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Chapter 5
14 days after the Big Drop
He had tried to maintain a low profile in the aftermath of the EMP attack. No generator use, no outward sign of being prepared in any way; his desire was to remain "gray", to stay below the radar and not be noticed. It had worked for a total of one and a half weeks. That was how long it took for his once friendly neighbors to put together the pieces, to add up the little signs and to remember all the little details that led to the attack on his home. The storm-related power outages where his was the only home in the area with power thanks to his generator, the lush garden every year, canning his harvest in the outdoor kitchen he had built his first year in the cabin, the blue barrels at each downspout where he caught and used the frequent rain water for keeping the garden watered; these and a hundred other little things that he didn't really think about at the time but which had obviously stuck in the minds of the 'neighbors' who walked or drove past his house daily.
He had barely made it out of his cabin alive, in spite of all his planning and preparations. The years of prepping and stockpiling supplies and food, of arming himself and learning the skills necessary to survive in an emergency situation, reinforcing the cabin doors and windows; all that work had held off the group of looters for all of 42 hours. The group had not even tried to talk to him or try to negotiate for or buy goods from him nor even to simply ask for assistance in any way; one day he had walked out the front door when he heard rounds slapping into the walls around him. He was lucky to get back inside without being hit. Over the three sleepless nights and days that he had held them off, he had managed to kill five of them without being injured worse than a few small gashes on his face from an inwardly breaking windowpane. The looters, all former neighbors of his, had backed off after posting sentries to watch his house while they came up with a plan that would allow them to get at his supplies without losing more of their manpower or risking the loss of all the supplies they had imagined (rightly so) were stored inside. They had finally settled on smoking him out. The lull in the action had allowed the man to rest for a short time; he was almost dozing as he peered out the firing slit in his shutters but he came wide awake as a barrage of rounds smacked against the exterior wall and shutters forcing him to lower his body behind the reinforced lower wall section. The covering fire allowed a couple of looters, dragging piles of branches behind them, to get close enough to the cabin to use the walls as protection while they set the wet pine branches, still covered in their dark green needles, under the windows and vents. They lit the piles as they moved around the little cabin until they had small fires burning around the entire perimeter; the heavy smoke completely enshrouding the building and quickly filling the interior.
The man smelled the first wisps of smoke and realized what the scumbag looters had planned. He quickly grabbed a bandana and wet it, then tied it around his face. He knew he didn't have long before the oxygen level in the house dropped to the point that he would lose consciousness and, soon thereafter, his life. He had one chance to escape with his life but it would force him to flee with only what he could carry on his person. The cabin and all its contents were going to be lost to the greedy thugs outside. He spent a few moments preparing a final surprise for the looters, periodically taking a few shots out through the firing slits to keep the looters at bay for just a short time longer. After a final look around, he checked his pockets to make sure he had the bare essentials for survival- a fire starter, water purification tablets, a bundle of paracord, his multi-tool and flashlight on his belt, and another knife clipped into his pocket. He then moved over to the wood crib alongside the fireplace and rapidly emptied the logs out onto the floor then lifted the false floor up, exposing the dark narrow tunnel below. Without pausing, he stepped over into the tunnel, crouched, reached up and closed the crib lid, then began to crawl on his belly off into the dark damp hole. The tunnel turned slightly to the right, then back to the left and after traveling almost 75 yards, he came to the end of the tiny tube; a larger area about the size of a telephone booth. A metal ladder led up to a still closed manhole cover. A small tube ran up the opposite wall from eye level up into the concrete that formed the ceiling of the small chamber. The man uncapped the tube and peered into the primitive periscope at the scene around his cabin.
The looters were just now approaching the cabin in what they probably thought was a proper assault formation. Two advance scouts were at the windows, trying to get a look inside the building without much success as the smoke had almost filled the building. The main group of looters finally approached the cabin and they began to batter at the door and windows in an attempt to gain entry. The reinforced entry points held up for 15 minutes under their unskilled efforts before the front door finally gave way, the frame splitting and breaking away from the wall. The dirty and tired group whooped as they rushed into the cabin, quickly searching the interior and opening the windows to air out the small structure. From his vantage point the man watched as the last of the looters entered the cabin. He then reached over and pulled firmly on the first of two wires that led back down the tunnel into the cabin. The wire pulled the handles on the propane bottles in the attic and the small crawlspace, allowing the gas to rush out and fill the spaces. He hurriedly climbed up the ladder while feeding out the second wire and heaved on the cover, pushing the thin covering of soil aside allowing him to exit the tunnel behind a stand of shrubs at the edge of the yard at the tree line. He then pulled the second wire, scraping the abrasive cap against the igniter button on the highway flare causing a white hot flame to ignite the propane. The force of the explosion washed over him and tossed him to the ground; the cabin and the looters inside blew apart in a massive fireball. Pieces of the log building rained down out of the sky and the man rolled quickly to one side to avoid being crushed by a section of log eighteen inches in diameter and almost ten feet long. He somehow dodged that one but another piece of wood caught him as he twisted and rolled, glancing off his right hip and causing a sharp pain in his lower back as muscles strained and tore. He couldn't spare the time to assess his injury beyond a glance down to assure himself that he wasn't bleeding badly and he began to move away from the now smoking ruins that had been his home.
He slowly worked his way into the wooded area that ringed his land on three sides. His primary destination was a gnarled old cedar tree deep in the damp woods and almost 100 yards from the nearest trail, a remote location that he had chosen for one of his caches of emergency supplies. Even though the cache was barely a mile from his cabin it took him almost an hour to reach the area, his pace slowed by both his injury and the need to remain as stealthy as possible. He couldn't afford to leave a trail that might allow any remaining looters to track him, especially in his present condition. The cold damp ground had quickly chilled him and the moisture on the undergrowth had soaked him completely within minutes of him entering the forest but he took the necessary time to be certain that he left no sign of his passing. Finally reaching his cache location, he stopped, in spite of his throbbing hip and back and the cold, and spent several minutes surveying the small clearing where the old tree stood guard on his much needed supplies. After satisfying himself that the area was clear and his cache was undisturbed, he hobbled out of the brush and went to the ancient cedar. He stood with his back to the tree and painfully marched off the required 15 paces, turned right and paced off an additional 6 steps. Kneeling and digging into the mixture of pine needles, twigs, and dirt that carpeted the forest floor with a stick and his bare hands, he found the small metal spade he had buried there almost two years prior. Untying the light metal wire that secured the protective bags over the shovel, he rolled it up and placed it in his pocket; the time for waste was gone and he knew that he needed to squeeze every bit of use out of items he came across or had on him. Taking the spade, he again stood and aligned himself with the cedar tree and paced off ten steps, turned left and paced an additional 5 paces. He kneeled and dug again through the debris on the ground until he located the strip of plastic surveyors tape that protruded up out of the ground. Gritting his teeth at the pain, he quickly dug down a couple of feet before the hollow 'thunk' announced that he had found the PVC tube of his cache.
14 days after the Big Drop
He had tried to maintain a low profile in the aftermath of the EMP attack. No generator use, no outward sign of being prepared in any way; his desire was to remain "gray", to stay below the radar and not be noticed. It had worked for a total of one and a half weeks. That was how long it took for his once friendly neighbors to put together the pieces, to add up the little signs and to remember all the little details that led to the attack on his home. The storm-related power outages where his was the only home in the area with power thanks to his generator, the lush garden every year, canning his harvest in the outdoor kitchen he had built his first year in the cabin, the blue barrels at each downspout where he caught and used the frequent rain water for keeping the garden watered; these and a hundred other little things that he didn't really think about at the time but which had obviously stuck in the minds of the 'neighbors' who walked or drove past his house daily.
He had barely made it out of his cabin alive, in spite of all his planning and preparations. The years of prepping and stockpiling supplies and food, of arming himself and learning the skills necessary to survive in an emergency situation, reinforcing the cabin doors and windows; all that work had held off the group of looters for all of 42 hours. The group had not even tried to talk to him or try to negotiate for or buy goods from him nor even to simply ask for assistance in any way; one day he had walked out the front door when he heard rounds slapping into the walls around him. He was lucky to get back inside without being hit. Over the three sleepless nights and days that he had held them off, he had managed to kill five of them without being injured worse than a few small gashes on his face from an inwardly breaking windowpane. The looters, all former neighbors of his, had backed off after posting sentries to watch his house while they came up with a plan that would allow them to get at his supplies without losing more of their manpower or risking the loss of all the supplies they had imagined (rightly so) were stored inside. They had finally settled on smoking him out. The lull in the action had allowed the man to rest for a short time; he was almost dozing as he peered out the firing slit in his shutters but he came wide awake as a barrage of rounds smacked against the exterior wall and shutters forcing him to lower his body behind the reinforced lower wall section. The covering fire allowed a couple of looters, dragging piles of branches behind them, to get close enough to the cabin to use the walls as protection while they set the wet pine branches, still covered in their dark green needles, under the windows and vents. They lit the piles as they moved around the little cabin until they had small fires burning around the entire perimeter; the heavy smoke completely enshrouding the building and quickly filling the interior.
The man smelled the first wisps of smoke and realized what the scumbag looters had planned. He quickly grabbed a bandana and wet it, then tied it around his face. He knew he didn't have long before the oxygen level in the house dropped to the point that he would lose consciousness and, soon thereafter, his life. He had one chance to escape with his life but it would force him to flee with only what he could carry on his person. The cabin and all its contents were going to be lost to the greedy thugs outside. He spent a few moments preparing a final surprise for the looters, periodically taking a few shots out through the firing slits to keep the looters at bay for just a short time longer. After a final look around, he checked his pockets to make sure he had the bare essentials for survival- a fire starter, water purification tablets, a bundle of paracord, his multi-tool and flashlight on his belt, and another knife clipped into his pocket. He then moved over to the wood crib alongside the fireplace and rapidly emptied the logs out onto the floor then lifted the false floor up, exposing the dark narrow tunnel below. Without pausing, he stepped over into the tunnel, crouched, reached up and closed the crib lid, then began to crawl on his belly off into the dark damp hole. The tunnel turned slightly to the right, then back to the left and after traveling almost 75 yards, he came to the end of the tiny tube; a larger area about the size of a telephone booth. A metal ladder led up to a still closed manhole cover. A small tube ran up the opposite wall from eye level up into the concrete that formed the ceiling of the small chamber. The man uncapped the tube and peered into the primitive periscope at the scene around his cabin.
The looters were just now approaching the cabin in what they probably thought was a proper assault formation. Two advance scouts were at the windows, trying to get a look inside the building without much success as the smoke had almost filled the building. The main group of looters finally approached the cabin and they began to batter at the door and windows in an attempt to gain entry. The reinforced entry points held up for 15 minutes under their unskilled efforts before the front door finally gave way, the frame splitting and breaking away from the wall. The dirty and tired group whooped as they rushed into the cabin, quickly searching the interior and opening the windows to air out the small structure. From his vantage point the man watched as the last of the looters entered the cabin. He then reached over and pulled firmly on the first of two wires that led back down the tunnel into the cabin. The wire pulled the handles on the propane bottles in the attic and the small crawlspace, allowing the gas to rush out and fill the spaces. He hurriedly climbed up the ladder while feeding out the second wire and heaved on the cover, pushing the thin covering of soil aside allowing him to exit the tunnel behind a stand of shrubs at the edge of the yard at the tree line. He then pulled the second wire, scraping the abrasive cap against the igniter button on the highway flare causing a white hot flame to ignite the propane. The force of the explosion washed over him and tossed him to the ground; the cabin and the looters inside blew apart in a massive fireball. Pieces of the log building rained down out of the sky and the man rolled quickly to one side to avoid being crushed by a section of log eighteen inches in diameter and almost ten feet long. He somehow dodged that one but another piece of wood caught him as he twisted and rolled, glancing off his right hip and causing a sharp pain in his lower back as muscles strained and tore. He couldn't spare the time to assess his injury beyond a glance down to assure himself that he wasn't bleeding badly and he began to move away from the now smoking ruins that had been his home.
He slowly worked his way into the wooded area that ringed his land on three sides. His primary destination was a gnarled old cedar tree deep in the damp woods and almost 100 yards from the nearest trail, a remote location that he had chosen for one of his caches of emergency supplies. Even though the cache was barely a mile from his cabin it took him almost an hour to reach the area, his pace slowed by both his injury and the need to remain as stealthy as possible. He couldn't afford to leave a trail that might allow any remaining looters to track him, especially in his present condition. The cold damp ground had quickly chilled him and the moisture on the undergrowth had soaked him completely within minutes of him entering the forest but he took the necessary time to be certain that he left no sign of his passing. Finally reaching his cache location, he stopped, in spite of his throbbing hip and back and the cold, and spent several minutes surveying the small clearing where the old tree stood guard on his much needed supplies. After satisfying himself that the area was clear and his cache was undisturbed, he hobbled out of the brush and went to the ancient cedar. He stood with his back to the tree and painfully marched off the required 15 paces, turned right and paced off an additional 6 steps. Kneeling and digging into the mixture of pine needles, twigs, and dirt that carpeted the forest floor with a stick and his bare hands, he found the small metal spade he had buried there almost two years prior. Untying the light metal wire that secured the protective bags over the shovel, he rolled it up and placed it in his pocket; the time for waste was gone and he knew that he needed to squeeze every bit of use out of items he came across or had on him. Taking the spade, he again stood and aligned himself with the cedar tree and paced off ten steps, turned left and paced an additional 5 paces. He kneeled and dug again through the debris on the ground until he located the strip of plastic surveyors tape that protruded up out of the ground. Gritting his teeth at the pain, he quickly dug down a couple of feet before the hollow 'thunk' announced that he had found the PVC tube of his cache.
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