Sean Slater - The survivor

‘You wearing?’

She rapped her knuckles over the centre of her chest, and it made a hard thunk! ‘Momma didn’t raise no fools.’

‘Good.’ Striker reached into the back seat and grabbed the shotgun. He racked it once, chambering a round, and gave Felicia a grave look.

‘Time for some people to face the Reaper.’

When backup was in place — all of them plainclothes units — Striker gave Felicia a nod and she drew her pistol. His palm felt wet, almost slippery now, and he tried to convince himself it was just the rain wetting his skin. But he knew better. And all at once, it felt like he was heading back into the cafeteria again to battle the three gunmen.

Tactically, the situation was a nightmare. Two cops with forty cals and one shotgun. They had no distraction or dark-light devices, just a couple of Maglites and the flashlights attached to their guns. On that note Felicia had been right. The Emergency Response Team could handle this takedown better, especially if machine guns and shotguns became the weapons of choice.

But ERT needed time, and that was the one luxury they couldn’t afford. As far as Striker was concerned, time didn’t even exist any more. Not in a normal state. Everything was just one big rush before the next shooting.

He snuck down the sidewalk, shotgun in hand. It was loaded with ten gauge — enough power to stop a black bear — and he rejoiced at the feel of the stock against his inner arm. It wasn’t just any old shotgun, it was a combat shotgun. Benelli. A tiny piece of lightning in his hands.

Without looking back, he asked Felicia, ‘You got me covered?’

She came up behind him and gave his shoulder a squeeze, indicating she was not only there, but on full alert. Striker readied the shotgun and moved forward.

Approaching the house from the front was bad tactics, even under the best of circumstances. To the west, the neighbour’s exterior lights were turned off, and Striker saw no motion detectors. He opted to use the yard as cover. As he led Felicia through it, straddling the fence and searching for dogs, the thought of booby traps filtered through his mind. IEDs — Improvised Explosive Devices — were common with these nut-jobs, starting back with the Columbine kids who had planned on blowing up the entire library.

Because of this, he stopped when they crested Que Wong’s backyard, he turned to face Felicia and whispered, ‘Eyes up for IEDs. Wires. Bottles. Containers — whatever. High and low. Watch every step.’

She nodded. Her face was blank, and her dark eyes were steady, determined. As much as a part of him begrudged her this ability to turn her emotions to ice, he also loved it. She was a rock in the field, always standing next to him when the worst of the shit hit.

That couldn’t be said about all the other cops he’d worked with.

A long hedge of manicured bush, five feet high, separated the two yards. In the rain and darkness, it looked like a solid row of blackness. As Striker flanked the hedge, searching for a break in the bush, a sliver of light found his eyes. It was coming from Que Wong’s backyard.

From the ground.

‘What the hell?’ Striker heard Felicia say.

He reached back and tapped Felicia, then pointed to the lit-up area of grass. Her long hair was wet, sticking to the edges of her face, and she shivered as she nodded. Striker felt the cold, too. The fall wind picked up, whistling through the greenery and blowing the rain into his face.

With Felicia covering his back, he crept along the bush-line until he found a small break in the greenery. It was narrow, but passable. He pressed between the two bushes and took in the full view of the yard.

It was ordinary, small. In the middle, near the house, was a small patio area, complete with a propane barbecue and an outdoor patio table with chairs. At the far end of that, an upright cement birdbath stood, nestled between two rows of barren shrubs. Striker let his eyes roam beyond the shrubs to a pile of old broken cinderblocks by the far fence.

The light was coming from the pile.

Striker made sure Felicia saw it. When she nodded, he moved forward and cleared the rest of the yard, finishing up with the patio. From this new vantage, he could see that the cinder blocks weren’t in a pile, but were arranged in a small square design. And in the very centre of them was a hatch, coming right out of the earth. A square of dirty light spilled out around the edges.

‘Well water?’ Felicia guessed.

He shook his head. ‘Bunker.’

‘Bunker?’

‘An old bomb shelter, I think. Step back. Cover me.’ He dropped down to one knee and studied the door in the earth. It was small, barely two feet by two feet. Only one person could get through that space at a time, and that was if there was a ladder going down, not steps. He took out his flashlight, turned it on, and ran the beam all around the edges of the hatch.

‘What are you doing?’ she asked.

‘Looking for wires. Igniters. Switches.’

‘You see any?’

‘No. But be ready.’

He put his flashlight away and with the shotgun in one hand, he grabbed hold of the latch, the steel feeling cold and wet against his skin, and heaved as fast and hard as he could.

The door was hinged at the top, and the joints screeched gratingly as the door opened, then slammed hard against the back row of cinderblocks.

Striker stared down into the hole and saw no movement inside. A dim light from an unseen source revealed a rickety-looking ladder descending into the earth. At the bottom, a murky passageway trailed north.

‘It goes towards the house,’ he told her. ‘Watch our backs.’

As he stepped down onto the first rung of the ladder, Felicia grabbed his shoulder.

‘You’re not going down there,’ she said.

He never took his eyes off the cavern below. ‘You got a better idea?’

‘Yeah. Get a dog.’

‘Forget that. No mangy mutt’s going down here to tear through all my evidence.’

‘Jacob-’

‘Just cover me,’ he said.

‘It could be a trap.’

‘Exactly, so don’t follow. Stay here and make sure no one locks me down there.’ And before she could protest more, he descended into the earth.

The ladder went down ten feet, then ended abruptly. Once on the ground level, he could see the source of the light: an exposed fluorescent tube that ran down the centre of the far room. From its light, he could see that the long corridor he was standing in ran straight towards the house, then ended in a large open room. From where he stood, there appeared to be no other doors in or out.

Just one big underground square of concrete.

Keeping the shotgun ready, he stepped forward. The room was cluttered with things. Stacks of small water tanks lined the far wall. Wooden shelves held canned goods, survival kits, batteries and toiletries. Sheets of white plastic covered the walls.

Striker stood still. Breathed as quietly as he could. Waited and watched for movement. There were no obvious signs of threat, but that meant nothing. Situations like this were explosive and often unpredictable.

He inched forwards into the open room. Almost immediately, he detected something in the air. Something beside dampness and old rotting wood. It was a distinct smell, a familiar smell.

Urine.

He took another step forward and scanned everything.

Old planks put together to form benches and a table took up the bulk of the room, sitting out of place and centre stage. It bothered him. They were mostly covered by an orange tarp. Striker looked around. Though the bunker was old, it was still unfinished. Fraying chunks of pink insulation poked out through the white plastic sheets that stretched from two-by-four to two-by-four. Here and there, homemade wooden shelves had been nailed up haphazardly. In the far corner of the room sat a new workbench, covered in metal parts.