C James

Wow, thanks Conner! Yeah, getting free time in that old plane was probably not the smartest move. LoL. I'm pretty knowledgeable on military hardware, so it wasn't hard. I knew basically want I wanted, and did some fact-checking on the 'net for a few things. The model of the radar on the F-15's for one, and the unit designation for the f-15's for another (I had no idea which ANG units fly F-15's, so I needed to find a squadron that did). The nuclear issue was a little harder. I've always had an interest in the engineering of nuclear weapons. However, I'm not a physicist. So, I had a pretty good idea how the device would work, and for some of the details I consulted a non-fiction book, "Dark Sun", by Rhodes, about the development of the hydrogen bomb. It gets into great detail on the physics and engineering *including of boosted-fission weapons, which are also used as the primary stages for thermonuclear weapons) and I highly recommend it for anyone interested. BTW, one part of Ch 38 I wanted to mention to everyone is this;

I never had a problem with motion sickness, provided I'm at the controls. I love open cockpit planes for airobatics though. An old Great Lakes biplane was one I got to fly (with an instructor). That thing was superb. I never got the knack of the inverted falling leaf, but I did learn to do hammerheads, plus tamer stuff like rolls, split-s, etc. But heck, I've done rolls solo in utility-class single engine planes (no problem, just don't pull any negative G's or your carburetor will stop working and the engine dies). I did my first jump from a Cessna 150... It was kind of an informal affair back then. Today, you do your first jump strapped to an instructor. However, this was to make sure I knew how to use the parachute (you have to wear one for airobatics). My instructor, my FLIGHT insturctor that is (It never occured to me that a flight instructor might not know everything about skydiving), had some rather odd ideas on teaching skydiving. He gave ground instruction, tought you how to roll on landing, etc, (the good old 7-pointer) and viola, you were ready to give it a try. No tower jumps, no nothing... He took you up in a plane and you made your own way down. I had to climb out on the wheel strut to jump.. I was wishing for the Great Lakes at that point; he could have just rolled inverted while I had my seatbelt unbuckled. LoL. I hit hard and sprained an ankle, but I had an enormous drop zone (a huge field of cut hay about a mile on a side, way too big to miss) so it was otherwise ok. It was a rush, but not something I ever felt like doing again.

Thanks!! Yeah, he could have lost his lunch, especially as he was caked in blood, ugh. I'd done one prior deadstick landing, but that was with an instructor as part of training. I was on downwind and he reached out and pulled the mixture, and then said, "You just lost the engine, set her down." I just cut the downwind and final short, that wasn't a problem, but I can tell you I was thankfull for the experiance a few weeks later. The maneuvers were easy enough; I had some prior airobatic training (Ever done an outside loop or an immelman turn in an open-cockpit plane? now that's fun!!), and nothing too tricky was required except the 30 degree turn as I approached the taxiway. I had to nail that and roll out perfectly lined up; I was entering ground effect by that point and getting close to stall. Other than that, it really didn't take much skill at all. It wasn't really a hard thing to do; I had to do it, so i did it. That sounds odd to say, but when you're in a life or death situation, there usually isn't time to worry. The main thing I was concerned about on my way down was whether I could stretch out the glide enough to make the airport. I thought I had it, but not quite. LoL Had I known I wouldn't make the runway, I'd have set down on a highway or road (plenty of 'em out in the desert, and not enough traffic to worry about). The flaps could be battery operated, but I'd killed the master electrical switch. I wouldn't have tried anyway; the electric motors are in the wing, and I had loads of fuel dripping around in the trailing edges. I was afraid of a short, or sparks. The FBO couldn't get away with such bad maintance these days. What they did was in effect rent the plains from private pilots who wanted to defray ownership costs. Some of them did much of their own maintance, though how that thing past it's thousand hour inspections is beyond me. On other occasions, I flew with the dashboard partially disassembled (they were working on it) and pencils stuck in the instrument vacuum lines. LoL.

Thanks!!! OK, the posting schedule is usually once a week. However, I released Ch 38 early, and ch 39 isn't back from editing (I was late sending it in). What this means (sorry everyone) is that there will be a delay in posting. I've been writing the final part of the story as one document, becuase thare are some complext interactions that need to be moved around so everything makes sense, timewise. Chapter 40 (that's the name on the document) is currently about the size of seven normal chapters. It should end up as eight when done. Then there's the prologue, which was actually the first thing I wrote in LTMP. As a guess, Ch 39 should post a week from Monday, *IF* it's ready. IF I can wrap up and finsih LTMP this weekend, I can get it all into beta and hopefully we won't be facing serious delays after that. Oh, BTW, Ch 37 was not the dramatic climax of the story. Edit to add: I gave up flying a few years ago, sort of. It costs too much to keep current. I do occasionally still fly left seat, but my liscence is no longer active. If I could afford it, I'd re-activate it in an instant. I love flying. CJ

The way I got myself into that situation is, basically, I was cheap! I was renting an aircraft from a rather shoddy FBO at my home field, and the oldest one was the cheapest. This was a very old Piper Cherokee. I was 19 and on my long cross-country solo (a requirement to get a liscence). I had about 30 hours total as pilot in command. This occured on the 4th of July that year, and I'd flown from Southern California up to central california, where I'd planned to refuel. Ooops, tbe FBO was closed, no fuel available. I did some calculations and figured I could make my next stop, a larger airfieild in the high desert. I made it, but I was nearly empty. It was a scorcher of a day; 115 degrees. I told the FBO to fill it to the tabs (a little less than full). They filled it right to the rims. Fuel being expensive, I didn't want to try training it out, and took the work of the FBO operator that it would be just fine. (Baaad idea). The other bad idea was the cheap old plane. They had been doing some rather poor maintanance. The tank seals (around the wing caps) have seals. It helps is they aren't corroded to nothing. It also helps if the rubber grommet seal where the wing root joins the fuselage actually present. They weren't. Avgas, even more than gasolone, expands when it gets hot. So, when you pumb gas from a cold ground tank and into hot wing tanks, it expands. However, it took a little while I guess. I took off, and started to climb. Fortunatly for me, the acitive runway was in the opposite direction from where I was heading, plus I had mountains in my path, so I climbed out, then did a climbing turn, back over the feild. (I was well above the traffic pattern). I continued to climb, slowly passing through ten thousand feet. once the feild was many miles behind me. Then I smelled gas. A glance at the wings (it was a low-wing aricraft, with the wing filler caps in top of each wing) did little to improve my disposition; both caps were spraying avgas like giant lawn sprinkler heads. I could also smell it, very strongly, in the cockpit. I opened the tiny window vent, which helped the breathing isue, but the gas was still spraying. I looked for the overflow tubes on the wing's trailing edge, and found one trailing some fuel (as it should be) and the other, nothing. I immediatly initiated a 360 degree turn towards the airport. At that point, I heard a rather loud bang from inside that wing. Then, that wind stopped spaying fuel. I assumed that I had a ruptured tank, inside the wing. I also had good reson to beelive that the fuel was flowing into the cockpit. The exhaust manifold was my immediate concern. It's under the engine cowling. I had these visions of the fuel trickling forward, and igniting in it. That meant I couldn't lower the nose. I was also worried about any electrical sparks. My first action was to kill the master electrical switch, which shut off everything except the engine. Given the risk of what I considered to be an imminent explosions, I also pulled the mixture all the way out. That shuts off fuel to the engine, shutting it down. So, with no radio, and no engine, at ten thousand feet over the desert, I reefed that old clunker around, hoping to make it back to the airport. I set up for best rate of glide, which in a cherokee sucks. I could have re-started the engine, assuming it would start, but I felt that risked blowing up. I didn't have a parachute, so jumping was not what I considered an optimal solution. I had a few other minor <cough!> concerns; the flaps on that plane were electric; I couldn't use them. Also, I beleived I had fuel in the fuselage, and it would be running down the main gear struts (fixed-gear aircraft) and into the brake assemblies. Therefor, I was coming in hot (Fast, due to no flaps), Deadstick (which means no engine) and no brakes. (That, incidentally, is when i thought of the landing at Edwards, which i used in Ch 38, but it was too far away.) I set up for a straight-in approach, hoping I'd make it. I was running out of sky pretty darn quick. I was coming in at an angle to the runway; I didn't have enough altitude to fly a real final approach. My plan was to turn as I paralleled the runway, right over the numbers. The only problem was, about ten seconds prior to landing, as i sailed over the airport perimeter fence, I realized I wasn't going to make it. I was also in what amounted to a flying bomb, and a bad landing would have been a fatal one. Parallel to the runway was a narrow taxiway. It was for small planes, so it was only about ten foot wide. It was my only chance, So, 30 feet above the ground at about 80 miles per hour, I banked and kicked rudder for the final course change (about 30 degrees) and lined up on the taxiway. I had just enough airspeed to roll out of the bank without stalling. That taxiway was far, far smaller than any runway I'd ever dealt with, plus lading without flaps is a little interesting in and of itself. . That turned out to be the smothest damn landing I ever made; couldn't even feel it. I was doing fine at that point, had the Taxiway run the full length of the runway. It didn't. It angled to the left, into a parking area. , and beyind that, into the airport resturmant. Due to having no brakes (I didn't want to risk using them) I took the turn, doing about 40mph, and rolled out in the aircraft tie-down area, almost stopping. I rolled a few feet fruther, coming to a halt about ten feet from the windows of the airport resturant. I think i got out of that cockpit in under a second, Lol. I'd been perfectly calm on the way down (being nervous would have done me little good) but as i walked away, and people came dashing out to meet me (Thy'd seen me land with a non-rotatian popeller, in the taxiway, so they knew somethign was amiss) that's when my knees suddenly betrayed me. Next thing I know I'm in a heap on that hot asphault, looking up, wondering what the hell happened. I figured that is was just nerves, but do do it in front of all those people? Damn, now that was embarrassing. I couldn't reach my instructor by phone, so I had a problem; what to do next. If I decleired an emergency, I'd have to wait for my instructor to come get me, and that would be expensive. I had a mechanic take a look; the bang wasn't from the fuel tank popping as I'd suspected; it had merely distorted from the pressure. I could therefor have probably used the brakes. The engine shut-down itself might also have been unnececary; I've received conflicting opinions on that, including from professionals. I'd lost only about 1/3 of my fuel, so after consulting with several pilots and the mechanic, I figured that the only thing really wrong was the bad seals on the wing caps. That's just a kind of gasket material, and in a pinch, even fabric will suffice. In other words, i made temporary gaskets out of my socks, fired up the plane, and continued on my way. Let me tell you, I kept a very close eye out for alternate landing points all the way back. LoL. Oh, and thanks to the shoddy maintenance that nearly got me killed, an unspoken deal was struck upon my return; I got free rental of that plane for the following year. (and to answer the question many of you are likely asking by now: OF COURSE I'm crazy! But yeah, i flew that plane many, many more times.) So, that's where Brandon's collapse came from, and the idea for Edwards AFB, too. And the no-flaps landing as well.

If I recall, it was Mike who said it would be ironic if the fighter pilot who tried to shoot them down ended up saving them? Well, Major Pierce did just that. His idea for landing at Edwards was about their only hope. Maybe Bonneville Salt Flats would have worked, but most dry lake beds wouldn't; they often aren't uniform enough. Oh, BTW, I'm curious.. Does anyone think Brandon's collapse seems odd? He was fine until he was safely out of the plane and on the ground, then his knees fail without warning. I'm hoping that part of the story doesn't seem too odd, becuase in fact, it's autobiographical. LoL One time, as a student pilot, in a small plane (not a jet, a low-wing single engine) I managed to end up at ten thousand feet, dead engine, dead electrical system, no flaps (they were electric) and no brakes. As an added benifit, I had loads of loose fuel in the cockpit and structure, so it was kind of a flying bomb. I dead-sticked the thing in to an airfieild about 50 miles from Edwards (Now you know where I got the Edwards idea from) and made the best, smoothest landing I've ever done (not easy, with no flaps). I had to- I was landing on a little taxiway, not a runway (I ran out of altitude, lol). I was totally fine when i climbed out of that plane. However, once I got about twenty feet away, my knees went out from under me and I collapsed on the asphalt like a sack of potatoes. LoL

Who? Me? Causing trouble? Would I do such a thing as that? Hrmmm, it may be early for them to get together, but to me this EVIL CLIFFHANGER seemed more like trouble brewing for Cody in some way. As for His Shadowyness not doing much with this cliffie.. Let me let you in on a little secret; He's the Master of Misdirection, and not above throwing a few red herrings about in his forum.

Well, Eric in FTL did some, um, questionable things. However, this is actually an on-topic post, becuase I'm proud to announce that I've decided to agree to His Shadowyness' requests; Eric may be appearing in coming chapters of DnCW! Umm, that was Eric Williams you wanted, right, Steve? Hrmmm, what will happen with Cody? There's that dizzying CLIFFHANGER His Shadowyness left us with at the end of Ch 5... (BTW: I'll have to say this... I took mercy when I posted LTMP 37, and posted the next chapter 48 hours later, so as not to leave ya'll in suspense, BUT, his Shadowyness has left us hanging with DnCW 5 since April 8th... See? I told ya he's evil...) And also, there are some more subtle developments... WHY was Joe needing to use Cody's computer, and more important, what will he find? I still think that has something to do with the cliffhanger... OR: What if he finds Cody's craigslist stuff, BUT, that's not what he's upset about.. Maybe he found Julie in there too? I have a hunch that the you-know-what is about to hit the air-impeller.

Ahhem! Wildone! How manyh times do I have to tell you: Shadowgod and I are not the same person, so I cannot possibly be the devil! Well, wouldn't it have been cruel if I posted 38 and it didn't mention Instict's fate, but focused instead on other subplots? In other words, if I'd kept everyone hanging until 39? But, unlike you, I'm not cruel so I didn;t do that. ACk, this is so unfair.. I tired so hard to return you to your rightful place on the cliffhanging throne... and "May the best goat win" come on, that's a frame-up if ever there was one!

Ok... Nobody quite got it, but Wildone and Benji each mentioned parts of it. So, in honor of this, the correct answer to Mike's puzzle, and Jkeeling's birthday (Happy Birthday!) I'll post LTMP 38. (actually it's already up)

The question is, will His Shadowyness allow Cody to have it? Or rather, turn Eric's kindness to evil in some way?

OK, a breif summary of the cliffhanger that needs to be resolved; The first problem is the four inbound missiles. However, even without those, they still have a few slight problems; two F-15's with Sidewinders boring in, ready to fire the second it looks like the Sparrows miss. (and the AiM 9 Sidewinder has a darn high success rate) or, the four f-16's ahead, armed with slammers (AMMRAMS, AIM 120's, the world's most effective air-to-air missle). And if they somehow get away from those, there remains the slight difficulty that their plane is crippled. That broken rudder cable makes landing exceedingly hard for a trained pilot, and their pilot is dead. There are also no parachutes aboard, and any kind of air-to-air transfer is unrealistic, confined to the realms of bad movies. So, that's the cliffhanger that needs resolving. It is resolved in 38. Of course, it might be the simplest resolution: the missiles hit, blowing them all to bits. But, it is resolved. BTW, bear in mind that I COULD have had 38 focus on some of the sub-plots, and not get to the issue of Instict at all. However, i didn;t: Unlike Shadowgod, I'm not cruel. Ahhh, Your Shadowyness! Good to see you, but I must say Im shocked and saddened that you haven't returned to your throne and thus give us the posting of LTMP 38? Oh, I do feel a need to mention that LTMP 37 is in part a homage to Shadowgod's immortal Living In Surreality Ch 26: LiS 26 is, truly, the Mother of All Cliffhangers. One of the ways LTMP 37 is a homage to LiS 26 is that the elipsis at the end was copy-and-pasted from LiS 26. I don't want to give any spoilers for LiS 26 here (If you haven't read Living in Surreality, it's complete and superb: it also won GA's Story of the YEar award.) However, LiS 26 is the ultimate cliffhanger, so of course I pay homage to it. and for this reason I also seek to return Shadowgod to his rightful place on his Cliffhanging throne, so he can once again survey his natural realm; the malevolent precipices of eeevil cliffhangers.

Ok, Mike, I'll see if I can answer your geese formation question... First, we need to look at the reason why geese fly in a V (as do many other migratory species). In general, they do it for efficiency; the following geese get a little bit of assistance from the wake turbulence of the ones before. The lead goose has to work harder, so they often rotate the lead, it's not always the same goose. That much I know, but, as for why the uneven V, all i can do is theorize, I don't know for certain. are we certain that they never fly in an even V? What I'm thinking is this; if there is no benifit to flying in an even V, why would they? As the birds joined up, the V would, per random chance, usually but not always be uneven. This might also occur when they are rotating the lead. Just a guess. Speaking of Geese, what do y'all think of Dimitri's goose plan? Think what you will of him, but Dimitri is clever. Its sadly all too common for investegators (for anything) to latch onto the first clue, form a theory, and dedicate themselves to it. This is atrocious procedure (and totally goes against proper investigative method) but I've seen it over and over, including in Aircraft crash investigations. I'd say Dimitri had good reason to think it likely that his goose stunt would work; a cursory investigation into a fatal crash (due to the authorities having much else on their minds) would make it a near certainty IMHO. If you recall, Dimitri brought down that Russian airliner early in the story, also making it look like an accident. In that case, a small explosive charge on a wing spar did the trick, with the plane coming down in deep water. And won't anyone join me in pressuring Shadowgod to resume his throne? Please?

I just wanted to add; if anyone gets it, I'll remove the post temporarily, replace it with one of mine saying who it was who got it, and post the chapter. I'll return the winning post, along with a spoiler alert, as soon as the chapter is actually oneline. Or, we could just do this the easy way; insist that Shadowgod reclaims his throne. He's really being very cruel to all of you, keeping you waiting like this when all he has to do is reclaim his throne to get the chapter posted... So, add the the outcry; call on Shadowgod to reclaim his cliffhanging throne! It's not as if he doesn't deserve it... Remember Living In Surreality, chapter 26? LiS 26 is truly the Mother of all Cliffhangers.

Ok, one clarification; I've never said they get out of the cliffhanger, only that it is resolved. One possible way for the cliffhanger to be resolved is; of the four missiles, three roar past Instict's jet within the radius of their proximity-fused warheads. The resulting explosions riddle the plane with a hail of shrappenl, shredding fuel tanks, engines, electronics, human bodies, etc. This also causes an explosion which renders the plane in to small pieces of burnt, shredded metal, leaving, of course, no survivors. That would resolve the cliffhanger, no? OK, hrmmm, what else can I say? There are some GREAT theories here. And somebody is warm.

I fully understand. I also know you had high hopes for Gunter. Sorry. Yes, I did. Good catch. I remember my thoughts and feelings on that day. I felt I needed to capture the shock, the surreal feeling of unreality, that is present on such a day. He had to do what he did, for Chase's safety, even at the cost of never seeing him again. I have to admit, that scene, and Eric's offer to stay plus his comment about burying a brother (Brandon), brought a tear to my eye when i was writing them.

Ummm, your Shadowyness, I find us in agreement. You have just offered 38 to anyone who DOUBTS my cliffhanging supremacy. Well, Here you have it folks: Shadowgod is campaigning to get his throne back!! (and no, i didn't edit anything here, and the only thing I changed in the quoted text was to bold the relevant bit). Well, Okay, I wouldn't call my kind offer to resolve the cliffhanger by posting 38 early blackmail, but, if you prefer to reclaim your throne by other means, you have my full support! I'd say this calls for a poll. Okay, now, I will say that it would be cruel to keep y'all waiting for resolution on this cliffhanger.. So, I'll propose a little game. The cliffhanger is indeed resolved, one way or another, in LTMP 38, Death Above and Death Below. The question is, how is it resolved? I'll be honest, I doubt anyone can figure it out. The facts needed to do so, however, are contained in the posted chapters. I'll say this; it's fully realistic. So, here's my offer. If anyone can figure it out, I'll post chapter 38 immediately. Or, we can just install Shadowgod back on his throne. Your choice. So, post your guesses here, and don't forget to include the how. Edit to add; more than one guess per person is fine. However, no one who has actually seen CJ 38 can win.

ACK!! Now, now, let's not be hasty! Y'all don't want to hurt sweet, innocent me, now do ya? Just return Shadowgod to his rightful place on his cliffhanging throne, and all will be resolved.

Perhaps he will need some persuasion? Come on, everyone, let your voices be heard, call on Shadowgod to resume his rightful throne!

ACK!!! But, but, but... I did offer to let Eric take Cody along? To keep Eric company? But nnnno, you wouldn't let that happen.

Peeks head cautiously into forum.... Please don't read anything I'm about to say as anything more than some points regarding what has already been posted. So far, no one (me included) has disclosed any actual info from Chapter 38 (we can't! The Echidna is back, and he of the anti-spoiler spines is honor-bound to make a pincushion out of anyone giving out spoilers). Sometimes, an editor or beta will also drop a few false "leaks", for fun. I've done this myself, such as my recent claims of a dizzying Cliffhanger in chapter 12 of Shadowgod's Dreams and Clipped Wings. The truth in that case is, I have no clue if there will be one or not. The chapter does not yet exist and as such I have no clue what it will contain. As for LTMP 38, The only real "leak" so far is that chapter 38 exists. This, I can confirm, is true... However, it is possible that it's short. "The End". Or, not. A y'all know, I'm a big fan of forshadowing. This situation with the plane was forshadowed from the start: Brandon's flying. Also, I almost never post lyrics in the text. When I've done so, they are always original (written by me) and there for a purpose. Remember the lyrics of the song Instinct sang at their final concert? This could play into the bit Benji quoted a few posts above, from the story description about Brandon's dreams. The mention of "Shot down in flames" could certainly also be rather appropriate. Standing at the edge? Well, um, yes, more on that lower down. The "dreams" part, and i do see the references to "Dallas", well.. let's just say, I never watched that show, but I heard about it, and I feel the whole "dreams" device is contrived and cliche. I also happen to utterly despise cliches. Also, which character has the title of the story? "Let the Music Play"? As we saw in Prometheus, that was the command Jerry gave to order the annihilation of Toowoomba and a huge chunk of Queensland. So, Jerry has the title. An antagonist winning? Is that possible? Hrmmm, anyone remember who, exactly, rde off into the sunset at the end of FTL with a suitcase full of cash? Ok, to calm everyone down, I suppose I could release the title of chapter 38? It's "Death Above and Death Below." Okay, now I've stirred up enough ominous points, I have a confession to make. Please sit down before reading further, becuase this will be a shocker.... LTMP 37, "Fire in the Sky", is a cliffhanger. And I wrote it. Shocked? You should be. I, who never use cliffhangers, have just admitted using one. I do this in spite of the fact I have created a perfect out: Shadowgod wrote the chapter ending. This is, in fact, true: He wrote the elipsis at the end of the chapter. I can prove this, becuase I took a screen cap when I copied it from one of his chapters and pasted it into the end of LTMP 37. But, I have decided that instead, I must confess to using a cliffhanger, and also explain why. The culprit is Shadowgod's cliffhanging throne. Back in January, I was voted in, so unjustly, as King of Evil Cliffhangers. As such, I became the unwilling occupant of Shadowgod's cliffhanging throne. In brief, it's making me dizzy. Is teeters on the crumbling edge of the malevolent precipices, and I, unlike Shadowgod, am afraid of heights. So, I have dizzy spells, and vertigo. This, combined with it's malevolent, evil influence, compelled me to, yes, I admit it, write a cliffhanger. The answer, I think, is clear. Shadowgod must be returned to his honored place, and re-occupy his cliffhanging throne. If this was to occur, I'd be so relieved, so overjoyed, at being freed from the dizzying heights his throne occupies that I would post LTMP 38 early (well before the weekend), and resolve the cliffhanger, once and for all. I hope Shadowgod, out of the goodness of his heart, will reclaim his throne. If not, perhaps y'all could, you know, persuade him a little? An outcry for him to do so might just do the trick. If not, I'm sure we can devise other means of, ahem, persuasion. CJ

I've only got a few seconds here, but I had to respond to one point; Don't worry, no one is giving away any inside info on the next chapter, Honest. What we are seeing here is something I do too; when I want to comment in a thread but I've seen the next chapter, I recall my impressions when I read it. That way I can speculate, etc, and join in. Thanks!! CJ

I've only got a few minutes before I have to run, so this has to be quick, but I wanted to address a couple of points. The missiles... They have lock; they had it at launch. It's also far, far easier to hit a lumbering jet than a maneuvering fighter, plus there are four missiles. Also, per the text, they cannot be destructed in flight; there are no range-safety packages on warshots (and these are warshots). I always laugh when I see scenes in the movies where a missile or torpedo is detonated just before it hits; that's just not possible. (for many reasons, but the main one being; the Enemy might find out how to do it, too). The title, "Fire in the Sky", comes from the line, "The four missiles, arrayed across the sky, death incarnate riding on columns of fire, " The missiles are the Fire in the Sky. Enjoy! CJ

Thanks!! And you're very much correct; military gear has to be hardened and that inclues isolation switches, etc. Fire in the Sky will be posted soon. (an hour ago is soon, right?) I just haven't announced it yet. It's a large chapter, larger than 36, twice normal size. Yes, no, and maybe. The area of metal that's part of the circuit (the vehicle body in this case) is large enough to cause major trouble. So, the best answer I can give is a guess; the vehicle being off would make it more resistant to EMP, but a strong EMP might still do damage. I'm guessing here, but I think the ground circuit from the electronics would conduct part of the received pulse.

Tim, I was about your age when my father died. That, too, was at the end of a long illness. There's not much I can say, other than it hurts but it slowly gets better. Try and remember the good times. It's been over ten years for me. It still hurts, though time has made it easier. Stay strong, my friend. CJ