“I don’t know, Greg. Come to that, I don’t really care. Listen.” She touched my arm. “I don’t think we should be doing this.”
“You think I’m being goddam nosy?”
“Yes. Phoenix has invited us to bring the rest of our people here. Don’t louse it up for Zak and the others.”
“But there’s something he’s not telling us.”
“Such as?”
“Didn’t you think that sudden invitation to Phoenix’s house party seemed convenient?”
“You saw what I did on TV. The military have launched an offensive against the hornets.”
“I know. I’m as pleased as the next man.”
“But?”
“I don’t know, Michaela. I just don’t know…” I murmured the words as I ran my hands over the twin doors marked COMM-ROUTE. These were more solid than the doors to the sick bay and boardroom. What’s more, a lip of steel ran ’round the doorway to seal them tight. They made me think of bulkhead doors in a submarine. I ran my fingers ’round the edge of the doorway. “Rubber seals,” I said. “It’s meant to be air-tight. But look at this at the bottom.” I crumbled a piece of rubber between my finger and thumb. “It’s rotted.”
Meanwhile Michaela looked ’round, as if she expected a voice to boom out, ordering us to return to our rooms.
“Hell,” I said, “this stuff is coming away by the yard.” A length of rubber looking like black spaghetti came away in my hand.
“Greg, leave it, please. They’ll go ape if they think you’re wrecking the place.”
“It’s rotted to crud.”
“Greg, I’m going back to my room. You do the same… please.”
“Michaela-”
“I don’t know what you’re expecting to find, apart from a whole heap of trouble. But we’ve got a chance to bring our people into a place of safety. Don’t you understand what that means? They can eat and sleep and take it easy just like we have. Listen, Greg, Phoenix is giving us a chance to live normal lives again. We can’t just… Greg, what’s wrong?”
I squatted by the door. Another strip of rubber seal came away. Wet and cold. Condensation had been working on the rubber for years. The rubber lay limp as a dead snake in my hand. The moment it fell from between the door and the steel frame I felt a jet of air play against my lips and nose. Cold as ice, it carried the smell of damp, confined spaces. When you lever back the slab of a tomb it must feel and smell like this. Faint toadstool odors. Moss. Damp. Decay. Chilled air that sends a shiver down your spine and fills your head with images of shriveled eyes and long-dead bones.
“Greg? You don’t look well.” She sounded anxious. “What’s wrong?”
The jet of air struck my face… something liquid about it.. . a sense of poisons floating there…
“Greg, are you-Greg, don’t!”
I slammed against the door. My fist punched at the steel. I punched again. My skin ripped across the knuckle, sending blood streaming across gray paint-work, smearing COMM-ROUTE.
I snarled through gritted teeth, “They’re in there… they’re in there!”
“Hornets?”
I nodded, my muscles snapping so tight in my stomach and back that I wanted to roar with pain. “Comm-Route… it means Communicating Route, doesn’t it?” I pushed myself back from the door to stop myself trying to tear it down with my bare hands. “That’s the tunnel link between this annex and the main bunker.”
“Easy, Greg…”
I clenched my fists as my stomach muscles spasmed like they were trying to rip out through my skin. “They’re in there. They’re inside. ..”
“That can’t be right. We’ve talked to Phoenix. We’ve seen the bunker crew. This place is secure; it’s like a fortress; hornets can’t be-”
I backed away from the door, shaking my head, perspiration running down my face, my heart pounding. “They’re here…” My voice came in a rasp. “They’re here… I don’t know how… but they’re here. ..”
Her eyes were frightened, huge-looking. “Greg, come away from the doors… no, right away.” She pulled me back. “Let me see your hand; you’ve cut it.”
“No. I’m going to find out what’s happening here.”
I yanked the sheet of paper from my pocket. Scanning it, I compared the words on the doors to the numbers I’d copied down. “Sick Bay. Boardroom… they don’t seem important. What’s this one?” I looked at a steel door. “Quartermaster store. There should be fire-arms in there.”
“I’ll feel more confident with a gun in my hand.”
Michaela suddenly became businesslike. “Tell me the code.”
“Four-seven-nine-nine.”
“Got it.” She tapped the number into the keypad. The electronic lock buzzed, then clicked. Michaela pushed the door. It opened easily. A light flickered on inside. “Oh, hell.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Empty. Someone cleaned it out.”
I glanced into the storeroom. Bare shelves. Empty racks that must have once held rifles. “There were guns here,” I said. “But Phoenix’s people didn’t want guests helping themselves. Try the next one.” To do this I had to pass the big double doors with my blood smeared across COMM-ROUTE. Instantly the Twitch came back to me. God, yes, those sons of bitches were in there. But how did you get through those twin doors? No keypad, so no electronic lock. No handles. It must be locked from the other side.
“Greg… Greg? Are you sure you want to do this?”
I looked at Michaela, my stomach muscles jumping.
“Greg, you don’t look well.”
You look crazy. That’s what she wanted to say. I knew my nostrils were flared. I was panting. My eyes would be blazing like the fires of hell. But then, this was a bad one. I could believe there were a thousand hornets lined up there, waiting to burst in and pound us to bloody hamburger meat.
I took a deep breath to try to steady my racing heart, but, hell, nothing would stop the muscles in my stomach writhing like a bunch of snakes. “There’s nothing written against the next numbers,” I said. Jesus, I felt surprised at how calm I sounded. “Try all of them.”
“OK. First one.”
“Six-seven-three-one.”
She tapped the number into the keypad beside the door marked BACKUP OPS. She waited for a moment. No buzz. No click.
“Next,” she said.
“Four-four-one-one.”
She punched in the code. Nothing.
“OK. Next.”
“Eight-seven-three-o.”
Buzz. Click.
“Bull’s-eye, we’re in.” She pushed open the door. Inside, the room had the feel of a dark cavern.
“Take it easy,” I said. “I don’t know if we’ve got company in here.” I leaned in, feeling the inside wall for a light switch. My fingers located a plastic pad. I pushed it. Instantly, fluorescence came with a fluttering brilliance. “Looks as if we’ve struck the jackpot.”
Michaela stepped in, her eyes wide with awe. “Just look at this place. Look at all the equipment! It’s like a TV newsroom.”
Good description. The room was maybe thirty-by-forty feet. In two rows, one behind the other, were workstations complete with keyboards and monitors, while filling just about the entire end wall was a vast booster screen. At the side of it were a bank of electronic clocks.
I glanced at my watch. “They’re showing the time coast to coast.”
“This must be the backup command center in case the one in the main bunker gets knocked out.”
“If this is a duplicate of what’s in the main building, then we could do all the stuff that Phoenix does, accessing other bunkers.”
“I guess.” Now thoughtful, she ran her fingers along the desktop, drawing furrows in the dust. “If we knew how to work it.”
“Try.”
“Greg? I don’t know where to begin.”
“You had a computer at home, didn’t you? You used one at college?”
“Sure, but-”
“Then the principle must be the same.” I pressed a button on one of the computer terminals. Nothing happened. “Huh. Maybe there’s some central control you need to switch on first. A circuit breaker or-”