When the first device was released, we lost most every bit of electronics that was powered up. Naturally, the bastards knew we would have the ability to turn on more, so they waited a full month before letting the next one go.
I had a layman’s knowledge of what electromagnetic interference could do before the wars, when airliners rained from the skies and electronics seized up like rusty old bolts…
Now, it simply doesn’t matter. Internal combustion, steam, hell even coal power are the norm again. I use a Savage 30-06 to hunt for food, and keep my land free of fools who still think their cellphones will come back to life.
“The satellites are still there!” They insist.
I don’t usually have the heart to mention the meteor showers that immediately followed the second device.
I’ve heard all of the scientific information about how there is no way anyone could have a device with enough power to do the job, but the fact remains… It happened.
The hardest thing for everyone now is not trying to win the argument, it is fighting to survive.
Fortunately for me, I have an edge. My father was a Marine. Not a Marine of the new millenium, thank you. A Marine from the mid-Twentieth. He fought fourteen wars no one ever heard of, then went to VietNam, three times. Then he came home to raise his kid. When I was eight, my old man took me to a pistol range… I learned how to shoot straight with a .22 before most of my friends had graduated from GI Joe with the Kung Fu grip. By then, I was also drown-proof, so said the United States Marine Corps lifeguards who trained children on the weekends at the base pool.