by Pete Thorsen
Chapter 9
The US attack had been planned for the middle of the night in Korea. When the US saw those ICBM’s launched they wasted not a second and sent out an emergency warning to everyone in the United States. They might have doubted that it would do any good because the warning was of such short time in nature, but the warning was sent.
And it was just after the noon hour here, and I was eating lunch and had the TV news on to listen to while I was eating. I heard the emergency announcement, and I dropped my sandwich and ran.
I ran to the new room attached to the house and threw every manual disconnect. Then I threw the main breaker for the house. Next, I ran to the meter on the pole near the house and snipped the seal and pulled the meter from the socket.
Then it was to the generator where I disconnected every connection. I used a laptop computer for everything because I could easily take it with me on jobs. I took it along with Karen’s laptop and all our other electronic devices and brought them down into the basement to the waiting metal trash can. Everything went into the trash can, and the lid was put on tight.
I had no jobs today, and Cassy was home with me. She was almost three now, and she could tell something bad was happening and started to cry.
“Wanna come into the basement and play with Daddy?”
“I wanna go in the basement and play with you Daddy.”
She stopped crying when I picked her up. With the other hand, I grabbed the remainder of my lunch and we went into the basement together.
It was complete darkness down there. But we were ready. And we had played with Cassy before down here in the dark. She knew what happened next.
“Light, light.”
I set her down, and she held on to my leg. I reached to my belt where I carry a flashlight all the time. I always need it for every job, and so I just carry it all the time. Cassy waited expectantly for the light. I flicked the flashlight on and shined it down on the floor. Cassy followed the beam of light over to a cabinet on the wall where it was shining.
“Candle.”
I followed Cassy as she opened the tall cabinet that sat on the floor. When she had the door open, and I was shining the light inside she grabbed a candle and a cigarette lighter from next to the stack of candles. She handed me the lighter as she tipped the candle in my direction.
“Do you want to hold the candle?”
“Yes.”
She reached back inside the cabinet where there were some light weight cardboard donuts. She deftly slipped one over the candle so any hot wax would not burn her hand then she again tipped the candle in my direction for me to light.
With her candle lit, Cassy was happy and knew everything was alright because we had played this before. She waited for me to light my candle but I grabbed a kerosene lamp and lit that instead. Next, we walked into another room of the basement.
Our basement was a fair fallout shelter. It was buried and had solid filled block walls with a solid cement ceiling. It was not up to being a real fallout shelter with three to five feet of dirt or concrete on top, but it was way better than most people had. I just kept an eye on Cassy as I finished my lunch. There was little I could do anyway now other than what I had already done.
I doubted we would get any fallout here and thought we would be back upstairs again in an hour or so. I finished the meal and played with Cassy. I never detected any tremors or shaking of any kind that would be a sign of a nuclear hit anywhere near us. I was worried about Karen, but I could do nothing about her right now.
If there were no fallout, then Karen would be perfectly safe and home by supper time. If there were fallout Karen would decide what to do. She would drive home if the car ran. If the car was dead and the fallout was happening she would go to one of the basements of the buildings we had scoped out before in town. She would have her get home bag with her, and if she did have to stay in town, she would be bringing the bigger bag the car contained with her also.
Though I would worry about her until she was here in my arms, I knew she was smart, and she knew just what to do to survive. We would both be worrying about the other as long as we were apart. It was sixteen miles from our house to where she worked. If there was no fallout and the car would not run she would walk home. If that were the case, it would be the middle of the night before she arrived unless she decided to stay in town over night. We also had friends about halfway home and she might very well decide to stay with them.
In my head, I knew she would be safe, but that did not stop my heart from racing or make me worry any less.
“I’m going to run upstairs for a minute. Can you stay here?”
“I can stay. Cassy’s brave.”
“Good girl.”
I ran upstairs using my flashlight. I looked out the windows looking for any fallout. The sky was sunny and clear. There was no sign of any kind of dust in the air or on the ground. I had a keychain radiation detector. I found that and walked to the front door. It made no noise and I opened the door, and it was still silent. I closed the door again and went back downstairs.
“Okay. Let's go back upstairs.”
Cassy carried her candle back towards the cabinet it came from and waited for me to catch up. She blew her candle out and carefully laid it down with others in the cabinet. Then I extinguished the oil lamp, and we went back upstairs.
I tried a portable radio, and there was nothing. It was a battery or electric model, and it had been plugged in when the event happened. Now it had no static no nothing. I assumed it was now toast. My watch said it was almost two in the afternoon. I was surprised that it even worked, but it was on my wrist, and I was in the basement and shielded pretty good when it happened I figured. Or maybe all watches still worked.
“Want to go and surprise Mommy at work?”
“Yes let’s go see Mommy.”
We went out to my pickup, but it would not start. I immediately wished that I had just kept that old truck I used to have years back. Maybe it had been old enough to still work.
“No, go?”
“No, go.”
The thought of being separate from Karen right now was almost too much to bear. Now I knew that there had been an EMP and Karen would be on foot. Yes, she would be safe, but that was not good enough for me.
“Let’s try the buggy.”
Cassy loved the buggy. It was an atv or an utv it was sometimes called. It had a steering wheel and a bench seat, and we used it around the place to haul stuff. Cassy loved to ride in it. Its top speed was only about twenty, but we did not take it out on the road, so we never went that fast.
I didn’t know if it would start or not but we went to try it. It was in the metal shed, and I didn’t know if it had a computer or not. But I would just try it. If it ran, we would go and get Mommy whether it was legal to drive on the road with it or not.
The machine started right up just like always. I shut it off again and told Cassy I would be right back. I ran to the house for a couple minutes to grab a pistol and lock up as I left through the front door. I grabbed Cassy’s car seat out of the truck and strapped it in the utv. I restarted it, and then we were on our way to see Mommy.
Chapter 10
Cassy was surprised and happy that we were taking the buggy to go see Mommy. Then she was surprised that I was going so fast.
“Fast.”
Was all she said with a big smile on her face and her long blonde hair blowing out behind her. I drove with the gas pedal to the floor with no let-up. It wasn’t like I was speeding, but I was not supposed to be driving this on the public roads because it was not street legal.
I sure didn’t care and never let off the gas. About a half hour later I could see someone ahead of us on a bike or walking. We had not seen a single car or truck on our drive so far. Getting closer I saw it was Karen. She was pulling a small two wheeled moving cart with her get home bag and the bigger emergency supply bag on the cart. She got a big smile on her face when she saw us.
“Mommy!”
“Hi, peanut. Are you out for a ride in the buggy?”
“We were coming to see you at work.”
“Well, I’m here so let’s go home.”
“We played in the basement.”
“That’s nice. We might do that some more when we get home.”
“Okay!”
The buggy had a work box in the back, and Karen threw the bags and cart back there before getting in the buggy. We just looked at each other for a moment, and then I took off for home. I had broken our rules by coming in to get her, but the look said that she was grateful that I did come in to get her. From the fact that we were in the buggy she knew the truck did not work. There was no need for words.
We drove home about as fast as we had driven away from it. I put the buggy back in the big shed and carried the bags into the house. Inside Karen was surprised there was no power at our house because of the solar.
“I shut everything down and broke all connections in the hopes that I could save the electronic components from getting fried by the EMP. I don’t know if I should hook it up again yet.”
“Oh, I didn’t think about all the electronics the system has in it. You did good, and we can get by for a day if you think we need to wait that long.”
“I just don’t know. And we will have to use the blackout curtains from now on if it does still work. We can’t take any chances. What was town like?”
“Just what you would expect. Nobody knew anything about anything. Everyone was still trying to use their smart phones. Cars were all stopped with many of them stopped right in the middle of the street. I expect by tomorrow many will be getting worried. Today they were just upset at the cars and the electric company.”
“No violence?”
“Only directed at their cell phones. That will change too but not today yet.”
“I could not stand not having you here.”
“Thank you for coming to get me. I was not looking forward to the walk. I grabbed that two wheeler from work so I could bring home both bags. No sense losing the big bag.”
“Good idea. Did you hear the warning?”
“No, but after the lights had gone off, I heard about it on the street before I started walking home. Everyone thinks the power will be back on any minute. Nobody knows why the cars aren’t working. Some appeared amused at the situation.”
“By tomorrow night no one will be amused. They will be thirsty instead.”
“Did you try and save the computers?”
“I threw all the electronics in our makeshift Faraday cage. I don’t know if they will work or not. I think we should wait until later and we can run the generator for an hour maybe. If it runs, that is.”
“There’s no trace of radiation?”
“Nothing so far.”
I held up the small radiation detector.
“So it was just an EMP then?”
“Well I don’t know that. It looks like an EMP, but there could have also been regular nukes too. The warning said three ICBM’s were inbound. That’s all I know. I am guessing that at least one nuke was exploded well up in the atmosphere to produce an EMP. North Korea knew that an EMP would do the most damage and kill the most people. Just not right away.”
“This is the very worst case scenario we could have come up against.”
“No there could be fallout too. That would be worse. But you’re right this is really bad. It’s spring. That will save some lives. Everyone has several months to get ready for winter.”
“Looks like you will be a gardener this summer. Just what you wanted.”
“You know how I feel about working in the garden, but I will be there right beside you. It will be a very small price to pay compared to everyone else.”
“Do you really think trouble will come all the way out here?”
“I hope not. But yes I think it will. And it will be up to us to plan for it and be ready, whether it comes here or not.”
With Karen home, Cassy had gone to sleep on her own from all the excitement while she was listening to the boring adult talk. We let her sleep, and we moved and talked quietly until we heard Cassy wake up. She found us while she was still rubbing her eyes.
Later we had supper cooked on the gas kitchen range. When we were done, I tried the generator, and I was happy when it started. I hooked it back up, and the house sprang back to life. I let it run for an hour while Karen and took turns in the shower and Cassy got washed up for bed. Then I shut it down again. I did not bother to unhook it because there would be no more nukes launched from North Korea. I knew what our military would do to them after what they had done to us.
We all went to bed about the same time as usual. I realized things would be very different now in many ways. Usually, we watched the TV news before bed. That would never be happening again. There would be no news of any kind for some time and maybe forever.
Everything in those radio stations and TV stations would be fried. There would be no electric power from the grid for a very long time. Not that it mattered because everyone’s TV’s and radios would also be fried. The only news would be very local news, and that would travel by word of mouth by people who would now be walking everywhere they wanted to go. It would be a whole new world for everyone.
With that thought, I went to sleep. Karen was here and safe at my side, and Cassy was sleeping in her room. We were all together, and we were all safe. I would do all I could to keep us safe.
In the morning it was still sunny and nice. The small radiation detector was silent even outside. I now had little fear of fallout though there was a slight chance some could drift in from some distance away.
I thought it should be safe enough now and I hooked the solar power back up. I was not surprised when the power came on because I knew the battery bank would be at full charge. I watched, and all the electronics powered up and gave me readouts on what was happening. We had been extremely lucky. By cutting all power and disconnecting everything from each other the whole system was saved. I left the electric meter off from the socket. I just put the meter inside the garage. When I had time, I would cover the meter socket to keep the bees from building a nest in there.
Chapter 11
So we had full power in the house. We had running water. We had what very, very few people had around here. I wondered just how much of the nation had been hit by the EMP. I wondered if all three of the ICBM’s had been used as EMP’s or if one or two had struck cities as regular nukes. And I wondered if I would ever find out any more about it.
I would assume that at least Hawaii and Alaska were still operating as normal. Would they send aid to the rest of the country? Just how much aid could they give us here? Now that America had been struck a terrible blow would other nations use this time to attack us? So many questions and no answers would be forthcoming.
It was still early spring but warm enough so I could at least start to enlarge the garden. After a normal breakfast that is just what I did. The old rototiller fired right up. Well not quite. It was as cantankerous as it always has been but it did start. And once started it ran well enough.
I had marked the corners of the new improved garden before I started the tiller. Now I ran the tiller over the ground breaking it up until I had the whole new plot done. Then I checked the gas and thinking I had enough I ran over the whole garden again at a ninety-degree angle from the first pass. Now the ground looked pretty good. We knew it would grow a garden because we had been testing it with a few plants for a few years now in that little garden area. We had been just playing and learning during those years; now we would be growing a garden for real.
I put the tiller away. I would likely make a complete pass over the whole garden again before we actually planted it. For now, it could just sit and wait for a spring rain to settle it down again. With the garden done for now I just walked slowly around the area then I walked out to the county road and stared at the place. I was looking at the place as others would see it and I was looking at ways I could
best defend it.
There were only the two of us. If any force of people came here, they would over run us and take what we have here. Also, even one person who had a rifle and some time and sense could just pick us off from concealment when we walked outside. But we weren’t defenseless. I walked back to the house and put on a holster and put my favorite pistol in it. Karen saw me do it. She said nothing and I went back outside. I saw that Karen was getting the pre-made blackout curtains out and ready for hanging. Something we had planned for but never really expected to ever use.
Outside again I wondered if the riding mower would start. It was stored in the big metal shed, and it was far from being computerized. I was not at all surprised when it started. It would come in handy later I thought as I shut it off again. I could use it to mow the areas near the road so any sniper would be in full view from the house. But I hoped it never came to that.
I just stayed in the shop area of the big shed and did some work. I was still working when Karen found me and asked if I was coming in for lunch. I followed her in and cleaned up. We all ate lunch together, and I stayed in and spent some time with Cassy before going back to the shop again to work.
Later Karen heard me pounding, and she came out to see what I was doing. I had a length of steel cable, and I had just made a loop on one end using bolt-on cable clamps. I had pounded on the ends of the bolts after I had them tight so they could not be removed without quite a bit of effort.
Next, I took out the garden wagon and put in some things including that steel cable with a small loop on one end. Then I pulled the wagon out to the end of the driveway. It was only day one, and I expected no trouble for a couple of weeks at least but I had the time today, and I would not be driving out of here anyway.
