High Pressure System: First Season Underground (12 page)

“You have been asked to head the project.” I pointed at Aaron. Murmuring filled the room and Aaron’s melancholy face brightened.

“Me?”

“Yes, you. Unless you don’t want to head the project. I can find someone else.” I paused to let it sink in and I could tell he was quickly warming up to the idea. “You must be a leader that will guide the rest of the class. No belittling anyone, make it a learning project.” I walked away so I could hide the smile that crept across my face when he sat up much taller in his chair as if he was eager for the challenge.

“Oh, I want the project.”

“Okay, good. Your sister and I were able to protect our feet with aluminum foil. That is not a practical solution for using long term if this continues and it can fail if not wrapped carefully. Everyone will need to research acid proof materials and you will need to come up with a solution that will work with materials we already have.”

I let them lose. Aaron divided the teenagers into groups, making sure the ages of the kids were balanced. For the rest of the class, they brainstormed materials and made lists of what they could make into a boot and then crossed things off when it wasn’t a material they could walk in easily. When it was time to go, no one wanted to. With the exception of me. I really needed to go visit Jim.

“I am excited over your eagerness for this project. However, can you guys come back to it tomorrow?” I was anxious since there had been no lock-down yet for the day and I didn’t want Jim to be alone if there was one. And my dogs had been home alone far too long. I didn’t have enough time to take them to The Farm that morning.

“You can go if you want. I’d like to keep working. I’m not allowed to be anywhere but here or with my family for a while. Honestly, I’d rather be here than with them.” Aaron’s face flushed when he admitted his punishment.

I hesitated. He removed himself from the group to come talk to me in private.

“I’m really sorry.” Aaron examined the pattern on the wall and traced it with his finger. “I really want to succeed with this project so I can make it up to you. You can go. You won’t be disappointed.”

I chewed on my lip for a minute. He was sincere and all of the teens were really engrossed in what they were doing. “Make sure you clean the room. No getting into anything or starting something on the 3D printers without supervision from the tech crew.”

“You sound like my mom. I promise. You can count on me.” He finally looked at me.

I nodded slowly. “All right. Prove your worth, apprentice.” I gave him a little smirk. He went right back to the group directing them on what they needed to figure out next.

I loaded up a couple of hard plastic take-out trays in the cafeteria and headed for my apartment. Once I had the dogs and Rocky bouncing around my feet in the stairway, the lock-down music started playing and echoed off the walls.

I had to hustle to Jim’s apartment before I was locked out for good. The rumbling was rather intense from the start. I knocked, hoping that he hadn’t made it to the thumb pad yet. I had no idea how much the heart attack slowed him down.

“Good timing. I was hoping you’d make it.” He let me in and the dogs romped around the room. Once we did our obligated lock-down check-in duty, I set our food down on the table.

The dogs started barking. “Hey, shhh …” I glared at them.

“If we can get them quiet, listen.” He dangled a cracker over their heads. They were silent as they danced on their hind legs eager for a treat.

I could hear it, a clicking-scratching sound in the ductwork near the ceiling. “They barked at a noise like that the other night. We were in lock-down then too.”

“Can you take the vent cover off?” Jim slid a chair over to the wall.

“I don’t want to find a mouse.” I studied the metal grate as I stepped on the chair. “Do you have a screwdriver or a flashlight?” I listened intently while Jim rummaged through a drawer. The noise was clicking a little closer.

There was pounding on the door. “Security. You need to open up the door after we override the lock-in procedure.”

Jim handed me what I needed before he went to the door.

Once he opened it, the security guards barged in, locking us all in together.

“We need to search your apartment,” the bossy one said as he hitched up his pants. I decided his name had to be Bossy Pants since he never bothered to mention his name for the second time in two days.

“For what?” Jim was rather miffed.

“There’s a signal we’re trying to trace and it is here.” Bossy pants looked at me. “There was something on your floor last night but we were sent for the boy before we could track it down.”

“How do you even know?” I asked. I was no longer sure if I should check the vent.

“What are you doing? Are you hiding something up there?” He scowled as he crossed the room and pointed at the vent emphatically.

I was all too eager to let him look so he could discover the mice if they were up there. “There was some noise in the duct and I was checking to see what it was. The dogs were barking at it. In fact they were barking at something like this in my apartment last night.”

I handed the bossy man’s bored friend the screwdriver and flashlight. When the scratching started again, the dogs barked all over again. The guard handed the screwdriver and flashlight over to Bossy Pants. No doubt he felt he was in charge of the world and bored guard already knew that. Probably a good choice. Let Bossy Pants take charge and then no one can disappoint him.

He stood on the chair and unscrewed the vent in no time. The noise sounded as if it scurried away when he shined the light in the duct. “What was that?” He stuffed his head and shoulders in the vent. “Hey.” His muffled voice echoed against the metal making it sound like he was stuffed in a tin can. “where’s that signal?”

“It’s not as strong. I think it’s moving.” The bored guard actually seemed interested in what he was looking at on the screen.

The bossy one popped out of the duct once he got himself unstuck and nearly fell off the chair. “That was it. That’s the signal.”

“What was it?” Jim asked.

“I’m not sure. It looked a little like a spider but robotic. There are no real spiders that are that big.”

“Where did it go?” It was definitely something that interested the bored guard.

“East side of the building. We can’t go chase it yet because of that storm.”

“Brandon’s been chasing the signal for weeks. It always happens before the storms show up and while we’re in lock-down.”

“He said last night it was almost traceable. It took a long time for it to shut off. When it stays on longer, the storms seem to last longer too.”

“Ahh … It stopped the signal.” Bored guard shook the screen as if that would make it come back.

“I almost grabbed it but I didn’t know what it was and I’ve never been a fan of spiders.” He jumped down from the chair and the floor shook.

“I think we should head down the hall.” The bored guy became the go-getter as he went for the thumb pad.

“I don’t know. I’m not a fan of the suction from those storms. I’ve had a few close calls.” Bossy Pants was changing personality too.

“I don’t care for that either,” I said and they both looked at me as if I intruded on their discussion.

“It’s just water coming in now,” bored guard argued.

“It’s water that will eat through your skin,” I said.

They both paused and glared at me.

“My science class is working on acid proof shoes. I wouldn’t chance it in the stairs until you have better protection.” I could tell my advice wasn’t welcome.

“We don’t tell you how to teach your class, you don’t need to tell us how to take care of ourselves. We’ve had plenty of experience in the halls when you’ve been in lock-down.”

“All right, guys,” Jim spoke up. “I’m supposed to be resting. You can leave and risk your lives all you want. I don’t need you starting an argument in my home with someone who has had just as much experience outside of lock-down as you. Have you seen what the acid water does to skin?”

“Come on,” Bossy Pants said as he opened the door and they left.

“Sometimes those two take their titles a little too seriously.” Jim sat down on his sofa. He did look weary.

I stepped up on the chair and shined the flashlight down the duct. I couldn’t see a thing. Whatever it was, it was gone. Those two wouldn’t find it even if they entered every apartment on the floor. I fiddled with the screw trying to get it to go in straight.

“Don’t make it too tight. I think we should make sure we can access the vent if we hear it again.”

“I’m having a hard time getting it to go in as it is. I wouldn’t want to make it so that thing could get in your apartment.”

“Good point. I don’t have the guard dogs you have.”

“They aren’t much protection. I had an uninvited visitor last night.”

“Who? Brandon?”

“No. I don’t think he has a creeper bone in his body. Micah is keeping his distance too so I don’t think I have to worry about him either. It was Aaron.”

“Aaron?”

“Marjie’s brother. I asked her to tell him to leave me alone. She thought he was harmless. Harmless creeper I guess.”

“What did he do?”

“He broke in and let the dogs out in the hall, giving them some leftovers so they never alerted me he was there. He was just sitting in my room watching me sleep. I guess he read something in a book that made it sound romantic or something. Then we were stuck together in lock-down.”

“How did that go?” he asked. I was sure he was stifling a laugh while he was acting concerned.

I squinted at him, trying to figure out if I was humoring him. “I told him off. I also said he needed to act more like a friend. I had no romantic interest in him. I think he did it because he saw me with Micah and that got him all fired up. He did get in trouble at home. Then I had to deal with him at school today, but he was pretty repentant. I put him in charge of coming up with a material the 3D printer can print into boots.”

“Now that is the way to deal with an uncomfortable situation. He’s a smart kid isn’t he?”

“Yes. I think he needs more ways to use his brain. Brandon should mentor him.”

I took our food out of the containers so we could have dinner before it was gross and inedible.

I enjoyed my evening with Jim. The shock of how close he was to dying was hard on him. I could pretend to be strong and reassure him when I was there. However once I left, I felt the weight of almost losing him wash over me. I wondered if going home was a good idea. It looked as if the water had filled the stairs again and ate away more concrete.

When I entered the hallway on my floor, Marjie was sitting on the floor near my apartment.

“Wow, it’s awful late. How long have you been here?” I let the dogs in the door.

“Not all that long. I have news for you.”

“Really?” I opened the door wider so she could come in.

“No, you should come with me.” With the mischievous smile on her face, I had a good idea I wouldn’t be disappointed.

I fed the dogs and Rocky real quick and followed her down the hall.

“I found his apartment,” she sing-songed to me.

“Seriously?”

“Yes. He must come home filthy all the time judging by the condition of the carpet coming from his apartment.”

“Really?”

“You have to see it.”

We descended the stairs a few flights and she opened the door. Stepping into the hall, I felt as if I was somewhere I didn’t belong. Maybe he didn’t want me to know where he lived for a reason.

“You can’t miss it.” She pointed towards a door down the hall and sure enough, the carpet changed from blue to brown at that door and it went all the way to the other end of the hall.

“Why is the dirt going that way?” I asked.

“I’ve been checking things out. Especially since they said this place had an elevator. That is the way to the industrial lift. They created a false wall to cover it. I’d show it to you but I think you need to go knock on his door and say hi before it gets any later.”

“Wait, what?” I did a double take. Marjie was leaving.

“Consider this a favor. You helped me find out information about my boyfriend and I owe you after my brother too. Micah seems lonely and he obviously likes you. Maybe you need to go out of your way to find him to prove that you do like him back. You don’t need to tell him I was the one who figured out where he lives. Just let him know it was easy with that trail he’s left down the hall.” Marjie gave me a quick hug. “I won’t spread rumors. But I will be pretty happy if can watch and speculate about what might be happening between you two.”

“Can you keep Brandon preoccupied?” I asked as she pulled the door open to the stairs.

Marjie looked at me and smiled. “Why would I want to do that? I like the drama.” She winked and laughed as she went down the stairs.

I scowled at the door where Marjie disappeared and clenched my fists when I turned to face the hallway. Against my better judgment, my feet took me to the filthy carpet and I was standing in front of his door. Micah should be in there. He said he wasn’t going to work for a few days, unless he was down in the community room.

My hand was poised over the door and I was about to knock when I heard clanging and scraping coming from his apartment. He sounded busy. Maybe I was interrupting him. However, I wouldn’t have time to come back. When I did have time, perhaps we’d be in lock-down again or he would go back to work before he was supposed to.

I sucked in a deep breath and knocked on the door. Something crashed and then it sounded as if things were being thrown across the room as his footfalls came closer to the door. I looked at the floor and smiled. I knew that feeling.

The door opened a crack and I could only see half of his face. When he saw it was me, his eyes widened. He slipped through the narrow opening and closed the door.

“It is pretty late. I wasn’t expecting anyone to stop by. Usually no one stops by ever.” Micah brushed dust off his pants. His bandaged hand was covered in an oven mitt that was as dirty as the rest of him.

“It was easy to tell you weren’t asleep. It seems as if we are all getting our nights and days mixed up down here.” That’s what Brandon said once before. It was useful now. “I just left Jim’s apartment so I thought you might like to hear how he was doing and I wondered how your hand is doing.” I rocked back and forth on my heels with my hands behind my back. I was starting to act like Micah too.

“How did you find my apartment?”

My face reddened as I tried to come up with a believable answer. “Isn’t it obvious?” I pointed to the floor. No, that wouldn’t have been obvious to me if I had been the one trying to find him.

“Oh. So you know what I’m up to?” he asked giving me a hard scrutinizing look.

“Not exactly. I thought you weren’t supposed to be working.” It did sound like a construction crew was inside.

“I wasn’t actually
working
.” He avoided eye contact. “How’s Jim.”

“Tired but fine.” I flicked some mud off the wall.

“You came all the way here to tell me that?”

“No. How’s your hand?”

“Fine.”

I nodded, grasping for something more to say. We were getting nowhere fast. “We had some excitement though. There has been some signal in the bunker they’ve been trying to track down and I think we figured out what it was.”

“Oh?” Micah finally glanced at me, but still seemed distracted.

“It was in the duct. One of the security crew thought it was a robot spider or something. That’s crazy, isn’t it?”

“No, that’s not crazy.” He was about to go into his apartment when he stopped and turned back to face me. “Remember when you’re apartment was a mess and you wouldn’t let me in?”

I nodded slowly. He was probably about to tell me goodbye.

“You remember when I said I had a project and someday I’d show you?”

“I think so.”

“Well, you’ve been warned. My place isn’t just a mess, it is a disaster. I’m still in the middle of my secret project. You can’t share this with anyone. Not Jim, especially not that gossiping girl, and absolutely not Brandon.

Disappointment quickly escalated to excitement. I found his place (with Marjie’s help) and he was actually going to let me in.

Micah wasn’t kidding. There were shovels, a pick, and two gray enormous wheelie bins in the middle of his living area. His kitchen was covered in dirty dishes. At least it looked like he had a grasp on cooking, unlike me. Dirt, not just a little dirt, but full on muddy dirt covered the floor near the bedroom.

“What is going on in here?” I had to watch my step.

“Wait, I want to show you something.” Micah moved some piles around on his table until he found what he was looking for. “Here it is.” He held up a bent leg that looked as if it came from a huge spider and it was robotic.

“What the heck!” I held it up in front of my face. Each leg section was as long as my finger. “That is not a small spider.”

“No, it’s not. And it is not easy to catch. It is short a leg now. I got this a few weeks ago. I thought maybe Brandon was trying to spy on everyone with it. If I could have caught it, I would have destroyed it and told no one. It sacrificed its limb and got away. It has some sort of stinger too. It didn’t get me, but it sure wouldn’t tickle if it got me with that thing. Who knows what kind of toxin it is carrying in it.”

“You really thought it was Brandon spying on you?”

“He has been so paranoid, it made sense. He has the ability to make computers out of anything we have stored in here. He’s built everything we use.”

“Couldn’t he have just wired a system into our rooms? It would probably be in the thumb pads if he wanted to spy on us.”

“Look, I spend all my off time in here alone. I didn’t say my conclusions were rational.”

“Are you going to take this to Brandon?” I extended it and retracted it. It was quite fascinating.

“If I did, I might have to explain myself. You should take it to him since you seem to know what this thing is up to.”

“Seriously? Everyone here has been great at passing the buck to me lately. You all should start paying me since I’m suddenly the bunker messenger.” However, I wanted to keep the leg to study it before giving it to Brandon. “Well, maybe I will take it to him if you show me why you have this huge mess in your apartment. It’s not much of a secret with the trail of dirt going down the hall. Anyone can see you’re up to something.”

“If anyone were to ask, I’d tell them I like to bring my work home with me.” He shrugged as he stacked the dishes on the table and moved them over to the sink. “But no one has ever asked.”

I leaned against a chair. Something was under one of the legs and I almost fell over.

Micah grabbed my elbow with his good hand and helped me up. He was inches away from me. I would like to say he smelled all manly again. That was true, but it wasn’t the clean manly that would make me want to cozy up to him. More like the opposite. I wasn’t about to complain about it and ruin something I’d been hoping for.

He seemed to read my mind because he took a step back. “Sorry, nothing personal. I haven’t been able to shower today and I’ve been trying to keep myself busy.”

“Can you shower with that on your hand?”

He pulled the oven mitt off and tossed it on the kitchen counter where it knocked a cup over. “Man.” He rubbed his forehead.

He was really cute when he was embarrassed. “Why don’t you show me your big secret. You promised me you would.”

“I did promise.” He still hesitated. “It’s not that I don’t want you to see it. I wasn’t prepared to share what I’ve been doing with anyone yet. It is still a work in progress.” Micah walked to the bedroom. He pushed the door open. The light was off and there was light coming from somewhere near the back of the room. He flipped the side of the bed up and it folded into the wall.

“That kind of bed has a weird a name. I always thought they were cool.”

“A Murphy bed?” He kicked some clothes out of the way.

“Yeah, that’s it.” That was not the only special thing about his room. The headboard stayed put on the back wall and there was a sliver of light coming from the bottom. Micah pulled on a handle. The headboard and a section of the wall opened up like a door and it was as if I was blinded by sunlight. It took a few moments for my eyes to adjust as humidity rolled out of the room and washed over me. I took a couple of steps into the massive room to take it all in.

We were on the inside of a well-lit carefully carved cave and it was breathtaking. I could scarcely take it all in. It was his own hydroponics but he made to look like an English garden. It was far more massive than it appeared at first and it was immaculately cared for, unlike his apartment. The lights that hung from the ceiling were hidden by dangling plants. Some of the upside down hanging plants had ripe red tomatoes coloring the intense green. I walked along a mosaic path. Even that was work of art. He had built a pond, or perhaps it was a stream, that flowed around the perimeter of the room. Fruit trees and berry bushes and strawberry plants were growing around the stream. I thought I saw movement in the water. Sure enough there were a few fish. I was speechless. In the center of the room were grow boxes of vegetables and lettuces. One end of the room was his sofa, near a small waterfall. Behind the sofa was a row of tubes full of circulating green water. The light was brighter on that end of the room.

“What is this place?” I felt as if I just entered The Secret Garden. The garden had to be the biggest secret in the bunker.

“I wanted the real outdoors. Digging keeps my mind occupied. Making this garden look the way it would up above brings me peace over all the things I can’t control. I can control what is here and it can sustain me so I don’t have to depend on all the others if anything goes really wrong down here. I can shut myself away and live here a long time. I’m still digging over here.” He led me to the back corner. It looked as if he was creating another big room.

“This area will be my own little farm. I want to bring in some chickens. Protein is important. That is what is missing. In the next hatching, I will be bringing home a few chicks. The fish are more for the fertilizer. The water is for the garden. The power in here is generated by the algae in the tubes over there. I have a fresh water source I’ve tapped into. Once my chickens come, I could live in here a long time.” He pulled a cover over some boxes.

I looked away, I wasn’t going to pry if he didn’t want me to see what he had stacked there. I was astounded at what he had been creating while the rest of us struggled to find our own peace with our circumstances. Reading books and teaching science seemed so lame compared to what he had already accomplished.

“In case you were wondering about how I managed to collect all this, I’ve been paid for the work I’ve done before everyone arrived. All that money is pretty much worthless now. Sometimes I take my payments in things. However, I did order some specialty plants and the water feature parts before everyone came and they are all mine. I’ve traded my construction skills for some of the plants and the energy setup. We don’t have a system like that in the main building though. I have another energy generator that I’m building that is even simpler than the algae and will give me an endless supply of power.” He gently pulled me away from his stash in the corner and steered me to the sofa. “I would love to sit here with you, but I think I need a shower first. There are some ripe berries over there if you want to pick some while I take care of my stink.”

He left and all I could do was wander through the room. I could imagine I was outdoors in a fancy garden with how he landscaped everything in his cave. Lots of camouflaged grow boxes were filled with mature vegetables. He even had pots full of multicolored flowers. There was movement in the flowers. He even had honeybees. That didn’t excite me as much as everything else. It would make sense. Otherwise he’d have to pollinate everything by hand.

I was eating a few strawberries when Micah returned.

“What do you make of this?” Micah’s wounded hand was free of its bandage. The skin looked red and angry.

“I don’t remember it looking that bad.”

“That’s what I thought. I hurts much worse.”

“Do you want to go back and have a nurse check it?” I held his wrist gently and couldn’t decide how much worse it looked. Sometimes bandages inflamed the very thing it was trying to protect. He smelled so much better, though. A whole lot better. I was hoping he would stay put and he would ask me to stay and …Wait. I had the dogs to go home to. However, Rocky would love the cave garden. The dogs would too. Unfortunately, they would probably want to pee on everything that shouldn’t be peed on.

“Can you help me wrap it again?” Micah asked.

“You don’t want to let it air out?”

“It hurts much worse with air on it.” He pulled out a roll of gauze from under his arm. “Let’s go sit down.”

That was going to be too much for me. Or not. Sitting with Micah in his romantic garden. It was the best thing that happened to me since I arrived at the bunker. My heart raced as I followed him to the sofa at the back of the cave room. He sat down, gripping his wrist as if it was somehow helping with the pain. The appreciative look he gave me wilted any resolve I had trying to keep my distance, from liking him too much. I couldn’t pretend that I didn’t like being near him. I sat down, my knee against his, and moved his arm so it rested on my leg while I carefully wrapped each finger individually the way he asked me to. Not too tight. I kept drawing in discreet deep inhales. He smelled really good. I could sit there bandaging his hand all night long. If I kept it up, he’d have an old fashioned catcher’s mitt. I shook my head and finished.

“What’s wrong?” He leaned his head down a little lower to catch my eye.

“Nothing. I had to stop letting my mind wander.” I taped the gauze down.

“Wander where?” He tilted my head up and met my gaze.

“Nothing special. Like, umm, wrapping your hand until it is more like a boxing glove so I have an excuse to stay right here a little longer?”

He laughed. He actually laughed really hard and shook his head. “That’s where your mind wanders? You can’t come up with something better, huh?”

“I don’t know. Maybe?” It was far too uncomfortable to say what
could
be running through my mind. My heart was pounding hard and fast in my ears. Micah didn’t stop staring at me. He could be reading my mind again.

He started to lean in when a flashing light caught his attention. He stood up straight and bit his lip.

“What is that?” It must have been a blood pressure alert. Mine had to be outrageously high and the light didn’t think I could handle his lips on mine.

“That’s the lock-down signal, I didn’t lock the door. Is it going to be an issue if Brandon knows you checked in here?” He held out his good hand to help me up.

“I can just tell him I was checking on you. Your hand does have me concerned.” I followed him into the apartment.