A Distant Eden Page 0,3

it might take days. But Roman had chosen to live that far away for a reason. Today, that reason had reared its head.

As Roman backed out of his parking spot and slowly headed for the down ramp a figure suddenly appeared at his window, beating on it with his fist. It was Fred from the ninth floor, another employee that Roman had occasionally been on work teams with. Fred was in a panic, his face drained of blood. Roman stopped the truck and rolled his window down. Fred was almost yelling, “My car won’t start! I have to get home. Something terrible is happening. I have to get home. Would you take me home?”

There had once been a time where Fred wanted to car pool with Roman, because he lived just thirty miles south of Fort Worth, in Alvarado. Roman had declined.

Frustration apparent in his voice, Roman said, “The best I can do is drop you off at the nearest exit off the interstate. I don’t have the time to drive you all the way home.”

Fred looked at Roman as if he was unsure whether to believe he meant it or not. “Are you kidding? You couldn’t drive me the extra ten miles to my house from the highway?”

“No,” said Roman. “I have to get home and I don’t have time for detours. Sorry, but those ten miles for you are twenty for me, and you saw how congested the roads are. That could cost me hours. Of course, you can wait for another ride, but I don’t think there will be one. Ten miles from home is a lot better than forty. Your choice though.”

Fred got into the passenger seat and Roman drove out of the garage. The office was two blocks off the interstate, and usually he went straight south on I-35. Having seen from his office window that I-35 was packed with stalled cars –cars that went dead when their electronics fried and fuses blew—he decided to try the side roads. He was hoping for more maneuverability until getting out of town. Speed was not the issue.

For a while there was silence. Eventually Fred asked Roman, “What do you think is happening?”

Roman had enjoyed studying and discussing the various ways that a near extinction event could happen, and there were a number of them. There was the Yellowstone caldera exploding, Earth being hit by an asteroid, a new ice age, global warming, the steady comeback of diseases as they became drug resistant, nuclear war, a gamma ray storm from space, new diseases escaping, bio-weapons, bio-terrorism, swapping of the magnetic poles, plagues and more. At an early age, he found talking about them to be something to confine to family and close friends. Most people didn’t want to hear about the real possibilities that were outside their control. Some people looked at him kind of funny if he even brought the subject up.

But now that he was actually involved in one, he found himself reluctant to talk about it. He didn’t want to try to explain to Fred what he thought was happening. Besides, he doubted Fred would grasp it. The conversation would only be futile.

Roman was silent for a long moment—and then at last decided that it was best to prepare Fred as best he could. “I think it’s a massive solar storm. The evidence is pretty clear. Our cell phones aren’t working. My truck’s radio is not picking up any stations at all. A solar storm of sufficient magnitude to kill all power would block all radio signals, at least for a day or two until the worst of the storm passes. An EMP event could do it too, but the sky is clear of mushroom clouds and there were no blinding flashes.”

A pole mounted electrical transformer blew up as they drove by it. That was a bad sign; the storm was intensifying. Soon electrical wires would overload with induced electricity from the sun’s storm, blowing out transformers and setting fires. Roman explained that to Fred and said, “Buried pipelines will also carry large induced currents and heat up. The induced current will speed up corrosion at an astronomical pace, causing gas and oil leaks that—combined with the high voltage current in the pipe—will cause explosions and fires to erupt from the ground.” Fred just looked at Roman with numbness. Roman didn’t think he was getting through to him.

As Roman drove, he saw and heard other transformers blow and houses burning. Plugged in appliances, such as