Read Breakdown: Season One for Free Online Page A

think.”
    And so he told him.
    It was, in his opinion, either an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) or a coronal mass ejection (CME). Either option was bad. The CME was marginally worse and farther-reaching than the EMP, depending on the strength.
    The phone call Thom had received from Andrew led him to believe it was an EMP, and Thom let John know his feelings. He looked like someone had punched him in the gut. “Was afraid of that,” was all he said before continuing.
    It was safe to assume that all non-shielded, non-military-spec electronics had been fried. That included most cars built within the last 30 years and pretty much anything that operated with the aid of a computer. If the outage was from coast to coast, millions of people would be dead within a few weeks.
    A panel of experts had estimated an event of this scale would kill 70%-90% of the population of the United States.
    Apparently, the experts also said it would take anywhere from one to three small yield nukes detonated about 300 miles above earth to wipe out the electronics of the entire northern hemisphere.
    Several thousand had died in the first minutes after the event, with hundreds of planes in the sky across the U.S. going down immediately. The fires would kill more.
    Next would be the old, sick, and weak. Anyone dependent on dialysis, life support, perhaps even pacemakers. The diabetics would last a while longer, but they, too, would eventually pass. Without a stable temperature, the shelf life of insulin would rapidly deteriorate.
    Within days, the water taps would run empty. Without a reliable, clean source of drinking water, folks would turn to other sources; water from the gutter, rivers, ponds, and streams, loaded with all sorts of bacteria and viruses. This, along with the lack of flush toilets, would lead to huge outbreaks of cholera and dysentery.
    Then the starving time would hit. Sure, the Midwest had already planted most of its wheat, corn, and soy for the year, but without the machinery to fertilize, irrigate, harvest, and transport, much of it would go to waste.
    Good news all around.
    Sometime during the talk, Talia came back and started to tend to Thom’s wounds. She started with his head and finished by unlacing his boots and treating his numerous ruptured blisters, even giving him some moleskin bandages to cushion them.
    They offered to let Thom stay the night, but the more they talked, the more he realized that he should be on his way. The real trouble would start soon enough. John told him that most folks have less than a week’s worth of food stored at their houses, so Thomas knew he needed to get out of any highly populated towns before then.
    Talia put together a small care package for him, including some thick hiking socks, a refill of his camel pack with nice clean water, and an honest-to-goodness MRE that would provide nearly 2,000 calories, along with a couple of sealed Mylar bags of beans and rice.
    “I’d ask you guys to come with me, but it looks like you’ve been planning for something like this,” Thomas said.
    “Something like it,” John agreed. “Started soon after we had the emergency training at the department. Knew that if I wanted to help anyone, I’d have to take care of my family first. Once I felt I had that covered, I started putting ‘care packages’ together for the neighbors, like those beans-and-rice bags. They won’t last forever, and it’ll take some cooking to get them soft, so go hungry if you think there’s danger nearby. A hungry man will smell food a long way away.” He took a sip of his milk and continued. “This world is going to need good men now more than ever, Thom. You get to your daughter and be one of those men. I started planning with my neighbors about a year ago. The folks on my block are mostly prepared. We might pull through. Going to make a go of it.”
    Thom nodded.
    “If you guys need to get out of town, I’m headed to Jackson Nursery, south on 63 from Columbia, about 30