A great earthquake destroys 85% of the world's oil supply, the automobile industry collapses and millions are thrown out of work. Martial Law is declared and freedom no longer exists in the United States.
The automobile industry collapses. Riots fill the streets of DEARBORN, CHICAGO, NEW YORK, TENNESSEE, and CALIFORNIA. Assembly plants are closed. Millions are thrown out of work and the country falls into chaos.
Martial Law is declared and the new order called, FLEDGLING ONE takes control of the country. Gas-consuming vehicles are banned. The penalty for committing a crime is immediate execution. There are no jails. They cost too much fuel to run and maintain. Private housing is banned. People are moved into government-controlled living quads, where power usage is strictly enforced. Everyone is a person of interest, and Employment Control keeps spy cameras trained on all workers of the state at all times.
To supplement the dwindling fuel supply coming from the south, the UNITED STATES declares war on MEXICO. And San Diego becomes a war front city. Disgruntled and rebellious reporter, Brick Sanders, and Tyra McCord, his beautiful photographer, work at KTIM, the federally-run television station.
Brick picks up a strange story from gas smugglers that run a drop line across the no-man’s land between the two countries. The Alaskan Pipeline has been blown up. The American war machine has ground to a halt. There’s a crazy Mexican general just south of the border. Someone is supplying him with guns and ammunition. He’s going to sack San Diego within a few days. Brick tries to break the story, but Colonel Cannon Leeds, the station director is a strict Fledgling One officer. The only stories allowed on the air come from the federal news control division of Fledgling One. And there is no such story on the line.
In desperation Brick and Tyra steal a jeep from the Federal motor pool. They have a machine gun battle with the guards at the pumps in Fuel Dispersal Center No. 2, and make a run for the electric fence that surrounds the city compound.
At the gate across Highway 101 Brick and Tyra have another gun battle with the guards. They break through and speed out into the countryside. The fence that surrounds the city not only keeps the citizens in, it keeps out the twisted, long-haired New Comancheros. The ground scroungers who roam the countryside outside the city. They rob and kill anyone caught out in the open country.
With the powerful Fledgling jeep, Brick and Tyra can outrun the scroungers and make it to the free southern states. The jeep speeds down Highway 101. Suddenly the jeep sputters and rolls to a stop. Brick and Tyra look to the side. A band of twisted scroungers with flesh-eating wolf dogs on leather leashes and long knives in their hands come down the hill toward them. Brick looks back over his shoulder. A bullet hit the fuel tank in the battle back at the gate. The gas is running out on the ground. He looks at Tyra, then down at the gauge in front of him. They are out of gas…
Excerpt
Saudi Arabia, January 9, 2034
A hook moon hangs in the predawn sky above the parched landscape dotted with oil derricks for as far as the eye can see. The first movement in the ground is subtle. The oil derricks shift then settle back down. Suddenly the great quake strikes. The ground heaves up like two waves crashing together. It rips apart, and forms a ragged tear across the land. Oil derricks topple pulling power lines to the ground as smoke and fire fill the air.
New York City, January 10, 2034
An announcer sitting behind a desk in a television studio looks away from the camera as the director signals for a commercial break. A girl, wearing horn-rimmed glasses, stops beside his desk and hands him an API press release. He skims it briefly, then looks back up over the desk and speaks as the camera comes back on.
"A pre-dawn earthquake that measured magnitude 14.5 on the Richter scale shook the Mediterranean Sea nations this morning. The quake, the largest ever recorded, toppled oil derricks and snapped power lines causing widespread blackouts in Iran, Iraq, Libya, and Saudi Arabia. Geophysicists at the U.S. National Earthquake Center in Golden, Colorado, say the quake has caused a ground fault that crosses the Persian Gulf, Saudi Arabia, and the Red Sea. The origin of the earthquake is estimated at only two miles underground and scientists predict massive aftershocks that could reach magnitude 9.5 on the Richter scale. The Red Cross and other relief agencies are warned to stay out of the area for at least twenty-four hours."
New York City, January 11, 2034.
A dark-haired female announcer looks into the camera and speaks.
"Scientists from Cal Tech were alarmed to discover that the Red Sea, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Persian Gulf, had all dropped their water levels by nearly a foot. Dr. John Desmond, a noted geophysicist from the University of Southern California, says the fault, which was caused by the massive quake, is clearly visible. He warns of even greater consequences if the three bodies of water continue to drain into the earth's core. The water levels of all bodies of water in the area are being closely monitored at this time."
Saudi Arabia - January 15, 2034.
A field announcer points at a visible ground fault that crosses the parched landscape and runs to the edge of the Mediterranean Sea. He then looks into the camera and speaks.
"Scientists were relieved today when the Mediterranean Sea returned to nearly its normal water level. The Red Sea and the Persian Gulf are slowly returning to their normal levels too. However, oil prices are expected to rise as pumping of crude through the Arab Emirates has been temporarily halted."
New York City - January 22, 2034.
A dark-haired female announcer looks away from the camera in front of her for a second as she is handed an API release. She reads it quickly then looks solemnly into the camera and speaks.
"Oil prices rose sharply to eight hundred and fifty-five dollars a barrel on the world market as the devastated Arab nations' loss of power stopped all pumping of crude for the last five days. Prices are expected to double again before pumping by the OPEC nations is resumed."
Beirut, Lebanon - February 14, 2034.
Sheik Abdul Kahlief Mohammed, wearing a white silk robe fringed in red, steps up on a pulpit and looks at the set of microphones in front of him, he blinks, and begins to speak in a strained voice.
"Five of our largest oil producing fields have gone dry only hours after pumping operations were resumed this morning… We are temporarily shutting down all operations until this problem is solved…"
New York City – February 15, 2034.
An announcer’s face looks out of a television screen as he speaks.
"The price of regular gasoline shot up to five hundred and fifty dollars a gallon this morning after reports that oil fields in Iran, Iraq, and the United Arab Emirates, began going dry only hours after pumping had begun. In an emergency session today, Congress overwhelmingly approved a bill to ration gasoline to three gallons a week. The price of gas is expected to climb to over six hundred dollars a gallon as gas-hoarders continue to buy at record rates."
Mexico City, Mexico - May 10, 2034.
A male announcer stands on the sidewalk outside the Mexican state house building. A sheaf of papers is handed to him. He scans it briefly then looks into the camera.
"President Williams of the United States, and President Alfonso Ramirez of Mexico, met today. It was the fifth meeting between the two presidents this year. After two weeks of negotiations an agreement was signed. It would allow the United States, along with Petroleos Mexicanos (PEMEX), to develop three wells in the southern Chiapas area and three more wells in the Bay of Campeche.
President Williams toasted President Ramirez and called the agreement a step toward greater understanding and friendship between the two countries. At the same time a group of more than ten thousand Mexican Nationals staged a demonstration in the streets outside the villa of President Ramirez this morning. The demonstrators carried signs saying, 'Down with Yankee Imperialists', 'No Oil for White Eyes', and 'Yankee Go Home'."
Washington, D.C. - July 22, 2034.
An announcer’s face appears on a television screen.
"President Williams has declared Martial Law throughout the United States as the bloodiest riots in the history of this country shake Chicago, Detroit, Dearborn, and other motor cities following the announcement by Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler, of the permanent closure of all their assembly plants."
The scene switches to a huge crowd of rioters racing through the streets of Chicago looting and burning buildings. The announcer continues.
"Thousands are reported dead and dying in the streets as rioting and burning continues."
Washington, D.C. - July 23, 2034.
President Williams, a thin white-haired man, steps up on a podium in front of a battery of reporters. A strained look crosses his face as he speaks.
"It is never a pleasant duty for the president of any administration to declare Martial Law for any segment of its people, let alone throughout the nation. But never before has any administration had to face the extreme problem which this administration has had to face. That is why I ask you, the citizens of this country, to cooperate with the military. The day of the automobile has come to an end. The days of wasteful misuse of energy has come to an end… Our California oil is depleted, but fortunately eighty percent of the oil wells in Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Tennessee were capped before the turn of the century. Many people have pointed at the development of biofuels, wind and solar power as the answer to this problem. These sources can support some of the needs of cities. But they cannot support the automobile industry, run the factories and power companies that supply light and heat to all the houses in America.”
The president blinked and paused a moment.
“If we did try to maintain the automobile and the private housing industry, it would cause shortages in grain to feed the pork, beef, and poultry industries. The cereal industry would collapse. There would be food shortages throughout the nation...”
The President looked away then at the camera again.
“Congress has placed before me a bill, which would form a new department of the federal government called the Oil Appropriation Committee. The committee's duties will be to oversee the proper distribution of fuel throughout the country. This can only be done by disbanding private housing. Living quads will be constructed where power can be closely monitored. It also federalizes all fuel-producing companies. I have signed the bill."
Mexico City, Mexico - July 25, 2034.
A male reporter stands in front of a warehouse raging in flames as he speaks.
"A pre-dawn sneak attack on the newly-constructed Shell Oil-PEMEX refinery in Campeche cost the lives of fifteen men and injured thirty-five others. Nuclear grenades hit storage tanks containing more than ten million gallons of refined gasoline. The fires at this moment are burning out of control. The Brown Berets, a rebel group of Mexican Nationals, are blamed for the action. President Williams has offered to send air support to help the Mexican Army Regulars now engaged in battle with rebel Mexican Brown Berets."
The announcer is interrupted as a young woman hands him a sheet of paper. He reads briefly, and then looks back at the camera.
"The Mexican government officially broke off diplomatic ties with the United States today when an XKE Star Fighter jet accidentally fired air to ground missiles into a freight yard outside Mexico City. One hundred and eighty civilians were killed. A battalion of Marines was sent to the South Chiapas area to protect United States' interest in the newly constructed oil fields. Heavy fighting was reported when Mexican Regulars joined the rebel Brown Berets in the fight against the Marines.”
San Diego, California - July 30, 2034
F.R.B.T. Newsroom(Federal Regulated Broadcast Television) - I looked up from the edited news brief in my hand as Paul Hansen, the announcer in the glass-enclosed booth to my right, checked his neatly penciled eyebrows. Paul didn’t give a damn about the real news that was going on out in the streets. He just liked his silver curls looking pretty. That way all the women in the audience got to wet their panties when he smiled at them.
Moving my eyes up to the right corner of the room, I looked at the surveillance camera mounted on the wall above Tyra’s desk. It made a buzz as it started its forty-five second sweep of the room.
I was feeling tight as hell and had to get out of here. There was a story out in the streets about some crazy Mexican general headed for the border. But Shlevert, the twisted little station guard, was hard on my tail lately. I had slipped by him a couple of times in the last week and Cannon the station director was threatening to have him shot. Hell with him, I needed Tyra to take him on a chase and get out of here.
The federal news copier in the corner to my left began to click. Dit. Dit. Dit. I sneered at the surveillance camera as I stopped in front of the copier and picked up the edited brief of what Fledgling One wanted the public to know. A droning, computer-modulated voice came out of the speaker box mounted above the hall door, blasting out the same bullshit I was reading.
"Pilots out of Thermond Naval Air Station flew sixteen missions against Mexican Nationals yesterday. It was an attempt to break the supply line to rebel bases outside of Tampico."
The metallic, computer voice abruptly clicked off.
Sixteen missions, who the hell did Blanchie think she was kidding? Sixteen missions hadn't been flown out of Thermond in over a week. I tore the sheet off the copy machine and walked back to my desk.
The security camera made a little whirring sound as it turned and picked me up again. Cannon, was probably watching me from his office in the restricted area. I looked at the camera and mouthed 'Fuck you’ and threw the brief down on the desk.
Tyra came into the newsroom with a handful of photographs and looked at me with those large green eyes that always made me feel warm all over. My eyes took in the whole picture as they moved down the chic gray business suit she wore. It fit well in all the right places and color-coded with the waves of dark copper hair spilling over her shoulders. Energy shortage or no energy shortage, I thought, some things are just as good as ever… I moved my eyes away because she was looking right back at me.
Turning to my right, I looked up at the second hand in the round clock on the wall above the glass-enclosed control booth. Let's see, it should take Shlevert about ten seconds to come panting through the door after Tyra.
Shlevert's title in the federally run station was News Orderly. It was his job to keep unauthorized workers out of the station director's office where the real news came in. The Juniper T-2-1 lightweight machine gun slung over his shoulder helped, but Shlevert had a perpetual case of the hots for Tyra. And he was at a constant trot behind her trying to get a hand in her panties. That gave me plenty of time to go down the hall and pump Blanchie, Cannon's dark-haired First Lieutenant Secretary. She didn't mind my reading the unedited briefs at all. Ten seconds later Shlevert walked into the office and leaned on the wall behind Tyra’s desk. Kind of slow, I thought.
A squadron of XKE Sky Hawks thundered in the sky overhead and rattled the window next to my desk. I looked out the window and counted four of the bat-shaped dark-blue jets streaking south toward the Mexican border. That was only the second mission today. I wonder if Blanchie was going to type up a release saying 'sixteen missions' were flown out.
The phone on my desk rang. I picked it up. "Yeah… yeah. That close?"
Tyra looked up. "What is it?"
"Bandits blew a gas storage depot just south of town."
"Which one?"
"Number Seven."
"That's the second one this month in that area," she said.
"Yeah, I know." I hit the intercom button to Cannon's office. "Number Seven just blew, Blanchie. We could use a driving pass." I picked up my notepad and grabbed my coat off the rack in the corner. Tyra slung a camera over her shoulder and was right behind me. We were out the front door and halfway down the landing to the press jeep.
Shlevert ran out the entrance above us and barked, "Halt!"
We turned.
Shlevert stood at the top of the stairs with the stock of his T-2-1 Flash Fire resting on the hip of his tight black Fledgling pants. His hate-filled eyes centered on mine.
"Your driving pass, please," he said coldly and held out his left palm.
"You heard me call in. Blanchie will give it to you." I turned and started down the stairs.
There was a loud metallic sound as Shlevert cranked a round into the chamber of his T-2-1. I turned back around. He brought the black hole in the muzzle up to just above my belt line.
"Your driving pass, please…" he said coldly and started slowly down the stairs with the gun pointed at my middle. He stopped two steps above me and twisted his mouth to one side. "Operating a federally-owned motor vehicle without proper papers is a crime punishable by death."
Tyra stepped in between us. "Shlevert, you heard him call in. Blanchie will give it to you."
"The papers must be presented to the Security Officer before entering a government vehicle… Get out of the way," he said evenly.
"Shlevert, don't…" Tyra said.
“Move,” he snapped.
I took a step back. Blanchie, with her cool gray eyes on Shlevert, opened the door at the top of the landing. She held out a driving pass in her extended hand.
"Here is their pass to operate a government-owned vehicle, Shlevert." Her cool timber cut through the mixture of voices as if nothing was happening.
Shlevert took the pass, then glared at me before he turned and started back up the stairs.
Professional Reviews
ForeWord Clarion Review
Dark Dawning: The Oil is Running Out
By Auguste Dinoto
It is 2034, and fighting factions struggle to gain control of dwindling fuel supplies in Dark Dawning: The Oil is Running Out, Auguste Dinoto's debut novel.
Catastrophic earthquakes in the Mediterranean Sea take out much of the world's oil infrastructure and drastically alter the lives of people around the globe, including investigative reporter Brick Sanders, who is living in California without air conditioning, fuel, or hot showers. Constant news feeds assure citizens that the United States government will take care of everything, but Brick sees something else happening on the streets. And it is on the streets that Brick and his photographer, Tyra, come to life. Their banter, which is sometimes playful and sometimes angry, expresses the sexual tension that runs between
them. Their dynamic relationship keeps the story moving, as they try to make sense of both the official explanation of the ongoing war with Mexico and the rumors among their contacts that things aren't quite what they seem. With swagger and bravado, Brick narrates their narrow escapes from life-threatening dangers, including their search for gas. Dinoto shows Brick to be an authentic character, driven by morality and at the same time susceptible to the sex and drugs available everywhere.
A thriller with multiple conspiracies to unravel, Dark Dawning also travels into science- fiction territory. Genetically engineered creatures called Hubroos lurk around every corner, ready to do the bidding of the government agency that created them to keep citizens in line. Dinoto offers quasi-scientific explanations for his story's worldwide disaster, citing an unimaginable earthquake with a Richter-scale reading of 15.5 that has caused the oceans to begin to "drain to the earth's core." It is hard to reconcile the level of destruction such an event would likely cause with the continuation of the mundane, such as television news broadcasts. If mass media still exists, then why does the news outlet use film cameras, rather than digital cameras? Perhaps this technological regression, along with elements like the return of the human-powered rickshaw, is meant to demonstrate the degree of change in the world.
At its heart, however, Dark Dawning is a suspense-filled adventure, not a science-fiction novel. While Brick's frequent psychedelic interludes and typo-ridden speeches slow the pace at times, the cinematic action near the end of the book rekindles the suspense: Dinoto's ricocheting bullets, exploding gas tanks, and horizon ablaze with bright orange fire will appeal to any reader intrigued by Hollywood-style adventures. The heroes are on the move just in time, with a variety of evils at their heels. Dinoto seems willing to sacrifice any character at any time, which keeps the reader guessing to the last page.
Her grandma always said she had “the blessing”, and to always use it for good, but sometimes there is shame in fame if a person can’t handle it. Don’t let the Boo Hag ride ya
Forced to put the schooner Heimdall into dry-dock for repairs and modifications, the crew chooses to holiday in Southern Utah so they can rendezvous with the Professor, a brilliant confidant from Rabat. What he shares at the summit stuns the crew and
