by Mick Farren
"What do you want to know?"
"What happened to our war?"
There was something very trying about the major's patience.
"It didn't happen. There was a marked deterioration in the international situation around the time that the bunker was sealed. For a week or so it really looked as though the Soviet Union was disintegrating. Then Podgorny and the revisionists staged their coup and took control of most of the Red Army in the west. Within days they were talking with the corporations and the Western governments. The grainlift was underway inside of two weeks and we were moving troops in to restore order while they cleared up the mess. Well, to be accurate, it wasn't strictly us; the troops were nominally neutral: Greeks, Cubans, Canadians, Swedes and what have you. Just so long as no one looked like either an American or a German. The Russians wouldn't have stood for that, too many long-standing prejudices."
Vickers finished the Coke and put the bottle down on the standard motel plastic coffee table. This one was a chipped but still garish metalflake blue.
"What about the President? We heard him giving the kiss-off speech. Too bad folks, the bombs are on their way but we are shooting back."
"Anyone can fake the President. Damn it, third-rate comics do him in their acts. You said yourself that he was supposed to be talking from a satellite donut and that it was extremely distorted."
Vickers pushed his hands through his hair. He wanted to take a hot shower and sleep for a week.
"And what about Herbie Mossman. Are you trying to tell me that he was a simulation too, or what?"
The major sighed.
"I've told you already. I can't comment about Mossman. You'll have to talk to your Contec people about that."
Vickers closed his eyes.
"I don't know."
"Why are you having such difficulty accepting all this?"
Vickers opened them angrily.
"Why? I've already told you why. If I accept what you're telling me, I have to admit that I've been taken for an incomparable fool. I've wasted eighteen months in a hole in the ground. Christ, man! I've been sitting there trying to come to terms with the idea that the whole world had been destroyed and now I find the world large as life and laughing in my face. People died in that bunker for fuck's sake, others went insane."
The Major stood up and turned on the motel room TV.
"How many times do I have to show you?"
He spun around the dail. There was porno, reruns, Penal Colony, Wildest Dreams, Jackie Gleason in The Honeymooners, soccer from Japan, jai alai from Los Angeles, an in-depth news show that was going on about some scandal inside Agrimex. A number of stations were off the air. It was exactly what you'd expect, considering that it was almost dawn. Vickers still wasn't quite prepared to lay down for it.
"You could have put this together to fool me. It wouldn't be hard to rig the TV and a bunch of tapes."
"Why would we do that?"
"Because there was a war and you're a well organized group of survivors who've been camped out here waiting for a crack to appear in the bunker's defenses. I'm the first crack and you want to use me to get inside."
The major was almost sympathetic.
"Isn't that a little farfetched? It flies in the face of all the available facts."
"All the available facts have come from your people."
"It's hardly plausible."
"Neither is the idea that I've been incarcerated in a fucking great hole in the ground because some lunatic decided that he wanted to fake the third world war. Why would anyone do that?"
The Major leaned back in his chair and regarded the ceiling.
"A lot of thought has been given to that question ever since the bunker was sealed."
"And?"
"You said yourself that Lloyd-Ransom and Lutesinger were both crazy, that in the early days they seemed almost eager for a war to start. You told me that they had this destiny fixation and that they went to a great deal of trouble to convince all of you in the bunker to share it."
Vickers was grudging.
"Yes, but . . ."
"There was a crisis in Russia and it looked, for about a week, as though the Soviets might drag the rest of the world down in flames. I've already told you this."
"So?"
"So Lloyd-Ransom jumped the gun. To ensure his complete control of the bunker he sealed it before the crunch came. He had the special effects standing by to convince all of you that the war had actually started. When there was no crunch, Lloyd-Ransom must have been faced with the dilemma of his life. The loss of face obviously proved more than he could take. He let the bunker remain sealed and left all of you in less than blissful ignorance. He must have been sitting down there praying that the world would come to an end anyway and justify his actions. It's little wonder that he developed an opium habit."
Vickers didn't say anything. He just sat and stared. Later, a slow burning fury would start, but right at that moment there was nothing but confusion. Deep down he knew that the major was telling the truth. It was just so hard to let go of all the months that he'd spent below ground. The major seemed to sense this.
"If this was just an elaborate scheme to get you to reveal the bunker exit, don't you think we'd have tortured and drugged it out of you by now?"
Vickers looked down at the carpet. There were a number of small burns around the leg of his chair. He concentrated on the pattern they formed.
"I suppose so."
"So what else would it take to convince you and bring all this to an end?"
Vickers slowly raised his head.
"I want a newspaper. The Los Angeles Tribune, dated yesterday. If you're for real, you should be able to get me one in a couple hours."
"We could fake that too."
"Yeah, but it'd be hard."
"Is there anything else?"
Vickers nodded.
"Yes. If the newspaper pans out, I want to be put in touch with Victoria Morgenstern. I suppose that technically she's still my boss."
* * *
"I don't like the idea."
"There's really no other way."
Vickers compressed his lips.
"If that's the case, I'd like to know how much you intend paying me for all this. The way I see it, you owe me eighteen months' back pay, in addition to which I want interest and a damn great lump sum for going back into the bunker."
"You don't change, do you?"
Vickers nodded. He knew he had the absolute upper hand. One of the best antidotes to rage and shock had been the realization of just how valuable he was.
"I try not to."
When Vickers had asked to be put in touch with Victoria Morgenstern, he hadn't imagined that she would come all the way to the Desert Inn to talk to him in person. She was notorious for hating to ever leave New York, yet within twelve hours of his making the request, a black civilian helicopter had descended on the motel's makeshift landing pad. It had disgorged Victoria and a quartet of bodyguards. A little later, a motorcade of corporate and military brass had arrived. Vickers couldn't remember when he'd seen so much gold braid and so many dark Crynelle suits in the same place, all looking at him. If he had played his cards right he could probably have the world. He was their only hope of retaking the Phoenix Bunker. That was always provided that he survived the proposed return visit.
It had been decided that Vickers should go in on his own. He was to sneak back into the bunker and, as far as possible avoiding detection, he should contact as many people as possible, starting with his own security group, and spread the word about the true situation on the outside. It was hoped that this would start an uprising that would result in the overthrow of Lloyd-Ransom and Lutesinger and the opening of the bunker. It was a typical Morgenstern cost-effective first shot. The military had quickly realized from Vickers' description of the tunnel that to try and throw an armed force into the first level by that route would be bloody, costly and quite possibly doomed to initial failure. Vickers, on the other hand, w
as a different matter. If he could slip in past the cameras and stir up a mutiny, it wouldn't cost them anything. If something went wrong and Vickers was killed they would still have lost very little.
The preparations for the mission were made with considerable care. Vickers wasn't in any particular hurry and therefore exceedingly willing to take pains. After the arrival of Victoria Morgenstern, he'd been allowed alcohol for the first time and he'd been quite ready to lounge around for a couple of days, drinking, watching TV, reading the papers and generally reacclimating to the real world. In his desire to take it easy, though, Vickers was in a minority of one. Both the army brass and the Contec people were impatient for him to get going. The bunker fiasco had cost a total of billions and they wanted it at an end. Vickers naturally did his best to stall. His first ploy was to ask for a replica of a blue handler's uniform. Vickers' theory was that, if he went back in the common blue overall, it would help confuse surveillance systems. There was a good deal of logic in this. There was no way that Vickers' disappearance could have gone unnoticed inside the bunker. There would undoubtedly be some kind of lookout for him. A handler's uniform might help delay a positive identification. Vickers also hoped that it might well take the army two or three days to come up with the garment. Unfortunately, a whole stack of surplus bunker uniforms were located in a Las Vegas warehouse and they had one in his size, plus a couple of spares, at the Desert Inn within twelve hours. At this juncture, Vickers had made the last-ditch suggestion that maybe a full-scale assault squad could go in all disguised as bunker rank and file and let him off the hook. The suggestion was vetoed and cost effectiveness prevailed. Vickers would go in on his own.
The final briefing before he was choppered from the motel back to the concealed bunker exit became uncomfortably like the prelude to an execution. Vickers had showered, shaved and dressed in the blue coverall. A tracer was attached to his right thigh so his progress into the bunker and the fact of whether he was alive or not could be monitored from outside. He took advantage of the army's obsession for gadgetry and equipped himself with all the miniature killing or maiming devices they had in their stores. He had a gamut of weaponry taped to his body under the uniform that ranged from concussion pellets to gas caps.
When all his preparations were complete, he walked out of the motel room with his Yasha slung over his shoulder. Two military policemen accompanied him and this only heightened the effect that he was going to the lethal injection. The dusk was gathering and the floodlights were coming on all along the razor wire that ringed the Desert Inn compound. The brass had gathered in what had once been the motel's piano and topless go-go bar. They waited in a half circle, their crisp uniforms and decorations providing a strange contrast to dirty red plush and the pair of giant, chipped plaster nudes that supported either side of the small strippers' stage. Victoria Morgenstern seemed to have been affected by the proximity of so many uniforms. Instead of her usual, severely tailored success suit, she had changed into an equally severe, tan safari outfit with a slightly impractical pencil skirt. The ensemble was topped off with a too-cute leopardskin pillbox hat. If this was her idea of desert wear, Vickers could see why she didn't like to leave New York.
He tried to lighten the mood in the room with another demand for money but it didn't help. They seemed determined to treat him like the hero of a suicide mission. He looked around at the dusty drapes.
"Do I get a drink before I go?"
Nobody had thought of providing the hero with a final belt.
"What do you want?"
"One hell of a large scotch."
There was a minor flurry while an aide was dispatched for Vickers' drink. When he finally got it, he raised the glass in silent toast and downed it in two swift swallows. One by one, they shook his hand and wished him luck. Each time, he nodded.
"I'm going to need it."
* * *
The chopper crew were silent, anonymous in their visored helmets. He wasn't sure, but he had the impression that they were avoiding looking at him. It was as though they considered him some alien, unnatural thing from the bowels of the earth and, orders not withstanding, wanted no contact with him. The helicopter lifted up and away from the lights of the Desert Inn. For a few minutes they ran through dark and then they were over the sprawling forward base in front of the sealed bunker entrance. Vickers had the grim thought that the lights of the base might be his last glimpse of the outside world. They circled once then crested the escarpment and dropped into the blackness of the opposite slope. Finally the crew had to speak to him.
"Can you find the entrance tunnel in the dark?"
"I'll need some light."
The pilot nodded. There was something a little eerie about the green of the instruments reflected in the crew's redscope night goggles. Once again there was that similarity to an execution. The co-pilot cut in a sungun under the machine's nose. The surface of the desert was brightly illuminated but it still took them three passes before Vickers spotted the dry streambed and the small bridge. The chopper settled on skids and Vickers unbuckled his seatbelt.
"I suppose this is me."
The crew didn't say a word. Vickers looked back before he ducked out the door.
"I guess I should take it easy, right?"
The pilot finally raised a hand. Vickers dropped to the ground and backed away. He stood and watched as the chopper lifted, then he turned his back on the glow from the other side of the hill and walked slowly down the streambed. It was black as sin under the bridge and he pulled out his flashlight. He reached the door. Although he hadn't locked it, the door still refused to open. He'd half expected this and had equipped himself with a small crowbar. He set the flashlight on the ground and went to work. After he'd pried a handhold between the door and the frame, he threw his weight back and dragged it open. He paused for almost a minute, took a long backward look at the outside world and then, with considerable reluctance, stepped into the tunnel.
* * *
The snakes had gone. Vickers was some way into the tunnel, moving slowly and carefully. He was certain that he'd passed the point where he'd encountered them on the way out. He was relieved not to have to walk through the squirming, slithering mass of reptiles but he also couldn't imagine where they might have gone. The walls of the tunnel were solid concrete. There were no convenient holes through which snakes might exit. In his hyper state, it made him uneasy. He halted and slowly looked around. There didn't seem to be any changes in the tunnel and very cautiously he started forward.
He reached the end. The sheet of corrugated tin was still in place. It represented the start of the second stage of his return. He crouched down and dumped the crowbar and the flashlight. If he was going in posing as a handler, he supposed that he should also have ditched the Yasha as well. Handlers didn't carry guns. He couldn't, however, quite bring himself to do it. He wasn't going back into the bunker without protection of some kind. He slung the machine pistol over his back, moved the corrugated tin to one side and eased through the gap. It was hard moving through the unfinished area. He stumbled a number of times over piles of building debris but he didn't want to take any chances. A moving light or even an infrared scan on a level where no one was supposed to be could prove an instant give-away. He made it to the edge of the finished construction. He crouched in the dark among the parked vehicles. Here and there there was a dim inspection light but these were really only enough to give some form to the black shapes of the tanks and trucks. He peered into the gloom looking for the movement of a patrolling guard. Over by the elevator entrances, there were more lights burning but here in the back of the vehicle park, illumination was less than minimal.
Vickers felt his way along the flat, armored side of a personnel carrier. He halted, looked round and then moved up the length of another. He was starting to sweat. It was hot in the bunker and the air smelled lousy. It stank of oil and metal, industrial cleansers and decaying junk food. It was only since he'd been outside that he noticed how a
wful it was. He slid past another vehicle and another. So far so good. There was no alarm, no running feet; above all, no shots. He was beside a line of light Pacer tanks. He stopped again. His hands had started to shake and it was only with effort that he pulled his nerves under control. It was like waiting for some huge, cosmic other shoe to drop. Then he sneezed. That was something else that he'd grown too used to. The air was thick with all kinds of behavior modifiers, an accumulation of eighteen months' worth. God only knew how they'd combined and mutated in that time. This alone was sufficient reason for everyone down here to be crazy.
He started along another line of tanks, still going more by touch than by sight. He was continuing this blind man's progress when the light hit him. It was like a physical pain. Now he really was blind. Over his shrieking nerves, the voice of reason told him it was a sungun, probably similar to the one on the helicopter. It hardly seemed to matter. Everything else told him that he had been caught. The booming, amplified voice removed any doubts.
"Stand right where you are, Vickers. We've been waiting for you."
NINE
Vickers was blinded. Sick to his stomach, he knew that he'd walked right into a trap. A feral instinct told him to run and keep on running. Reason, though, kept its grip. Run and they'll shoot you in the back for sure. Avoiding looking straight into the sungun, he slowly raised his arms.
"Been waiting for me?"
"For days. We have orders to shoot you on sight."
Although the voice was distorted by the booming amplification, Vickers was pretty sure that he recognized it. Carmen Rainer. She'd have been more than happy to shoot him on sight but presumably she just couldn't resist cat-and-mousing him before she put him out. He knew that he had only one card to play. It was a simple statement.
"I've been outside." Just to make sure there was no doubt: "I've been on the surface."
He held his arms straight out at his side. When your life's on the line, it's no disgrace to look like a crucifixion. There was no answer for almost a minute, then more lights came on and the sungun went out. Vickers tried to blink away the lingering afterimage. The sungun had been mounted on the turret of a light tank. Carmen Rainer was sitting in the turret, leaning on the fire control of the multicannon. She was smoking a cigar. Grouped around the base of the tank were four soldiers, Yabu and Parkwood.