by Paul Teague
So many questions, so few answers. There’s nothing I can do to progress things right now, so I decide to head for Level 2. When we toured the bunker earlier, we bypassed the lift. It had looked pretty basic at that time but now, like everything else in this transformed bunker, it’s definitely something that I want to try.
As I approach the lift, a member of the bunker staff gets in ahead of me.
‘Just hold the doors please!’ I shout, catching the lift before the doors close. I expect to see only two floor options in the lift, but there are four. Well, I say four, but there are also two unusually labelled buttons above the marker for Level 1. ‘It must go up to the cottage,’ I think to myself, ‘but why two buttons?’
‘Where do the other floors lead to?’ I ask my companion in the lift.
‘They’re redundant,’ she replies. ‘There are only the two levels in this place, the rest are there in case they extend the bunker in future.’
She can see that I’m curious, so she presses buttons 3 and 4. Nothing happens. No lights, no noises, nothing at all.
‘How about those two?’ I ask, pointing at the unusual symbols above the button marked ‘1’. ‘Nothing again,’ she replies.
She presses both of them. Individually and then together. She must have kids in her life beyond the bunker; she’s very patient. They must be young kids because she’s very ‘show and tell’.
‘See,’ she says. Again nothing. She presses the button for Level 2 and we begin our descent. I had been thinking that maybe it was just a simple case of a broken lift. But no, those buttons are not for use.
The lift arrives on Level 2, the doors open and the lady steps out, giving me a smile as she does so. I notice a faint, red pulsating light in her neck. It is very faint this time, I’d never have noticed it if I hadn’t known to look carefully. ‘Must just be something to do with all the people here,’ I think to myself, resolving to ask Kate next time I see her.
I’m about to step out of the lift to begin my exploration of Level 2 when an attack of inquisitiveness makes me step back inside. I’ve never been one of those people who just accepts things at face value. Ask Mum; she’ll tell you.
For instance, when she told me at age five not to touch the kettle because she’d just boiled it, what do you think I did? I opened the lid and touched the water with my finger of course! And when Mum asked me not to touch the kitchen blender when I was thirteen because the lid wasn’t on, what do you think I did? Well I pressed the button of course! And created a massive mess of blended strawberries and bananas. So, after the kind lady tells me that the extra lift buttons don’t work and even goes so far as to demonstrate – what do you think I do? I need to prove it to myself of course. Why would anybody add extra buttons if they weren’t needed?
Everything has been designed very carefully in this place, I can’t imagine anybody leaving a few spares around in case they’d forgotten anything. So, I decide to put it to the test. I press the weird symbols first. The first button, then the second button, then both of them together.
My heart gives a small jump. There is a glimmer of something when I touch the buttons together: a momentary jolt, but it stalls. One of the buttons is illuminated. I try again. Same again, a small jolt, but no movement. You have to press both buttons at once to get that though. One of the buttons remains illuminated.
‘Okay, move on, Dan,’ I think to myself. I press the third button.
When the woman had done it earlier, there was nothing. No sound, light or movement. But when I press the third button there is an instant response and the lift starts to move down to the next level.
Unseen
When the lady and the youngster re-entered the cottage, he’d immediately spotted the mother. He could guess what was happening outside, he’d prepared for it of course, but he didn’t think that it was going to play out like this. In this place. And with these people involved. How did they link up with this? He didn’t know yet, but he’d keep close because it was unlikely to end well. And after losing her child in that way, didn’t she deserve to have someone like him looking out for her? Where did the kid come from? That might cause a problem later, but first things first.
The sirens were sounding; the first release must have begun. She was making her way to the bunker, the same as everybody else. That’s where he needed to be too. He followed at a distance, an expert at not being seen, but was quick to realize that they were not going to make it to the bunker doors in time.
He knew that when the first release was completed they would not be able to see a thing. So, she was doing the best thing, the most sensible strategy was to wait by those doors. She was making good decisions under stress. Sooner or later they’d be spotted and he’d be able to get in. He’d just pretend to be bunker staff, nobody would know. He could patch in clearance levels when he got inside; should be simple enough.
So, as the woman and the child sat closely together on the left-hand side of the bunker doors, they were completely unaware that only a few feet away from them, standing in complete silence and completely unknown to them, was the man who would be forced to shoot one of them in the next thirty-six hours.
Beyond The Blast Doors
There were two people beyond the blast doors. That’s what the monitor indicated. It identified them both as human. It would not make any sense to open the doors to the bunker cat in a situation like this, so it was important to know who – or what – was out there.
One female – age thirty-seven and one male – age forty-eight. The female was sitting with an arm positioned as if she had it wrapped around somebody. Unusual. It must have been hard to hold it out like that, but there appeared to be nobody else there.
The woman and the man could not be connected. He was standing at a distance from her. They didn’t appear to be talking or linked in any way. He was keeping his distance. Having disabled the surveillance in this area, he would be able to open the doors to let the two people in.
Although he wouldn’t question where the information came from, he knew that the woman had to be retrieved safely and concealed in the bunker. She was crucial to what was about to happen.
The man was useful too, he would serve as a cover for James. They would want to know why he didn’t follow protocol. James would hand over the man and make him available for BioFiltration. He’d just be a member of the cottage staff who came here when the sirens went off.
Lucky – or unlucky – depending how you looked at it. That would act as a cover for the woman. He’d be able to get her safely in the lift before he distracted everybody in the Control Room with the man’s arrival.
She’d be going to a place where they wouldn’t find her. Somewhere that he didn’t even know existed in the bunker at that time. He’d be guided there via the blue device in his neck.
This woman would soon be able to play out her part in this, under cover and out of sight.
Chapter Fourteen
Deeper
I’m pretty stunned when the lift starts to move downwards. I’m nervous that moving to Level 3 may have alerted Kate and her team in the Control Room. I don’t want to get into any more trouble so, rather ridiculously, I press the button for Level 2 again, as if it’s going to conceal what I have just done.
I step out into Level 2 and just wait in the corridor. I assume that I’ll be joined at any moment by Kate and her security team. They must know what just happened. But nobody comes. I walk up and down the corridor and nip into the loos for something to do. A few minutes later I emerge. Nobody comes. They can’t have known what I just did.
I head back for the lift, feeling a little more daring now. I press the button for Level 3. Down it goes again. The doors open. The corridor is similar in size and layout to the ones on Levels 1 and 2, but it is coloured differently and is long and curved, rather than dead straight. There is a thick, red stripe going along each side of the wall. It looks more serious here, I think that the red line leads somewhere.
The doors clos
e, and I decide to try Level 4. I press the button. Once again, I go down a level. The doors open, and this corridor looks different as well. The corridors are black this time, but they still have those thick red stripes running along them. Both corridors are completely silent, there are no bunker staff there. I’m beginning to wonder if the lady was telling the truth earlier. Or to be more precise, if she was telling me what she believed to be the truth. I’m not sure what to do. I feel like somebody who just got away with something they’re not supposed to do. I expect to hear alert sirens or something similar. But there are no sounds and nobody comes. Kate and her security team are nowhere to be seen.
Regardless of that, there can only be so long until they realize that I’m not showing up on any of the cameras on Levels 1 or 2. For a moment I feel completely stuck. I’m desperate to explore these two new levels, but I really don’t want to get any more negative attention from Kate. Every part of me wants to stay here, but I can’t risk getting into any more trouble. Dad, Mum, David and Harriet are relying on me. I’m the only one who can look out for them at the moment. So, I press the button for Level 2 and decide to stick to my original plan.
Rather annoyingly, the lift heads for Level 1. Somebody must have called the lift before I pressed the button. For a place that’s so hi-tech, you’d think that they’d be able to sort the lifts out. It turns out to be a lucky break though. The lift arrives at Level 1 and the doors open automatically. A man gets in, presumably the chap who called the lift in the first place. But it’s not him who catches my eye. It’s the man who’s walking intently along the corridor towards the exit who now has my complete attention. I haven’t seen him before and he looks just the same as everybody else down here.
Except for one thing that’s different. There is one of those faint lights in his neck. It’s pulsating furiously, but you’d still have to be looking carefully to notice it. However, there’s something very interesting and different about this one. The faint light in this man’s neck is glowing blue.
Mission Failure
She had not known Roachie prior to the mission taking place as he was much more experienced in Army life than she was. After completing her basic training, and what seemed to be a very large number of psychometric and aptitude tests, she was summoned to a meeting at a barracks that she’d never heard of before, let alone been to. She called it a barracks, but the soldiers that this place housed wore a uniform that she’d never seen previously, certainly not Army, Navy or Air Force – or even SAS come to that – but definitely military in nature.
You get used to doing what you’re told in the Army so she didn’t question it when she was asked to sign an E-Notice. She’d already signed the Official Secrets Act as a standard part of her military life, but she’d never had to sign an E-Notice before nor had she ever heard of one. Rather than reading the text thoroughly, she’d skimmed it, just to get a sense of what she was doing. But really, did she have much choice in the matter? She trusted the Army; they had her best interests and the interests of the country at heart, right?
There were sentences referring to ‘injections and implants’, all pretty standard practice in Army life, where you may get posted anywhere in the world and have to take your ‘shots’ to protect you from whatever nasties were out there. She’d never seen this before in any of the documents that she’d signed during her short military career. In outlining the types of threat that she might encounter – including via air, sea and land – this E-Notice made mention of ‘off world’ threats. She just assumed that this was one of those legalese ‘cover all’ statements. Like ‘Acts of God’ in the home insurance policy. It’s the sort of statement that the lawyers can use to wheedle their way out of anything. ‘Could apply to meteorites and bits of fallen space stations, I guess,’ she thought, and moved on, without further reading, to the signature area.
Besides, as a young nineteen-year-old hungry for adventure, why wouldn’t she be up for this mission? It was an opportunity to play at being James Bond, a bit of espionage. For some reason, she and this other guy had been selected entirely on the basis of their psychometric profiles. A random pairing of no significance, or so it had seemed at the time.
Of course, they had to be trained to a certain level of military competency, but it was their minds that were being sought for this particular job. It was a safe mission, they’d been assured of that from the start. A one percent casualty risk, apparently. Some boffin would have modelled it on a computer somewhere and come up with that figure. In military terms, that risk is fine. In fact, in a simple office risk assessment, that’s probably okay. No more than a knocked over hot coffee or a trip over a waste paper bin. Annoying, painful for a short while, but not in need of a hospital visit. With both of them in hospital only forty-eight hours later, one of them on life support, that particular boffin might have wanted to double-check that figure of one percent.
Selection
It had been interesting to hear the objections and concerns that people had when they were going to become a part of a very unique operation. It never failed to fascinate him; human beings are such complex, yet predictable, things. They just wanted to know that their families would be fine and that the outcome would be good. They had been chosen specifically on the basis of detailed psychometric testing. This testing process had been pioneered many years earlier, and had been proven to work time and time again in live simulations. In all respects these were just average people. Of course, they had certain basic parameters of health, fitness and intelligence. But these were not the defining qualities for selection.
Every person selected for service in the bunker had been specially screened to ensure that they would act in exactly the same way in a simulation process. There were key indicators in their personality profiles which ensured that with 99.9 percent accuracy, in moments of stress, they would behave the way that they needed to. And most importantly, they had a predisposition to accept the concept of ‘the greater good.’ Not everybody got that one. If you had to die to protect a person that you don’t know, to do something that would help other people, would you sacrifice your life? Many people say ‘no’ without hesitation. Others say ‘yes’ but simulations show that they won’t follow through. There is another profile group which would only do so with further qualification and much more information. But in the blink of an eye, faced with sudden and overwhelming information confirming that you must give your life for the good of others, would you do it?
It turned out that you can select a specific group who will say ‘yes’ without hesitation, because in an instant, they can see the logic of one death to save many lives. It takes a very unique mix of empathy, intelligence, bravery, logic, decision-making … he’d isolated over fifty-seven key factors in this process. But he needed to be sure – with 99.9 percent accuracy – that when these people who’d been gathered in the bunker learned the terrible truth that they would make the right decisions for the greater good. The future of all humanity.
Chapter Fifteen
In The Shadows
This has really got my interest. How come this guy has a blue light in his neck and everybody else that I’ve seen so far has a red one? Why do I seem to have more access to this bunker than anybody else that I’ve met here so far? Including Kate. I wouldn’t describe myself as unlucky, but neither am I a magnet for massive good fortune. So the thought that I might be the only person on the planet to be able to access virtually all the areas of this secret facility is preposterous. I’m sixteen years old for goodness’ sake. I’m still not allowed to buy a pair of scissors, let alone access a top secret military facility.
Something is going on here and I’m getting more intrigued, the more I learn. I’m desperate to take a look around Levels 3 and 4, but I want to know what this man is up to. He seems very intent, whatever it is, but I reckon that this blue and pulsating light must single him out as being different in some way. Maybe he’s a higher rank, or perhaps he has unique access to the entire bunker. Who knows? Any
way I’m going to postpone my visit to the newly discovered levels and see what he’s up to first. But not before I do a quick test.
‘Excuse me!’ I shout to him as the lift doors open to reveal him walking along the corridor.
‘I’m trying to get to Level 3 and the lift doesn’t appear to be working.’
‘Level 3 doesn’t exist,’ he replies. ‘It’s there in case they expand the bunker in future.’
‘Okay, thank you!’ I reply and pretend to head off the other way along the corridor.
Scooby-Doo and Shaggy would be proud of me. I double back and follow at a safe distance along the corridor. Whatever is going on with Levels 3 and 4, the bunker staff certainly believe that they don’t exist. Or, they’re forbidden to share that information. However, that lady who did the demonstration earlier certainly couldn’t operate the lift beyond Level 2. I wonder if this chap with the blue flashing light in his neck could do it. Maybe that’s what the colours signify? No time to debate this now though, he’s heading at some pace along the corridor.
He seems to be making for the bunker entrance, but that can’t make sense, there’s nothing to be done out there for now. According to Kate, we have to wait here until we get mission instructions. And then I observe something as I walk quietly behind him in the shadows. Ever since we committed to heading out towards the bunker entrance, I’ve noticed something different about the surveillance cameras. Beforehand, they were constantly showing signs of life via their whirring lenses and flashing LEDs. But these cameras are lifeless, they don’t appear to be powered up.