by JK Franks
While JD had the general directions, Steve had been given the other half of Gerald’s secret. How to locate and get into the cabin. The man had been right, getting there had not been easy. They had left the last paved road at least twenty miles back. The bikes had been left midday the day before when the path they were following disappeared. From what he could see, the property was about as isolated as you could get in the state of Georgia. National Forest parkland bordered much of the land. Beyond that, fifty miles to the northeast was a large Air Force base just below Macon. Virtually no private land between them. Wildlife in the area should be plentiful. No towns or development anywhere around that they could see. Amazing that a place like this even existed.
Dropping the pack, he sat down in the meadow and rested his back against it. Trey would have loved it out here; he should have spent more time with his son. It had just seemed like everything the boy had needed was so expensive. He’d just felt the need to work harder and harder to pay for it all. He now fully understood; he had been trying to fix his son instead of just loving him fully for who he was.
He’d been the best dad he knew how to be, but in the end, it wasn’t enough. The world has gone to shit. Millions are dead. America is on the verge of collapse or maybe even civil war, yet all he could think about were the deaths of his son and Gerald. The loss seemed so trivial in the scale of misery out in the world. To him, it was everything, though. On some level, he knew it was probably for the best in his son’s case, but it still made him feel awful to think that way. People weren’t disposable, everyone had value. Even in his son’s limited capacity, he had understood. He had taken care of Elvis, followed his dad’s instruction even after his own food was probably gone. Ultimately, he might have even sacrificed his life to protect the dog.
He thought back to the people, the children along the fences in the detention camps. The president had no right to abandon so many of her fellow citizens. We all have as much right to survive. We have to be able to choose our own fate. Even if Gerald was right, and there was no way the government could help everyone, they didn’t have to add to the misery.
Looking at the penned notes, he brought the binoculars to his eyes one more time and scanned the slight ridge on the western edge of the lake. He was beginning to think this had all been some elaborate ruse by the old man. It would be just like him to keep screwing with them even after he was gone. The notebook had a crude drawing of the location. The shape of the lake matched, it had to be here.
Epilogue
They nearly walked into the structure before finding it. The cabin had been completely shrouded by old military camo netting. The shape blended into the surrounding trees perfectly. How had he built this way out here?
Elvis ran and barked as they got close enough to see the house. “Hold him,” Steve warned. “There are a few things I need to take care of before it is safe to enter.”
He took long minutes examining the ground, then gingerly stepped over a set of hidden trip wires. The notebook indicated that activating any of the wires would arm other defensive traps in the area. One of the wooden steps was also rigged. After a half hour of lifting netting and disarming traps, he stood and looked at their new home. It was far larger than he expected, and turning around, he realized it had a gorgeous and tactically smart view of the lake and valley beyond. Parts of the cabin looked old, ancient even, but most of it seemed relatively new.
Inside was even more surprising. The cabin had a bank of solar panels supplying electricity, and once they turned the inlet valve on to the tank, hot water. Gerald had even equipped the cabin with blackout curtains that closed automatically when darkness fell. The house lights would remain invisible to anyone outside. The kitchen and pantry were fully stocked, and as Gerald had said, it would last them for months. They sat down and ate one of the MREs from the stack on the counter. The food hitting their empty stomachs was a shock. “We probably ought to take it easy on the food. Our systems aren’t used to regular calories.”
Afterward, they began exploring the rest of the cabin. JD found a small weapons room which was stocked with a variety of defense and hunting guns. Cases of ammo lined one entire wall. The boy sat and began stripping down and cleaning the weapons they had been carrying.
Elvis followed Steve around the bottom floor inspecting every corner. His nose began sniffing along a particular set of boards in one of the bedrooms. “What is it, boy?” Steve asked with a knowing grin. Somewhere along an inner closet was a small handle that would release an access hatch to a hidden cellar. He watched the dog trying to figure it out as his hand found the latch. A small click and the ends of those boards popped up slightly. Steve marveled at the craftsmanship. The hinged door disappeared into the floor completely when closed. If Gerald did all this work himself, he missed his true calling.
“Going into the cellar,” he called out as he descended the wooden ladder. As he got to the bottom rung, a set of LED lights came on automatically. The “cellar” was larger than the entire first floor. It had obviously been extended underground back into the hill. Steve’s mouth dropped as he took it all in.
He was looking at a large open space with numerous side rooms which were essentially cut-out cubicles. The open space was dominated by a set of oversized leather sofa and chairs, and a massive gun safe. Beyond that, row upon row of cases and containers of freeze-dried and canned foods. A small kitchenette area was along one side. That was followed by a well-equipped combination exercise and first-aid room. Nearby, a radio room surrounded by a strange copper mesh lining the walls, with several of the ham radios Gerald said were there. He also saw a well-used MacBook Pro and a rack holding at least a dozen of the small, fast, solid-state drives. Besides the equipment was a spiral notebook with instructions on how to use everything. Looking around the room, he guessed the mesh was supposed to protect the electronics from an EMP or hopefully, in this case, the CME which had devastated the United States and possibly the whole world. The man had been a serious prepper, but beyond that, he was just smart in his planning. There was nothing in this place that didn’t have a purpose.
A mechanical room held the battery bank for the solar array hidden somewhere far above, as well as spare batteries on shelves. Tools for almost any task and surprisingly, a large Polaris four-wheeler and trailer. He had seen no other way to enter the basement, but apparently, there was. No way to get that thing up the wooden ladder. He spent an hour down in the basement before JD came down and joined him. The two of them had walked every inch of the space amazed at the contents, but still, neither saw any other exit. Steve heard Elvis whining up at the opening, wanting to join them. He climbed the few rungs to reach the dog and brought him down as well.
Elvis began his inspection of this space just like the floor above. Even though the dog had never spent much time indoors, he seemed right at home. Ultimately, it was the canine member of the group that discovered the biggest surprise. He started pawing at a section of the wall toward the back of the basement. Steve looked at it for quite some time before he noticed it. The section looked the same as the surrounding walls except . . . right there. Steve focused up at the top where it met the floor trusses of the floor above. Running inside a gap in the metal trusses was a flat iron bar. The bar was not unusual as it extended around on both opposing walls, but here it had two black wheels covertly mounted about fifteen feet apart.
Gerald’s notebook hadn’t said anything about this, but Elvis, and now Steve, felt like something lay beyond the wall. In hindsight, it took way longer to figure it out than it should have. The wall was essentially a large sliding barn door hanging from the iron rail above and riding on casters in a hidden groove below the wall. The system was ingenious and almost impossible to detect. Once JD found the catch, the entire wall slid out of sight behind another section.
“Holy shit, what the hell is that?” Steve said in amazement. What he was looking at was a very large corrugated metal pipe. Something you might see on a construction site o
r . . . he wasn’t sure— maybe a drainage pipe going under something big like an interstate or something. A series of bright LED tubes flickered to life running down the entire length. The shiny metal tube was at least fifty yards long. Hanging at the far end was a set of firing range targets. The floor of the tube had wooden planking to make a flat walkway even with the basement floor.
“It’s a hidden firing range,” JD said in awe. “I bet you couldn’t hear anyone shooting down here if you were outside.”
“Smart,” Steve said. “You would need a way to sight in guns and scopes that didn’t give away the location.” Looking just above the targets, he smiled. A hand-lettered sign read “EXIT.” They would have to investigate that tomorrow, but at least he now knew how to get the four-wheeler out if needed.
“This place is amazing.”
Steve nodded at the boy in agreement. Gerald had never talked much about the place, but it was far more than either had expected. Their friend had taken care of them even after he was gone. He knew the house had many more surprises in store. He could see several sets of bookcases along one wall. “I think we will be ok here.”
“For how long?” JD asked.
That was a very good question. Yes, they could hunker down to weather what was happening beyond this valley. Deep down, he knew that would not be enough. He felt the rough edge of paper in his pocket and pulled out the crumpled picture. Gerald had offered him this place, but at a cost. He also gave him a mission in exchange for the safe harbor. “Time we start earning our keep, kid.”
Steve carefully took the radios and laptop out of their protective sleeves and powered them on. To his relief, they all worked just like the manual indicated. The scanner on the radio began picking up random broadcast almost at once. He and JD studied the guide until they knew the basics of the system. Amazingly to Steve, the laptop had a connector that fit into the second radio. Gerald’s notes indicated that radio could be used in something called “packet mode” to receive data transmissions via certain radio frequencies. The laptop could decode these transmissions. It would, in fact, work as a crude form of internet.
He took out the crumpled paper from the back of his friend’s notebook. The radio guide had warned him about transmitting too often. They knew some of the story; others must know more. We all have to know what’s coming. The radio was mainly to be used in a passive, listen/receive-only mode. Apparently, transmissions could be isolated and the sending radio source located if someone was looking. Someone like the government thugs, he thought. In this case, though, Gerald had been clear—make contact. . .light the fire.
He pushed the button and changed to the frequency listed on Gerald’s note. This was the channel of the man his friend had simply called “a Patriot.” All he heard on the channel was silence, so he queued the mic, following the exact wording Gerald had listed in the manual. The guide indicated he could choose his own call sign and he almost said, “The Rat.” But in honor of his late friend, he kept the call sign Gerald had marked on the sheet as his own; it seemed very appropriate. He was rewarded several minutes later by a male voice with a pronounced Cajun accent: “Acknowledged. We show this as first contact—please prepare system to receive files.”
Steve verified the packet radio was in receive mode and the software on the laptop was standing by. He heard sounds that he took to be the encrypted file transmission, although he had no idea what to expect. On the MacBook screen, he saw a filename appear and a checksum data number followed by estimated time to download. The incoming filename was called CATALYST-CME.zip. The time to receive was estimated at more than twenty-three hours. The system wasn’t built for speed apparently.
The voice came back again, “Hello, Sentinel. This is Pitstop. You can call me Gopher, what’s your status?”
About the Author
Fiction author JK Franks’ world is shaped by his love of history, science and all things sci-fi. His work is most often filled with vivid characters set in dire situations only a step or so away from our normal world. His focus on gritty realism and attention to meticulous detail help transport his readers into his stories.
The first novel of his apocalyptic Catalyst series, Downward Cycle, was published in 2016. The follow-up to that, Kingdoms of Sorrow, continued the tale of a near-future apocalyptic event and a group of survivors’ efforts to hang on to the remnants of a collapsing civilization. The novella, American Exodus, published late in 2017 takes a look at the disaster from a fresh and more personal perspective. Look for at least one more book in the series.
Always writing, JK Franks now lives in West Point, Georgia, with his wife and family. No matter where he is or what's going on, he tries his best to set aside time every day to answer emails and messages from readers. You can also visit him on the web at www.jkfranks.com. Please subscribe to his newsletter for updates, sneak peeks, promotions and giveaways. You can also find the author on Facebook and Twitter or email him directly at [email protected].
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Other books by JK Franks:
The Catalyst Series
Book 1: Downward Cycle
Life in a remote oceanfront town spirals downward after a massive solar flare causes a global blackout. But the loss of electrical power is just the first of the problems facing the survivors in the chaos that follows. Is this how the world ends?
Book 2:http://amzn.to/2nNwmki
With civilization in ruins, individuals band together to survive and build a new society. The threats are both grave and numerous—surely too many for a small group to weather. This is a harrowing story of survival following the collapse of the planet’s electric grids.
Book 2.5: American Exodus Novella
This companion story to the Catalyst series follows one man’s struggle to get back home after the collapse. No supplies, no idea of the hardships to come; how can he possibly survive the journey? Even if he survives, can he adapt to this new reality?
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