Eight months later
“Good morning, Eli,” Sammie said into the mike. “The colonel is still at the farm. I understand the farmers have found a safe stash of feed for our livestock. He wanted to see them off and ensure all were wearing their dosimeters.”
“Well, little lady, we would much rather hear your voice than his.”
Sammie laughed. “You sailor boys are all the same — a girl in every port.”
When he keyed his mike to respond, Sammie could hear others of the crew yelling, “Keep her on.”
“We wish. Can you hear the fellows in the background?”
“Yes, I can. Hi fellows.”
Before Eli could respond, another radio transmission blasted over the speakers. Beside her, Jack and Charlene grinned at the flirtation.
“Yes, stay on, ma’am.” The voice spoke in broken English.
“Who is this?”
Eli keyed his mic before the other station could respond. “Cool it, Zebra. We found her first.” He chuckled. ”Sammie, my people, hear your lovely voice around the world. This clown is in Africa. I had convened the network before calling you. Your father will explain. Please tell him that the net will reconvene at 1400 Zulu.”
“Will do. Bye fellows,” Sammie said in her broken Hebrew with an ornery laugh and a hint of feminine seductiveness.
“You made their day,” Charlene said. “I assumed you knew that you were talking to the network.”
“When I took the call, I thought I was talking only to the submarine. Are you aware of the new weather satellite that the Israelis put us on to?”
“Charlie told me. Your dad has been working with him to modify our electronics to download actual images of what the weather is doing around the world. I wonder why our country didn’t establish an intelligence network like the Israelis.”
“Why did our government not do a lot of things,” Sammie exclaimed angrily. “When it clipped NSA’s wings over the telephone intercepts, it clipped just about all our intelligence gathering capability.”
“The encryption unit and the Israeli network have opened our eyes to world events more than anything else. At least we now know what the bad guys are up to and can prepare accordingly.”
“I dread tomorrow,” Sammie said.
Charlene jerked her head around to look at Sammie. “Why? Are you talking about the shopping trip to Las Vegas? I would give my eye tooth to be going.”
“No, I’m looking forward to the shopping, if you want to call it that. Sergeant Griffin and I are providing security and will participate in the burial. We will recover the food and other essentials taken from here to base camp. After that, we plan to blow the entrance to the basement to make it a mass grave for our people. The chaplain is going with us to perform a service.”
“As I said, I wish I was going. The colonel said that both he and I must remain on post because we will have scrounging teams out of the mountain to bring in hay and feed for the animals in addition to the details on supply runs to Vegas.”
Sammie laughed and shook her head. “It is not going to be a shopping trip in a sense you are thinking. It will be more like a grabbing raid. Between now and winter, we plan to fill this mountain with feed for our animals and anything we can get our hands on for the rest of us.”
“Ray mentioned that we’re getting a train,” Charlene said excitedly.
“What?” Sammie’s surprise was evident.
“Out of a tunnel in one of the mesas on the Atomic Test Range. They have little trains that they used to carry the workers and supplies into the mesa back during nuclear testing. That is going to make it much easier for our people to live in this end and commute to the animal kingdom.”
Sarge bounded into to the annex to find Charlene’s’ son, alerting them of Bradley’s return.
“Eli called,” Charlene announced when he entered the annex. “He said the net would convene at 1400 Zulu.”
Both Charlene and Sammie’s stare demanded that he share details on the net. Their eyes remained on him even after he sat down.
“Ok, ok. I get the message,” he grumbled jokingly. “Israel and the United States had a history of sharing intelligence during the Cold War and even up to a couple of years before the EMP. When our Congress denied funding to NSA’s global phone eavesdropping program, they also whacked other programs in the interest of political correctness. This forced the various agencies to call in their intelligence collection personnel embedded around the world. The Israelis had a similar intelligence program, and that is the network in which we will now be a participant.”
“Wow!” Sammie said. “This sort of intelligence is priceless.”
Charlene motioned to the Israeli encryption unit. “Is that the reason we never knew of their transmissions?”
“Affirmative. It scrambles the transmitted signal and descrambles the incoming. It acts as sort of a repeater in that it transmits and receives at UHF outside the normal bands.”
Charlene continued looking at the encryption unit. “And the reason we are not receiving amateur radio transmissions?”
“Atmospheric conditions are partly to blame. Mainly because the Islamic radicals forbid any such activity and have eliminated anyone found with a radio —especially amateur transmitters. The ISIS militants are forcing 7th-century ways everywhere they can. As always, the various Muslim factors are fighting each other as well as any nonbelievers. Had the Brotherhood succeeded in gaining control of the dam and started their farms in Arizona, it would have been just a matter of time until the ISIS showed up to convert them.”
“And us?” Sammie questioned.
“And us. That includes any other bands of survivors such as ours. As more of the network stations check in, we are learning about other survivor groups such as ours. The embedded Israelis are reaching out to them. In time, we will be talking to other survivor groups. Most, like us, managed to acquire assets from military bases for their defense and survival. I understand that through mid-United States that there are several small groups in most cases occupying a former military base. I’m sure this means they have military members to pull them through as we did here.”
Bradley thought about this for a moment. “I don’t think we can judge other survivor groups by what we experienced here. In large part, our government planned our group to protect our advanced technology. The military was organized and mandated to protect not only what we have archived here, but also the VIPs selected by the government. Even with all our technology, we would not have survived without those we brought in from Beatty and the Amargosa Valley. I imagine most other survivors being groups who organized and prepared for such an emergency. Many would have had prior military training that helped by their knowing military equipment acquired by the group. The key to survival is preparedness and organized leadership.”
“Like the Mormons?” Charlene suggested.
Bradley shook his head negatively. “No. I am not against hoarding food and supplies but doing so as the Mormons did simply make one a target of those who did not. I feel it more important being knowledgeable enough to recognize such an emergency and timely reacting to it. Being prepared means having an organized group and having a means of escaping the masses of people. Part of the preparation is knowing where you can acquire any additional essentials, having a defensible venue to go to, and immediately going to that venue while you can.”
Sergeant Griffin entered the alcove. “Ma’am, we are ready when you are.”
Bradley laid his hand on his daughter’s shoulder. “Thank you, Captain, for doing this. We have too many in the field today for me to leave my post.”
“Understood, sir. I will perform the honors and ensure a safe return of our people.”
“I know you will. We will have you on camera and radio in case something happens. Make sure everyone is wearing dosimeters and make every minute count. Rad Safe is allowing six hours exposure today.”