Paradise: An Apocalyptic Novel (6 page)

6

A Singular Goal

The morning light
peeked through the gray dawn. Amanda and Jackson crouched in the weeds, checking the house for movement. They were absent from the party, although given the night’s excitement, no one had noticed.

“Look,” Amanda said, “the old bastard went to sleep.” She pointed at Cole’s room, where a light had just extinguished. The old man must have been burning the midnight oil something fierce.

“Jesus,” Jackson replied, checking his watch, “that leaves us 23 minutes.”

“Your plan said 30, minimum.”

“It’s right now or we might not get another shot.” Jackson figured he’d throw caution to the wind. The mainland was in shambles, and their way off the island was compromised. They were here, and pretty soon, everyone would be scrambling to survive.

Leaves and jungle fauna rustled behind them. Jackson jumped.

“Don’t worry about that,” Amanda said, before adding, almost too low to hear, “yet.”

A cold prick of fear ran along Jackson’s spine, but it was soon replaced by adrenaline. On the south side of the house, a canopy of trees hid their approach. Not that anyone was awake, but it seemed some caution couldn’t hurt.

Amanda fumbled along the side of the house in the dim light, hands groping along the masonry. After a minute passed, then another, she found the switch to the hidden entrance. With a twist of an ornamental phoenix, wings outstretched in majestic flight—one of hundreds adorning the side of the house—the ground opened before them, revealing a series of steps.

The passageway was dark, and smelled of dust and decay. Although the house was only five years old, no one had been down here since the thing had been built. There had been no reason to—until now. Jackson ducked down, shoulders hunched, so his head wouldn’t hit the ceiling.

The stairs seemed to plunge into the depths of the earth, but that was a product of the cramped quarters and total lack of light. With the wall as their guide, the pair made it down into the central room. Fluorescent bulbs flickered to life overhead, sensing their movement.

Shadows were draped across the room in the poor light, but the thin beams showed enough: four passageways, including the one they’d come down through, extending in a cross shape from this, the core room.

“There’s an entire network down here,” Jackson whispered, and he sounded almost impressed about it.

“Yeah, yeah.” Amanda had been down here before—and even though the ambiance was a few shades past freaky, she knew what needed to get done. “All right, look,” she began, heading over to the console in the center of the room, “you get one shot at this.
One
. Otherwise the place locks down, alarms sound, and we’re caught here like a couple of jackoffs. Understood?”

“We went over this. I got it.” Jackson took a deep breath, setting down his supplies: a pair of gloves, a gel finger encased in a plastic bag, an assault rifle and a small book.

“Where’d you get that, anyway?” Amanda asked as Jackson put on the gloves, wiping them on his shirt.

“Snuck in last night, after everyone passed out. Maverick was at the table. He didn’t even notice.”

“No gambit required, huh?” Jackson had designed an elaborate plan to get Maverick’s fingerprint—a prerequisite for the biometric scanner—the night before, with a series of ruses that required intricate timing. That didn’t turn out to be necessary.

“Got lucky.” Jackson removed the gelatinous thumb from the bag and steadied himself. Even in the dim light, the ridges of a fingerprint could be seen on the end. He pressed it down on the scanner.

Nothing happened.

The two stepped back, looking at the exit. Maybe it wasn’t too late to run.

A series of gears sprung to life, shocking them back to reality. The console lit up, throwing a kaleidoscope of colors across the room’s walls. A map, indicating which pathway the weapons stash could be found down.

“Glad we got this fingerprint, then, now, aren’t you?”

“It would have been a one in three chance, otherwise.”

The location of the weapons changed every couple weeks, the automated system moving the cache from hallway to hallway at random. This was so, if someone gained access to the room—somehow, which was almost impossible anyway, if they didn’t know about it—then they would only have a 33% chance of even
reaching
the cache.

Go down the wrong hall, and there were sensors that would lock you in, sound the alarm, and allow the gatekeepers to decide your ultimate fate.

The correct tunnel stood dead ahead. Jackson checked his watch.

“Fourteen minutes,” he said, taking a step forward, “it’s going to be tight.”

“Better start running, then,” Amanda replied, before darting off down the hall, the motion-activated lights struggling to keep up with her blistering pace.

Each hall was
half a mile long. This would be an extravagant expense, but Maverick enjoyed the thought of having his very own supercharged panic room.

After a minute, the two heard the door close behind them. This was a safety feature; a fingerprint was required to get out, once the threat had passed. In cases of extreme emergency, this would keep the bad guys on the other side, and the good guys safe—whoever they were.

Jackson felt strange in the tunnel, like he was crossing the River Styx, but he kept up with Amanda, even though she was in far better shape. The trip took them less than five minutes, which wasn’t bad, considering Jackson couldn’t remember the last time he ran at a dead sprint.

Their progress was halted by a console with a keyboard attached. In front of them stood a massive steel door, over six inches thick. The only way through was a series of questions.

No one would ever argue that Maverick didn’t like a good time, and his escape plans and fallout shelters were no exception to that.

Jackson tapped a key. The monitor sprung to life after a short delay, displaying a string of red text in the same font as a twelve dollar alarm clock. He read it aloud.

“When was The Hideaway built?”

“Damn, he must have been drunk when he made these questions. 2009, right?”

“Yeah,” Jackson replied, “damn if it doesn’t seem longer than that.”

Jackson punched 2-0-0-9 on the keypad, before checking the time again. Eight minutes; they had to be out of the tunnel by 5:30. This was going to be tight.

Another series of red words unfurled across the monitor.

“When was Elevation Industries first founded?”

“Twenty years ago.”

“Is that exact,” Jackson asked, beginning to thumb through the book, “because I don’t know if that’s a trick question.” The three of them had founded a company, years ago, by the same name, but it had failed.

Maverick’s current iteration of the firm was born four years later, like a phoenix rising from the ashes. Jackson read through the notes in the little black book. It was a series of musings Amanda had written down five years prior, when she was exploring these tunnels. Maverick had showed her around, given her a couple cryptic hints about how to get inside the vault. Just in case.

Maybe he wanted to see if she would ever try to crack it, if her curiosity would get the best of her. But it hadn’t, because the thought of being stuck in here was brutal—and it wasn’t like the island was too much to handle.

Well, not until now.

“Type in 1990,” she said, “it’s gotta be the answer. Otherwise, anyone would know.”

Jackson hesitated, fingers hovering over the keys, before pressing the numbers. The screen flashed off, and he bit his lip.

“Was that it?”

“I don’t know. It’s not doing anything.” The screen was blank. Jackson stared at the seconds ticking away—fifteen, then twenty. There was no noise from the other end of the hall, no cacophony of sirens.

The computer spit out another message, and Jackson read it, exhaling deep.

“What is the singular goal of the company?”

“Is this multiple choice or something?” Jackson could tell from Amanda’s tone that she didn’t remember a mention of this question.

“No. Just a red cursor, blinking, waiting for me to put something in.”

“Try the company’s tagline,” she said, “might as well.”

“You sure?”

“You got a better idea?”

“There’s nothing in the book that would help us?” Jackson clung to it, like it held the answer to life itself. In a way, it did—at least, to his immediate life.

“Not in there, man,” Amanda said, the casual words unable to hide the anxiety and fear nipping at the edge of her voice, “just have some faith.”

Jackson typed in the words.
Fit for all, all for fit.
The motto that accompanied their television and print ads, along with some airbrushed celebrity. It was corny, but the people seemed to enjoy it. Not that anyone ever got into good shape using their products.

He stared at the keyboard, then looked up.

Fit_For_
sat on the screen, the cursing blinking at the end. Nothing else had registered; he took his hand away from the enter key.

“Check this out,” he called, and Amanda leapt to her feet.

“What do you make of this?”

“Did you press enter? Don’t tell me we’re screwed.”

“No, I stopped. But I typed the whole thing in.”

“Maybe the keys are broken.”

“Yeah, they just broke after the first two words.”

“I was kidding, dumbass,” Amanda said, rolling her eyes, “you pick up sarcasm about as well as you pick up chicks.”

“Like a stud,” Jackson deadpanned, and he could see a little smile crack her pursed lips. But then the situation landed on them once more, and it faded. “Let’s see what this does.”

The backspace, to his mild surprise, worked; this wasn’t like the Hotel California. He typed in another string of letters, and once again, only eight characters showed up.

“It’s an eight letter word,” he said, glancing at his watch. Five minutes to go. It was going to be almost impossible to get out. “Hit me with some suggestions.”

But Amanda said nothing, stood there counting off things on her fingers.

“So,” Jackson said after a moment, “you were saying?”

“Ambrosia.”

“What?”

“Just type it in,” she said, her brown hair shaking back and forth, “that’s been the goal all these years. That son of a bitch.”

Jackson didn’t respond, only banged in the letters and pressed enter. The screen flashed a success message, this time without any delay. He turned back to Amanda.

“How the hell—”

He was interrupted by a loud grinding sound. The door was moving, and it wasn’t going to be quiet about it. His voice was trampled by the echo of sliding gears and ungreased hinges. Another question flickered across the screen, but it was a request for a key code—to halt the bi-weekly room switch and lockdown sequence. There wasn’t time to figure it out.

The pair turned to watch the door open, a bank vault revealing its treasure. Or, in this case, guns.

“Wow,” Jackson said, and that was about the best word to describe the situation. Firearms that were no doubt illegal for the layman to have—were necessary
for the layman
never
to have—adorned the room’s walls.

RPGs, grenades of all types, sniper rifles, military grade assault rifles that looked like they would require more than a few gym sessions to carry, let alone fire. Shotguns, pistols, tranquilizers; it was like Maverick had planned for the end of civilization. Good to have, given the circumstances, but the pair doubted he was involved in the chicanery on the mainland—even if he was acting like a shady bastard.

The left wall was stocked with food and a small camping stove, dozens of gas cartridges spanning the shelves. It was enough for years—this place was even impenetrable to siege. Amanda went to the sink, and turned the knob. Crystal clear water flowed through.

“I wonder if it’s from the river,” she murmured, more to herself. There had to be another way out, if they got trapped—or at least a ventilation system, so they didn’t suffocate.

“What are we grabbing?”

“These,” Amanda said, dumping a bucketful of grenades into her pack, which caused Jackson to cringe. No explosion ensued, but the cavalier attitude didn’t thrill him. “And some of these.” She tossed him a pump action shotgun and enough cartridges to put down a small uprising. “And can’t forget this bad boy.”

She tugged the RPG from the wall, a little bit unsteady, and strapped it to her back. They looked outfitted for war—the single shot hunting rifles and semi-automatic pistols on the homestead looked like a joke in comparison.

“Grab that,” she said, pointing at a massive rifle. Jackson pulled it from the wall, almost toppling over. His finger slipped and pulled the trigger, and a thunderous shot reverberated across the room, like a clap of thunder in a canyon.

Sparks showered the two as the bullet crashed into the wall, before ricocheting into a can of beans. The preserved food exploded, dousing them in salty, lukewarm goo.

Amanda didn’t say anything. Her expression said enough—the way she wiped her face of the sticky sauce told Jackson that he’d better not do it again. The gun had ejected a bullet casing that was at least half an inch in diameter, and over two inches long. The thin smell of smoke tickled Jackson’s nostrils, and he coughed, putting the rifle on his back.

“Christ, Jack,” she said, “that thing would blow the head off a goddamn elephant.” She stopped for a moment, and Jackson tapped his watch. Yanking another object from the wall, she turned to go. “Thermal scope. For the rifle.”

“My aim is already pretty good.” He couldn’t see her response, but he suspected that her eyes were rolling like marbles down a steep hill. “Four minutes. A bit less.”

They began to run, new provisions banging and clanging, filling the endless hall with a distorted symphony of harsh metallic noise.
Stomp, stomp, ting, stomp, stomp, crash
. Onwards they ran, pain searing their lungs, imploring them to stop. But they marched forward, flailing under the weight of their packs, and now they could see the door, still open, right before them, thin beams of light floating in from the control room.