by Ike Hamill
Mike pulled himself away and jogged over.
“We’re going below to figure out what’s what,” Robby said. “Can you get someone to hold this door.”
“Sure thing,” Mike said. He took over Liam’s spot and called to someone while Robby led his kids into the stream of people who were carrying boxes inside. Liam was reluctant to squeeze in line. Robby slowed and held a place so Liam could slide in front of Janelle.
When they finally got beyond the last of the boxes, Liam seemed more comfortable.
“The stairs and the elevators are over here,” Liam said. “We should take the stairs. I think that the elevators should only be used by more than one person at a time. They’re tricky.”
Robby filed that fact away. There was something behind Liam’s eyes when he passed by the elevator doors. One of the doors had been propped open with a fire extinguisher. The other elevator door was closed.
“We can go down here,” Liam said, pointing at the door to the stairs. Robby’s eyes were drawn to the strange writing above the door. At first, the symbols looked like decoration. They weren’t any language that he was familiar with. There was something about the asymmetry of the design that made him think otherwise.
Liam pulled open the door and gestured. The lights at the top of the stairs had been off. As soon as Robby moved his kids close to the doorway, they began to glow. The illumination grew as the lights warmed up.
“It’s a lot of stairs,” Liam said. “I mean, I guess. I haven’t taken them.”
The kids were in front, behaving for the moment and not running ahead. Robby had threatened to make them hold hands the whole way down if they didn’t stick close together. There was nothing they liked more than exploring. Descending slowly looked like it was killing them.
“Did Merle talk about any other levels, or do these stairs go all the way down?”
“I don’t know,” Liam said.
It wasn’t a pertinent question—they were going to find out if there were any other levels as they descended—but Robby had wanted to get a sense of what was bothering Liam. The answer had been pretty casual. It didn’t seem like Liam was particularly afraid of what was at the bottom of the stairs.
“Tell me more about the bunker itself. Did you get a sense of who made it, or why?”
“They told me that you already had a theory,” Liam said. “They told me that you think it was built so important people would survive a nuclear war.”
“Maybe,” Robby said over his shoulder. “Based on how Merle described some of these places, it seemed like one possible explanation for their existence. They’re certainly not like the other bunkers—the ones that were built as access to the groundwater, like at the old ranch.”
Their feet echoed off the stairs as they descended. The kids seemed to be competing for how hard they could slap their shoes against the stairs as they went down.
“I heard about those,” Liam said.
“Did you get a military vibe down there?”
“I guess?” Liam said. “There was a place in the other entrance that Merle and Jackson thought was made to ambush intruders. I guess I don’t understand why that would be important when this entrance over here is wide open and has both an elevator and stairs. Wouldn’t the intruders just come in the same way you did?”
“Maybe it can be sealed,” Robby said. “Once everything is loaded in, there might be a way to close it off.”
Robby hoped that they wouldn’t have to do that. He didn’t like the idea of moving the bulk of the survivors underground and then sealing them in.
“That’s a good idea,” Liam said.
“How much farther?” Jim asked.
“How should I know?” Robby asked.
“Because you always know stuff like that,” Jim said.
Robby shook his head and rolled his eyes. “We’re halfway.”
“See?” Jim asked. “I knew that you knew.”
“He made that up, dummy,” Janelle said. She leaned over the railing, looked down, and then looked up. Jim took the opportunity to pass his sister as she said, “We’re five-eighths of the way.”
“That’s about halfway,” Jim said.
“Whatever,” Janelle said.
Jim started to accelerate, now that he was in the lead.
“Jim!” Robby shouted. “I will put a leash on you. Is that what you want?”
Instead of answering, Jim stopped and waited for them to catch up.
Robby glanced back up at Liam and asked, “So it appears to be fortified? Were there separate dining areas that appeared to be designated for higher ranking people?”
“All the dining areas looked the same, but the living quarters were different,” Liam said. “There were some rooms with lots and lots of bunks, and some that were like hotel rooms with private bathrooms. I think that the soldiers were rooming together and the officers had their own places. We found a control system built into the bathroom mirror. You just close the door and pop the lid off the toilet and it lights up. I couldn’t understand it, but Merle cracked the code on how to use it.”
“He’s good at that,” Robby said. “Did you see any appliances, like machines to keep the place going? Were those distributed around or all in one place?”
“All in one place,” Liam said. “You’ll see soon.”
Robby glanced over the balcony. They were closing in on the lower landing. When Jim picked up speed again, Robby didn’t call him back. Now that it was close, they all began to rush to the bottom.
The kids stopped dutifully at the closed door. Robby put out his hands and stood there until they each frowned and held out their own.
“Good,” Robby said. “Until we know where everything is, we stick together, right?”
“Right,” they said.
“Good.”
Robby nodded to Liam, who opened the door.
They glanced down the rows of machines in the utility room and Liam pointed to elevator doors—one was open and the other closed. Liam explained about the buttons and how he had to keep it pressed in when he rode it up to the top.
“The one I took to the top is wedged open up there. Merle said that if you don’t hold it open, it automatically descends and it can’t be called to the top from up there. So, if we want to use both, someone is going to have to ride this one up,” Liam said, without volunteering.
“And the rest is that way?” Robby asked, gesturing with his chin.
“Yeah.”
“Let’s take a quick tour and figure out the best way to move the supplies in.”
Liam led the way down the short flight of stairs to the level of the machines.
“I think we’re going to have to carry it all,” Liam said.
Janelle went slightly ahead and Jim slightly behind so they could fit down the corridor.
“There are some kind of rolling carts or platforms,” Robby said. “Back there, by the elevators, I saw a system built into the wall that would be used to lower them down from the elevator level to this level. I’m guessing that there’s a store room at the far end and it may be where the carts are kept.”
“Merle had a cart,” Liam said. “He said he used it for the… uh… people. He didn’t tell me where he got it though.”
“You don’t have to be careful about what you say around us,” Janelle said to Liam. “We’ve seen plenty of bodies.”
Liam glanced back at her and blushed. “Oh. Okay.”
They walked a few more paces. Robby was looking for doors that would lead to some kind of storage area. He studied the floor for markings that might suggest where the carts had been wheeled in the past.
“Dad, what was that?” Jim asked in a whisper.
“Jim, if you try to scare your sister, you’re going to be in a lot of trouble,” Robby said, giving his son’s hand a squeeze. “Apologize.”
“Sorry,” Jim said.
“I wouldn’t have believed him anyway,” Janelle said. “I’m onto all of his tricks.”
Jim burst out
with a little laugh that suggested trouble to come.
Robby glanced back and gave his son a warning look.
“Is that it?” Liam asked.
Robby followed Liam’s pointing finger and saw a rolling door built into a dim part of the wall.
“Could be—good eye, Liam,” Robby said.
They all moved that direction. Janelle spotted the sensor at the bottom corner of the door and guessed that they should wave a foot in front of it. Liam stepped aside and let her have the honors. When she did, the door began to slide silently upwards. About halfway up, the lights in the storage room began to come on.
“Good,” Robby said. “It looks like those carts can link together in a chain. Kids—start putting them together and we’ll take a bunch up to the entrance so the supplies can be moved in.”
When he let go of their hands, they shot off like springs. Janelle and Jim figured out how to clip the carts into a train and started to make a string toward the aisle. Robby moved to the other side of the room to investigate what they would do with the supplies. Behind the silver doors, he expected they would find freezers or at least coolers, if they were still operating. A long ramp led up to a higher door at the far end. The storage room was easily big enough for all the supplies they had brought. It would be easier to organize everything if there were shelves, but the carts would do well enough, he supposed. Assuming that kitchens were somewhere beyond the doors, it would be simple enough to wheel the food there right on the flat carts.
Robby turned back around, nodding.
“This is going to work,” he said.
Liam was watching the kids with the carts, chewing on his fingernail.
“What’s up, Liam?” Robby asked.
“Nothing,” Liam said. When Robby raised his eyebrows, Liam added, “I don’t know—don’t you get kind of a three bears vibe here?”
“How do you mean?”
“Like, we don’t belong here but we’re making ourselves at home. What happens if the people who do belong here come back?”
Robby lowered his voice. “I think Merle already moved them all out. I think they’ve been dead a long time.”
“Maybe,” Liam said.
The kids had joined together about a dozen carts and they moved to the first one to try pulling. The two of them grabbed the handle and pulled, gathering slow momentum until the trail was moving.
Robby went to the back of the line and added his weight to pushing the train. When they reached the turn, he was able to steer the rear of the line so they didn’t crash into the metal pole that protected the corner machine. Liam followed, watching the procession while he continued to chew on his fingernail.
The kids were trying to pull faster and faster. When they got the train going in a straight line, Robby jumped on the rear cart, using his weight to slow them down. As they neared the half wall at the end of the room, they jumped on the front cart. It veered a little as it slowed to a stop.
“You know how the lifts work?” Robby asked.
“We’ll figure it out,” Jim called.
Robby stepped off his cart and Liam caught up, standing next to him.
“The kids are going to be able to figure that out?” Liam asked.
“I think so,” Robby said. “We have a few minutes before everything will be unloaded upstairs anyway, and this will keep them occupied.”
Pointing and arguing, Jim and Janelle figured out how to clip the carts into the lift that brought them up to the height of the elevator platform. They cheered when they found the lever that raised up the cart. Jim jumped up to move it out of the way while Janelle got the next cart unclipped from the train and clipped into the lift.
Robby smiled.
“That didn’t take long,” Liam said.
“Don’t do too many,” Robby yelled. “The elevators look like they don’t take very many at a time.”
“I guess we shouldn’t have left that elevator up top,” Liam said.
“No worries,” Robby said. “We’ll take a load of carts up and then get it on the next trip.”
With the first load of carts, they started the ball rolling on moving all the supplies into the depths of the bunker. Liam took the stairs while Robby and the kids went up. While people were rolling loaded carts back onto the elevator, Liam finally made it up, huffing and panting.
Based on how Liam was acting about the elevators, Robby had expected a surprise on the trip up. It had been uneventful. Jim and Janelle filled the ride up with their discussion about why there wasn’t a bigger elevator.
“They made that giant storage room and they have all these carts. It would take a million trips to get all the supplies down,” Jim said.
“Not a million,” Robby said. “How many, would you say?”
“There were eleven rows of carts down there,” Janelle said.
“And more than fifteen per row,” Jim added.
“Twenty-two trips,” Janelle said before Jim could blurt out the number.
“And why would they limit it to four at a time?” Robby asked.
Jim and Janelle both shrugged.
“Best guess?”
“Weight?” Janelle asked.
“Could be,” Robby said. “I would guess that whatever they were moving on these carts was stored vertically, since we didn’t see any vertical storage downstairs. So, if each of these was like a column of supplies, they could have been very heavy. That’s one reason I could think that they wouldn’t move more than a four at a time.”
“Maybe the elevator isn’t very strong,” Jim said.
“Because?”
Jim shrugged again.
“Think about it,” Robby said. “Tell me if you come up with any ideas.”
They waited a few more seconds and the door opened at the top. Robby let the kids wheel the carts down the hall. He waited in the door, keeping it open. As soon as they disappeared around the corner, Robby cursed himself. Once they delivered the carts to the entrance, the kids might find something more interesting to engage themselves with. They were both too smart and too curious to leave unsupervised in a situation like this.
He got lucky. A few minutes later, they returned at the front of a procession. The two carts were full and they had brought helpers to grab the other carts and go back down with them to bring more up. Robby let out a relieved sigh and stood aside so they could roll out the empty carts and move on the loaded ones.
“Kids,” he said, meaning to keep them close this time.
“Yeah?” Janelle asked.
Robby realized that it would be a mistake to punish their quick return.
“Nothing—hurry back. We have a lot to do.”
“We know,” Janelle said.
Back in the appliance room, Robby watched the line of people. They were like ants now, rushing their line of food and belongings into the hive for the long winter. He grabbed his kids out of the line as they walked by.
“Have either of you seen Liam?”
“Nope,” Jim said.
“He’s up at the top, trying to catch his breath,” Janelle said. “Why doesn’t he want to take the elevators?”
Robby shrugged. “You ready to explore a little?”
“Yes!” Janelle said.
Jim smiled and nodded.
“Do I have to hold your hands?” Robby asked.
The kids both fixed him with a solemn glare as they slowly shook their heads.
“Don’t make me regret it. Liam mentioned that nothing in here is marked, so we’re going to make marks as we go,” Robby said. He held up a marker.
“Can I?” Janelle asked, reaching for it.
“We’ll take turns,” Robby said.
Jim shrugged, as if to say that he didn’t care. He had gotten good at feigning indifference when he missed an opportunity.
“Janelle gets first duty with the marker. Jim gets to lead the way.”
They climbed the short section of stairs and Robby opened the door. Jim went first, pausing to wait for t
he lights to warm up while Janelle marked the other side of the door.
The trip started out with few decisions. Robby was surprised at how long the snaking passage ran before they found anything interesting. It didn’t make sense to put so much distance between storage and utilities and the rest of the facility. He made a mental note to inspect the machines they were leaving behind—there might be a safety reason that warranted the distance. If that was the case, people would want to know about it.
“Left or right?” Jim asked when they got to a branch.
“Your choice,” Robby said. “Janelle, you’re going to mark both halls with arrows that point back to the mechanical room. Put a big M next to the arrows.”
She nodded. They used the same scheme other times that they had explored places. By the time they were done, they would have signs leading to all the areas of interest. After that, they could work on optimizing the routes. Jim picked left and Robby thought he knew why. Moving to the left was most likely going to bring them to an intersection that could lead back to the store room. Jim was being conservative, trying to map the hall back to a known area. It was the same direction that Robby would have chosen. If Ashley had been there, she definitely would have chosen the other way. Ashley loved to explore new areas more than anything else.
Jim ran ahead when the hallway straightened out and Robby had to call him back.
“We’re sticking together, right?” Robby reminded him.
Jim nodded. When they got to the next intersection, Jim surprised him, picking the path that would surely lead away from the store room. Since he wasn’t allowed to run ahead, he was exerting his independence by doing something unexpected. Even Janelle seemed surprised, looking longingly back toward the hall that probably led back to the rest of the people.
Around them, the hallway transitioned. The light was lower in the new section and the walls and floor were a darker color. If Robby had to guess, this new ambience suggested that they were entering living quarters. The vibe was almost soothing compared to the bright light of the mechanical room.
“You think that they simulate a diurnal cycle?” Jim asked.
“Maybe,” Robby said, glancing up at the ceiling.