Forsaken World (Book 1): Innocence Lost

by Watson, Thomas A.

  “Yeah, I did the same thing,” Ian said, moving over beside him. “I knew the doors were heavy with a hinge that runs the entire length of the door and the pneumatic assist at the top. But after what Doug said, I wanted to check it out. The door is four inches thick. If you feel the bottom, you can feel a three-inch-thick steel plate and a one-inch carbon plate. It has an aluminum skin, and that is what is juiced up. The frame is insulated, and that’s about the only thing I can tell other than it is made out of some thick ass steel.”

  “It’s a fucking vault door.”

  “Just like Jen said, we are the new pigs running from the big bad wolf and ended up in the house made like a vault.”

  Shaking his head, Lance moved over to the trailer to see Jen and Carrie sitting on the ice chests. Jennifer looked up. “Sorry, Lance. We tried, but the damn things won’t move.”

  “I’m a little mad that you even tried.”

  Jumping off the ice chests, Jennifer reared her shoulders back like she was getting ready to fight. “I’ll kick your ass for thinking that.”

  “No thank you.” Lance smiled, holding his hands up.

  “Carrie, Carrie,” Allie came running into the trailer, holding out the phone. “My momma wants to talk to you.”

  Carrie’s face lit up with a smile as she ran over and took the phone. “Hello, Ms. Mary.” Allie came over as Carrie walked into the house, talking to Allie’s mom.

  Allie looked up at them. “Momma said Carrie needed someone to talk to.”

  Jennifer wiped her eyes. “Yes, she did,” she said, spinning around. “I’m not taking one end by myself.”

  Letting out a groan, Ian moved to the end with her. “Oh great, I get one end all by myself.”

  “But you’re such a stud muffin,” Lance said, giving a heave. They lifted the top one off and slid it to the back of the trailer. “Let’s just get them inside and close up,” Lance gasped.

  The sun was coming up as they closed the back door with all the ice chests sitting side by side next to the staircase leading down to the basement. “Ian, your mom wants to talk to you,” Carrie said, walking over wearing a gigantic smile.

  Wringing the sweat off his face, Ian took the phone. “Hey, Mom.”

  As Ian walked away, Lance stood at the top of the stairs, looking down into the basement. “Lance, we aren’t even going to try it until Ian is here, so stop thinking about it,” Jennifer said, dropping down on an ice chest, panting.

  Taking several steps back, Lance just stared at the first one in line. Unbuckling his chest rig, Lance let it fall to the floor and shook his arms, loosening them up. “Lance, I mean it, don’t,” Jennifer said, slowly standing up.

  Charging forward, Lance extended his arms, catching the top of the ice chest and sliding it across the floor. “Move, you cocksucker!” he screamed, shoving the ice chest toward the stairs. When half the ice chest was over the first step, gravity did the rest.

  The ice chest tilted and slid down the stairs, hitting the bottom with a crash. Looking down, Lance saw it was on its side, still closed, and looked unhurt. “Piece of cake,” he grinned, taking a few steps back.

  Jennifer moved over beside him, shaking her head. “I now know you are more pigheaded than Ian.”

  Lance grinned. “Now!” he said, and they charged the next ice chest, screaming many unkind words as it slid across the floor and down the stairs.

  When they had all but one down, Jennifer looked at the pile at the bottom of the stairs. “They are down there, but we will still have to wait for Ian to move them to the freezer,” Jennifer said, stepping back and joining Lance for the next charge. “Fuck it; I’ll unload them where they land.”

  “It’s a walk-in cooler, not a chest freezer,” Lance grinned. “Now!” They charged, shoving it down the stairs, and it joined its companions in the pile. Ian walked over, holding out the phone to Jennifer.

  “The mommas want to talk to you,” he said. With a shy grin, Jennifer reached out and took the phone.

  “Hello,” she said timidly. “Hello, Ms. Wilkerson.” She smiled then listened to the phone. “Yes, ma’am, I’ll call you Ms. Mary then.”

  They watched Jennifer walk away, chatting with Ian’s mom. “That was nice of them,” Lance said, heading downstairs.

  “Yeah, they saw them moping around as you talked to your mom and dad. When Allie talked to Mom, Carrie ran to the back porch, crying, and Jennifer had to love on her,” Ian said as he jumped off the pile of ice chests. “Looks like a fight at a tailgate party.”

  Nodding, Lance walked to the north wall, or the back of the house. A large, metal cooler door stood mounted in the wall. He opened it, exposing a large, walk-in freezer. He and Ian called it a cooler because after playing outside in the heat, they would run inside it and cool off. “The floor is that shiny stuff they used in the garages. Remember when we would come down here sliding in our socks? We can slide those damn things much easier down here.”

  “Ah yeah, Lance, your mom said watch your mouth. My mom and dad were talking to me on speaker phone, and she heard you and Jennifer cussing like sailors.”

  “Damn, I’m in trouble.”

  “No, your mom just said watch your mouth. She said she would’ve left the heavy fuckers till the rotation of the Earth put them in here or go and kill something else and stock the freezer with fresh meat.”

  Laughing, Lance grabbed one ice chest that was standing on one end and pushed, flipping it on its bottom. The ice chest seemed to levitate across the floor. The only problem they had was the slick floor stopped at the freezer door. They solved that problem on the next one, building enough speed that the ice chest sailed through the freezer door, hitting the back wall twenty feet back with a loud thump.

  When the last one was in, Ian looked at Lance. “All floors should be like this.”

  “I never heard of a Yeti ice chest, but I think the damn things can be used to stop bullets,” Lance said, running for the stairs.

  Ian followed Lance upstairs. “Yeah, Dad said he wished we could’ve emptied our freezer, but I told him I wasn’t sorry. Your mom had enough meat for two armies.”

  When they reached the top of the stairs, they met Jennifer, who had a relaxed smile. “Finished?” she asked.

  “Hell yeah. I’m going to sleep,” Lance said, moving around her.

  “Hold it, mister. Ms. Sandy said you were to take a shower before passing out so you will sleep better.”

  “It’s my mom, Jennifer, not Ms. Sandy,” Lance said, turning around.

  He saw Jennifer still wearing the same smile. “No, she said I could call her Ms. Sandy or Momma Sandy if I wanted like Ian does.”

  “Fine,” Lance said, dragging his tired ass away.

  “Ms. Mary said the same to you, Ian,” Jennifer said as he followed Lance.

  “Yeah, I figured as much,” he huffed. “Since girls are here, the bathroom on the left is for girls, the right one is the men’s room.”

  As the kids got ready for bed, on the other side of the world, the parents watched. They could tell by the way they moved, talked, and pushed themselves that none of them were really kids anymore. Like other kids around the globe, they were living in a forsaken world.

  Chapter 17

  March 16

  Hearing soft whispers and a door close, Lance fought to wake up. Cracking his eyes, he saw the light in the living area were turned down. Glancing around the sectional, Lance saw Allie and Carrie curled up side by side, sound asleep. Lifting his arm, Lance saw it was just after two a.m. “Damn, eighteen hours.”

  “The captain is awake,” Ian said in a quiet voice from the kitchen.

  Smelling the aroma of coffee, Lance sat up and cringed. Every joint in his body hurt, and they popped as he moved. Feeling the side of his face was cold, he rubbed it and felt it was soaked. Glancing down at the couch, Lance saw a huge drool spot. “Whoa, my face leaked.”

  “Yeah, I had to wash and dry my pillow,” Ian said, walking over.

  “
Where’s Jennifer?

  “Bathroom,” Ian said, handing Lance a cup of coffee.

  Taking a sip then wiping his face again, Lance asked, “How long you been up?”

  “About two hours.”

  “Why didn’t you wake me up? Eighteen hours is more than enough,” Lance said, feeling a stabbing in his bladder.

  Ian started laughing. “Brother, we almost slept two days.”

  All other thoughts left Lance’s mind. “You mean—” He struggled to get his mind to add the time. “I slept forty-two hours?”

  “Yeah, I guess you can say we were tired,” Ian grunted.

  Hearing a door open, Lance looked up to see Jennifer coming out of the bathroom. “You and Jennifer were out that long too?”

  “Jennifer woke up at nine tonight,” Ian said as Jennifer walked over.

  Stretching out, Lance smiled at her then looked down at his tented shorts. Taking off in a dead run, he cried out, “I got to go to the bathroom.”

  “What’s wrong with him?” Jennifer asked, sitting down on the couch.

  “Two days without peeing,” Ian grinned.

  She shook her head. “I don’t know how boys can go that long,” Jennifer said with a little envy. “I woke up like six times to go pee.”

  Lance came back wearing a bathrobe. “Who watched the squirts?”

  Ian pointed at a laptop on the kitchen bar. “Our parents?”

  “Huh?”

  “They called and told Allie to turn on your laptop and had a webcam set up. They used all their battery up and turned off when Jennifer got up,” Ian said, laying his head back on the couch.

  “Why didn’t they wake one of us up?”

  Lifting his head, Ian watched Lance walk around and drop down on the couch. “Mom told Allie if they woke us up, no more snowman DVD.”

  “No wonder they didn’t wake us up.”

  “Yeah, looks like we have to find a copy of that DVD,” Ian huffed.

  Lance shook his head. “No, I got the one from my house,” he sighed. “Any stinkers show up here?”

  “You spoil Allie and Carrie more than the parents do,” Ian huffed. “No, the parents have been keeping an eye out for us since they have the surveillance system up now. They told them when to let Dino out and back in, and Dino never barked or growled, so nothing is within range of Dino’s nose.”

  Glancing at Jennifer and looking away quickly, Lance asked, “Did you talk to Mom and Dad?”

  “Yes,” she nodded. “Your moms said eat when you woke up, and Mr. Bill said after eating, go downstairs to the ‘hidden room.’ The computer work station’s password is the same as the door. Open folder on desktop that says, ‘SHTF.’ Click on Doug’s folder, and it will tell you what to do and the order it needs done.”

  Hearing “eat,” both boys realized they were starving. They both jumped up. “I’m eating whatever cooks the fastest,” Ian said.

  Watching the boys jump over the couch instead of walking around, Jennifer shook her head. “I’m kind of scared to get near them.”

  They pulled out food and pots, making a mess as they just pulled stuff out of the fridge and shoved it in their mouths as the food on the stove warmed up. Jennifer sat on the couch until she saw them getting to the table with bowls and crackers.

  “What’s on the menu?” she asked, walking over to the stove.

  “Chili and rice,” they both said with full mouths.

  When they finished, Jennifer just sat in awe as they cleaned up the kitchen and loaded the dishwasher. “I never thought I’d see a dishwasher at a ‘hunting’ cabin,” she said, carrying her empty bowl over.

  “Dad said that was the only way to wash dishes to ensure they were clean and ensure that common sickness didn’t spread,” Lance said, pouring the powder in. “I don’t care because washing them by hand sucks.”

  Lance took her bowl and put it in the dishwasher. “Thank you,” Jennifer said and ran to the bathroom. The bathrooms sat between the two rooms. Walking inside the girls’ bathroom, she stopped at one of the two side-by-side sinks to wash her hands. Next to the sinks were two commodes sitting in privacy stalls, and across from the stalls were two walk-in showers. The men’s bathroom was the mirror opposite of this one.

  Walking out, she saw Ian and Lance waiting on her. Jennifer followed them downstairs and glanced around the basement. It was just as big as the cabin, and the only “room” was in the southwest corner. It only had plywood walls with a very heavy duty shelf running around the foundation wall.

  A heavy duty washer and dryer set sat on the east wall, and bookshelves were around the wall and lined the center of the floor. Some of the bookshelves held books, but a few held household supplies and canned foods. It looked like a lot to Jennifer, but after hearing what Doug told them, she now knew this wouldn’t last long. At least half of the shelves in the basement stood empty, and that just seemed like a waste to her.

  “We need to get the meat out of those ice chests,” Lance said as he walked past the cooler door.

  “I did that already,” Jennifer said, looking at the freezer door that sat in the north wall and gave a shiver. “It’s cold in there, but I left the empty ice chests for you two to get.”

  Stopping and turning around, Lance said dejectedly, “You know, Jen, you could’ve waited. Shit, I try to sleep for two days, and Ian wasn’t far behind. You trying to make us feel like dweebs?”

  Ian groaned as Jennifer put her hands on her hips, glaring at Lance. “Listen, buddy,” she growled, looking up at him. “You and Ian have been busting ass doing stuff I couldn’t help on, but I’m part of this group, and I’ll do my share. I’m not going to be treated like some turd. I’m not going to lay about and be useless, understand? If we have a problem, I’ll bitch slap you.”

  Even though he was taller than Jennifer and outweighed her by a good thirty pounds, Lance took a step back as Ian groaned, shaking his head. “Should’ve warned you, Lance. I said something like that, and she threatened to break out a tampon and use it on my ass.”

  “Girl, you need to chill with the tampons,” Lance said, wondering if he should take another step back. “I just meant we are in this together.”

  “Fine. I may not be as strong as you two or know as much, but I can help,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest.

  Lance huffed. “Shit, we don’t know much.”

  Ian nodded and walked over to the west wall where the bookshelf ended and a small desk sat in the corner with a desktop computer one it. A four-socket outlet was face-high to him on the wall with the word “Bad” written over the two left sockets. Moving over to the desk, Ian opened the top drawer and pulled out a straight screwdriver. “I find it hard to believe something is really there.”

  “I feel like an idiot,” Lance said as Ian moved over to the outlet and turned the center screw. The front of the outlet clicked open. “Yeah, I feel stupid.”

  Nodding, Ian swung the outlet open to see a keypad. “There’s not even any exposed wires,” he said in awe as he punched in the numbers Uncle Doug told them. When he pushed the last number, the bookshelf beside him gave a big click with a suction of air and moved inward several inches. “I can’t believe we didn’t know about any of this.”

  Lance and Jennifer moved over as Ian pushed the bookshelf into the wall, and lights started turning on, exposing a massive underground room. “Holy shit,” Lance gasped. “This place is bigger than the cabin.”

  Off to the left in the front corner was a large computer area with over a dozen monitors. A large server and a bank of external hard drives were linked and turning on. Everyone jumped when the largest of the monitors in the center of the computer station turned on, and they saw the logo on the screen. Then, all the other monitors started coming on. Walking in, they looked to their right and saw a bed with medical monitors nearby. Cabinets and shelves filled the front wall, and two large refrigerators stood side by side.

  “This makes our computers look like crap,” Lance said, slowly
moving over to the computer area and saw a sticker printed with “Master Control” on the desk. On the right of the computer area was a HAM radio set up. “Ian, you see that?”

  “No way,” Ian said, moving over. “That’s a Yaesu and Icom.” He looked at all the units, shaking his head. “Makes the stuff we used to work on our merit badges look like toys.”

  As the computer warmed up, the three moved back into the room. Rows of filled shelves with boxes stacked on the floor filled the room, leaving them only a small path between each row of shelves to the back. Reaching the back, they found a small area with shelves only on the north wall and a tiny kitchen area with a small room in the corner. Next to the small kitchen area were three massive gun safes like the ones at Uncle Doug’s house.

  Ian opened the room to find a sink, toilet, and walk-in shower. “It’s a tiny bathroom,” he said, closing the door as Lance walked around a table over to the wall. Mounted on the wall were fold-down bunk beds, stacked three high with five sets. Lance moved over to the shelf mounted on the wall, thinking that the amount of beds didn’t make any sense with this small living area.

  Reaching under the bottom shelf like Uncle Doug had instructed, he felt a latch and pushed. The entire twenty-foot-long section slid down the wall, covering up a massive map of the area around the cabin. Three very wide doors were set within the wall. Lance opened them up to find a wide, dead-end hall behind each door lined with filled shelves. In the first two, he could see safes on the back wall. Looking in the last door, he saw two more safes then gasped, realizing what filled the shelves. “This is nothing but ammo.”

  Ian walked over and stood beside Lance. “You know, now, I understand why Uncle Doug only left a small list for us to get. We didn’t need all that extra stuff; he just wanted to keep us busy.”

  Jennifer came over in shock. “I don’t know if we have room for the crap we loaded up.”

  “We’ll make room,” Lance huffed. “We didn’t load that shit for nothing.”