by Howard, Bob
At sunrise they were climbing down the ladder to a tarmac that was covered in white. There were no blemishes in the snow, and Sim was quick to point it out to Anne and Addison. The rats had done them a favor, and now the rats were gone.
They could only tell it was sunrise by virtue of the fact that it wasn’t as dark outside as it had been. As they went by the security office, Jon went inside and made sure the third switch was in the up position. Hopefully, it meant there was power to the door in the hangar. They had moved to the roof, closing doors behind them one last time. Then they had sat cold and quiet on the roof and waited.
The walk to the hangar had their hearts pounding. Other than the day they had run around lighting heads on fire, they had spent most of the last two years in the airport.
It was so cold that they could see and hear themselves breathing. Garrett couldn’t resist.
“Did anybody else see that Tom Hanks movie where he was from a foreign country, so he had to stay in the airport until some bureaucratic red tape was straightened out? I think he had to live in the airport for several…weeks.”
He hooked everyone with the long pause between the last two words, and they all visibly relaxed a bit as they choked back the laughing. Rather than winding them up tighter, they just became more alert when he told everyone to keep their eyes open. The big tail of Air Force One was reaching out above them, and they were just about to walk into the gloom of the hangar.
Sim moved faster and got up to the front of the group. After all this time, he had to take a few minutes to see the place where he had spent the night. He reached the big rear landing gear with hardly a glance to his left or right, but this time there was nothing inside that he would have seen. He increased his speed and practically jumped onto the nose gear. He climbed up into the wheel well and clicked on his flashlight. He just wanted to be sure that he hadn’t missed something on that night.
The seams around the door that would have allowed him to reach the cockpit were sealed tight. Being afraid hadn’t made him miss anything. He dropped back onto the wheel and joined his friends who were standing in a circle around a section of the hangar floor.
Mike and Jon were busy tossing ropes over the wing and securing them to the wheel under the wing. Mike made rope climbing seem easy in the airport, so he was the logical choice to climb to the top of the plane and walk up to the cockpit. There was just enough light for them to see the cord that hung from the roof of the hangar down to the windshield over the pilot’s seat.
He yelled down, “I found the tennis ball hanging from the garage ceiling. It must have come down when we turned on the light switch back in the security office.”
When Mike climbed out to the cord, he reached out to inspect it. There was a row of labeled buttons on a black, flat panel.
“No wonder it was hard to see in the dark,” he said out loud.
He pulled a pad out of his pocket, drew a picture of the panel, and tossed it down to the others. Anne picked it up and handed it to Garrett.
They were gathered around Garrett when Jon sensed more than heard something behind them. He spun around and found himself face to face with the destroyed features of an infected dead.
The smell of the thing was overpowering, and Jon had a brief thought that it had to be his imagination or he would have smelled it coming.
Jon fell over backwards and landed hard, but just as he was ready for the infected to fall on top of him, the foul smelling creature changed direction.
From the left knee down, its leg had collapsed toward the right leg at an unnatural angle. Susan was slightly behind it with her arm raised to come back in the other direction. When it came down, the hammer in her hand hit the side of the thing’s head and sank in over an inch.
Garrett didn’t have to say much, but he said it anyway.
“Let’s not make that mistake again. I’ll help Mike get this thing open. Everyone else face outward and keep your flashlights on.”
When the lights clicked on, their beams reached far enough for them to see that the rest of the hangar was empty, but their nerves were already so jangled that they left the lights on.
Garrett studied the pad that Mike had tossed down. He saw that Mike had numbered the labels, so he stood in a flashlight beam and held up one finger. He saw Mike lift up the panel and press a button.
There was only a faint vibration under his feet, but Garrett felt it. Judging by the reactions of the others, they were all feeling movement around their feet, too. They moved outward away from the edges of the rectangle on the floor.
It wasn’t obvious until they swung their flashlights down toward the seams. The floor appeared to be growing at first, but it was just an illusion. It was, however, rising upward.
On an impulse, Garrett stepped over to the side of the rectangle that faced Air Force One. It was nothing more than a big black box in the dim light of the hangar, but anyone would recognize an elevator door when they saw one.
It came to a stop at floor level, and Garrett saw there was a large lever type handle on the door rather than an up or down button beside it. He reached out and pushed the lever to the left, and the door opened. He couldn’t have been more surprised when a light came on inside.
He held the door open with his left hand out of habit, but he wasn’t about to let that door close. He stuck his head inside and saw there were buttons that matched the dark panel Mike had reached above the cockpit. He motioned for Mike to come down from his perch on the plane. He didn’t have to clarify his message because Mike was running along the fuselage of the plane so fast that Garrett was afraid he would fall and break his neck.
Everyone else only needed the smile on Garrett’s face to know it was time to find out what was at the bottom of the rabbit hole. They all hurried around and went inside. When Mike swung down from the wing and ran for the door, they teased him about taking so long, and said they were full.
Once they were all inside and ready, Garrett shut the door and pressed a button that said they were going down to a subway.
******
It didn’t take long to decide to leave the helicopter pilots behind. Whatever happened inside that hotel, they couldn’t afford to lose their pilots. The six men were reluctant to go back to the helicopters, but Captain Miller felt like it was a better choice. That still left a sizable force of soldiers plus our group. We had left Charleston with thirty-six soldiers, not counting the Captain or the pilots. We didn’t want to leave Fort Sumter undermanned if they were attacked while we were gone. Four had stayed behind at Guntersville, but seeing thirty-two soldiers covering our civilian group, we felt like we would be able to handle whatever we were walking into.
The hotel entrance was a mangled wreck where there was evidence of the massive explosion, so we began circling around it to the side entrance that faced a tall skyscraper across Nationwide Blvd. It would be locked, but it wouldn’t be a problem.
The Mud Island group was mixed in with the trained military, and I had the feeling that they had been given orders to keep us alive. We had gained a lot of experience since the first days of the infection, but so had they. That experience added to their military training made me glad they were on our side.
We hugged the front of the huge hotel all the way to the corner and then waited up against the wall while a small group rounded the corner to make short work of the door. When they signaled that we were in, we moved quickly to the corner in single file. The cold wind was like a slap across the face when we stepped around the corner toward the door, but it could have been worse. At least a soldier was holding open the door to block some of the wind.
To get everyone inside fast, we formed two columns on the left and right sides of the hall. I was back toward the middle, so I saw the soldiers switching from M4’s to handguns. Our group chose machetes for close combat. As far as I could tell, there were about twenty of us on each side of a long hallway, so we were strung out with a few handicap accessible rooms along each side. The doors wer
e all shut, so they were being bypassed in favor of a bigger prize.
The Chief was at the front of our column across from Captain Miller, and he whispered in a low voice that we had to find the basement. Elevators weren’t an option, so we needed to find the stairs that went down to a sub level. Word was passed down the line for someone to check the emergency exit stairs that were located near the door we had entered, and a small group of soldiers quietly disappeared through the door.
They returned in five minutes with the message that they had checked upward five floors, and it was all clear. When they went down to a sub level they found at least a dozen of the infected packed into the narrow landing in front of a door that had a small red and white sign on it indicating it was for staff only.
The Chief motioned for Cassandra, Hampton, and Colleen to go to the lower floor to assess the situation. Besides Kathy, they were the most proficient in close quarters with machetes.
Even though they were only told to assess the situation, they saw that their advantage of being on higher steps gave them the reach they needed to be able to do more than assess.
“We’ve got this,” said Cassandra.
She stepped a little closer to the crowd squeezed together on the small landing and swung downward at an infected that was reaching for her. Her swing removed its arm and caused it to fall forward on the stairs at the same time, exposing it to her second strike on the top of its head.
Hampton and Colleen moved downward with Cassandra. They were too close together on the stairs to swing across, so they used the same tactic as Cassandra. Overhand swings straight down to remove arms and follow-up blows to the heads.
It was easy at first, but as the steps became choked with the bodies of the infected, they had to wait for the next ones to climb upward first.
Hampton was grateful for the thick layer of duct tape he had wrapped around his legs when he felt the sharp pain from the pressure of a bite. Despite being dead, the infected seemed to have retained the strength in their jaws to at least inflict pain, even if their teeth didn’t penetrate the skin. The culprit that had gotten him was one of the dead he thought he had eliminated, so he started making sure it wouldn’t happen again.
They had to step on the backs of the infected to reach the last of them, but there were no more close calls. Colleen checked the bite carefully to be sure it didn’t break through the tape and was satisfied that he was okay.
They helped each other move the bodies from the stairs and from the landing in front of the service door, then Cassandra eased the door open just enough to see through. It was just another dark hallway with the exception that the doors closest to them had the red and white signs on them to identify specific services.
“Let’s check in,” said Hampton. “We need a lot of light down here.”
Fifteen minutes later our squad of soldiers and civilians were ready to move into the sub level. The Chief had explained to Captain Miller that the emergency exit wasn’t supposed to be something that could be accessed by everyone on the hotel staff, so it would probably be locked. As a matter of fact, it had to be hidden well enough for hotel management to not even know about it.
“The survival group that built these shelters were eccentric, so we need to find a sign that seems out of place. Once we find the room, the door itself will be hidden. Bus said I would know the door when I saw it. He said it was supposed to have something to do with Uncle Titus.”
The squad moved into the dark hallway and took up positions along the walls. The soldiers had night vision gear, but the Chief had suggested they stick to flashlights. The Mud Island group wouldn’t be able to do anything but follow the soldiers in the pitch black hall, and the clue might not be obvious in the green glow of the night vision gear.
It turned out to be a good thing because they might have missed their first clue. Every small rectangular sign on every door was red with white letters embossed into them except one. It was white with red letters that said Reserve Under Structure Housing.
“What in the world is that supposed to be?” asked Captain Miller.
“Nothing anyone would think is their responsibility,” I said, “but the first letter of each word spells my uncle’s last name.”
The Captain gave a nod to the soldier on point, and he tested the handle. The door was locked, but it was the same style lock as all of the doors.
The Chief was right on it, and he passed word down the line to Tom who was at the back of the squad. Tom ducked back into the stairwell with Hampton. Jean and Colleen held flashlights on the bodies while Tom and Hampton went through the pockets of the ones who were dressed like hotel employees. It was only a minute or two before they found master keys and passed them up to the front of the line.
The Chief slid one into the lock, and they were rewarded by the click as the door unlocked.
Inside was an unremarkable room with several large pieces of machinery that were designed for no purpose other than to confuse anyone who didn’t know what the room really was. The machinery had meters attached that measured everything from PSI to humidity. The important thing was that each machine had the word RUSH stenciled on it.
In the darkness we fanned out to find the door, and the Chief reminded us to count on Titus Rush and his sense of humor.
“I found it,” said Captain Miller only a minute later.
He pointed at a half door on the end of the machinery. It was round, just like the escape hatches inside Mud Island.
“How do you know it’s an emergency exit that comes up from the shelter?” I asked as I walked over to his side.
Stenciled on the door was EXIT ONLY, but there was no visible handle.
“I don’t see a keypad for entering the combination,” said Jean. “There must be some other way of opening this door.”
Everyone spread out again, but this time we were searching for the combination dial like we had seen at the other shelters.
“Everyone keep in mind what we were saying earlier about Titus Rush having a sense of humor,” said the Chief. “It can’t be as easy as finding the door.”
Colleen said, “This reminds me of one of those places where you go with a group of family members or friends. They put you all together in one room, lock the doors, and you’re supposed to use clues hidden in the room to find a way to get out.”
“Sounds like a good way for families and friends to get mad at each other,” said Kathy. “Put a bunch of cops in a room with clues hanging on the cork boards, and watch how fast an argument starts. Someone makes a suggestion, someone calls them stupid, and the next thing you know everyone is bringing up family trees.”
“So you’re saying if I make a stupid suggestion about where the combination lock is then someone will get personal?” asked Colleen.
“Not me,” said Kathy, “but toss in something to increase the pressure a bit, and people could get testy with each other.”
“As I recall, there was a time limit, and you had to pay to do it, so people wouldn’t be happy if they paid to be in there, and then someone made a stupid suggestion.”
“I don’t understand something,” I said. “What if someone figured out the clues immediately? Wouldn’t people feel like they didn’t get their money’s worth?”
“Maybe,” said Captain Miller, “but this is one puzzle I’d like to solve fast rather than slow.”
Cassandra was standing in front of the machinery with RUSH stenciled on it.
“Anyone notice these big things are white with red letters on them? Just like the sign on the door.”
“Here’s where the family gets into a fight,” said Tom.
Cassandra didn’t take the bait and ran her hands over the sides of the big metal wall of the machinery.
“This thing has gauges, but what does it do? Chief, how many sets of numbers are in your combination?”
The Chief could hear it in her voice. She was onto something, and we all moved over to where she was touching the meters.
“C
heck this out,” she said. “One gauge says Pounds per Square Inch, but the next gauge says Decibels, and the next one says Temperature. One has nothing to do with the other two.”
The Chief was shining his light into the first gauge, and he could read the numbers going around in a circle. He reached up and pulled the top cover right off of the gauge and turned the needle easily with his finger to three, the first number in the combination. He put the lid back on the gauge just like the cap on a medicine bottle.
Cassandra already had the second lid off of the gauge that said decibels.
“How did you know it was three?” asked Cassandra.
“I have a cheat-sheet from Bus, but if you were following the clues, the band named RUSH had a hit in 1981. The album reached number three on the charts, and judging by the scale on the gauge your decibel range should be set to forty-four. A song on the album named Tom Sawyer reached number forty-four on the singles chart.”
“Wait a minute,” said Jean. “You have to be a trivia expert to figure this out?”
“It’s not supposed to be easy,” said the Chief, “but think about the year. Titus Rush and his prepper friends started these shelters in 1969. It took them over ten years to build them, so the combinations were probably one of the last details. The clue is written right there on the wall in front of you. RUSH. The band must have been big with them since they had his name.”
“I think he might have known them personally,” I said.
That got a slight chuckle out of everyone, but Captain Miller pointed out politely that they were in a dark room and his men were stretched out in a dark hallway.
“Okay, the first gauge had numbers one through ten, so I set it on three. The second gauge has numbers one through fifty, so I set it on forty-four. The temperature gauge goes how high?
“All the way to two-thousand,” said Cassandra. “She stuck a finger inside and turned the needle until it reached 1981.”
As she put the cap back on the gauge, we all saw the needles spinning at the same time, and to our left there was the unmistakeable sound of moving machinery. Somewhere gears were turning, being driven by an unseen power supply.
