Homefront: The Voice of Freedom Read online

  ONE

  APRIL 10, 2026

  The repaired, jury-rigged walkie-talkie crackled with an unavoidable burst of strident static before the Vietnamese resistance fighter’s voice came through loud and clear with his distinctive broken-English speech.

  “Hurry, my friend! They coming! I see now! Three—no, four tanks! Large number troops. Hurry! Fast! Over!”

  Ben Walker cursed silently as he struggled with the wiring beneath the mixing console. “Kelsie, throw me the wire cutters!” he called, but there was no answer. He bobbed his head out from under the counter and saw that she wasn’t even in the control room. “Kelsie, where are you?” he shouted louder.

  “On the roof with the antenna!” she yelled back. He could barely hear her through the hole they’d made in the studio’s ceiling. “The wind is not cooperating!”

  “Where are the goddamned wire cutters?”

  “Aren’t they by the generator?”

  Walker scooted across the floor on his butt toward the hand-cart-mounted engine-generator, where Kelsie Wilcox had left the tool case. He rummaged through the various tools she’d dropped and finally found the cutters.

  “Walker!” spat the walkie-talkie after another rupture of noise. “You almost done? Over!”

  He grabbed the device and spoke. “Nguyen, how much time do we have?”

  The two-way radio spurted again. “Five, ten minutes, tops! I see troops, maybe five mile away on Highway 50.”

  Oh, Jesus, we’ll never make it.

  Walker left the walkie-talkie on the counter and returned to the mess of wiring under the console. As he cut and restrung the cables according to Wilcox’s instructions, Walker feared his struggles over the last sixteen months had been for naught. After the ordeal of trekking across the desert, nearly dying, recovering, and then surviving the Las Vegas blitz, it made no sense that he should give up the ghost now. Not when he had finally found his true calling, a purpose that actually meant something. His college journalism professor, Shulman, once told him, “Walker, your thinking is way too existential for your own good. You need to relax and take life with a grain of salt.” Back in 2011, when he was a mere twenty-year-old smart aleck and cynic, that kind of advice went right over his head.

  Now that he was thirty-five, he could only dream of taking life with a grain of salt. No one in America could do that in 2026. Not with the destruction of the country’s electrical infrastructure, the food and water shortage, the breakdown of mass communication and transportation, and, worst of all, the Korean Occupation.

  Korean Occupation. Just thinking those words sent shivers down Walker’s spine. Never in a million years would he have thought the United States could be invaded by a foreign power during his lifetime.

  No, Walker wasn’t about to die now. He had to get the broadcast out before the bastards from the so-called Greater Korean Republic overran the small but strategically important city of Montrose, Colorado. Walker had to get the abandoned and decrepit old radio station working so he could rally the resistance fighters. It was his job and his destiny.

  On top of the small building, Wilcox struggled with the Yagi-Uda antenna she had built from scratch. The radio station’s old antenna was no longer functional, as pieces of it had been scavenged long ago for its scrap metal and electronic hardware.

  For a thirty-one-year-old woman with a degree in electrical engineering, it was ironic that her skills hadn’t been in demand until a year ago. Before the devastating EMP blast that wiped out nearly every electronic device with an integrated circuit all across the United States, Wilcox had floundered in the country’s collapsed economy by working as a blackjack dealer in a depressed Las Vegas that was a shoddy shadow of what the city had been fifteen years earlier.

  The strong wind was an unexpected obstacle in their plan to make a broadcast before the Korean People’s Army stormed the town. Wilcox quickly drilled holes for an extra set of brackets to secure the antenna. Once she was done, she tried wiggling the damned thing. It was sturdy enough.

  She looked across Rose Lane and saw several members of the resistance cell on Main Street, otherwise known as Highway 50. Nguyen Huu Giap, the unconventional leader of the original rebel group from Utah, was busy supervising the Ragtag outfit and ordering them to guerilla-warfare defensive positions. Wilcox knew Giap was related to a powerful Viet Cong general from the Vietnam War, which she found paradoxical.

  Then there was Boone Karlson, the head of the Montrose resistance cell. Wilcox spotted him issuing orders to men who had never had military training; now they were faced with defending their homeland with their lives. It appeared the team was busy setting roadside IEDs. Wilcox looked eastward. The dark mass of troops moved closer by the minute. The army must have come from Denver or some other point east of Montrose.

  The resistance members scattered, taking positions behind buildings, natural objects, and piles of sandbags that were placed in the road.

  How many of them were there now? Thirty? Forty? How could they hope to defeat an oncoming army?

  “Is that the best you’ve got, you dog-eaters?” shouted Connor Morgan from the road.

  Wilcox had to smile. Morgan probably could have taken on the Korean army by himself.

  She then looked back along the lane toward the elementary school. As it was mid-afternoon, classes were finished and parents flocked around the building to pick up their children.

  Damn! Didn’t someone tell them the Koreans were coming?

  An explosion rocked the ground.

  Screams and confusion. Moms and dads who hadn’t connected with their kids ran into the building. Others fled in terror.

  “Kelsie, where the hell are you? Aren’t you done yet?”

  “Coming, Ben!”

  She couldn’t worry about the civilians. Wilcox scrambled down the ladder and rushed inside the building that back in the day was the site of a popular country-and-western AM radio station.

  “We’re ready,” she said. “How’s it coming down there?”

  Walker slid out from under the console and took a seat. He carefully tapped the homemade transistor board they had plugged into the console. “I think we might be good to go. Tell me again—you sure our signal will be stronger through this station?”

  “Ben, remember this is still LPAM. When we were using our kitchen sink transmitter, we were lucky to be heard across the state—maybe two or three. You’re usually not going to get a strong signal with low-power broadcasting. But the equipment here has what it takes to get your signal out across the country in both directions. Given that the airwaves are awfully damned empty these days, I think the chances are pretty good. Trust me.”

  “If you say so, sweetheart,” Walker said. He and Wilcox had built the portable transistor board out of spare parts and old-school equipment. Now it was live, its indicators glowing dimly. He tapped the microphone. “Testing, testing.” The needles on the control board meters jumped with his voice. “Kelsie, you’re a friggin’ genius.”

  They knew pockets of Americans around the country had access to repaired AM/FM radios. Ever since Walker began transmitting music over the air in the various locations where they’d been, the response was surprising—and encouraging. Not everyone in the country had capitulated to the unwanted guests who were wreaking havoc across the nation. Walker believed that in every town, in every state—even if there was no communication between anyone—there were clusters of determined individuals who were prepared to resist the attackers.

  Another explosion rocked the building. Wilcox lost her balance and fell against the console. Then they both heard gunfire from their colleagues’ M4s and M16s. Shouts. And some screams.

 
“Oh my God, Ben,” she whispered as she dropped to her knees. “The school just let out so there are civilians all over the fucking place. Hurry.”

  “Goliath’ll stop the Koreans,” Walker said.

  “Not if it’s outclassed in firepower, and it is. I saw them. They have tanks.”

  Outside, the unmanned ground combat vehicle known as “Goliath” stood in the middle of Highway 50, firing at the Korean opponents with its .50 caliber heavy machine gun and four-barrel rocket system. The thing was a cross between a six-wheeled miniature tank and a dune buggy, covered in a hull made from high-strength aluminum tubes and titanium nodes protected by a steel skid plate able to absorb shocks from impacts with rocks, tree stubs, and even other vehicles. Its unusual suspension enabled it to travel smoothly over extremely rough terrain and overcome obstacles like man-made barriers, ditches, and boulders. Goliath carried up to eight thousand pounds of payload and armor.

  Hopper Lee, a Korean American in his early thirties, and a member of the resistance forces, acted as Goliath’s keeper and handler. He sat safely behind the wall of sandbags with the remote control device he had rebuilt himself. With it, Lee could send Goliath GPS coordinates and the robot would travel autonomously to its destination—and run over or destroy anything in its path.

  Crouched next to Lee was Wally Kopple, a crusty former National Guard sergeant in his fifties. He sported a QBZ-03 assault rifle, using it to cover the robot in the road.

  Kopple coughed and spat a glob of brownish phlegm.

  Lee said, “You should have that looked at, man.”

  “Oh, sure,” Kopple said. “I’ll call my doctor up right now and make an appointment. Maybe he’ll give me a lollipop for being a good boy. You think my insurance will cover the visit?”

  Lee shrugged. “Just sayin’.”

  Kopple coughed again. “You keep your eye on Goliath and make sure we don’t lose him. When Nguyen gives the word, we’re heading home. There’s no way we’re gonna stop that blitzkrieg coming our way.”

  The Koreans were now a hundred yards away. The infantry marched alongside what appeared to be four Bradley Fighting Vehicles, obviously confiscated from the American military. Through binoculars, Kopple saw the offensive flag the KPA draped on the front and sides of the armored vehicles. Its design depicted the American flag completely washed out in red and covered by the North Korean star and wreath from their own coat of arms. The Korean soldiers strode forward, ready to bravely face whatever puny firepower the weakened Americans managed to dish out. They were armed with assault weapons, wore dark brown and olive uniforms, and had painted their faces with black stripes.

  Kopple raised his QBZ-03 and fired bursts at the front line of infantry. It was a decent weapon, not great, although the damage it inflicted was slightly better than that of an M4.

  “You’re wasting your ammo,” Lee said. “Wait until they get closer.”

  Kopple released the trigger, coughed, and said, “I hate it when you’re right.”

  Then he saw the civilians. A swarm of parents and children poured out from Rose Lane and into the line of fire.

  “What the fuck?” Kopple stood and shouted, “Get out of here! Now!”

  The people were already in panic mode, running in different directions. Savvy fathers spotted the oncoming juggernaut of troops and attempted to herd everyone back toward the school.

  It was too late.

  Boone Karlson, the African American who brought the Montrose cell together, crouched behind the stone wall of an abandoned gas station, surveying the oncoming menace through binoculars. With the Koreans’ arrival to the town, he knew the ensuing weeks—maybe months—would end up being the most significant time of his life. Before the EMP, Karlson had often wondered if he would go through the stereotypical midlife crisis when he turned forty. Now, at thirty-nine, that wasn’t a concern. The crisis wasn’t personal—it was global.

  The troops, swarming up the highway like ants, would be in range within a minute. As he waited, he glanced across the road to see if his men—and women—were ready.

  A few more seconds and they would unleash hellfire …

  He started to count down from five. When he got to three, the civilians showed up.

  No!

  Karlson stood to warn them, but he heard Kopple’s shout. Unfortunately, the alarm made the situation worse—the adults and children panicked and ran in a dozen directions.

  The Koreans were in range. If the resistance cell was going to strike, they had to do it now.

  Karlson shouted the order to fire at will over the civilians’ heads. The adults heard the order, grabbed their children, and threw themselves onto the pavement. The few dozen resistance fighters reacted immediately. Gunfire erupted from their hidden positions, mowing down the Koreans in the front lines. Hopper Lee heard the enemy’s leader shouting commands to keep marching. The scene reminded Lee of old movies he’d seen of Revolutionary War-era battles with soldiers, carrying crude single-shot rifles with attached bayonets, simply marching straight at each other and shooting.

  Then the tanks fired again. And again.

  The shells struck a mass of the civilians, as well as obliterating a resistance bunker occupied by four men.

  Screams of horror almost surpassed the din of gunfire.

  Kopple cursed, stood, and fired the QBZ-03 at the oncoming soldiers. “Get off our property you sons of bitches!” he yelled, but a coughing spasm grabbed him like a vise. He fell to his knees and spat more dark phlegm over the sandbags in front of him. After he got his wind back, the sergeant just said, “Shit …”

  More shells from the Korean tanks hit the street in front of the resistance fighters’ positions. When another cluster of civilians were killed in a blazing fireball, one surviving father had the tenacity to urge the rest to run back to the school. The dozens of parents and children who were still alive bolted across the road, directly into the streaking lines of fire.

  Oh my God! Karlson thought. He watched in repulsion as several adults and children were cut down; but the cluster kept running, and many of them made it to the cover of buildings along Rose Lane.

  Lee’s walkie-talkie erupted in static and then Nguyen Huu Giap’s voice cut through the noise of gunfire. “Hopper, be ready evacuate, yes? Plan we discuss. Route to Home through old cemetery and golf course. Over.”

  Home was the Montrose cell’s hideout southeast of downtown, on the edge of the abandoned suburbs. With the addition of Giap’s cell, from Utah, the small den had become an overcrowded, yet cooperative community of like-minded individuals. There, they shared food and water and supplies, slept, trained, and made plans to attack the enemy. Like other cells around the country, they were the Koreans’ number-one target. Every day held the risk of being exposed. They were safe only as long as the enemy never discovered Home’s location.

  Kopple picked up the radio. “This is Kopple, Chief. We read you. Just give us the word. What do you hear from our boy inside the station? Over.”

  “I gave him five minutes. Over.”

  “Better give him two. Out.”

  Then the Korean infantry raised their own automatic weapons and sprayed the road and buildings in front of them. The barrage was a storm of deadly strength, forcing the small band of Americans to hunker down and take cover.

  Goliath, unthinking and unfeeling, continued to defend the road by deflecting the Koreans’ gunfire and returning volleys of hell at the approaching fire ants.

  The old radio station building, not quite a hundred yards away from the melee, rattled with every detonation. The elements and tubes on the transistor board in front of Walker glowed bright and then faded. He pounded his fist on the counter. “Damn! Kelsie, I need more power.”

  The woman leapt to the engine-generator, which had begun to sputter. “We filled it with gas, it can’t be empty yet! Wait—I see, the voltage regulator is loose. Hold on.”

  The gasoline used to fuel the generator was precious. Walker and Kelsie kept their
own supply of the sequestered commodity at Home and used it only when Walker wanted to make a broadcast. Gas had been a luxury item that a minority of citizens could afford prior to the EMP attack. Now people murdered for it. Service stations that still carried and sold the valuable resource were few and far between, and they were protected with heavy security systems and often gun-wielding officers. However, bootlegging operations were widespread—supplies of petrol were smuggled over the borders of Canada and Mexico, which lay mostly out of the EMP’s range. The stuff sold on the black market for less than what one had to pay at the legitimate service stations, but it was still costly. In a different era it might well have been gold—or drugs.

  The walkie-talkie blurted the new orders. “Walker! Two minutes! You copy, my friend? Over.”

  The journalist grabbed the radio and answered. “All right!”

  “We blow horn, yes? You move! Out!”

  One of the guys in the cell had a bugle. Every day he blasted everything from Reveille to Mess Call to Taps. Giap was referring to the standard Retreat call. When Walker and Kelsie heard it, they had little choice but to run.

  Wilcox fiddled with protuberances on the generator before sitting back on the floor and using her heel to lightly kick the unit—then the motor revved up and sounded healthy once again.

  “There, try it now.”

  Walker unfolded a scrap of paper upon which he had scribbled, tapped the microphone again, and froze. He had rehearsed his speech a dozen times and suddenly he couldn’t open his mouth. It was too important to mess up.

  “Ben?”

  He didn’t move.

  “Ben! Snap out of it!”

  Walker waved her off. “I’m okay.”

  Then he spoke into the mic.

  WALKER’S JOURNAL

  JANUARY 14, 2025

  Here we go again.

  As I start this year’s journal, I’m reminded of Frank, the head of the journalism department at USC. He was a mentor to me. Professor Shulman. Franklin Shulman. Frank. He was a great guy. I wonder where he is now?