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Check out the Survival Monkey Forums... This is the ongoing list of chapters of Lights Out: these are hosted here with Permission from Halffast. enjoy! And the complete work by Halfast
Here's a teaser for the Lights Out noobs...
Lights Out “Damn it!, he exclaimed. Mark Turner didn’t curse often, but he was pissed. It wasn’t the fact that the lights went out that upset him. They did that three or four times a year in this older industrial section of town. What bothered him was the fact that the UPS unit hadn’t kept his computer running this time and he had lost over an hour’s worth of work. He picked up the phone to call computer support to bring him a new UPS and dialed their number with the help of the dim glow of the emergency lights. Nothing. He hung the phone up and then picked it up again, putting it up to his ear this time. No dial tone could be heard. “Crap!”, he thought, “What ever happened took the phone system down too.” Mark stepped out into the hall and some of the other accountants were already there. “Hey, Mark.” “Hey yourself, Jim.” Jim Davis was Mark’s closest friend at work. No one could have guessed it by looking at them . They were complete opposites. Jim was six foot three, 215 pounds and had super jock written all over him. Mark was barely five foot nine, 185 pounds, and starting to go bald. Despite holding a black belt in karate and being a pretty good runner, he looked like a computer nerd. The two of them had spent countless weekends together hunting and fishing much to the chagrin of their wives. “What’s the matter?”, Jim asked. “Oh, it’s just that my UPS went bad and I lost a bunch of work.”, Mark answered. “That’s strange, my UPS went down too. Maybe they bought a bad lot of them. Well, hopefully we’ll get to go home early with the power out and we can worry about it tomorrow.” “Now, Jim.” Mark said looking over the top of his reading glasses with a sadistic smile. “You know that company policy says that we have to wait 30 minutes before we leave to see if the power comes back on, and you know that it will in 29 and a half minutes.” “Yeah, I guess you’re right.” After five or ten minutes of discussing the upcoming football season, the guys were interrupted by Suzy Smith, the office worry wart. “Something is really wrong!”, she said. “No joke.” Jim replied. “The power went out again.” “No.”, she answered, oblivious to the sarcasm, “It’s more than that. I went out to my car to listen to the news to see what happened. The radio won’t work and the car won’t start either. So, I pulled out my cell phone to call my husband and it’s dead too.” “Probably your car battery is dead and the power outage knocked out all the close cell sights.” Jim said. “I don’t thinks so. The car will turn over…it just won’t start, and my cell phone is D,E,A,D, dead and I charged it up last night.” “Let’s go take a look at your car.” Mark suggested. When they got outside Mark noticed that there wasn’t a cloud in the sky and it was already starting to get warm outside. “Man”, said Mark, “It’s not even 10 o’clock yet and it’s already hot.” “Yeah”, Jim replied with a big smile, “That’s what I like about South Texas… you never have to wonder what the weather is going to be like in August.” When they got to Suzy’s late model Mustang, Mark asked her to pop the hood. “Now, try and start it.” Suzy turned the key and the motor turned over but would not catch. “See what I mean?” Suzy said mostly to Jim. Mark reached down and pulled a plug wire loose and held it close to the engine block. “Try it one more time, Suzy.” Suzy engaged the starter again. “OK, Suzy, that’s enough.” “What’s wrong with it?”, she asked. “Well, I don’t know exactly why, but you don’t have any fire.”
“What do you mean?” “You see, you only need two things for an engine to run…fuel and fire. Gas and an electrical spark to ignite it, in other words. And, you don’t have any spark.” “Why not?” “I don’t know, Suze, I’m just an accountant.” “Look at that!”, Jim shouted pointing to the north. There were four distinct columns of smoke rising into the air. Three were in the direction of the airport and one was further to the east. One of the columns, the one that looked closest to the airport, was significantly bigger than the other three. “I’m thinking that Suzy is right. Something IS really wrong!”, Jim exclaimed. He looked at Mark, “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” “E M P?” Jim nodded his head. “What’s E M P?”, Suzy asked. “It stands for Electromagnetic Pulse.”, Jim told her, “It is a byproduct of a nuclear explosion and it knocks out electronics in the blast area.” “You, you, you mean we’ve been nuked?”, Suzy stammered. “Let’s not jump to any conclusions.”, Mark advised, “We obviously haven’t taken a direct nuclear hit or we wouldn’t be standing here. Jim, go try your car and I’ll try mine.” As Jim walked toward his car, Suzy followed Mark to his Jeep. “Well, if it’s not EMP, what else could it be? Oh, God, this is bad. I have to get home. What if we were nuked and we just don’t know it yet? What if…” “Suze! Calm down. We don’t know enough to even guess what going on and panicking is not going to help no matter what.” Jim tried the Jeep, but just like Suzy’s car it would turn over but not start. Jim had hoped that since it was a 1978 model and didn’t have a computer that it would be okay. “My truck won’t start either.” Jim said as he walked up. “What do we do now?” Suzy asked.
“Let’s go back to my office and see if my portable radio will work.” Mark answered. When they got to Mark’s office he opened his bottom desk drawer and pulled out a small radio. He turned it on and all they heard was static. “Well at least it comes on.” Jim stated. “Why wouldn’t my car radio work?” Suzy whispered. “If we got hit by EMP it probably burned out your car radio, but this one may have been protected some by the building and by Mark’s metal desk. Try 1200, Mark.” Marked rolled the dial to 1200. ……is the Emergency Alert System. Please tune to 640 AM for further instructions…This is 1200 AM, broadcasting on reduced backup power…This is the Emergency Alert System. Please tune to 640 AM for further instructions…This is 1200 AM, broadcast…. Marked spun the dial to 640. ….five minutes. This is the Emergency Alert System. Please stand by for an important announcement in five minutes. This is the Emergency Al….. Mark turned the volume down. “I guess we’ll know what’s going on in five minutes.”, he said. As word got around that Mark had a working radio, his office began to fill up with people asking all kinds of questions and telling everyone what they thought was going on. When his office could hold no one else, Mark suggested that they all go to the break room. People kept pouring into the break room. After five minutes, Mark turned the radio up. ……Ladies and Gentlemen, the Vice-president of the United States. My fellow Americans, as you know, 27 minutes ago the power went out. Also affected were most of the communication and transportation systems in the continental United States, most of Canada, and parts of Mexico. This seems to the effect of a large EMP burst. We are not sure at this time of the source of the burst and we do not know if was accidental, an act of God, or a malicious attack. We do know that the burst is NOT the result of a nuclear attack. I repeat, we have NOT been attacked with nuclear weapons. As many of you know, the President and most of his cabinet were in route to his ranch in Texas on Air Force One. Since the burst, we have not had any contact with them. “Oh my God….the President is dead!” Someone in the room cried. “SHHHHHHH!!!” Many replied.
I am assuming command until we can contact the President. I am activating all of the reserve units of the military until we can determine the cause and source of the EMP burst. I am asking all of the state Governors to call up the National Guard to help local authorities until we can get the power back on. All off-duty police, fire, and emergency personnel should report for duty as soon as possible. I am asking all other Americans to remain calm and to try to get to your homes. Most of your vehicles will not run until the electronics have been replaced. If you have a running vehicle, please help your friends and neighbors to get to their families. FEMA will be setting up shelters in the major cities for those of you that can not get home. You can get information on these shelters here on these EAS stations, as it becomes available. Our first priority is to get the power, communications, and transportation systems back on line as quickly as possible. However it may take a day or two to get the power back in the major cities and the rural areas may take a little longer than that. Please stay in your homes and follow the instructions of your local authorities. I am imposing a curfew for all Americans effective at dark. This is an emergency that we Americans have not had to face before. I know that if we all pull together just as we did on September 11th, we will emerge from this stronger and wiser as a nation. We will keep you as updated as possible. Thank you for your cooperation and God bless. This is 640 AM. We will be back in a moment with a list of FEMA shelters for the city. Mark turned the radio off. “What are we going to do now?”, someone yelled. “Everybody just simmer down, now.”, Todd Rosenberg, the company CEO, instructed as he stepped up on a chair so everyone could hear him, “I would like to meet with all the department heads in the conference room in five minutes. Is Tom Baskins here?” “Right here, Todd.” “Good, Tom will you go see how many of the delivery trucks will run and then come to the conference room?” “On my way.” “OK…everybody else, please go out and see if your car will start. If it will, come back and give your name and where you live to Mark Turner here. If it won’t, don’t panic, we’ll find a way to get you home. Come back to the break room or go wait in your office and just relax…everything is going to be okay.” Almost every one made a mass exit toward the parking lot. “Mark, can you get a pad and write down where everyone lives whose car will run?” “Sure thing.”
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