“Useful? How?”
The popping paused. Without the loud popping to mask my voice I reverted to chitchat. “Do you want coffee with this? Or there’s soda in the refrigerator.” I gave the pan a shake. The corn must be all but used up. Popcorn had reached the lid. “Hey, here we go again.” The bangs and pops started up, nice and loud. I whispered, “There were sets of numbers on some paper. Code numbers for the locked doors. What do you say to some late-night exploring?”
“Michaela, Greg. Good morning.” The voice of Phoenix broke in quickly. “Did you both sleep well?”
We broke the clinch and turned to reply to that disembodied voice.
“Fine, thanks,” Michaela said pleasantly. “We helped ourselves to breakfast.”
“Of course, be our guests.” Phoenix’s velvet voice padded from the speaker. “After all, your tax dollars paid for it. Be sure to make yourself at home and enjoy the rest of your day.”
“Thanks, we will,” I said.
“Any plans?”
“We thought we’d stay home today.”
Phoenix laughed. “You might as well. It’s raining out.”
“Any sign of hornets?”
“Oh, the infected people? Yes, they’re still waiting outside the door. They won’t quit for a day or so yet.”
“Do you know what became of your previous guests, Phoenix? People like us you invited in to stay for a while?”
“They moved on. Of course we-the bunker crew, that is-don’t know where they went. Naturally we pray they found some safe haven. What’s that sound?”
“A sound?” Michaela asked the question innocently.
“Yes. It sounded like gunshots.”
“Oh.” She smiled. “It’s just popcorn.”
“Popcorn? It sounded so loud.” Phoenix paused.
I said, “The pan must be close to a mike.”
“Maybe,” Phoenix agreed. “Now don’t go burning yourselves, will you, guys?”
“We won’t.” Michaela laughed. “Why don’t you come across and join us?”
“I wish I could, Michaela. Only the rules don’t allow it.”
“Rules are made to be broken.”
“An intriguing thought. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go. We’ve got a little incident happening at one our sister installations.”
“An incident, Phoenix? What kind of incident?”
But there was no reply. We stood looking at the kitchen walls for a moment, waiting for the voice of Phoenix to return.
“I guess the man’s busy,” I said. “Let’s watch some TV.”
“What are you doing, Michaela?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re sketching.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Are you sketching me?”
“Nothing else to sketch.”
“I’m flattered.”
“Don’t be.”
“Are you ticklish?”
“Do you bleed?”
“I bleed, but I’m going to tickle you.”
We were in the lounge area. I’d sat eating popcorn while watching a batch of sitcoms. I only just noticed that Michaela had curled herself into a big, plump arm-chair, where she worked with a pencil on some scraps of paper.
I hooked my hands like claws, then shambled across to her; my knees bowed like a gorilla’s. “Gonna get pretty lady. Gonna tickle her good and hard.”
“You do and I’ll bust your lip.” She laughed and threw a cushion at me.
“That’s don’t hurt Mungo,” I grunted. “Mungo tickle pretty lady.”
“Here, let me draw Mungo. Hold still while I sketch that big bulbous forehead of yours.”
“Like this.” I struck a pose with my arms reaching out over her monster-style.
“Yeah, like that.”
“Mungo like pretty lady?”
“Mungo very pretty.” Smiling, she worked the pencil. “I’m drawing Mungo’s big round nostrils, the big wart on his nose. His staring eyes, shaggy eyebrows; his bug-ugly yellow teeth.”
“Mungo see now.”
“Mungo can wait.”
“Mungo impatient.” I grunted like a gorilla, but oh, Jesus, keeping up this playacting was making me crazy. I wanted-hell, no-I craved to have a proper conversation about Phoenix and my suspicions, but by this time I’d convinced myself that not only were there microphones dotted about the bunker but hidden cameras, too. Those things were probably implanted in the walls, and of course the lenses would be little bigger than pinheads. To all intents and purposes they were invisible.
“Right, show me the picture or I tickle good and hard,” I told her.
“Oh, all right. Here. Sit down beside me.” She patted the cushion. I sat beside her. Then she pointed at the drawing. “I think I’ve got the lips just perfect, don’t you?” She pointed at what I took to be a drawing of a face with a long smiling mouth. Instead of lips I realized she’d run words together: Good-Idea. The-Popcorn-Scam-Worked . Then she pointed to the chin, which was formed by the words: Didn’t-Hear-Us-Did-He?
“What do you think?” she asked, fixing me with her eye.
“My God, Michaela, you’ve really caught my chin, but where are my eyebrows?”
“It’s a work in progress.”
“Here, give me the pencil.” Above the eyes I wrote: Careful, he’ll be watching. “There; eat your heart out, da Vinci.”
We sat ’round some more. All the time I felt conscious of camera lenses burning into the pair of us. I guessed that Michaela felt the same way. She continued to sketch, but she looked a little on edge. Try as I might, it was hard to concentrate on the TV. My eyes kept sliding off screen to try to find those hidden camera lenses.
“Say, people, good news!” Phoenix spoke so abruptly that Michaela started. “Listen, I’ve been given security clearance from the highest level to show you something.”
Michaela and I looked at each other. Phoenix sounded excited.
“So, Greg, Michaela, if you could move into the lounge so you can see the TV screen…”
I said, “We’re already in the lounge, Phoenix.” But then, he knew that, I’d wager. He’d been sitting in his lair watching us all along.
Michaela put down the sketches. “What you got to show us, Phoenix?”
“I hope you guys are going to be as thrilled as I am about this. We’re implementing something called Reach Out. At last we’re allowed to start doing what we’ve been put here to do.”
“How does that work, Phoenix?”
“As the program title states we’re going to Reach Out to bands of survivors like yourselves to provide you with food, ammunition and medicines.”
“You mean you’re going to help us?” Michaela’s eyes were wide.
“That’s right.”
“That’s going to be a tough one, Phoenix,” I said. “You haven’t seen the mess the cities are in, or how few there are of us who survived in the outside world.”
“Oh, but there are.” The velvet voice gushed now.
“There are more than you think, Greg. Of course, this epidemic hit the country hard, but there are hundreds and hundreds of facilities like this. Most are far bigger, housing a hundred or more people.”
