BW

Everyone had gathered for breakfast, and after the blessing was said, began to eat. That is when Kathy approached Bob, with a problem.

"Bob. I think there is something wrong with the radio. I couldn't get it to come on this morning."

"I'm not surprised. As long as everyone is here, I guess we'd better talk about what has happened. Tom. Why don't you start."

Tom quickly explained to the assembled group what he had seen in the night. After he spoke, before anyone could ask any questions, Bob spoke again.

"Now. I want everyone who is wearing a watch to check the time."

All of them, except Tim and Alex, did so.

"What's going on Bob? They blow up bombs in the atmosphere, and now our watches don't work? Sounds a little weird to me."

"Do you remember me talking about an E.M.P.? Well that is how it is done. A specially designed bomb goes off in the upper atmosphere, and sends out the pulse. After that, any unshielded electronic device is dead. What is left of America has just been sent backwards in time to the 1800s' at best."

"THAT can't be good. But why would someone do that?"

"My guess is that the Russians, Chinese, and anyone else involved in the invasion have found out that while Americans love their pleasures, we aren't going to just roll over and die because we have to do without them. It tells me there is some kind of fight going on for the remainder of the nation. And they aren't doing as well as they had hoped. So, knock out any remaining electronics, and you give the invaders the advantage. Their stuff is hardened against such measures. Civilian stuff isn't."

"O.K., That makes sense." Kathy said, "But what will it mean for us?"

"It makes sure that almost everyone that might come here will be on foot, horseback, or be driving an older vehicle, the kind without all the electronics in them." Bob frowned, "It also means we have to start checking for radiation."

"How do we do that?" asked Sam.

Bob reached into his pocket and pulled out a radiation detector. "With this. Hold on Kathy, I can see the questions forming in your mind. Remember I said unshielded electronics. That shed where I parked the truck and 4X4 is metal. It is also on a concrete slab, and grounded, like a lightening rod. It should have protected everything inside. This was one of those things. Lets' see if it worked."

With that, Bob switched on the detector, and was rewarded with a small red light flashed on, to let him know it was working. He set it to audio, so that they could all hear the occasional beep that indicated radiation had been detected.

"What do the beeps mean?" Tom asked.

Bob explained how the detector worked. At first he saw concern washing over Kathy's' face, and so he told her.

"There is always some small degree of radiation in the air. Mostly it comes from the sun. And that's fine. We can tolerate that. At this setting, anything between zero and twenty-five 'beeps' per minute is safe. More than that, and we are in trouble."

Bob looked around for Alex, only to find that sometime during the demonstration, he had left. He had taught Alex about the detector years before, but it still irked him that he had left just then. He turned back to Kathy.

"Dear lady, you are our medical expert. Should this thing get to high of a rad count, it will be up to you to take care of it."

"How do I do that? We don't have a bomb shelter, or time and materials to build one."

"With this." Alex called as he re-entered the room. In his hand was a box. He looked at his father. "Sorry about leaving in the middle of that Dad. But I could see where it was going, so I went and found this in the truck."

"Found what?" asked Tim.

"Let me guess." Said Maria. "Potassium Iodine."

"Right on the first try." Bob answered.

"Isn't that for protection against radiation?"

"Sort of, Kathy. What it does is fill the thyroid with 'good' iodine. One of the effects of a nuclear blast, is that it puts radioactive iodine in the air. If it is breathed in, it lodges in the thyroid, and causes all kinds of problems. The bad news is that after age forty, in most cases, the thyroid shuts down. So if you are over forty, it isn't going to do you much good. But for the younger members of our group, it is very important."

Bob turned once again to Kathy. "These have to be administered according to a combination of age and weight. That is your job, should it become necessary. I taped the information about that on some of the bottles."

Kathy reached out and took the box from Alex with a quiet "Thank you." to both Bob and Alex.

"Maria, how did you guess?"

"John and Todd. They were both vets. and had a lot in common. They were concerned about the possible need for it. I heard them talking about it."

"Shouldn't we figure out who gets how much of this?"

"Now Kathy. You know a gentleman never asks a lady her age. That's up to you."

---

Everyone in Director Claires' office was doing their best to either become invisible, or be somewhere else. Anywhere else was better than being near him. It had been a little over a week since the Director had gotten the Russians and Chinese to set off the nuclear bombs to cause the E.M.P. He had expected that once those who were resisting them were without power, the resistance would collapse like a house of cards. He was wrong.

Those who he was trying to break so that the final destruction of America could take place, had been toughened by having to do without anything they had been used to before it all started. They had been nearly starved, frozen, attacked by roving gangs, and dominated by troops that didn't even speak their language. And they had had enough. The chance came for them to take a stand. The even had a preacher on the radio tell them to stand and fight. When that happened, unregistered firearms that had been long hidden were brought out, cleaned, oiled, and loaded. They were still divided on the issue of who were real Christians, and who wasn't, but for the moment, it didn't matter. They had business to take care of, and they were doing it with a vengeance.

Claire couldn't for the life of him figure out how they were doing it. Even after the pulse, the damned Americans STILL fought on. Satellite photos were no help either. He had thought that they would show the Russian forces where the Americans were gathering, so they could accurately direct artillery fire, and air strikes. They showed nothing of the kind. The defenders had learned that things like 'space blankets' would defeat most high tech surveillance devices. All that was needed was to camouflage the blankets after they were in place. They had learned how to hide the heat signatures from even their own bodies. And Claire was furious.

So far today, he had killed three men that had brought him more bad news. Things were starting to get REALLY bad, and many wondered how they could explain how they had been either tricked, or forced to work for the director, once they figured a way to quietly disappear.

BW, Vietnam Vet