Dystopia: The Long Road (2 page)

“I do not believe in a fate that will fall on us no matter what we do, I believe in a fate that will fall on us if we do nothing.”

-Ronald Reagan

The days passed like a blur as John continued his inventory, his thoughts on the anniversary of September 11
th
.  There always seemed to be some kind of threat on this anniversary.  He wasn’t sure if it was because of the day that the crazies came out of the woodwork or if there was something about it. 

It was another cold day; he wished this cold front would pass.  The thought of winter starting already was unnerving to say the least.  Amy was already in complaint mode, constantly bitching about the fire.  He wished she would get up and just put some wood in the stove instead of crying she was cold. 

Sometimes he did wonder why they were together; she was a pretty woman with her nails always done beautifully.  She had short blonde hair that sat on her shoulders and perpetually needing some kind of goo or ooze in it. 

He on the other hand, was what his friends affectionately called, the “Grizzly Adams” type. Having scruffy hair and beard, he carried a few extra pounds.  Which he swore Amy orchestrated with all her good cooking. 

Some days he also wished she would live up to her threats to go and move to Florida to stay with her mother.  But most days he loved her and wanted to keep her safe and warm.

Being the day before the anniversary of the fateful day the towers fell, he wanted to make sure his things were well organized. 

He looked at this day as his annual inventory and prep check day.  It was not that he actually thought there were any threats, but it made a good reason to make sure his house was in order before winter. 

He checked his bug out bags and replaced anything going out of date on this day. Being prepared for an emergency was always very important to John, especially living in an environment where a day without heat during the winter could equal death. He had a “BOB” for Amy too, but he doubted she would ever carry it farther than down the long driveway.   He began to go through the bags starting with his own. He pulled out a number of smaller bags first each containing different kits.  One for medical supplies he set aside this one would need to be updated and another for fishing and fire starting he set aside, these he would just check. 

After removing the tent and the space bag holding his dry clothes he began his annual ritual of changing batteries in the flashlights.  He exchanged the antibiotics and pain relievers as well as his vitamins.  He placed it all back into the pack along with replacements for his freeze dried foods and edibles.  Amy’s bag was far easier to check, as hers contained only her clothes, freeze dried foods and smaller versions of the kits he kept in his bag.

Feeling satisfied with his day he headed to the kitchen to see what she was cooking up.  She was a wonderful cook and it was something she loved to do, he did appreciate the good eats. 

Tomorrow he will have to work and was not looking forward to it; he hated his job as an electrician.  It made him think of Dez and Matt and how they got to choose their own schedules, he thought ‘they sure got it good, what the hell am I doing all this for?’  ‘I totally should have gone into computers instead of electrical.’

Something wonderful was summoning him from his thoughts; it was a terrific smell coming from the kitchen.  He recognized it and knew immediately she had made his favorite. 

He practically danced into the kitchen singing, “Yay for me, it is lasagne night.”

Amy loved it when he would get excited about what she cooked, and secretly he knew it and would do it often so she knew he appreciated the good grub.

September 11
th

As the morning sun began to shine, John headed outside to take care of making sure Amy had enough wood inside before he headed to work.  As soon as he opened the door, he knew it was much warmer today. 

He still wanted to bring in the wood and make a fire for her as she was sure to want one.  He dreaded going to work today, and it weighed heavy on his mind.  Surely they would make this day a day of remembrance like Martin Luther King Day or Presidents Day. 

It puzzled him how it could not have gained such a status and sometimes annoyed him that there were observed holidays for stupid things yet not to remember the fallen on this day.  ‘Maybe it is just that I don’t want to go to work that it annoys me.’ Laughing to himself, he fixed his lunch and headed out the door.

              The morning was the same stuff he had been doing for the past three months. 

He spoke hushed to his friend Lefty saying, “Hell man, you would think working on at army depot today we might get to at least see something interesting.” 

Lefty looked at him, saying, “You know, I was just thinking that.  It seems too quiet today, usually we see uniformed guys doing this and that.  Today, though, there is nothing, almost eerie.” 

John nodded and went back to his work thinking, ‘it
is
too quiet, and eerie was a good word for this day.’  He shrugged to himself and tried to look busy enough to get him through till lunch.

During lunch there was chat about the lack of activity on this date and some speculation, but John just had an uneasy feeling about it all.  Looking into his lunch, he could not help but wonder ‘What was I thinking this morning?’  Inside the cooler was a decent turkey sandwich, but he had also tossed in some random junk food.  There was some candy, a Swiss Roll, a baggie full of chips, and a yogurt drink. 

Lefty looked at his lunch and asked, “What happened to your lunch? Did a nine year old pack it for you?”

John just shrugged and said, “I was a little distracted this morning.  I usually put in some leftovers, not sure what I was thinking.” 

They both laughed and Lefty stole his yogurt drink, while John headed for the soda machine for something else to drink.  The rest of the day was more of the same, John was glad when it was time to go home.  He hoped Amy was cooking something good for dinner after the less than appetizing lunch he had.  He drove home in his usual mood, with NPR on the radio.  However, today he was barely listening to it, his thoughts were elsewhere.

Each day passed much the same and John was finally feeling better about the eerie quiet of the eleventh.  Driving to work a few days later he chided himself thinking, ‘I always get these feelings of dread, I should not let them get me all nerved up.’ Amy phoned bringing him out of his self-reprisals. 

Answering the phone he said, “Hi babe, what’s up?” 

She responded, “Hi yourself, you forgot I had a hair appointment today and needed the truck.”

Sighing, he said, “Be ready in five, I’ll be right back.” 

He had forgotten and now this was just one more thing to curse himself over.  He would be glad when this week was over.

“Has a remarkable opportunity arisen for President Putin to Bust the U.S. Petro Dollar and collapse the Criminal Banking System behind it?”

-Preston James, Ph.D.

September 14
th

John woke before the sun came up; he liked having some quiet time in the mornings.  He grabbed himself a cup of coffee and sat down to watch some news, this was unlike him, but lately he had been watching in the mornings.  For reasons he himself didn’t know, he felt better after the eleventh was passed, but still had this feeling he couldn’t shake. 

He always said, “The news is full of nothing but fluff and circus acts.”

He figured he would watch the circus for a bit before starting the day.  He had the day off and planned to make the most of it.

He was half watching the news and half thinking about what he wanted to do for the day.  He knew Amy had some plans but couldn’t remember what, he also knew he would catch hell for not remembering.  As he sipped on his second cup a line scrolled across the bottom that made him take notice.
“Financial markets are experiencing drop today in the wake of the OPEC announcement that the standard for oil sales will no longer be in U.S. currency, all oil will now be transferred in Gold.” 
He knew what this meant, although most Americans have no clue what the petrodollar is, he knew exactly what this meant…. Hyperinflation was on the horizon.

This changed everything he’d planned to do today, now not only was he feeling like something wasn’t right, he was sure something very bad was on the horizon.  His mind began to race, going through all the possibilities of how things could go down.  He found himself pacing through the house without direction. 

Most people would not think anything of this, but he had done a lot of research on the petrodollar and without the oil to back the U.S. dollar, it would crash, becoming nearly worthless.  Since going off the gold standard the only thing propping up the dollar had been OPEC and its agreement to trade all oil in U.S. currency.

John knew deep down, that coming soon would be something that was nothing short of disastrous. 

He scolded himself as he did often, “I’m not ready for this!”

Checking things off in his mind, he began his mental list of things he wanted to address.  “Cache” he thought, he had wanted to get that done this summer and had been putting it off.  The thought struck him like a truck when it crossed his mind, ‘Matt’s parents, I have to go over and see them.  I need to see what their situation is.’

John and Matt had been friends since middle school and he was close to his parents.  Often just strolling in around lunch time and helping himself to snacks while chatting with them.  He decided he would go over this afternoon, coincidentally right around lunch time.  He giggled to himself thinking how he would be going to check on them yet helping himself to lunch.

Heading to the barn he got out the fifty-five gallon drums, he had collected earlier in the summer that he planned to use for his cache.  Behind the barn was the chicken pen, he planned to bury them in the far corner of it.  With the chickens constantly scratching the ground there was no grass anymore, he figured no one would be able to tell something was buried there.

In one of the three drums, he planned to put fuel, he had wanted a diesel truck, but Amy insisted she wanted him to get “normal” gas.  She said that she hated the smell of the diesel and said she would not ride in it if he did.  Thinking about it, he felt it was a good choice as he would now be able to fuel all the vehicles without the need of different drums.  He buried all three of the drums without backfilling until he was done adding the contents.  The fuel drum he filled full which took a few trips to different gas stations with his five gas cans that each held 5 gallons. 

He then began to decide what he should place in the others.  He knew that a time might come when his guns could be confiscated so that was one thing he was going to consider for the non-food drum. 

The other was a food cache; he lined the drum with a large Mylar bag and placed 2 cases of freeze dried meals inside with coffee, sugar, powdered milk and chocolate.  He also added canned meats of various kinds and fifteen pounds of beans.  There was still room in the drum so he added salt and other spices and ten pounds of rice, topping it off with some flour and powdered eggs and a few jars of canned butter and peanut butter.  Not wanting to waste any space he poured a large bag of various packets of things he had collected from all his takeout food to fill the voids.  He sealed the bag and closed the lid taking care to make certain it was closed properly.

The final drum was non-food items he placed another Mylar bag inside, but only to make sure there would be no damage in case of leakage. 

He decided on fishing equipment, a net and some snares.  He added zip lock bags full of matches and lighters along with a whole box of heavy duty trash can liners. 

He opted for two of his Glock 19’s both chambered in 9mm and five hundred rounds for them.  He also had a 12ga that he had picked up at the flea market and two hundred-fifty rounds of bird shot and another hundred of double ought buck.  Finally, John added his old .22, and five hundred rounds of ammo for it. The gun had been a gift from his grandfather when he was nine years old, and held a special place in his heart.

Standing back looking at it, he knew he could get still more into this one, so he decided on a hatchet and camp saw.  Not knowing what else he could add he began to walk about just looking at different things when it hit him, “Water” he said out loud. 

Searching through his closet, he found what he was looking for, he had purchased some time back a Katadyn portable water filter, and it even had two replacement filters for it.  As he was headed back to the drums, he remembered his other Med kit and decided to add it as well.  Feeling fairly content with his caches he added random smaller items.  These consisted of some silver coins, five bottles of varied liquor and a few flashlights along with spare batteries. 

Once filled and all were sealed he completely covered the drums and spread the rest of the leftover dirt around the chicken pen.  He rolled it with a large, heavy roller he used to mash out the mole trails in the yard; I worked well to pack it down.  Afterwards he spread some chicken scratch around to get the chickens moving about so it would look like it usually did

Heading to the house to clean up, he asked Amy if she wanted to go over to Mark and Renee’s with him. 

She said, “Babe, you know I always go out with the girls on Fridays.” 

John replied, “I know that there sassy pants, I just didn’t want you to think you were not invited.” 

He winked at her as he did his best strut into the house.  Watching his strut, she laughed, and shouting out after him, “Oh yeah, shake that sexy ass.”

He laughed as he headed for the shower, he loved her playful banter.  Driving the five miles over to Mark and Renee’s he considered what he might say.  They had always thought he was just a little bit “off” where his thoughts on things like this were concerned. 

He decided he would just try and play it off light, as though it might cause some disruptions and make sure they go do some food shopping.  While there he would look around and quietly assess their situation and get Mark to go out and fill the tanks on the vehicles.

John walking into the house went right over and grabbing a soda from the fridge, sat down in his usual seat.  Renee, true to form, started making sandwiches for the guy’s lunch.  John knew Mark always came home for lunch around eleven o’clock and would time it just right. 

Laughing Renee said, “We were expecting you today, being your day off and all.” 

Mark and John both laughed, while John winked at her and gave her a kiss on the cheek saying, “You know me well, mom.”

John talked with them a while about things and felt confident they would take his advice, at least for now.  He and Mark went and filled the tanks in both vehicles and picked up a few items from the hardware store.  This gave John a chance to talk to Mark about things. 

He explained, saying, “Mark, I know you and Renee think I am crazy sometimes, but something isn’t right about all of this.  I know you know what OPEC is but if the world goes off the Petro-dollar we are in big trouble.  It wouldn’t hurt anything to do your grocery shopping tonight instead of waiting till Sunday would it?” 

Mark agreed to head out to the grocery store this evening just to appease him.

While they were chatting John got a text from Matt that said, “There is going to be an announcement on TV, you need to check it out.”

John texted back telling him they would watch.  John and Mark headed into the house to put on the afternoon news.

John, waiting to see something other than a circus show said, “You know Mark; the news of OPEC this morning was pretty big.  This is all going to cause our money to crash.” 

Mark just nodded with his usual dismissal of things John would say.  John knew he was being dismissed on the subject and left it alone for the moment.  Renee had brought them both a cup of coffee while they watched the news. 

Mark looked at John and said, “The weather sure has been cold for this early in the season, now they are calling for snow already.” 

Mark nodded just waiting for whatever Matt had wanted him to see.  The news was almost over when the anchor said, “
In financial news, a cyber-attack against the banking industry today has caused some computer glitches in the system.  At the close of business today all systems will be offline until Tuesday morning. This bank holiday will allow programmers to correct the problems with the computers over the weekend.”

John hopped up from his seat exclaiming, “I didn’t think it would begin this soon.  Mark you and Renee need to go to the store now and pull your money out of the bank!” 

Mark, waving him to calm down said, “Why would I need to do this, don’t worry so much the banks are insured.” 

John replied, “Listen Mark, if I’m wrong and God help us I hope I am.  Then you can just go put it back in on Tuesday right?  Please, Mark just this once trust my conspiracy theories.  What harm will it do to take it out and put it back in if everything is ok?” 

Mark had never seen John so adamant, so he agreed to do as he asked. As they were all getting ready to leave John told them, “Listen, try and get things that won’t go bad if we lose power or anything.  Plus, if you buy extras it won’t take up too much freezer room.” 

They agreed and each went their own way to take care of what they had planned to do.  John admonished them to not talk to people about anything or they might find others looking to dig a little deeper and he did not want anyone questioning anything.

Chapter 4

“In the midst”

“There are only nine meals between mankind and anarchy”

-Alfred Henry Lewis

John and Amy’s checks were direct deposited into their account and he wanted to withdraw all of their money.  He did not, however, wish to drain the accounts and cause a red flag to go up.  They had a number of accounts so he began with the smallest credit union, they were pretty chummy with the tellers there and he decided to empty all but a hundred dollars in that one. 

He went into the bank and filled out the withdrawal slip, taking it to his favorite teller he started making small talk. “Hi Sharon, how ya doing today?” 

She replied in her usual cheerful tone, “Sure glad it is Friday.”

He nodded and said, “No rest for me this weekend, I’m finally going to be getting that new barn.”

She looked at the withdrawal slip and said, “I thought you needed to save up more than this to do that.” 

He just winked at her and said, “My buddy Matt is going to loan me the rest so I can get it done before winter.” 

Counting out the cash for him, she wished him luck with it and he waved as he was going out the door.

He was practically dancing at how easily he had fabricated the story for her. Smiling to himself, he thought, ‘Well, I’m not really full of shit.  I was saving it for the new barn.’  While driving to his other bank, he wondered how he might pull most of the money without questions.  Many things went through his mind about it; this was a much larger bank and often asked questions about large withdrawals.  I was not unusual for him to do so to pay taxes or other things so he hoped he would not have too much to explain.  As he approached the line a lady cut right in front of him, with bleach blonde hair and 4 inch heels brandishing her designer purse like it was a trophy.  She was demanding everyone wait on her immediately, saying, “I’m in a hurry, so can we please get this place moving?” 

John was irritated with her, she had no apologies for her actions just pushing everyone around.  He got to the teller and said, “That was probably the most irritating thing I’ve seen all day, that woman was a piece of work.” 

The teller agreed while John continued, “I don’t know where she thought she was more important than everyone else.” 

The teller replied, “She’s always in a hurry and I’m just thankful it wasn’t my line this time.  She’s always demanding something and being rude to us tellers.”