Stasis: A Will Vullerman Anthology (3 page)

"Destination is beneath the ground and cannot be seen.”

"Thank you for telling me the obvious."

"You are welcome," replied the comm system.

Will walked to his left about twelve or so meters, but he didn't see anything. "Call Immanuel," he told his comm.

Immanuel answered the call on the second ring. "You d'ere?" he said.

"Yeah, but I don't see anything."

There was silence from Immanuel's end. "Hold on, let me check somet'ing," Immanuel said. Will waited.

"D'ere," Immanuel said. "Accordin' ta th' report, th' entrance was in a hollow, beneat' a hill. If you tear away th' grass, you should find a place ta punch in you numbers."

Will bent down on the rise and thumped around in the grass with a gloved fist. Towards the bottom of the rise there was a metallic noise.

"I think I found it." Will dug his fingers into the grass and tore it up by the roots, uncovering a rusty lid. He easily wrenched it off its hinges, exposing a dusty, grimy square touchpad. As soon as the light of the sun touched it, it turned on and a set of keys appeared.

"Beep me once you get it open," Immanuel said. There was a click.

"Call terminated," the comm said.

Will called up the coordinates on his wrist reader, and carefully punched them into the touchpad. Once he had touched the last number, the touchpad dinged, and turned off.

Will stood back...and waited.

Nothing happened.

And then the ground began to shake—vibrating, rumbling, quaking. Will backed away from the rise as it got worse.

Like a dog shaking itself off after jumping in water, the hill shed its grassy coat. Dirt streamed from it, until the unmistakable sheen of steel shone dully beneath it. A door?

With one final shudder, it rid itself of the last of the dirt. And with a click, the steel door opened.

"Dial Immanuel," Will said. He took a step forward.

"Redirecting call," the comm replied.

Immanuel was probably forwarding his signal on to HQ. Will waited.

"Vullerman?"

Will recognized the voice—Sunglasses again. "Sir."

"Is the gateway open?"

"Yes, sir. I was preparing to enter."

There was a short pause. "Good. According to our sources, there's still a blocking signal surrounding the area. We will no longer be able to communicate with you once you enter the door. Once you've discovered what's inside, however, you are to come back outside and report. Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir."

"You are free to go now. We'll be keeping the comm signal open for your return."

"Thank you." Will took a deep breath and pushed open the steel door, entering the darkness within. He caught a glimpse of grey concrete, but then, with a thump, the light suddenly disappeared. He turned.

The door had shut behind him, leaving him in near-total darkness. He put his palms on the metal and shoved, but the door didn't even shift, much less open.

So he was trapped. At least for now. Later, he might be able to find a place to punch in his coordinates again, but now he had no choice but to continue with his mission.

A chill ran down his spine. What if there was something down here? Something still alive? Nuclear influence could warp DNA, make cells mutate. Might it have done something here?

And if there
was
something in the darkness...

"Any signal?" he asked his comm system.

"Negative," his comm said. "No signal."

“What about life signs?”

There was a pause. “A scan has been attempted, but the signals have returned corrupted.”

So he was alone. If something bad happened, he wouldn't be able to call for help. And he didn't even know if there was something alive down here.

Will pushed the thoughts out of his head. Never mind what he couldn't do; it was time to concentrate on what he could. He had a mission, and he had to fulfill it.

"Give me some light.”

Out of one fingertip beamed a small LED light. It cut back the darkness and showed Will the room he had walked into—no, it was a passageway, leading into the depths of the earth. The floor and walls glinted beneath his light. A tap with his foot confirmed it: it was some sort of metal. Steel, perhaps. Someone had invested a lot of money into this, then.

Time to go. HQ was expecting an update soon, so he'd better get on with it.

He started down the hallway. It reminded him of a book his grandparents had read aloud to him when he was younger. It had been written ages ago, but it was still a classic. He sure hoped he was heading to a world better than the one he had left behind, like the characters in the old story.

"Further up and further in," he muttered.

************

The passage curved down into the bowels of the earth. It made sense, Will supposed. The farther underground he went, the less he could be affected by the world outside.

After twenty minutes, Will came upon a steel door. He frowned. He didn't have any coordinates for other doors. Or would it use the same coordinates as the first door?

He searched the door with his light. No visible handle. His light stopped at a box just beside the door. A touchpad, perhaps? He lifted up the box and found a switch just beneath it, made of shiny steel and wider than his hand. With a little effort, Will threw the switch.

The door hissed, and then edged open on what was apparently electronic gears. Will flashed his light through the opening doorway, glimpsing a small chamber beyond. He walked through the doorway, and into the chamber.

It wasn't much wider than the hallway, and only six or seven meters long. An identical door with an identical switch sat at the end of the chamber.

Will stepped forward and pulled the switch down. But instead of the door in front of him opening, he heard the grinding of gears behind him.

No! Will cursed himself and turned, flashing his light at the door, but it was too late. With a hiss, the first door shut, and he could hear the locking of the gears through his speakers.

Shoot. Now what?

But even as the thought crossed his mind, he heard a whirring in the air. With a sudden lurch of apprehension, he realized that the chamber was exactly like an airlock. Fool! Hadn't he at least thought things through before throwing the switch? His suit filtered the air; it didn't provide it. If the air was being sucked out, then he could die.

"Comm, atmosphere reading, please." Will's voice cracked.

"Carbon dioxide levels are rising, radiation is diminishing. Other levels are staying steady."

Will let out a sigh. The chamber must have been filtering out the air from outside and replacing it with its own.

The whirring stopped.

"No radiation detected," the comm said.

Will scanned the chamber again. There was no sign of the door opening, but at least he wasn't going to die. "Habitability analysis?"

"The air is safe for human life."

Good. He took off his helmet and breathed the air. It was a little stale. He was underground, after all. But it still tasted a lot better than the air he had breathed in urban Europe.

Click.

Will whirled about, shining his light in the direction of the sound, toward the second door. With a whir, the door began to open.

Swallowing hard, Will stepped through the door.

And a bullet ricocheted off the steel wall, mere centimeters from his head.

Ding!

Will's training kicked in, and he dove for the floor, dropping his helmet. What about the door? His light raced to the door he had just gone through. Closing.

"Light off," Will shouted, and his light clicked off, leaving him in total darkness.

He breathed in deep, calming breaths, striving against the sudden influx of adrenaline. Somewhere, there was a gun. That much was certain. The question was, was it being used by an automated turret or a real person?

He had seen no signs of life so far, so there was a good chance it was a computerized sentry of some sort.

Will moved to his right. If the computer-sentry could sense light and movement, then it would concentrate on the place it had last seen him. He hoped that the computer couldn't detect sound as well, but just in case, he tried to be as quiet as possible.

Will's mind raced. How would he dodge the bullets, assuming there were more? It came from somewhere in front of him. So if he could find his way across the room—if it was a room—he might be able to reach safety. That is, if there were no more ambushes ahead.

And he hoped that there was safe air wherever he was going, because he wasn't about to go looking for his helmet.

Will crouched and began to move forward, but as he did, he spotted a glow farther ahead of him.

A human?

He reached back and felt for his handgun, tucked into the back of his suit. There. His finger found the trigger, and he brought it forward, resting it against his thigh.

The glowing figure's features became clear. A girl. A little girl, not more than eight, with dark hair pulled back in a ponytail, wearing a mid twenty-first century dress.

And holding a gun, loosely in one hand.

The girl's eyes were blank. Like she didn't know what she was doing. It chilled Will's heart. What in the blazes was going on here?

She raised the gun. A shot rang out, and the bullet sparked on the steel flooring, not three meters away.

Will's hands trembled. He tried to raise the gun. Couldn't he defend himself? Wasn't it okay, in self-defense? His finger tightened around the trigger. His breathing spun out of control.

No. He couldn't. He couldn't—he
wouldn't
—defend himself against a little girl. He couldn't shoot.

He threw his gun down and stood up.

And then the little girl disappeared. Bright lights powered on along the ceiling, revealing a long hallway. Dust dimmed the shine of the steel where it hadn't before. Strange. Perhaps the radiation had something to do with the lack of dust in the previous rooms.

Will examined the area. Five meter ceiling, sleek walls and floors. And mounted on the wall to Will's left was some sort of automated artillery.

He let out a breath. So the little girl
was
an illusion. Will shivered. No wonder America had been attacked. They had technology that was far more advanced than anything Will had ever seen. All he could think was that, somehow, he had passed a test, and that the image of the little girl was created by a computer and projected. Perhaps it was a way of making sure that the intruders didn't have hostile intent.

But it had looked real.

Will picked up his handgun and shoved it in the pocket on the back of his suit. His helmet lay nearby. He grabbed it and put it under his arm, starting down the hallway.

So what was so valuable that so much money had been invested in this place? Why was it so hidden and protected?

He hoped to find out.

************

He rounded a bend and found yet another door waiting for him. Will glanced around. The passage led nowhere else, so perhaps this was his destination.

This door, however, had handles. Good, old-fashioned handles. Will switched his helmet to his left hand and grabbed the handle, yanking the door open.

A solitary light glowed above the door, with darkness beyond. The light revealed metal caskets in rows, as far as he could see, receding into the darkness. Each casket was roughly three to four meters long and half as tall as Will was. A green light glowed beneath each casket. Even beyond the reach of the light, he could see the soft green glow of other caskets, like some subterranean field from a penny-dreadful steampunk novel.

The sight instantly made him think of coffins. Will shuddered, but forced his mind to something else. It would do no good to be morbid.

To his left, there was some sort of a booth: two "walls" about a meter and a half high, a chair, and what looked like a large, boxy touchpad on a center wall, which was a few centimeters higher than the other panels.

Will knew he should probably examine the touchpad first, but his curiosity got the better of him. He moved to the nearest casket and examined it. Steel, as far as he could tell. At the end closest to Will, there was a label on top. Words glowed on the label. He leaned down and read, "Lana Shepherd—Wichita, Kansas".

Will backed away. Was it really a coffin? What kind of a graveyard was this?

Swallowing hard, he leaned over the 'coffin' again. On the side of the coffin, there appeared to be a panel. He pushed gently with his fingertips, and it slid smoothly back. There was a touchpad beneath, and words glowed on the screen. It read, "Stasis level: full stasis. Stasis status: functional and livable for stasis patient. Stasis patient status: alive and in suspension. Aging disabled."

Will's breath caught. In stasis? So the person was
alive
?

"God almighty," he breathed. It wasn't a curse, or an exclamation: it was a praise. This discovery could revolutionize everything. If the scientists back home could decipher the technology used to keep people in stasis, NRC would be eradicated, as would many other diseases. With
years
to treat a patient, doctors would be able to save millions of lives.