Shelter

by C A Bird

  Mark started to put his arm around her but she walked over to Aaron and the two of them went to finish their meal. Mark felt a strange sense of ill ease. Could he be jealous of the time Aaron was spending with Chris? He knew they had to work together and wondered if there was some way he could volunteer in the farm to be with Chris more. Unfortunately he didn’t have an awful lot of interest in that area.

  He noticed Lori had finished her dinner and was staying behind to help clean up. He went over and started disassembling the speaker towers.

  October 3

  Samuel held the test tube of nutrient broth up to the light as if he could visibly determine what the problem was. “You would get better answers if you took it to the lab and ran it through the analyzer.” Chris said.

  “I don’t know that that’s true, young lady. I been growing things all my life without your fancy, shmancy equipment.”

  “Yes, but you weren’t trying to grow them without soil in a dark, dank, underground cavern.”

  “You think the problem’s the light?” he asked.

  “Maybe. I think we need to talk to Bud about changing the wavelength. I don’t know if it’s possible but I know that florescent light is a different wavelength than incandescent or natural sunlight. Maybe one of the machine shops can make us new lights.”

  She was using small clips to anchor the new plants to support wires. The glass wool and peat the plants were anchored in didn’t supply enough support on their own. Three weeks after planting they’d produced their first crop, with a yield far less than expected, and she was convinced the nutrient content was wrong. Of course, light was needed for photosynthesis but all plants also require carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, potassium, magnesium and several other essential minerals. Carbon, hydrogen and oxygen are no problem, obtained easily and in large quantities from water and from carbon dioxide in air. The other nutrients are usually supplied by salts in the soil. Here, however, since there was no soil, it was up to her to determine the proper percentages of mineral salts to add to the distilled water. Iron, manganese, boron, zinc, copper and molybdenum also presented no problem, being needed in minute quantities. These trace minerals were added, along with a fungicide, after the final nutrient broth was prepared.

  It was painfully obvious to Chris that the original mixture was incorrect. Using computer modeling, she created a theoretical mixture, fed the data to the analyzers and created a new, and she hoped, optimal nutrient solution. She had changed the percentages of potassium nitrate, calcium nitrate, potassium acid phosphate, and magnesium sulfate. After dissociating in solution, these salts supplied necessary ions for growth, such as K+ and NO3-.

  These new plants were being fed the re-configured mixture utilizing the sub-irrigation method of hydroponic gardening. The solution was flooded through the peat or glass wool and allowed to drain periodically. There was no danger of depleting the salt solution since the plants extracted a fairly small amount of minerals from the solution, which would then be replenished and reused. Working her way back and forth through the hydroponic beds, she babied the young crop, coaxing them to flourish.

  She was thoroughly satisfied with the crew assigned to assist her. Sam had proven to be a gem and although, as he pointed out every day, he had spent his entire life farming by “time-tested methods” he had surprised her with his feel for growing things in an artificial environment. Several teenagers were currently cultivating the open in-ground growing areas that would be planted next.

  Theresa West, a botanist, provided valuable assistance. Chris believed Terry should have been in charge but she’d brought her family with her, and was able to spend far less time at the farm than Chris. Satarana Patel, a nutritionist, assisted Kate in the kitchen but spent considerable time working with Chris as well. Rana and Candy Pitowski, an entomologist were becoming good friends. Savannah Strahan, who owned an organic produce store helped out as well. Candy had worked for a farming co-op researching agents for exterminating insects that attack food crops. Samuel referred to these women as his harem and had been warned by Chris she was going to report him to the government for sexual harassment. All in all it was a talented and hard working group.

  Ted and Beth Wright, a married team of veterinarians, had responsibility for the animals penned behind the doors in the farm’s back wall. Their cave was slightly smaller than the food production cave and was filled with corrals holding several each of cattle, goats, sheep, and hogs. Many were pregnant, having been part of an on-going animal husbandry program. The Wrights enjoyed more volunteer assistance than any other work area, many of the residents, including quite a few teenagers, wanting to work with the animals.

  A third, even smaller cave, which they referred to as the “Chicken Ranch,” was accessible through more doors to the side of the animal cavern and contained chickens, turkeys and game birds. Tunnels led from this area and eventually wound their way to the power plant.

  There were several Dragon Doors off the farm and animal caves leading to storage areas, some of the larger ones used for storing animal food, another used for disposal of their waste and, of course, the cave where Mark had found Old Pierson’s body.

  Chris didn’t have a lot of experience with hydroponic gardening but knew it was only a matter of time until she discovered the optimal mixture of soil substitute, nutrient broth and lighting. The computer had an extensive collection of material on gardening in artificial environments and she was learning as quickly as possible.

  The last of the original fresh produce had been consumed at the barbeque a few days before. They had been able to produce fast growing romaine, cucumbers, tomatoes and zucchini but with the low yield it would never be enough. Chris was using her new recipe for the broth trying to increase the yield for the next harvest period. She smiled as she saw Sam sneaking off to the lab with tubes of the nutrient. He would never admit to using the lab’s computer but she had seen him with Darryl Washington on several occasions and knew he had been trained on it.

  Someone grabbed her from behind and she jumped, whirling to find Aaron laughing at her. “You work entirely too hard, my dear. How about some dinner?”

  She swatted him on the shoulder and immediately apologized when he winced. “Oh Aaron, I’m sorry, but you started it. Okay, good idea. I’m starved. I just can’t seem to be able to produce a decent yield and it concerns me to death.”

  “You’re worrying about it too much,” Aaron told her. “Many of the residents have come in for physicals and although some have other problems no one is suffering from malnutrition.”

  She was touched by his support but knew the food stores wouldn’t last forever and if they were forced to live underground for an extended period of time people would eventually be relying on her to provide necessary provisions. “I know we still have plenty of food but it’ll be different now that the fresh food is gone. People will get tired of not having produce. What bothers me is that the science is right.”

  She walked beside him, checking the new plants. “I can’t figure out why we can’t get a decent yield. It’s not that we aren’t getting growth, it’s just that the yield is too low. If we had more area we could provide enough food at this yield.”

  “Why don’t we use some of the dragon areas? We could rig more lights and dig furrows in the dirt floors.”

  “That might be worth investigating. I’ll discuss it with Dad. Thanks, Aaron.” She turned and took his hand. “Keep the ideas coming, I need all the help I can get.”

  There was an awkward moment where neither spoke. Then Aaron leaned down and kissed her on the cheek. “At least I’m good for something. Until my arm is back to full strength I feel useless.”

  His cast had been removed but his wasted left arm was a reminder of two months of inactivity. Gradually beginning to exercise it, he was regaining strength in his arm as well as in his overall conditioning. It started that wonderful day he had stumbled, literally, upon Chris in the farm cave. She introduced him to the gym an
d had proven to be a stern taskmaster. During all the years as a medical student, an intern and a resident he had gotten out of the habit of regular exercise. There was never enough time. Fortunately he possessed good genes and hadn’t turned into a complete cream puff.

  Chris saw Rana Patel approaching from behind Aaron, appearing distressed.

  “I want to know why these fellows tease me and call me “Frog face,” Rana asked without preamble.

  “Hi Rana, who calls you this?” Chris asked her as she elbowed Aaron, who was trying to suppress laughter.

  “All those small boys. They hide behind the boxes and when I walk by they call me “frog face” and then they run. What does this mean?”

  “Come on Rana, we’re going to eat. Why don’t you come with us? You’re going to have to get used to that sort of thing, these kids don’t have enough to keep them busy and I’m afraid they’re getting too good an education. They must have learned that Rana pipiens is a species of frog.

  Rana looked momentarily blank and then suddenly said with a completely straight face, “Oh, that’s very funny. I like that.” And they all headed off for dinner.

  October 26, 12:30 p.m.

  Walter checked the gauges in the environmental system control room. One of the readouts was swinging wildly, indicating the unit being monitored was malfunctioning.

  “What do you think’s the matter with it, Dad?” Jerry asked him. The gauge fell to zero, indicating the carbon dioxide scrubber had suddenly quit working completely, leaving five others in this part of the shelter to carry the load. Walter tapped on the glass and frowned. These scrubbers were similar to those used on Mir, the Russian space station. Funny, Walter thought, those had malfunctioned all the time too.

  “I don’t know, son. The others are fine but we’ll have to adjust them to keep the CO2 and nitrogen levels optimized.”

  The outside air was still contaminated, and although the radiation was beginning to drop rapidly, there was no way to make it safe with any amount of filtering. One of the dragon caves was used for storage of compressed air tanks large enough to supply air for the shelter for approximately two weeks if the main and backup oxygen generators should all fail, an extremely unlikely event. They still had plenty of capacity on the remaining generators and there were three additional banks in other areas. Walter didn’t think they would need to utilize this equipment for much longer.

  Pete leaned over his dad’s shoulder. In addition to working in one of the machine shops he’d been trying to help his father and brother by learning about the environmental systems. “What about the air temp, Dad? Seems a little cool in here.”

  Jerry, thoroughly enjoying having knowledge about something his little brother didn’t, jumped in to answer him.

  “It’s a cave Pete. It’s always cold down here. The air temp is steady 64 on the top level and gets colder as you descend. The shelter doesn’t even have any air conditioning. We’ve been heating the air although it’s warming up on it’s own with all these bodies down here.”

  “How do you keep the temp from getting too high on the upper levels?” Pete was examining the gauges on the equipment.

  “The plenums are all baffled. The computer controls the degree to which they open and close to stabilize the temp on the upper two levels. We maintain it slightly lower on the bottom level since the machine shops, gym and farms are down here. The whole shelter is allowed to cool down to 68 degrees at night.”

  Walter pulled the cover off the generator and he and Jerry were examining the unit’s innards. Pete took this as his cue to escape while he could. “I gotta go, see you two later.” Walter and Jerry were so engrossed they didn’t even notice him leave.

  Pete took the stairs to level one and headed for the school to see if Sandi was ready for lunch. She had just dismissed the combined Kindergarten through third grade kids and they pushed through the door, almost running him over in their haste to get to lunch.

  “Whoa, slow down kids.” He pressed his back against the jamb until the final kid raced past and grinning at Sandi he reached for her hand.

  “You interested in having some lunch?”

  “You know, Pete, I’m not really very hungry.” She turned away and went to erase the marker board covered with math problems.

  “Come on Sandi, Chris told me they’re having some problems getting the yield up on the crops. You need to eat your share of the produce. Did you have breakfast?”

  She admitted that she hadn’t which concerned him even more.

  “Are you feeling okay? What’s the matter?” He turned her around and hugged her. He was aware she was depressed about her family and felt guilty she hadn’t gone home before the war. “You know, we’re all having some problems adjusting. What can I do to help? Do you need to see Dr. Jim?”

  “No Pete, I’m fine, really. I just need some time. She turned away and resumed erasing.

  “Okay. If you want to talk later I’ll be in the pub.”

  He left her, not knowing what else to do. They had spent a lot of time together and he was concerned that her depression was getting worse. Her smile was absent and she had become withdrawn.

  Although it was only noon several others were sitting at the bar or at tables. Johnny Jay saw him come in and had a Bud open before he even reached the bar.

  “Hey, Pete, you look like hell. What’s up?” The phrase “You look like you’ve lost your best friend” was never used in the shelter.

  Almost everyone had.

  “Aw, I’m just worried about Sandi. Can’t seem to cheer her up.” He downed half the beer in one gulp.

  “Hey Dude, most of the folks are having a tough time. She’ll be okay. She just needs some time.”

  “That seems to be the consensus. Everyone just says they need more time. It looks like that’s all we’ve got right now.”

  He glanced around the room, noticing with displeasure that Clay Hargraves and his three friends were there. Clay’s friends were all in their late teens or early twenties. Clay seemed to fit in better with younger men than with men his own age. Pete didn’t care for Clay’s arrogance or his attitude. Clay intimated he had authority over others since his father was the owner but Pete didn’t buy it and he didn’t think Will Hargraves intended it either. He noticed that whenever Clay’s father was around Clay backed off and didn’t exhibit any authority at all. Clay’s sister Chris had taken on a tremendous responsibility with the hydroponic farming, but as far as Pete could tell, Clay hadn’t made an effort to perform any work at all, spending his time with his buddies in the pub or gym, or hanging out with the younger women.

  As Pete gazed at the group Clay looked over at him, raising his hand in a gesture of greeting. Pete nodded and quickly looked away.

  Elsewhere in the room people were talking and enjoying the company of others. Very few people liked being alone, and humans seemed to become more gregarious when cataclysmic events affected their lives. Karl Dohner was one exception, a solitary figure at the end of the bar, drinking scotch and spending hours staring into his drink. Johnny had the good sense to surreptitiously water down his booze but even though it was just past noon it looked like Karl was already drunk.

  Doctor Laskey was interviewing a couple at one of the tables. He decided that in addition to being an educator, he would act as the shelter’s historian by documenting the survivors’ experiences. Being determined to write this history from a more personal perspective than most, he spent considerable time talking to people and questioning them about their feelings.

  Pete got another beer and wandered over to a table where two of his friends, Tom Jenkins and Paul Brady were sitting with Vernon Richenour. “Hi guys, what’s going on?”

  Vernon leaned forward, speaking in a conspiratorial manner, almost a whisper. “We were talking about when we can get out of here.”

  “What are you talking about? Who in their right mind would want to leave?” Pete asked.

  “I don’t think Hargraves is leveling with us ab
out the outside. There’s no way everyone could have been killed. Surely we should be able to contact others by now.”

  “Well, I don’t know much about it but I don’t think the radiation is gone yet. My dad has monitors on the outside air and he says it’s so radioactive out there we can’t even filter it enough to use it. We’re still using oxygen generators.”

  “That could be a ruse. How do we even know for certain there was even a war?” His gaze shifted between the young men.

  Paul Brady shrugged his shoulders, “Duh . . . I saw the blast. It couldn’t be anything else. It was too bright, and I’ll never forget that noise.” He visibly shuddered at the memory.

  “Well, I just think we need more information. Hargraves should communicate better.”

  “No offense Mr. Richenour, but why would the man spend hundreds of millions of dollars to build this place to save our sorry asses and then keep us prisoner? I’ll bet he’ll let you leave anytime you want.” Pete said.

  “Don’t get testy, young man. I just think we need some answers. I’m going to talk to Hargraves about it.” He got up and left.

  “That guy’s a troublemaker,” said Tom. “He goes around all the time stirring people up about non-existent problems. Why doesn’t he just split if he hates it here so much?”

  Pete looked toward the door. “Some people would complain if you saved their life in a nuclear war and didn’t thank them for giving you the privilege.” As he imbibed another beer he kept looking toward the door, hoping to see Sandi enter. But she never did.

  Johnny went over to see if Dr. Laskey wanted a drink. He seldom did, but Johnny took his job as bartender very seriously and was determined that no one should go without. As soon as Johnny left the bar Karl reached for the bottle of scotch and filled his glass, tucking the half empty fifth up under his shirt. He glanced nervously at Johnny with bleary eyes and stood unsteadily to leave the room. Johnny returned to the bar and was relieved to see Karl’s back disappear around the corner toward the elevator that would take him to his second floor apartment. He noticed that Karl had taken his drink with him.