throat then I nodded.

  It was time to take our share of the spoils.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I held my breath as I crept inside the shop.

  The first thing that struck me about this place? Just how much quieter it was than the supermarket I’d been in earlier. But then again, that place had been more in town, a central hub that everyone knew about. This was way more out of the way. And aside from the thugs I’d seen leave the place earlier, I hadn’t seen much in the way of activity.

  Paul was by my side. Already he was scanning the aisles, mentally taking note of what he did and didn’t need. He seemed like he knew his stuff, and he seemed like he was a decent guy to boot. I wasn’t in the habit of making new friends in this world. But Paul seemed like he was just trying to get by in his own way, so I wasn’t exactly going to stop him gathering the supplies he needed to get to his mother.

  As long as it didn’t come down to one final remaining supply that the pair of us desperately needed. I might be working with him now, but I wasn’t sure I was ready to offer up what was rightfully mine to him just yet.