When It Rains

by Joel Shaw

  "I know. The Twin Cities are not far from Saint Cloud. How are you navigating? Do you have a map app on your ID card or what?"

  "I was told not to use my ID Card. I have paper maps that I have been using."

  “You have paper maps? That’s interesting...where did you get them?”

  "A guy named Jordan Whittaker helped me out before I left Texas. He gave me everything I'm using including the Brammo. He gave me maps for every state between Texas and Minnesota. They're in my backpack."

  "This guy, Jordan, sounds like a good man. You should have brought him along." Shania laughed.

  "I wish you had." Sheila said as she approached holding several items of clothing in her arms. "These are for you Amber. You'll feel better if you get out of those dirty clothes. We do have a washing machine. I'll show you how to use it."

  Amber smiled and took the clothes. The Whittakers had big hearts, for sure. "Thanks, Sheila. Really. Thank you very much. I'm going to owe you and your brother big time."

  "We were just talking about your brother, Sheila.”

  “Oh? What about him?”

  “Yes, Amber told me that he once worked for the NGA. I asked Robert what that stood for and he said...let me see if I can get this right...National...Geospatial...Intelligence Agency. It has something to do with satellite mapping and analysis."

  “I have no idea what he has been doing since I last say him, but that sounds like it’s right up his alley. He loved his maps.”

  "Well, it sounds as though he would be the one to talk to about maps, doesn't it? I'd like to see your maps, Amber. Paper maps are rare. If you have one of Kansas, I would be particularly interested in that one."

  "I do have a Kansas map. I'll get it." She walked to the locker where she had stowed her backpack and withdrew the maps. She put the saddlebags in the locker and returned to the table where a group of curious youngsters had assembled around Shania. Robert had joined the group as well as Amber spread the map on the table. She began to realize the value of the paper maps as many of the group confessed that they had never seen a paper map in their life.

  In spite of the fact that the internet was dead, old mapping software existed on various platforms and was used daily by everyone in Health Services by means of the display on their Federal Identification Cards.

  Jamie activated his Id’s screen to compare the Kansas map app with the paper map.

  Amber felt compelled share what Jordan had told her about the risks of using the ID cards.

  "You shouldn't be using your ID Card, Jamie." Amber blurted.

  “What?” Shania stared intensely at the newcomer. “Do you know something we don’t? Out with it girl.”

  Amber tried to remember exactly what Jordan had said.

  "Jordan told me that every time I used my Federal ID Card or Federal Water Card the location, date and time was recorded in a national database. He said that was how the government kept track of us." She pointed at everyone in the silent huddle. “All of us. I haven't used mine since he told me that. It's kind of scary."”

  "Is that true, Robert?" Shania's question was as pointed as a spear.

  Robert had been their go-to guy for all things related to security and communication. He had infiltrated Health Services ten years ago. He was keeping tabs on the group and reporting their activities to the NSA on a regular basis. He knew about the tracking capabilities of the cards but had never mentioned them. He had also been a member of Black Swan in it's early days. A secret he swore never to divulge.

  "Robert. I asked you a question."

  "Yeah, yeah, I was just thinking about something else."

  "Think about what I asked you Robert." Shania pointed her long black index finger at his face. "And answer me."

  "Yes. I am familiar with the capabilities of the cards." He was cornered and he knew it. His training from years ago was murky and muddled. His mind was not responding to the pressure the way it once did.

  "Why didn't you tell us about them, Robert. Apparently we have unknowingly been putting ourselves at risk for years. We brought you on board because of your security and intelligence background. We trusted you, Robert."

  “...I...but...” Robert wanted to explain but stopped when he felt the cold steel tip of Sheila's dagger on his neck.

  "No buts Robert. We have learned more from Amber in five minutes than we have learned from you in ten years. I think it's safe to assume that you have betrayed us in every aspect of our operation." She looked a Sheila with a knowing nod. "Lock him in the broom closet, then search his apartment.”

  "Yes mamm. Come on, old man." Sheila yanked him off his chair before he could stand up and pulled him half-crawling down the hall, pushed him into the janitor's closet, and slammed the door, bolting it on the outside.

  "Jamie, what's Roberts apartment number?" Sheila barked. Amber was stunned. The kind, caring, soft-spoken woman she had met the day before had morphed into a vicious predator.

  "Two eleven. I'll show you."

  "Good, let's go. You want to come, Amber? You might be able to help."

  "Help with what? I don't know anything." She wasn't sure she wanted to go with this new version of Sheila. Jules had said she was tough. He was right about that.

  "My brother showed things to you that we have never seen and talked about things that we know nothing about. Maybe you'll recognize something. That would be helpful."

  "Go ahead, Amber," Shania said. "I would appreciate it."

  "OK, just a minute. I'd like to put these clean clothes in my backpack and get a few things if you don't mind."

  “Make it quick...and bring your headlamp.” Sheila ordered.

  Amber returned to the locker she had been assigned and performed a quick inventory of the contents of the saddle bags. It appeared as though Jules hadn't disturbed anything. Other than the smashed protein bars, nothing appeared to have broken. The vacuum-packed seed packets that filled one side of the saddled bags was unscathed during the accident, having been on the top side of the grinding event. Her hat was crushed, but it was meant to be wadded up for storage; she figured the veil could be crushed without damaging it, too. She put the hat and headlamp on her head. She withdrew the stun gun and holster and strapped it around her waist. The nature of the fun and carefree Health Services venue that she had enjoyed had suddenly changed to a semi-hostile environment. The ongoing events reminded her to keep her guard up at all times from now on. She slipped her sheathed knife into her waist band and fastened her windbreaker to cover the weapons, unsure of the reactions they would draw if they were visible.

  She walked hesitantly toward the waiting group. “I’m ready." She hope to sound confident even though she was scared. She saw that Sheila made no attempt to hide her weapons. She was strapped and clearly ready for whatever may come her way.

  "You ready, Jamie?" Sheila made eye contact with the muscular young man. He too had armed himself with a handgun held by a narrow holster on his left hip.

  "Roger that."

  "Let's go." Sheila marched toward a section of the warehouse that Amber had not explored. "I've got my radio, Shi. Channel 4.”

  “Roger that. Keep in touch." Shania said. She turned her attention to her employees whom had witnessed the unfolding drama. "The show is over. Get back to work. We have deliveries to make."

  As the youngsters bustled about their assigned duties, Shania watched the search party disappear down the basement stairs.

  #

  CHAPTER 16 - MAY 7

  "Where are we?" Amber had never been in a tunnel of any sort or even under ground for that matter. If she had known the word claustrophobic, she would have understood the meaning of it at that moment. The four-foot wide tunnel was illuminated only by the red light cast by tiny headlamps allowing them to see a mere ten yards forward. The six-foot high by four foot wide tunnel was crowded with pipes and conduits of varying sizes fastened to the ceiling or each other at regular intervals with rusting and sometimes broken hardware forcing them to dodg
e and duck as they advanced along the concrete floor that was covered with a fine silt and littered with decomposed rodent skeletons as though the tunnel had once flooded and all the rodents drowned at the same time. The atmosphere was suffocating. Amber wanted to hold someone’s hand.

  Jaime detected Amber’s discomfort and maintained a monologue the entire length of the tunnel in an effort to distract her. Amber barely heard a word. “...This is a utility tunnel that connects our warehouse with our sister warehouse which we have converted into a dormitory for the crew. We don't normally use it to go from one to the other, but normal has just been busted. I'm not taking any chances. If Robert is an informant, then it’s time to make some changes...”

  Several long minutes passed before Jaime announced that they had reached the end. Sheila pulled a ring of keys from her pocket and tried several before finding the right one. The heavy steel fire door screamed on its hinges as she pushed it open revealing a staircase leading up.

  "This way.” Jamie led them down a long unpainted, hallway punctuated with doors every twelve feet. "He's on the second floor."

  They climbed the stairs in silence. The stairwell door opened into another long, unpainted hallway. Jamie counted as they passed the doors," 203,205,207,209,211. This is it.”

  Sheila stepped forward with the master key and attempted several times to insert it in the keyway.

  “Dammit...it doesn't fit. He must have changed the lock."

  "Are you sure you have the right key?" Jamie was trying to be helpful; that was a mistake.

  "Fucking right I am, Jamie.”

  Jamie stepped back, his hands in the air, signifying surrender. “Whatever you say.”

  "He changed the goddamn lock." She kicked the door several times; it didn't give. She looked at Jamie who outweighed her by fifty pounds or more. "Give it a body slam, Jamie. If it doesn't break, we're going through the fucking wall."

  "Roger that." Jamie positioned himself opposite number two-eleven and launched his body against the door, wincing as he hit it. All the nearby doors rattled but number two-eleven didn't budge. He looked at Sheila and shrugged. "No can do."

  "Forget it." Sheila barked. "He's reinforced it, too.” She studied the unpainted sheetrock in the hallway. The wall stud locations were easily identified by the placement of fasteners driven into them through the sheetrock. "We're going through the wall. All of these rooms are laid out the same, right?"

  "Roger that."

  "So, if we start at the door and pace to the left three feet, we would be past the closet, right?"

  "Roger, there's a closet here." Jamie took a long step to the left of the door and stopped. "The living room starts right about here." Jamie used the heel of his boot to scrape a mark at right angles to the wall.

  "This should be good right here,"he said and gave the wall a kick between the vertical lines of fasteners with his steel-toed boot. He kicked several more times, until his boot broke through the drywall on the far side. Sheila impatiently pushed him aside and ripped at the broken drywall with her leather-gloved hands like a tiger trying escape a cage, she clawed and scratched a four foot tall by fourteen inch wide hole.

  "There mother fucker," she growled. She drew her pistol and slipped through the wall into the apartment. Jamie squeezed through, pistol in hand. Amber followed.

  Inside, the four hundred square foot, two-room apartment was tidy. A small closet by the door contained several boxes and several hanging garments. A neatly made single bed was against the wall with small dressers at both ends. Two base cabinets topped with a six foot laminate countertop were opposite the bed. A small table and chair was near the singular south-facing window. A small bathroom contained a vanity with a basin and water jug on top and a bucket repurposed as a seat was positioned in a shower base that had a drain.

  "Let's take our time. Look at everything. Don't just dump his shit out on the floor, Jamie. We don't know what we are looking for. Read every scrap of paper. If there's anything unusual we'll take it back to Shi. She can help us sort it out. Sheila toggled her radio's mic and spoke.

  "Black Dahlia, this is Snap Dragon, over."

  "This is Black Dahlia, go ahead, over."

  "We're in."

  "Ten four, how does it look, over."

  "Nothing unusual. He's keeps it neat, over."

  “There has to be something in there. Be thorough, over."

  "Roger that, over and out."

  "Let's get busy. Jamie, you take the bed and the dressers, I'll take the closet and the base cabinets. Amber, you take the bathroom."

  "Roger that." Jamie started pulled the top drawers out of the first dresser and dumped it on the bed.

  “Roger that” Amber grinned after using the strange vernacular.”

  Sheila snapped at her, “This ain’t no fucking party sister. Put on some gloves and get busy...and watch out for sharp objects. Be very careful. Understood?”

  “Yes mamm...I mean...understood.”

  They searched for an hour, picking through every drawer, box, shelf, bag, pack and so on, finding nothing out of the ordinary. Frustrated, Sheila slumped in the chair by the window.

  "There's something here. I know it. We're missing it." She studied the cloudless morning sky through the window for a few moments toying with a glass of water on the nearby table.

  "Goddamn you Robert." Impulsively, she threw the glass at the window, watching it shatter over the windowsill. She looked at Jamie and Amber; they were watching her intently.

  "Relax. I'm through breaking things. For now, anyway. She tried to laugh but it sounded caustic.

  Amber was watching the water from the broken glass drip off the window sill, soaking the unpainted drywall below the window. "Look at that." A piece of drywall tape was peeling away from the drywall, revealing a jagged saw cut.

  "That clever bastard." Sheila tossed the chair aside and kicked a hole in the wall below the window snapping the drywall. She tore it away from the wall revealing a cavity containing two thick file folders. She studied the window assembly for a moment then pulled on the window sill, it slid from under the casing and sash with little effort.

  "You super clever bastard." She removed the files, handing them to Jamie. "Don't mess with those; we'll take them with us. Now, let's see what else our good friend Robert has in here."

  She ripped the remaining sheetrock down to the bottom plate of the wall and gave a low whistle as she turned to her compatriots holding a palm-sized object.

  "Check this out, Jamie. It looks like a cell phone, doesn't it? Except the antenna is way bigger. I thought cell phone service was limited to The Colonies.”

  Jamie studied the handset."It's an Iridium 9700. These came out in the forties.

  She looked at Jamie and Amber; they were watching her intently.

  She placed another item on the table. "Look at this." It was a small plastic bag containing a two inch by one-half inch by a quarter inch thick object. "What the hell is this?"

  Jamie was busy studying the Iridium.

  “It looks like a cell phone from 2020 or so. My dad had a drawer full of old cell phones and there were several that looked like this.” He pushed the power key, the small screen glowed.

  “It’s got power, Sheila." He was gleeful. He missed the old communication technologies. Cell phones were a thing of the past. Cell phone service outside of The Colonies had been disconnected following The Telecommunication Act of 2040 which barred Tenants from wireless services.

  "This is awesome. I'm going to call my home old phone number and see if anyone picks up." He began poking the keys with his fat fingers.

  "Hold off on that, Jamie. We can take a closer look at it when we get back."

  "Roger that." Jamie uttered, clearly disappointed but obedient nevertheless.

  Sheila studied the tiny apartment again and again. Her gut was telling her that they were still missing something. Something else was hidden in the apartment, but what...and where? She thought it was unusual that they ha
dn't found anything of a personal nature in Robert's apartment. No documents or ID card, nothing that indicated his true identity.

  She suddenly realized a critical error on her part. She hadn't searched Robert before locking him in the janitor's closet.

  "Did either of you find any of Robert's Id cards?”

  Amber and Jamie shook their heads no in unison.

  "So, who is this guy, really?"

  "Whoever he is, he is connected," Jamie broke in. "I've been thinking about Iridium. My dad was in the Merchant Marines. He had a ton of trade magazines laying around. I always read the communication articles first, and I remember an article about Iridium. Iridium is system of satellites that orbit earth. There's like sixty or more of them. I was fascinated by it because it allowed a guy to make a phone call from anywhere on the planet. That's some sick technology. My dad used an Iridium satellite phone at sea. That's what this is; a satellite phone.

  Sheila wasn't listening to Jamie. She was obsessing about Robert's identity. They had taken his word regarding his background when he first joined the Health Services. Just as they had to do with all of the volunteers. Background checks were a thing of the past. One was taken on one's word. Trust was given until trust was violated. She studied the floor and the walls and then turned her attention to the ceiling. Nothing was shouting at her to 'search me'.

  "Amber and I will take this stuff back and share it with Shi. Do what you can to secure the hole in the wall. We'll see you back at the cafeteria."

  "Roger that."

  Sheila and Amber departed through the hole in the wall. Retracing their steps through the tunnel to the warehouse cafeteria. Shania joined them as they were spreading the contents of the thickest file folder across the table top.

  "So our guy Robert is a spy, huh?" Shania was clearly disturbed by what she was seeing.

  ”Look here, he’s recorded all of our activities since he's been with us. He's got records of our food shipments for the past five years. He's recorded the date and times of our trips to the 'well.' He has dossier about individuals in our crew. Shania took the stapled sheets labeled with her name and read some of the content: