Burning Skillet: Southern Fried Infrastructure (Grid Down Prepper Up Book 2) Read online

  Burning Skillet

  Ron Foster

  Alabama, USA

  © 2017 by Ron Foster

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN-13:

  978-1987564341

  ISBN-10:

  1987564340

  Printed in the United States of America.

  Acknowledgements

  1

  Fish Camp

  Whether it be man-made or natural, a disaster can happen at any time and there are times when things just seem to be happening all at once. Today was worse than yesterday, but maybe somehow it wouldn’t be as bad as they expected tomorrow would be. This seemed to be the small cabins occupant’s general consensus regarding the way their luck had been running.

  The small group of bedraggled bugged out fish camp survivors of North Korea’s catastrophic infrastructure attack sat huddled quietly around a small solar/crank/battery powered radio searching the static for more news. Radio reception was awful at best under the leaky metal tin roof of the cramped little one room clapboard cypress wood fishing cabin they were in. The noisy metallic din created by the rain pelting against the rusting corrugated steel sheeting made matters worse by making it hard to make out a signal as one of the party slowly dialed the set trying receive a new station. The rain had been coming down in buckets off and on for three days now and the tight living arrangements of the shelter and frustrations of not being able to get out to hunt or fish had everyone grouchy and on edge as well as actually slowly starving to death.

  “Carl you might as well take a break and give up fooling with that radio for awhile. We need to try to save on the batteries.” Travis said somberly watching the rain beating against the window pane.

  “I ain’t using up the batteries Travis. I got it set to crank power at the moment instead.” Carl retorted back while still fiddling with the radio’s dial looking for a strong enough signal to maybe hear something other than garbled voices or church music

  “Well I was going to talk to everyone about that power situation with the radio later on but now seems as good time as any I guess. That is if you want to take a break and leave it alone for a minute.” Travis replied attempting to put some calmness in his voice so his request didn’t receive any undue anger in return.

  The small multi-powered emergency radio had become a bone of contention and an object of jealousy lately amongst the group, even though by all rights it was known to be actually owned by Travis and his wife Tina. The only other portable radio they had on hand was a big old fashion world band affair that took D cell batteries that was found in the cabin gathering dust when they arrived and moved in. Their supply of D cells was very limited and now only reserved for the couple lanterns they used to light their primitive abode.

  Travis had gotten the big radio going using some D Cell battery adapters that took his rechargeable AA batteries but when two of his so called renewable energy devices failed to take and hold a charge the last time he put them in his little solar battery charger he informed everyone that practice was ended as far as he was concerned except for dire emergencies.

  “Ok Travis, what’s on your mind? You worried I am going to hurt the radio someway? I am being super patient with it and taking it easy on that little plastic cranking handle just like you said to be.” Carl said hotly.

  “I know you are buddy, I still wished that thing’s handle was made of metal but it’s not. That isn’t what I am worried about so much at the moment my friend What concerns me right now that I have on my mind is whatever kind of battery they got in that thing that the crank or solar panel charges has got to have some kind of life span of its own the same as those faulty rechargeable batteries and I don’t know what it is. There is no way for us to even get a look at what is in that radio without dismantling the entire thing and after losing those couple double A batteries that the manufacturer said supposedly could be recharged hundreds of times I am kind of freaked out on our powering it up often at all. I don’t remember seeing in the direction its number of times recharging capabilities.” Travis said eying the set like he could maybe see inside of it somehow.

  “Durn! I never even gave that aspect a thought, how the hell does a magneto thing of mah jig work anyway to produce electricity with a crank?’ Carl said looking aghast at their little lifeline of getting at least some news of the outside world that might now or any day from now have some kind of failure problem.

  “I don’t know but I wish I knew and as we all know it ain’t like I can just go get on the flipping internet and search around to find out some answers anymore. I have been thinking a lot on our communication problems or more to the point the lack thereof for some time and I haven’t really come up with anything much except for what we have already discussed to try to fix it. I have been picking my brain on hooking something up to a car alternator to spin it and make some juice but it just takes too much physical force to do any good. I need something easier to turn like a marine alternator or a treadmill motor to cobble something better or better yet find me a dang mechanic somewhere to help fix that aggravating generator we got attached to the house.” Travis said regarding everyone intently listening to him and formulating their replies best they could on a technology issue most were in the dark about Everyone but him and Tina had been suffering the withdrawals from having an operational smart phone within reach of or constantly in their hands all day before the grid went down and were still addicted in some ways to wanting to do something electronic like check the radio every few minutes as a new habit of sorts to replace them fooling with their cell phones.

  Steve and Beth`s old cabin had an ancient emergency gas generator hooked to it and Steve said he had a couple years back drained the gas tank out and winterized it the best he could before closing up the place but the old thing just wouldn’t start at all for them now. At first, they figured the mud dobber wasp nests and general dirt and grime that they had carefully cleaned off of its exterior was preventing it from operating, later after they had studiously cleaned it up some more, checked wire contacts and polished the spark plug contact with some foil they found all that work had been for naught. It just sat there tempting you to pull its starting cord in hopes of a miracle. The thing actually did hit once after a bazillion pulls of the cord but it had immediately died. However, that once had gave them a ray of hope that someday they would get it to run but because more advanced small engine repair was nobodies forte the effort to get it going was reluctantly abandoned for now.

  Carl still had about a quarter of a tank of gas left in that old Cadillac of his that they could have siphoned off and rationed to run it with but that wasn’t happening. So much for the first plan. Oh what a miracle that would have been if it had worked when they had first newly gassed it up! The cabin had a washer and dryer that could have been run off the generator as well as a water pump to suck water out of the creek for sewage but those two life necessities were reduced to physical drudgery and now evidently timing and the weather.

  Yes, there was indeed working indoor plumbing of a sort for comfort now at “Mad Max” which they had labeled as a nickname for their current living conditions but the cabins restroom was now delegated as the unofficial women’s bathroom of sorts for peeing and everyone’s number 2 had to go outside in inclement weather or otherwise.

  Buckets of water could be used to flush the cantankerous old porcelain edifice for times when they couldn’t go out at all like this monsoon they were experiencing. Thankfully their having access to a somewhat flushable toilet inside when it rained became a luxury inde
ed and made things more bearable. This meant they had a place to go to the bathroom if they needed to early mornings or late night in the cabin and its use for such was allowed upon these occasions. There was however only one bucket in the house and one just didn’t get it half full most of the time to flush the toilet properly so the user was required to warn everyone don’t go in there for a bit and take a refill trip to the creek to fetch more water to wash the waste away.

  A bunch of what you might consider older people with their own bathroom routines (Travis and Tina, Carl and Wilma, Steve and Beth plus the younger but still over 40-year-old man Slim all sleeping in one room upon occasion would find themselves competing for and quite challenged by the single attached restroom facilities that included a non-working shower stall that remained a good place to clean up with a wash cloth and bucket of hot water because it had its own drain and privacy,

  “Hey Travis, not that your prepper inventions or Frankenstein electrical experiments ain’t cool as the devil but I am going to remind you that my Cadillac isn’t junk yard scrap to rob parts off of. You still ain’t got around to putting my dashboard back together after trying to remove the radio and running it off my battery in here.” Carl said eying him for busting some of the dash’s plastic trim in his efforts of getting it out.

  “Hey that was a good idea and you agreed I could give it a try! I can’t help it that they put the danged antennae for the radio in the back windshield and the damn thing is so technical with its circuits and such it wouldn’t recognize a coat hanger as an antenna.” Travis said mumbling something about needing the impendence of a resistor or some other forgotten electronic knowledge that over complicated and nixed his efforts to get radio signals.

  “Whatever reason that it didn’t work the first go around you’re not taking the alternator or whatever it is off the generator to see if you can spin it with those sawed down PVC pipe blades you made for that wind turbine idea you been speculating on.” Steve warned wanting to keep his generator and Carl’s car intact until somebody thought of something better to maybe make the emergency power generator run.

  “No, I ain’t going there but I still say it might work for us charging a battery. You all remember that I am the only fool out here with a DC to AC inverter anyway to use them car batteries for something and we do have a working drill now thanks to me!” Travis said speculating on the rechargeable drill in the tool shed he had managed to get going and use for what he didn’t know yet.

  “I give you credit Travis for knowing something about most things but you are like a cat with a ball of yarn that loses interest and goes about its business after it has had its fun. I don’t want that generator sitting in pieces doing nothing if it’s just a minor fix or tweak it needs that we ain’t thought about yet or could maybe get someone to do later for us. So, folks let’s get back to the subject at hand and all of us leaving dismantling my Genny out of the picture until I say when. Travis what kind of invention or whatever it is you are proposing we need now to fix this communication gap we got going on?” Steve said as all eyes in the room centered on Travis.

  “I am pretty much out of any kind of new invention ideas, for that matter I am pretty much out of any kind of ideas at all to help us survive here without going out and finding some more supplies. I think the only choice we got now is go scavenging in town or by the beach and see what we can find that might be usable. We aren’t going to make it through this coming winter on our own unless we get some salt and all of us figure out how to preserve meat. You heard what the radio said last time we got a good listen to it about an early hard winter coming because of Solar Minimum.” Travis said referring to a somewhat cryptic weather advisory that a natural mini ice age might be coming that was possibly someway being influenced by various nations geoengineering their own weather.

  “I still can’t for the life of me wrap my head around that rather spooky news, if everyone knew that we were headed for colder weather why mess with making more rain and winds? Anyway, we have already ate up about half of all those wild weeds on the property we were supposed to be saving and drying for seed up in the rafters and we have already seen what being shut in here for three days with nothing to eat does to us. I don’t see that we have any other choice than some of us going looking for anything that ain’t nailed down that might be still left no matter how futile that effort maybe. Like Travis said even common table salt now has become a necessity for us, that particular item by the way I am sure we can find some of somewhere.” Tina said more than willing to take the risks of leaving camp and enduring the rigors and dangers of foraging in the dead town and deserted tourist beach front area 30 miles away.

  “I have got me a pretty good dose of cabin fever just like the rest of you all probably do I suppose so I am up for anything. I am more than dreading being cooped up here all winter and I am like you, it’s bad enough having to stay inside because of the weather but doing it without a way to have some kind of preserved food stored for the really bad days is going to be going beyond unbearable. It’s hard enough to catch a fish out there when they not biting and the weather is good in the summertime, trying my luck in the cold and wet of winter all day is going to require me finding some more suitable clothes than what I have right now.” Slim said pointing out once again he didn’t have any winter clothes with him to endure the hardships and dropping temperatures ahead.

  “What If I take Slim with me and Tina and we could spend a few days having a look around some empty buildings to scrounge? We should be able to scavenge some gas also while we are there on the coast for some future return trips.” Travis said remembering that someday there would be no gas at all to be had or worse case as time goes on any scrounge -able fuel would go bad eventually. Gas had a shelf life he insisted but it was much longer than what Carl thought it was who always dutifully added preservative additive to his stored gas for his lawnmower every year.

  “I guess that somebody needs to stay around here and guard this place from looters or squatters but who in the world would want it besides us is beyond me. I know there is fish in that creek and game in the woods but I will be darned if I don’t think somebody is upstream catching them all before they can get down this way.” Beth said still thinking the farm houses closer by might offer something but she agreed with the group that they were probably too dangerous to approach because the chance of survivors still eking out a living and surviving were higher there than the mostly abandoned spring break town they were considering searching through.

  “When was it exactly that you all planned on leaving for town for a resort rummaging run?” Steve said looking at Travis and Tina.

  “I would first consider when by saying that we could go ahead and leave now if it wasn’t for us having to hunt a place to spend the night at. Might be kind of difficult with us not knowing the conditions over there. Tell you what, I say that we should maybe spend the rest of today to sit around and talk about likely places for us to have a look at if anybody can remember the lay of the land over there. Anyone know of any likely places to search that might have been over looked by other people scavenging? Some place maybe not so obvious or off out of the way somewhere maybe?” Travis said waiting on the group to respond.

  “Let me think on it some today and then we will talk some more about it tonight. The rain thank the Lord finally looks like it’s going to let up on us for a minute so maybe it will give us a chance to get out and fish.” Steve said moving towards his fishing tackle stored by the backdoor and peering out the window.

  .

  2

  Postmaster

  Travis, Tina and Slim loaded up and got ready to head out on the road for town in the morning. A old phone book found in the cabin had proved to be a pretty good resource for speculation and finding leads to help to plan the trip, Discussion also took place regarding the various pros and cons of contacting anyone still living around the area.

  Everyone was most likely as bad off as they were but who knows. They had n
o contact with others at all and perhaps other survivors could help them in some sort of way. They themselves didn’t have anything worth trading and it was most likely no one had any extra food they would let go but this wasn’t a certainly. Perhaps there was other ways they could network together but no one could envision one off hand, still they should maybe make some effort it was decided. Approaching others could be downright foolish and dangerous Travis and Slim had objected. Wilma had come up with a pretty good idea about how to go about it though. She stated the obvious and said use the mail box. There were miles of country road dotted with rural country mail boxes on the side of the road. If the scavenging group saw an interesting house or situation on the way to town they could drop a letter in the mailbox. Just an introductory one for now…she had said and that started a huge conversation all through the night.

  Of course, the obvious objection voiced by Carl first was “Who the devil checks their mail box after an apocalypse?” It was argued that just putting up the “I got mail to be picked up.” red flag on the box wasn’t enough to draw most people’s attention very quickly in order to get someone to check it. Come to think of it no one had really noticed on the way down here if the mail had even run the day the grid had gone down or if a number of mail boxes were left with their red flags up.

  Now this unique take on communicating and possible problem solving took on a unique conversation life of its own. Why the possibilities to ponder were endless as well as the complicated possible problems they might encounter should they undertake it, but the concept had so many merits it had to be taken seriously and discussed in depth.

  First off what would the note or letter they placed in the box say anyway? “Hi we are starving, are you?” Beth had quipped humorously not liking the idea of the return address being their very own mail box. Carl had said they should cut up one of the extra bed sheets and attach them to the flags on the boxes to show the owners something was new and needed investigating. His wife agreed as a white flag was the universal symbol for truce or parlay and suggested the note should be used as a introduction to meet at a later time for trade and read the responses if any to try to gauge the senders intents.