by Howard, Bob
The Chief had been forced to abandon ship when he and Kathy had escaped from the cruise liner, and they couldn’t save five thousand people, but when he had tried to protect Allison, she had died when he had forgotten to be careful just once. That one lost life meant more to him than the thousands on the ship, because he had let down a friend. This time he was getting some payback. The Chief had found Hampton, and he was going to see to it that they all made it home safely.
The boat motor began to sputter to life, shook violently, and then settled into a steady roar. Kathy let out a cheer, and the Chief gave the anchor one last throw. It looked like he was bowling because he always took down more than one.
When the Chief jumped into the boat, he looked like he was ready for more fun, but it had still been business as usual. It was still all about staying alive.
He shouted over the sound of the motor to Kathy who had taken her place at the steering wheel, “It’s too far to go all the way back around the island to get to the entrance. We need to stay with the plan and go for the front gate. If the bridge over to the island is too low to go under, we can beach at the road and cross.”
Kathy gave the Chief a thumbs-up as she turned sharply around the end of the dock and increased speed. It seemed like only seconds had gone by as they sped past the front gate of Ambassadors Island and closed the distance to the bridge. Just as they had feared, the bridge wasn’t intended to be a shortcut from one side to the other. A fisherman in a Bass boat would be able to slide under the bridge if he ducked, but not a ski boat.
The Chief shook his head at Kathy when she looked at him, so she peeled off sharply to the right and skimmed the boat along the edge of the road back to the sloping gravel. She smoothly beached them right where the road met the brick. It was close to where the Chief had spotted the pattern that pointed to the entrance.
As the Chief went over the bow he called back, “Leave everything but weapons. We’ll have everything we need once we’re inside.”
Hampton looked longingly at the backpacks they had prepared for the long term. He was expecting the Chief to take them down through something like a manhole into the safety of a bunker about the size of a camper, so every can of beans was worth its weight in gold. He looked at Colleen and saw the doubt written on her face, too.
“Let’s go, people,” she yelled. “If you haven’t noticed, we have company.”
On the other side of the bridge where it connected to the mainland, there was a horde of infected that had been drawn toward the gunfire on Ambassadors Island. They were still far enough away to be of any real concern.
The problem was in front of them. The people in the pick up trucks didn’t bother to close the front gates when they had returned, and the army of infected dead that had destroyed them was moving toward the opening. Some were on the road moving directly toward the gates, and some had already reached the brick walls that kept people from going around the gates. They were moving in from the sides to join those already on the road. Where they converged there would be a brief logjam, but not enough to stop them.
None of them needed to be warned again that they needed to move faster, and they all scrambled over the bow and up the bank of gravel to the road. The Chief was in the lead, and he cleared the road in four long strides. He disappeared over the opposite side before Colleen even reached the road. Hampton reached back and grabbed her hand to pull her up more quickly, and then they followed Kathy as she jumped over behind the Chief.
They were still visible to the infected dead that were straying close to the side of the road, and at any moment they would begin to fall over the edge toward the four survivors. The Chief ran to the place where the brick wall came down to the water like a small jetty, wondering where the door was. He knew it wouldn’t be too obvious, but he didn’t have time to play games that involved clues.
The others ran up beside him, all breathing heavily, more from concern than exertion. The brick had bright, gold lettering on it that said Ambassadors Island. It stood out as if it was embossed onto the brick. There was something that looked like a broach in the middle of the letter “o”, and the Chief saw it was a miniature version of the pattern inlaid into the brick entrance driveway at the front gates. He touched it hopefully, and it moved.
Each point represented a number, and each number was the combination that would open the door. He carefully spun the dial of the combination lock, stopping where he estimated the numbers would be. There was no handle, but a dark line appeared where the sloping gravel met with the equally sloping wall. He shoved his big fingers into the dark line and got a grip, and just as the first of the infected dead began falling over the edge from above, he slid a section of the slope out of the way to the left. A pitch black opening appeared that was big enough to go through. Hampton pulled Colleen into the opening, and as the Chief and Kathy pushed the falling bodies away into piles, they backed into the darkness of the outer room of the shelter. Kathy found the handle on the sliding door and pushed it closed in front of the reaching hands and biting faces of the infected dead.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Ambassadors Island Shelter
“Does anybody have a flashlight?” asked Hampton. “Mine was in my backpack.”
“There’s a light switch around here somewhere,” said Kathy.
“A what?”
“A light switch. You know, the thing that turns on the lights.”
Coming from the bright light into the totally dark room caused all of them to be just a bit more blind than they would have been if they had time to adjust. Despite their close call, the Chief was almost in tears over the verbal exchange in the dark room. They couldn’t see his face, and he already had a hand over his mouth.
“Why would there be working lights in here?” asked Colleen from somewhere behind him.
The Chief felt Colleen bump into him.
“My God, I hope that was you, Chief.”
What they didn’t know was that they weren’t even standing in a tiny little room. They were so sure that the room would be small that they just stayed close together.
Hampton said, “Did anyone notice that our voices almost seem to echo in here?”
The Chief felt Colleen against his back again and said, “I don’t think we were properly introduced, Miss, so I don’t think I know you well enough for you to be doing that.”
If blushing could make you glow in the dark, Colleen would have lit up the room.
“Chief, Kathy, meet Colleen,” said Hampton.
They both said hello to Colleen, and everyone started to laugh. Kathy leaned forward and put her left hand out in front of her. It landed squarely on top of a light switch, and she flipped it upward out of reflex. She had a split second fear that it would open the door again, but in that split second when the lights came on, that fear was gone. They all turned as one to face a wide open room that was situated like a balcony looking down over an immense cavernous shelter.
They were about twenty feet from a safety railing, and they walked over to it to look down at what they had found. There was a metal plate attached to the top of the railing, and they could see it was engraved. Colleen walked over and read it out loud.
“Welcome to Ambassadors Island Shelter.”
From their vantage point, they could see that the shelter stretched the entire length of the island. The ceiling of the shelter gave the feeling that it was the sky over their heads, and it was painted a powder blue to look more like the sky. There was a stairwell on the left that descended from a height of about forty feet, but there was also a freight elevator against the wall to the right.
There were a variety of work spaces separated by walls, but there were no ceilings over most of the spaces. It was like looking down over a cardboard reproduction of a building without the roof on it. The rooms were painted in a variety of colors that made it look relaxing and comfortable, just like homes should be. From above they could see wall decorations such as pictures, mirrors, posters, and signs. It all
looked very welcoming.
“I wonder what’s inside the areas with roofs on them,” said Colleen.
“Let’s go find out,” said the Chief.
He didn’t wait for the others to agree. He started for the stairs while he kept his head turned toward the shelter.
“Wait a minute, Chief. Don’t we have to think about whether or not it’s safe?” asked Kathy.
Hampton and Colleen both wanted to ask the Chief the same thing, but to Kathy and the Chief there was a special meaning. They had lost a member of their group, a young boy, because they didn’t take the time to make sure the bottom floors of the shelter at Fort Sumter were clear of the infected.
The Chief stopped and waited for them to get to him.
“Okay, so we go down as a group, and we move as if we know something is here. The thing is, we’re also pressed for time. When we find out where the communication room is, we’ll be able to figure out how much time we have.”
“Hang on a second, Chief. Why are we pressed for time?” asked Hampton.
“Hampton, we’re so pressed for time that I don’t have time to explain it to you until we get more information. Let’s get going so we can at least locate the communications room.”
The steps going down were solid metal, and they felt like they were made to last forever. It was obvious that they had not been used by the number of people this shelter could hold because they looked so new. It was also as quiet as a tomb.
When they reached the bottom, they were in a main corridor that ran between the rooms. It was immediately apparent why the ceilings were left off of the rooms. The blue simulated sky above gave them the feeling like they were outside in city streets instead of below a neighborhood on an island. The well decorated rooms of the various work spaces would make inhabitants feel less claustrophobic.
It was all new to Kathy and the Chief, but it was breathtaking to Hampton and Colleen. To them the world was a place where you fought to stay alive. This was a safe haven beyond their wildest dreams.
As if someone had read their minds, the first large room they came to was a dining area. The tables were set restaurant style. Table cloths and silverware were neatly placed on tables, on one end of the room there was a completely stocked bar.
“Remember how to get here,” Colleen whispered into Hampton’s ear.
There were other dining areas along the main corridor, as well as rooms that were set up as different shops. One had racks of clothing, one was a shoe store, and one was a store Kathy and the Chief couldn’t wait to tell Ed about. It was loaded with video games.
One thing the group noticed was that all of the stores were stocked as if they were in a mall, and malls had become a reflection of the variety of tastes and diversity. Whoever designed this shelter wanted the illusion that everything was normal inside, even if it was far from normal outside.
Kathy said, “My guess is there would have been some sort of currency exchange so people could earn their supplies. You couldn’t just walk in and pick out your new shoes or order a steak in one of the restaurants. You had to work in one of the businesses too.”
“I agree,” said the Chief. “They were trying to establish routine here so people wouldn’t get bored.”
“Oh, my God,” said Kathy.
She sounded so horrified that the others drew their weapons and formed a loose circle. They all glanced in every direction trying to see what it was that had Kathy so shocked.
“What is it Kathy?” the Chief asked in a low voice.
“I know who this shelter was supposed to be for. We had a clue all along. It was right in front of us the whole time.”
Hampton and Colleen were totally clueless because they didn’t know how the shelters came into existence. The Chief had wondered about the name of the island and if it possibly had something to do with the occupants, but he thought it was a little too obvious.
Kathy explained, “I think if we find some records of who was supposed to be here and who owned those homes up there, we would find they were all summer homes for ambassadors. I mean, think about it. They lived overseas in foreign countries, but when they would come back to the United States, they had to go somewhere. Some of their families may even have been full time residents of Ambassadors Island.”
“So, where are they?” asked Colleen.
“Maybe they couldn’t get in because whoever had the combination for the lock out front didn’t make it back,” said Kathy.
“Okay, Kathy. We’ve been down this road before,” said the Chief. “No sense in dwelling on it right now. Let’s find that high tech stuff we need.”
They continued their search for half an hour until they came to a sign that had an arrow on it and said Central Control. It was one of the rooms that had a ceiling on it, and the next sign pointed down more stairs. In front of the stairs was a security station with a metal detector.
“Everyone step around the metal detector,” said the Chief. “We don’t need to waste time trying to figure out how to turn it off.”
The steps only went down one flight, but they went exactly where the Chief had hoped. The room looked like a NASA launch control center. He started looking through the maze of consoles for something to indicate which one would give them radio contact with the outside world. It took almost ten minutes, but the Chief found a terminal that had a headset attached to it, so he hit the power button and waited for it to boot up.
If he didn’t have to worry about a login ID or password, he was in business, but he looked under the keyboard just to be sure. Just as he guessed, there was a note taped to the keyboard with a string of letters and numbers, and under that was Betty123.
“How original,” said the Chief, “you give people the instructions on protecting passwords, and they do this anyway.”
Kathy was looking around the rest of the room and came to a door that was unlocked. The sign on the wall said it was access to the storage and living quarters.
“Chief, I’m going to check out the rest of this level.”
The Chief knew they had to at least know what was in the shelter, but he was worried about getting away from the area before the wind shifted and started blowing radioactive fallout their way.
“Okay, but take Colleen with you for backup, and leave a trail of some kind. I’ll have Hampton come looking for you if we need to get out of here fast.”
Kathy found a black Sharpie next to a computer and pulled off the cap. She checked to see if it had gone dry and found it to be usable.
“I’ll draw arrows at every turn. If the ink runs dry, I’ll come back.”
Kathy and Colleen disappeared through the door, and Hampton started exploring the rest of the equipment. The Chief was busy logging into the computer and looking for communications software.
It didn’t take long for the Chief to find what he was looking for, and he opened a program labeled Shelter Communications Network. He immediately saw that the only shelters displayed were those that he expected to be online. That was disappointing because he had hoped to find other shelters were occupied.
Their goal had become more than survival. They planned to occupy all thirty-two of the shelters and then to begin to fight back. It would take years, but they hoped to eventually eliminate the infected dead. Of course there were the living survivors who were making it difficult. If everyone with a gun was on the same side, they could have rolled right up to Ambassadors Island, told the occupants why they were dropping by, and turned the shelter over to them.
“Chief, I found the closed circuit TV system. I have Kathy and Colleen on a monitor and about twenty other areas.”
“That’s great, Hampton. Try to keep an eye on them. Is there interior communications available with that?”
The shelter at Fort Sumter had lacked that capability or they might not have lost Perry, the young boy who had accidentally stumbled into the only infected dead inside the shelter.
“Here it is, Chief.”
Before the Chief could war
n him, Hampton keyed the switch and asked Kathy and Colleen if they could hear him. The moment he did it he felt stupid because he had always been so careful. It was the newness of the shelter and the unbelievable feeling of security that made him slip.
Hampton’s voice boomed throughout the entire shelter. On the monitor he saw Kathy and Colleen get low to the floor, one facing in each direction with weapons drawn. Everyone waited, holding their collective breath to see if there was an unwanted response to the broadcast. The silence continued for several minutes, and Kathy held up a thumb on one hand.
“You don’t have to say it, Chief. I’ll keep my finger off that button.”
“That’s okay, Hampton, but I would have suggested you only tap twice on the microphone without speaking. Kathy would hold up one, two, or three fingers, and you would have tapped that number of times. It’s something we worked out a long time ago.”
The Chief finally found the control panel in his program that would open contact with the other two shelters. He selected Mud Island, the oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, and Fort Sumter from a menu and decided to keep it set on the function that would let him send a text message. There was always a chance that an audio signal could be intercepted and less chance of a text message being seen by someone above. Besides, after the mental mistake by Hampton, the Chief felt like keeping it quiet for a few minutes.
All three lights next to Mud Island, Fort Sumter, and one labeled GOMEX turned green, which he hoped meant someone was at their monitors ready for a message.
He typed, “Ambassadors Island shelter is online. Have located Hampton and a friend. What’s the word from GOMEX?”
Text messages popped up immediately from Mud Island and Fort Sumter. Both had similar questions about their safety.
The message from GOMEX said, “Cat 4 and increasing. Turning northeast at fifteen knots. Expect heavy rain ahead of storm. Winds should begin influencing Oconee within twelve hours. Would advise a safety window and vacate area of Ambassadors Island within ten hours.”
