The hotel had two wings in the back of the main hotel. Right away, it was obvious that this was the construction that we had heard. There was a chain link fence surrounding the wing on the left. It was reinforced by a series of approximately twelve-foot concrete slabs, used as a perimeter. It was heavily guarded by a bunch more of the armored men, who were now starting to remind me of Storm Troopers from Star Wars, only in black.
The people working on the wall were made up of both men and women. Most of them looked pretty rough, and none of them were exactly smiling.
They were manually pulling up those large concrete slabs with a rope-made pulley system, and their clothing was worn and ragged. I remember thinking that they reminded me of what the Hebrews must have looked like in Egypt as they built the Pyramids. It wasn’t clear if the armored guards were protecting the men and women, or driving them to keep working.
We walked around the side of the building to what one of the armored men called, West Entrance. Passing through a double barbed wire twelve-foot high fence, we came to the door leading to an underground passage. It was a blast door, designed to withstand a nuclear attack. Two foot thick, reinforced metal that sat on two massive hinges.
I suddenly remembered where I had heard of the Greenbrier. My Economics professor in college forced the class to subscribe to the Wall Street Journal. The old bastard would actually pop quiz us to make sure that we’d read it, and were up to date on current events.
I recalled reading a huge spread, about the Greenbrier that we were actually quizzed on. As it turned out, the Greenbrier Hotel was a luxurious hotel where all the celebrities would visit. It was also the home of an underground, government funded fallout shelter created in secrecy during the cold war by Eisenhower.
The Wall Street Journal reporter blew the secret wide open in the nineties. At that time, I couldn’t believe that the government was able to build such a big facility without anybody knowing about it.
Its general function was to be the home for the Senate and the House of Representatives should there ever be a nuclear strike. I couldn’t remember much past that, except that it was supposed to be huge. Since it wasn’t a secret anymore, the government basically abandoned it and the town had it open for tourism these days.
There were more guards, also dressed in black Storm Trooper outfits. They radioed through their helmet com-links announcing that we were coming in. I heard them make the request to prep the “chamber.” I didn’t know what the hell the “chamber” was, and was feeling on edge as we continued along.
“What is this place?” Kyle asked.
I started to answer, but one of our friendly Troopers growled, “No talking. All your questions will be answered after you pass the test.”
Test? I thought. What test? We’d been tested enough since this thing started.
The guards led us down a long passage that was pointed deep into the mountain on which the hotel sat. At the opposite end, there was a hallway where they stopped, though they ordered us to keep going. Peering down the narrow hallway, it was dimly lit and I hesitated before walking forward.
“Just follow instructions, and everything will be okay at the other end,” the leader said. I didn’t find him very reassuring.
The three of us entered the hallway, hesitantly, uncertain as to what we were dealing with. The door shut behind us with a reverberating thud, sealing us in the narrow corridor with tile running up the walls.
“Take off your clothes; put your hands up against the wall to your right,” the demand came over a speaker.
“What the hell is this? I paid a lot of money for this place. Why are we being treated like animals?” Michael bellowed suddenly.
No answer.
The three of us stood there for a few moments looking at each other, wondering just what the hell we got ourselves into.
“Guess we should get this over with. I think they want to make sure we’ve not been bitten,” Kyle said, taking a deep breath.
As one, we did as instructed. Once our arms were on the wall, a black light turned on. It exposed all the blood and gunk that was on our face, arms and hands, whatever was exposed to the creatures’ blood. I remember feeling disgusted by the revelation that I had so much of that crap all over my body.
“Turn,” the voice boomed over the speaker.
We all cautiously turned around.
It was as if we were being moved around like cattle. None of us had any say in what was happening, and despite my anxiousness to get through this, I was beginning to feel a little pissed at the constant demands.
A high pitched screech came from the walls. I had just a moment to look at Kyle, but before I could ask what the hell it was, a burst of cold water shot from both sides of us.
I flinched back, instinctively taking a huge breath into my lungs as if I was getting ready to be submerged. The cold felt like a million needle pricks across my body.
“Warm water cleans better than cold!” Michael shouted. “You hear me? What is this shit?”
I noticed Kyle wasn’t even phased by the water. He had a bar of soap, and was washing away the filth from his arms and hair. Michael and I decided to fight through the coldness and do the same.
When it stopped, the voice commanded, “Move forward. Step through the door. You’ve passed.”
I couldn’t help but wonder what would have happened if we had not.
Still grumbling about the abrupt cold shower, we moved through the door to find a beautifully furnished locker room. It had mahogany cabinets, expensive soaps, most importantly, towels, and fresh clothing. We dried off, and each picked out a white jump suit that seemed to be one size fits all.
As I put it on, I explained to Kyle and Michael what I thought the place was, based on the Wall Street Journal article.
We sat there for several minutes before a door on the far side of the room opened. A man dressed in a suit and tie stepped through the door. He was an older gentleman with a friendly smile and a trusting face. The perfect person for the job, I thought uneasily.
He introduced himself as Jarvis, and explained that his role was to help ensure our smooth assimilation into Avalon.
“What is this place?” Kyle asked, trying to confirm my earlier thoughts. Jarvis explained what I had, but elaborated in much better detail.
He explained that the Greenbrier bunker, originally called Project Greek Island, was two football fields stacked on top of each other in size, contained one thousand beds, a cafeteria and a working hospital. It had months’ worth of food, water and other provisions, a self-sustaining nuclear power cell and a TV studio that would rival NBC.
It was true that it was no longer in working order, as far as the public was concerned, but a private entity had purchased it in 2000, and had been keeping it up for a profit, in case of catastrophe; it is what Michael had been paying for all these years.
Michael was absently nodding in agreement.
Jarvis asked if we’d like a tour, taking us on a walk around the facility. It was indeed massive. He went on to explain that the government got away with building it in secrecy by what he called, “hiding it in plain sight.” Eisenhower had paid for the second wing of the hotel to be built directly above the bunker, so that they could build without raising suspicion.
Jarvis showed us the cafeteria, where we all grabbed some canned fruit and dried beef jerky. Even though it was dry, and had probably been sitting there for months, it was the first meat source of protein I’d eaten in days, and I relished in each bite.