knots.
The scene was much the same through the night, and on the following day. Early in the morning, they came near to shoreline where a sizeable city had once been. It was a macabre scene. Dead bodies were everywhere, floating in the water and lying on the ground. There was no standing structure in view. Fires had obviously swept through the area, but none was yet still raging. The crew of the Texas examined it with the naked eye, and when composure allowed, through the nearness of their powerful binoculars. They passed by several such towns, all of which shared the same fate, until the commander gave the order to steer further out to sea.
When they estimated their distance, speed, and relative positioning, it was believed they would make San Diego in twenty-eight hours. Twenty-eight hours later and the city was nowhere to be found. For the next twelve hours, they continued north along their current route. What was supposed to be the California and Western coast of the United States was instead a combination of sea stacks and sheer rock face hundreds of feet high. Morale among the officers was becoming grim. It was time for a decision.
“Reverse course, maintain current speed,” Commander Weston ordered. He said nothing more until the next day.
When they returned to an area estimated to be near the California-Mexico border, the USS Texas came to a stop. It was the first area they found that allowed passage inland before they came to the rocky cliffs. The carnage was visible on shore, but the crew did their best to ignore it. Nothing could be done about it in any event. After a meeting with all of the officers on board, they emerged from the galley and began the preparations agreed upon. The Texas would be abandoned.
“This is Commander Weston,” the captain said into the vessel’s intercom, “Prepare to go ashore. Make ready all available craft, and secure all movable equipment, both personal, and functional. Make haste, but don’t leave anything of value behind, especially rations. That is all.”
It took more than seven hours to vacate the sub even though they were only a few hundred yards off shore. Once that was completed, a skeleton crew returned to the Texas to move her further out to sea. Once there, precautions were taken to secure the weapons systems. After one last look around, commander Weston gave the final orders to his crew. Orders he never even considered before this day. “Seal it up,” he said to the welders, “Seal it up tight.”
He stood by as the men did their work. When they were finished, they paddled their boat to shore to join the others who were establishing a makeshift camp. They did so as far from the smell of the carnage as possible. A few men were brave enough to search about through the ruins, but they returned finding little of value.
It was a somber night. They posted a guard more because of training, than out of any real necessity. They did not even hear the call of animals that night. No barking from dogs, no cries from sea gulls ever present on the shorelines, and none of the unnatural sounds indicating the presence of men.
After they made a quick meal for breakfast, Weston addressed them all with Captain Lieutenant Orlov translating for his compatriots. “It’s obvious we cannot stay here. Since none of our directional equipment works, and celestial navigation is not available to us, we have estimated a course, which should intersect with the center of the United States. If we come across anyone, or any form of communication along the way, so much the better. I’m sure we can all make guesses as to what we think happened. I’m also sure that we will be much better served if we remain together, and support one another. We don’t know what we are going to find out there. But, if we stick together, I’m sure we can handle it.
“What I want to do now is divide everyone up into manageable teams under each of our officers. We will be in mixed company to learn to communicate with each other better. You will obey the orders of your appointed officer regardless of uniform. We will spend the rest of this day getting ready for the move.
“We’ll need to go into the town and secure any wheels, or wheeled vehicles, which we can use to transport our equipment and supplies as well as any viable supplies we can find. I’ll want all of the specialists to look for materials of their trades to include medical supplies. If you think we need it, and we can transport it, bring it.
“Any questions?” There were none. The gravity of the situation maintained control of the general attitude for the time being. What was incumbent upon their officers was to prolong that control.
“Very well; Chief Stewart has the list and he’ll break you down into your respective groupings. We have a lot to get done today, so let’s be serious about it,” he finished with a tone of authority, but without an acknowledgement of his rank, which is customarily followed with an ‘aye aye sir,’ or a ‘yes sir.’
Two-hundred fifty-seven naval personnel, which included ten enlisted women from the Texas, set out to find the answers to what had caused such devastation in such a short period of time, and to find anything resembling the life they left behind.
THREE 
After several weeks of reconstruction projects, the people in the mountain complex turned their attention to daily routines. It was a grim time where activity of any kind provided needed distraction from the tragedy they had survived. Emotions ran high and tempers were short. The best therapy was work and time. Everyone lost loved ones, and while it was human nature to want to survive, that survival provided little comfort as time passed. Not only did the loss of family and friends weigh upon them, the loss of a life they had envisioned was now gone. Uncertainty and the unknown prevailed.
Several of their number, however, were not plagued by such thinking. They were the ones preparing for an event such as this, knowing long beforehand that it was a certainty. The preparations they made went far beyond their initial survival. They planned for all contingencies involved for an indefinite stay underground, and what would follow. They knew people needed structure, routine, and satisfaction in accomplishment. But most importantly, they needed hope. Hope of a return to what had been, hope of a future not living underground. Hope for themselves. Hope for their children. They gathered many of the best and brightest into the complex under the guise of an exercise. These were the ones who would shape that hope. The scientific advancements known to the government and military establishment were much farther along than those whose progress was hindered by the many bureaucratic layers that existed in private industry. Geneticists, biologists, pathologists, and engineers of all sciences were recruited without their knowing their actual roles. They were assigned to labs with technology and equipment with which even they were not familiar. This served to both placate them, and make them useful for the promotion of the goal to inhabit the surface once again.
Without the ability to grow food underground, geneticists built upon the already available science to engineer designer foods. These foods resembled protein bars. They could be made to taste like any known food, and shaped into different forms. It was one more thing to which people needed to adjust. It was more nutritious than food grown naturally, and it tasted great, it was just unusual.
A fresh water supply was no problem. They had tapped into separate underground aquifers many years prior, and while the sources were pure, they also maintained a filtration system. Power too was unlimited. A geothermal power plant had been in operation providing electrical power, hot water, and steam to power most of their earth moving equipment. Natural gas was also integrated into the facility, though the decision was made to limit its use to necessity.
These basic needs, however, were not enough to maintain order. The people had to appreciate and understand life in a new light. This would be accomplished in a variety of ways. Just like basic trainees in any military, they had to be trained to forget their former lives. Their dress changed, their vocabulary changed, and their thinking changed. While people both in and out of the military pursued advancement based on authority, recognition, titles and money, those were to be a thing of the past. Self-advancement was not conducive to the ultimate goal. A collective effort was. The challenge here was in stimulating the initiative with new rewards, a different mindset. This was all taken into consideration by those few who were actually controlling the sum total of all the parts. They would accommodate the needs of people as much as they could, they would reason with them when necessary, and they would punish them when warranted. Nothing would interfere with their main objective. In time, they would once again walk upon the surface of the earth. If they succeeded, it would be a world made in their image.
