The Event Series (Book 3): The Archive and Beyond

by Thomas Larson

  “You okay?” she asked. She seems to know, sense when I am in turmoil.

  “Yeah, just thinking.” I replied.

  “About what?”

  “Mills, Fort Knox, Cheyenne, what we may have opened as a can of worms.” I answered.

  “Yeah, lot of things could happen. I wonder, you think that the bases may take a shot at us?” she asked.

  “Don’t know, Cheyenne and Pittsburgh seemed cool with what happened. We have no idea what is up with Fort Knox.”

  I opened my eyes and looked at her.

  “Maybe we should talk with The Three and push along the move. Get settled in, just in case someone does something stupid,” she offered.

  “Yeah, probably.”

  “There’s more isn’t there.” She said.

  “Yeah.”

  “And.”

  “Okay, Matt caught me this morning, he is not happy with our dumping Mills in the woods. He thinks he deserves a cremation or burial.” I told her.

  “And you think he doesn’t.”

  “Yeah, and I guess, I see Matt’s side of it. Am I wrong? Am I being a stubborn dick about it?”

  “Tom, I love you, and you are my stubborn dick, and yeah, you’re wrong.”

  We sat in silence for a few minutes.

  Fire Pit tonight was fairly well attended. As it began, I cleared my throat.

  “Folks, as you know we had the incident with Lt Mills, it was ugly, and dangerous, and bad. In the end, things happened and tempers flared. I had his body dumped into the woods. I was wrong, as much a shit as he was, no one deserves that, thank you Matt and Asuna for pointing that out to me.”

  Ruffle, Ruffle, Whisper, Whisper.

  “With all the bad shit that the Otis Crew did, we gave them a peaceful end, and I am wrong to deny that to Mills. I am going to walk out there now, and cremate him. I ask you, Matt and Tanya, will you join me and say a few words, please.”

  Tanya and Matt looked at each other, then at me, “Of course.”

  I got up and started toward the woods where the body was, Asuna walked beside me and held my hand. Matt and Tanya followed, in fact all those at Fire Pit joined. Mills was put to peace. And in doing it, it put my anger to rest and peace also.

  September 14th

  (Margo) Code and I wanted to go to the shops in Northampton which is a little to the northeast of the Archive. It was a college area and one that had the reputation of being very culturally diverse based upon the colleges in that area, There was Mount Holyoke, Smith, UMASS Amherst and a couple of others. But that is on hold, The Three decided that we have to move Group Two into the Archive immediately. No explanation was given, just “Yep, you’re moving in today.”

  So we packed the remains of our goodies and it was off to the underground facility. I can’t help but wonder if there is maybe a connection between the move and the Mills thing.

  Anyway, Code and I spent the day setting up our new room. Once we get the all clear we need to get some paint, and I still want to check out Northampton. But for now, we will do with what we have.

  (Matt) There is a big push on to get the second group moved into the Archive. I think that there is concern that whoever was associated with Mills might take revenge on us, or may send a force to try to take this place away from us. So Tanya and I will move to our room and get settled in early.

  We are still planning to make the trip to see Helen. The move will actually push our start date up by a week. I have talked to Mom and she is good with our going on horseback out to the college.

  I am glad that Tom reconsidered his course of action on Mills. I could understand his thinking to a point, but it would have been a slippery slope to start down. I know that we have The Three and that they are generally in control, but at times, some good and some bad, Tom can be a strong influence on what happens with us all. I’m glad he saw the light and relented on this.

  Tanya and I talked about what we would do for a design of our new digs, at this point we will just get our stuff moved in and leave it the ghastly grey of the military. We will have plenty of time to spice it up when we get back.

  In all the movement today we really had no time for a proper Vesper. But that was fine; we had kind of a coffee klatch in the dining hall of the Archive. It was good.

  (Lance) And then there were seven, the Group 3 people are all that is left in the camp and we have two days to pack our shit and get out of Dodge. Tom talked to me about the Mills thing or should I say it was really more like 20 questions. What did you think when you talked to Pittsburgh, are they pissed at us? Did you sense any hostility? Were they part of the Fort Knox plan? Were they just an outside element that was not in the inner circle?

  I thought about it, those questions. I believe that Katzung and his crew are good people and doing the best they can for the world. I feel the same about the contacts I had with Cheyenne. I listened in when Tom talked to Generals Osgood and Welles. I had no feeling of them being part of the Fort Knox, De Soto scheme.

  Still, we have lived by trusting our guts for a long time and better to be ready and be wrong than to find ourselves in something bad like we did with Stanwix.

  We, Del and I, got all our personal stuff all moved up to the Archive today. There were a couple of bunks in the room where we were assigned, Room E-12. It is about halfway down the hallway on the left hand side. We are between Code / Margo and Taylor with Mark and Michelle across the hall. We will have to decorate, paint, make it home, but for now, the priorities are power array, computers / server and then home decorating.

  I have not gotten to the electronics and computers. We were going to swing back down tomorrow and start breaking that system down but I want to strip some of the solar panels first. We can never have enough power. I want to get a solar array set up ASAP to enhance what the wind turbines can supply.

  I figure that will take a few days and we can change over the computers once we get the power up and running. I am sure that the turbines could handle the power load, but still, a little more juice would be good.

  It was quiet here at camp tonight, not many of us left.

  (Tom) I leaned on The Three to try to get everyone under cover earlier than we had planned. I talked to Lance and he feels that it is most likely that if we were to be attacked it would be from Fort Knox. I have to agree. I had no sense of an issue toward us from Cheyenne. Osgood, General Osgood, seemed truly pissed at what De Soto was trying to do. He said he would take care of it. I am not sure how that would happen, but he seemed sincere, ditto with Katzung and the Pittsburgh.

  The Three agreed that it would be better to be safe than sorry. My biggest concern is that De Soto; if he has access, might send a missile our way and just try to wipe us out. If it is a bunker blaster, we are basically done for. But if it is a tactical nuke, and I would not put it past him, we could or should be able to withstand the blast. Wow, Cold War threats all over again. That is just messed up.

  We will seal the door each night and during the day keep the inner door, beyond the library portion, mostly closed. It would minimalize damage to us all. It is sad that after all we have gone through we are back to this.

  Asuna and I are basically moved in already we had moved most of our essential stuff up to the mountain. We have the room pretty much set and cleaned up. One more wall to paint, and the waterbed to fill, and we are set. But we will stay in camp a couple more days. I want to make sure that the remaining equipment is safe.

  We brought the fuel truck up there today, we still have half a tanker truck of JP-8 available which should last us another month or so but we should consider a fuel run soon. We have been landing the helicopter in the parking lot.

  Lance and I periodically check the Sat-Comm to see if there were any contacts. There was one from yesterday morning and another in the afternoon. The coding said that they were from Fort Knox, but there was no message, but then there wouldn’t be, the system does not work like an answering machine. It does have a caller ID sort of function, b
ut no recording capability.

  Besides, I think that even if it was capable of recording, it would seem doubtful that they would leave a message like “Agent 3, this is General De Soto, we haven’t heard from you. Have you secured the package? Your call is important to us; please call us back and leave a message after the beep.“ Yeah, I don’t see that happening.

  No get together by the flagpole tonight but some of us circled the Adirondack chairs by the lake and we sat there. It was mostly quiet, just absorbing the scene, and the fresh air. We sat until after dark. I am going to miss this, the lake. It was a place to go to just sit and enjoy the calm. Bitchin’ Northern Lights tonight, brighter than I have ever seen.

  September 15th

  (Matt) Tanya and I have spent much of the day getting settled and moved in. But we have also spent a little time getting ready to ride out to Montgomery Fulton CC to see Helen. I am kind of looking forward to a spaghetti dinner with her.

  We are going to travel light, a little tent, some MREs from the stores at the base, and that is about it. We don’t need winter clothes although we may find a chilly night along the way, it is September.

  I am not really worried about running into Changed along the way, we have seen few since the spring, other than the ones in the Stanwix attack.

  We will leave in the morning. Tanya and I did a special little get-together tonight with Vespers with those at the Archive. We told everyone that we were going, and why. A couple of people actually wanted to come along until they heard it was a horseback trip, no trucks to be taken.

  (Margo) Code and I headed up to Northampton today and were able to find a little kind of Anime Comic Shop. They had a lot of stuff including some DVDs of TV series I had never seen, some Full Metal Alchemy manga and some cosplay stuff. Code is not so much into the Manga but loves the anime.

  We also found some Cosplay outfits, but most of it was a little over the top. We did find some Kimonos and Yukatas that we can wear. We passed on the school uniform things. But they did have a bunch of Attack on Titan stuff so I grabbed a bunch of the dark green hoodies with the Scout Squad insignia for Del, Lance, Tom, and Asuna.

  We got back late in the day and just chilled out doing the final touches on our room before dinner.

  Matt did a thing, kind of a Vespers in the Community / TV room tonight. He and Tanya are going out on another pilgrimage. Code and I talked about it later and although it would be kind of cool to go; I think we will pass this time.

  Oh, interesting, Gillie must be doing better than I thought, seems that after Vespers, and when the hallway was empty, someone was sneaking into Tay’s room. Not sure why they have to sneak around, but good for them.

  (Tom) I spent much of the day helping Lance dismantle some of the solar panels so that we can transfer them up topside. Asuna helped out also. We will bring them up to the Archive tomorrow. I am thinking we have two days left here in camp and then it is off to our new digs.

  Matt and Tanya are going out for a ride tomorrow, going to see that Librarian Lady, Helen. I have no idea what they are thinking or why they are going, but that was the story I was given. I am thinking a week or two on horseback to have a dinner with an old friend seems a little extreme for me, but …..

  As we sat out tonight by the lake at dusk, it was just Asuna and I. It was so peaceful.

  “Asuna, what do you think, how about you and me stay here, live out our life by the lake.” I said. I am not sure if I was serious or just caught up in the moment.

  Silence for a few moments, I looked over and she was staring at me. “Might work for a little longer, but I am thinking that come December you might be changing your tune,” She replied.

  “I know, and you’re right, but right now, this is how I wish we could live.”

  I could make out the smile in the dimming light, “yeah, it would be nice, but really, it isn’t that easy.”

  “Well, if it can’t be, let us at least enjoy it now,” I answered.

  “Enjoy what?” said Mark as he walked up with Michelle, “you guys weren’t gonna be naughty were you? We can come back later.”

  “No, but if we were, you certainly played the buzzkill.” I laughed.

  We all sat out there, Lance and Delaney also wandered over. It was just a nice time, we talked about the future, but also relished the peace that we had at that moment.

  September 16th

  (Lance) Never got around to doing my journal yesterday, in fact was so busy today I almost skipped it again today. Tom, Asuna and Del helped me break down some of the solar panels yesterday and we loaded them up this morning and took them topside. We got them pretty much laid out were we were going to put them but then a storm rolled in this afternoon and we had to head inside.

  Last night was kind of cool; we all ended up out by the lake and just sat, talking. It led to some interesting discussion of where we will be a year from now, how can humanity recover, can it recover, and what the future will hold.

  When Del and I got back to our cabin, we talked a little more and have decided that come spring time we will start working on trying to build a family. I wanted to try earlier but Del pointed out that she did not want to be all pregnant during the summer, a little pregnant was okay, but a lot pregnant during the hot time of the year did not appeal to her.

  (Tom) Asuna and I helped Lance in the morning, but when the rain and thunder kicked in; we decided that it was time to hide inside. We spent the afternoon finishing up our room.

  It is kind of funny, funny peculiar, not funny haha, that the Archive sort of reminds us of the Sky Crystal. We have this corridor with rooms off it and as time has gone by, some of the rooms have developed a sort of personality of their own based upon the occupants. It was like the Crystal with the rooms, dioramas that were set up specifically for those ‘guests’ that the QUalz had taken aboard. But I guess the biggest difference is that the rooms are what the people inside of them projected as their image, or place rather than what they actually were. Am I making sense here?

  On the Crystal, Asuna’s room was the 4 year old’s Hello Kitty room as it was when she was taken. Now, her room, our room, is comfortable, contemporary, and southwestern in décor. Maybe it comes with age, I guess, maybe it matches who we are now.

  We headed back down to the camp for our last night there. I figure we should enjoy it. Even now I think that we may sneak away for future visits, kind of a getaway for a night. But we also have to think about Fort Knox and whether they will pull something on us. So for a little while we will be rabbits in our hole.

  (Matt) Tanya and I are leaving shortly, we want to be on the trail by about 10, so I am just doing a short entry here on the laptop because it will not be something I can keep charged on the road. I will have a little notebook to maintain my journal. Not sure how much I will write.

  We are off. Be safe everyone.

  (Margo) Matt and Tanya left this morning; Teckla gave them a ride down to the Oxbow Farm to get the horses. Even though his arms are still in casts, Lincoln tagged along with them. I guess he wanted to see what shape the farm was in after the attack. I bet it was hard on him considering his last time at the place. They did not get back until about 2 PM. He looked drained.

  Code and I took some time today to start scoping out the hunting areas that we might be able to use. We have to start all over finding where the deer trails and watering holes are. Being on the mountain we found a number of streams and a couple of places where there were little pools that would be likely for the animals to visit.

  The word is that the entire clan will be back together tomorrow, well except for Matt and Tanya. I think that will be a good thing.

  September 17th

  (Margo) I am thinking now that maybe it would have been a good idea if Code and I had gone along with Matt and Tanya. I actually enjoyed the trip out west to Cheyenne Mountain. Well, most of it, the Kit Carson thing was kind of nasty.

  We have our room set, and decorated; it is a simple design, Japanese like we h
ave seen in Animes. We have found some good hunting grounds and it would seem the new place is going to ultimately be comfortable and pretty much weather proof.

  The new Rec Room has a few things that we did not have in the old campground. There is a pool table and a ping pong table so we have some new activities we can work with. We will have to bring the overhead projection TV thing up so we can do movies on the wall.

  It is like a new camp in a lot of ways, except it is underground.

  (Tom) Well, we are in our new home. I think I said before that it was kind of like the rooms on the Sky Crystal, each a little different, most have a personality of their own, or at least the ones I have seen. And yet for the most part they are not as elaborate at the ones on the Crystal. There are some exotic themes, like Margo’s Asian anime or Asuna and my sort of southwestern desert. But Teckla, Mark, and some others are really kind of just meh.

  I guess it was a false alarm on Jan, she is not pregnant. And now that I think of it, it seems odd to me that we have not seen the start of a ‘baby boom’ with the end to the fear of being ‘Changed’.

  Fred and Jan built a little fire pit area on the grassy area on top of the underground. They had also brought up a load of the Adirondack chairs for us to sit in. Tonight we had our first fire out there.

  Tomorrow Lance is going to go get started on the solar array. He is hoping to have it up and running by the evening, or following day by noon at the latest.

  (Lance) Del and I are all moved in. It is kind of creepy with all the lights turned off if we leave the computer stuff on. It is still the original stuff that they had in the way of vacuum tubes and green monitors, kind of like stone knives and bear skins of the computer age.

  I got the array planned and the wiring set up so we will be good to begin hooking it up tomorrow, we should be done by the evening if all goes well. But in looking at the sky I am thinking we may see rain. What is the old saying, red sky at night, sailor’s delight? It isn’t a red sky.

  I was the last one inside tonight, closed the blast door.