The Final Battle V

The sudden whine of the EMP generators starting up brought Luke quickly back to reality. He looked at his watch – eleven o’clock. “They’re not supposed to fire these things ‘till midnight!” he shouted. He hurriedly found his walkie-talkie and pushed the talk button: “Eddie, Taz?” “What the hell’s going on?” “You guys there? Come in.” Taz’s static altered voice squawked out of the 1970’s era Radio Shack T/C 350 child’s toy. Not much for sound quality, but modern jamming equipment had no affect on it. “Yea, were here. Wad’a want?” Luke replied: “It’s a hour early, what’s going on down there?” “Relax old man” the static box shot back. “We’re testing the controls. You want them to work later, don’t you?” “OK” said Luke. “You could’ve warned us. You almost gave me a damn heart attack.” “Heart attack this” Taz replied. Luke knew Taz was holding his middle finger up to the radio.

The three returned to their seats on the logs. The boys had a good laugh at Luke’s expenses. Luke eventually joined in the laughter. Yea, it was funny. Him jumping around like a spaz. Fumbling around for the walkie-talkie. He knew the controls would have to be tested. But they could have warned him. Luke figured Taz had done it on purpose. After all, he did get his nickname from an old cartoon character. He made a mental note to return the “favor” at the appropriate time.

“All right students” Luke began. “Settle down. History class is back in session.” “After the credit card dilemma, we had millions of people coming over to our side almost overnight. We had to get organized, and fast. We now had the manpower to occupy and control large areas. Not just hit targets and disappear into the night.” “We also had a lot of hungry mouths to feed. The U.S.S.A. still controlled all of the shipping ports, so most of the imported food was going to Wall Street conglomerates”. “We decided to put our strength into controlling the borders to the North and South. That way we could bring food in.” “Once the borders were secured the ACF turned its attention to the vast farmlands in our country. People in the rural farming communities were glad to see us. They were getting screwed so badly, they had no use for the government anymore”.

Luke paused to fill and light his pipe again. After a few deep puffs he continued: “Now that we controlled the land borders and most of the in-country food supply, the government was getting nervous”. “They couldn’t get any rice or grains to export to China anymore. Most of the dry goods that China imported we managed to destroy in their warehouses. So the overseas countries started cutting way back on exports to the U.S.S.A. Besides, payment was getting spotty. Greenbacks were barely worth the paper they were printed on, and they weren’t having any of that credit card shit”.

The night sky above DC lit-up in brilliant flashes of miniature exploding suns. “Flares” said Luke. “Just some of the boys having fun. They want to make sure all of those bastards in DC are awake when the real fun begins”. “Wouldn’t want them to sleep through their own funeral now, would we.” Looking across the river they could see The National Mall, The Capitol Building, The Lincoln Memorial, all backlit from the flares. It was a majestic site. Luke picked up the bottle of Jim Beam a took a big swig. “Come on boys. Lets go down to the river bank and watch the fireworks”. Luke started singing “Oh say can you see, by the dawns early light…”