Looking back under the trees, they could see a dilapidated cyclone fence, with rusted and unreadable signs hanging every ten yards or so on it. Some lay on the ground where they had fallen off. The Land Rover drove leftward along the tree line for a few seconds, then abruptly veered right, onto a barely-visible remnant of a concrete road. Thirty yards in, they came upon a still-standing steel-poled gate. The sign on this barrier was newer, and contained official warning phrases: “Restricted Area” and “Use of Deadly Force Authorized.”
Zeke hopped out, unlocked the new, heavy padlock on the chain that held it shut, then drove through. He must have been here before. Maybe the lock was his. They paused to let Spooky lock it up again.
There was some chatter over the net, but Zeke kept his mouth shut, probably enjoying the sense of mystery he had created. Daniel was curious, but then, he liked a mystery when nobody was trying to kill him because of it. He just kept his eyes open and tried to figure it out on his own.
They drove up the road, two hundred more yards of still-serviceable but overgrown concrete, until they came to an enormous set of double doors in the mountainside, hidden by trees that had grown up. The opening would be big enough to drive a five-ton military truck straight in if the doors were thrown back. Daniel figured Zeke wouldn’t have led them up here if he didn’t know how to get in.
The doors had a large wheel mechanism, like a ship’s pressure hatch, holding them shut, and a big handle next to a hooded boxy metal fitting. It looked like it would take two men to move the wheel, if it would turn at all in its current state of disrepair. Apparently someone had slapped a coat of paint on the door and mechanism a few years back and there was another of the steel warning signs bolted to the front.
When everyone had dismounted from the trucks in front of the doors, in the twilight under the trees, Zeke called out in a loud announcer’s voice, “Welcome to the Bunker: code name Sosthenes.”
-16-
Zeke sprayed some lubricant into the mechanism of the door, stuck a big odd key into a hole in the hooded box fitting, and then cranked the handle to the left like on a combination safe. It took two of them to turn the hatch wheel, and three of them to get it closed again from the inside. It was well-made, but it was old. There were manufacturing plates fastened to the inside of the door that said “US Army Corps of Engineers” and “1943” on them.
They drove their little convoy into an unlit tunnel, bored into the mountain at a shallow downward angle. The headlights showed hastily cut living rock, the seams and veins visible as the tunnel descended through layers and lodes. There was crude and deteriorating bracing of riveted steel girders, and the whole thing was faced with rusting steel mesh. This kept most of the rocks out, but there was one part where they had to get out and manhandle some small boulders and rock fall where it had broken through into the open space of the tunnel. This place hadn’t seen any maintenance in a while.
About a quarter mile down there was another huge double door, with a smaller, man-sized one inset into one side. They opened these too, with less difficulty since it hadn’t been exposed to the elements at all. They drove through, into a vast open space the size of an indoor sports stadium, perhaps two hundred yards across and a hundred high. Huge girders braced the roof, and more steel mesh. There were only a few rock falls that had broken through, along with a trickle of water that was forming limestone riffles and tiny stalactites along the rising, sloping wall-ceiling.
Rows of vehicles stood covered in dull green canvas tarpaulins – five-ton and deuce-and-a-half trucks, vintage jeeps, and construction vehicles, things Daniel didn’t recognize that could be some kind of mining and cutting equipment. He saw a row of dusty glass windows along one side, and several doors. Two truck-sized tunnel openings led even deeper.
They got out and turned off the vehicles, but left the truck lights on. Ten people shuffled around the four modern vehicles in the eerie silence, punctuated by dripping water and the sound of engines cooling.
“Cold in here.” Elise rubbed her arms, then pulled someone’s jacket out from behind a seat and put it on.
Daniel suppressed a flash of jealousy as he saw it wasn’t his. He should have thought of that. She had nothing but the clothes she was wearing. He resolved to fix that situation. He resolved to give her whatever she needed.
“What is this place?” asked Roger, peering nearsightedly around through his thick glasses. It appeared the question was somewhat rhetorical, for he started to answer it himself. “Some kind of government bunker, built back in World War Two…but that backhoe is a 1950s model.”
“Right,” answered Zeke. “The Sosthenes bunker was commissioned in 1940 during the Battle of Britain, when they thought there would eventually be a chance of air raids on the East Coast by the Third Reich. The Germans had some super-bombers in development that never panned out. Then as that threat waned, the US kept building because of the possibility of the Nazis getting the A-bomb – and because they’d already paid for it. Never underestimate the inertia of a government contract and jobs in a Senator’s home state. It was to be a place for continuity of governance, where the President, Congress and the Supreme Court could maintain function. It was kept active into the cold war, through the changeover to the better known Greenbrier bunker, code named ‘Greek Island,’ in 1961.”
Arthur crossed his arms. “There is no way this kind of construction could withstand a nuclear attack. The whole thing would probably collapse. Glass in the windows? Pathetic!”
Zeke responded, “They had no idea until the first test how powerful an atomic blast would be. It even surprised the scientists working on it. That’s why they built the Greenbrier bunker, after they knew what it would take. Remember, we were stretched to the limit in the Big One. Once it ended, we breathed a big sigh of relief – for about four years. The Soviet Union detonated its first atomic bomb in 1949 and immediately started to turn the screws with the Berlin blockade. So the US geared up for the Cold War. The government initiated Project Greek Island in the 1950s and once they had that super-bunker, this place got mothballed. Fortunately for us, over the next fifty or sixty years, it got forgotten about too.”
“How do you know they won’t dig up the information on its existence, pardon the pun?” Elise asked.
“Because I searched every database I could access and deleted all references to it. I buried the only hardcopy file I could find in the basement of the Pentagon, and I took the keys out. It’s in the wrong box on the wrong shelf in the wrong vault, in a section that has already been digitized. But the Sosthenes file never was digitized. It was intended to be secret. So barring incredible luck or a tipped-off search taking thousands of man-hours, no one knows about this.”
“Except that mining official.”
“Sure, but all he knows is he ran into some unknown government property bounded by a fence. He never got in. Once I took a look I knew I couldn’t let anyone in on this. I told him it was hazardous waste storage, and if their mining operations got too close they could release toxic materials. And…I kinda let slip something about nerve gas and national security.”
Several of them chuckled. Elise said, “So he thought you were giving him a cover story and it was really old chemical weapons.”
“Yup,” Zeke replied. “So unless all hell breaks loose and the government actually comes out into the open to find us, enlists the public, it’s very unlikely anyone will connect the dots. If they do…at least we have our Alamo.”
“They all died at the Alamo, boss,” muttered Larry.
“Okay, bad metaphor. It’s our Cheyenne Mountain, how’s that.”
“That’s good, that’s an Air Force Base,” Daniel chimed in.