Frozen (Final Dawn Book 10) Page 2

  They were intrigued, but not stupid. They wouldn’t try to gain entry to see what was inside. Not after reading a sign on the door, purportedly from the Bureau of Mines, warning that the mine was unstable and had collapsed.

  Timing is a magical thing. It determines who lives and dies, who’s rich and poor, and who finds true love and who doesn’t.

  Timing, in this case, was key in determining the Green brothers’ future as well as the future for those who were in the mine preparing it for another disaster.

  For it was right after the brothers had read the sign and decided it was too dangerous to go farther, that they returned to the nearby woods to resume their hunt. And heard the roar of an eighteen wheeler approaching.

  It piqued their curiosity, for it wasn’t something they normally heard from the stillness of the woods.

  They watched from inside the tree line as the massive overhead door suddenly rumbled to life. As it opened, a young woman went to one knee, aiming an AR-15 rifle in their general direction, though it was obvious she did not see them.

  As the door continued to rise a Kenworth tractor, towing a 53-foot refrigerated box trailer, pulled up and waited to enter. Then it pulled into the mine and the door closed shut behind it.

  They lost all interest in hunting rabbits for the time being, and stayed at their position for another two hours.

  In that time they saw the door open several more times, as tractor trailer combinations arrived and tractors left again.

  Each time, the procedure followed the same pattern.

  Finally bored with the routine of the operation, the brothers resumed their hunt.

  On their way back to the abandoned house they’d claimed as their own some two miles away, the day’s kill in hand, they finally spoke about what they’d seen.

  Neither brother, though, was particularly smart. They could thank their mother and father for that, for they weren’t exactly Rhodes scholars themselves.

  Neither could fathom any possible reason why four different drivers, driving four different trucks, might be hauling trailers into an abandoned mine and depositing them there.

  Their first inclination, since they now possessed criminal minds, was to try to figure out a way to use the knowledge to their advantage.

  But since they weren’t particularly intelligent, they couldn’t think of any. Even if the material on the trucks was of any value, they’d have to figure out how to break in to get it.

  And that in itself would be a problem.

  For the girl at the door with a rifle obviously meant business.

  And who knew how many others, similarly armed, were inside the mine and couldn’t be seen.

  And besides, the trailers they were hauling in looked like the hundreds of others which dotted the shoulders of every state highway in the area. Not to mention nearby Interstate 10.

  Those trailers were free for the picking. It seemed stupid, even to the brothers, to break into an armed camp to steal something they could get elsewhere without risk.

  They finally decided that, while curious indeed, the abandoned mine wasn’t worth their efforts.

  They took a pass.

  But then, a few months later, the sky suddenly got dark again, and temperatures plummeted quickly.

  And that changed everything.

  -3-

  The smell of the millions of tons of earth thrown instantly into the skies actually preceded the skies’ darkening by several minutes.

  No one knew why, exactly. Meteorologists probably could have explained the phenomenon by calling up charts of wind patterns and relative humidity and other factors, but the weathermen were all dead now.

  And their scientific explanations wouldn’t have mattered in the least anyway; for it wouldn’t have stopped what everyone knew was coming.

  Hannah and the others, who’d sought shelter in the mine before Saris 7 struck, were the exception. All the other survivors recognized the rich earthly smell for what it was.

  A warning of impending doom.

  The darkening of the skies not long after confirmed their worst fears.

  And the plummeting temperatures which resulted from the darkened skies, once it happened, were expected.

  Around the world, tens of thousands of people who were armed started holding the barrels of their weapons against their temples and pulling the triggers.

  The hopelessness of going through another long freeze was just too much for them to bear.

  Hannah and Frank Woodard, unable to reach all the drivers by radio, instead sent Rachel a strict instruction:

  “After each driver returns with their next load, do not allow them to leave again. Have them park their rigs inside the mine and then report to the big house. When the last of them returns, we want you to secure the overhead door and come as well. We need to get everyone together to decide where we go from here.”

  Marty was in a similar situation. He immediately returned to the prison in Eden to gather his own troops. One at a time, they returned to the prison and parked their rigs.

  There was never a sorrier-looking bunch as the men awaiting them, for they too recognized the strong smell of dirt in the air and knew what was coming.

  Marty immediately sent two extra men to the sally port to beef up security at the prison. The visitor’s doors on the front of the building had been welded on the inside as well as outside. So had the employee entrance on the north side of the building.

  The only way in and out of the prison now was the sally port.

  “Don’t let anyone in unless one of our people is with them,” Marty told each of them. “I don’t care how sad their stories are. We’ve worked too hard and too long to prepare this place to protect the citizens of Eden. We will not run out of provisions because we’re giving things out to outsiders.”

  His words made perfect sense. He owed his allegiance not to travelers wanting to take shelter, but to the citizens of Eden who’d placed their trust in him.

  He didn’t know it at the time, but his words would soon haunt him for the rest of his life.

  Once the sally port was secure, manned with men who Marty had personally certified proficient in small arms use, he turned his efforts elsewhere.

  “Okay, the rest of you… break into teams of two. Take a pickup truck and select a city block. Go door to door. Get all the survivors and their belongings and bring them back with you. Don’t let them bring crap we can’t use that will get in the way. Let them bring their mementos and family photos, but not their bicycles and treadmills. Let them bring clothes and a few toys for the kids, but not every toy they own.

  “In short, use your own judgment. Don’t be afraid to tell them they can’t bring something, and if they balk, explain to them that the ninety six trailers we brought in should have everything they need. And tell them space is limited. Extremely limited. Their amount of personal space is going to be about a hundred square feet a person. But it’ll be warm and cozy and fairly comfortable.”

  As the last of the dispatched men departed the building, Lenny came into the room.

  “What do you want me to do, Marty?”

  “Just follow me around for now, Lenny. Make sure I don’t overlook anything. We’ve only got one chance to do this right. Don’t let me screw it up.”

  -4-

  Early on, the first time the group of forty one occupied the mine, they’d decided on a form of government very similar to one Native Americans used to have.

  There was no leader in the traditional sense. Rather, there was a guide who steered public meetings in a smooth manner. Everyone was invited, and everyone of adult age had an equal chance to speak his or her mind. Each decision was put to a vote, and each person’s vote carried equal weight. Any member was allowed to abstain from a vote if they were unsure.

  A group of three elders voted again in the event of a tie, and were not allowed to abstain. Their odd number ensured a decision was made in every case.

  Mark, because he was the one who’d conce
ived the whole idea of taking shelter in the old salt mine, was elected official meeting guide at the first meeting.

  Now, ten years later, he still filled that role. And barring any challenge from anyone else, he’d be the one to guide the meetings for round two of the war Mother Nature seemed to be waging upon them.

  Once everyone was assembled in the dining room of the big house, he called the meeting to order.

  It was a pathetic sight.

  Most of the children had gathered in the back of the room, their mothers trying their best to comfort them. Sami, several months pregnant, sat atop a cushion, her husband Brad standing behind her and rubbing her shoulders.

  She appeared ready to burst into tears at any moment. Minutes before, as they’d waited for Rachel to arrive from the mine, she’d blubbered to Brad, “I don’t want to have our baby in the mine. I don’t want him to grow up the way Markie did, never feeling the wind in his hair or the sun on his face. It’s just not fair.”

  The general mood of the place was one of despair. No one wanted to be here. No one wanted to go through this a second time.

  Those in the room who believed in God thought He was testing them. Strengthening their resolve, perhaps.

  Those who were nonbelievers thought the cosmos were throwing them a sucker punch. Or kicking them when they were already down.

  After Rachel arrived, Mark called into the control center on the radio. The center was just outside the dining room and down the hall a bit. He could have walked. But he was just about ready to call the meeting to order. He didn’t want his sudden disappearance to encourage others to slip out as well.

  “Mike, what’s the outside temperature?”

  Mike was Debbie’s son, a divorced man of forty one. He was in the mine with his two children, who no longer had a mother. She’d been invited into the mine when Saris was looming near ten years before but had declined, saying her place was with her new husband. Both of them perished not long after.

  Now his children, thirteen and fifteen, sat glumly at a table, trying their best to keep from crying, wishing their father was there with them instead of taking his turn manning the security control center.

  When they’d built the compound, they’d overlooked the chance to install a remote thermometer which could be read inside the control center. The technology existed then and such things were available, but Hannah was in charge of procurement and simply dropped the ball.

  Bryan had remedied the problem by climbing atop the wind turbine on top of Salt Mountain. He installed an old-fashioned glass and mercury thermometer and a wind gauge on one side of a panoramic security camera which overlooked the compound.

  Now anyone in the control center could look at monitor eight at any time during daylight hours and see not only the compound as a whole, but also the outside temperature and wind speed.

  Sami, ever the smart aleck, had remarked at the time, “Too bad it can’t tell us the weather as well.”

  “Oh, it can,” Bryan had replied. “If the thermometer is wet, it means it’s raining outside. If it’s dry, then it’s not.”

  On this particular day it was dry. Not that that accounted for much.

  It was also much harder to see than usual, since the skies had now darkened considerably from the dust in the atmosphere.

  “It’s thirty four now and still dropping,” Mike responded over the radio to Mark. “Down from thirty eight an hour ago.”

  -5-

  After Rachel fixed herself a cup of coffee and found a seat at a table by herself, Mark called the meeting to order.

  “Well, I guess all the speculation has become reality. We’re in a world of hurt again. If nobody has any objections, I’d like to call Hannah and Sarah up. They should be able to tell us what to expect over the next months and years.”

  Both women stood. Hannah walked toward the front of the room, but Sarah said, “I’ll defer to Hannah. My memory’s still iffy, and everything regarding Cupid 23 is still a blur. I’m sorry.”

  Hannah started by saying, “The good news is this one won’t be as bad as the last time. It’ll be shorter, for one thing. Probably somewhere between three and four years. I’m hoping it’s even shorter than that. You’ll remember we overestimated the duration last time, guessing between seven and ten years. The thaw came in six and a half. NASA used exactly the same formula to estimate the effects should Cupid 23 ever strike the earth, and odds are we overestimated there as well. At least I hope we did.

  “Make no mistake about it, though. Even if it’s just a couple of years, it’s still bad and it’s still deadly.

  “Outside temperatures won’t hover around zero degrees like they did last time. But I still wouldn’t expect it to rise above freezing for at least two years. Two summers from now, in the middle of August, it might break freezing for a few days. But then it’ll drop again.

  “The real thaw probably won’t occur until the third summer, or even the fourth.”

  Melissa asked the question many others in the room had been thinking.

  “How come this one won’t be so bad? And why does it take so damn long to get warm again?”

  “Cupid 23 was a piece that broke off of Saris 7 many years ago, when it collided in deep space with an asteroid. It was considerably smaller in size than its mother, and because it wasn’t out there for eons being slowly worn down, it was irregular and jagged in shape.

  “Because of its shape, it was what the NASA community called a tumbler. Imagine a football thrown in a perfect spiral. It flies faster and more true than if someone like Mark throws it and it wobbles like a wounded duck.

  “Then apply that analogy to the meteorites. Saris 7 was like the perfect spiral. Cupid 23 was more like the wounded duck.

  “Saris 7, because it was going faster, went through the atmosphere of earth faster as well. Much of it burned up during entry. But because it was moving so quickly, most of it was left intact. When it impacted with the earth it was still pretty good size and still moving very fast.

  “Cupid 23, because it is a tumbler, hit our atmosphere at a much slower speed. Much more of it got burned off during entry. Obviously, some of it survived entry and collided with the earth. But it was much smaller than Saris 7 and moving much slower at impact; therefore it packed less of a punch.

  “The impact was significant, yes. But much less earth was thrown up into the atmosphere than with Saris 7 ten years ago. That’s why the skies won’t be quite as dark as they were last time. And because more sunlight will seep through, the temperatures won’t drop quite as much. And because there’s less dust in the atmosphere, it won’t take quite as long to dissipate as before. That means a shorter time before the thaw.”

  She tried to be simplistic on purpose, so that the children in the room could understand as well. As she looked around, she noticed the puzzled looks had pretty much gone from the faces.

  The sadness was still there. The look of despair. But now everyone knew exactly what they were dealing with.

  “Does anyone have any questions?”

  She looked around one last time before going on.

  “If you think of any questions later on, or if you need more clarification about the formula we used to make our estimates, just find me. I’ll be around…”

  Her last words weren’t meant to be funny, but elicited a couple of half-smiles. The coming of the new freeze meant the group would be tied more or less closely together for the duration.

  Most thoughts went back to the days when they lived in the mine, insulated from the grueling temperatures outside. They remembered the feelings of claustrophobia, of loneliness. Of the worry they’d felt and the hope that friends and loved ones left on the outside could somehow find a way to survive.

  Of the cabin fever they’d felt which made them dread having to get out of bed on many days.

  Hannah took her seat and Mark stood once again.

  “I spoke to the elders just before the meeting and they gave me a list of things they wanted to d
iscuss. And a couple of decisions which need to be made.

  “We’ll cover them first, as is our routine. Then we’ll discuss any further matters any of you wish to bring up.

  “If any matter needs to be voted on, we’ll do the vote and settle the matter before we move on to the next one.

  “For the benefit of the children who haven’t visited one of our tribe meetings in the past, welcome. I’ll take just a minute to explain, for their benefit, how this whole thing works.

  “Your role, as children, is to watch and learn. You won’t be permitted to speak, but you’ll see how our business is conducted so you’ll know what is expected of you later on. Once you turn eighteen, you’ll be given an equal chance to speak and a vote equal to everyone else’s.

  “We don’t do debates here. My role is a moderator, and a guide to keep the agenda moving. I hold no greater power or authority than any other adult in the room. After I introduce an agenda topic, I make sure every adult has a chance to say his or her piece about it. We’ll continue until everyone who wants to speak has had their chance.

  “Then, if the topic requires a decision be made, we will conduct a vote. If it doesn’t, we’ll move on to the next item.

  “Any questions from you newcomers?”

  There were none.

  “Very well, then. Let’s get on with the council meeting.”

  -6-

  “The first topic the elders suggested was the feasibility of staying where we are. We’ve worked hard over the last few months to get the mine ready for occupancy again. And although we didn’t get everything done that we wanted to, it is fairly well stocked and will make at least as good a shelter as the big house.

  “However, it is underground. I don’t have to tell any of you the psychological impact that had on everyone the first time we did it. I felt the cabin fever as much as anyone. I’m not looking forward to going back in there any more than anyone else.

  “So we have an opportunity to make a decision: do we go quietly into that dark night… or tunnel, or do we try to stay here and see if we can make it work? Who wants to speak first?”