When The Grid Went Down

by Nick Randall

  * * *

  Butler sat in the driver’s seat of the lead vehicle, his steel gray eyes fixated on the Hi-Lux in front of them. His hands gripped the steering wheel so tightly that it was amazing it wasn’t being bent.

  Riding shotgun, his son Gale said, “I only see two of them. We can take them out and continue onto the cabin. This doesn’t change anything.”

  “Dammit, son!” Butler grimaced through clenched teeth. “This sure as hell does change everything! We’ve lost the element of surprise! That was our whole advantage besides our numbers!”

  “We can take them out,” Gale insisted. “They won’t get far.”

  “All they gotta do is swing their truck around,” Butler countered.

  Gale performed a brass check on his Ruger Mini-14 carbine.

  “They aren’t that far away,” he said. “We can shoot out their tires and engine from here.”

  Butler said nothing.

  “It’s either that, or they get away and we can’t continue on with the surprise attack because they’ll be ready for us,” Gale continued. “They’ll warn the others to be ready for us.”

  “You know what?” Butler said, performing a brass check on his own Mini-14. “We didn’t come here just to turn around and go back, did we?”

  “What are you saying?” Gale asked, his finger itching on his carbine’s trigger.

  “I’m saying we fight,” Butler decided. “Right now.”

  He opened the door to the truck and stepped out.

  * * *

  “NOW JANE!” Robert screamed, as Butler and Gale exited their truck. “RUN!”

  Jane flung open the door to the Hi-Lux and immediately began sprinting as fast as she could down the road with Randall’s Beretta. Before the EMP, she had been on her high school’s track team and she knew how to run over long distances. But now her running skills were about to be put to the ultimate test.

  The moment she leapt out of the vehicle, Robert swung the truck around to block the road.

  Butler and Gale began opening fire with their Mini-14s. Bullets crashed into the Hi-Lux and shattered windows! Robert ducked!

  “Run, Jane, run!” he yelled after his sister as she took off running down the road.

  With the Hi-Lux now blocking the length of the road, Robert stepped out behind the vehicle for cover and returned fire with his AR-15.

  Being a veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan and with plenty of combat experience under his belt, he was a more seasoned fighter and accurate shooter than either Butler or Gale.

  Both Butler and Gale dove for cover behind trees at the side of the road as Robert’s rounds only barely missed them. More of his bullets smashed into the lead convoy vehicle, shattering the windows and headlights, flattening the tires, and causing smoke to emit from the engine.

  Butler’s militia members began piling out of their vehicles down the convoy line.

  “Who the hell is firing?!” someone asked.

  “What’s the hold up?!” screamed another.

  “It’s the Parkers!” yelled back Butler over the gunfire. “There’s one or two of ‘em attempting to pin us down!”

  “What do we do?!” yelled Mitchum.

  “Take cover, dammit!” Butler yelled back.

  Robert continued firing his AR-15, pinning the entire convoy down, until the rifle clicked empty.

  “Dammit!” he swore to himself as he ejected the magazine, inserted a fresh one, and chambered a round before firing again.

  In the process, he began grabbing more weapons from the back of the Hi-Lux: Randall’s scoped Springfield M1A .308, Jane’s .30-30 Winchester lever action, and Duncan’s shotgun.

  Butler, Gale, and a few of the militia took advantage of the lull in Robert’s shooting to return fire.

  Bullets WHIZZED over Robert’s head. He promptly returned fire again with his AR-15, the bullets smacking Butler’s lead vehicle and one bullet catching a militia member in the leg, dropping him.

  Robert quit firing, set his AR-15 against the Hi-Lux, and lifted out Randall’s M1A. With the scope and the more powerful and heavier .308 bullets, he figured he’d have a better chance to pick off more targets.

  “He’s probably reloading, now’s our chance to rush him!” yelled Jones.

  Just then, a .308 bullet from the M1A struck Jones in the head, snapping it back and spraying blood and brain matter over the vehicle he was standing next to.

  Several of the militia members gaped in horror, watching Jones’ body fall down in what seemed to them like slow motion. Few if any of them had ever been in a gunfight before, and they were woefully unprepared.

  In fact, none of the militia other than Butler, Gale, and Mitchum were actually shooting back at Robert. Instead, they were diving for poor cover behind brush and trees on the side of the road or simply standing or sitting in shock.

  “You bastards, shoot back!” Butler screamed as he fired three rounds at Robert in rapid succession. “He’s got us all pinned down!”

  Robert continued to pump rounds downrange with the M1A, taking careful aim with the scope. Five more rapid but carefully aimed shots, POP POP POP POP POP, and two more militia members were lying dead beside the road and another was badly wounded in the abdomen.

  At this point, Robert was winning the fight. The entire convoy was held up on the road and he was picking off militia members like they were flies. Butler, Gale, and Mitchum, taking cover behind the trees at the side of the road, were shooting back but it was difficult to see in the darkness from their perspective so their shots were wildly inaccurate. The fact that they didn’t have any of the combat experience as Robert didn’t help.

  It was only now that Butler realized, despite their overwhelming numerical superiority, that there was a chance he and his militia would not be able to defeat Robert without taking mass casualties, let alone take on the entire Parker family afterwards.

  His militia had little to no fighting experience, and most right now were cowering behind poor cover rather than shooting back. Eight militia members were already fleeing on foot back down the road, not even bothering to turn the rear car in the convoy around.

  Robert, realizing that he wasn’t exactly fighting seasoned soldiers, took careful aim with the scope again and with two more squeezes of the trigger hit one militia member in the shoulder and another in the hip.

  “We have to retreat!” a militia member shouted over Robert’s rifle fire and the horrific groans of several of his wounded comrades. “He’s got us in a funnel! Picking us off like flies!”

  “No, he’s just one man!” Butler screamed in absolute frustration, reloading his Mini-14. “Mitchum, take a half dozen guys and circle around him through the woods! We’ll keep him distracted!”

  “You got it!” Mitchum yelled back, and motioned to Phil and four other scared militia members behind him. “All of you, come with me!”

  Phil and the other militia members were eager to comply, not necessarily because of the opportunity to outflank Robert, but just to get out of the way of his hail of deadly accurate bullets.

  “Covering fire!” Gale yelled.

  Butler, Gale, and a few militia members in the front all opened fire on Robert simultaneously with suppressive fire, forcing him to take cover.

  Meanwhile, Mitchum, Phil, and the four other militia members broke from the road and bolted into the woods to outflank Robert.

  Now pinned down by incoming fire, Robert fired blindly back with the last few rounds in the M1A until it clicked empty. He didn’t know where the spare magazines were, so he simply dropped it on the ground and rolled over to the Winchester .30-30.

  Lying prone on the road, he fired from under the Hi-Lux and hit one militia member who was brave but stupid enough to charge his position, leaving him lying in agony on the ground and clutching his stomach.

  Racking another round into the chamber, Robert took careful aim at Butler and fired. After racking another round, he peered through the gun smoke to see that Butler was still aliv
e and well behind his tree. His shot had missed.

  In a fury, Robert began racking and firing the .30-30 at the convoy as fast as he could, one of the bullets wounding another militia member in the shoulder and the rest whizzing over their heads, until the rifle clicked empty just like the M1A had.

  “Suppressive fire again!” Butler shouted once Robert had stopped shooting.

  As before, he, Gale, and the militia members in the front of the convoy all rose at once and opened fire on Robert’s position, pinning him down and not allowing him to fire back.

  Robert knew he couldn’t hold this position for much longer. The incoming gunfire was simply too overwhelming and missing him by mere centimeters. Sooner or later, but most likely sooner, he would be hit.

  It was then that he glanced to his right and saw the flashlights of Mitchum’s party visible through the woods. He realized he was being outflanked!

  Either he had to leave now or never. He reached for his AR-15, but to his dismay, he saw the receiver had caught a bullet or two and was now badly damaged to the point of likely being unusable.

  Without another thought, he picked up the shotgun, an old Ithaca pump action 12 gauge, and took off running down the road the same way Jane had went.

  “He’s fleeing!” yelled Gale.

  “Approach, slowly!” Butler responded. “He might be trying to draw us out so be careful!”

  Butler, Gale, and around twenty of the militia members stepped forward from their cover and with their rifles raised began to approach the Hi-Lux, which at this point was borderline unrecognizable due to being absolutely riddled with bullet holes.

  Robert had disappeared into the darkness down the dirt road by the time Butler, Gale, and the militia reached the Hi-Lux.

  “Half of you get this damn truck out of the way and get back in the vehicles,” Butler barked. “The rest of you follow me and let’s bag this little bastard!”

  With that, Butler, Gale, and ten militia members took off running down the road after Robert. Ten more militia members followed Butler’s orders and began to work to push the bullet riddled Hi-Lux out of the way to clear the path for the convoy.

  Back at the convoy, no less than five militia members were dead and another ten wounded, at least eight had fled into the night, and the remaining sixty or so were either tending to the injured or still doing nothing in absolute shock.

  Robert continued to run as fast as he could down the road, getting a good start ahead of his pursuers. He was amazed that he had not been hit at all in the firefight and that he had managed to kill or wound as many militia members as he did.

  “There he goes!” he heard someone yell from the woods, and he realized Mitchum’s party had spotted him. “After him!”

  * * *

  The Cabin

  Thomas and the rest of the family heard the intense gunfire from the cabin.

  They had all gathered outside trying to deduce where it was coming from. In addition to Thomas, Marcus, Susan, Bruce, Angela, Claire, and Barry and Christine.

  “That’s real close,” said Marcus, his voice barely audible over the gunfire.

  Marcus already had his Glock .40 strapped to his hip. He was the only one out of them who was currently armed, though the family had plenty of firearms and ammo inside the cabin.

  Just then, they say a figure running out of the tree line and running across the field to their position. Marcus’ hand instinctively dropped to his Glock.

  “Fire up the truck!” the running voice shouted, extremely hoarse from exertion.

  It was only then that the family realized who it was.

  “It’s Jane!” Bruce exclaimed.

  Bruce, Marcus, Thomas, and Claire ran out to meet her half way in the field.

  “What’s going on?” asked Marcus.

  “They’re here!” Jane managed to get out, gasping for breath and dropping to her knees from exhaustion.

  “Who’s here?!” Marcus and Bruce asked at once.

  “The Compound!” Jane said after a few more breaths. “Robert’s holding them up! We gotta go, now!”

  “Our worst fears have been realized,” said Thomas.

  The five of them ran back to the others at the cabin.

  “Get the Hi-Lux started, we gotta move!” said Bruce.

  “What’s wrong?!” asked Susan.

  “The Compound is here!” yelled Marcus. “That gunfire is coming from them and Robert!”

  “What supplies do we bring?” Angela asked, trying to stay calm.

  “There’s no time!” Bruce yelled angrily. “We’ll be lucky if we can all fit in the Hi-Lux alone. Grab some guns and food and move out!”

  The family quickly dispersed to grab what food items and weapons they could. They ran all throughout the cabin, while Claire worked on getting the Hi-Lux started. Since only three people could fit inside the truck itself, the rest would have to ride on the bed outside.

  Barry grabbed Thomas by the arm while he was helping the others gather supplies.

  “Thomas, take this,” said Barry, handing him a well worn single action Colt Peacemaker .45 LC revolver with a long 7.5 inch barrel and target sights. The old weapon was wrapped in a black leather holster and cartridge belt.

  Thomas’ fingers were still hurting from the torture by Butler and his sons a few days before, but they had healed enough to the point that he took the gun in his hands and looked at it.

  “This is your gun, grandpa,” Thomas said, trying to hand it back.

  “Take it, I’m not as good a shot as I used to be anyways,” Barry said. “Besides, you need a gun and you may have to lead them on.”

  “What are talking about?” Thomas asked.

  Instead of answering Barry simply walked outside to the Hi-Lux, leaving Thomas standing there confused.

  Chapter Two

  Dirt Road

  Butler, Gale, and the ten militia members cautiously hunted for Robert down the road. They had linked up with Mitchum, Phil, and the other four men, bringing their current strength to 18 in addition to the others who were at the convoy several hundred yards down the road.

  “He must have gone into the woods!” said Butler. “Spread out! And be on your guard, we can’t afford to take more losses!”

  The group began spreading out into the trees on either side of the road. Butler, Gale, Mitchum, and Phil remained on the road itself.

  Sure enough, Robert was hiding in the trees about fifty yards away. He was watching Butler’s group disperse, who were plainly visible in the night because every one of them was waving around a flashlight.

  Robert grinned. Easy pickings.

  He quickly assessed his weaponry. He had the 12 gauge with six shells in the magazine tube, a KA-BAR knife, and his Ruger .357 revolver. He also had a few extra .357 rounds in his pockets, so he figured if he placed his shots accurately enough there was a chance he could get them all.

  Robert crouched and waited behind the tree, breathing silently. He wondered if his sister Jane had made it back to the rest of the family. He said a quiet prayer for them under his breath.

  One militia member cautiously approached Robert’s position, rifle at the ready and flashlight in his mouth. Robert could tell he was nervous because the rifle was shaking in his hands.

  Robert waited until the militia member turned around. He was only around twenty or so feet away.

  Then, Robert rose from his location and FIRED the shotgun at close range!

  The militia member fell screaming as soon as he was hit. Robert’s shotgun was loaded with birdshot, which wasn’t the best self-defensive round or anything but was more than capable of ripping apart skin and flesh.

  Robert immediately dashed further into the woods. The rest of the militia started shooting wildly into the trees as soon as he had fired his shot.

  “Stop it, he’s got you all shooting at each other!” Butler shouted angrily from the road.

  Butler was growing increasingly frustrated by the lack of discipline and experience
in his fighters. He cursed himself for not having originally considered the possibility of that before embarking on the mission.

  The militia members quit shooting. Robert ran through the trees, heading back for the road. Running on the road would be the only opportunity he would have of linking up with his family in time.

  After another minute, he made it back to the road far ahead of Butler, Gale, Mitchum, and Phil. They were scanning the woods with their flashlights, so there was a chance he could get ahead of them fast enough…