“It appears to be just him by himself, yes.”
“Activity, what would you say that he’s doing other than just sitting there?”
“Tough to tell; with these optics it looks really shadowy, but he has something in his hand that’s flat, a book maybe? I’m really not sure, that would be mere conjecture on my part, but it looks like he also has some kind of handwritten sign on a piece of cardboard up against his leg.”
“That would make sense if he was hitchhiking, but I can’t imagine that there are too many vehicles looking to pick up people these days. Okay, I got that written down for activity. How about location? Still the east side of the Clear Creek Road?” Megan spread out the map of the state forest. “Can you point to it on the map here?”
“I would say right here, north of the junction of Leatherwood Road.”
“Got it. Now the last is time, and I’ll mark that at thirteen-forty-six. We can share this with Joshua later, but for now let’s get back to our primary task; how about we stalk our way back to camp along the south side of this ridge here? We may be able to find a fat doe sunning herself.”
“Sounds good to me. No four-wheeled or four-legged traffic to be seen here today—that guy down there does give me pause, though.”
“I’m not so weirded out when it’s a klick or more away and my boys are safely in the other direction.”
“Gotcha. Okay, put your game face on; Papa would never let us get this chatty on a hunt—zip that lip, sis.”
Phil soon worked into the routine at the McGregor ranch. With all liquid fuels now considered precious, a lot of their formerly mechanized tasks were laboriously performed by hand. So Ray and Phil’s extra manpower were greatly appreciated. With the many chores—including lots of manure and sodden-straw shoveling—there was very little spare time available.
The precious free time that Phil did have in the evenings was spent listening to shortwave broadcasts on his Grundig G6 Aviator radio, trying to catch news reports. He was troubled that there were fewer and fewer stations operating each week, as the global economic collapse slashed the budgets of most stations, or as power grid failures took them down. But there were still many hams operating in the U.S. and Canada—some of whom had photovoltaic power systems—and he greatly enjoyed listening to their chatter. He even heard some radio amateurs in Japan and Siberia talking in English to hams in Alaska. With his training as an intelligence officer, Phil regularly took down detailed notes about what he heard.
Whenever he heard a callsign that began with a V or C, then he knew that it was a Canadian ham. A, K, N, or W prefix callsigns meant they were in the United States. The wealth of information that the hams imparted over the course of several months was amazing to Phil. But like all other raw intelligence, their reports ranged from reliable to wild speculation. Piecing together their reports, he was able to establish the severity of power outages and level of societal breakdown in most of the United States and Canada.
It became clear that the eastern United States had been the hardest hit. With its high population density, there simply were more mouths to feed than there was food, and the chaos was intense. He expected a massive die-off, especially in the frigid Northeast. Canada’s large cities—particularly Toronto and Montreal—had enormous riots that had been quelled only with machine-gun fire. Alaska was completely isolated. Because it had long been dependent on air transport, there were thousands of deaths due to starvation and hypothermia. In Alaska’s larger cities, there was even some cannibalism.
The McGregors were anxious to hear any news about the conditions of their daughters’ locales in Tavares, Florida, and on Samar Island in the Philippines. The only concrete things that Phil heard about Florida and the Southeast were that the eastern power grid had gone down and stayed down, and that there was uncontrolled looting all along Florida’s southern Atlantic coast from Coral Gables to Delray Beach. There was also continuous looting throughout the Tampa, Orlando, and Jacksonville metropolitan regions. He heard a secondhand report that the City of Ocala had barricaded itself and was fending off large bands of looters from Orlando. He hoped that Tavares, a slightly smaller town in the same region, had taken the same precautions.
Because they still deemed the threat of looter gangs minimal in the ranch’s remote region, the McGregors didn’t institute twenty-four-hour-a-day security, as they’d heard the families in Kamloops had done. They did take the precaution of doing some target shooting to confirm the point of aim for every rifle and pistol at the ranch—except for the old “flop top” single-shot .577 Snider carbine, for which they had only seven cartridges. Since neither Alan nor Claire had any military experience, Ray and Phil taught them the basics of patrolling, ambushes, and “fire and maneuver” team tactics. They did quite well, considering their age.
24
END IN MIND
By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith.
As the Crunch continued and society devolved, millions of average Americans were forced to go out and “forage” for food. The first targets were restaurants, stores, and food distribution warehouses. As the crisis deepened, not a few “foragers” transitioned to full-scale looting, taking the little that their neighbors had left. Next, they moved on to farms that were in close proximity to the cities. A few looters formed gangs that were highly mobile and well armed, ranging deeper and deeper into farmlands, running their vehicles on surreptitiously siphoned gasoline.
Once the envy of most nations, the United States quickly plummeted to conditions matching those of many Third World countries. Power failures were followed by municipal water supply failures, followed by major disruptions of food distribution, the collapse of law and order, fires, and full-scale looting. The last phase was a massive and desperate “Golden Horde” outmigration from all of the major cities, mostly on foot, as food supplies ran out. The loss of life was tremendous.
By late December, Joshua’s little group had patrolled a sizable swath of the forest in their environs, and in that time they did not see very many people, nor did they see any snowplows on the roads, although there were tire tracks. They heard occasional rifle shots in the distance, usually just one or two shots. But on three different nights they heard firefights, with exchanges of gunfire that ranged from dozens to hundreds of shots. Clearly, someone was taking lives in addition to property. The closest firefight sounded like it was two or three miles away, an uncomfortably close distance.
When Megan and Malorie returned to the cave after the patrol out to Clear Creek Road, they reported that they had spotted more deer tracks and even fresh deer scat—but were unable to pack out any venison.
“I’m just glad that you were able to make it back safely,” Joshua said. “The boys have been playing quietly most of the afternoon. When I went down to check on them earlier, Leo had fallen asleep.”
Malorie slumped down to take the load off her feet and spoke first. “Megan and I did take a SALT report while we were out there. It was rather odd, so I’ll let her tell it.”