19
They made good progress over the next two weeks, putting nearly three hundred miles between them, Chicago, and the memory of Elm.
The bite of that memory replaced the shameful feelings Nathan had about Syd, and he came around to the idea that he might always need something to worry about.
It wasn’t that his optimism came back in the same way it had before, but the tempering regrets he had stopped it from being unrealistic. In the past, Cyndi had always been the practical and pragmatic one, but now Nathan felt that his experiences were drawing him in that direction, as well.
The days were still lengthening, which allowed them to travel longer before twilight and feel like they were making better progress. Dave estimated that they were just over a third of the way to Casper, somewhere in the middle of Iowa and some ways south of De Moines They also encountered, but didn’t engage with unless they had to, more people. They saw cars moving along roads, and even passed over farmland where someone was trying to raise cattle. The beasts were thin and rangy, but at least someone was trying. The further west they got, the more activity they saw, but this also meant that some dangers were ever more present.
On a supply hunt one morning, they found a family in a farmhouse who had only recently been killed. A mother, father, and daughter, all shot through the head, their house ransacked. There was no one around, no one to tell, and it wasn’t like they could call 911. So Nathan, Dave, and Freeson burned the bodies in a pyre while Cyndi said a few words. Whatever useful things had been in the farmhouse had been looted at the time of the killings. But even if they hadn’t, Nathan wouldn’t have felt right about taking things and loading them up while bodies smoked and charred.
It was a maudlin experience and a stark reminder that things were far from normal, even out here as they traveled westward. The people they did see after that were moving quickly in their cars along the snowy roads, and no one who saw the dog teams came close to wanting to make contact.
In many ways, Nathan was grateful for that, too. You couldn’t tell someone’s motives ahead of time in any random meeting situation, and perhaps it was best—until Casper at least—that they kept to themselves.
The hunting was poor, though, and their supplies were dwindling. They’d have to fetch up at a farm or town sometime soon, Nathan figured, and see what they could trade—all they really had was Nathan and Freeson’s ability to fix machinery, Cyndi’s health advice or first aid, and information from Dave and Donie’s occasional success with the uplink to the satellite, but all of that had to be better than nothing.
The land was wide open, the hills flat, and the snow was still deep, so the sleds moved quickly, but Nathan knew that the further west they traveled, the chances of a real thaw from arctic conditions to tundra would mean they’d eventually need to find some way of traveling without the dogs. A truck or bus would need fuel, though, and that was certainly in short supply. What they needed was horses and a wagon.
“Shall we get you a six-gallon hat and spurs, too?” Cyndi joshed one night at camp as Nathan talked them through his thoughts.
“Well, only if you’re running a clean house with plenty of redeye.”
“I’ll poke you in your eye if you’re not careful and that’ll make it red.” Cyndi laughed and Nathan kissed the end of her nose. The last two weeks had been hard, watching yet another iteration of the apocalypse unfold around them. People were better able to make a living in the less harsh conditions, but because of still marauding scavengers, there was a sense that people had become more paranoid, more unwilling to engage with those who might want to trade with them. Which was why it was a surprise the next day when they came across a sign nailed to a tree far from any road. It had been put there to attract exactly the kind of travelers that Nathan and his crew were—those staying off the roads, moving quickly along the valley, and looking for a welcome rest or a permanent home.
EVERYONE WELCOME. COME ONE COME ALL. SPACES STILL AVAILABLE. WE NEED YOU. YOU NEED US. FOLLOW THE TRAIL AND COME SEE FOR YOURSELF.
The sign was a bit weathered, but the paint was still bright. Underneath it was an arrow pointing away from the iced river to a path, snowed over but recognizable between the skeletons of scrubby bushes. The trail was just wide enough for the dogs, but Nathan felt wary of taking the sign at face value.
“Not everyone out here is going to be a wolf. Some of them may be spiders. This might just be an enticing web, and then there’ll be something nasty waiting to run out and eat us if we step into it.”
Dave came over with his flipped open laptop, fully trickle charged with the solar panels on his sled. “Missile silo. Old Atlas Nuclear Bomb launching site.” He pointed at the screen where he’d called up his stored, offline cop-maps that he’d hacked last year, many of which had been proving invaluable. The maps still got real-time satellite updates—when they could get uplinks—since the NASA and commercial GPS systems were still working after a fashion. They hadn’t been able to cope too well with the shift in the Earth’s crust, but the images they sent out on the automated systems which were still working helped users get a sense of how catastrophic the world’s problems were now. Now, Dave used his thumb and index finger to zoom in. Nathan saw the raised bunkers, all of them covered in snow, but with wide, triangular, concrete entrance ways.
“Why would they be calling people to a missile silo?”
“Because they built apartments in them,” Lucy answered, having come over with Freeson to look at the screen. “I have two. One in the east; one in the west. I don’t think this is one of mine, although I didn’t take a lot of notice to be fair. I mean, who does?”
Nathan looked at Lucy like she’d just spat in his coffee. “Who’s building apartments in missile silos?”
“The very rich, darling. I have a one whole-floor apartment in one with 1,800 square feet of living space. I could just about cope with that—they go for two million dollars a unit, give or take.”
“Give or take.”
“Yes, well, there was some tax unpleasantness, but my accountants kept my exposure low. The other apartment cost four-point-five million and is three times the size. Five years of food, well selected neighbors, ten floors of other apartments; there’s even, I’m told, a store, a cinema, and a swimming pool. Survive the apocalypse in style, I say.” Lucy smiled as if she was telling them the most normal and well-known information of all time.
Nathan couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You have, not one of these places, but two, and you didn’t think to tell us?”
“Well, no, you seemed so intent on getting to Detroit, and now Casper, and anyway, I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t let you in. They’d probably shoot us all if we got too close, the way we’re dressed now. Anyhow, it’s possible I lost them in the last divorce. I might not even have access myself now.”
Nathan shook his head. “I don’t believe it. I just don’t believe it.”
“Welcome to how the other half lives. I reckon if they’re asking for people to join them, perhaps they’re not full-up yet, or perhaps they’re particular about who they invite in. I’d say this sign would bring them candidates aplenty, but if it’s still up, and it’s been here a while, then they’ve not let everyone inside at all. Shall we pay them a visit and find out? Maybe they’ll welcome us with open arms?”
They were met at the bunker door by a man and two women who were dressed in unisex blue boiler suits. The man was a dumpy fifty-year-old with a completely bald head, and he came forward with two plump women with blonde hair coiffured to within an inch of its life and laser smiles.
The man introduced himself as Strickland Grange, and the women as Michaela and Pamela Grange. The women just smiled and seemed happy to let Strickland handle the introductions. Strickland didn’t go into detail about the women at all, either. They all shared the same surname, and that could mean they were siblings or all married to each other. It wasn’t clear, and Nathan didn’t really want to dig into that just yet, as just th
e thought of them not being siblings made him feel queasy, especially when he looked at Strickland’s fleshy features.
“We saw you approaching on our system and came out to meet you. You’ll see we’re unarmed, and I’d thank you to, if not put down, please make your weapons safe.”
Freeson, Cyndi, and Lucy complied.
“We are a peaceful community here at Calgary and we absolutely do not allow weapons inside.”
“We don’t know if we want to come inside yet,” Donie said with a raised eyebrow and a jutted chin. Dave was tapping furiously at the laptop on his knees. The satellite uplink station stood open on its stand next to him on the sled. He’d been setting up since the moment Strickland and the women had appeared from the armored door of the bunker.
“That is, of course, your prerogative, young lady. Let it be known you would all be welcome to meet with us and our management committee, to look at the suitability of any of you to stay. We are not an entirely closed community, you understand, but we are always on the lookout for the right kind of people to join us.”
Nathan stepped back into Strickland’s eyeline, and Strickland smiled beatifically, waiting for Nathan to speak. “And who are the right kind of people?”
“Shall we go in and find out?” was all Strickland would answer. “If you leave your guns and equipment here, we can arrange to have it brought in later if you decide to stay.”
Nathan and the others looked at each other with questioning eyes—trust was in short supply these days. In the end, it was Cyndi shrugging, nodding, and putting down her AK-47 that transmitted acceptance.
“It’s better to travel hopefully I reckon. Let’s go in and see what’s what,” she said as Strickland smiled some more.
They left the dogs tied up with their sleds and their guns just inside the bunker entrance, but behind the blast door through which Strickland and the others had emerged.
“Your dogs, supplies, and weapons will be entirely safe while you come down to meet everyone, and I’ll send some of my people to tend to the dogs—we have food and water aplenty for them. More than we know what to do with, really, and we are entirely sanguine about sharing.”
Nathan left all of his weapons on his sled but kept the knife in his belt. He felt sure Freeson would have kept something about his person, too, knowing the gruff mechanic, and Lucy’s purse might still conceal a snub-nosed pistol.
The concealed weapons lasted five minutes on their persons as they followed Strickland down the corridor leading down into the bunker. Some yards before they reached the first internal blast door, there were men dressed in similar boiler suits operating airport-style security systems and a body scanner. They took Nathan’s knife, Freeson’s pistol from the back of his belt, the colt from Lucy’s purse, and the SIG-Sauer Cyndi had taped to the underside of Brandon’s cradleboard.
Strickland smiled gently as every weapon was located and put aside. “I am fully aware of how difficult it is to build trust in these troubled time, Mr. Tolley, and I completely appreciate how you might initially want to circumvent our rules here. I assure you, we mean you no harm. Quite the opposite, in fact. Now please, let us offer you and your group some hospitality in the mess. I’m sure we have much to teach each other.”
Nathan felt deflated at the whole turn of events, and if he was being honest with himself, a little stupid for trying to smuggle any kind of weapon into the silo. How did it look to these folks he had just met? It didn’t transmit the idea of trust to these people, and had already gotten them off on the wrong foot. If this facility was anything like what Lucy had described, then it was certainly a viable option for them getting some rest, and perhaps even remaining within until they’d made copies of Elm’s ledger and were ready to plan how they could disseminate his knowledge to as many people as possible. To have possibly fouled up an opportunity from the get-go, by feeding into the paranoia of the land and the people they’d witnessed taking advantage of others, was already a misstep. Sure, the Granges and their people were slightly odd, but he hadn’t seen a single weapon on their persons or on those operating the security systems.
“I’m sorry,” Nathan said sincerely. “Force of habit, Mr. Grange. We’ve had some tough times recently, and it’s hard to trust people at face value. But that’s our weapons now,” Nathan offered, holding open his coat as one of the security team patted him down.
“You won’t be the first, Mr. Tolley, and please call me Strickland; no need to be so formal. We’re trying to build something unique here at Calgary, and we have to be very careful ourselves. Hence our desire not to let weapons of any kind into the facility. Everybody ready? Excellent. The elevators are this way.”
The smell hit them first as the elevator doors opened on the lowest level of the silo, which Strickland informed them held the mess room, the administration office, and the communal kitchen. The smell wasn’t horrendous, but it was sour. A combination of old sweat, cooking grease, and wet hay was the best Nathan could offer as description as his nose wrinkled and he exchanged glances with Cyndi.
Brandon didn’t appreciate the aroma of the mess area any more than they did and immediately began to cry. Pamela fussed over him and Michaela gave a matronly smile as they walked out into the deepest space in the silo.
The walls were circular, unfaced concrete walls, with a military and almost utilitarian feel. Steel benches filled the central area with integral bench seating, there was a boarded-off section of the arc walls with two doors on one side of the space, and Nathan saw an open-plan kitchen on the other end, where two women in boiler suits were cooking below intensely humming extractors.
The area was a good thirty yards across, and lit with migraine-level LED lighting. Even to light a deep space underground, though, it felt like overkill to Nathan. There were a few more boiler-suited figures sitting at the benches, and a couple of them looked up at the crying baby, but most of the others were at the tables reading. Engrossed, rather than merely interested.
“We’re eleven stories below the surface here; there’s one other level below us with direct access to the aquifer, and deeper level pipes and construction to take advantage of geothermic exchanges for heat and power. That said, if the ground water were to become contaminated, we have three years’ worth of water in backup tanks and enough food to see your baby son there through until he starts school. Perhaps beyond that, as we’re not at capacity yet.”
Strickland took them to an empty bench and sat down with them as Cyndi asked, “How many of you are there here?”
Strickland had the answer immediately in his mouth in anticipation; this was a spiel he had delivered many times before, Nathan thought. If Strickland hadn’t been a salesman before the Big Winter, he’d been someone used to selling something, he was so open and persuasive. And yet Nathan wondered what it was about the man that was making him feel uneasy. Perhaps it wasn’t the man at all—perhaps it was the residents who’d taken no notice of them as they’d come in. Or maybe it was the smell or the two blonde women… but there was something about the place itching beneath Nathan’s thinking. He couldn’t put a finger on it yet, but there was definitely something being left unsaid.
“We have a little over seventy residents at this time. But we think that if the water stays clean, and our hydroponics grow the requisite food, and the aquacultures behave themselves and provide renewable fish stocks, we have the ability to house perhaps one-hundred-and-fifty souls here, if we manage well, and live frugally but not abjectly.”
Nathan smiled as Lucy’s eyes widened at the words ‘living frugally,’ and he immediately noticed her ‘I need two bloody Marys’ face.
“I can see the world outside has fallen far since the commencement of the Big Winter. Across the globe, systems were already breaking down before it arrived. But while the shift in the Earth’s axis, or even only the crust, has taken away much, it’s true, it has given us an opportunity.”
Here it comes. Nathan braced himself for the wing-nuttery about to be expose
d. “What opportunity?” he asked, his cynicism reflecting the faces of his clan around the table.
Strickland shrugged. “Nothing impossible or way out there, Mr. Tolley. I can see from your face you’re worried I’m about to tell you about the magic, or the aliens, or the gifts from the gods. No, we just think there’s an opportunity to teach, learn, and eventually emerge from this changed world with a group of people who can travel the land bringing help and, may I say, some hope. But they have to be the right people.”
There it is again. The alarm bell. “That’s the bit that worries me. Who chooses who’s right and who’s not? You?”
Strickland guffawed hard and had to reach into the top pocket of his boiler suit to pull out an immaculately laundered handkerchief and dab at the mirthful tears which had appeared in the corner of his eye. “Me? Oh, Mr. Tolley, what a card you are; of course not me! No, Mr. Tolley, a much higher and acceptable authority than me. You, Mr. Tolley. Your wife. Your children. Your friends. It will be they who decide, and the wonderful thing is, they won’t have to say a word. We’ll know with incredible detail and absolute surety. Mr. Tolley, you don’t know if you’re right. I don’t. But in the morning, I assure you, we’ll all know. Now, please, enough business. Let’s eat. I’m ravenous!”
The last thing on Nathan’s mind right now was food. His head was spinning with what Strickland could mean by a higher and more acceptable authority—but before he could explore further, Tony, who was sitting with Freeson, hugged his own tummy, his eyes wide at the word ‘eat’. He was pretty much licking his lips in anticipation, and Nathan was suddenly reminded of how hungry he was, too.
“Okay, Mr. Grange. Let’s eat. But I want to hear some solid facts about this place and what you’re proposing.”
After the Shift: The Complete Series Page 45