Trackers 4: The Damned (A Post-Apocalyptic Survival Series) Read online

  CONTENTS

  Trackers 4: The Damned

  Copyright

  Books by Nicholas Sansbury Smith

  Acknowledgements

  Foreword

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Trackers 4: The Damned

  Copyright October 2017 by Nicholas Sansbury Smith

  All Rights Reserved

  Cover Design by Elizabeth Mackey

  Edited by Erin Elizabeth Long

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from the author.

  BOOKS BY NICHOLAS SANSBURY SMITH

  The Hell Divers Trilogy (Offered by Blackstone Publishing)

  Hell Divers 1

  Hell Divers 2: Ghosts

  Hell Divers 3: Deliverance

  The Extinction Cycle Series (Offered by Orbit)

  Extinction Horizon

  Extinction Edge

  Extinction Age

  Extinction Evolution

  Extinction End

  Extinction Aftermath

  Extinction Lost (A Team Ghost Short Story)

  Extinction War

  Trackers: A Post-Apocalyptic EMP Series

  Trackers 1

  Trackers 2: The Hunted

  Trackers 3: The Storm

  Trackers 4: The Damned

  The Orbs Series

  Solar Storms (An Orbs Prequel)

  White Sands (An Orbs Prequel)

  Red Sands (An Orbs Prequel)

  Orbs

  Orbs II: Stranded

  Orbs III: Redemption

  Orbs IV: Exodus (Coming Winter 2018)

  For information about new releases sign up for Nicholas’s spam-free newsletter. Subscribers will also receive special offers and access to exclusive giveaways.

  CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Many people have a hand in the creation of this story. I’m grateful for all their help, criticism, and time. I’d like to start with the people I wrote this book for‌—‌the readers. You are the reason I always try to write something fresh, and the reason I strive to always make each story better than‌—‌and different from‌—‌its predecessors. For those of you waiting on my other books, I thank you for your patience, and hope you enjoy the Trackers series.

  Before you dive in, here’s a little background on how this story came to be. In 2016 I was finishing up book five of the Extinction Cycle, and at that time, I thought Extinction End would be the “end” of the series. I decided to write a new type of story‌—‌a story without monsters, zombies, or aliens‌—‌about a different type of threat to our national security.

  Rewind ten years. I’m sitting at my desk as a planner with the State of Iowa. It was there that I learned a good deal about a terrifying weapon known as an electromagnetic pulse (EMP). During a meeting with several agencies, I was shocked to learn there wasn’t much being done to harden our utilities and critical facilities to protect against such a threat.

  A few years later, I started working for Iowa Homeland Security and Emergency Management. I had several duties as a project officer, but my primary focus was on protecting infrastructure and working on the state hazard mitigation plan. During my tenure, I helped multiple communities apply for grants to build safe rooms in their schools or municipal buildings to protect from tornadoes. A few years later, I started working on grants that strengthened and hardened power lines in rural communities.

  After several years of working in the disaster mitigation field, I learned of countless threats from natural disasters to manmade weapons, but the EMP, in my opinion, is the greatest of them all.

  That brings us to today. We’re living in tumultuous times, and our enemies are constantly looking for ways to harm us, both domestically and abroad. We already know that cyber security is a major concern for the United States. North Korea, China, and Russia have all been caught hacking into our systems. We also know other countries are experimenting with technology that can shut down portions of our grid. But imagine a weapon that could shut down our entire grid. The perfectly strategized EMP attack gives our enemies an opportunity to do just that.

  Before you start reading, I would like to take time to thank everyone that helped make this book a reality, starting with the Estes Park Police Department.

  In the spring of 2016, my fiancée and I spent a week in Estes Park, Colorado, a place I had visited many times growing up. I wanted to show her this gorgeous tourist town that borders Rocky Mountain National Park, and I decided it would also make a good setting for a portion of Trackers.

  The police department very graciously allowed me to tour their facilities and ride along with Officer Corey Richards. Department officers and staff explained police procedure for tracking lost people and their operations and response to natural disasters. Captain Eric Rose, who is in charge of the Emergency Operations Center, described what they went through in the flood of 2013, when Estes Park was quite literally cut off from surrounding communities.

  I’ve spent time with many law enforcement departments over my career in government, and I can tell you Estes Park has one of the finest and most professional staffs I’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting. Thank you to every officer for serving Estes Park and assisting with Trackers. I hope you find I did your community justice.

  I’d also like to thank my literary agent, David Fugate, who has provided valuable feedback on each of my novels. The version you are reading today is much different than the manuscript I submitted, partly because of David’s excellent feedback.

  Next up is my editor, Erin Elizabeth Long. She has had a hand in every book I’ve written thus far. I won’t lie‌—‌Trackers was a challenge for both of us, and Erin really encouraged me to continue pushing until I got the story right. Thanks, E. I appreciate you more than you know.

  I also had a great group of beta readers that helped bring this story to life. You all know who you are. Thanks again for your assistance.

  Trackers is more than just a post-apocalyptic thriller about the aftermath of an attack on American soil. It’s meant to be a mystery as much as it is a thriller. There are a lot of EMP stories out there, but I wanted to write one that included new themes and incorporated elements of Cherokee and Sioux folk stories, which I encountered when obtaining a degree in American Indian Studies.

  This story, like many works of fiction, will require some suspension of belief, but hopefully not as much as my other science fiction stories. Any errors in this book rest solely with me, as the author is always the gatekeeper of the work.

  In an interview several years ago, I was asked why I write. My response was that while my st
ories are meant to entertain, they are also meant to be a warning. Trackers could be a true story, and I hope our government continues to prepare and protect us from such a threat.

  Much has happened on the North Korean peninsula since Trackers was first published in early 2017. The North Korean People’s Army has fired multiple ballistic missiles into the Sea of Japan, conducted several nuclear weapon tests, paraded two new intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), and even threatened thermonuclear war.

  These frightening developments have ended the debate over whether or not the North Koreans have nuclear weapons, but it’s still not clear if they can actually deliver them by ICBMs. There are other ways to attack an enemy with nuclear weapons, however, and I explore one of them as a novelist in the Trackers series.

  I don’t know the best way to approach the North Korean threat, but one thing is certain‌—‌if something isn’t done soon, the stability of the entire world could be at risk.

  During my visit in 2016, Captain Eric Rose of the Estes Park Police Department told me that he wasn’t sure he was ready for a post-apocalyptic Estes Park. I’m not either, but only time will tell if the Trackers saga remains fiction.

  With that said, I hope you enjoy the read, and as always, feel free to reach out to me on social media if you have questions or comments.

  Best wishes,

  Nicholas Sansbury Smith

  FOREWORD

  Dr. Arthur Bradley

  Author of Disaster Preparedness for EMP Attacks and Solar Storms and The Survivalist.

  When used conventionally, a nuclear warhead could destroy a city and cover the surrounding region in deadly radiation. Horrible to be sure, but at least it would be localized. When detonated in the atmosphere at the right altitude, however, that same warhead could generate an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) that would cause almost unimaginable harm to our nation.

  The most significant effect of such an attack would be damage to the nation’s electrical grid. Due to the interdependency of systems, the loss of electricity would result in a cascade of failures promulgating through every major infrastructure, including telecommunications, financial, petroleum and natural gas, transportation, food, water, emergency services, space operations, and government. Businesses, including banks, grocery stores, restaurants, and gas stations, would all close. Critical services such as the distribution of water, fuel, and food would fail. Emergency services, including hospitals, police, and fire departments, would perhaps remain operable a little longer using generators and backup systems, but they too would collapse due to limited fuel distribution, as well as the loss of key personnel abandoning their posts.

  In addition to the collapse of national infrastructures, an EMP could cause widespread damage to transportation systems, such as aircraft, automobiles, trucks, and boats, as well as supervisory control and data acquisition hardware used in telecommunications, fuel processing, and water purification systems. Such an attack could also damage in-space satellites and significantly hamper the government’s ability to provide a unified emergency response or even maintain civil order. Finally, many personal electronics could also be damaged, including our beloved computers and cell phones, as well as important health monitoring devices.

  With the collapse of infrastructures, loss of commerce, and widespread damage to property, an EMP attack would introduce terrible financial ruin on the nation. Consider that it is estimated that even a modest 1-2 megaton warhead detonated over the Eastern Seaboard could cause in excess of a trillion ($1,000,000,000,000) dollars in damage.

  Testing done in the 1960s, such as Starfish Prime and the Soviet’s Test 184, provided some idea of the potential damage, but weapons have become even more powerful and our world more technologically susceptible. No one really knows with certainty the extent of the damage that would be felt, but expert predictions range from catastrophic to apocalyptic. What is universally agreed upon is that the EMP attack allows for an almost unimaginable amount of damage to be done with nothing more than a single nuclear warhead and a missile capable of deploying it to the right altitude. Given that there are more than 128,000 such warheads and 10,000 such missiles in existence, it seems prudent to better understand and prepare for this very real and present danger.

  What many do not know is that the U.S. has been openly threatened with an EMP strike by Russia, Iran, and North Korea. Leaderships of these countries have come to appreciate the truly asymmetric nature of such an attack. Consider that an EMP strike would be largely independent of weather, result in long-lasting infrastructure damage, and inflict a damage-to-cost ratio far greater than any conventional weapon, including a nuclear “dirty bomb.” Worse yet is that our enemies would not limit themselves to a single EMP strike. Rather, they would detonate several warheads, carefully timed and positioned across the nation to achieve maximum damage.

  Author Nicholas Sansbury Smith understands how an attack could cripple the United States. I first spoke with him when he was working for Iowa Homeland Security and Emergency Management in the disaster preparedness field. He reached out when he was writing a science fiction story about solar storms with some questions about my book, Disaster Preparedness for EMP Attacks and Solar Storms. Since then, Nicholas has also spent a great deal of time researching EMPs.

  Trackers is a work of fiction, but many of the places in the story are real. Utilizing his background in emergency management and disaster mitigation, Nicholas has done an excellent job of describing a realistic geopolitical crisis that sets the stage for an EMP attack. The following story is a terrifying scenario in which brave men and women must adapt to a challenging new world‌—‌a world that we could see ourselves being thrust into. Part of me wishes Nicholas had continued writing purely science fiction stories about aliens and government designed bio-weapons, because Trackers is a novel that could become non-fiction.

  For my twin brother Zachary Angaran Smith. Thank you for all that you do for at-risk youth. We need more men like you in this world.

  “Hell is empty and all the devils are here.”

  — William Shakespeare

  1

  SAM “RAVEN” SPEARS watched the refugees in Bond Park huddle around the fire. A cold rain fell from the sky, threatening the flames, but it was still better than snow.

  He put a hand on his head, as if that would help the migraine. His shredded ear pulsated with pain, and his entire body felt like someone had taken a hammer to it. He remembered the old Marine Corps saying about pain being weakness leaving your body.

  Yeah, that’s bullshit.

  Pain was one of the rawest feelings a human could experience‌—‌the body’s way of ordering someone to stop doing stupid things that could kill them. Raven had never been great at following orders.

  But he was still alive, and so was his family.

  Now he had to figure out how to keep it that way.

  He walked over to Bond Park, searching the crowd for Detective Lindsey Plymouth. Only two days had passed since Chief Colton had been taken hostage, which left them only one more day to deliver their prisoner, Jason Cole, and the first supply drop to Highway 34.

  Time was running out, and he needed to find Lindsey to go over their plan. A voice stopped him halfway across the street.

  “Sam, we got a situation at the roadblock on 34.”

  Raven turned to see the police dispatcher, Margaret, holding the door to town hall open. He jogged over to her.

  “What kind of situation?”

  Lindsey came running around the corner of the station. Dressed in a coat and stocking cap, with her duty belt around her waist and a Bushmaster AR-15 slung over her back, she looked ready for a battle.

  “We’re about to have company,” she said.

  “I’ll get the horses,” Raven said when he saw the look on her face.

  A flare shot up from the Crow’s Nest. He followed it into the sky.

  “No time. We need to take the Volkswagen,” Lindsey said. “I’ve already grabbed you a rifle.�
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  Raven bolted toward the parking lot around the side of the building, where the Volkswagen Beetle was already loaded with gear and weapons. He grabbed the AR-15 in the passenger seat and palmed a magazine into the gun. It wasn’t his crossbow, but times had changed. He needed bullets to deal with the enemies closing in on all sides.

  The small car tore out of the parking lot, tires squealing. The streets were mostly empty on the way out to Highway 34, aside from several kids riding bicycles on the side of the road. They stopped to wave at the car, but Raven didn’t return the gesture. Every parent here knew the threats outside the town. It blew his mind that they would let their teenaged kids out.

  Raven rolled down his window and yelled, “Go home!” Then he chambered a round and looked over at Lindsey.

  “You got any idea what’s going on?”

  She shook her head. “All I know is that Dale Jackson reported a vehicle stopped near the turn-off for Storm Mountain.”

  “Shit,” Raven muttered.

  They sped down the open road, the old bug purring like a cat with a smoking habit. The chassis rattled at the high speed.

  “You get any sleep last night?” Raven asked, making a stab at small talk.

  She shook her head. “Did you?”

  Raven shrugged. “I’ve been trying to keep Creek comfortable, but his eye is really bothering him. Damn cone around his head isn’t helping either.”

  “I’m sorry,” Lindsey said quietly.

  They were both still rattled from the attack on Storm Mountain. Don Aragon and Officer Hines had paid the price for their betrayal. Their bodies were still rotting in the woods, but that didn’t make Raven feel any better. If a man like Officer Hines could try to kill Lindsey, then the world was in major trouble.