Continuing to scan the dial, he found several AM stations still on the air. Most of them were saying the same thing and were just as bewildered and alone. Hammond started to think about what had happened. His mind began sifting through the pieces and solutions. The coordinated and controlled thought he had used while in the Navy came back to him and he carefully analyzed each piece. Without really knowing why, he went outside, started his lawnmower and began mowing his grass. As he pushed the mower back and forth he continued his quest for an explanation. Slowly, piece by piece, conclusions began to formulate in his mind. After awhile he realized he had completed the yard and was mowing the same grass again. He stopped and turned the mower off, wheeling it back to the old garage behind the house.
The garage was actually an old barn a former owner had built to do some light gardening. Roger rolled the mower into the door and to the side, and then walked over to his pride and joy. Sitting in the middle of the barn was a large object covered in a tarp. He pulled the tarp off to reveal a pristine 1968 Oldsmobile Delta 88 convertible. Walking over to the driver’s side, he ran his hand along the yellow finish. Then he opened the door and sat in the driver’s seat. Inserting the key into the ignition, he crossed his fingers and turned it. The starter motor kicked in. Almost immediately, the big 455 cubic inch V-8 roared to life under the hood.
“That answered a lot of questions,” he said to the world. Revving the engine a few times he let the car warm up while getting out and popping the hood. The big engine purred like it always had while he checked the fluids. Satisfied, he closed the hood again and got back into the driver’s seat. He shifted into drive and eased the big car out into the early morning light, down the drive, and parked it again beside the house.
A half hour later, Roger Hammond left his home and his job to begin what he hoped was a new future. Dropping his bags in the spacious trunk, he eased himself into the car again, flipped the switch and waited as the white top folded back and seated itself into its receptacle behind the rear seat. Hammond then drove out of his driveway and into the unknown.
It had been a long two days. Jim Butler’s uniform had lost all of its creases and seemed to hang off of him. He sat slumped like a rag doll in the back seat of what had once been a Presidential limousine. More than thirty vehicles had been in the underground parking garage under the White House lawn. To everyone’s surprise, all but one started right up. The old 1972 Lincoln once ferried Nixon through Washington and beyond, but was now relegated to hauling diplomats at official functions. It was big, heavy and armored, but it ran, so it was drafted into being a White House taxi to get people around the city. After over 48 hours of solid work, the President ordered Butler home for some rest.
Butler thought about all they had done in the first day. Many calls had been made and received from world leaders via the hotline. After the Brits, the Russians had called just as shocked and just as concerned. Like the British, they had no intelligence indicating where the attack had come from. More importantly was the unspoken desire that the United States not suspect them. It was the same with all of them.
On a good note, telephone communications had been reestablished between the White House and several key points in the city — namely the Pentagon, Capitol Hill, Treasury, Commerce, State and Homeland Security. Individual telephone lines had been laid along the streets and on poles and strung into portable Korean War era phone equipment dug up from a local reserve center warehouse. Soldiers from Fort Belvoir were still stringing lines and setting up rudimentary switchboards to handle the necessary communications. Too bad nobody was saying anything important, Butler thought. Despite a lot of meetings and a lot of talking, they were not much better off than they were when the bombs went off.
The Lincoln turned into Butler’s neighborhood and pulled up to the front of his house. “Make sure to pick me up in the morning,” Butler said as he got out of the car and waved to the driver.
The young sailor smiled back at him and said, “I’ll be here, sir.”
As the car pulled away, Butler noticed a yellow convertible sitting beside the house. He trudged to the front door and walked inside. Entering the den he heard a conversation in the kitchen just as the door opened and Jessica Butler came through. She broke into a wide smile and hugged her tired sailor.
“I was afraid you weren’t ever coming home,” she said after he kissed her warmly.
“I was afraid I wasn’t going to get home myself for a while,” Butler replied with a tired grin. “But I have orders from the top to get some rest. By the way, whose car is that in our driveway?”
“Who do you think?” came a reply from the kitchen door. Hammond was standing there holding a meat fork.
Butler’s face broke into a wide grin. He had met Roger Hammond seven years before while serving on a destroyer out of Pearl Harbor. Butler had been the commanding officer, or CO, and Hammond the executive officer, or XO. They had struck a quick friendship that grew as each earned the professional respect of the other. By the end of two years, they had come to know each other’s thoughts and led the crew through every shipboard evolution, bringing praise for the ship and a camaraderie that few ships or crews experienced. Since that time their friendship had been maintained and they treasured the times when they could work together. Even after Hammond had a command of his own, the two men talked and collaborated. Now when times were bad, his friend Hammond appeared, and he knew things were going to work out. He warmly shook Hammond’s hand and slapped him on the shoulder. “It’s about time you showed up,” he said with a grin.
“Somebody had to clean up this mess,” Hammond said in return. “Good thing Jessica and I got supper ready. Then again you were always lousy on the grill.”
“We’re having steak tonight,” Jessica said. “We figured if you did get home you would need a good meal.”
“And you were right,” Butler said.
“Then let’s get it on the table,” she said as she led both men into the dining room.
The dinner was restful and friendly with no talk about the Navy or the nation that had not been about some amusing situation they shared or a sea story. That alone rested Butler more than sleep would. After clearing the table, Jessica urged the men to relax in the den while she finished up. Both men dropped into familiar furniture from the years they had known each other — Butler in his recliner and Hammond on the leather sofa. After only a moment, Hammond’s face turned serious. “How bad is it?” he asked.
Butler chuckled briefly. “Pretty bad. We absorbed about 74 high-altitude, low yield explosions and two that actually hit the ground.”
“EMP?”
Butler nodded. “Between 75 and 100 miles. Not high enough for widespread coverage, or low enough to have blast damage, but just enough to give us a really strong pulse to take out anything. We lost it all — radio, TV, telephone, transportation, anything electronic. Gone. We came to a standstill the other night. Worse yet, the Brits let us know later on the same thing happened in Japan, Korea and a few other places along the Pacific rim. All came from missile launches somewhere at sea. The radiation is tearing up the ionosphere and within a month there won’t be a satellite left operating anywhere. That EMP is a real killer.”