John Krygelski - The Aegis Solution

“What did you do to them?”

Milton permitted a slight smile to cross his face. “They left and joined Walden. Within a month, maybe two, they returned. And when they came back, they were ready to join in our society.

“I took a very long time to answer your question as to why I thought Walden failed. But Madison is only accountable for a portion of the population loss from there. I said at the beginning, the only other way you could lose people was through death. I would know nothing about that. Please tell me, has it been an issue?”

“Almost from the beginning, suicide has been, if you’ll excuse the expression, a way of life at Walden. A week would never pass that didn’t include the loss of some of our residents, sometimes several.”

“You must have developed a feel for their motives.”

“We tried to get a handle on the motivations. We had group sessions, counseling, interventions, hundreds of one-on-one meetings before the fact. Nothing ever emerged as an underlying reason.”

“What reasons did they give?”

“Most of the time, none. But if they did, the reasons were best described as superficial, more akin to a convenient excuse, rather than anything substantive. As an example, we had a young, healthy man commit suicide because he had torn his favorite shirt.”

“I have a theory, Mildred, about the so-called utopian mind-set, which I believe is far too exclusionary, unrealistic, and eventually damaging. Over time, the never-ending progression of actions, words, and even thoughts which must be forced into that tight mold of utopia gradually create such an intolerance to even the slightest deviation that an almost allergic reaction, a full-body and full-mind reaction, occurs, taking the person directly to furor or desperation. A house of cards has been constructed, so high and so tenuous that literally anything can knock it down. There is no resilience.

“Altogether, how many have you lost to suicide?”

Mildred sat back in her chair and looked up at the ceiling for a moment before answering. “Over the life of our community, approximately two thousand.”

Bonnie Schwartz refilled her coffee mug and laughed. “I can’t believe he said that!”

“He did! Right in front of his wife and my husband,” Jennifer exclaimed emphatically.

“What did you say?”

“I told him to dream on!”

They both broke into high-pitched squeals, causing the others in the break room to twist around in their chairs and glance at them. Bonnie looked at the clock on the wall. “I’d better get back. I was only supposed to be gone a minute.”

“Yeah, me too.”

Schwartz turned and walked hurriedly back to her station outside the lab. Thankfully, no one was around to see her return. She placed the full mug on the desk, accidentally setting it on top of a pen, which shot out from underneath, causing the coffee to slosh out of the cup.

“Dammit!”

She scurried to the restroom and grabbed several paper towels from the dispenser, returning to her desk. After the spill was mopped up, Bonnie sat down and checked her work phone for any messages she might have missed. Then she picked up her cell phone from the desk and checked for text messages. There was one from Jennifer, which had arrived only moments ago: “By the way, I gave him your email, lol.”

Laughing again, she moved her thumbs madly as she typed back a threat to send the man Jennifer’s cell number. After having dispatched the text message, she checked her phone for any others and, finding none, replaced the cell phone on her desk. As she did, she noticed something strange on one of the video screens set up as an array in front of her.

“What the…?” Pulling out her keyboard, Bonnie typed in a few commands, and the video camera she was watching zoomed in for a tighter view. She was instantly mortified by what she saw. Recovering, she dialed the extension for her supervisor.

Sheldon Kennerley arrived within two minutes, winded from the jog to Bonnie’s station. When he stopped and his eyes fixed on the screen, he gasped. It was a close-up view of Syndi sprawled on the floor in front of her work area. From the angle of the camera, he could see that a copious amount of blood had gushed from apparently every orifice in her body, pooling around her and saturating the white lab coat.

“We have a breach!” he shouted. “Sound the alarm. Thank God, no one has opened the air lock. Bonnie, get Director Faulk on the phone.”

Faulk opened the door of the Hummer before the driver had come to a complete stop, the wind forcing the door shut again, almost slamming his leg against the frame. Putting his shoulder to it, he pushed it open again and climbed out, holding on to the side grip-bars to prevent the gale from knocking him to the ground. The roar made it impossible to speak to his team, but they knew their orders and followed him out of the transport.

The group, leaning forward at an impossible angle, made their way to the entrance.

Boehn glanced over at Killeen. “Gather all your men. It’s time we departed Aegis.”

“What about him?” the young security chief asked, motioning toward the still-unconscious Kreitzmann.

“Bring him and the others. Since the land line and the T1 are both down, I’ll gather all of the files on flash drives.”

“It’s going to be difficult to assemble everyone without the others noticing. What should I do with them if they ask questions?”

Boehn’s first impulse was to issue a harsh order. He quickly realized that extreme measures were no longer required. “Bluff, bully…I don’t care if you simply ignore them. I doubt that any of them will physically attempt to stop you, especially since we have their boss.”

“Done.”

Elias and Tillie were crouched in the air plenum, both peering down into the corridor below. Wilson was stationed back at the last junction, watching for any search teams.

“I hope you’re right,” Tillie whispered.

“So do I. It was the only spot on the perimeter that made any sense.”

He referred to a note on the plan that indicated there had been a block-out, a temporary opening in the continuous concrete wall which made up the envelope surrounding Aegis. Once they stood the wall, there would not have been any access to the interior for the workers to use, other than the single opening which was to become the permanent entrance. Having only one way in and out of a project of this magnitude would have been impractical and unsafe. The temporary opening was actually a gap formed in the tilt-up wall, a hole created when the panel was cast. After it was no longer needed, it would have been filled in and covered.

“It is much easier to remove the in-fill of a former opening than to try penetrating an engineered panel. Besides, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Kreitzmann picked the section of Aegis where the old opening is located to call home.”

Tillie, still staring intently down, murmured, “Like I said, I hope you’re right. It looks quiet down there now.”

Elias slipped the knotted rope off his shoulder. “Might as well take a look.”

Gripping the edge of the lay-in grille, Tillie quietly pulled it up and out of the opening, while Elias took one final look at the page from the plans, memorizing this section of the layout. He had already tied one end of the rope to a nearby pipe and dropped the free end down to the floor below. “I’ll go first.”

With the now functional AK-47 slung over his back, Elias gripped the rope and lowered himself through the opening, taking only a few seconds to climb down to the floor. Tillie was already following him down before he finished his descent.