Nemesis: Inception

by G. Michael Hopf

  Lexi was awake and heard Carey but ignored her pleas to get up. Instead she grabbed a pillow and covered her pounding head. Not content with the evening ending at two in the morning, Lexi brought the party home, which included inviting Jeff back to her place.

  Carey, half dressed, stormed towards Lexi’s bedroom but stopped instantly when Jeff stepped out of the bathroom and into the hallway.

  “Mornin’,” Jeff said, scratching his head.

  “Excuse me,” she said, pushing past him and into Lexi’s room. She walked over, snatched the pillow and tossed it across the room. “Get up, we’re late. The clock isn’t working, and by the looks of it outside, it’s well past nine. Now get up!”

  “Argh, my head hurts.” Lexi sighed.

  Carey hurried back into the living room. “Where’s my phone? Have you seen it?” she asked Jeff, who was in the kitchen, drinking a glass of water.

  “Nope,” he replied. “Um, what’s up with the power?”

  “I don’t know, but I need my phone,” Carey snapped and headed towards the couch.

  Lexi felt bad for not getting up as promised, but her head was pounding from the many hours of drinking. She looked on her nightstand and saw her phone. Calling out to Carey, she said, “Found mine.” She pressed the home button, but nothing happened. She then hit the power button, but still the phone was dark. Unable to get it to work, she tossed it back on the nightstand and sank back into her thick pillows.

  Carey pushed bottles, glasses and bags of chips aside on the coffee table, looking for her phone. “Where’s my phone?”

  Knowing she had to get up, Lexi rose, put on a pair of pajamas and exited the bedroom. “Sorry, sweetheart, we’ll get you on the next flight out, I promise.”

  “Argh, where is it?” Carey moaned.

  Jeff watched Carey frantically look for the phone. “Say, what’s your number? I’ll call it,” Jeff said, pulling his phone from his back pocket.

  “415-555—”

  “Never mind, my phone is dead too,” Jeff replied, fiddling with his phone. “Hmm, hey, you have a 5S charger?”

  “Yeah, on the counter,” Lexi answered. She then looked at Carey and barked, “Sis, calm down, you’re being grossly obsessive.”

  “Here it is!” Carey exclaimed when she found her phone buried between two cushions. She saw the screen was dark and tried to turn it on, but the phone remained dark. “Damn, it’s dead too.”

  “Carey, please stop yelling about everything. My head is pounding,” Lexi beseeched.

  “Hurry, get dressed,” Carey begged, tossing her phone on the coffee table.

  “What is going on? There must be a power outage,” Lexi commented when she tried to turn on several light switches. She walked to a large window and pulled up the blinds.

  Bright sunlight splashed across the room. Carey was right, it was later than nine in the morning.

  Lexi looked out and down on the parking lot of her condominium complex. From her second-story vantage point, she could see a dozen neighbors working on their cars. She thought it odd but quickly dismissed it. She turned back around, went to her room, grabbed her phone and came back. “I’ll be right back. I’m going to run to the car and charge this.”

  Opening the door brought in more of the late morning light.

  “I’m coming with you,” Carey said.

  Jeff didn’t say a word; he just stood in the kitchen, drinking water.

  From the second-floor balcony, they had a bird’s-eye perspective of the entire three-acre complex. The parking lot spanned out to their right and Carey took notice of the people and inoperable cars.

  “I don’t think I’ve seen so many of your neighbors gathered at one time in one place,” Carey commented.

  “Only during the annual summer soiree, but at this time it’s strange,” Lexi said, referencing Palm Grove’s yearly community part.

  Palm Grove Condominiums was a luxury complex two miles west of the coast in Solana Beach. It consisted of four two-story white stucco-sided buildings spread across three acres. Each building held twenty condos, with each side having ten, five up and five down. The buildings formed a U-shape with a large swimming pool and community club house in the middle. A maze of concrete sidewalks connected all the buildings and the amenities. Small patches of perfectly manicured grass, shrubs, date palms and flowering plants surrounded each building.

  For San Diego standards, the complex was older, having been built in the 1980s, but the location was great and the prices fit Lexi’s budget. She could have afforded a larger place, but she refused to take money from her mother, who was financially well off. Their relationship was difficult when she lived at home but only turned worse after she left home at eighteen for college. Her mother had tried to engage her, but it didn’t matter, Lexi had given up on her long before. Carey questioned her sister’s disdain but could never get Lexi to openly discuss it. Whatever the reason, she disliked her mother and wasn’t about to share why.

  Lexi and Carey made their way down to the parking lot. The numbers of people they saw grew as more and more people exited their condos with disconcerted looks on their faces. She pressed the fob to unlock her white Honda Accord, but the lights didn’t flash like they normally did.

  “Hmm, it’s not working,” she said and looked at the keys in her hand to make sure she had the right set. She pressed the unlock button several more times but nothing. Besides her phone and the power outage, this was another clue that something was terribly wrong. She looked around and saw she wasn’t alone, as her neighbors were struggling to get their cars unlocked and started.

  She inserted the key into the door and manually unlocked the car. She climbed in, put the key in, and just before she turned it, she paused to say a little prayer, “Please turn on, please.” She turned the key, but nothing happened, not even a click. The car was dead. She tried again and again, foolishly hoping that with a random attempt, the engine would roar to life, but it didn’t.

  “What’s going on?” Carey asked.

  “It won’t start. Nothing works. It’s completely dead,” Lexi replied, frustration in her tone.

  Irritated, she rested her head back, closed her eyes and began to think about what could cause something like this.

  Carey looked around and saw a group of people close by. She rushed to them in hopes they’d have answers.

  Lexi’s head was still pounding and she felt dehydrated from the hours of heavy drinking. Unsure what to do and fatigued, she laid her head against the steering wheel and thought.

  A loud tap on the top of the car startled her.

  She looked up and saw Jeff towering above her. “You scared the shit out of me!”

  “Sorry.”

  “You’re in security, what’s going on here?” she asked.

  “I’m not sure if checking unlocked doors and handing out entry passes makes me an expert, but I can see something isn’t right,” he replied. “Pop the hood and I’ll take a look.”

  She did as he requested.

  Jeff didn’t know much about cars but felt compelled to at least look.

  “Anything?” she asked, getting out of the car.

  “To be honest, I wouldn’t know what to look for, but if your car won’t even make a sound, I’d have to guess it’s the battery or maybe the alternator.”

  Lexi looked around and saw a couple dozen other vehicles with their hoods up.

  Carey raced back over to them, clearly excited. “I know what’s going on!”

  “Is it a good thing?”

  “Um, no,” Carey blurted out.

  “You look happy, even downright excited,” Lexi said.

  “Knowing the problem is the first step to finding a solution, isn’t that what you say?” Carey said, reminding Lexi of a common quote she used.

  “Anyway, what did you hear?” Lexi asked.

  Jeff’s massive stature moved around the car and stood behind Lexi.

  “That guy over there said it was a terrorist attack,” Car
ey said, pointing towards a small group of people huddled near a car. “His name is Greg.”

  “What kind of attack?” Jeff asked.

  “Something to do with a nuclear bomb,” Carey answered quickly.

  Hearing that it might have been an attack, Lexi marched over to the group.

  “Which one of you is Greg?”

  A pudgy young man raised his hand.

  “Why do you think this is some sort of terrorist attack?” Lexi asked.

  The man looked at her and could see the stress and fear in her eyes.

  Jeff and Carey came up to stand behind Lexi.

  “Hi, nice to meet you too,” the man responded.

  “My sister said you know this is an attack,” Lexi pressed.

  “I never said I knew, but if I had to logically guess, I’d say this is either a massive CME or EMP.”

  “In English,” Lexi stressed.

  Jeff spoke up. “EMP stands for electromagnetic pulse. I learned about it in the Army. I don’t know the other acronym.”

  “Coronal mass ejection, a solar flare,” Greg answered.

  “A what?” Lexi asked.

  “The sun spews out highly charged radioactive particles that overwhelm the grid, but an EMP can do greater damage or more precise damage to small electrical devices, like why our phones don’t work or cars won’t turn over,” Greg proudly answered, seemingly happy with his breadth of knowledge.

  “How do you know this stuff?” Lexi asked. “Are you a scientist or something?”

  “This guy, hell no,” one of the other men standing next to Greg replied.

  “Not a scientist, but I’m knowledgeable about these things,” Greg said, defending himself.

  “He works at the Apple store in UTC,” another man blurted out with laughter.

  “Listen, guys, this shit is serious and I’m pretty sure I’m right,” Greg said again, defending his theory.

  Lexi began to process what Greg was saying. She didn’t know whether to believe him or not, but regardless, something had happened and it frightened her.

  “Anything else you can think of?” Lexi asked, determined to gather information.

  “Um, not really,” Greg replied.

  “How long before everything comes back on?” Lexi asked.

  Greg looked around sheepishly and said, “It probably won’t. If this was an EMP, it’s fried everything. I don’t know if this is a local event or widespread, but what I know about these things is we can expect the lights to be off for a while.”

  Lexi’s face grew ashen. She knew what that meant and fear began to grow inside of her.

  “I’m scared,” Carey said, grasping Lexi’s arm.

  “So our cars, the lights, everything won’t work again, that’s what you’re telling us?” Lexi pressed him.

  “Pretty much.”

  Jeff pulled away from the group and marched towards his Chevy Silverado truck.

  Lexi watched him go through the same motions. He tried to unlock—nothing. He opened it manually and, like everything else, the truck failed to turn over. After several failed attempts, he exited the truck and shrugged his shoulders.

  “What are we going to do?” Carey asked Lexi.

  “I don’t know. I need time to think,” Lexi answered.

  “Do you want some advice?” Greg said.

  “Go ahead,” Lexi replied.

  “If you’re smart, you’ll get the hell out of town.”

  “Why?” Lexi asked.

  “Because as soon as everyone figures out that the power isn’t coming back on and no one is coming to help them, people will go ape shit.”

  “You don’t think anyone is coming to help, the police, the Army, no one?” Lexi asked.

  “I can’t guarantee that, but look, if this is what I think it is, then EMS, the government itself will be overwhelmed. You’re on your own; no one is coming to save us.”

  “It sounds like you’re saying this is the end of the world,” Carey said, her voice cracking.

  “Like I said, I don’t know for sure, but this has all the clues of an EMP attack. The first thing you should be doing is finding a way out of here and fast.”

  “Why, go where?” Lexi asked.

  “Anywhere out of the city, because soon this place will come apart at the seams.”

  The last words Greg said kept repeating in Lexi’s head. It all sounded so depressing and hopeless, but it also sounded unbelievable. Needing to find something to do, she returned to her condo and went looking for food. Lexi opened the refrigerator and stared at the empty shelves. Her stomach growled, but there wasn’t much food to eat. She stepped to the overhead cabinets that served as her pantry, but she only found a skimpy selection. Irritated and feeling overwhelmed, she slammed the cabinet door.

  “What’s wrong?” Carey asked, nervously chewing on her fingernails.

  “I’m hungry and I have nothing to eat.”

  “Did you look in the freezer?”

  Lexi then remembered she had a pint of ice cream. She opened the freezer door and almost cheered when she saw the sweating carton of Haagan-Dazs chocolate. “Score!” She grabbed it and pulled the top off. “This will hit the spot.”

  “I want to go to Mom’s,” Carey said.

  “Not going to happen,” Lexi shot back.

  “What are we going to do, just sit here and wait?”

  “In the meantime there isn’t anything we can do.”

  “Mom will have an idea of what we should do,” Carey stressed.

  “Um, no, she won’t.”

  “We have to do something.”

  “I am,” Lexi said, walking towards the kitchen.

  “What?”

  “Eating, I’m starving and I need to eat. I suggest you join me,” Lexi quipped.

  “Not hungry.”

  “Letting this melt is considered a sin in most countries,” Lexi joked.

  “Lex, I really think we should go to Mom’s house,” Carey again said.

  “Listen, you go. I have no desire to see her, plus you don’t even know if she’s there,” Lexi replied, then shoved a spoonful of melting ice cream in her mouth.

  “Last I talked to her, she said she was coming home later today.”

  Lexi squinted and cocked her head. “Wait a minute, you said you didn’t talk to her. Did you lie to me?”

  “What was I supposed to do, let you sit in jail? She fronted me the money to bail you out!”

  “Carey, you promised you weren’t going to tell her!”

  “I didn’t know what to do,” Carey cried out.

  Lexi’s face turned flush. She scooped a large dripping spoonful out of the carton and flicked it at Carey, hitting her in the chest.

  “Hey, what the hell?” Carey squealed.

  “You bitch, you know how I feel about Mom. You deserve that.”

  “If it wasn’t for me and Mom, you’d still be in jail. How about showing some gratitude,” Carey blasted and picked the scoop up with her fingers. She tossed it back at Lexi and barked, “Be grateful.”

  Lexi took another scoop and flung it at Carey.

  Carey retaliated with a pillow from the couch.

  Soon both women were tossing anything they could get their hands on.

  A loud knock at the front door jolted them back from their adolescent behavior.

  “Who can that be?” Carey asked.

  “Maybe it’s Jeff.” Lexi jumped up, ran to the door and opened it quickly. “Oh, hi, Liz.”

  Liz was a neighbor of Lexi’s that lived in the adjacent building. Lexi couldn’t call her a friend because the use of that word was held for a selective exclusive few. While many overused the word, Lexi only labeled those who she knew and could trust. She would joke that in order to be called her friend you’d have to be willing to bury a body with her.

  “Did you guys hear?” Liz asked.

  “Hear what?” Lexi asked.

  “The power outage was a terrorist attack,” Liz said rapidly while looking over L
exi’s shoulder.

  “You want to come in?” Lexi offered reluctantly. She didn’t like Liz much because she tended to drone on, and whenever an opportunity presented itself, she’d link everything to politics.

  “Yeah, sure,” Liz said and stepped in.

  Lexi closed the door and followed Liz towards the couch.

  “We heard the same thing,” Carey said, wiping her shirt off.

  “It’s scary,” Liz said, taking a seat next to Carey but avoiding the mess of the melting ice cream.

  “We met a guy who says we should get out of town right away. He claims everything is going to get crazy,” Carey said.

  “This stuff is scary, but don’t believe that nonsense. I’m sure the president is on top of this right now,” Liz said confidently.

  Lexi rolled her eyes and plopped into the thick cushioned chair.

  “What? It’s true, we’ll be fine. What everyone needs to do is calm down; don’t listen to tinfoil-hat right-wing nut jobs and all their crazy conspiracy theories. I heard Greg too and he’s just a wacko. I say we should just enjoy this for what it is. The government and military will be here soon to take care of everything, trust me.”

  “What is this?” Lexi asked.

  “A vacation! Relax and have fun,” Liz said with a glowing smile.

  Lexi exhaled deeply and thought about what Liz was saying. She wanted to believe in Liz’s confidence, but she couldn’t. It had been drilled in her head long ago not to turn over one’s trust completely to anyone or anything. She also couldn’t believe this could turn out so rosy. It might not be as bad as Greg described, but it wasn’t as wonderful as Liz made it sound either.

  Challenging Liz, Lexi asked, “If the military or government is so awesome, how did they let this happen to begin with?”

  “It’s the republican’s fault.”

  “Huh?” Lexi asked.

  “Yeah, I bet this is just retaliation for all the wars they started.”

  “You know…” Carey chimed in.

  Lexi gave Carey a hard stare.

  “What?” Carey asked, referencing the look.

  “Liz, while I can appreciate your deep and devoted enthusiasm, I really don’t have the energy to sit and listen to politics,” Lexi said.