by D C Little
He watched the intruders as they piled over the gate. Two men faced out, scanning the forests and holding rifles. Another man helped the others down. Blake knew his cover was adequate. He knew they couldn’t see him, but they would if he made a go for the bunker. What he needed was a distraction.
When one of them became stuck on a throng of the gate, it diverted everyone’s attention. As soon as the two lookouts turned to help, Blake used the distraction to his advantage, slipping from tree to tree until he squeezed into the rock outcropping. Why had this felt more intense than any other op he had been on?
He clicked his radio back on just in case the group headed toward him. He couldn’t disclose the location of the bunker to the trespassers by the creaking sound it might make upon opening.
“Blake, are you okay? Please say you’re coming back.”
That’s why. His family needed him. He keyed in the bunker code, slipped under the hatch and closed it slowly and silently behind him. Letting out a deep breath, he eased his way down the ladder and to the steel door where he quietly tapped out his secret pattern knock.
Kris flung open the door and buried herself in his arms. Then she stood back and slapped his arm with a glare that could kill.
“You scared me to death! Why didn’t you say something? Let me know you were alive?”
A small smirk played at the corner of his mouth. “And give away my location?” He pulled her back into his arms. “I have a lot to teach you.”
She pushed away. The fire in her eyes had diminished, but he could see it still smoldering under the surface. “I could say the same to you macho soldier. You aren’t a one-man team anymore.”
He watched his wife while her words sank in. She might just be right. Working with his family, the only people he truly cared about in this world, was definitely different. Maybe they both had a lot to learn.
~6~
Kris hunkered next to Blake in front of the screens. Their eyes hadn’t left them for the last half hour. Her mouth had gone dry the moment she had heard the alarm. Seeing the people crawl over the gate had constricted her throat. It seemed an eternity before she had finally broken free of her panic enough to radio to Blake. She knew, though, it had only been a matter of a few seconds.
After giving the alert, her eyes had shot from the screens to Tucker to the radio like a merry-go-round until she had to shut them or pass out. Tucker had been right, and she had no idea if her husband would make it back to them...again.
Yet he had.
She took solace in the warmth of his powerful body next to hers, though the tenseness his rigid muscles showed he was in no place to offer comfort. His gaze poured into the screen as he watched the intruders walk onto their property with purpose. They continued their surveillance as the group strode into the screen that showed the land next to the bunker, the piece of their property that happened to host three apple trees still laden with fruit.
“It’s like they knew right where to go...” Kris trailed off, stunned.
“It appears that way.” Blake narrowed his eyes and peered closer to the screen. “Have you told anyone about those trees?”
“No. I do follow some of your crazy rules.” She nudged him to take the edge off her retort, but he didn’t budge.
“Has Tucker?”
“He worships the ground you walk on, and every order you have ever uttered he follows like one of the Ten Commandments.”
“Then the only other person that knows about those trees is...”
“Marvin.” The word left her mouth as heavy as the betrayal she felt, and yet, could she blame their groundskeeper? He had to do what was needed to survive, just like everyone else.
“Marvin the Maintenance Man.” Blake growled. “I should have known better.”
“What other option was there? There was no way I could keep up the grounds as well as hold down a full time job and raise Tucker.” She stood back, planted her fists on her hips, and glared at him.
“Of course.” He eyed her like the sight of her up in arms made his thoughts flee from the danger above them to more satisfying activities. “I would never expect that. There was no choice.” He pulled his eyes away to stare at the screen again. “I should have known he would betray our trust though, and prepared for it.”
“Is he is betraying us, or is he trying to survive?” Kris questioned him.
She couldn’t read his expression. Tucker’s coughing broke them from their conversation. She was by his side in a matter of seconds.
“Calm breaths, Tuck,” she soothed, caressing his head.
“Daddy...” He mumbled the words between coughs.
“He’s here, Sweetie. He’s back with us.”
A smile curved his lips before he racked another heaving series of coughs.
“You’ve got to keep him quiet.” Panic turned Blake’s voice into an angry snarl as his gaze shot from them to the screens and back again.
“We’re twenty feet or more underground. How can they hear us?” She narrowed her eyes, wishing she could knock some sense into him. How did he expect her to keep their sick son from coughing? She sat Tucker further up, propping pillows under his head as his coughing eased.
Blake pointed to the air outtake, jamming his finger in an angry gesture.
“Well, he can’t just stop coughing. Besides, if he did, it would surely turn into pneumonia.” She shook her head. For someone as intelligent and experienced as her husband, he sure acted ignorant sometimes.
“And if they hear us,” he whispered hoarsely, “we might as well say goodbye to the comforts we have here.”
Kris rolled her eyes and turned her attention back to their son. She wasn’t sure if sound escaped the bunker or not, but she knew what had to be done to keep her son alive. Her gaze flicked to Blake and back again. She also knew her husband’s unyielding pessimism.
With Tucker settled again, she kissed his head before rising to get the tea started. While pulling out a pot, another one crashed, the sound echoing like a dropped candlestick in a cathedral. Kris froze. She felt Blake’s searing gaze.
He murmured a curse under his breath.
Slowly Kris turned to look at him. He turned to her long enough to place a finger against his silent lips. A wash of cold tingles shot down Kris’s spine. Though her legs ached from holding the squatting position, she kept absolutely still.
It felt like an hour before Blake offered her a hand to rise, though she was sure only a few minutes had passed. Her shallow breathing left her light-headed as she rose. She clasped onto her husband’s thick forearm until the blackness dissipated.
“They heard?” she asked in a whisper, even the thought of it left her heart racing.
“Every head turned toward us.” The finality in his quiet voice left her mind reeling.
“What are we going to do?”
“I should have checked. Why didn’t I ever test the sound issue?” He rubbed a hand down his face and then paced back and forth.
Kris wondered if the floor would wear out with the constant friction.
She reached out as he passed her, letting her fingers wrap around his large hand. “We can’t do anything about that now. We can only work with what we have. Stop beating yourself up and make a plan.”
Blake’s eyes squinted and then widened before he hung his head with a nod. He squeezed her hand and went back to his vigil at the screens.
Kris eased the pans back into place before filling the smaller one with water and heating it on the stove. As grateful as she was for having all of the amenities, she couldn’t help but wonder if it would have been better to be up top. At least then they had the possibility of slipping unseen into the forest.
Her chest constricted. More than ever she felt like a caged animal, and now the predators were above, ready to sniff them out. Closing her eyes, she took a few calming breaths and willed the tightness in her chest to give way. The difference was that she had her cub to protect, and her mama bear instincts raged within her.
>
The satchel Blake had taken lay on the table. She reached in and pulled out the long needles, three in each group, a ponderosa pine. She nodded. The only side effect with this tree concerned pregnant women, nothing they had to worry about.
Methodically, to keep her mind clear, she chopped the needles, releasing a fresh scent into the small space. It caused her to close her eyes and imagine being above ground in the forest and fresh air. A smile pulled at her lips as she continued her task until a thwapping, a sound like distant waves, alerted her to the water boiling.
She dumped the cut needles into the boiling liquid and turned off the heat. When she pulled out the lid, she did so with utter focus to ensure no extra sound would emit from her action.
While the tea steeped, she wrapped her arms around Blake and watched the activity above. She felt him tense, but held on anyway. She knew he needed comfort as much as she did, whether he knew it or not.
~*~
Blake’s jaw ached from clenching his teeth, but he couldn’t relax. Kris’s carelessness alerted the swarm of intruders to their presence, yet no one left the group to scout the location of the sound. Instead they set up camp near their apple trees, only ten yards from the outlet valve.
When Kris wrapped her arms around him, he almost stepped away from her touch. He had only caught himself in time to still his body. He couldn’t help the anger pulsing through him. It took every ounce of his willpower to remind himself it shouldn’t be directed at his wife.
Not for the first time he questioned his decision of locking his family down here, cornered in a steel box. Granted, the likelihood of the intruding group having the strength of artillery it would take to breach the bunker was slim. Yet, there were other ways they could affect their livelihood and those caused his head to buzz with horrific scenarios.
“They’re staying?” Kris’s voice solidified the scene, making the reality hit him like a ton of bricks.
Blake could only nod. He had no words of comfort for her. No plan or advice. He had nothing but self-degradation and words she shouldn’t have to hear.
“Could we stuff the outtake?”
He shook his head, having already dismissed the thought. “We need that valve. Otherwise the air pressure will increase beyond capacity.”
She nodded while silently watching the group setting up tents and continuing to scan the area like criminals on the run.
“They seem scared.” She hugged her arms around herself.
“They should be. They are trespassing and stealing.”
“They’re trying to survive, Blake. They don’t have a bunker or a prepared husband to count on. Look, there’s even a few children. They have to eat.” She scanned their cupboards full of food.
“Don’t even think about it,” he growled. “I didn’t spend all this time and money preparing only to give our food away and have to watch you and Tuck go hungry.”
“We have plenty.”
“Kris,” he grasped her by the shoulders and turned her to face him. His eyes bored into hers. “You need to understand the extent of our situation. This isn’t going to just last a couple months, or even a couple years. This might be the new way of life for us...forever.”
Kris’s mouth dropped open. Her eyes went wide, and then they narrowed.
“No electricity. No cars. No phones. No grocery stores. Just this.” He kept his voice void of emotion, void of fear, just stating facts.
He let the realization sink home, giving her time to process what that meant. Sure they had prepared, definitely more than most. They had honed skills and immersed themselves in knowledge of survival, but she had never taken it seriously. He had always known that, but it was enough for him knowing that she would have the skills when it happened...even if she never believed it would.
When he dropped his hands from her shoulders she walked dazedly to the tea and poured it into a mug, her movements calm, measured, and completely assured.
He couldn’t take his eyes off her, expecting her to plummet into another panic attack or fall to the floor in sobs, but she kept on task. Calmly. Did she still not believe him?
She tasted the liquid and then added a little cold water and tested it again. With a nod she sat next to Tucker and lovingly eased him awake with caresses and soothing sounds Blake couldn’t decipher.
The boy woke and smiled at her. They needed to understand the severity of what they faced and how pertinent near silence in the bunker was. He strode over to them but stilled himself when he finally made out her words.
“...so when you cough, do you think you could cough into a pillow like this?” She held a pillow to her face and coughed into it. The muffled sound was quiet enough it shouldn’t be heard above ground.
Tucker nodded.
“You’re such a brave boy. I made this special tea with pine needles your Daddy brought back from above ground.”
“That’s why he went out there? He almost got caught for me? Why didn’t he listen to me?” Tears welled in his son’s eyes before the boy’s body started to shake. Tucker grabbed a pillow and stuffed it over his mouth. His coughs barely sounded through the barrier.
“Great work using the pillow,” she soothed, caressing his head. “We would do anything for you, Tuck.” Kris handed him the tea. “It tastes pretty good.”
“I would drink it even if it didn’t,” he said seriously.
“You’re amazing.” Kris kissed his forehead.
Blake turned away from them and went back to the screens. He had been gone so long that now he felt like an intruder in his own family. Maybe he was wrong about them needing him. He watched the people camping on his property. A couple of them hoisted rifles and handguns. Blake ground his teeth. No, they needed him. Their innocent souls had no idea of the terror people were capable of committing.
~7~
Kris lay in bed. The darkness cloaked them like a blanket, a thick, restricting blanket. Her husband’s snores drowned out Tucker’s raspy breathing. Should she wake him? Surely his snores were louder than Tucker’s coughing. She nudged him gently with no response. Several more attempts with the same result built up a panic in her. She elbowed him hard in the ribs.
Blake sat upright. She couldn’t see him, but heard his unmistakable abrupt movement.
“What happened? Are you okay? Is Tucker okay?” The fear in his whispered voice was palpable as she heard his hand rummaging in the blankets for their son’s chest.
“He’s fine. You were snoring. I feared it would alert them,” she whispered, doing her best to keep the fear from her own voice. A part of her felt guilty for waking him so roughly, especially when hearing his first concern was for her and their son.
“Was it really that loud?” he grumbled while situating himself, causing the mattress to move and shake.
“Yes,” she said simply.
Tucker groaned. She reached out a hand to settle him. They had resorted to giving him the medication at night so they all could get some sleep. Yet, she hadn’t been sleeping.
As her boys settled back into heavy breathing, her mind began to whirl again. She couldn’t show her emotions during the day. She had to be strong for her son and her husband. It was only at night that she could allow her emotions to release.
Tears wet her pillow as she stifled the sobs of fear, exhaustion, and a desperate need for mercy. She silently pleaded, prayed, and begged for her son to recover, for the people above to pass on, and for a way to survive what the world had succumbed to.
Blake’s words earlier that day had hit her hard. Hearing him state her fears out loud that this could be their new norm created wave after wave of terror within her. She tried to process how to survive, and yet she continued to wonder about things beyond survival, things that enhanced the quality of life.
Like, would her son ever get to play with another child? Without that socialization, what would he grow up to be like? Her thoughts continued to wondering what would happen if something happened to her and Blake. Tucker would be alone
, with no one. A shiver ran through her body. Her heart ached for her son and what this life might mean for him.
Sometime later, spent and numb with exhaustion, she finally slipped into a fitful sleep.
~*~
Blake shot out of bed, adrenaline pumping through his veins, his body ready for the fight he knew waited for him. Yet, as he blinked his eyes to focus all he saw was the dark inside of the bunker and heard his wife coddling their son.
“Shh, it was just a nightmare. You’re safe.” Kris soothed.
Blake hit the battery powered light near their bed, illuminating the room in a soft amber glow. Nothing else moved, only his wife who shot a cursory glance to him before returning her attention to Tucker.
Blake breathed deep to calm his racing heart. What had awoken him in a way that made his heart pump and muscles tense, ready for an attack? Had Tucker screamed in his sleep, a scream—loud enough to wake him from a dead sleep? He hurried over to the screens, ignoring the cold air prickling his bare skin.
Outside the sun lit the bustling camp. It was so difficult to tell what time it was down here. Kids ran around playing tag in the trees, picking apples, and eating as they pleased. He shifted his gaze to his son who had just fallen into a muffled coughing fit. A rock of guilt sat heavy in his gut. On the ground, the day looked beautiful. Here the air smelled stale and stiff, the bunker cold and sterile.
Blake’s mind warred with options. In the end he shook his head. His family was safer here, safer than anywhere else. No one could get in and harm them. They had everything they needed to survive. If they kept their location hidden, they had nothing to fear.
Except insanity. His entire body erupted in a shiver.
Warmth surrounded him as a blanket covered his shoulders. He hadn’t noticed until then that his body shook from cold. Turning, he saw Kris walking back to the kitchen area. She turned and smiled at him before filling a pot with water.
