EMP 1500 MILES FROM HOME

by Mike Whitworth

  I wasn't worried about how long it might take us to get over the mountains. Cap taught me that it always takes as long as it takes. I was glad he was there to take care of Lucy and Ben. That freed my mind to think about how to get home to them, rather than be consumed by worry and make even more mistakes, even though there were times I could not stop worrying about Lucy and Ben, and how they might be doing.

  Our horses were steel-shod. If we took the horses through the pass, the sound of the horse’s hooves on the pavement would telegraph our passage for half a mile, or more, if someone was there to hear.

  In Indiana, near where we lived, there are folks who live the old way, without electricity or modern vehicles. You could hear their horse’s hooves on the rural blacktop roads as their buggies passed. I wondered how those folks were doing? Even they depended on many things produced by modern civilization. They were an industrious bunch though. If they needed something, I would bet they would figure out how to make it.

  I thought we should silence our horse’s hooves. We could cover the horse’s hooves with wraps of cloth, or something similar. I even wondered about making, for lack of a better term, sandals for the horse’s hooves from old tires. But we didn't have any old tires, and the only strong cloth we had was our blankets.

  It was now September, and the nights were growing colder. Losing one of our blankets would be tough, but leaving the horses behind would be a serious setback. The cart carried our food and water, Yeti's chairs, as well as the stuff we had accumulated. If we moved forward on foot without the horses, we would have to leave most of our water, food, guns, and other stuff behind.

  I didn't like either alternative. I liked them even less when I once more heard the machine guns in the pass. Julie started at the sound of the guns, as did I. Yeti slept through it all.

  "That didn't sound good," I said.

  "They are still in the pass."

  "Yeah, darn it." We fell back into silence after a bit. Julie was getting sleepy so I told her to turn in. She nodded and rolled up in her blanket.

  I decided we should move out before dawn and get farther from the highway and closer to the mountains. If I were in charge of the group in the pass, I would set lookouts to see what might be coming up the road. I had to assume that they had done so. Being closer to the mountain front and away from the road would make us harder to see, as their attention would likely be focused on the highway.

  What really puzzled me was why here? From what Julie told me, there were few people around here and few spoils to be had. Well, if they were a military unit charged with imposing martial law, controlling the pass made sense of sorts. If they were an invading army, controlling the pass also made sense. After some thought, I had to admit that there was no way for me to determine their purpose at the moment. I simply had to assume it was bad.

  I dug out a small notebook and a pencil and began listing things we should do. First, we needed to be sure that nothing we had, or used, could reflect light that could be seen from a distance. Then, we needed to ensure that everything moved very quietly. Sounds could be heard across the desert for a long way, especially anything that banged or clacked. Of course, camouflage was needed. We needed to show only the colors of the terrain through which we passed. I wasn't sure how we would accomplish that one, or even if we could with what we had. Fortunately, my once white shirt was now a dirty brown and our coats were drab as well.

  I sat watching and listening for another four hours. Then Yeti awoke and, after he watered a nearby mesquite bush, took over watch. Julie was still asleep. I told Yeti about the gunfire and warned him to stay quiet. Yeti nodded. I rolled up in my blanket as best I could. It was, as always, too short, but with the jacket, I was fairly comfortable and soon fell asleep. That night I dreamed about 50-caliber machine guns. They were still on my mind when I woke before dawn.

  Cap taught me about the 50-caliber machine gun. It is a fearsome weapon that, in the hands of an expert, can take men down at 1650 yards (almost a mile) and is still effective on larger targets at over 2,200 yards (1.25 miles). That means it outranged the Mosin Nagant and the 30-06. Both of these rifles had a maximum-targeted range of maybe 1000 meters, although the bullets would carry up to two miles. If we faced the machine guns, we would lose. Superior armament always wins in a face to face.

  In a few minutes we had everything packed and were moving away from the highway. Both Julie and Yeti agreed we should move closer to the mountain, which Julie said was called Whiteface Mountain. In the two hours before dawn, we made about three miles, and then settled into a small arroyo that hid us from view of Highway 60, and, hopefully, the mountaintop.

  About two hours after dawn, I snuck out of camp and walked back along the base of the mountain. Julie did the same in the other direction. I made it back to camp almost three hours before Julie. I was starting to get worried when she showed up.

  "Did you find anything?" I asked.

  "Not really."

  "I think I may have found a way. Back about a quarter of a mile a big arroyo cuts into the mountain. I think we might be able to make it to the top of the mountain there, but we will have to pack our stuff on the horses and ditch the cart." I looked at Yeti. "That will make it rough on you."

  "That's OK," Yeti said.

  "Do we have enough water?" Julie asked.

  "I don't know," I said, "we have ten gallons."

  "We will have to go on water rations," Julie said. "I haven't heard of any springs on Whiteface Mountain, but then I don't know much about this area."

  We spent the day getting our gear ready, making sure we would make as little noise as possible, and show no reflections. We sacrificed one blanket and covered the horse's hooves so the steel shoes wouldn't ring on the rocks. We used the other two blankets to make pack rolls to go over the saddles. The extra guns were more difficult to pack, but we rolled them in extra clothes, inside the blanket rolls. I vowed to try to find some real packsaddles and some canvas, as well as another cart and several more horses when I could.

  Our food supply was getting low but it was too dangerous to hunt because the sound of a rifle shot could bring trouble. Julie said we had enough food for three days. Our water would last no longer. That meant we had three days to cross the mountain. It wasn't a big or particularly rugged range, but it would be easy to run into trouble if we weren't careful.

  We decided to start when the stars were out. We hoped there would be enough starlight to reach the arroyo, and then make our way far enough up the arroyo to be safely out of sight. Once in the arroyo, we would hole up and wait for morning.

  After the stars came out, we made our way to the mouth of the arroyo, and then walked a good distance up the arroyo before stopping. We took turns standing watch and getting a few hours sleep. Julie and I let Yeti sleep the longest since he would need the most energy to make the climb. Yeti was dropping weight, but he still had a long way to go. I was sure he would eventually lose the weight, if we lived long enough.

  With first light we moved out again. We only had a couple of miles to cover to get there, but the rise was around a thousand feet per mile. That worked out to a climb of almost one foot for every five feet we walked, certainly not the steepest gradient, but still very tiring—especially for Yeti.

  Julie led the horses while I walked point. Yeti followed the horses, sometimes holding on to the last horse's tail to make it up a particularly steep section.

  As we climbed I saw clouds forming. There was something about them that made me nervous. Soon they were gray and rising.

  "We are in for a rain," Julie said.

  "I hope it isn't a thunderstorm like the one I saw when I drove from Albuquerque to Socorro."

  "I am afraid it may be bad. See how fast the clouds are rising and this is still morning. Usually rain comes in the afternoon."

  "Should we take cover?"

  Julie studied the clouds a bit more. "Yes, I think so."

  I looked around for a good spot and saw none. "Yeti," I
said. "Do you see a good spot for us to find protection from rain?"

  Yeti looked around. "No, I don't. I wish we had the cart. We could use it for shelter. I am guessing we don't want to be on a high spot because of lightning, and, if the storm dumps a lot of water, we may not want to be in the arroyo bottom. He pointed to a pair of large rocks about ten feet apart midway up the slope. "Let's go there.”

  Soon we had the horses tethered between the rocks. We draped our largest plastic tarp over the tallest rock to make a low tent. Yeti placed big rocks on the edge of the tent while Julie hobbled the horses. The clouds were growing darker while we worked. I placed our most necessary gear under the tarp. I put head-sized rocks under the upslope end of the ground tarp and then used more rocks to weight it down. I hoped that would keep water off of our ground tarp under our makeshift tent.

  I hoped the hobbles and the tether line would be enough to keep the horses from bolting during the storm. I could already hear thunder in the distance and soon we saw lightning flashes.

  I picked my rifle up to put it under the tarp when I saw a stream of sparks move from the ground to the rifle barrel. The static electricity made my hair stand on end.

  "Wayne, put the rifle down," Yeti said. "The charge is building and the rifle could cause a lightning strike."

  I put the rifle down beside a rock and followed Julie and Yeti under the tarp. The storm rolled in quickly. Soon the rain was beating at the tarp and thunder came almost instantly on the heels of every lightning strike.

  While we were sitting under the tarp, I noticed sparks flying from the metal eyelets on Julie's boots. "Quick, Julie, take your boots off. We need to get all metal objects off of us. Soon there was a pile of pistols, knives, belts, etc. on the edge of the ground tarp. I didn't know where else to put them and I hoped it was far enough away. Yeti said the sparks meant that the static charge was building for lightning strikes.

  By now the thunder was continuous. I counted lightning flashes every ten seconds, or so. Julie huddled against me and Yeti scooted closer to us as well. Julie put her arm around him and pulled him into our huddle. For the next 30 minutes, we stayed like that, hiding from the storm. I slid over and checked on the horses once. They were scared and kept trying to run, but the hobbles and tethers kept them in place. I hoped they wouldn't injure themselves, and I hoped lightning wouldn't strike them, or us.

  I remembered my conversation with the motel clerk when I arrived in Socorro. I told her about the lightning storm I saw over the same mountains we were now in. She said that lightning was bad in the area and told me about a professor at the local college who was killed when a lightning bolt struck him out of a blue sky as he walked home. I remember feeling sad for the professor and his family. At least the professor had someone to morn for him. If we didn't make it through this storm, the chances were that no one would ever know where or how we died.

  The storm intensified and inch-sized hail came down with the rain. The lightning flashes and the thunder were both continuous now. We had to put our fingers in our ears to keep from going deaf. The only thing we could do was to endure. The hail grew in size and I covered Julie with my upper body. I could feel the impact of the hail on my back through the tarp. Several larger hailstones even punched their way through the tarp. Just before the storm abated, I felt something large strike next to me. I looked and it was a hailstone the size of a softball.

  Thirty minutes later we were packing our gear on the horses. Julie and Yeti spent a long time calming the horses down. Neither horse seemed to be badly injured although one of them was bleeding from a cut on his neck. I thought we had been lucky. If there had been more of the softball-sized hail, we would probably all be dead.

  We started climbing again. No one spoke. I think we were all stunned by the intensity of the storm.

  We rested often, but not long at a time. Cap taught me that was the best way to make time, so that was just what we did. By evening, we were in sight of the mountaintop. I jogged up the arroyo while Julie made camp. Yeti had already collapsed and was sound asleep.

  I came to the end of the arroyo in only two hundred yards. Then I climbed the slope to the top of the ridge. I stayed low and scanned the other side of the mountain. About three hundred yards down the slope I could see the start of another arroyo. That would most likely lead us onto the alluvial plain below. From there we could make it to the highway. Hopefully we would be able to reach the highway far enough away from the guys with the machine guns to not be seen.

  There was still another 20 minutes of light, but it was fading fast. I stayed where I was, trusting that starlight would allow me to make it the few hundred yards back to camp. I had a small flashlight but I didn't want to give away our position, so I was determined not to use it.

  I wanted to see if there were any lights showing on the plain below. Even if a rancher only lit a kerosene lantern, from my vantage point, I should be able to see it over a distance of several miles.

  After a while I counted three faint lights. All three seemed to be on the lower reaches of the mountain or on the valley floor itself. I hoped that meant we would not encounter anyone on our trip down the mountain. The lights also showed me where we might be able to trade for food and water, with care of course.

  I made my way back to camp. I gave the signal as I approached and Julie responded with the correct signal. All was well.

  "What did you see?" Julie asked. I described what I had seen. She nodded.

  At over six thousand feet, it grew cold quickly after dark. It felt like the high thirties to me. Julie left our gear packed so we could get off to a quick start in the morning, so the blankets were unavailable. Yeti was on the ground between two pack rolls, wearing his jacket. Julie used her jacket to cover his legs. He was dead to the world; completely worn out. The horses were hobbled a short distance away.

  Julie sat against a large, flat-sided boulder that was still warm from the heat of the day. I sat down beside her and covered us both with my jacket. After we were a bit warmer, we opened a can of beans and shared it cold. It is surprising how good cold beans can taste when you are really hungry. Julie had another can of beans set out for Yeti when he awoke.

  We huddled together under the jacket once the empty can was buried. Julie soon fell asleep. I could feel her warmth against me. It brought back memories of Lucy, but at the same time I knew that Julie was not Lucy. It was getting a bit confusing, but I was too tired to think about it. I managed to stay awake through first watch. When I woke Julie, she nuzzled against my neck in that time between sleep and full wakefulness. It felt good, too darn good. I said nothing.

  Once Julie was awake, I fell asleep against the boulder. It was daylight when I woke. I noticed I was covered with three jackets. Julie and Yeti were stirring. We would be ready to go in only a few minutes.

  After a breakfast of cold beans and colder water, we started up the arroyo. Before the sun was well up we were at the top of the mountain. Yeti struggled with the last part of the climb, but he managed it by hanging on to a horse's tail. Winded, he stood just below the mountaintop and managed to say between gasps for breath "On the way down, it will be you guys trying to keep up with me. I will have gravity on my side."

  Yeti

  My legs and back hurt so much I almost screamed with every step, but I made it. Reaching the top of that mountain seemed like the most difficult accomplishment in my life, and maybe it was. I knew I pushed myself harder than I ever had, many times harder. I made it without dying. And I thought I would die, especially during the last two hundred yards.

  When I reached the top, I wanted to apologize to the horse whose tail I held onto. The horse seemed fine, but I wasn't sure he wasn't faking it. How would you like 400 pounds pulling on your tail while you tried to climb a mountain?

  Julie

  I was as proud of Yeti as I would have been my own son when he reached the mountaintop. I could tell Wayne was pleased with him as well. Wayne and I stood side by side and looked down
the other side of the mountain. Yeti looked too, but from his seat on a rock. I visited several of the ranches in the valley below with my dad when I was younger, but I couldn't remember any of the rancher's names.

  After seeing the convoy and hearing the gunfire, I was worried about my dad at the ranch. Even though my dad had guns and a few ranch hands, I didn't think he would be able to defend the ranch against that convoy, and that scared me. Up to now I had not been worried about my dad. The ranch never had electricity. The grid being down wouldn't impact life at the ranch the least bit, except for not being able to get supplies in town. However, I knew that my dad had huge stores of food on the ranch. He often talked about how bad things were getting and he wanted to be ready in case anything ever happened. Well it happened and I worried that my dad, for all of his wisdom, had not done enough to improve security at the ranch.

  I looked up at Wayne where he stood on my left. Without thinking I put my arm around him. He didn't seem to notice, but I felt the heat of his skin through both of our shirts. My head just barely came to the top of his shoulder, but I was careful not to lean against it because this was his bad shoulder. We stood like that until Yeti had his breath back and stood up.

  "Let's get going, folks. I want to see what is down there," Yeti said.

  Wayne

  We made good time down the mountain. By evening we were within an eighth of a mile of the valley floor. We camped in a protected spot. As darkness came I climbed to the top of the ridge beside us and looked out over the valley floor. Soon, Julie joined me. We lay flat and watched for an hour before we saw the first light flicker on. Soon, two more lights appeared.

  "No operational security there," I whispered.

  "Those are ranches," Julie said. "This far from town they probably don't even have electricity. Those folks only go to town once a month to get groceries and their mail. I doubt they even know what happened yet. The lights we see are probably kerosene lanterns."