Fortune Lost

Fortune Lost

A Tale From The Silver Exodus Series

Marcus Abear

Copyright March 2022

When the aliens announced the silver trading program my wife and I decided to play it safe and keep our trades quiet. In the weeks following the Yellowstone eruption, society had spiraled out of control and those with silver became targets. Intelligent people, like the two of us, didn’t advertise our ownership of silver or tell others about the technology we traded for.

Even though the aliens explained how they could track stolen silver and prevent the trade, it didn’t stop the criminals. In the weeks after the trade program was announced there were many news reports of civilians, and even some governments, stealing personal silver stockpiles from civilians. It was mainly in the larger cities and our county only saw a few attempted thefts.

Once the criminals figured out that the aliens could track stolen silver and coordinated the return with local authorities the thefts stopped. In our hometown, a few of the local scumbags found themselves on the wrong end of a gun, but, unfortunately, a few people who stood their ground ended up dead or severely injured. A dozen criminals were charged with the theft of silver during a national emergency and were sentenced to death in our county, but I don’t know the national numbers.

My wife and I kept things quiet, like I told you, but our neighbor at the bottom of the hill did the exact opposite. He flaunted his silver fortune and paid the ultimate price. Three weeks after the cataclysm, when the food supplies started running low, the advertising of his fortune and the technologies he traded attracted attention.

I had known the guy my entire life and remember my uncles telling me some wild stories about him from when they were teenagers. He had gotten into some trouble and a judge gave him the choice of jail or the military, so he never made it past his junior year of high school. During Afghanistan conflict he was wounded and was given a commendation medal for bravery in the face of the enemy but ended up on disability for the rest of his life.

He probably would have done twenty years in the military if he hadn’t gotten wounded. The improvised explosive device, a homemade bomb, that he stepped on malfunctioned and instead of losing his leg or worse he was able to limp away on his own. The VA gave him a fifty percent disability rating for losing two toes and part of his foot.

He used his disability payment to buy silver, guns, and survival supplies for fifteen years while waiting for the world to end. My father told me he lived in a trailer on his uncles' farm and worked on cars to cover his living expenses, weed, and booze, so his VA pay was extra according to him. I guess the money was his to do what he wanted, and it made sense because his other work covered his basic living expenses.

My wife and I did something similar to build up our little silver stockpile. We worked at a restaurant during college and used our Wednesday tips to buy silver. That was the worse night of the week for tips, and I thought buying silver was better than putting the money into a jar.

During the four years we worked at the restaurant we bought silver when it was between nine and fourteen dollars per ounce. We accumulated just over four hundred ounces, which was worth almost fifteen thousand dollars before the arrival of the aliens. Now that silver was valued somewhere between twenty and thirty thousand dollars per ounce in trade value, fifteen grand can be traded for about ten million in alien technology.

Our neighbor had over five thousand ounces of silver and he let everyone know about his fortune. While my wife and I were conservative and low-key with our purchases, he went hog wild with his spending. The lavishness, and him running his mouth, drew some unwanted attention from the local scum.

I’m not sure why he didn’t go to the colony, but his uncle went on and on about how the colony was a conspiracy theory so the aliens could make slaves out of us on their home world. Now, I don’t know anything about the colony because my wife and I didn’t consider it an option. We had enough silver to trade for a colony farm, but not enough to transport our children and grandkids.

Merck, that was his name, well he purchased a longhouse for himself, one for his uncle, and one for his illegitimate son and the boys' mother. Longhouses were twenty thousand square foot mansions loaded with advanced technological comforts. He then went on to buy the largest solar power station and four virtual reality systems that were similar to a particular science fiction show that will go unnamed.

Merck went on to buy the most extensive greenhouse system and food synthesizers available, which was the size of a small stadium. By the time he was done trading, Merck had put together a small village on his uncles' farm. I won’t detail what more he gathered because we never figured out what was in three of the outer buildings on the property.

My wife and I were very conservative with our trading strategy. We started by trading for what amounted to a technologically advanced seventy-five by twenty-two doublewide modular home. It came wholly self-contained and included a solar paneled roof, a humidity condenser for water, and a sewer system.

It also came with modular additions that increased the footprint but saved us from trading for outbuildings to house the options. We added a twenty-foot greenhouse to the rear of the house, a twenty-foot entertainment deck to the front, and a wing attachment on each side to house vehicles and power systems.

We purchased the same items for each of our two children but made sure that they were delivered to their properties and now ours. The leftover silver was traded for a personal health regeneration system and one of the food preservation systems. Our children gifted us the few ounces of collectible silver rounds they had kept since they were children so we could trade for one of the larger food synthesizers and solar generator to power it that the whole family used.

Our trades didn’t attract any attention and we weathered the cataclysm in relative peace. It took two years for the skies to clear up once Yellowstone quieted down, but it took another two years for the food supply chain to recover. The eruption did have a positive side effect; we had bumper crops for the next ten years. The dust and ash from the volcano coated the Northern Hemisphere in a layer of natural fertilizer that no chemical company could match.

Merck never saw those crops, the poor bastard! When the local scum came to collect some of his technology, he made the mistake of stepping outside to defend his property alone. Brave, yes, but he should have stayed inside with his fortune and waited them out.