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Darkness Descending
From Eve’s Journal: April 16, 2030

From Eve’s Journal: April 16, 2030

Six cities were shut down this week, Dear Journal.

Phoenix, San Diego, San Francisco, Boise, Portland, and Denver. They slammed the digital doors on all of them. Cars trying to leave were deactivated five miles outside of the towns and everyone inside was reportedly taken to some “processing facility” outside Bullhead City.

In Denver and Boise, it was the farmers who started the trouble.

Denver has definitely been skimming off the wheat supply, and the farmers in Idaho have been ordered to keep their mouths shut about it.

One poor bastard was found in Boise swinging from the town hall gazebo with his tongue cut out.

Damn near everyone in that 15-minute monstrosity gets bussed to one wheat farm or another. The ones who aren’t farmers are accountants.

The anon boards lit up over that one. The farmers were carrying actual pitchforks down Main Street when they cut the internet off.

In San Francisco, San Diego, and Portland, it was all about the latest energy equity adjustment. Who says big government doesn’t have a sense of humor? They just shut the lights off.

All of them.

They’ve all been dark for going on three days now. And for every night the protests continue, every household will be docked fifty bucks for preventing the businesses and schools from “safely” opening.

Phoenix… Phoenix was something completely different.

Some crazy bitch went on a stabbing spree.

She was walking down the middle of the street in her underwear, stabbing anyone she could with a corkscrew.

Witnesses say she yelled “Repent!” right before burying it into somebody’s back.

When the drones caught up to her, she plunged it into her jugular.

The city was closed pending an investigation, grief counseling, and an independent study to explore red flag restrictions on kitchen utensils. Internet access has been restricted to approved family-friendly sites,

It’s “out of respect for the traumatized town,” a spokesman said, “so they can start the healing process.”

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Bullshit.

The woman was an Inclusion Officer. They don’t want anyone shaking up that hornet’s nest.

Luka is trying to follow the money trail on the wheat scam. Her gut is telling her Denver isn’t the only hub holding back on their district.

She’s not quite showing yet. She figures she’s about four weeks in. But she is glowing. And morning sickness is starting to kick in. Seems the only things she can keep down at the moment are strawberry yogurt and frozen waffles. Patty’s concocting some kind of tea for her. Not gonna lie. The smell damn near made me gag.

Luka’s a natural-born digger, though. If something’s going on with that food chain, she’ll find it.

I’ve been trying to hunt down the other groups like ours, the ones Gabe’s crew have been “nudging.”

It’s a needle in a haystack gone haywire.

Even as I write this, faithful journal, I know, on some level, Gabriel is watching me. He sees these words.

I know you see these words, Gabriel. You always have.

We need to know who we can count on. We need to be able to share information.

If you can’t tell me who they are, then at least point me in the right direction. We need to find each other.

If the other groups are like ours, they’re a bunch of nobodies. Nobodies who are probably just as good at flying under the radar as we are. If they don’t want to be found…

But they have to want to be found, right?

If they know what we know, then they know we need each other.

I guess a Bat Signal is too much to ask?

The foundation’s damn near ready outside. I can’t believe how fast they got it leveled and framed up. Donnie says they’ll have the walls up and be ready for the big pour on Thursday.

Chet’s seen a couple of inspectors cruise by, but so far, no one has stopped.

Pretty sure that’ll change when they bring the cement trucks up.

I’m trying not to feel like there isn’t an anvil hanging over our heads 24/7.

People are feeling it all over.

You can almost smell the fear simmering, even up here.

In town, everyone is looking at each other like they saw a UFO and are too afraid to ask if anyone else saw it, too. Instead, they just grin like wallflowers and mumble something about how glad they are they aren’t in a city.

I keep expecting the Ghouls to try and run us mountain folk out of here.

Brady said they don’t need to. They know where folks like us live. As long as we’re not poking holes in their smart-city bubbles or looking for a government bailout, they can afford to leave us alone for now. As best as he can figure, the Ghouls have already silenced us online and we’ve all but cut ourselves off from the new world order.

In a very real way, people like us have neutralized themselves.

He said they’ll come for us later, when we’re more of a threat to them. They won’t come in shooting. They’ll just close down the highways and wait for us to either starve to death or freeze.

They are either really patient or really ignorant.

I don’t know of anyone else around here that’s doing what we’re doing, but people are prepping for something, even if they don’t know what it is.

Steve was at the lumber yard and said the garden section was all but picked clean, and a ton of stuff is on backorder. Vandals have been tearing up Rail Road Flat and Pine Grove, and now there’s talk of forming a volunteer patrol group to keep an eye on things around here.

It goes without saying, they’ll all be armed to the teeth, and half of them will probably be drunk.

Course, none of that will matter if the bombs start flying or the grid goes down, which makes worrying about any of this feel pointless.

I think I’m numb to almost everything.

I’d rather feel horrified or pissed off or … something.

But I’m just numb. I’m going through the motions, getting shit done, and it’s like I’m totally dead inside to the slaughter that I know is coming.

I’ve accepted it the way I accepted Tax Day and Daylight Savings. Either I’m in some sort of dissociative daze, or I just don’t give a shit.

God help me, I’m not sure which is worse.