Kyle West - Revelation

“It’s too dangerous, then,” Makara said. She looked frustrated. “Are there any other Bunkers we can use? Ones that did not fall from the xenovirus?”

“That would be much safer,” Ashton said. “Since 108 is off the table, and 114 for the same reasons, we have to look at other Bunkers. Our options will be very limited, both by location and other reasons. Most Bunkers aren’t as large as 108; that closes off most even from consideration.”

“Any Bunkers you know of that are nearby?” I asked.

“Then there are others that haven’t been heard from in years — even decades. I can’t remember all of them off the top of my head, but 111, 112, and 106 are all nearby. I’d have to go through my files to refresh my mind on the details of each.”

“You have access to that information?” Makara asked.

Ashton nodded. “I was able to save some important documents — digitally of course — during my escape from Bunker One. One of these was a Bunker manifest, which gives names, descriptions, coordinates, and the reasons each Bunker fell — at least for the ones we have information on. The manifest stopped being updated with the fall of Bunker One, but I’ve my own notations whenever I discovered something new.”

“And you’ve been sitting on this for how long?” I asked.

“I haven’t really been sitting on it,” Ashton said. “I’ve told Samuel most of it already. I only thought to mention Bunker 108, because in theory, it would be the perfect place to shelter, if not for the xenovirus.”

“You said 111, 112, and 106,” I said. “I don’t even know where those are.”

“When the U.S. started the Bunker Program in 2020, they created twelve Sectors,” Ashton said. “The Sectors are of varying size, are designated as letters A through L. Each Sector has its own twelve Bunkers: 1-12 are in Sector A, 13-24 are in Sector B, and so on. Bunker 108 is in Sector I. Often, the Sectors are called by their rough location — in the case of Sector I, it would be the Mojave Sector. The last in each sequence, such as 12, 24, and 108, were designated as Command Bunkers — ones that were to manage the rest within their Sector. The only exception to this was Bunker One, which controlled all the Bunkers.”

“This is all interesting,” Makara said, “but what’s the point?”

“I’m just trying to illustrate that there are lots of Bunkers,” Ashton said. “None will be as large as 108, unless we find the last in each sequence — which were all Command Bunkers.”

“So, to fit in everyone, we would have to find Bunker 12, 24, and so on,” I said.

“Precisely. And none of these Bunkers are close to each other. A great many are covered in Blight. Others are prohibitively far away, such as on the East Coast, or too far north.” Ashton sighed. “I will do some more research, but after all is said and done, it might still turn out that Bunker 108 is our best option.”

I hoped that wasn’t true, because Bunker 108 would be a horrible option.

“Well, we have to find something,” Rey said. “And it can’t be far. We don’t have time for that.”

Everyone was silent as they thought.

“We’ll talk it over with Samuel when he gets back,” Makara said. “I’m sure he’ll have his own opinion. For now, the plan remains the same. We keep going west, away from the Great Blight. We’ll stock up once we hit Pyrite. Hopefully, by then, we’ll have more information to go on.”

“I’ll start researching possible options,” Ashton said.

I was glad Ashton was giving himself another project. It meant he would probably forget about me, for the meantime.

As if reading that thought, he looked in my direction. “We’ll have to put that Elekai research on hold for a few days.” He gave a thin smile. “I’m sure you don’t mind.”

“Not at all,” I said.

At that moment, Michael’s radio crackled to life.

“Michael? Michael, you there?”

It was Marcus. His voice was panicked.

“Yeah, come in,” Michael said, his eyes nervous. “What’s going on?”

There was a long, dreadful pause. Instantly, I knew something terrible had happened. Something we could never come back from.

“It’s Samuel,” Marcus said. “I think…I think he’s dead.”

Immediately, Makara snatched the radio from Michael’s hand.

“What do you mean, you think he’s dead?” she yelled. “Answer me!”

The radio sizzled with static for a moment. From the other end, Marcus cursed, as we all sat in shock.

“We got ambushed by a crawler. We were speeding away on our bikes, back for the ship, but it was too fast. It tackled Sam, and he went crashing down. I stopped and fought the thing off. But now, Sam isn’t moving.”

“When did this happen?” Makara asked.

“Just now — I called you first thing.”

“Did you check for a pulse?”

“Of course I did! I got nothing. If he’s still alive, he doesn’t have long.”

“What’s your location?”

“We’re two miles out from the mesa. I can hear more of them coming…”

“We’re on our way,” Makara said.

Makara ran out of the conference room, followed quickly by Anna. Within minutes, the ship was in the air, flying east.

And all I could think was — Samuel was not dead. He couldn’t be. A single crawler couldn’t do this to him. It had to be another false alarm, like what had happened to Makara in the Coleseo .

A couple minutes later, we found Marcus far below, standing above a figure sprawled on his back. The twisted corpse of a crawler lay nearby on its side, facing the east. Sam’s bike lay sideways in the sand where it had crashed. All was just as Marcus had described.

When we landed, we all ran outside. The cold wind blew, stinging me with dust. In the distance, I could hear high-pitched screams. Marcus had been right on that count as well. More crawlers were coming.

Makara ran to her brother, grabbing his shoulders. His forehead was bleeding, and a giant black welt was forming there, even as Makara held him.

Char knelt beside Makara, feeling for a pulse. For a few, terrible seconds, he said nothing. Finally, he nodded.

“He’s not dead. Not…yet, anyway. He has a head injury, so it could be very bad. It’s hard to say now, but it looks like he hit his head on a rock or something during the impact.”

Makara did not react. She didn’t have the strength to. “Let’s just get him on the ship. Do what we can for him.”

Char, Julian, Michael, and I lifted Samuel, doing our best to keep his body even. He did not stir the entire time. We carried him to the ship. Once inside, we carried him to the clinic, laying him on the bed. Still, he did not move.

Char and Makara came in. “Give him some space. Everyone besides me, Makara, Marcus, and Ashton, clear out.”

“Take us back to the army, Anna,” Makara said, her voice thick.

Anna nodded, turning to me. “Come on.”

Before leaving, I took one last glance at Samuel. His eyes remained closed, and he had not moved a muscle, other than in the almost imperceptibly small breaths he took.

Michael, Anna, Julian, and I walked to the bridge in silence. It was not looking good. Boss Dragon and Rey stood in the galley, watching us, their faces unreadable. They said nothing as we passed through the galley, into the main corridor, and to the fore of the ship.

“Will he be alright?” Julian asked, after Anna had settled down in the captain’s chair — a place I had never seen her sit before.

Anna shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe he gets better. Maybe he doesn’t.”

Slowly, Anna took off for the hill we had left behind. It wasn’t until we were gone that I remembered we had left both bikes, including Marcus’s, in the dust. It was too late. As the ship spun away, the last view I had was of crawlers overwhelming the position. They were just a few miles out from the army’s camp.