Neighbors
and tools to do one thing to do that, while the rest did whatever they could to help and perform other tasks.

The shelter was completed two weeks before Thanksgiving of that year. Just about the time the snows started. Snow wasn’t unknown that early in the year, but never had there been a blizzard that early in living memory.

There was much speculation that the several years without evidence of sunspots was an indication of reduced solar radiation, and the cooler than normal previous summer and the hard winter that was setting in.

It wasn’t really certain that the community would have celebrated Thanksgiving Day in the shelter, had the conditions not been so bad, or not. But the fact was that during the last meeting, which was now taking place in the shelter, the idea was brought up and seemed to develop on its own.

The families outside the cul-de-sac that were now a part of the community were contacted and invited. They all attended, as did the residents of the cul-de-sac, the first time some of the people had met the others.

The day acted as a basic test of the facilities, and they were found to be adequate, but definitely not luxurious. An immediate need was discovered. The babies and small children needed an area where they could be taken care of and kept entertained during active times, separate from the rest of those in the shelter.

But the day went well, and everyone headed home after the day’s activities, to catch the ends of the football games and other regular Thanksgiving Day activities. A couple of people stayed behind to help Hank clean up, but he quickly sent them packing to enjoy the benefits of American life during a holiday.

The work done, Hank shut down the generator and walked through the dark, silent shelter, using one of the dozens of wind up flashlights that had been acquired for use in the shelter when the LED lights wired to a battery bank were turned off to conserve power.

He was smiling when he went home a few minutes later.

The weather was the main topic of news through Christmas and New Years. But things returned to somewhat normal conditions after that, leading toward a late spring. Then, civilization, as the small community knew it, ended.
     

CHAPTER TWO
     
    There was warning, of a sort, but it was all rhetoric by the leaders of half a dozen nations. Accusations, counter accusations, warnings and counter warnings. It was enough for Hank to move his stored sandbags to fill the basement windows and doorway, and cover the house floor over the shelter. Then, when it happened, it happened quickly.

Russia launched tactical nuclear missiles against the newly installed anti-missile defenses that the US had installed in Poland. That seemed to be the trigger for all else that happened. The US retaliated in kind. India and Pakistan attacked each other with their nuclear arsenals, China moved on Taiwan and the US intervened.

Israel was hammered by everything the Arab and Muslim coalition in the Mid-East could throw against them, including the thought to be a few years away nuclear capability that Iran had developed. There were additional nuclear devices used against Israel including suicide bombers driving nondescript vehicles with tactical warheads in the trunks.

But Israel went down fighting. All four-hundred plus of her nuclear devices were delivered to the enemy, three-hundred eighty-seven of them successfully.

At first, it looked like China would back off from the Taiwanese invasion, but when Taiwan not only defended its shores, but launched their own conventional missile attack against the Chinese troop buildup on the mainland; China began dropping nukes on the island, and the two US Fleets in the area.

Everyone with nuclear capability was drawn into the conflict on one side or the other. It was what had been feared since the beginning of the Cold War. Global Thermonuclear War.

Hank’s first knowledge of the start of the war was when his NOAA All Hazards Alert

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