Free Charlie's Requiem: Democide by Walt Browning, Angery American

ground?”
    “We made them lightning proof. At least, that was the excuse we were given. I thought it was some middle management ass-wipe that got a bug where the sun don’t shine. But, that wasn’t the case.”
    Parkway moved even closer to John, leaning into his ear.
    “It was the feds,” he whispered. “The federal government mandated it, at least that’s what my supervisor told me.”
    “That doesn’t make any sense!” John replied. “Why would they care about Orlando’s lightning problems?”
    “Exactly what I thought at the time. But who am I to argue with the powers that be? So we did it. Took us almost four weeks to finish. It didn’t make any sense ‘cause the summer storm season was coming to a close. But when is the government ever prone to logic?”
    John chuckled. “Agreed!”
    “It didn’t make any sense, that is, until now.” Parkway concluded.
    “Why now?” John asked.
    “Because,” Parkway finished. “If we hadn’t grounded and protected all this stuff, the city would still be without any hope of power.”
    “You mean to tell me…” John started.
    “Yeah. When we grounded and protected the capacitors, transformers and other equipment from a lightning strike, we also protected them from the EMP.”
    With that, Parkway raised his right eyebrow as if to say “ Quite a coincidence” , and walked back to his men, leaving John standing there with a lot more questions than answers.

Chapter 7
    “In a time of War, where every man is enemy to every man… the life of man (is), solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”
    -Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan
    J orge peered under the stalled Explorer, looking down the trash-filled street ahead. A young woman, hardly a teenager if not younger, sat on the right curb in front of a modest concrete block home. She seemed lost, her hair pulled back in a futile attempt to appear presentable. The grime on her face was camouflaged by thick makeup that, even fifty yards away, looked too heavy. It gave her a desperate, trashy look that set off some alarm in the back of Jorge’s mind.
    Ever since last Thursday, when the power died and the Delta jetliner crash-landed in the lake in his backyard, the world as he knew it ceased to exist. Things turned upside down in a matter of seconds. His new home, career and plans for the future had gone up in smoke.
    Watching the Airbus jet land on top of the water behind his house was just the beginning. When Jorge reached the “crash site,” he was greeted by over a hundred passengers who were just as bewildered as him. The pilot, Kevin Stillwagon, had masterfully set the metal bird down; and in a stoke of good fortune, their left wing settled next to a dock. All the jet’s occupants, having exited down the wing onto the dock, were amassed in the back yard of a 1950’s concrete block mansion. The elders in the group had taken seats on the patio furniture that was now a makeshift airline gate. With no one at home, the group sat bewildered, waiting for the plane’s crew to tell them what to do next.
    Jorge offered little information to the pilot and his staff, other than to confirm their location. The captain did explain his theory about an electromagnetic pulse causing the power outage. Linking the loss of power in the jet to the loss of power on the ground, Captain Stillwagon surmised that no one was coming to help them. With dusk settling, and after some discussion, the entire group decided to walk to the airport. Like some modern day Trail of Tears, the collection of tourists, business people and uniformed airline employees all snaked their way east toward Orlando International Airport. Fortunately, it was only a few miles away, but several of the oldest in the crowd were assisted by a couple of wheel chairs that the captain bravely salvaged from storage compartments in the front of the still-floating plane.
    The sound of the group’s departure still haunted Jorge’s memories of their early evening exodus. Everyone