EMP Journey

by Miles Maresh

  Chapter Fourteen

  Dave took backroads that roughly paralleled Interstate 10 as he headed toward his Bakersfield area home. The mustang was fast and powerful but was unlikely to be heavy enough to move vehicles blocking the roadway. Mike had shown Dave the portable winch he kept in the Mustang’s trunk. With that Dave was able to move a few cars that had been abandoned in the roads. He was surprised to find little traffic either on foot or in working vehicles. He passed a few walkers who waved feebly but made no real attempt to flag him down. Dave was armed and felt he could use the force necessary to overcome people wanting his vehicle. He was aware though, that when he got closer to the LA megalopolis he might have trouble with larger groups of people. If he lost the vehicle at some point he just wanted to be close enough to Bakersfield to get there by other means. Dave’s leg still hurt from being shot in Texas just a few days earlier, but he would finish his trip by walking if he had to. He just hoped his family was okay. He lived in a rural gated subdivision. He had about 3 acres as did most of his neighbors. With the ability to farm land and keep animals Dave, although not a prepper was better off than most people. By now people in the cities would be entering the hills around Bakersfield. Although he liked his community, with millions of people displaced close by he was unsure if the area would be safe for long. Dave knew his neighbors would mobilize to protect what they had. He would much prefer to live on his own land on his own terms but he appreciated Mike and would keep his offer in mind.

  Dave had to traverse the city streets around the freeways in Los Angeles so he could make his way home. Very few working vehicles were on the road so Dave was getting stares as he passed large groups of people looting stores or just standing on the side of the road. Dave tried to keep his speed up but a large mass of people at one intersection hemmed him in. They surrounded the car and started pounding on the locked doors and windows. For a brief moment Dave considering trying to drive through the crowd, but realized there was just too many people. The most likely result of driving through the crowd was driving over someone and then being killed himself by the remainder of the crowd. Dave chose the safe option and grabbed his go bag and jumped out of the still moving vehicle. As Dave had hoped, the crowd ignored him and chased the vehicle. Dave slung his backpack over his shoulders and headed for a less crowded street to continue his journey on foot.

  Dave had 2 pistols, a knife, ammunition and a few MREs in his go bag. He knew he was about 50 miles from his house. And thought he could get there in 2 days if he didn’t have much trouble. He was still trying to keep off the most crowded roads so he could not travel the most direct route Night was falling and Dave was looking for a safe place to get some sleep. The few motels he passed were ransacked and occupied by squatters. Farther back from the main road were some upscale houses. Any of these that were vacant were sure to be occupied by squatters soon but it had only been 10 days since the EMP. Although people were out of food and starting to realize the power was not coming back on, they were not fleeing the town in droves yet. Mike picked a smaller house that looked vacant, He checked all the windows and assured himself that the owners were not there, He jimmied the lock in the back, entered the house and checked all the rooms to make sure he was alone. He then checked the kitchen and was not surprised to find there was no food to be had. On a hunch he checked a few closets and noticed many empty rods and no suitcases visible. Dave was pretty sure the residents of this house had another location somewhere remote where they were headed. Because he just wanted to get some rest he barricaded himself into an upstairs bedroom had an MRE and went to sleep.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Mike and Trevor made the way to their north Phoenix home without further incident. Because their home was so far north of the city center the violence hadn’t hit there as much. The stores were out of food and supplies but had been boarded up rather than being destroyed and burned by looters. As Mike pulled into his neighborhood he noticed several people in the street who hid quickly when they saw Mike’s truck. To Mike it looked like Rick and his gang were still around and terrorizing the neighborhood. At Mike’s house the heavy, steel, security door was shut but several windows were broken. On the ground floor, that did intruders little good because Mike had left the steel plates over some of his windows. However, a second floor window was also broken and there was still a ladder leading up to it. Mike and Trevor entered the house with guns at the ready. They quickly cleared the rooms and surmised the intruders had left the ladder there when they exited the house after finding the little food Mike had left in the kitchen. That food was gone and several closets were ransacked. Mike manually opened the garage door as Trevor removed the ladder and put it in the mostly empty garage. After Mike backed the truck into garage they shut and locked the door and headed to the shelter. It was obvious the shelter had remained hidden from the intruders above. The hidden hatch was undisturbed and all the supplies were where they left them.

  After loading the truck with furniture and supplies Mike put a tarp over the truck bed and tied it down tightly. Mike called Emily on the Satellite phone and told her what the house and neighborhood looked like. They decided it would not look good to let others in the area seeing them coming and going with supplies. Since some of the neighbors had obviously been in his house and found nothing. If they realized he had hidden supplies they had nowhere to go but down. Mike said he would take as many supplies as he could to the 2nd basement. The access to that was hidden from view even more so than the primary basement was. If intruders discovered the primary shelter they would not realize there was another one 5 feet under it. Mike and Trevor left just enough supplies in the primary shelter to appease any possible intruders so they would think they had gotten everything. Mike and Trevor also decided to until about 2:00 AM before they left the house. They did not bother to replace or cover the broken upstairs window. If intruders wanted to enter the house they were getting in. Mike just wanted to make it difficult to get in tools and heavy digging equipment inside.

  After moving the supplies to the lower storage Mike and Trevor had MREs and waited for night to fall. Just before dusk they heard a knock on the door. Mike checked the peephole and saw Janet and Todd Douglas. Mike opened the door and said “Todd! It’s good to see you. I am glad you made it back.” Todd was taken aback but Janet nudged him and Todd began to speak. “Janet tells me that you’re hoarding food and supplies. The neighborhood has decided to pool our resources. The power will be back on soon and once everyone goes back to work we will pay for any extra supplies you provide. This is not an option. We also need your vehicles for the community” Mike said “Are you crazy? Surely you know what happened to the last people that tried to harm my family and steal our supplies. The power grid is down worldwide. What makes you think the government is even functioning much less able to replace all the fried electrical circuits? I am not about to put my family at risk to provide for a whole community. I don’t even live here full time at the moment. All my supplies are at my cabin in the mountains. You can get off my property now” Mike steered both the Douglasses to the door. “Wait” cried Todd “Are there any other cabins in your area? Where is your cabin?” Mike wasn’t about to tell Todd where his cabin was. But he said “You need to stop fooling yourself about the power coming on. Get to a rural area and start providing your own food. There will be no more food deliveries to the grocery stores for years. You need to hunt, fish, and grow your own crops. Pooling resources with others just delays the inevitable”. Todd and Janet left silently but Mike could hear the arguing as they walked back to their house.

  Mike and Trevor left for the cabin at 2 AM. Because they had cleared the route just the day before they decided to take the interstate. It meant going through Crown King but the cabin was so much farther back in the mountains that only 4 wheel drives could traverse the roads. Even if they went by the landslide they would notice the small valley on the other side. Mike reached the area of the road where the landslide was and noticed another tru
ck parked by the side of the road. The truck was empty but he noticed two men climbing the rocks up near the top of the landslide. Mike told Trevor to get a weapon ready and he tore up the path through the rocks as fast as he dared to go in the truck. The men heard the truck coming and turned to face Mike and ‘Trevor with weapons drawn. “There’s no need for that” Mike called out. You are on private property.” Mike had posted private property signs over the rise right before the mine field where the road picked up. He didn’t want them out by the main dirt road where people driving by would realize there was something to protect. The men said “It wasn’t posted. And this is government land you can’t own it.” “Yes you can” Mike said angrily “I have owned this private road for 10 years. There is no need to get killed today I have more people inside with weapons and there’s only two of you. “The men put their weapons down and started climbing down back to their truck. Mike didn’t think he had seen the last of them.

  Mike and Trevor waited until the men had disappeared then used the winch to move the rocks and then continued to the cabin. Trevor was grinning when he saw his sisters hard at work pulling weeks and rocks out of the expanded garden Emily had them working on, Don’t enjoy it too much” Mike warned him. “After you move rocks to help expand our defenses you can help your sisters in the garden.” Mike filled Emily in with what he had learned on his trip. She agreed that strengthening their defenses was more vital than the septic tank and the plumbing improvements Mike had promised. Mike took Trevor and Cheryl with him when he went back to the road in front of the landslide. Mike did not want his daughters to be left out of the defenses and protection of the family. He was uncomfortably aware that they might have to live in this type of world for many years and he was not going to let them fail to develop the skills this society would need them to have. Mike’s plan was to make it impossible for vehicles to stop along the road next to the landslide. There were areas to pull off the road right next to the slide and a few more both up and down the road. They worked on the other pull offs first. Mike and the children would carry medium to large sized rocks to create barriers. Then Mike would hook the winch up to large boulders and move them as close to the road as possible to prohibit the stopping of vehicles without blocking the road. It was hard, brutal work. A group of three walkers, two women and one man went by. They looked curiously at the truck and the workers but did not say anything. Because they were headed up the mountain toward the cabin turn off Mike and his children tailed them from a distance but they walked by the landslide. Blocking the last part of the road without losing access to the road himself was problematic. He could always use the winch as he had been doing at the top of the rise, but moving the rocks was hard without leverage and the boulders Mike was moving along the road had narrowed the access. Mike put in a small area of felled trees to provide a hidden gate to his road, He tied them together in a way that looked natural but allowed the section to swing open. Past the barrier the landslide still appeared foreboding although he had moved some of the larger boulders to the side of the road. If anyone got past the barrier on foot or with a vehicle they would immediately see the no trespassing signs Mike placed along the inside area of his barrier. Just over the top of the rise Mike and Trevor strung out barbed wire completely across the clearing as Cheryl attached more no trespassing signs to the wires The new signs also warned that the road was mined. It wasn’t yet, but Mike had the plastic explosive and the detonators. He didn’t want to maim hikers but that what the signs were for. With cliffs on two sides, a deep forest on the other and stronger defenses in the front Mike felt more at ease. He wanted to establish a watch but with only the five of them he didn’t know if they had enough manpower to create a food supply and defend the homestead. He wondered how Dave was doing. He hoped that Dave’s family was alright and that they would join his family in the mountains. If Dave joined them they would be able to establish a watch. Though Mike was happy with what they had accomplished a city of 2 million people was starving just 90 miles south of his cabin. Many of those people would want to leave the city but few of them had their own place to go to.

  Chapter Sixteen

  As Dave approached his neighborhood he noticed a good number of dejected individuals heading the opposite way. He stopped one man and asked why. The man said “The development ahead is gated and has armed guards in watchtowers.” Dave knew his community was gated but there were no watchtowers last time he was here. He surmised they were put up quickly after the EMP to dissuade wanderers from coming into the area. Dave was excited that the community appeared to be secure. If they were keeping outsiders away it meant that his family was probably safe, as he approached the gate he saw a sign the said “No Trespassers; violators will be shot”. Dave was sure that didn’t apply to residents so he put his hands up and yelled “Dave Matthews here. I live in this community my family is inside.” There was not response from the watchtower but Dave strode forward confident they would let him in. A shot rand out at his feet and Dave froze, “A voice from the fence said “Turn around we are not accepting new residents.” Dave yelled “I have lived here for 10 years. I live on Telegraph Lane. Ask around, almost everyone knows me.” With only 200 houses in the subdivision Mike wondered why the men in the watchtower did not. The gate to the compound opened and three men Dave did not know strode out. He said “Who are you” I don’t recognize you. The man in the middle a big man almost as tall as Dave but 10 years younger and 20 pounds of muscle heavier said “We are with the National Guard. We are here to protect this community, we cannot accept more people no matter what their story is. We will be hard pressed to feed and protect what we have now.” Although not an ex-military member Dave did not believe they were really National Guard. Where were their uniforms? Why didn’t the man give his name and rank? But he wanted inside. Dave responded “I appreciate that but I am a homeowner of this community with my immediate family inside. If you are protecting the community I am a member of that. Check with my family.” While Dave did not trust the men he offered his services. He said “I am also a licensed pilot. I can help pick up supplies and resources.” “What good will that do?” one of the men sputtered. “Planes are not flying. Your skills are useless”. Dave responded “I flew most of the way back from Texas in a crop duster. It was shot down, but I have another one in my barn. It is in pieces but I can put it together. It has no computer chips and will definitely fly.”

  The big man introduced himself as Major Ross Andrews and took him to his house in a Humvee that had no military insignia. Dave’s wife Diane and son Robert and daughter Ruth came running out of the house. After they embraced, Major Andrews said “I need to see that crop duster.” Mike walked back to the barn. He had bought the extra plane as a parts supply for his main aircraft. Most of the plane body was still intact but much of the mechanical systems was in parts. Dave knew he could put it together but he would have to obtain some belts and hoses he had already used on his other plane. With so many disabled cars around he should be able to make parts that would work. “What a pile of junk” Andrews complained. Dave said “I didn’t say it was Lear jet, but they wouldn’t fly now anyways, this will.”

  After the major left Dave filled in Diane and his children about some of the trip. He left out some of the violence but he had to admit the gunshot would which was still bothering his leg. He also told the family about Mike and his cabin in the Arizona mountains. His wife seemed hopeful when he told them Mike had offered them a place to stay. “Why would you want to leave this” he gestured around? His house was nice. Even without power he had a great view of the nearby hills and mountains in the distance he had acres of land, a barn and a landing strip just inside the fence around the community. Diane sent the children on errands outside and told Dave what was going on in the area. Diane also did not believe the Major and his men were National Guard. There were about 20 men, several with families. They came into the neighborhood right after the EMP and proceeded to move into several vacant houses. When that didn�
��t give them enough room they forced smaller families to live together so they could take the houses. Several men and their families just disappeared. The Guard claimed they left the community but it was known that they wanted their houses for themselves. They did put up watchtowers and were effective at turning away outsiders but they controlled everyone inside the walls. They forced all residents including children to work in the fields growing crops. All food was held by the guard in a central location. They confiscated supplies and food from all residents and inspected their houses to make sure they were not holding back. They gave meager rations to the residents but ate heartily themselves. Many of the men were also thought to be sexually abusing the girls in the community. Dave’s blood ran cold He asked Diane “Have they done anything to Ruth?” His daughter was only 13 and he would kill anyone that touched her. “Not yet, I keep her by my side when we work the fields.” Diane responded. “If your friend has a safe place in Arizona that would be better than these intruders running this like a Russian Gulag.” Dave said “When I get the crop duster fixed, I will rig it so we can get four people inside. This place is going to be hell when they run low on food. There is no way they can grow enough crops to feed the entire community. There also are massive groups of people leaving Los Angeles. This place is likely to be overrun whether this fake military is here or not.” Diane was concerned about leaving their neighbors behind. She said “I don’t feel right leaving people with these animals still around.” Dave said “I had two guns which they confiscated. We have no way to fight back against their fake army.

  Dave still did not want to leave the neighborhood and the house he had lived in for years. He purposely dragged the plane reconstruction along so it would take longer. He did not want to work in the fields and did not want his family to either. He thought the military might be reasonable but he observed armed guards patrolling the fields while the townspeople worked. Dave went to Andrews to complain. He said “How can you reconcile holding these homeowners at gunpoint while they grow food for you? This is not your land and these people are not your prisoners.” Andrews responded. “The guns are for the safety of the workers. Someone could climb over the walls and attack them. They need to work so we can provide security for this community.” Dave said “My family will no longer work the fields. My children are too young for that and need their education. My wife will home school our children.” Andrews was taken aback but he replied. “: you won’t be provided food for your family if you don’t help produce it.” “Fine” said Dave “stay off my land and I will grow my own food.” Andrews said “You are a troublemaker. You can try growing your food now but don’t come crying to me when you are hungry. You also need to get that plane working. I will not provide security for people who will not help.”