Worst Case Scenario Read online

  “Oh.”

  Within five minutes Dukes and Penny had crafted a stretcher from two saplings and the blanket. Ian and the pilot placed the lady onto the stretcher and tentatively lifted her for the hike.

  Dukes and Penny each picked up their shotguns before leading the survivors toward their home. Ian looked back over his shoulder at the crash scene and at the mushroom cloud that reflected on the water. He said a quick prayer for those that had died today and then looked at the analog watch on his wrist. It was 6:30 at home.

  CHAPTER 6

  Grace didn’t like the fact that Mr. Miller insisted on making sure that ‘everything was alright’ with Anna’s house before he went back across the street. He kept talking about seeing the airplane go down and that it was the end of the world. Grace was happy to see the man leave the house. She was creeped out by his ranting about the end of the world and how alone he was.

  “Why did you let him walk around the house?” Grace asked her friend, as she peeked through the curtains. The man was still lingering around his own garage glancing back at Anna’s house every so often. The black columns of smoke around the city were still evident, even as the sun set.

  “I don’t know? We’ve known him for like ten years. He’s a little creepy but has always been harmless.”

  “A little creepy! He’s a whack job, Anna. He rambled about the end times and he was all alone the entire time,” Grace said, not happy with her friend. “He also scoped out your entire house. He knows everything about what you have in here.”

  “So,” Anna shot back. “He knows my parents are out of town today. They probably asked him to keep an eye on the house or something,” she defended the action with no clue why Grace was being so paranoid.

  “Anna, he knows what you have in the house and that we’re here alone, without cell phones.”

  “What ever! He’s fine. Anyway, I thought we were going to your parents house.”

  “Right. Why don’t you lock the doors, while I make the call.” Grace pulled the radio out of her pocket.

  “Why do we need to lock the doors?”

  Grace rolled her eyes at her friend and nodded in the direction of Mr. Miller’s house as she pressed the transmit button. “Momma B, this is Tardis Blue are you there. Over.”

  Anna rolled her eyes in response, and was about to go lock the doors when she heard Grace’s mother’s voice crackled back in response.

  “Tardis Blue, this is Momma B, thank God. Are you okay? Remember use code. Over.”

  Anna looked at Grace again in question. Grace held a finger up to stop her question.

  “Affirmative to both questions. We are at AC’s house. Her parents are in Atlanta. Can she come to our place? Over.”

  There was a pause before the radio crackled again. “Affirmative. Does your Jeep work? Over.”

  Both girls looked at each other.

  “Why wouldn’t your Jeep work?” Anna asked.

  “Haven’t tried yet. Over.”

  “Okay. Hold. Over”

  Grace knew that her mother was thinking about how to tell her something without broadcasting it on the public radio channel.

  “Tardis Blue, most cars don’t work now. Do you remember why that would happen? Over.”

  Grace swallowed hard. She felt the pressure of tears push at the rims of her eyes. Her crazy prepper parents had drilled readiness into her for the last six years. She knew what that meant if all of the cars suddenly stopped working. It meant terrorism. It meant an EMP or a nuclear bomb had gone off somewhere in the south. She put her hand to her mouth and looked at Anna. She knew what city in the south that would most likely be the target. A tear ran freely down her cheek.

  “I confirmed it on the short wave Tardis Blue. It was an EMP over the northeast and a nuclear event in Atlanta.”

  “What is it? What does that mean?” Anna asked, her voice becoming shrill with the lack of knowledge. “Grace, you’re scaring me! What is it? What is an EMP? What is a nuclear event in Atlanta mean?”

  Grace keyed the microphone. “Affirmative Momma B, I got it. Over.”

  “Tardis Blue,” her voice was firm. “I need you to listen to these instructions and follow them. Okay? Over.”

  Grace listened to the instructions of her mother while Anna paced around the kitchen. She was going to have to tell her what she knew, but not right now.

  “Grace, talk to me. What was that about? Why were you crying?” Anna asked her friend as she following her back out to her Jeep. “Why are we supposed to be so secret? What’s a nuclear event in Atlanta?”

  Grace would answer all of her friend’s questions soon, but now she had to do what her mother asked her do. “I’ll tell you in a bit,” she said, peeking outside to see if Mr. Miller was visible. He wasn’t. It was now dark. Anna huffed and followed her friend out.

  Grace quietly opened the half door of her Jeep and slipped into the drivers seat. She slid her key into the ignition and turned it to the first position, careful not to start the car. The light under the dash came on and she quickly turned the key to the off position and pulled it out.

  Anna stood in the garage, several feet away watching her friend. “Is a nuclear event like a bomb?” She had a sharp edge to her voice.

  Grace ignored her, then went around to the back of the Jeep and stuck her head under the back of the chassis below where the tire hung off of the back.

  “Where is it Mom?” Grace asked herself. With it being so dark, she was having a hard time finding exactly what her mother was talking about.

  “Do you want a candle or something?” Anna asked, the sarcasm was thick in her voice.

  “I don’t think so,” Grace answered. She didn’t want the attention a candle would bring, especially if creepy Mr. Miller guy was watching.

  “Found it,” she said quietly.

  “Found what, Grace?” Anna watched Grace stick both hands under the chassis, clearly trying to manipulate something. There was a metallic click and Grace stood up.

  “Okay,” she said tucking the 9mm handgun in the small of her back. She pulled her shirt out so that the gun was hidden in the waist of her pants.

  Anna took a step back when she saw her friend with the gun. “Is that what I think it is?”

  “Yes, and it wont hurt you. My parents trained me on how to use it safely; it’s for our protection until we get to my house. Also, I’ll tell you what I know about Atlanta in a few minutes,” she said, buying a little more time before she had to tell her friend that her parents were dead. “First, lets raid your house,” she said, walking past Anna.

  CHAPTER 7

  Leah was worried sick for her family. There was no way to know what had happened to Ian. He had missed the earlier flight out of Houston that was supposed to connect him through Memphis, and was running to catch another flight that would connect him through Atlanta. They had talked briefly before he boarded the plane in Houston so, she was pretty sure he was in the air between Houston and Atlanta when everything happened.

  So, to stick to the plan that she and Ian had constructed, she tried to focus on Grace, who was ‘trapped’ at Anna’s house until later in the night. She had given her explicit directions about when to leave, what to take from Anna’s house and where to find the gun hidden on her Jeep. But, the quiet time while she waited for action was eating her up inside.

  “Oh God, Ian. I hope you weren’t in Atlanta,” she said to herself, knowing that the alternative was that he was in the air between Houston and Atlanta. “Please God, please let him have missed that plane. Right Daisy? Maybe it broke down on the tarmac and they never left the ground?”

  The dog sensed something different was up. Their routine was different.

  Leah was careful to only let the dog out in the back yard where their neighbors couldn’t see them. Daisy was a very skilled dog and had been trained by one of their friends to follow watchdog commands, but Leah did not feel the need to deploy such tactics…yet. Daisy was more of a family pet, and she just d
idn’t see the need for using her dog as a weapon.

  While out in the back yard with the Daisy, Leah tried to peer up and down the street from the side corner of the house. The houses were fairly well separated, each one having a nice sized lot, so she could only see three or four houses.

  She could see Mr. Rivers, the elderly Korean War hero that everybody watched out for on the street. He was closing the shutters on his windows by the light of a lantern.

  Smart thing to do, she thought to herself.

  Except for the one or two people she saw walking home after abandoning their car somewhere else, the street was quiet.

  Unless you count the multiple pillars of burning smoke around the city, the multiple gunshots in the distance and the atomic explosion in Atlanta!

  “Just a typical suburban day,” she said, leading the dog back inside. “This day sucks!”

  Once in the kitchen, she lit a candle and checked her watch again. 8:48. She had a little over three hours until Grace was expected to start back. She desperately wanted to call her on the radio, but knew better. They needed to save the batteries and needed to keep the chatter to a minimum. Also, the golden rule was to hide the fact that you possessed something that still worked because the thinking was if you had one thing, you must have many things.

  One of the things that they had, that would fall into this category was a short-wave radio. Wisely, they stored it in its own Faraday box. But, there was something wrong with it regardless. Leah suspected the batteries. They were special, and prone to draining rapidly. They had lasted for about 10 minutes, letting her know about the EMP and the nuke in Atlanta before dying. The other thing that was wrong with the short-wave radio was that it could only receive transmission, not make them, which was something Ian had wanted to upgrade for months. Would of, could of, should of!

  With a growing need to know what was going on she decided that this was as good a time as any to hook the batteries up to her hand crank dynamo charger. It would take about 20 to 30 minutes to charge the batteries, which was the primary reason she had not yet done it. That, and she had really not felt like it.

  She was fighting the urge to pop a bottle of wine, sink into her couch and just let the cards fall where they may. But, she knew that she couldn’t do that if she held any hope of her family making it through this…this…

  “What the hell is this, Daisy?”

  Daisy looked at her and then to her empty bowl. Leah looked at the bowl and then at the bottle of wine on the counter. “I like my idea better,” she said, but still moved to put a scoop of dog food into the bowl.

  “Better enjoy this girl, I am rationing it from here on out,” she warned the dog.

  Rations? We have to think about rations. This sucks! What kind of world do we live in now? Rations? Like, I just told my daughter to arm herself with a freaking pistol before she drives home! Damn it!

  Shaking her head from the negative thoughts she plugged the cable from the radio into the charger and started angrily turning the crank. Ten minutes later she stopped and was greeted by the glow of a green LED, letting her know that the batteries were charging. The spring forces of the dynamo would do the rest over the next 20 minutes…it was just a pain in the ass.

  A knock at the front door startled her from her musing and frustrations about life. The dog barked, spilling kibble out of her mouth, and took off around the corner for the front door.

  Leah let the dog do what she would normally do, protect them and keep them safe by keeping whoever was at the door occupied. In the few seconds that the dog was barking, she grabbed the Smith and Wesson 9mm pistol that rested on the counter, released the safety and tucked it into the jeans along the small of her back.

  There was a time where she had given up guns in her life. But the needs of her family, and especially the need to train Grace, had brought her back to what was familiar.

  < >

  “We need to be ready for the aftermath. We have to be ready for the craziness that happens,” Ian said, as he worked with his wife and his daughter at the gun range five years earlier. “We have to be ready for the freakers!”

  He paused and watched his daughter draw a pistol up, extend her arms and fire six times. “Very good, Grace,” he praised. She hit center mass with all six of her shots at 25 yards.

  Grace released the pin ejecting six small brass casings from the .22 caliber pistol she was shooting. “Thanks, Daddy.”

  “You’re a real natural, just like your mom,” he said, now watching his wife raise her weapon, sight the target and fire at three paper targets on three different lanes. She double tapped each one, leaving two 9mm holes in each human size target about chest high.

  Leah ejected the clip and left the weapon on the shooter stand. They were the only ones in the range and she let out a little yelp of excitement. It felt good to be shooting again.

  “Damn, lady!” A giant smile spread across Ian’s face. “You’re down right dangerous! No wonder Grace can shoot like she can. You two are the total package!”

  “Thanks hon, I think it’s safe to give a little credit to the instructor,” Leah said, patting him on the chest and kissing him lightly.

  “Only a little?”

  “Don’t push it Daddy,” Grace joined in on the teasing of her father.

  He laughed at the way he was being teased.

  “Daddy, what are freakers?”

  Ian breathed in deep before answering his daughter. “Freakers are the people that lose all sense of reality during the opening hours of any crisis or natural disaster. Do you remember studying about what happened in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina?” he asked his daughter.

  “Yes, thousands of people had to be rescued from roofs. Right?”

  “That’s true, honey, but there were also people that looted. People that stole from others. People that did terrible things to women and children and even people that killed other people.”

  “Why did they do that?”

  “Well, when certain people think that they are trapped, or that there are no more rules, they think that they can make up their own rules. Sometimes, people actually do go crazy in an incredibly short period of time. They can’t handle the reality of the situation they are in, so they lash out and do crazy and dangerous things to innocent people. These people are the freakers.”

  Leah softly put her hand on his shoulder indicating that he should back off on the scary lesson for now. “I’d like to shoot a little more,” she said. “Maybe Grace can try something more challenging?”

  “That’s a great idea,” Ian agreed with his wife. “Okay, we have the range for about twenty more minutes. Grace I think you ready to step up to the 9mm,” he said, already reloading the clip.

  “Awesome!” she said. “I kind of like this prepping thing.”

  All three of the family laughed out loud.

  < >

  Five years later, Leah had fired over 5,000 rounds since she had started prepping with her husband. She was as comfortable holstering a pistol in her belt as she was putting on shoes. She figured that in all of their years of her training, prepping and learning about survival that she was ready for almost any situation.

  But, she wasn’t ready for the people that were at her door.

  CHAPTER 8

  Ian walked at the back of the line of survivors; his shoulders burned from carrying his portion of the stretcher. He figured that they had walked about two miles, with half of it on deer paths and fire roads through the woods and uneven terrain. It was now completely dark and the only light they had was from the near full moon.

  Under normal circumstances the light of the moon would have been enough, but with the stretcher in front of him, he found it hard to keep his footing and hoped that he would not turn an ankle.

  “Hold up,” Dukes said quietly but with enough sharpness to make the troop stop in their tracks.

  Along with Bill, the other guy carrying the stretcher, Ian set the stretcher down; happy to flex his arms.
>
  “What is it?” Mary asked. Ian knew what it was, but this wasn’t his rodeo.

  “A motor,” Dukes hesitantly responded.

  “That’s good right?” Mary asked, confused as to why a car in the woods would be a bad thing in light of what had happened.

  “Well,” Dukes started, but the engine noise was growing closer.

  Ian could tell that Dukes was worried about who this might be. He watched Dukes look at the group of people with him. He was exposed and Ian sensed the other man’s quandary.

  “We should all back away from the fire road,” Ian said quietly. Not surprisingly, everyone backed up from the road and crouched down. He then caught Dukes eyes and pointed at him and then put two fingers to his eyes and then pointed to him and then to the noise.

  Dukes realized what the other man was saying to him and he moved closer to the road, without the hindrance of the group, to get a look at who or what coming.

  Ian crouched down and fumbled around the brush with his hands; he was looking for anything that might be used as a weapon. He put his hand on a sizeable stick and slowly edged it closer to him. He also noticed that Penny, Dukes’ fifteen-year-old daughter had moved away from the pack and into a position just up the road. It was a good position to give support to her father.

  “Nice.”

  “What?” Mary asked. She was crouched next to him.

  “Nothing. Shhh,” he said quietly while putting his finger to his lips.

  She looked at him, her eyebrows were raised and her head shook slightly. She had no idea what was happening. Ian suspected that the pilot knew what was happening because he saw the man put his hand on a large rock and shift his position into a better way in which to spring up.

  The engine noise was slowly growing louder and they had flipped on a white spot light. “Great,” Ian thought. He watched Dukes shift his weight to the balls of his feet and slowly released the safety on his shotgun. Ian thought he might be a former Marine. Marines just move like that.