“Good. I could use a beer before swimming around the basement,” said Alex.
“You’re still planning on going down there?”
“Unfortunately, I don’t see any other option, unless you want to ride to Limerick with a shotgun.”
“No thanks. You still need a shower, by the way—not that I can smell you over myself.”
“The whole neighborhood is going to smell ten times worse in a few days. This crap isn’t going anywhere,” he said.
“Good thing we won’t be here.”
Chapter 17
EVENT +09:57
Scarborough, Maine
Alex sat on the top stair and splashed his feet in the pitch-black water, desperately trying to convince himself that he didn’t need any of the equipment in the basement. He could think of twenty good reasons why he shouldn’t submerge himself in the darkness below, most of them safety related, some of them purely irrational. His overly active imagination had swept the worst sea creatures conceivable two miles inland with the tsunami, to be deposited through the basement window.
He wore a blue swimsuit, tight-fitting polyester running shirt, and swim fins. A diver’s mask and snorkel, which he’d taken from the boat and stashed in his rucksack, sat on his lap. He’d gotten lucky with that decision. Since the Maine coast wasn’t exactly renowned for its crystal-clear waters, the rest of their snorkeling gear was in the basement, where it waited for a trip to Florida or the Caribbean. They’d always carried at least one snorkeling kit onboard the sailboat for practical reasons. Over the past five years, he’d gone over the side more times than he could count to clean seaweed from the propeller or disentangle a lobster pot line from the rudder.
His biggest fear was the electricity. What if the grid was restored while he was submerged? He knew this wouldn’t happen, but the thought dogged him. The waterline was well above the breaker box, exposed directly to the house’s external utility feed. He pushed this thought as far away as possible, focusing on the more immediate, tangible challenges he’d face underwater. Breathing always came in at the top of his mental list.
From what he could tell, the water pushed up against the basement ceiling. He might find a pocket of air between ceiling joists if the water level was a few inches below the floorboard, but the air would be limited. Using the snorkel to access the air presented a few risks. With only a few inches of dry space, he would have to be extremely careful not to tip the snorkel and inhale water. Low on air deep inside the basement, a panicked moment could kill him. This assumed he could find a few pockets of air. If not, he’d have to take the entire operation slowly, making multiple trips to unlock doors, safes, clear debris—all culminating in a few long, unobstructed trips to haul out his perceived bounty. Fortunately, everything he needed was clearly labeled and conveniently located in one place inside the “bunker.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to attach a line or something?” asked Kate.
“Are you coming in after me if something goes wrong?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“Then I’m definitely not attaching a line. One of us has to survive this,” he replied.
“I think I’m capable of swimming twenty feet and dragging your ass out of there. I’m a better swimmer than you,” she pointed out.
“Then maybe you should be the one making the dive,” he said, raising his eyebrows.
“I’m not familiar enough with your system down there.”
“Having a line attached is just one more thing I have to worry about. I’ll be fine. If I’m having trouble, I’ll come right up. Promise.”
“All right, but I wish we had a way to communicate,” said Kate.
“I’ll check the first few joists for an air pocket. If I don’t find air, you’re going to see me back here every thirty seconds or so. If I find air, I’ll try to use the snorkel to clear the whole path in one trip. You can sit in the water with your goggles and watch my light. The water’s pretty warm,” he said.
“You always say that,” she said, taking a transparent pair of goggles off the kitchen island.
“It’s at least ten degrees warmer than the beach water. Probably heated up over land,” said Alex.
He heard a knock from the mudroom, followed by Charlie’s voice. “You guys here?”
“Come on in, Charlie,” Alex called. “I’m about to take a swim.”
Charlie walked into the kitchen with his AR suspended at chest level by a one-point tactical sling. Alex noticed that he had completely rearranged the attachments on his rifle since he’d last seen him. Instead of a long-range scope, the rifle now featured an EOTech holographic sight with flip-up magnifier, a laser/flashlight combination and a bipod. Alex’s rifle lay on the recently cleaned granite island, along with the rest of his tactical gear. Charlie’s eyes immediately diverted to the rifle.
“You sprang for an ACOG? Dammit. Now I feel like I cheaped out on this,” he said grumpily.
“I think that EOTech combo costs the same. I almost went with that,” said Alex.
“But you didn’t,” said Charlie, still staring at Alex’s rifle.
He finally broke the attachment-envy-induced trance and joined them at the basement doorway.
“Christ, it’s dark down there,” Charlie remarked. “Did you open the bulkhead door?”
Alex looked up at Kate and shook his head. “We’re fucking idiots.”
“I’m not saying another word,” said Charlie, winking at Kate.
Five minutes later, the underwater world below looked vastly different. With mostly clear skies and fierce sunlight penetrating the southeast corner of the basement, he could see the outlines of the bottom stairs and a few of the shelves along the submerged facing wall. He felt better about the situation, though it did nothing to alleviate the oxygen situation.
“You think I should be able to find some air?” said Alex.
“Definitely. I’ve been marking the water progress on the wall next to my stairs,” said Charlie. “It’s dropped at least six inches in the last three hours. Before that it didn’t move. There has to be a pocket of air. You could always wait until later.”
“We don’t have another three hours. I need to know if the gear is part of our plan or not. It’s almost three. We’ll get everyone together when I’m done with this.”
“You could always use one of the garden hoses to breathe. I assume it’s still connected to the house,” said Charlie.
“I’ll take my chances holding my breath. That hose has been there for fifteen years.”
“How about I stick around while you go swimming—just in case?”
Alex nodded and activated the LED light attached to his mask. He’d used over a dozen rubber bands to tightly affix the waterproof flashlight. He had the option of using several head-mounted lamps scattered throughout their rucksacks, but couldn’t convince himself that they would continue to work submerged. He knew for a fact that this light would work, and in the environment below, he needed one-hundred-percent reliability. The light from the bulkhead opening would illuminate his path to the bunker door, but the area inside the bunker would be pitch black. He wasn’t taking any chances. He fitted the mask and adjusted the light to face directly forward.
“I always wanted to go cave diving,” he said and slid into the water after a deep breath.
The first thing he noticed was the cut on his forehead, which burned like someone held a match against it. A dozen other cuts and scrapes sounded off for a moment, but nothing could compete with the exhilaration of swimming through salt water in his basement. The cuts were a distant memory by the time his feet touched the concrete flooring.