The silo did have a connecting hallway to the barn, but another key-pad, complete with a flashing red indicator light, protected the steel door of the silo, just as the one outside had.
"Any suggestions?" Frank asked.
"Maybe you'll have to shoot it off after all," Jeremiah said, a frown settling on his face.
"Maybe I can take it apart," Jimmy said, as he bent and began to study the key-pad, "gimme that pocket knife of yours, Gary."
Two slotted screws appeared to be all that held the small black device to the wall. Using the edge of one of the smaller blades Jimmy carefully unscrewed the key-pad, and gently started to ease it away from the wall. The mounting screws were apparently an intrinsic part of the alarm system, for as soon as Jimmy lifted the key-pad a loud braying siren began to wail in the building. "Damn!" Jimmy yelled, and dropped the key-pad as though it had burned him.
"So much for surprise," Jeremiah yelled above the braying of the siren, panic in his voice, "We better take out the door if we're going in."
Luther
Eleven miles away, Luther sat mesmerized by the pulsing message on the monitor. He was replaying for yet another time just exactly how he would enter the remaining codes, and launch the missiles from wherever they were buried in the huge underground complex.
He had men searching them out, but there were miles of underground roads, tunnels, corridors, and natural rock passages to search, and it would take forever for them to search them all. He could only hope that they would stumble upon them in their searching. After all, the law of averages must be tipping in favor of it, he thought, they had already searched better than half of the complex itself.
It still made him angry that their location had not been known to him. He had known several other things. He had known of their existence, hadn't he? So why was it he didn't know where they were? He supposed it didn't matter, not really anyway, as everything was close to being over, and regardless of where they were, they would still do their intended job.
He was anticipating word from Willie later on this evening, concerning the woman. Her capture was assured though, he knew, and Willie would not really be telling him something he didn't already know, rather just confirming it for him, and once he had the woman, he would have them all.
Another thing that really pissed him off was that he was not positive of where the four men were. He had been able to see them leave Fairport he had even been able to glimpse them briefly as they sped across the lake. After that though, he had not been able to track them, and had no idea where they had gone. But they would have to come here eventually, wouldn't they? After all they were seeking the missiles, and they had left Rochester.
So far they had not been spotted trying to enter the caves. They would be, he assured himself, and the orders he had issued concerning them were to shoot to kill, on sight, no fucking around. He had no doubt that he would be in possession of their bodies by night fall, and once he was, he would punch in those codes, and send the fools in Rochester a little present.
He didn't question why in his mind it was so important to him that their top people were dead or at least captured, before he sent the missiles. It was just part of The Plan. His Plan and he had thought it out carefully. Plans were important, and once a plan was devised it was even more important to stick to it. Follow it. See it through to the end. He wanted their deaths to be more personal, he wanted to look at their dead bullet-riddled bodies, and maybe stomp what was left of them, or order their remains torn to shreds.
Yes, he decided, as he watched the screen, torn to shreds, ripped limb to limb. "Yes indeedy," he said aloud, and shuddered with delight.
He was still thinking of how much he would enjoy the little scenario he was playing out in his fevered mind, when the screen suddenly went blank, and then a split second later began to flash a new message. The wide grin that had been plastered on his face, suddenly slipped as he looked at the screen.
SECURITY BREECH ZONE 7.......
INITIATING POWER DOWN SEQUENCE IN TEN SECONDS.
ENTER COMMAND CODE SECTOR SIX, ZONE SEVEN TO
ABORT POWER DOWN SEQUENCE NOW __
A small cursor blinked, waiting for the requested input.
Now what the fuck did that mean exactly? Luther wondered, and where the fuck was sector six, or zone seven for that matter? And just what the fuck was going on, he asked himself. Power down what? Sector six and zone seven? Did it mean that the four men had somehow managed to enter the underground facility undetected? If so, Luther assured himself, somebody's balls would be hanging from his belt. They would join several others he had skewered, that now hung suspended from a leather thong at his waist. Fucking-up was not allowed, and the punishment he had devised for it, was a powerful deterrent. As he watched, still puzzled, the screen changed once more.
INITIATING POWER DOWN NOW.
ESTIMATED TIME TO POWER DOWN SECTOR
SIX TEN MINUTES.
ABORT COMMAND ON STANDBY.
A small computer generated digital clock appeared in the upper left hand corner and began to track the time second by second.
Slowly it began to dawn on Luther that the termination might be referring to the missiles. That maybe sector six, zone seven, might be where the missiles were located, and that possibly the four had not only broken into the underground facility, but that they may also have found the missiles, and that maybe, just maybe, they were trying to disarm them, and if that were the case, it couldn't be allowed, it just could not. Because, he told himself, well because it couldn't, because...Well, because that wouldn't be fair, that would be cheating, and even that old bastard who was passing himself off as God wouldn't cheat, would he? Could he?
No, Luther decided, he was too much of a goody-two-shoes, for that shit, and besides, he didn't know how to cheat, that was... Well, that was just the way it was, he reasoned. Only I can cheat, it had always been that way, and... and... Well, anything else wouldn't be playing the game fairly, it would be... cheating, and cheating was no fucking fair, no fucking fair at all, and... So, it couldn't be, it was against the rules. Not allowed, but... Just in case he was thinking of cheating, not that he could, he assured himself, but just in case, just in case that old bastard was trying to be crafty, hadn't he better try punching those codes in right now? Hadn't he better? He glared at the computer screen. Yes, he decided, just in case, not that it was possible, but... "Just in case," he whispered, as his fingers deftly punched the terminals keyboard, and entered the final codes. "Just in-fucking-case," he whispered again. He was rewarded with a new screen for his efforts, as the old one blinked away.
TERMINATE POWER DOWN SECTOR SIX ZONE
SEVEN? Y/N __
The screen asked, as the cursor blinked, waiting for input. He quickly punched Y on the keyboard and was rewarded with yet another screen.
CONFIRM ACTIVE LAUNCH STATUS Y/N __
He pushed Y once more.
ENTER LAUNCH COORDINATES_________
Luther referred briefly to a small blue book he had liberated from the base commanders safe. He punched in the specified code for an in-country launch, and then entered the required coordinates.
SPECIFIED COORDINATES INDICATE
10% SURVIVAL RATE THIS FACILITY.
TERMINATE/PROCEED T/P____
Luther pressed P, and the screen went blank.
Frank
Frank emptied the full clip of the machine pistol into the steel door, which seemed to absorb the bullets rather than bounce them back at him which had been his concern. The heavy steel lock-set blew apart and fell to the floor. Smoke and the smell of burnt gunpowder hung heavy in the air. Jeremiah wriggled his fingers into the bullet-warmed opening that had once contained the lock-set, and tugged sharply. The door swung slowly open, and they stepped inside the silo.
Luther
Luther had begun to panic. A new screen had not appeared, and just what did that mean? He wondered. He refrained from touching the keyboard, or the monitor, although he would h
ave liked to, he was too afraid he would not be able to control himself, that he might just rip the keyboard from the station and smash it to bits, and if it didn't respond soon, he was afraid he would, and what would that do, and... The screen blinked back on, interrupting his thoughts.
CALCULATING SAFE-FLIGHT STAND BY.
The screen blinked.
Now what the fuck did that mean? Luther asked himself. What was safe flight, and how come it had to calculate anything, and how come it wasn't just launching the fucking missiles, and this is really beginning to piss me off, and... The screen changed.
Frank
Frank stepped into the silo behind the others. The smoke was heavier inside the room, and the stench of sulfur dioxide was almost gagging in its intensity. The room however was not so obscured by the smoke, that he could not see that it was empty.
"There ain't a damn thing in here," Gary said, echoing their thoughts, "now what d'you make of that?"
Frank was examining the walls of the silo. What had appeared to them to be solid brick on the outside, was not. "Fiberglass cast," Frank said, "it's fake, this isn't a silo..." He had been about to say more, when the floor beneath his feet suddenly began to tilt. "Out!" Jimmy yelled in surprise. "Its’ under the damn floor, get out!"
Luther
Luther stared at the new screen.
SAFE-FLIGHT INSTALLED.
DESTINATION.EXE INSTALLED.
SYS LOC.EXE INSTALLED.
INS.EXE ACTIVE.
24:12:06 TO LAUNCH.
The clock-like entry began to run backwards second by second, as Luther watched in anger.
"NO!" he screamed into the room. "Right fucking now, not twenty-fucking-four-fucking-hours, RIGHT NOW!" He fought to control his temper, and forced his hands to release the key board.
NOW,
He typed out with a jab of one finger, and pressed enter. The terminal beeped, but other than the small beep, nothing happened. He forced his anger down, typed,
TERMINATE,
and again pressed enter. Other than the same small beep, nothing happened. His hands spasmed and he once again grasped the keyboard. One finger jammed the enter key, and a rush of beeps issued forth from the terminal.
NO, he told himself, as he ripped the key board loose, and rocketed it into the screen. The screen imploded with a bright orange shower of sparks.
"NO, NO, FUCKINGFUCKINGFUCKING," he screamed as he pummeled the monitor with his fists.
Frank
As the four men watched from the relative safety of the hallway, the concrete decking tilted to one side, and a slim white missile glided out of the abyss below the silo. Before it was entirely out of its dark prison, the fiberglass silo began to tip and then crashed to one side. All obstructions removed, the missile, along with its launch mechanism, glided out of the dark socket, and rose majestically into the late afternoon air. Once fully extended the launch assembly swiveled, and canted the missile to an almost flat trajectory, then the hydraulic machinery fell silent. The missile was aimed to the southwest, Frank saw, directly at Rochester.
Ten seconds later the same heavy thudding of hydraulic machinery, came from the direction of a field behind the barn. All four men sprinted to the outside, and around to the rear of the barn. A second missile was rising out of the field, impossibly white against the back-drop of the deep blue afternoon sky.
They watched in silence as the missile swiveled, and assumed the same nearly flat trajectory as the first had. When it was finished the silence seemed deafening in its intensity. Frank broke it.
"We're screwed," he said softly, a defeated look on his washed out face, "it was all for nothing."
"What about trying to find the wiring and cutting it?" Jimmy asked, with no trace of hope in his voice.
"Never get to it time," Gary said softly, his eyes locked on the missile that had magically risen from the field. "And where would we look?"
"Why ain't it launching?" Jeremiah asked, Shouldn’t it oughta?"
"We're screwed," Frank repeated, as if he had heard none of the other men speak, as if he were totally alone, and really only speaking to himself. "We are screwed."
Jeremiah's hand shot out, and smacked loudly against Frank's cheek. "We ain't screwed, Frank, so don't say we are, we ain't," his eye's flashed with anger. "It ain't launching, Frank," he repeated as though he were speaking to a child. "And if it ain't launching," he continued, dropping his voice to a calmer level, "we ain't screwed."
"He's right, Frank," Gary said, with a note of hopefulness in his voice, "there ain't no steam, or whatever that stuff is you see when a rocket gets launched. There ain't none of that comin' out the bottom... they ain't launching, least ways not yet they ain't."
Frank shook his head and looked at the missiles, first one, and then the other. "Can we disarm them somehow? Turn them away from Rochester somehow?" he asked.
"We kin try," Jeremiah said, "but we don't want to get too near 'em. In fact maybe this is too close, anybody know?"
"If they're nukes, we're way to close," Gary said, "but who gives a shit, I don't. If they launch they'll kill a hell-of-a lot more'n just us four. I vote we try, if it kills us... so be it. I'd rather die trying," his face was grim and determined when he paused and looked around at them. "Well," he asked, "what's it gonna be?"
Luther
Luther was standing in the Main Operations Room. His mangled hands dripped green fluid onto the white composite top of the partition he was leaning against, as he watched the wall of screens. The fluid bubbled and hissed as it ate its way through the top and ran down the sides.
The room was nearly empty, save Luther himself, and some of the computer jocks. He had sent everyone else searching for the four men he was convinced were somewhere in the facility.
All the screens were in countdown mode. They had switched automatically as soon as the last sequence of numbers had been entered.
If Luther had been in the operation room before the change-over, when the screens were still monitoring outside cameras, and if he had been looking at one monitor in particular, he would have seen the objects of his wrath, as they had stormed the Jeffery's farm, and killed the biker that had taken up residence there.
Luther knew about the biker. He had been informed by Willie himself two weeks before when the man had moved himself into the farm house. "Willie," he had said, with a sneer, "who gives a shit about a farm house?"
Willie, who had thought at first that it might be important, had immediately dismissed it, and told the control room personnel not to keep track of the farm.
Steve Iverson, however, had kept track of the man in spite of being told not to. The biker seemed to be up to something, and Iverson hoped that he would be the one to figure out what. Today the watching had paid off, and Luther would have known what had transpired, if he hadn't ordered one of the men in the control room to shoot Iverson, who now lay dead on the floor by Luther's feet. Iverson had watched the whole thing, and had been in such a hurry to tell Luther, that he had forgotten to ask permission to speak.
Luther had been far to consumed with anger, to listen to someone who did not even have the courtesy to wait until he was asked to speak, and so had ordered Iverson shot, without ever knowing what sort of information he was so eager to depart.
Far better to nip disobedience in the bud quickly, Luther thought, as he gazed down at Iverson's crumpled body.
Once he had been able to calm down, he had wondered briefly what Iverson had wanted to say, but only briefly, and then his attention had been drawn to the screen-wall, and the count-down clocks that they showed.
He knew for sure now, that he had been cheated, but it was still salvageable, he told himself. He had called Willie, to make sure that they would get the woman, impressed upon him how severe the penalty would be if he didn't, and then had allowed himself the joy of watching the screens count down.
It could have been worse, he reasoned, the missiles might not have set at all, the old bastard might have jin
xed that too. But he hadn't, and if he had to wait a few hours so what, hadn't he already waited for thousands of years? What was a few more hours compared to that?
"Nothing at all," he whispered calmly into the quiet room. "No big deal." No sooner had he spoken the words out loud, when all the screens in the Operations Room went blank.
Frank
"We do it," Frank said, as he stared at the missile in the field and sighed. "Gary's, right, four of us, or all of them."
"How come there were no warnings," Jimmy asked, "shouldn't there have been those triangular warning plaques inside if they're armed with nuclear war-heads?"
"Maybe, maybe not," Gary said, "but what else would they be? I don't have a clue, 'less they're chemical war-heads could be some sort of regular war-head. Maybe even CFP's. Trying to figure out what it is, ain't gonna help us at all," he said, as he turned and started toward the missile behind them. The others followed, and when they reached the missile, they began to circle it. Taking their first real look at it.
They had been too panicked before to notice much of anything, other than, it was white, it was big, and it looked like death, and it was the last thing they had really wanted to see, even though they had come here to find it.
The launching mechanism was almost as big as the circumference of the silo had been, and the massive steel girder-like arms that protruded upward, cradling the missile securely, also held two thick cables of wires that entered the body of the missile about twenty feet from the ground.
"What happens if we cut those wires?" Gary asked, as Jeremiah and Frank left to get the ladder they had used to climb onto the barn roof.
"Wouldn't it blow up?" Jimmy asked.
"It ain't like a bomb, like you see defused on TV," Gary answered. "Least I don't think it is. But I ain't sure if cutting those wires will do the trick. It might not. I think though, that they might be to guide it... I wish to hell I knew for sure, but I don't, I'm guessing. But it's a place to start, I suppose."
Earth's Survivors: box set Page 194