“Personally,” Duke said. “I think going out there is nuts. I’ll wait it out.”
“What about you?” Tony asked me. “Did you get enough?”
“Oh, no, I’m going out with a campfire. Maybe for a few minutes. I mean this was Peter’s idea.”
“Really?” Tony said snidely.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
Before he could answer, his name was called over the radio and Tony lifted it. “Yeah, Tom. I’m here. We just came back in. I’ll be up if you want to step up.”
“No, that’s not it,” Tom said. “You may want to get up here. We made contact.”
Tony and I ran top speed down the stairs and to the switch room. There was a feeling of hope that consumed me. Yes, it had only been two weeks since impact, but to suspect life extended farther than our bunker was one thing. To know it was another.
We arrived and Tom looked as if he felt agitated.
“What’s wrong?” Tony asked.
“They aren’t saying much,” Tom replied.
“Bad signal?”
“It’s not great, but it’s there. They just aren’t saying much. Like they’re playing games.”
“Can it be local? Maybe the fire hall?” Tony suggested.
“I doubt it. They’re gonna need some power behind the antenna. Knowing the limitations with the cotton candy cloud, I’m gonna say this is not local. I mean it could be.”
“But you think it’s one of the three. Which one? Omega Man, Damnation Alley, or Threads?”
I interrupted. “Wait. You just named movies.”
“Yes,” Tony replied. “The secret bunkers were named after disaster and apocalypse movies.”
“That is so ridiculous. You probably just reached locals who are saying, Yeah, we’re Omega Man.”
Tom shook his head. “No. I did not call out to them. I just called out. They replied Damnation Alley.”
Tony’s eyes widened. “Oh my God.”
“What?” I asked.
“That’s the main one. That’s the one in Texas where Gil went.”
Another instant shot of adrenaline filled my body and I could feel the blood pump fast.
“What did you ask them?” Tony questioned Tom.
“I asked them to verify their location and how many survivors. They said it was classified.”
Tony immediately grabbed the radio. “I’ll try.” He pressed down to speak. “Damnation Alley Damnation Alley, do you read?”
“Roger that. Loud and clear.”
We may have been loud and clear to them, but there was a lot of static coming from their end. We still could understand them.
“We are a survival Station in North East Pennsylvania called Protocol One.” Tony said.
“Never heard of it.”
“We have survivors.”
“Congratulations on survival. Please know there is nothing this station can do for you at this time.”
Tony pulled his hand away. “What an asshole.”
“Told you,” Tom said.
Tony tried again. “Damnation Alley, we are a privately funded shelter with a VIP and scientific experts.”
“We have VIPS and scientific experts too.”
Tony groaned and looked at me. “What is this? My bunker is better than yours? What the fuck. Sorry.” He depressed the button again. “Damnation Alley I am not playing games with you. My name is Anthony Garrison of Global Security and with me is Anna Jenner. Former wife of Senator Gil Jenner. We know your location and I can spew forth the list of VIPs that you have there, but I won’t. Since you won’t give me any information, can you at least get a message to Senator Gil Jenner?”
Nothing.
“Damnation Alley, come in.”
Finally, they returned, and they had lost their arrogant tone. “Protocol One, Senator Jenner never arrived at the facility.”
The second I heard that, I wheezed out all the air from my body and stepped back. Tony tried not to show emotion but I saw it. He froze for a second, hand hovering over the microphone while his jaws clenched.
“Damnation Alley, are you sure? Maybe he’s there.”
“Negative. We lost contact with the Senator in route. I was personally part of the search party that went out after impact.”
I walked from the switch room, I couldn’t listen anymore.
Tony asked more questions and the more he asked, the less I wanted to hear. I picked up enough of the conversation to know there was no mistake.
I just started walking. The shock of it all took me over and I really didn’t know where I was headed. I made it to the stairwell that went topside and midway up, I just stopped and sat down.
I didn’t know what to do. The shock was more than I expected. My thoughts were fuzzy and I couldn’t move. I literally couldn’t move.
Tony came blasting through the fail safe door, as if in a panic looking for me. He stopped suddenly and was breathing heavily. “There you are.”
I just stared at my hands.
“I’m sorry. I really am.”
I felt my lips tremble and I rubbed my hands together.
“Are you okay?”
I closed my eyes, trying to absorb it. “Um, yeah. I’ll be okay.”
But that wasn’t the truth. Truth was, I didn’t know.
Gil.
He planned everything. He had prepared for anything and everything about survival except for the possibility that he wouldn’t survive.
I didn’t know how much more heartbreak I could take.
In my soul and in my mind, I truly believed and envisioned Gil doing well, locked down in a high end shelter. But that wasn’t the case.
Gil didn’t make it.
The words didn’t make sense.
The whole situation did not make sense.
Not long before I had been waiting for something to jump out of the darkness, out of nowhere, and it now it had.
31 – MISSING PIECE
August 15
Poor Anna.
Did I want people to think that again? They would. Less, if they didn’t see how it affected me.
I was determined not to be Poor Anna again.
Poor Anna lost her son. Poor Anna lost the father of her child and the man who built all this for her.
Poor Anna has everything she needs to survive except a reason to live.
That was not how I wanted to be perceived. I asked Tony and Tom not to tell anyone. The others didn’t need to know.
After the news, I took a few minutes on the stairs then went up to watch as almost everyone went out to enjoy the air and the fires.
Funny how we dreaded the fires that burned out our world, yet we celebrated their light that night.
I stood at the blast door watching them. Tony stood with me. He asked me a few more times if I was all right. Each time I told him the same thing. I would be fine.
At one point, Tony said. “Well, I’m not. I’m in shock over this. I didn’t not expect this.”
My response was only, “Can we not talk about it?”
So we stood in silence.
The temperature hadn’t dropped much by the time Duke called it a night for everyone. Nelly didn’t go out. She stayed back with the children.
When we all retreated, it was good to see that Spencer came out of his room. He didn’t know me well, yet he asked if everything was okay because I looked like something happened.
Was I that transparent?
Maybe it was showing because I was processing it so much. Or at least trying to.
Skyler had left me a list of items removed from storage to stock the kitchen. I decided to enter them into the tablet, to take my mind off of things. But instead I found myself going through all of Jackson’s saved pictures.