Linkage (The Narrows of Time Series Book 1)

by Jay J. Falconer

  Kleezebee and Rosenbaum, who were still engaged in a private conversation along the wall, both fell over and landed on the floor.

  Lucas was shaken out of his seat and landed next to Drew’s wheelchair. He reached up for his brother’s arm and pulled Drew down beside him, allowing them to crawl under the mahogany conference table together for safety.

  As soon as they were underneath, a series of events happened almost at the same time: one of the padded ceiling tiles came crashing down and landed on Drew’s empty wheelchair, with the pointed corner of the tile hitting first. It tore a penny-sized hole in the fabric seat. Then a teleconference screen broke free from the wall and smashed into the floor with a bang, and a moment later, glass lenses from two of the cameras shattered into pieces after the video units shook loose from their ceiling mounts and hit the floor next to the table.

  The destruction continued to escalate, with lawn mower-sized chunks of cement raining down from above, splintering into dozens of pieces when they hit.

  It was getting hard to breathe with streams of cement dust spewing into the air. Lucas coughed right before the room suddenly went dark. He heard a few more items come crashing down around him.

  Drew immediately latched onto Lucas’ right arm. “Another energy field?”

  Lucas nodded, even though Drew couldn’t see his face. “Oh yeah, and it’s close.”

  Before the last syllable left his mouth, the dim emergency lighting kicked in. Lucas looked behind him to see if everyone was okay.

  He saw Kleezebee and Rosenbaum kneeling together under the table. They were next to Hudson Rapp, who appeared to be unharmed, though his face was covered in a film of white dust, making him look like a mime.

  Lucas didn’t see Dr. Suki, not at first. Then he spotted a bloody hand sticking out from under a pile of cement chunks. Since everyone else was accounted for, the arm must have belonged to Suki. But Suki’s hand and fingers weren’t moving—probably dead.

  One more death on my hands, Lucas thought.

  He could feel the cement floor moving beneath him as the tremor’s violence increased. As far as he knew, they were on the bottom-most floor, with nothing but bedrock underneath them. However, if something manmade were down there, they could fall through.

  Drew tapped him on the shoulder and tried to tell him something. But Lucas couldn’t hear the words clearly due to an intense, brain-splitting squeal that suddenly filled the room. Now he knew what gophers felt like when someone used ground-penetrating sonar on the surface.

  It wasn’t long before Drew blacked out and fell against his thigh. Soon after, Kleezebee and Rosenbaum also lay unconscious. Director Rapp was awake and vertical, but his left ear was bleeding heavily from its center, almost like someone had stuck a screwdriver inside his ear canal.

  Another volley of debris fell onto the table above Lucas. It sounded like some of it may have smashed into one of the TVs built into the tabletop, shattering a screen.

  A few seconds later, the tremor stopped and so did the squeal, just as the conference room doors swung open on their own. The room was now quiet, except for the moans of those around him. Outside the entrance, he could see Larson lying on the ground, face up—apparently unconscious, or maybe dead.

  Lucas poked his head out from under the table, hoping another piece of concrete wouldn’t shake loose and put a dent in his melon. His eyes ventured up, noticing a heavy bundle of cables hanging through one of the gaps in the ceiling. The place was a mess, with cement, ceiling tiles, glass, insulation and other building debris spread across the conference table and the floor. Despite the sweeping devastation, the ceiling and walls were holding together somehow. But he knew that fact could change at any moment. Especially if another energy field spawned and tore across campus.

  THIRTEEN

  Lucas helped Drew back into his wheelchair after he woke up. The chair’s leather seat held Drew’s weight despite the puncture in its material. They were lucky the falling debris hadn’t caused more damage to Drew’s only mode of transportation.

  “You in one piece, brother?” he asked Drew.

  “Sort of.”

  “Must have been another energy field attack,” Kleezebee said.

  “Yeah, and right above us,” Lucas said, eyeing what was left of the ceiling.

  “Do you think it damaged the science lab?” Drew asked.

  “Yep. You can kiss our experiment goodbye,” Lucas said, coughing twice from the dust swirling in the room. “I can’t believe it affected us twenty floors underground. I thought we would’ve been safe down here. Boy, was I wrong.”

  “Gives you an indication of its destructive power,” Kleezebee replied, grimacing.

  “Professor, your leg!” Lucas said, seeing his boss walking with a severe limp. Blood had soaked through the cuff on the same pant leg.

  “One of the video screens landed on my ankle and I heard something snap. I’m pretty sure it’s broken. It hurts like hell, but I’ll live. Everyone else okay?”

  “I’m not injured,” Rosenbaum said, dusting herself off with her wrinkled hands. Sprinkles of debris had been trapped in her beehive hairdo, much like in a spider’s web.

  “Dr. Suki’s in pretty rough shape,” Rapp said, grunting to remove hunks of heavy cement covering the frail man. A two-foot section of rebar was sticking out of the upper right quadrant of Suki’s chest. He checked Suki’s pulse. “His vitals are weak. We need to get him to medical, and soon.”

  “Thank God,” Lucas said, feeling relieved. Suki’s death wasn’t on his head, after all.

  “I’m sorry, what?” Rapp asked. He was clearly taken aback by the callous-sounding comment.

  Lucas froze for a moment to consider the timing of his words, then decided to elaborate. “I mean, thank God he’s alive, right?”

  Rapp’s annoyed look evaporated. “Yes. He’s alive. Barely.”

  Kleezebee picked up the receiver to the house phone and listened. “No dial tone. Switchboard must be down. Someone’s going to have to go up top and get help.”

  “I’ll go,” Lucas said, watching dust trails trickling down from the ceiling in a swirling pattern. “But I’m taking my brother with me.”

  Larson walked gingerly into the conference room, his face looking weary. “How? The power’s out and I doubt the elevator is working.”

  NASA Director Rapp pulled out an ultra-thin computer from a leather bag he had sitting underneath the table. He powered up the unit and wrinkled his nose. “We shouldn’t be on emergency lighting right now. This facility is self-contained and has its own nuclear power plant and air-filtration system. Something’s wrong.”

  “Did you say nuclear?” Larson asked.

  “Yes. Something must’ve caused the reactor to go offline.”

  “There wasn’t a meltdown, was there?” Larson asked.

  “If there was, we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now,” Rapp snapped.

  “Do you know the location of the reactor?” Kleezebee asked, hopping on his good leg to move closer to the NASA director.

  “I should have the building’s schematics on my iPad. Let me see if I can locate it,” Rapp said, using the device’s touch screen. “What was that horrible sound earlier? It made my ears bleed.”

  “I’ve heard it a few times now,” Lucas said. “At first, I thought it was being generated by the dome’s energy matrix and only extended out in front of the dome. Now I’m starting to think it’s more like ground-penetrating sonar. Almost as if the anomaly is searching for something.”

  “Searching for what?” Larson asked.

  “Probably you,” Kleezebee said with an annoyed look on his face.

  Lucas laughed. Drew didn’t.

  “Looks like the reactor’s two floors up,” Rapp said, breaking through the tension.

  “Do you have the plans for it?” Kleezebee replied, pointing at the man’s iPad.

  “Roger that. It’s all right here.”

  “Then I might be able to get it
working again.”

  “Excuse me, Professor,” Lucas said, thinking about his mission to go get help. “If the science lab was destroyed, then I doubt the elevator’s going to work, even if it has power. There’s nothing left at the top of the elevator shaft.”

  “What about stairs?” Drew asked.

  “Yes, they’re next to the elevator,” Rapp said.

  “Are you nuts? It’s twenty floors up,” Larson whined.

  “The rest of you should go. I’ll never make it to the top with this ankle,” Kleezebee said. “I’ll stay behind and see if I can get the reactor working again. We’re going to need it for the ventilation system. We could be here a while.”

  “I agree. We don’t want to suffocate before we’re rescued,” Larson said.

  “I’ll assist you, Professor. I can’t climb all those steps, either,” the elderly Rosenbaum said, shaking the dust and debris from her high-profile hairdo.

  “I’m staying, too. Someone has to look after Dr. Suki,” Rapp said, staring at Kleezebee’s injured leg. “We should see about getting your ankle into a splint. You should probably sit down. Keep it elevated. It’s gonna swell like hell once the body sends fluids to incapacitate the area around the injury.”

  “Then I guess it’s just the three of us,” Lucas said to Drew and Larson, picking up the theory notebook from the table. He blew off several layers of dust from its cover, in the direction of Larson, unintentionally—well, sort of.

  Larson coughed and waved his hands in front of his face. “If there’s this much damage down here, do you really think the stairwell is clear all the way to the top? I think not. It’s nothing but a goddamn waste of time and energy.” He folded his arms and pinched his nose and lips together. “No, I’m gonna wait right here until help arrives.”

  Lucas was more than happy to leave Larson behind. He held up the notebook in Kleezebee’s direction. “Professor, this contains a few theories that Drew and I put together regarding the energy fields. You might want to review them while we’re gone?”

  “Why don’t you keep them for now? I can’t do anything with ‘em down here.”

  “Sure,” Lucas answered his boss before slipping the notebook into the zippered section of his brother’s backpack. It was still hanging on the back of the wheelchair.

  Lucas turned to Drew. “Do you remember the way back to the elevator?”

  Drew shook his head. “Yeah, I memorized it on the way here. I’ll draw you a map.”

  “No, you’re coming with me.”

  Drew shook his head. “You should go alone. I’ll just slow you down.”

  “No chance, bro. I’m not leaving you behind,” Lucas said, looking at the others in the room. He knew with Rosenbaum and Rapp staying behind to help Kleezebee and Dr. Suki, that would leave only Larson to look out for Drew’s safety. And that asshole was the last person he’d choose to watch his little brother.

  Drew looked down at his wheelchair. “If the elevator’s disabled, how am I supposed to get up the stairs?”

  “I’ll carry you on my back if I have to. Wouldn’t be the first time, now would it? Besides, there’s no way in hell I’m leaving you down here. We’re going to stick together, no matter what. It’s what Ramsays do.”

  “You two need to get moving. Once you let the emergency crews know where we are, find Trevor. He’ll get you someplace safe,” Kleezebee said.

  “Sure, but what if we can’t find him?” Lucas replied.

  “Then get as far away from Tucson as you can,” Kleezebee said, tossing a set of keys to Lucas. “My car’s in the rear parking lot of the apartment complex.”

  Lucas shook his head. “We can’t just run from this. Drew and I need to find a way to help stop what’s happening. We have to do something.”

  “Let me worry about that. For now, I need you to get help and then find Trevor. Understood?”

  “But, sir—”

  “This isn’t open for discussion. I’ve made my decision. Now, go get help and then get as far away from here as you can. That’s an order.”

  “Yes, sir,” Lucas said, not wanting to agree.

  “The professor owns a car?” Drew asked quietly.

  Lucas shrugged. “Yeah, who knew? I always see him traveling around campus on foot.”

  “How will we know which one it is?”

  “Good question,” Lucas replied, turning to Kleezebee to find out.

  The professor beat him to it. “It’s a yellow eighty-two Volvo. You can’t miss it. There’s a three-foot crack across the windshield. You can drive a stick, right?”

  Lucas nodded. “Sure, Professor, no problem.” He remembered seeing a faded, piss-yellow four-door sedan parked next to the dumpster whenever he took out the trash. It had numerous spider webs stretching from its undercarriage to the pavement, and a year’s worth of bird crap all over its hood. He doubted whether the Volvo would start—its battery was probably dead.

  He slid a chunk of cement out of the way and pushed his brother out through the conference room door and into the waiting area.

  “So we’re really just gonna leave town?” Drew asked.

  “You heard DL. He wants us to get help and then get as far away as possible.”

  “What about finding a way to stop this?”

  “I don’t like it any more than you do. But we have our orders.”

  “So let me get this straight. You pick right now—this very instant—to start blindly following the professor’s orders? Without question?”

  “Yep. Seems to me that if I’d listened to him before, none of this would be happening right now. All those people would still be alive, including Abby.”

  “Good point.”

  “For once, let’s just do what we’re told. I can’t handle anything else at this point. One man can only take so much.”

  “I know you think you’re alone in this, but you’re not. I’m with you every step of the way, Lucas. It’s time for me to have your back, like you always do for me. We’re the Ramsay brothers, remember. No matter what, we stick together and figure this out one step at a time.”

  “Thanks, buddy. That means a lot. You have no idea.”

  There was much less debris in the hallway as they made their way back to the elevator through the maze of connecting corridors. When they arrived, the elevator doors were compacted to half their normal height and bent outward into the hallway.

  “Looks like we were right. There’s nothing connecting to it up top,” Lucas said.

  “I wonder if anyone was in it?”

  “Let me check,” Lucas said, peeking into the partially separated elevator doors. He cupped his hands around his face to block out the hallway light. “It’s too dark in there to see.” He pressed his right ear against the crack in the doors and listened. “I don’t hear anything, either. We should keep moving. Got a long way to go.”

  “Do you think Bruno was at his station when the energy field hit?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t think about that right now,” Lucas said, not wanting to dwell on the possibility of yet another friend getting hurt. He shifted his focus to Kleezebee’s note—the one the professor gave to Trevor right before the meeting started. “I wonder where Kleezebee sent Trevor and Mary earlier?”

  “You don’t think they were in the science lab, do you?”

  Lucas shrugged, wishing his brother would stop with all the death questions. He opened the doorway to the stairs and walked inside. Above him was a seemingly endless series of switchback metal stairways that stretched as far as he could see.

  “Holy shit,” Lucas said, hearing his voice echo. Light in the stairwell came from emergency lights installed above each level’s entry door.

  “Are you sure you wanna do this?” Drew asked.

  Lucas bent down with his back to Drew. “Hop on, like when we were kids. Just don’t squeeze my neck too tight.”

  “Don’t forget my backpack,” Drew said, climbing up onto Lucas’ back, piggyback-style.

 
Lucas removed the knapsack from the wheelchair and handed it to Drew. “Can you put this on, or do I need to put you down first?”

  Drew slung the pack over his right shoulder. “Nope, got it.”

  Lucas began the long climb, making it up six flights of stairs before his leg muscles screamed at him to stop.

  “Where’s Trevor when you need him?” he asked, gasping for air while leaning against the handrail for a few seconds. Stenciled on the entry door in front of him was the sublevel floor number—14. “For a little guy, you weigh a ton. It’s probably all those push-ups every morning. Or maybe it was all those burritos.”

  “You can put me down for a minute if you need to.”

  “No, I wanna keep moving. Just give me a second. Gotta catch my breath.”

  Lucas took a few more deep breaths before resuming the ascent with his brother’s arms wrapped around his neck. He pressed on, floor by floor, ignoring the occasional twinge of pain in his lower back, stopping every two minutes to rest and recharge his lungs. Each flight of stairs was a bit harder than the last, taxing the remaining strength in body.

  He wasn’t sure he’d make it to the top, but continued anyway, hoping to find the energy. He didn’t have a choice.

  * * *

  Kleezebee and Rosenbaum huddled in the control room on Sublevel 18, sitting in front of the twenty-foot-wide operator’s control panel for NASA’s underground power reactor. The front half of the room was crammed full of screens, gauges, switches, knobs, and instruments, surrounding Kleezebee on three sides. It reminded him of NASA’s launch control room in Houston, which he’d seen in person several years before.

  Kleezebee’s injured ankle was resting on top of an upside-down trash can, while a homemade crutch—fashioned from an old janitor’s mop and duct tape—leaned against the control desk. There was power to the room, keeping the bank of instruments running, while red, green and yellow lights flashed on and off like someone sending Morse Code. He scanned the systems, one by one, taking the time he needed to assess the situation as Rosenbaum watched.