Bump and...
The Fall- January 2036 "…and now the top story of the night. Officials at the U.S. Department of Energy have announced that the Sharon-Harris nuclear power facility in Raleigh, NC has been granted permission to begin construction of the first nuclear fusion reactor in history. They have complied with all safety measures, including the construction of a 50 earth and stone wall that completely surrounds the plant. Officials say that this one facility could power the entire southeast for…… oh god….. this just in! A large meteor has impacted the Pacific. Reports indicate a tidal wave approximately one mile high is threatening the entire Pacific Coast…."
From the private journal of Dr. John Packard, Kennedy Space Center- If only it was one. In a few hours, the first impact will hit the Pacific. Projections show that the damage to nations bordering the ocean will be catastrophic, but the world could still recover from that one impact. Soon, they will find that the meteor is only one part of a much larger rock. Who would have thought that the comet would shatter Ceres or that the debris would head towards us….
I guess we’re lucky in that it will not all hit at once. While the debris will play merry hell with our satellites, it will take nearly a year for it all to fall and calculations show that the largest pieces should enter a stable orbit. God, the devastation! Civilization cannot, will not survive, but maybe humanity will. If only Congress has not slashed the last appropriations bill. Those power sats could have turned the rocks away…
After the Pacific strike, pieces of rock, some the size of baseballs others houses, peppered the entire Northern Hemisphere. Much of western society collapsed. Even the US with its mighty ability to deal with natural disaster could not begin to deal with the damage and loss of life. It did not take long for the cities to fall into barbarism as the food and water stopped. The South and Midwest of the United States seceded to avoid having to provide relief to the North and West and civil war erupted soon after.
In the Middle East, a brutal war began, and ended, in a few short hours as Israel, India, and Pakistan proved their nuclear capability. Few survived the nuclear exchange to see another meteor devastated the region.
China, too, suffered an attack as the Russians attempted to move south. The Russo-China conflict lasted for a few short months, until a scattering of small meteors ripped into the region.
The final rock fell in late 2036 impacting the Atlantic Ocean. While not as large as the meteor that fell into the Pacific, it had the same effect. In most areas, the ocean spread two, three hundred miles inland. However, the Outer Banks of North Carolina helped alleviate some of energy of that final strike…for a while, Raleigh, was beach front property.
Even so, the rains were incessant, and little sunlight broke lighted the devastated world. And it grew cool on a world gone dark…
Yet some hope exists. Already a group of heroes has appeared to help the people of this fallen world. Join them as they resume their adventures!
