Further:

by Travis Mohrman

  Both men stared at each other and watched as the color bled out of their faces.

  22

  Hearing a new voice put Handro on the defensive immediately. Cooper watched him crouch down and look around for a threat.

  Cooper had a different approach. He heard no malice in the voice and also, he was too happy to simply be warm. “Hello?” he responded in a thready voice.

  “I didn’t intend to startle you,” the voice said

  “Where are you?” Handro said loudly, his voice a little too aggressive for Cooper’s taste.

  “I’m sorry, I’m no threat to you at all. I’m not in that facility; I’m in a similar one very far away.

  Both men stared at each other again, not understanding at all.

  “You look half frozen. Please relax and warm up. I will be happy to explain everything once you are more comfortable.”

  Handro leaned in to Cooper and very softly said, “If she isn’t here, how can she see us and hear us? I think she is lying.”

  “Possibly, but we’re not going back outside right now. This is our only option and we need to embrace it for now. Let’s just try to act natural,” he whispered back.

  Handro was still visibly shaken as Cooper walked away from him and into one of the ‘H’ rooms. He started shedding his wet outer layers and placing them on the floor. He felt much lighter without all the bulky clothing.

  He wasn’t certain, but it felt warmer inside than it seemed to earlier in the day. Cooper wrote this off as his imagination, since the conditions outside had deteriorated so badly.

  Sitting on the soft bed, he had some time to think about the voice. He had no clue how something could not be there but still be talking to them. The more he thought about it, the less he cared. He accepted that there were a great many things he didn’t know about this world.

  When Tom first rescued him from his log raft, he had been amazed at the engine. He had never seen one operational. The rest of the technology at the village was far more advanced than he had grown up with. Why would he assume that advancement would stop there? Hell, this place had doors that opened automatically. A voice without a body didn’t seem that far of a stretch.

  The dogs had already made themselves comfortable in the strange place. Cooper watched Rufus climb right up onto one of the beds. He spun around several times, as he was prone to doing, and flopped down. Lupe quickly followed suit. The redhead was stunned that the animals were able to fall asleep in such a strange place, but the more he thought about it, the more his own eyelids got heavy.

  As he laid back and allowed the soft bed to gently embrace him, he saw Handro slowly walk into the room and begin sloughing off his outer layers also. Cooper was happy to see the other man try to relax slightly as he too sat on one of the elevated, cushioned platforms.

  He knew this was not the right time to take a nap. They needed to talk about what the voice could mean. Cooper just couldn’t keep his eyes open any longer. He told himself that he was just going to rest them for a second; squinting through the near blinding snow had made them tired. He had earned just a short rest for his weary and battered eyes.

  +++

  Cooper woke up feeling energized and refreshed. He hadn’t slept that soundly since they had left the village and he was sure he had never slept on something as soft as that bed. For a second, he wondered if he had dreamed the whole encounter with the mystery voice.

  Looking across the room, he saw Handro was still sitting on the bed, leaning his back against the wall. He had drifted off as well. He was shocked the dark skinned man had allowed himself to fall asleep, but it was a testament to just how tired they were and the effect of a warm room.

  As Cooper stood up, both dogs opened their eyes, but refused to move from the soft platform. Instead, their eyes followed him as he walked around the room.

  With a grunt, Handro popped awake. “How long were we asleep?” he said, looking around quizzically.

  “I have no idea, can’t exactly see the sun in here. I can go open the door to the outside, but it’s certainly dark by now. I feel really good, though.”

  “Yeah, so do I. How should we handle our mystery guest?”

  Cooper smiled at the questions. “I think in this situation, we’re the mystery guests.”

  Handro chuckled as he picked his heavy clothes off the floor. They were still wet from the snow melting onto them as soon as they came inside. Cooper picked his up as well and started looking for a place to hang them. He knew it was a bad idea to wear wet clothes.

  As the redhead looked around the room, he saw all the flat walls. No place to hang anything. He thought about hanging them off the dome lights but that would darken the room. Then his eyes settled on the strange black boxes that were sporadically spaced all throughout. As he walked over to one, thinking he could hang his layers off them, he heard a faint whirring sound start.

  The sound grew slightly louder until one of the parallel lines on the wall opened up and a long pole emerged. Cooper jumped back from it and caught the attention of Handro.

  “You can put your clothes on there to air dry. The facility can also dry them mechanically, but you would need to place them into a chute and they would disappear for a brief period.” The mystery voice had returned.

  Cooper, trying to approach this the same way he had when he met the villagers, replied with a thank you and placed his wet clothing on the pole. “I would like to hear more about the mechanical drying, if possible,” he said.

  “Of course. The wet fabrics just go down a chute into a large machine that spins them quickly while blowing hot air on them. It could dry your things in a matter of minutes,” the voice replied. “I still like to hang my things to dry outside when it’s nice weather.”

  As Cooper listened to the voice talk, he tried to gather any clues about it. It certainly seemed friendly and helpful. There was a warmth in the voice, an amount of caring that he appreciated. Handro had been sitting back, observing all this. The dogs didn’t seem to care about the voice in the least.

  Cooper knew what he needed to ask, but he had grown fearful of offending their host. He was trying to think of a polite way to blurt out the simple question when it became a moot point.

  “I know you have many questions for me. I also have just as many for you. Let’s start with simple introductions. My name is Ann,” she said.

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Ann. My name is Cooper and this is Handro.” Handro shot him a wary look and Cooper brushed it aside. “I kind of feel like I should offer you some potatoes,” he said, smiling to himself.

  “Potatoes?” replied Ann.

  Cooper realized that no one present would understand his bad joke and moved along. “Doesn’t matter. What is this place, Ann?”

  “This is one of a dozen underground facilities built to withstand any kind of cataclysmic event. There was one on every continent. Sadly, few remain inhabited.”

  Handro stood up now and stared off into nothing as he began to speak. “Why should we believe you?”

  Cooper wished that Handro could tone down the aggression. He wasn’t sure if the man even understood that he was coming off confrontational or if that was the point.

  “You shouldn’t,” she replied. “All you have to do is believe the evidence in front of you. I have no reason to lie to either of you. I realize it’s odd, standing in a room talking to a person you can’t even see. I can project myself into any of the screens in any room, but I think it would be best if you headed to the library at the end of the hall. There are things there that will help me explain and hopefully we can build some trust.”

  Cooper was all for this plan, but Handro was still skeptical. “You go with her. I want to look around in the other supply rooms. I’m not convinced that people aren’t here. I will catch up to you and you can fill me in.” Leaning in closer to speak with a whisper he added “Don’t automatically believe anything she says.”

  Cooper nodded. Perhaps he was too quick to trust people.
Handro did have more experience traveling to places, but meeting new people and then openly distrusting them seemed rude. He figured he would continue to be kind and keep any suspicions deep inside so they wouldn’t show on his face.

  He helped Handro re-attach the braced boot to his foot and lace it up tightly. Then, the other man slowly left the room. Cooper could hear a single clink every time the metal brace contacted the floor.

  Cooper grabbed a small piece of salted meat from his pack to nibble on. He didn’t feel hungry, but he knew he probably was. As he made his way down the hallway to the library room, both dogs followed closely, hoping he would drop some of the meat their way.

  +++

  The door was already open when he got to the library. Cooper wondered how you would leave a door open if you wanted it to stay open. He also noticed that there was no way to keep a door shut if you wanted it shut. His box back in the city had a large iron bar to slide into place to keep the door from swinging open. These doors slid into the wall so he couldn’t think of anyway to hold them shut.

  He was still wondering this while staring at the open doorway when Ann’s voice returned. “Ok, Cooper. Do you see the large screen in front of you? It’s the large black rectangle on the wall.”

  Cooper had been wondering what those were. He noticed when he was close to it that even though it was black, he could still make out his reflection in it as if it was some very dark pool of water.

  “Yes, I see it.”

  “I’m going to turn it on in just a minute. It’s going to turn bright blue and then my face will pop up and you’ll see me. It can be startling the first time someone witnesses this.”

  Her voice still held and that warmth and concern that Cooper had heard in the other room. “How is that even possible?”

  “I can explain things all in due time, just know that these screens can be very fragile and we can’t make them anymore. It’s going to turn blue soon.”

  Cooper watched as the screen flicked from dark black to a bright blue. It happened so quickly, he questioned whether or not it had always been blue. In one instant it changed totally with no transition between the colors. His mind was spinning trying to figure out what could cause that as the screen changed again.

  Now it looked just like a window. He could see books on the shelves and thought it looked remarkably like the room he was in. He slowly walked close enough to it and touched it to make sure it still there. Sure enough, his fingers met solid material, but the screen was now warm and where he pushed on it, the pictures changed drastically. It was like the colors were floating there and when he touched them they smeared around. Removing his fingers, he saw the colors all went right back into place. He was in awe of whatever this was.

  Then Cooper saw a figure walk around the desk and sit down. She was wearing a shirt with blue and gold bands running side by side all across it except for the all white collar.

  “Hi Cooper. It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Ann said as she sat at the desk just in front of the bookshelves.

  Cooper stared at the face looking back at him through this screen. His first thought was that her face matched her voice perfectly. Her face was warm and her smile seemed incredibly genuine. She had shoulder length hair that was mostly gray and straight with a few slight waves in it before it bobbed at the end. Her face wore tight wrinkles around her eyes and mouth with wider lines on her cheeks.

  He suddenly remembered Walter, the elder from his city, describing these wrinkles as happy lines when he was a boy. Saying you earned more for every time you laughed and were happy.

  Ann looked to be nearly as old as Walter, possibly older, but her eyes and smile were much brighter. This was a very happy and contented person. Cooper realized she was not haunted by the same demons as the elders in his city.

  “It is very nice to see you also. What are these screens? What makes all this happen?” Cooper was still bewildered by all this.

  “The screens are part of a computer. Basically, I have a machine over here that takes pictures and puts them on that screen. It is very difficult to explain without something to reference.”

  She was right, Cooper thought; he didn’t understand. He decided to ask what he hoped would be a simpler question. “Why is it warm in here?”

  With that, Anne smiled. She was pleased with the question. “The facility has heaters. Machines that take the water from outside and heat it, then push it through tubes that were installed in the concrete when the facility was built.”

  Cooper reached out to touch the concrete and it did feel warm, although it wasn’t hot at all.

  “The system was designed to give even heat through the entire structure with as little maintenance as possible. It works quite well. The heater, and everything else inside here, is powered by the movement of the water in the river.”

  “Is that what the huge, underwater wheels are doing out there?” Cooper said, thinking back to the submerged behemoths for the first time.

  “Yes, I’m glad you saw them before the river froze!” Ann was smiling now, pleased with the function of the bunkers.

  “How do you know all these things about what is going on here when you’re not here?”

  “The facility communicates with all the other ones. So I can look at the weather data for you and access the cameras and things like that. I can even turn more features on in your site when you think you are ready for them. It would give you a little more control of your environment. I already took the liberty of increasing the temperature for you all.”

  “I don’t think we plan on being here long enough to learn how to use these things. We need to leave as soon as we can.”

  Ann eyebrows rose slightly for a split second, but then dropped back, the pleasant demeanor washing back over her like a wave. “Where do you have to go?”

  Cooper hesitated. He assumed he should keep his village a secret, but he didn’t want to outright lie to the woman. “We have people back home. We got trapped here when the river froze. Then, Handro hurt his ankle when we tried to walk all the way home. We are going to leave as soon as he heals or we can put our boat back on the water.”

  “Every time you come into the bunker, you get scanned. It’s a simple security issue. I’m afraid to tell you that either one of those outcomes is several weeks away. Your friend’s ankle is nearly broken. It’s a very severe deep sprain.”

  Cooper was unable to contain his emotions with that revelation. The worry grew in his eyes as he thought about what his friends would think had happened. He knew they would try to come up to find them, if they hadn’t already, and he didn’t want them putting themselves at risk in this cold.

  He hadn’t given any real thought to how she could know the extent of his injuries, but he was past the point of being too surprised about what Ann might know.

  “It’s okay, Cooper. The facility has some medication that will lessen his pain and I saw you already found a support brace. Depending on how far you have to walk, I would think the river would thaw before your friend is fit to travel very far.” Ann looked down and began scribbling little things on the desk. Without looking up she casually asked “How far of a hike would you have to undertake to get home?”

  Cooper couldn’t tell if Ann was really digging for answers or just asking him a simple question. He decided to try to dodge her question just as casually. “It would be a very far journey, to say the least.”

  Ann smiled back at him. “The river should thaw in a week or two though, then you can just float back home in your boat.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I’m hoping,” Cooper said, before realizing just what he had admitted to.

  “I have activated a few more functions for you. All voice activated. Would you like a chair to sit in? Just ask for a chair.”

  He had grown tired of standing. More than anything, he just wanted to see where in the world a chair was going to come from, there were none in the room.

  “Can I have a chair please?” Cooper said much too loudly. />
  Ann let a few small laughs slip before she could catch herself.

  Cooper heard the same faint whirrrrrr sound and the space on the floor behind him began to slip and turn itself over, revealing a small square hole. Just as quickly as the hole appeared, a small, hard plastic chair with a black cushion popped through it and the opening closed beneath. The chair slowly slid the small distance to position itself beneath him.

  The redhead sat down gingerly, worried the chair might not be real. After putting his full weight on it and growing comfortable, he looked back to Ann. He tried, and failed, to hide the shock on his face.

  “What else can this place do when I ask?”

  “Nearly anything. Let’s practice a few other basic commands.”

  Cooper just sat and listened with amazement. He was half expecting to be roused awake from a dream to find himself out in the freezing cold of the field somewhere.

  23

  Cooper was flipping through different camera views on the screen in the library when Handro walked in.

  “What is this? What happened to the wall?” Handro asked as he looked into an image of the frozen river taken from one of the surrounding hills.

  “This is the outside. Handro, this place is unbelievable.” Shifting his gaze from the man to one of the small black boxes on the wall, Cooper said, “Please get this man a chair.”

  Cooper watched Handro go through all the same reactions he had, but it took more convincing to get him to actually sit on the chair.

  “It’s not going to swallow you into the floor. It’s a machine like any of the other ones back at the village, just more advanced.”

  He could see that the larger man would need more convincing, but he assumed he would come around. “Are you hungry?”

  “That’s what I came back to tell you. One of those supply rooms is full of dried food! Enough to last years. I’ve never seen anywhere near that much food!”

  “Ann told me all about that and showed me how to bring up the lists of what is in all those boxes.”