2041 Sanctuary (Dark Descent) (39 page)

Darklight – World’s largest private security contractor

SFSD – Special Forces Subterranean Detachment (
Terra Force
)

SED – Sanctuary Exploration Division

[For easy reference this page is duplicated in the final Appendix and is also listed as the last entry in the
Table of Contents
]

Chapter Twenty Two

GMRC Subterranean Base Director Richard Goodwin lay on his bed staring up at the white fabric roof of his tent, the intricate pattern of the stitching between the durable cloth panels keeping his subconscious mind occupied while his higher brain wandered free of visual constraint. Currently Goodwin’s thoughts lingered on the same quandaries that had plagued him every day for many months; how to locate Sanctuary’s USSB and how to keep up the morale of those he was duty bound to protect.

As the former director of Steadfast, Goodwin was used to leadership and, by all accounts, quite good at managing those under his care; until now, however, he’d not had to contend with such an array of adverse challenges. Having to provide people with a steady supply of food and clean water signified the magnitude of his problems, although a welcome stroke of luck had ensured this most pressing of issues had thankfully fallen down his list of priorities. With the basic necessities taken care of, getting out of their current location had taken centre stage.

Ever since their arrival in the deserted Anakim city well over two hundred days earlier, the thirty thousand people he’d brought with him from Steadfast, predominantly civilians but including five thousand Darklight contractors, had been living out their existence in the revelation that was Sanctuary. Unfortunately setting up home in this frankly unbelievable and barren ancient underground structure had not been their goal.

Professor Steiner, Goodwin’s direct superior within the GMRC, had directed him to break into USSB Sanctuary; a facility Goodwin had believed to be just another underground base, built as a failsafe against the asteroid AG5 that had finally impacted off the South African coastline in 2040. The reality was the USSB, a United States Subterranean Base, was contained within a much larger structure of the same name.

Sanctuary’s immensity, Goodwin’s unauthorised access and an earthquake, had all conspired against the Steadfast evacuees, who’d quickly become lost and trapped within a ghostly abandoned city of – at the time – unknown origins. Only the arrival of a pre-recorded video message from Professor Steiner had enlightened Goodwin to the truth, not just about Sanctuary and those that built it, but about the continued threat from space and the six remaining asteroids destined for Earth.

Thoughts of the disclosure of the catastrophe that awaited those on the surface always brought a deep melancholy upon him, and now was no different. Goodwin still had relatives on the surface, as did many others that shared his current predicament. If only he could escape this place and warn them, bring them back underground to safety. A sardonic chuckle escaped his lips making his chest shake. Safety, pah! It was all he could do to stay alive, the thought of rescuing anyone at this point seemed deliciously ludicrous to his mind.
And even if I could warn those I held dear, would I, or more importantly should I?
Professor Steiner had entrusted the secret to him in the belief he would hold it close, not for his sake but for the sake of humanity itself.
Could I really be that cold and leave those on the surface to die without doing something to save them?
The professor had; the loathsome thought declared itself unbidden and unwelcome, driving its way to the forefront of his deliberations. Goodwin knew the professor’s actions were disconnected from normal reality, but they were still cold and distant, the condemnation of billions of lives apparently accepted as an inevitability.
What else could he have done?
Goodwin wondered. The answer came quickly:
nothing. There was nothing that he could have done.

Goodwin had decided early on to keep the momentous secret about the future between himself and one other person; for now, anyway. If he disclosed the truth to everyone, it would only serve to nullify his efforts to keep those with him calm and functioning. Knowledge such as he now possessed would send many over the brink. Despair was the one thing the Steadfast evacuees could do without right now. The one person he knew he could burden with the information was the Darklight leader, Commander Hilt. The man was the proverbial rock and had taken the news surprisingly well, accepting what Goodwin told him without question. His impassive features had altered to show a deep consternation, of course, anyone hearing that the planet, as we know it, was nearly at an end would give some kind of reaction; any sane person at least.

A noise nearby caused Goodwin to lapse back into reality and he rolled his head to one side to listen as low voices murmured on the edge of hearing;
probably a couple of soldiers preparing breakfast
, Goodwin surmised, as the sound of footfalls faded away. His thoughts turned to the professor again, his friend and mentor. He hoped he was okay. Malcolm Joiner was holding him under arrest when Goodwin left Steadfast and it had seemed the Director of Intelligence would go to any lengths to stop its evacuation. This could mean that Steiner and the rest of Steadfast’s staff were still trapped in the base. That, combined with the fact that, according to the professor’s message, Steadfast could be destroyed when the asteroid hit, didn’t bode well for the professor or the hundreds of thousands left behind in the base. Goodwin heaved a sigh. There was very little he could do about it now if that was the case; he must live in hope that the professor had got them out somehow, and he believed if anyone could it was him. He might even be on his way to Sanctuary at that very moment, or already preparing to send out search parties for Goodwin; a pleasant thought indeed, but an unlikely one.

The sensation of the bedcovers shifting brought his mind back to his surroundings once more. More movement and the sheets were pulled away, leaving half his body exposed to the cold outside air. Smiling, he propped himself up on one elbow and leaned over to look at the small woman who shared his bed. Dark brown, shoulder-length hair lay fanned out over her well-tanned skin, the dyed blonde highlights almost completely grown out; a consequence of their stay in Sanctuary where luxuries were few and far between. Kara Vandervoort murmured in her sleep as Goodwin bent down and kissed her on her soft, freckled, upturned cheek. She was such a beauty; he was a lucky man to have such a brave, intelligent woman in his corner. He’d always seen himself as rather plain and ordinary, an unattractive proposition to such as her. At first he’d been confused by her advances, finding it hard to believe she would be interested in him. When she’d failed to lose interest he eventually built up the courage to do something about it; he was glad he had.

To the casual observer Kara appeared only to be in her early twenties and since he was a forty-four year old man the match would have seemed ill suited, to some anyway. In actuality Dr Vandervoort had thirty-three years under her belt and had been Steadfast’s Ecosystem director, part of Goodwin’s key management team at the base.

He’d told Kara many times that he couldn’t have held everything together if she hadn’t been around to lend her support and buoy him up when the stress and strain of their current situation sought to overwhelm him. Kara, as ever, had told him he’d have performed just as well without her; if only she knew how wrong she was.

Not wanting to disturb her sleep, Goodwin decided to rise and slid from the bed, the cold floor sending a shiver through his body as he did so. Taking his clothes from the crumpled heap on the floor where they lay, he pulled on his suit trousers, the belt much looser on his waist than it had been when he’d first arrived at Sanctuary.

‘I’ll need to make another notch,’ he mumbled to himself, shrugging into his creased white shirt. Pulling on some dirty looking socks and a pair of repaired Darklight issue boots, Goodwin picked up his red body warmer, opened the tent flap and ducked outside. A gust of cold air ruffled his thick, black hair.
So strange
, he thought, I’m miles underground and yet there is definitely wind down here. He’d surmised it was probably a result of the size of the chamber they were currently in. At around three miles high the cavernous space was – well – words failed to do it justice, but as Kara said in her South African drawl, it was
bloody massive
. The scale of the towers within the city also boggled the mind, not that they were visible in the pitch blackness that surrounded them; they could only be seen using some high-tech Darklight visual spectrum enhancement goggles. They were there, though, just a few hundred yards away. Goodwin looked up into the black, visualising the hundreds of gigantic edifices that populated the Anakim city; the name the professor had used for the race that had built them. Knowing who’d created these monstrous buildings didn’t detract from their eerie nature, in fact it enhanced it; Goodwin could almost feel their presence permeating through the air towards him. Another shiver ran down his spine, this one not induced by the low temperature.

He looked at his watch. The time was five a.m. and the rest of the camp remained quiet, or at least the section he was in did. Thirty thousand people covered a substantial amount of land. It had been decided early on that setting up residence in the city would have been too unnerving, and many of the civilians and even some of the Darklight soldiers had voiced their unease about such a plan. Goodwin had been quick to agree with them.

The supplies brought along by the Darklight forces had quickly proved inadequate, but somehow enough makeshift tents had been erected, interspersed by small, water powered generators that ensured the portable floodlights stayed on twenty-four seven; without them they’d have been totally blind. That the gennies worked with water wasn’t luck, the state-of-the-art equipment brought along by the Darklight private security firm was capable of producing electricity using a variety of fuel sources, even bio matter. What was fortuitous was the presence of a huge fresh water aquifer located two miles away from the city and their camp. They’d needed something to go in their favour, considering what had gone before, and a steady supply of drinking water and fuel for the lights hadn’t been the final surprise relayed by one of Commander Hilt’s reconnaissance teams.

Whether by design or otherwise, the body of water teemed with a mackerel-like fish. Alongside this animal, many other species had been extracted by improvised angling gear. Giant catfish, supposedly nearing world record size, had been landed, alongside other creatures that looked distinctly prehistoric, many of which may have been unknown to science. The forms of these aquatic wonders hauled from the depths resembled marine life usually found in the world’s deepest oceans. Prehistoric, pale, white skin and transparent bodies with large black eyes and razor sharp teeth did little to whet Goodwin’s appetite, but eat them he did, as did everyone else; it was either that or starve. An enforced pescatarian diet did not suit most, but proved impossible for others. Those who found the pungent fish too difficult to keep down had to make do with a variety of edible plants found around the fringes of the lake. To Goodwin the colourless vegetation appealed far less than the meat on offer and the taste had confirmed his observations.

The reason how so much life thrived underground was unclear, although the lake itself turned out to be in line with everything else around it; its enormity more akin to a Scottish loch or inland sea. From what they could tell, the expanse of water stretched for over three miles in breadth and thrice that in length. When it came to the depth, a crude plumb line had been unable to find the bottom, which shelved off sharply; the line used had run out after one and a half miles had disappeared beneath the inky black surface.

Walking through the camp, Goodwin headed for what served as the command post, a lean-to against a large outcrop of rock a few minutes away from his and Kara’s tent. Hilt’s recon teams had been due back late the previous night and Goodwin was eager for news of their scouting mission, which was most likely the reason he’d awoken so early. Perhaps today would yield some better results than the previous expeditions undertaken.

Hysterical laughter drifted on the soft breeze, making Goodwin pause in his passage, the light from a distant lantern barely highlighting the path ahead. A shriek and a scream made him alter his direction; jogging along, he made haste towards the source of the commotion that still echoed into the darkness. A young man came into view ahead, his height towering above a woman he now grappled with, both toppling to the floor.

Rushing forwards in the half-light, Goodwin grabbed onto the man’s heavy knit sweater, doing his best to haul him off his victim. Staggering back, it was all Goodwin could do to hold onto the person as he twisted and wriggled in his grasp.

‘Wait! It’s okay, he’s just playing,’ the woman said to Goodwin, picking herself up from the floor.