Solar Storm: Book 2: Solar Storm, #2

PART 1

SEASON 1: EPISODE IV

ENDURANCE

CHAPTER ONE

Jay fiddled with the controls on Mac’s radio as he attempted to pick up a signal. He felt more than useless as Logan and Shelly cruised the streets of Blooming Grove with their headlights off, looking for a suitable car to steal.

It seemed to him that everyone in town who owned a car had already evacuated. That certainly explained the convoy Jay encountered before Officer Polczek gave him a lift into town.

So instead of gazing out the window at deserted streets and listening to Shelly bitch from the front seat about wasting time to help a stranger, Jay pulled out Mac’s radio and listened for news from the ether. At one point, he lucked onto a pair of HAMs discussing the crisis; Logan stopped the car so they could all listen. From the sounds of it, inner cities across the country resembled war zones. The prevailing rumors had FEMA setting up massive refugee camps near major cities, but the two HAM operators disagreed over the veracity of that idea.

…rounding people up and bussing them outside the city, reported one voice.

That's bullshit—they can't do that! argued the second operator.

Well they did, replied the first through a burst of static. Saw it with my own eyes…

No warrants or anything?

Not that I could tell. I didn't stick around to ask.

The hasty conversation did little to lighten anyone's mood. Jay cleared his throat. Well…that's something. I guess the government is finally getting involved.

But at what cost?

Logan don't—let's just find him a car…

No, seriously, asked Logan, turning in the driver’s seat to look at Jay. You okay with the government forcibly removing people to…to camps? he spat the last word.

Just get us moving, moaned Shelly. I don't want to go through this again.

Go through what again? asked Jay.

Logan put the car in drive and continued the slow prowl through Blooming Grove. My wife didn't want me standing up for what I believed in—

I never said that, hissed Shelly. "I didn't want you to go to jail for your hacker buddies."

An awkward silence settled over the car as they drove. Jay smirked as he looked out the window.

I knew it…

I won't say we saw this coming, Logan began in a calmer, lower voice.

What? The police state? asked Shelly. You and your conspiracy theories—that shit landed you in jail and what did your friends do for us? Nothing.

That's hardly fair. And no, not the police state, Logan said evenly. "Anyone with enough sense to breathe could see that coming. I just didn't see the attack coming."

What attack? Jay asked from the back seat.

Here we go… groaned Shelly.

Tell me something, Logan said looking at Jay in the rear view mirror. Do you really think a group of hackers no one's ever heard of could take down as many websites—both private and government—like what happened a few days back?

You’re talking about The Proletariat, Jay said.

Exactly. I've been hacking for decades, man—I got some good connections, man: Anonymous, TripleC, hell I even know a few guys from the SEA. I've never heard of The Proletariat—and neither have my contacts. What do you think the chance of success is for a strike from a bunch of nobodies—especially on such a big scale?

I have no idea—I’m a librarian, not a hacker…

Neither am I, said Shelly, "but even I know there’s no way you can take down most of the government, almost all the free press, and the world’s social media in one swoop."

She’s right, Logan said, the pride evident in his voice. It was an inside job.

Jay shook his head. Like the CIA or something?

Sure, you've heard of UMBRAGE, right? The CIA's own hacking group? Those guys infiltrate all the big players and steal their ideas. They're the ones busted in the famous WikiLeaks dump last year.

But why? asked Jay. That doesn't make any sense—why would the government, the CIA, hack itself? They were one of the agencies affected in the shutdown, weren't they?

Look at the big picture, man, advised Logan. He turned down a side street. What would have happened if people knew about the CME ahead of time? Say 12 hours.

Jay thought for a moment. What would Mac have done?

"I’ll tell you—there would have been chaos on a global scale. People panicking to get out of the cities, trying to buy every supply in sight…the fighting would have started pretty damn quick. By covering it up—"

Jay interrupted. They bought themselves a few days of peace and quiet.

Yup. That was all they needed to set up camps and throw the Constitution out the window.

Jay shook his head. You should talk to my neighbor. He sounds just like you.

Logan laughed. Your neighbor is a smart man, then.

Jay looked at the radio in his hands. More than you know.

They found a promising car, parked in front of a house on an unnamed side street near the edge of town. By that time, Jay was ready to take a bicycle or even a skateboard. Logan and Shelly had been arguing the merits of anarcho-capitalism as a viable mode of self-government for twenty minutes non-stop.

Logan stopped the car at last. Come on, I think this is our chance. He opened his door and got out.

About time, muttered his wife.

Jay couldn't agree more. Not wanting to sit with the acerbic Shelly one second longer than necessary, Jay hauled his aching body out of the car along with his gear and moved over next to Logan as he worked at the lock on the target car’s door with a wire.

"Hurry up," hissed Shelly from the passenger seat.

Just ignore her, she's just under a lot of stress right now, Logan muttered under his breath.

Who isn’t? Jay replied.

This is taking too long, Shelly grumbled.

Can't we just break the window? whispered Jay.

We can, but I wanted to do this quietly… Logan muttered as he looked over the hood at the house.

I don't think anyone's home. Just about everybody in this town was in that convoy, Jay offered.

Well, all right—let's do it the loud and quick way…here goes nothing, said Logan. He he dug around in one of his pockets and cautioned Jay to step back.

If this works like it did last time, it's gonna make a mess.

What are you going to do? Jay asked. What's in your hand?

A piece of a broken spark plug. I don't understand it myself, but I saw somebody do it a while ago. You toss it at the window and it just shatters. He took one more look around the deserted street. You see anything?

Jay took a look. Nothing. Let's do this, he said through gritted teeth. I'm only doing this to get to Leah.

Logan flicked his wrist, and the window shattered.

Holy shit, it worked! Jay blurted.

"Be quiet, hissed Shelly. I thought I heard something…"

Ah, you're just being paranoid.

Pot calling the kettle black, babe, Shelly retorted.

Whatever. I'm in now—it'll only take a second. Logan brushed the glass off the front seat and climbed in and got to work on the steering column.

Jay winced at the sound of snapping plastic from inside the car. He knew the noise couldn't travel very far, but sound always seemed louder in the dark.

Get the fuck away from my car, you sonsabitches! a voice bellowed in the darkness.

"Shit," grunted Logan from the front seat of their target vehicle.

Jay ducked down behind the left rear wheel. Now what do we do? he whispered.

A loud cha-chak echoed through the night as the local man racked a round in his shotgun. "You ain't stealing my car!"

Jay's blood ran cold. I'm sorry, he called out, we're just trying to get—

Shut up, hissed Logan.

Run, shouted Shelly, I'll cover you!

What? asked Logan. With—

Behind Jay, a gunshot split the night and a pistol's muzzle flash illuminated an old man in the driveway on the other side of the car, holding a shotgun.

Cha-chak.

No! Logan cried. Don't shoot!

The shotgun blasted again, sounding like a cannon on the other side of the car. Jay screamed and covered his ears as he hunched by the left rear wheel.

Two more quick pops from Shelly's handgun replied. He’s down—Logan, let’s go!

You're on your own, man—sorry, Logan called as he scrambled out of the car they were trying to steal and jumped into his own. Shelly raced over to Jay and tried to grab his backpack.

Gimme your fucking gear!

Jay stepped back from the pistol-waving woman and turned away from her. No!

You stupid son of a bitch, I’ll shoot you if you don't give me your shit, she snarled.

Jay reached for the gun as she aimed. They struggled, and the gun went off two more times, causing them both to scream. Jay thought Logan yelled too, but he could only be sure of the ringing in his ears.

As he and Shelly wrestled for the gun, he felt his backpack snag on the car's side mirror. She kicked his knee, and they both fell to the ground, the gun clattering away on the pavement toward Logan's car.

Something hard hit Jay on the side of the head—Shelly had kicked him.

Stop it, he pleaded, injured hands up in the air to protect his face. Just take what you want!

Shelly gave him another kick to the gut, forcing him to curl up in a ball as he gasped for breath. She knelt, muttering to herself about how stupid people could be as she rifled through his bag and grabbed an armful of the supplies Mac had given him, then jumped into their car.

Jay rolled over on his stomach, coughing for air as he watched the taillights of their car recede in the distance. Only when he got to his feet did he remember the man with the shotgun.

Hello?

Hearing no answer, Jay limped around the target car and peered into the darkness. He found a body in the driveway and when he knelt, his hand came away wet with blood. The man had no pulse. Someone shouted in the distance and Jay saw a flashlight appear around the corner at the end of the street.

Oh crap…

In a panic, he grabbed the dead man's shotgun and a handful of shells he found scattered on the ground. Jay shuffled back to the car Logan had tried to steal, grabbed the leftover bits of gear from the ground, and threw it all in the front seat.

He climbed in as the first shot rang out down the street. Then someone fired again, the bullet pinging off the car. In a panic, Jay looked in the mirror and spotted several flashlights bouncing as people ran toward him.

"Shit, shit, shit…"

Jay fumbled at the exposed steering column and realized he had no clue what the hell he was doing. He reached over and scooped all the remaining gear on the front seat into his pack along with the shotgun shells, grabbed the bag and the shotgun, and slipped out of the car.

The silhouetted pines across the street offered his only way to escape. Jay hobbled across the road and disappeared into the woods.

CHAPTER TWO

Jay stared at the old man's house through droopy pine boughs. He decided to lay still in the underbrush near the road for a few minutes and watch the house. He wanted to go back to the house and find the car keys, but unfortunately a candle burned in one room—at least one local had stayed behind with the body.

So much for sneaking into the house to look for car keys.

Jay turned and crawled further away from the road. Finally, deep in the pines, he shrugged the backpack on his shoulders and stood, groaning with pain. He'd have to walk through the night to have any chance of reaching Leah.

Kate was gone—he’d finally come to grips with that. His life with her, his comfortable life at the library, it was all gone. Things like a modest house, his telescope, the simple joy of cutting grass on a warm spring day—all of it lost in the death throes of a technological world thrust into the dark ages.

He'd lost everything except Leah. She waited for him out there, somewhere to the south.

As he walked, the strength of that thought flowed through Jay's muscles and eased the pain in his legs. By all the gods of both sides of his family, Jay swore to find his daughter. He'd fulfill the promise he made to her as a child—he would always be there for her, no matter what.

A lopsided grin creased his face. The coronal mass ejection had to be the biggest no matter what in recorded history.

After only a few moments, Jay found his energy flagging. His breathing came quicker and the cold air punished his lungs as he struggled to keep moving. He knew as long as he kept the road on his right, he’d be heading south—that's all that mattered—but moving, that was the hard part.

Jay collapsed against a pine tree, panting with exertion and praying for relief from the burning cold in his lungs. To take his mind off the pain wracking his body and the cold air threatening to freeze him from the inside, he pulled out Mac’s radio and fumbled at the dial.

The orange screen lit up. Not knowing what else to do, he held the radio up in the air as he limped along, hoping it would automatically lock on to Mac’s pre-programmed channel. Every so often he’d push the transmit button and mumble into it.

After a few minutes of feeling foolish, staggering through the forest with his staff and holding a radio in the air like a mad man, Jay was about to put the thing back in his pack and save the battery when it let out a squelch.

Mongoose, that you?

Mac’s voice echoed through the night and shot a bolt of hope straight into Jay’s faltering heart. He dropped to his knees in the snow and pressed the transmit button with shaking hands. Mac! Oh my God, Mac, it's you!

No names!

Jay laughed and rolled onto his back in the snow. Of all the things going on in the shit show they called the world, Mac wanted to scold him about using his real name over an unsecured radio. The absurdity of it all finally hit Jay, and he needed a moment to stop laughing.

When at last Jay calmed himself, he sat up and wiped the snow from his hands and legs. Okay, Iceman—okay, I'm here. After a moment he remembered to release the transmit button.

Jesus, I've been trying to get a hold of you all day! What the hell happened? I thought you understood when you’re supposed to sign on and listen for me?

Jay gripped the radio with trembling fingers and brought it to his lips. You have no idea how happy I am to hear your voice.

Yeah, it's pretty good to hear you too, buddy. Listen, where are you? No specifics, we don't know who's listening—but what's your situation?

Jay sighed and looked around as the cold seeped into his lower legs and back. He struggled to his feet and picked up his staff again.

I am…I'm outside…I'm almost to the school…I think it's only a couple miles away.

Outside? Now? Mongoose, are you on foot? Where’s your car?

Jay fought back a solid wall of grief. Yes, I'm on foot…I…I lost the car. These guys had guns…

Dammit, I told you—you should've been armed!

Jay took a deep, cold breath and put one foot in front of the other. He had to keep moving. "I know. I realize that now, but there's nothing I can do about it. Actually, I got robbed twice. I met these folks in a church; we were trying to steal a car," he said, tripping over a hidden root. It took him longer than he would’ve liked to get upright again.

And then while we were still in the car, its owner came out. There was a gunfight…

Were you injured?

No—I don't really know what happened, it was all so quick. All I know is, they took most of my supplies and I got away and ran into the woods.

Jay trudged on in silence for a few moments, one step at a time: left foot, right foot, staff…left foot, right foot, staff.

When Mac’s voice came back over the radio, it was quiet; but insistent. Listen to me—you're in a potentially deadly situation. You've gotta keep moving, you understand? With temperatures as cold as they are, you're gonna be in some serious trouble if you stop to rest. There's only one way to survive this and reach Leah: you have to keep moving.

Jay sighed again as he continued