“And you can’t guarantee that the sun’s not going to go nova tomorrow, either.”
“Actually,” Jill said, “there aren’t any signs to indicate that the sun will go nova in the next billion years or so.”
“And if it does, even a place like Moultrie’s got out there won’t do any good,” Larkin added, “so that’s one thing I’m not worried about.”
Trevor tapped the brochure that was lying on the table next to his plate and said, “Okay, given that the world is a dangerous place these days—”
“That’s putting it mildly,” Jill said.
Trevor ignored the interruption and went on, “How do you know this . . . refuge or whatever you want to call it . . . will offer any real protection?”
“We’ve both gone out there and taken a look at it,” Larkin said. “I’ve been there twice.”
“And you’ve seen what the owner wants you to see and listened to what he wants to tell you.”
Larkin inclined his head in acknowledgment of his son-in-law’s point. Trevor was a smart guy, a likable guy. Larkin had gone through a little of the usual dad’s feeling that nobody was good enough for his daughter, but logically, he knew that Trevor was. The two of them were a fine match.
“Yeah, but I took a good look around and asked a lot of questions. Maybe you two should go out there and do the same thing.”
“And the cost of it . . .” Trevor said.
“Yeah, it is pretty expensive,” Jill added.
“True. But you don’t have to pay the whole thing up front, and if you needed it, we thought we could maybe help you out with the down payment.”
“Oh, no,” Trevor said instantly. “We couldn’t do that.”
“Why not?” Larkin asked. “We’ve never loaned you a dime. There’s not many people our age who can say that about their kids.”
Jill made decent, but not spectacular, money as a pharmacist. Trevor made decent, but not spectacular, money working for a computer consulting company. Together, their incomes had allowed them to live comfortable lives, although in recent years it had become more of a challenge because of constantly rising taxes and the cost of everything else going up as well. Still, Larkin figured they were doing all right. But probably not all right enough to come up with the chunk of money the Hercules Project would require.
“We have the money,” Susan said. “Helping you out wouldn’t be a hardship. Well, not enough of one to worry about, anyway.”
Jill looked at her mother and said, “What do you really think about all this, Mom? You’re the most level-headed person I know.”
“Hey,” Larkin said.
“You’re level-headed most of the time, Dad, but we all know you can go off on a tangent now and then.”
“My tangents always turn out to be right. Well, nearly always.” Larkin reached over and picked up the brochure, held it up as he added, “This is one time I really hope I’m wrong, but I’m not sure we can afford to take that chance.”
Jill was still looking at her mother. Susan said, “I started out telling your father it was far-fetched, just like Trevor did. I even said it sounded paranoid.”
“She did,” Larkin said. “Took great pleasure in it, too.”
“But I don’t know,” Susan went on. “After what happened in Florida . . . that terrible attack and the people responsible for it promising there would be more . . . I just wasn’t sure what to think anymore. I started listening more carefully to the news, and there are just a lot of things going on in the world that could cause a real catastrophe. I mean, there are at least two countries with nuclear bombs that would like to see the United States blown off the face of the earth. Then when you think about the terrorists who might be able to get their hands on a nuclear device, or some biological weapon . . .”
Trevor said, “They make movies about that stuff. In real life, the government always finds a way to stop such things from happening.”
“Yeah, the same government that runs the IRS and the VA,” Larkin said, “and all the other alphabet soup agencies that can’t quite seem to do their jobs. If you want to put all your faith in the government, Trev, you go right ahead. I’ve dealt with them too much to do that.”
“Dad’s kind of got a point,” Jill said. “The FDA and the other agencies we have to deal with have put some good safeguards in place, but they’ve also weighed the whole process down with so many needless, contradictory regulations that sometimes I think it makes the public less safe in the long run by wearing out the people who have to cope with the bureaucracy.”
“See?” Larkin said. “I raised a smart girl.”
“You say that because she’s agreeing with you,” Trevor said.
“What more proof do I need?”
Trevor sat back in his chair and raised both hands as he said, “Look, objectively, intellectually, I have to agree with you that the world is a dangerous place. Anybody would have to have their head completely buried in the sand not to realize that.”
“Or stuck up somewhere else. I believe the technical term is Rectal Cranial Inversion.”
“But casting your lot with these . . . survivalists . . . I’m not sure that’s a good idea, either. I mean, they’re kind of extremists, aren’t they?”
“Some people might say that. Some people might wish they’d been a little more extreme themselves, if things really go as bad as they could.”
“I guess I can understand stockpiling some food and water—”
“Won’t do you much good in the case of a nuclear explosion or a virus that’s going to wipe out ninety percent of humanity.”
“Maybe not, but what if none of those things happen? Then you’re stuck with some really expensive real estate that’s under the ground.”
Jill said, “Look, we can go around and around in circles like this all evening and not get anywhere. Maybe what we should do is make an appointment to go out there and look at the place.”
Trevor gave her a surprised look. “Really?”
“It can’t hurt anything, and if my folks feel this strongly about it, maybe it’s not a bad idea.”
He shrugged and said, “Well, sure, if that’s what you want. Maybe this weekend?”
Jill nodded. “I’ll call and see if I can set it up.”
“You want us to come with you?” Larkin asked.
“No. We can make up our own minds, Dad. But we’ll take everything you’ve said about it into consideration.”
Susan said, “That’s about all we can ask.”
Trevor said, “Have you actually signed up yet, Patrick?”
“Not yet,” Larkin said. “We wanted to talk to you two first.”
“Because we wouldn’t want to live in a world without you and our grandchildren,” Susan added.
“Well,” Trevor said as he lifted his wineglass, “I’ll drink to that.”
* * *
They were on their way out to the Hercules Project that Saturday afternoon, listening to NPR—Jill often got annoyed with the station, but Trevor liked it—when a news bulletin came on. Jill was driving—they were in her crossover—so she thumbed the button on the steering wheel to increase the volume.
“—reports that the North Korean missile destroyed an American fishing vessel in the Bering Sea. The North Korean government issued a statement a short time after the incident declaring that the firing of the missile was only a test, not an aggressive action, but it stopped short of apologizing for the loss of life and the destruction of the vessel. Nor did the statement actually say that the American vessel was struck by accident.
“With tensions already in a heightened state, the Pentagon immediately placed the American fleet in the Pacific on high alert. The President, in a statement from the White House, said that it would be a mistake to jump to any conclusions and that a full investigation of the incident will be carried out. In the meantime, he assured the North Koreans that the United States will not overreact to this incident.”
“Overreact?” Jill s
aid incredulously. “They blow one of our boats out of the water, kill who knows how many Americans, and the President practically falls all over himself telling them not to worry about it, it’s all good, we won’t do anything about it!”
“He didn’t actually say that,” Trevor pointed out.
“He might as well have.”
“You’re starting to sound like your father. The President said we were going to investigate the incident fully.”
“And when we find out that they did it on purpose—which it sure sounds like they did—how are we going to react? Are we going to go in and blow up a few things, too?” Jill snorted. It wasn’t very ladylike, but there was no other way to express her contempt. “You know good and well that’s not going to happen. If anything, the guy in the White House will apologize to the North Koreans because our boat got in the way of their missile!” She took a deep breath. “And here’s what really worries me . . . If that missile reached the Aleutian Islands, it wouldn’t take much more for it to make it to Alaska. That’s the United States, Trev. You want that dictator lobbing nuclear warheads at the United States?”
“Nobody said anything about nuclear warheads. I’ll bet the missile was unarmed, if it was just a test like the North Koreans say. Just the impact was probably enough to sink the ship.”
“You think they’d have a missile that they couldn’t put a warhead on if they wanted to?”
“I don’t know. I’m no expert on nuclear armaments.”
Neither was Jill, but even so, the latest incident was enough to make her glad they were taking this little excursion today. If nothing too terrible ever happened, at least it was a pleasant drive in the country.
If worse came to worst, though, it might wind up saving their lives . . .
Chapter 9
The tour of the Hercules Project went a little better than Jill anticipated. She didn’t mind Trevor asking hard questions of Graham Moultrie. The man had to expect those and be able to provide honest, complete answers if he was going to ask people to invest that much money. She had been concerned that Trevor might be a little obnoxious about it, though. Sometimes he could come across as condescending and arrogant. In point of fact, he often was the smartest guy in the room, and he’d been known to act like it.
As it turned out, however, Trevor was on his best behavior. That might have had something to do with Deb Moultrie going along with them on the tour. The redhead was distracting, to say the least. Trevor was able to focus on what Moultrie was saying, but he couldn’t work up the energy to be annoying. That was Jill’s theory, anyway.
Anyway, Deb wasn’t that much more attractive than her, Jill thought, so there was no need for her to feel threatened by Trevor’s reaction.
They went through the place from top to bottom, seeing everything there was to see, as far as Jill could tell. She knew from talking to her parents that they were thinking about getting an apartment in one of the missile silos. Those were more expensive, and Jill wondered if she and Trev and the kids wouldn’t do just fine in one of the four-person units along one of the main corridors. The lower level barracks-style arrangement was out of the question. There would be little enough privacy in the four-person unit.
When they were finished with the tour and had paused near the staircase leading back up to the surface, Trevor said, “Can I ask you one more question, Mr. Moultrie?”
“Sure,” Moultrie said with a smile, “if you call me Graham like I asked you to.”
“All right, Graham.” Trevor waved a hand at their surroundings. “This is a big operation. When you get right down to it, it’s a real-estate development.”
Moultrie thought it over and nodded. “I think it’s fair to say that. What’s your question?”
“Every real-estate developer I’ve ever run into has had salesmen working for him, trying to move the property. I didn’t see anybody around here except you and your wife. Where are your salesmen?”
“I don’t have any,” Moultrie replied without hesitation. “Don’t need ’em. The Hercules Project is my baby. Well, mine and Deb’s. You see, Trevor, a guy who buys a big piece of property, cuts it up, and slaps fifty or a hundred houses on it, he’s looking to do one thing: make money. I want to make money, too, but for a different reason. I want to funnel that money back into this place and make it even better. Because in the long run, the goal is to save humanity. You might say we’re trying to save humanity from itself. I know people talk about climate change and natural disasters, but my gut feeling is, if things ever get bad enough to need something like the Hercules Project, it’s going to be because of a war or a man-made plague or something else that we’ve done to ourselves out of sheer greed and stupidity and lust for power.”
Jill said, “That makes it sound like you don’t have a very high opinion of people in general.”
“That’s absolutely right,” Moultrie said, again without missing a beat. “I don’t. No offense, Jill, but you and Trevor aren’t old enough to remember the way things used to be. People had some common sense that’s missing today.”
“Every generation says that about the generation that comes after them,” Trevor said.
Moultrie shrugged. “More than likely. But think about politics. Neither side is willing to admit that the other has any good ideas, isn’t even willing to consider that possibility. If one side does something, the other side says it’s the worst thing that could ever happen. Then they switch around and the dance goes on. They’re so consumed with that and their never-ending quest for power that they’ve let our place in the world slip.”
“You mean nobody fears the United States anymore.”
“It’s not fear so much that I’m talking about. It’s respect.” Moultrie chuckled. “But I’ll be honest with you . . . a little good old-fashioned fear isn’t a bad thing for your enemies to have, either.”
“Wouldn’t it be better not to have enemies?”
“Now you’re just denying human nature. There will always be people who hate and resent the United States. As messed-up as we are now, as little of a threat as we’ve become compared to what we used to be, there are still plenty of them out there, just hoping something terrible will happen to us. And if they can nudge along whatever that is, they’ll do it, gladly. We’ve seen plenty of evidence of that today.”
“That North Korean missile hitting our fishing boat,” Jill said.
“Exactly,” Moultrie said. “That was a test, all right, but it wasn’t an accident. They aimed that missile right where it landed, just to see how far they could push us. And based on Washington’s reaction so far, now they know: they can push us a little farther.”
“You could be jumping the gun,” Trevor said.
Moultrie shook his head. “I wish I was. But I don’t believe that I am. And that’s why I believe in this place enough to handle every aspect of its development myself. Because things are just going to get worse, a lot worse, before there’s ever a chance of them getting better.”
A strained silence settled over the four of them for a long moment before Deb said, “That’s enough doom and gloom for right now. Let’s go back up to the office. I’ve got a nice bottle of wine. Maybe we could have a drink and talk about something pleasant.”
“Like getting us to sign on the dotted line?” Trevor asked. The bluntness of the question made Jill wince a little. She was usually the more outspoken of the two of them.
Moultrie answered smoothly, though. “Not at all,” he said. “I don’t want you making any decisions today. This is an important step, a very important step, and I want anyone who decides to join us in the project to be absolutely certain they’re doing the right thing. Because who knows . . .” He smiled again. “I could turn out to be totally wrong about the direction the world is headed.”
Jill might have hoped that was true, that Moultrie was totally wrong.
But looking back over everything that had happened, she was afraid he wasn’t.
* * *
Bail
ey and Chris were smart kids. They knew something was going on. The way their mom and dad had gone to their grandparents’ house for dinner on such short notice, the trip out on Saturday afternoon without any explanation of where they were going . . . Those things were just enough out of the ordinary to tell the kids that something was up, and there was a strong chance it wasn’t anything good.
Jill could tell that from the way they looked at her. She hated keeping them in the dark, but she couldn’t bring herself to tell them that Mom and Dad were trying to figure out what to do in case the world came to an end. Kids had enough . . . kid things . . . to worry about without piling that on top of them as well.
She and Trevor hadn’t talked much on the way home. Despite how pleasant Graham and Deb Moultrie had been, the whole experience was a sobering one, starting with the North Korean missile incident.
Jill ordered pizza. They sat around and watched some cheesy old monster movie on TV. Just a pleasant Saturday evening at home. Then Bailey and Chris, both of them yawning, had gone off to bed. Trevor got a beer out of the refrigerator, carried it into the living room, and sat down next to Jill.
“We have to talk about this,” he said.
She was watching the news with the sound off. The police in Ohio were digging up some guy’s backyard and had found seven bodies so far, with the prospect of more to come.
“Has the world really gone mad,” she said, “or are we just better informed?”
“You mean because we have twenty-four-hour news and more social media than anybody can keep up with?” Trevor shook his head. “I don’t know. I’d really like to believe the world isn’t worse than it used to be, but I just don’t know anymore.”
Jill couldn’t keep a certain savagery out of the gesture as she pushed the button on the remote to turn off the TV. She said, “We have to do it.”
“What? Buy space in that . . . project? We need to talk about it, sure, but—”
“We talk things to death, Trev. We debate, we ponder, we mull, we think it over. And usually we don’t pull the trigger on anything.”
The Doomsday Bunker Page 5