The Secret Bunker Trilogy: Part One: Darkness Falls (20 page)

The terraforming process is a slow one, these environmental ailments
cannot be cured instantly.
It will take fourteen days for Genesis 2 to breathe new life into the
planet.
It’s said that it took God
seven
days to create the earth.
Such a work of art is not so easily recreated.
First all life forms will be put to sleep.

This regeneration will take place around them and unknown to them.
The darkness that surrounds the earth will provide everything that
the planet will need to survive.

Over the next fourteen days and nights, that black, impenetrable
blanket will change colour and begin to lighten as the complex
atmospheric, chemical, geological and biological transformations take
place.

Even God would be in awe of this process and might be forgiven for
questioning how Man had become so advanced that he was capable of
mimicking the power of The Creator.

The terraforming process is a complex one, and it can be used to
breathe new life into extinguished planets or light the flame of first life
in dead planets.

It can also be used for destructive and selfish outcomes.
When God used those powers to create the Earth it was for benevolent
purposes, to give Man the opportunity to live in His beautiful garden.
Imagine then if those powers were used for evil and how much harm
could be unleashed across the surface of the planet.

It
was
Nat that I’d seen with Mum!
Now I am certain.
I don’t know what to think or feel. We’d grieved for Nat for three years, I’d missed her every single day
since then.
And yet there she was, right in front of me.
In the middle of whatever is going on in this bunker.
I feel incredibly level-headed considering what’s just happened, and I
know that Nat and I
must
be reunited as soon as possible.
The fact that she’s alive has to be connected with the amazing
technology in this place,
we
must be caught up in all this in some way.

But how?
Nat seems to be able to move around this place just like I can.
And if
she’s
inside the bunker now, Mum must be here somewhere too. I’ve got to figure out how to get her back from wherever this device
took her.
And I
hope
she’s trying to figure out how to get back to me, she had
just enough time to see me.
I hope she recognised me.
Since she disappeared moments ago, I’ve lost that feeling of
‘connection’ again.
It’s already dawned on me that this must be hooked into Nat, it
must
be a ‘twin thing’.
Useful though, because I seem to be able to sense when she’s around.

I must have been picking up on her ever since she managed to get
through the bunker doors, if she’s definitely below ground now, that
timing seems about right. At that moment, an announcement and alert sounds through the
transportation area and the corridors outside.
It is 8 o’clock, the time of the mission briefing.
I curse what’s just happened with Nat and the fact that I’ve got caught
here, on Level 4, at the time of the briefing.

I need to run by the second Control Room on the floor above, I left my
phone on the workstation there and I want to ask Kate how I can
charge it. I want to see the end of Dad’s video too, it might tell me how I can
reconnect with Nat.

I rush back to the lift, and return to the 3rd level.
The announcement that the briefing is about to begin is sounding
throughout both of these lower levels, which nobody else so far seems
able to access. They must all be connected in some way if they share the same
announcement system.
I head back to the Level 3 Operations Centre and make straight for
Doctor Pierce’s console.
I pick up my phone and it lights up as my hand touches the screen.
I check the battery life as it should be dead.
It’s fully charged now.
How did that happen?

It’s like this place has wireless electricity.
That would explain the lack of plug sockets.
I wonder if that’s how it works, this place is certainly techie enough. I’m about to open up the MMS message that Dad sent me, when a
familiar face appears on every single terminal in the room.
It’s Doctor Pierce.
He begins to speak.
‘My name is Doctor Harold Pierce, I have met
all
of you already but
due to the highly confidential nature of this mission ...’
His words are cut off on the terminal at this workstation
On all other terminals he is delivering a briefing speech.
‘Firstly, let me start by reassuring you that your loved ones are all
completely safe and secure,’ he goes on.
But on the screen I’m looking at, he’s saying something
very
different.
It’s like an overlaid message, as if one message is embedded within
another.

‘Dan,’ he begins in the second message.
‘This is an encrypted message which only you will be able to receive.’

‘At present, you are the only person in the bunker who has Purple or
Black Zone access.’
‘That won’t be the case for much longer.’
‘I don’t have much time to speak, we’re currently on an encrypted
delivery system.’
‘You’ll have worked out already Dan that you and your sister are very
special.’

I begin to talk, but he continues to speak over me.
This can’t be a live message, he must have recorded it beforehand.

‘Dan, as you’ll see on the main screens, I am currently explaining to the
bunker personnel what’s going on outside.’
‘I don’t know if you’ve ever heard about terraforming, but we’re
involved in the highest level project to regenerate the planet.’

‘That automated process will begin the second my mission briefing
ends, bunker personnel will receive their agendas directly to their
personal devices.’

‘Dan, I’ve spent more than 20 years personally preparing for this.’
‘I thought I’d covered every possibility, but I’ve missed something … I
can’t believe I didn’t see it.’
I get the feeling that he isn’t here to deliver good news to me.
‘The terraforming has been hi-jacked by a terrorist faction Dan.’

‘I don’t know who they are - or where they are - I just don’t
understand how they even got access, it should be impossible, it’s all
tied into me.’

He’s clearly flustered and has the look of a genius who’s just been told
that his theory is rubbish, even though he knows that it
must
be
correct.
‘If they sabotage the terraforming Dan, they can kill the planet …
everything
will be dead.’

‘It’s the minerals they want - and the gas - they don’t care about what
else is left.’
He’s clearly getting quite distressed now.
I’m with him on that.
‘I managed to get some people inside the bunker who you can trust
Dan - your mum is one of them, and James, her friend.’
‘You can tell if they’re safe by the devices in their necks.’

‘Look closely under their skin, you should see a very faint, blue,
pulsating light there. If you do, they’re safe, they’re connected directly
with me.’

He furrows his brow.
‘If they have
any
other colour device Dan, you
mustn’t
trust them.’
‘I have partial control, but the encryptions were hacked when the
sirens sounded.’
‘It’s why the lights were off in the bunker for so long, why the timing
was all wrong.’
‘They hacked in when we were at our most vulnerable - as we handed
over from Governmental control to the bunker.’

‘Dan, I’ve got to go. Remember, you can access
all
areas here, but
you’ve only got a short head start on them, once the hacking is
complete, they’ll have the run of the place.’

‘One last thing Dan. They’ll go for the terraforming last of all. First
thing they’ll target are
the drones
.’
The message ended. Just as his final words were delivered on the second presentation that
had been continuing on the main screens.
‘ … The Global Consortium thanks you for your service in the Genesis 2
project.’

At the very moment that Doctor Pierce finishes his briefing in the
Control Room, Amy notices something that she might have missed if it
wasn’t for her conversation with James only minutes before. In unison, the minute the screens return to The Global Consortium
logo, the necks of the bunker staff glow red. It’s like a lacklustre display of Christmas lights, all of the bulbs a single
colour, power barely managing to illuminate the filaments, but
definitely there if you know where to look.
She turns to James.
His neck is fine, still blue.
He’d noticed what was happening too, and read her face when she
nudged him.
‘You’re fine,’ he acknowledges, checking out her neck.
The light was blue.

Across the room there is a simultaneous ‘beep’ as the bunker staff
receive their instructions on their personal devices, just as Doctor
Pierce had suggested. There is a sudden air of purpose, as Control Room staff receive their
personal mission agendas.
The time for acclimatisation is over, Genesis 2 has begun.
‘I need to get back to my station,’ James whispers, ‘I’ll find out what I
can.’

He walks towards the man who had taken up his duties in his absence,
somebody he hasn’t noticed here before.
The man makes way for him, and seems lost momentarily, like he has
no place to go. He is saved by the alarms that began to sound on a console to his left.
‘Statis Room power has been cut, as requested,’ the terminal operator
reports to Kate.
‘How long?’ asks Kate.

‘A maximum of one hour independent survival for the adults, about 40
minutes for the children.’
Amy hears everything.
James walks over to her and whispers hurriedly.
‘They’re
killing
the civilians in the statis room Amy, they’ve turned off
the power supply.’

‘Take my E-Pad I’ve mapped in the location.’
‘When you get there, I’ll send instructions to work around it without
detection. I’ll do what I can here while you’re on your way.’

Amy leaves the Control Room, adrenalin flowing, heart beating
furiously.
Unknown to her, the man who had been sitting at James’ terminal
notices this and follows her, making sure that he is not detected.
She is suddenly aware of a feeling that she hasn’t experienced in some
time, since those terrible events with James.
It is survival instinct.
She follows the navigation information on the E-Pad and manages to
make her way through the corridors easily enough.
James must be monitoring on the cameras.
As she approaches the Statis Room door, it slides open without her
having to place her hand on the panel.

James is good, he must have managed to override it.
Unfortunately, his actions are detected immediately by Kate. Security just went up to maximum level and anything that is out of the
ordinary now gets relayed to her instantly.
Inside the Stasis Room, it doesn’t take Amy long to work out what is
happening.

Encased in glass cocoons, she finds her family and other people, some
of whom she recognises as the bunker staff that she’d seen on the
previous day. To the side of each of the inanimate bodies is what is clearly a lifesigns indicator.
The levels on the graphs are going down, bit by bit.
Heart rates are slowing.
These people are dying. She
has
to save her family.
The Stasis Room door opens.

With the blue device in her neck currently inoperative, she recognises
him straight away, but she can’t place where they have met before.
The alarms are sounding in the corridor outside, they must have
spotted her.
The man in the doorway looks like he is about to speak, but becomes
aware that there are heavy footsteps behind him.
A security team is following just behind.
He takes the gun that he has been hiding within his uniform, points it
at Amy and shoots.
She falls to the ground.

As the security team enters the Stasis Room a small pool of blood has
begun to form where her body lies still and lifeless.

Kate receives the news that the intruder in the Stasis Room has been
dealt with.
Unknown to the man called James, she alerts Security to his recent
unsanctioned actions.
Combined with his unexplained visit to the bunker entrance earlier, he
looks like he’s going to mean trouble.
They catch him unawares as the security team storms quietly but
efficiently into the Control Room and take him away for interrogation.

With the red devices pulsating furiously in their necks, interrogation
will now mean something completely different to what it did only an
hour previously. Somebody else is now calling the shots here, internal sabotage will
neither go unnoticed nor unpunished.
Kate continues to work through the tasks that are being directly
transmitted via the device in her neck.
By a source unknown.

As the faint red glow pulsates in her neck, she executes her next task
with no emotion or any thought of consequence.
‘Begin Drone activation!’ she commands as the woman in front of her,
responsible for carrying out that task, sets to work at her console.
‘Activation sequence has begun, authentication required to process,’
the woman replies.
Kate places her hand on a panel at her desk.
Her eyes are scanned by a red laser.
This is
Black
Zone security operation.
Kate has full access to the bunker.
‘Drone activation underway!’ comes the confirmation from across the
control room.
‘Initiate the arming sequence!’ replies Kate.

My mind is racing.
First Nat’s reappearance - or should I say ‘resurrection’? Now this message from Doctor Pierce.
Dad said to trust him.
Doctor Pierce said to trust Mum and James. I need to start tracking people down - and fast!
I remember the unfinished video message on my phone, and begin to
replay it.
I get to the part where it broke off earlier.

It’s about
you
, it’s all about you and ...’
It continues:
‘It’s about
you
, it’s all about you and Nat.’

‘It’s because you’re twins, it’s all about you two. Dan … Nat is alive. It’s
all connected with your genetic patterns, you have to work
together.
’
‘Doctor Pierce says I’m not going to remember recording this
afterwards, so it’s in your hands Dan.’
‘Trust Mum, look for Nat and do everything
together
.’