EMPowered- America Re-Energized Read online

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Tidbit # 1: Sybil Ludington & Israel Bissel

  Chapter 3

  Tidbit # 2: The Boston Massacre

  Chapter 4

  Tidbit # 3: Nancy Hart

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Tidbit # 4: Francis Marion

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Tidbit # 6: Aldrich Ames

  Tidbit # 7: Martha Bratton

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Tidbit # 8: Peter Francisco

  Chapter 13

  Tidbit # 9: Read Between the Lines

  Tidbit # 10: Abraham Woodhull

  Chapter 14

  Epilogue

  Tidbit # 11: Mary McCauley

  Tidbit # 12: Benedict Arnold

  Tidbit # 13: Robert Hanssen

  Tidbit # 14: Vice President Aaron Burr

  Miscellaneous Tidbits

  EMPowered:

  America Re-Energized

  By Diane Matousek Schnabel

  Copyright 2015

  Diane Matousek Schnabel

  Kindle Edition

  Prologue

  —— DAY 396 ——

  Monday, March 17th

  Thirty-two Days after the Electromagnetic Pulse

  i

  Lake Powell, Utah

  THE SUN HAD BARELY peeked above the horizon when Spencer Duffy reached the water’s edge. The warm, low angle of the morning light conferred an almost magical serenity over the landscape; deepening the blue-green waters of Lake Powell; accentuating its rock layers of white, orange, and red; contrasting ragged textures with areas worn smooth by time, wind, and water. Not the picture of hell he had always envisioned.

  Formerly amicable neighbors staked out the banks of the lake, casting fishing lines and menacing glares, warning Spencer to steer clear of their territory. The dwindling bounty of smallmouth bass was creating a contentious, competitive environment.

  Survival of the fittest, he thought. Darwinism at its ugliest.

  After filling two five-gallon buckets with lake water, he began the long trek home, his mouth as parched as the barren, rocky terrain. He glanced longingly at the water. For thirty years he had taken it for granted, the twist of a faucet, the flush of a toilet. He would give anything to go back.

  By the time he arrived home, a fiery ache was singeing his shoulders. His fingers throbbed from the bite of the metal handle, and his chores were only beginning. Spencer poured a few gallons of water into a jerry-rigged filtration system. He had stacked layers of fabric atop a pillowcase packed with playground sand, ineffective against the finer silt particles that gave the lake its turquoise color, but better than nothing.

  While newly strained water dribbled into a copper-bottomed stockpot, Spencer lit a fire. For kindling, he used segments of baseboard molding; for logs, the legs of a dining room chair.

  He hoisted the heavy stockpot onto a metal grate, secured the lid, and paused to warm his cold, aching hands above the flames. Mid-March temperatures in Utah’s high desert barely scratched sixty degrees, and the lake water had felt like a glove of needles pricking already tender fingers.

  Inside the house, the temperature was marginally warmer. His wife, Shannon, was in the master bedroom, sound asleep. She was a twenty-eight-year-old Irish beauty with fair skin, emerald-green eyes, and long hair that shimmered like melted chocolate. Spencer’s gaze lingered over her belly, swollen with their first child, a son due any second.

  A seed of apprehension germinated into anxiety then sprouted into a full-blown panic. No doctors, no hospitals, no Demerol, no epidurals, no fetal monitors.

  How the hell am I going to deliver this baby? And what if, God forbid, something goes wrong?

  ii

  District Three, Virginia

  GENERAL JONATHAN Quenten, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, stepped inside a secret elevator and descended into an underground command center. He had never liked his younger brother, not when they were kids growing up in Arkansas, even less now that the weasel had become Commander in Chief.

  Over the past month, sadness and regret had chiseled deep crevices into Jonathan’s doughy skin, siphoned the life from his hazel eyes, and accelerated the graying, thinning, and receding of his short brown hair.

  He nodded to the Secret Service agents standing post and entered the President’s private office. An opulent putting green stretched wall to wall, a raised carpet of synthetic grass with four regulation cups and changeable contours.

  Jonathan waited until the soundproof door clunked shut then said, “Damn it, William. Put down the golf club! I can’t believe you’re putting away while Rome burns.”

  President William Patterson Quenten’s silver-gray eyes narrowed, skewering Jonathan with indignation. “If Rome is burning, it’s because your military allowed our enemies to strike the match!”

  “My military acts on your orders. I advised you to shoot down that Iranian rocket, and you refused, for fear of jeopardizing your precious nuclear deal. And while the mullahs were signing that deal and taking custody of planeloads of cash, their Revolutionary Guard Corps was preparing a multipronged attack.”

  William sauntered up to the golf ball, weight shuffling foot to foot, fingers interlocked around the putter’s grip. He was a fit man of average height, more charismatic than handsome, with a crop of thick brown hair, a rounded jaw, and a fading golf-course tan. William tapped the ball and swore as it skirted the cup and veered off at a ninety-degree angle. “Damn, I’m getting rusty.”

  “Your golf game is not a priority, William. The relief effort is faltering because roadways are choked with defunct vehicles. Less than a quarter of trucks are operable, and those have limited range because gas stations are nonexistent.

  “A tenth of our population has already died, and fatalities are expected to rise due to malnutrition, scarcity of potable water, and absence of sanitation; factors which will cause a spike in diseases like cholera and typhus.

  “Our borders and ports remain vulnerable. We have no means of communication with the general population; and jihadist cells are expanding their tactics beyond door-to-door executions.”

  Jonathan hesitated, trying to drive a horrific image from his mind. “In desert regions they’re targeting river systems, shooting civilians, and polluting waters downstream with the decaying corpses.”

  Anger bloomed over the President’s cheeks like a rash, then he thrust an accusing finger at Jonathan. “You assured me this new Terrorist Eradication Squad would stop these cells.”

  “The TEradS can’t be deployed until the middle of May—thanks to your mandatory six-week training on rules of engagement.”

  “Hey, my name is the only one on that executive order, empowering U.S. Soldiers to gun down civilians. If these TEradS teams make one misstep, my political opponents will weave it into a noose and hang me with it!”

  iii

  Lake Powell, Utah

  STEAM JIGGLED THE stockpot lid, huffing and hissing until Spencer lifted it from the fire. He carted the boiling water through the house, to the master bedroom, and placed it on a trivet where it could radiate its warmth into the room.

  “A little help?” Shannon asked, reaching for his hand so she could pull herself upright. “I should’ve been out there fishing by now. I bet all the good spots are gone.”

  “Take it easy today,” he told her. “The last thing we need is you going into labor two miles from home.”

  She flashed an indignant glare, a reminder that her hormones were an
insurmountable foe. “No, the last thing I need is to be all alone when I go into labor.”

  Knowing further discussion was futile, he hurried back to the yard and smothered the fire to salvage the unburned chunks of wood, hopefully for tonight’s dinner.

  Shannon waddled out of the house, a fishing pole in each hand, and they began the long journey, traversing ruts, ridges, and slippery patches of crumbling rock; difficult enough to navigate without an unwieldy center of gravity.

  Protectively, Spencer’s hand latched onto her elbow; and an hour later, they settled on a rock formation that jutted out into the lake. He took in the view of Maweap Marina, now a multimillion-dollar island of floating refuse, then he traced the long queue of fisherman paralleling the rocky shore.

  “The power’s not coming back,” Shannon said with a weary sigh. “After the baby comes, we need to leave.”

  She made it sound as if it was a choice, as though they weren’t surrounded by miles of desert, with no rations, no transportation. Head shaking, Spencer glanced to the south.

  What is that popping noise?

  Occasionally, a chunk of canyon wall calved like a glacier, spitting sandstone into the lake, but he didn’t hear a splash, didn’t see any ripples over the surface.

  “Spencer, are you listening to me?” she asked, nudging him with her elbow. “We can’t just stay here, content to do nothing.”

  He bristled at the remark. Nearly every waking hour had been devoted to survival, acquiring food, treating water, and carving slit trenches, literally beating the rock into dust and granules that could bury their excrement.

  The popping noise resumed, this time louder.

  Fishermen were scattering.

  Spine-raking screams propagated across the water’s surface.

  Men with rifles were advancing on both sides of Lake Powell, shooting everyone within sight.

  Vulnerability shuddered through Spencer. He grabbed Shannon by the arm. They had to get off this peninsula. They had to get away from the lake.

  “Who the hell are they?” she asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  Dressed in blue jeans, sneakers, and windbreakers, they looked like Maweap residents, terrifyingly ordinary. A few fishermen returned fire with shotguns and handguns, but the semiautomatic rifles quickly ended the resistance.

  Shannon was crying hysterically. “Oh God! They’re shooting people and throwing dead bodies into the lake.” She stumbled. Her legs seemed to give out and she pirouetted toward Spencer, a gaping bloody hole in her abdomen.

  The sight was a bludgeon, battering his chest with the fiercest pain he had ever experienced.

  I’ll never see my baby boy, never kiss Shannon again.

  Then he noticed the stream of blood gushing from his own chest.

  iv

  District Three, Virginia

  GENERAL JONATHAN QUENTEN greeted the secretary of Homeland Security and the Vice President as they entered the underground private office. Both men had inherited their current positions, as Jonathan had, but Aaron Burr’s rise was the most extraordinary. A series of deaths, instigated by civil unrest and EMP-induced plane crashes, had vaulted the former secretary of agriculture into the vice presidency. Everything about the man reminded Jonathan of plastic, from his shiny helmet of salt-and-pepper hair, to his perpetual smile, to the feigned concern in his baby-blue eyes.

  All four men moved into an adjacent room with monitors embedded into rich wood-paneled walls, then they settled around a conference table. Jonathan eyed the bottles of drinking water, knowing that for the average American, they were more precious than gold.

  Ben Arnold, the crater-faced, secretary of Homeland Security, slid a pack of cigarettes across the table.

  Jonathan watched his brother light up then exhale a cloud of bluish smoke toward the ceiling. The President’s addiction was a rare, well-kept secret in Washington, guarded by his inner circle with bribes, threats, and intimidation. Could the spin machine help William dodge and lie his way out of responsibility for the EMP?

  “So, Mr. Chairman, what has the military accomplished since our last meeting?” Ben Arnold asked with a condescending twang that underscored his distrust and contempt for the armed forces.

  “Army and Air Force have secured the nation’s nuclear reactors. Seven carrier strike groups are underway and—”

  “Have you redirected the Pacific contingent to Russian ports?” Aaron Burr interrupted.

  “No, Mr. Vice President. Given the level of Russian cooperation, a blockade is no longer necessary.”

  “They destroyed a third of our satellites. That cannot go unanswered.”

  “You know, as well as I do, that a cabal within the Russian military was responsible for that attack. The terrorists are already in U.S. custody. And they will stand trial.”

  “Trial?” Burr scoffed. “That was an act of war.”

  “If our military could be infiltrated by terrorists, why couldn’t the Russians’?” Jonathan demanded. “And if one of our rogue Pilots bombs a Russian target, do you want them declaring war on us?”

  Burr’s hand slapped the table in frustration. “With all due respect, Mr. Chairman, that policy will enable Russian agents to launch covert attacks and use terrorist infiltrators as plausible deniability. Have you forgotten about the Russian-flagged cruise ship? The dirty bomb that stalked the U.S.S. Stellate?”

  Jonathan wanted to knock his head against the conference table. Maybe a slight skull fracture would allow some logic and common sense to seep inside. Instead, he said, “Russia is not our enemy. An Iranian corporation purchased that ship a year ago, and the radioactive material was stolen over a decade.”

  Arnold’s mouth twisted into a scowl. “Not according to Aldrich Ames.”

  “The CIA director is cherry-picking facts to promote an agenda,” Jonathan continued. “And right now, terrorists should be our focus. They’ve begun preying upon our basic training facilities. I recommend federalizing the National Guard and redeploying them to protect our draftees.”

  Arnold chuckled derisively. “Then who will reestablish rule of law? Are you recommending that the President abandon civilians in favor of military personnel who should be able to protect themselves?”

  Vice President Burr was grinning at them as if they were simpletons. “The solution is obvious, gentlemen. The United World peacekeepers will institute rule of law while the National Guard defends our military bases.”

  “The Chong Sheng Plan?” Jonathan asked, alarm and anger ripping along his vertebrae. “You can’t be serious.”

  Burr stiffened. “Perhaps you need a refresher course in history. The Chong Sheng Plan is based on the Marshall Plan, enacted by Congress to rebuild Europe after World War II.”

  “And the military’s track record is abysmal,” Arnold added. “You’ve only managed to restore power for two Districts of Civilization. One near Houston because its refineries produce diesel and jet fuel; its factories, bullets and bombs. The second near Detroit because its auto industry can manufacture planes and tanks. It is painfully clear, Mr. Chairman, the military is looking out for itself, not the American people.”

  “If you want more Districts of Civilization, give me more transformers,” Jonathan said flatly.

  The President shot forward in his chair, removed the cap from a water bottle, and extinguished his cigarette. “We don’t manufacture high-capacity transformers in the U.S. anymore. Hell, prior to the EMP, it took almost a year just to requisition one.”

  “Chong Sheng means rebirth, Jonathan.” Arnold patted his forearm as if soothing a child. “And the Chinese have a stockpile of transformers ready to be shipped. Those could power ten Districts of Civilization, one per FEMA Region. The plan would restore our cellular network and provide a million smartphones; phones that could disseminate news and facilitate a digital currency, jump-starting trade and the economy.”

  “But Chong Sheng necessitates a massive influx of Chinese workers and United World peacekeep
ers, who—by the way—will not be subject to U.S. law,” Jonathan said. “And how do you know those phones won’t be loaded with malware? Have you forgotten that prior to the EMP, China was hacking our oil companies, banks, and defense contractors? These are the people who sent us lead-painted toys and drywall laced with fly ash that corroded electrical wiring. They harassed our ships in international waters, downed a spy plane and held the crew hostage—”

  “Come on, Jonathan,” Arnold interrupted. “The incident from 2001? That’s ancient history.”

  “How about last week? When Chinese J11s fired on a Raptor?”

  “A misunderstanding,” the President said, scuttling the notion with a wave of his hand. “The J11s assumed they’d been fired upon when the Raptor shot down a B-2 bomber—another one of your rogue Pilots.”

  Burr cleared his throat with self-important formality. “These are the facts, Mr. President. China has shown restraint with regards to Taiwan. They have donated shiploads of relief supplies, temporarily housed the United World assembly, and imposed sanctions on Iran and North Korea. And you’ve read the EMP Commission report; without the Chong Sheng Plan, ninety percent of Americans will be dead within a year. Do you want that to be your legacy?”

  Chapter 1

  —— DAY 441 ——

  Sunday, May 1st

  Fourteen Months after the Electromagnetic Pulse

  1

  District Eight, Colorado

  THE POPULATION OF District Eight had inflated beyond ten thousand, luring people from neighboring towns with promises of electricity, cellular phones, potable running water, and a United World peacekeeping force.