“Yeah,” I respond continuing to stare at the mammoth diesel engines.
“Thanks for including me and letting me be a part.”
“You may not thank me later, but you bet,” I say turning to put my arm around his shoulder.
“Do you think this place will work out?” He asks giving a small nod toward the store.
“I really hope so. We may have quite a fight on our hands clearing it out. I’m not a fan of its open interior and with it having the second story open to the bottom. We have plenty of teams and so, if we play it right and do it smart, we should be okay,” I answer.
I hear the sound of birds chirping in our vicinity before the noise of an approaching vehicle overrides their calls. The Humvee appears at the corner and is driven up over the curb. Gonzalez brings the vehicle to rest a few feet from the fenced-in generators and both women jump out. Opening the rear, McCafferty extracts bolt cutters and the hose while Gonzalez hoists the two metal gas cans. The silver-colored padlock is cut off and the gates swung open.
I step into the enclosure and tap down the sides of the tanks. The hollow sound follows my tapping down to the bottom of both tanks. Empty, as I thought. I reach up and unscrew the cap on the top of one tank, inserting a metal pole sitting by the side. It comes out with a miniscule amount of fuel on the bottom. The second tank indicates the same. We siphon a few gallons from the Humvee, filling the gas cans a few times and emptying their contents into the dry tanks. Resealing the caps, I hit the green “run” button on the first generator. The generator cranks for a moment, coughs and sputters, and then comes to life with a roar. I test the second generator and it follows the same process.
I head over to the side with the noise from the generators fading as I round the corner. Bannerman is by the side doors, measuring them, with the others standing a short distance away. I walk in front of the glass doors and peer in.
“Crap,” I say with my head still pressed against the glass and my hands cupped around my eyes.
“What?” Roberts asks.
Darkness still reigns inside although I’m able to see the green exit lights glowing above the entrance doors far to my right.
“The lights are still off,” I answer pulling back from the door.
“Do you have the measurements?” I ask Bannerman.
“As best I can,” he replies.
“Okay, let’s head out front. I’ll turn the generators off and meet you there,” I say.
With our original group, I return to the generators and hit the red “off” button on both of them. They sputter and die. Closing the fence and putting the padlock through the gate, we reload the gear and I send Gonzalez and McCafferty to the front with the Humvee. Robert and I continue around the rest of the exterior, finding only three large service bay doors that are closed and locked. I do note that the roof is flat but cannot see any easy way up from the outside. Gathered at the front with the others, I notice windows set into the second story.
I point to the windows and tell Bannerman, “We’ll need something to cover those.”
He looks up. The windows appear to be a regular size and are set into the wall on either side of the entrance.
“I think bars might be best for something like that,” he says. “Maybe a set on both sides.”
“Good idea,” I tell him. “Hopefully they’ll have something like that at the same place where we find the doors.”
I get the phone book we secured from the weather shop and open it to the yellow pages where I found the security door manufacturer. I take note of the address. The rays from the sun cast a shadow from my finger across a map of the city as I find the location and trace a route. I look up towards the western sky and judge the travel of the sun across the light blue sky. We have quite a few hours of daylight left but it doesn’t feel like it. I look at my watch and see it’s a little after three in the afternoon. I figure we should have enough time to get the doors and be back before Lynn shows up. Providing everything goes well that is. I would like to leave those without training here but don’t want to leave the scant few I have with me behind to guard them. You never know what the circumstances are at the location or what we may run into and I’d like to have every able body with me just in case.
“Alright everyone, let’s mount up,” I say.
Slumping into the Jeep seat, the invigoration I felt earlier is beginning to fade, being replaced by an oncoming tiredness. The warmth of the day, although much cooler and less humid than the previous days, is adding to a feeling of lethargy. O
We drive down the black-topped road, take an exit south of town and on subsequent country lanes that eventually lead to a medium-sized metal pre-fabricated building set behind a chain link fence. I come to a stop by the short, dirt and gravel driveway leading in. A wide open dirt-filled yard, with scrap pieces of metal scattered and strewn about, encircles the structure. A couple of rusting trailers sit in one of the corners of the yard and three large panel vans are parked towards the front.
The gate to the facility is open making it easy to drive up to the entrance. The blue metal building is plain but large. Two windows and a white door adorn the right side of the building with a large roll-type, garage door in the middle. All are shut and the place looks vacated. It has a quiet, desolate feel to it. With our engines shut down, that feeling only intensifies.
A warm breeze blows through causing the dust to eddy about the abandoned yard, giving it its only life. The dust twirls upwards forming a small funnel and moves across the abandoned yard. The others exit the vehicles after the swirl of dust passes out of the gate like a customer leaving. The air is calm following the short dust storm, settling into the warm summer day once again. The rays beat down from a sun hovering above the top of the trees across the road. For once, time seems to stand still in this little lot. Not a breath of air stirs or sound is made. It’s like we stepped out of the world we were placed in and into a separate piece of reality. Even the degree of tension about the time seems to have ebbed.
The feeling of separation from the rest of the world suddenly vanishes and we are left just standing in a dusty, litter-strewn lot with an aging, prefabricated metal building in the middle of it. Clumps of brown grass grow among and around where the larger metal parts have been scattered. The others in our group are standing adjacent to their vehicles in much the same manner; perhaps feeling the same way, perhaps lost in other thoughts. I think there are times of great stress when the mind just has to rest itself. Or maybe when it’s about to embark on something of great stress. I certainly remember folding into another world prior to a mission but that was more on a conscious level of focusing the mind; eliminating distractions that may interfere with being centered.
“Henderson and Denton with me. Robert, you as well. Gonzalez and McCafferty stay with the vehicles,” I say breaking the silence that seems to have stretched for an eternity.
The others are startled from their trances by the sound of my voice bouncing off the metallic building. As at Cabela’s, Robert and I take the lead with Henderson and Denton behind. I want to do a circuit around the building prior to going in. The aging building is streaked with rust where the sides join the overhanging roof. It’s just another sign of neglect that the lot has already shown. I just hope they did a better job with the security doors they built. Weeds, long dead, are growing against the sides of the structure.
Gravel fills some of the larger potholes, crunching under our boots as we make our way along the longer- than-it-seemed side of the building. My toe catches one of the stones and sends it skipping across the dirt lot, kicking up small puffs of dust where it hits. I feel the heat radiating off the sheet metal as we continue toward the rear. Rounding the corner, the back end of the structure looks similar to the front but without the windows or door. A large, roll-type door, identical to the one in front, is open revealing a concrete floor with dust swirled across it. With this side of the building in the shade, the light isn’t penetrating far inside. I wave Robert and the others behind me, sidling against the outside wall until I come to the opening without revealing myself.
I stand for a moment listening. The fact that the door is open alerts me to the possibility that night runners could be lurking inside. The additional fact that we are out of the city a little ways may mean there aren’t many night runners around, although I’m sure they will expand out into the country as the food within the cities begins to disappear. I don’t hear any sounds coming from inside except for the occasional pop of metal heating up and expanding. None of the panting I heard in the hospital is present. I look to the ground in front of the door looking for tracks but the breeze and dust has rendered the ground smooth, effectively removing any tracks if there were
