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WYOMING:
Henry opens his eyes when he feels a thud in his seat from a tire running over something in the road. One of the guards sitting in the back of the cargo truck with him glances up for a moment, then looks away. The guard sitting beside him has his head tilted back against the rear wall and is snoring softly. He hasn’t seen Rita since the helicopters landed at a private airport, but at least the two men respected his age, or perhaps Rita told them to be considerate, and they didn’t tie his hands.
He looks down at the device strapped onto a wooden pallet and feels the truck slow down as it turns a corner and stops. He hears men talking outside, but the conversations are muffled. When the truck begins moving again, the road feels rough, tossing him from side to side. When it stops again, one of the guards stands and opens the rear door, allowing the dwindling sunlight to illuminate the interior.
Rita climbs out of a golf cart, walks around to the back of the enclosed cargo truck and looks at Henry sitting on the bench seat against the far wall. “Sorry for the rough treatment, Henry.”
Henry remains seated. “I will not help you, Rita.”
“Fine. Come with me and I’ll take you somewhere for dinner. I even have a place for you to sleep.”
Henry feels his stomach rumble when he hears the word dinner. He slowly gets up and walks past the device to the rear of the truck. When Rita reaches out to help him down, he shrugs her off and climbs out on his own. “I could use something to eat, but I will not change my mind.”
Rita knows Henry is tired and decides not to push the issue. “That’s okay. I’ll explain everything in the morning. Follow me.”
When Henry moves around the truck, he freezes in place when he sees the entrance into a mountain. He turns and stares at Rita. “Are we going underground?”
“That’s right. It’s an old research facility.”
Henry feels his heart rate increase. “I do not do well underground.”
“I promise you it’s safe.”
Henry turns and stares at the entrance into the facility. It’s an arched shaped concrete opening, twenty-feet high, and fifteen-feet across at the bottom, similar to a tunnel entrance on a highway. The face of the mountain around the entrance is a vertical wall of stone, two-hundred-feet high, and one-hundred-feet wide. Imbedded in the concrete above the opening, are the letters C.O.B.R.A. He looks at Rita. “What is COBRA?”
“It stands for Complex Organisms and Biological Research, Alien.” She indicates the waiting golf cart with her hand. “Get in. It’s a long walk to the facility.”
Henry hesitates to climb in. He’s not claustrophobic, but he is afraid of being buried alive. As a young boy in Germany, he had been playing with some friends in a flimsy old bomb shelter hastily constructed during World War II. It collapsed on him and he was trapped for three days, and he is not anxious to be below ground again.
One of the men puts his hand on Henry’s shoulder. “I’ll make sure you’re safe, Doctor Heinz.”
Henry turns and looks up at the guard who was snoring. He was courteous and respectful on the island when he clipped the harness onto him and they were hauled up into the helicopter. “Forgive me, but I do not even know your name, sir.”
“Chris Jenkins. I’ll be your escort while you’re here, Doctor. I’ll do my best to make you as comfortable as possible.”
Henry turns and reluctantly climbs into the rear seat of the golf cart. Once Rita sits in front, Chris climbs in behind the wheel and drives into the entrance. As they continue down a long level tunnel, Henry feels a knot form in his stomach. Fluorescent lights flash by overhead, illuminating the concrete floor and walls curving up to form the arched ceiling.
Three-hundred-yards further, the tunnel ends at a fifteen-foot-square, steel-framed opening. On the left side, massive hinges support a two-foot thick steel door for sealing the facility, which only adds to Henry’s anxiety.
They drive through the opening and enter an enormous circular chamber. The ceiling is shaped like a dome, one-hundred-feet high, and three-hundred-feet across at the bottom, and has a grid-work of steel rails with several mechanical hoists hanging from the ceiling. Chris stops the golf cart just inside the entrance and the three of them climb out. He leads them through a doorway into a lounge with a small kitchen for dining and entertainment and indicates the table and chairs. “Why don’t you two take a seat and I’ll fix us something to eat.”
After they sit down, Henry stares at Rita. “Will you at least tell me why you brought the device to this facility?”
“We need a safe place to conduct our experiments. This facility is leased from the government by the D.A.R Corporation. DAR is short for Demolition And Reconstruction. They contract with the government after any major disaster, such as hurricanes, tornadoes, bombings, just about every major catastrophe here in the states. It’s a billion dollar industry for those who get the contracts.”
“I do not understand. Why do you need the device?”
Rita knows why, but also knows if she tells Henry it will only strengthen his resolve not to cooperate. “All in good time.”
Henry thinks about the heavy steel door. “Did you see the movie, The Andromeda Strain?”
Rita grins. “Both versions, and you’re right to make the association. During the beginning of the space program in the sixties, the government was worried about bringing samples back from the moon. They set up this abandoned gold mine as a place to study the material, and in 1970, the facility was sealed. One day a congressional representative convinced the government this place was outdated, and a wasted resource, and it should be leased under contract to the highest bidder. The owner of DAR, Steve Preston, underbid his competitors and now has full use of this facility.”
Award-winning author James M. Corkill is a Veteran, and retired Federal Firefighter from Washington State, USA. He was an electronic technician and studied mechanical engineering in his spare time before eventually becoming a firefighter for 32-years and retiring. He has since settled into the Appalachian Mountains of western North Carolina, and has a fantastic view from his writing desk.
He began writing in 1997, and was fortunate to meet a famous horror writer named Hugh B. Cave, who became his mentor. In 2002, he rushed to self-published a dozen copies of Dead Energy so his wife could see his book published before she was taken by cancer. When his soul mate was gone, he stopped writing and began drinking heavily.
His favorite quote. “When you wake up in the morning, you never know where the day will take you.”
In 2013, he met a stranger who recognized his name and had enjoyed an old copy of Dead Energy, except for the ending. When she encouraged him to start writing again, he realized this chance meeting was just what he needed to hear at the right moment. He quit drinking and began the rewrite of Dead Energy into The Alex Cave Series, and thankful for that fateful encounter.
You can contact him at jamesmcorkill@gmail.com
Other books by James M. Corkill
Dead Energy. The Alex Cave Series Book 1.
Red Energy. The Alex Cave Series Book 3.
Gravity. The Alex Cave Series Book 4.
Pandora’s Eyes. The Alex Cave Series Book 5.
DNA. The Alex Cave Series Book 6.