The Dying of the Light: Interval (10 page)

Governor Gates looked thoughtful. “Dagger, are you closest?”

A new voice came on the line “Actually, we are, Madam Governor. This is Governor Simms, Bunker Ten. But we can’t do it.”

“Why not?”

“Bad weather, I’m afraid. It’s storm season here in the Carolinas, and the winds are blowing something fierce right now. We’re tracking a possible hurricane coming up the coast, so a rescue mission from us is out of the question. Hell, I wouldn’t want to have any of our birds in the air at all, much less going that far. And that’s just the weather. Last time we did a recon flight we nearly had one of our helos shot down by a SAM, of all things. Guess some of the militia are still around.”

Gates looked over at Kim and I. “Believe me, Governor, I know exactly what you mean. Well, Malcolm, do you think you can get someone out there to look into this?”

“I’ll work up a plan. I can’t promise that we’ll bring back anything useful, but we can at least take a look.”

“Good. What about Bunker Six? Anyone heard anything?” She turned to her aide, Daniel, who spoke up.

“No further word has come from Bunker Six, ma’am. The latest information we have is what our own Bravo team brought back from their recon mission a year ago. The bunker does appear to have been abandoned.”

I thought back to the shocking news we’d received back then. Everything had been fine, until suddenly it wasn’t. No word, no emergency message, no nothing. Just silence. When Bravo Team arrived, they found only walkers and an open bunker door. Some of the walkers had Bunker Six insignia on their uniforms.

Something awful had happened under Mount Whitney, and no one was left to tell the tale.

There was silence on the line as each of the bunkers on the call kept their thoughts to themselves, until the silence was broken by a click and a sudden cough.

“This is Chief of Staff Hughes. Please hold for the president.”

Shock was evident in the room as everyone looked up, thrust out of their doldrums by the surprise. I leaned over and whispered to Kim. “President? Since when?”

She shrugged and whispered back. “Maybe he just got tired of waiting?”

“This is President Marnes,” came the thin, reedy voice of the man I detested. Most people disliked him for his politics, but in my case, I simply thought he was the slimiest piece of human trash to crawl out of the gutter since… well, since Henry Gardner. Not in an evil way, just… well, like a used car salesman you just can’t shake. He’d been in the pocket of the Secretary of Defense and Gardner himself in the months leading up to Z-Day. “Is everyone present and accounted for?”

“Not exactly, Mr. President,” said Gates.

“Mr. President,” interrupted Dagger. “Please let me be the first to congratulate you on your presidency. It’s long been clear that this was a step that needed to be taken, and I for one am glad to see it happen.”

“Yes, well, uh… thank you, young man,” said the president. “Who might you be?”

“Malcolm Dagger, sir. Bunker Four.”

“Ah, yes, our neighbor! Glad to have you aboard, son. Always good to meet a new governor.”

I looked over at Kim, rolled my eyes, and mimed raising my feet off the floor, eliciting a chuckle she quickly turned into a cough as Gates glanced her way.
It’s getting deep in here
, I thought.

“Not a new governor, sir,” said Gates, trying to take control of the call back from the two. “Governor Yarborough is indisposed. And we have a pressing matter regarding Bunker Nine, sir.”

“Yes, yes, I’m sure that’s all very important. I have some bigger news, though. Effective immediately, control of operations of the AEGIS bunkers will pass to my staff here in Bunker Five, under an executive order.”

The noise was deafening, to the point that Gates dialed down the volume from her control at the end of the table. The only bunkers
not
adding to the noise were our own and Bunkers Seven and Eight. Eventually, someone at one of the other bunkers got tired of the yelling and started slamming something hard down onto the table, over and over like a gavel, until the noise finally died down.

Naturally, it was the president who took the initiative to continue. “As I said, the bunkers are now under the authority of my staff here at Bunker Five. You will each be contacted regarding new procedures—”

“Begging your pardon, Mr. President,” said a familiar voice, interrupting what were clearly carefully prepared remarks. Kim and I sat up straight and looked at each other, grinning like fools.

This is going to be good
, I thought.

“Begging your pardon, sir, but that’s got to be the worst idea I think I’ve ever heard come out of your mouth. Or the mouth of any president, for that matter. And that’s saying something.”

The president was clearly flustered. “Who the hell is this?”

“Brigadier General George Maxwell, sir.”

Not even the newly-appointed president could forget
that
name. “Well, General, I assume you have something to say, so say it. Although I’ll be having a chat with Governor Ridgely as soon as I can.”

“Governor Ridgely right here, sir. I’d listen to him, Mr. President.”

When there was no answer from the president, Maxwell continued, “Putting all operations from the AEGIS Bunkers under the control and planning of one man is insane, sir. Not only do your people not have the faintest clue about what we’re dealing with here in our bunker, or they’re dealing with in Bunker One, or
any
other bunker, for that matter, but you’ve also left out the simple fact that you can’t run a facility as large as these by remote. Things happen, decisions need to be made on a daily basis that can’t wait for approval from someone thousands of miles away, especially when a good strong storm can knock out communications for days.

“Have you ever seen what a
haboob
does to a communications tower, Mr. President? Do you even know what it is? It’s a sandstorm. It etches glass like acid, and we have to replace all manner of parts on our tower. Fortunately, we prepared for that and have the extras, but if we had to come to you to get approval to use them… well, that’s just stupid, Mr. President.”

“Are you quite through, General?”

“No, sir. Not by a long shot. But that’s OK. Speak your piece.”

It was all I could do to keep from laughing out loud.
God, I miss that man.
I noticed that Kim was more than a little red-faced with internal laughter, too. Hell, even Gates was cracking a smile.

“Very well, then. My orders stand. Any bunker refusing to comply will face reprisals—”

The laughter was clear, and this time Maxwell didn’t wait for the go-ahead. “Reprisals? How? Are you really that much of a fool, sir? What will you do from thousands of miles away? Do you see now how ridiculous this whole thing is?” He laughed once more, then calmed. “Anyway, the governor and I have things to do. Kim, are you there?”

Startled, Kim answered, “Uh, yes, sir. I’m here, sir.”

“Call Mary. She needs to talk to you about something.”

“Uh, yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

“Bunker Seven out.” There was a distinct click on the line, and we were left in stunned silence. For a moment, anyway.

“Get him back!” came the voice of the president, muted and distant. “I want that man back on this line, now!” Another click, and the president was gone.

“Perhaps we should proceed with the call as usual,” said Gates, turning to receive a stack of status reports from Daniel. “As to bunker resources—”

“Just a moment, Madam Governor,” interrupted Malcolm Dagger. “I’d like to bring up a point of discussion.”

Gates sighed. “Yes, Mr. Dagger, go ahead.”

“It seems to me that these quarterly calls are almost always the same thing. Bunker X used so much of this resource last quarter, Bunker Y used thus and so of that. But nothing of substance, nothing with any point. What does it matter if you used a hundred widgets and we used ninety-nine? None of us can supply the others with anything, not even basic staples. Just look at your own situation, for example. Under attack all the time and all that we can do here is sit and listen.”

“It’s important to keep us tied together, Mr. Dagger, for—”

“For psychological reasons, I know. I’ve heard the training videos too, Governor. I think it’s crap. We’ve got ten thousand people here, more or less, and we’ve got all the ‘tying together’ that we need, thank you very much.”

I leaned over to Kim. “More or less?” I whispered. She shook her head, her lips compressed into a thin line. She was clearly not happy.

Dagger went on, “No, I think for the future we’ll be getting in touch only when there’s a good reason. I’m sure we all have better things to do than sit in a multi-day conference call every quarter.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” said one of the other governors.
Stimmons, I think. Bunker Three
.

Bolstered by the slight vote of confidence, Dagger continued. “I’ve already spoken with Governor Yarborough about this, and he agrees. Bunker Four moves to cease regularly scheduled calls, and to contact only when there is significant news of which the other bunkers need to be informed. Do I hear a second?”

“Bunker Three seconds the motion.”

“Bunker Two agrees as well.”

“And Bunker Ten. We’ve got too much to deal with here, Angela, I’m sorry.”

“The motion carries,” said Dagger. “Further ongoing communications will occur only when necessary. Best of luck to you all. Bunker Four, out.”

“Bunker Three, out.”

“Bunker Two, out.”

“Bunker Ten, out.”

Gates sighed, and the rest of us sat there stunned at what had just happened. “You still with us, Roger?” asked Gates.

Roger Tate, governor of Bunker Eight, answered. “You bet, Angela. Frank and I aren’t going anywhere. And you can bet once George and Mary hear of this, they’ll be with us, too.”

“Good. At least there’s that.”

“As I was saying before being so rudely interrupted,” said President Marnes, coming back on the call. “We’ll be looking at the way—”

“Sorry to interrupt you yet again, Mr. President,” said Gates. “But most of the other bunkers have signed off.”

“Signed off? What do you mean, signed off?”

“I mean your buddy Malcolm Dagger riled up the troops and split us all up. Bunkers Two, Three, Four, and Ten are now completely independent and won’t be calling in regularly. They say they only want to talk ‘when it’s absolutely necessary.’ And for the record, Mr. President, Bunkers One, Seven, and Eight categorically refuse to turn over our day-to-day operations to your staff. I suggest you come up with another plan. Good day, Mr. President. Bunker One, out.”

I would gleefully murder the man who installed that
, I thought as the base alarm went off in our quarters for what felt like the umpteenth time in the last three days. It was surely yet another drill. I pulled the pillow over my head as Kim switched on the lights.

“Out of that rack, soldier!” Kim yelled good-naturedly as I groaned, doing a passable imitation of a walker.

“I. Am. Not. A. Soldier,” I said. “I’m a contractor.”

She pulled the pillow away and tossed it on the end of the bed. “No such thing, anymore!”

Grumbling, I got dressed and noticed the time: 3 a.m. “Fine. But you’re making the coffee this time.”

When she didn’t respond, I glanced over, and saw her face. Few things in this life have the power to take me from nearly asleep to wide awake in a heartbeat, but the look she had then was one of them.

“What do you need?” I asked, but she didn’t hear me.

“Understood,” she said to her Bluetooth. “Get both teams to station. Yes, both!”

Knowing it couldn’t be good news, I was ready to head out the door in a few moments, having grabbed everything we would both need for an extended stay in Operations, including the coffee.
Especially
the coffee.

“Roger, we’re on our way,” she said. “David, it’s not a drill. Let’s…” Finding me ready to go, she nodded, grabbing her pack.

“Kim, guess what? It’s 3 a.m.,” I said, as we left our quarters, headed for the lifts as usual.

“And? David, it’s too early. Don’t make me play guessing games.”

“Sorry, I just meant that it’s dark outside. We have the advantage. What if we turn off all the lights and use night-vision?”

She brightened, realizing what I meant. “Damn, you’re right!” She touched her Bluetooth again, opening the connection to Operations. “Ops, get all the lights off at the main gate. Switch the sentry guns to infrared. Yeah, anything hot that’s child-sized or bigger. And order both teams to bring night-vision.”

Moments later, as we approached the main hall of our level, we were joined by the rest of my own Alpha Squad as well as Bravo Squad, led by Captain Angelo Martinez. Glancing over my troops, I noticed without surprise that each of them were in fine order. Nothing out of place. I felt justified pride as we hit the big main lift, the rest of the main-level assignees filing in behind us.

I squeezed Kim’s hand and stepped off the lift with the rest of Alpha and Bravo squads as Kim continued up to Operations. I looked over at Gunnery Sergeant Dalton Gaines. “Gunny, I want you up in the tower again. Take Barrents with you. Angelo, I want the rest of Bravo over the main gate. Alpha will be on the ground. This is not a drill, fellas. Any questions?”

As I expected, there were none. “Good. Move out.” Barrents and Gaines moved off toward the observation tower elevator with their heavy .50-caliber sniper rifles, and Bravo left for the main gate.

I looked at the rest of my men, all of whom wore grim expressions, no doubt reflecting my own. “Let’s go, fellas.” I reached up and brought my Night-Vision Device, or NVD, into place, watching as the others did the same. Mounted on our helmets, these variants of binoculars could be raised or lowered in front of the wearer’s eyes as needed.

We exited through the man-sized door built into the volcanic rock of the mountain, taking up positions behind the fortifications that stood well back from the main gate. With our nightvision, we had a clear view of the road leading up to the gate, and the three hundred yards between, which was mostly minefield except for the road. Not only would these guys have to get through the cement-and-steel barricades that had seen significant use over the past few years, and the electrified fence,
and
the sentry guns, but then they had the mines and snipers to deal with as well. And all of it in the dark.