The Ark of Asylum (The Ark Series Book 1) Page 5

  “I’ll get right on that, sir. Try to have a nice day, John. Sorry for the bad news.” Adam quickly leaves the room and exits the house without saying bye to Kate. Kate immediately walks into John’s office, her curiosity obviously getting the best of her.

  * * *

  When days turn into weeks and there is still no word from the government concerning the issue, John starts to wonder if they have just given up or if they are planning something. He’s convinced it is the latter. He knows the government just won’t roll over on this, especially with what kind of state the country is in nowadays. The world is on the brink of a potential third world war, and tensions are high all over the globe. Reports from all over the world say that countries are being attacked by countries like Iran, Iraq, North Korea, and maybe even China. A new world war technically hasn’t begun yet, but it is only a matter of time before this happens.

  Speculations of a joint effort by these counties are on the rise with tyranny and mass destruction as their main objective. England has been hardest hit by terrorist attacks, followed closely by the United States, both of which have been ruthlessly bombed and attacked for years and with no clear enemy responsible for the attacks. The four countries that are believed to be behind the attacks have claimed no responsibility, making some believe that these countries aren’t responsible for the attacks at all and that who are really behind these attacks are multiple and separate weapon manufacturing companies in effort to sell more guns to the American public and the world, thus making more profit from fear. After the banking crises, which happened over fifteen years ago, the public’s trust in corporations has never recovered, and the inhuman act of greed is always in the back of people’s minds.

  John sits at his computer trying to grasp and comprehend just what could happen in the world much sooner than he thought. With countries that are under attack by terrorists now building their armies and increasing their offensive attack capabilities, it seems certain that war is inevitable. He contemplates the ramification of a world war and knows that the process of preparing the town for a massive attack must be sped up and fine-tuned. He picks up the telephone and dials out. “Adam. This is John.”

  Adam answers, “Hello, sir. What can I do for you?”

  “First things first, have you heard anything from Homeland Security or anyone about their issues with us?”

  “No, sir, not a word, but of course I’ll be sure you’re the first one who knows when I do hear from them.”

  “I know you will. Now onto the next topic, I need to know how far along you are in finalizing the security protocols and operational procedures for emergency situations. I would like to, as soon as possible, conduct the first emergency evacuation drill. I know that everyone, especially the children, has been trained on what to do in an evacuation, and I think now’s the time we get them used to the process of an evacuation to the Ark. Don’t you?”

  “Most certainly, sir. I completely agree. We are pretty much fully operational now, just with a few tweaks and a bit of fine tuning to be taken care of, and a full emergency drill will most definitely help with the fine tuning. I say we could probably go forward with a drill within the week, barring any setbacks.”

  “Okay, great. That sounds like a plan. You get a few of your men ready for the drill, but I don’t want you mentioning this to anyone else. I don’t even want to know the exact day it will happen. It needs to be as unexpected and unanticipated as possible. Just don’t do it in the middle of the night. We don’t want to traumatize any of the younger children while they’re sleeping, okay?”

  “Of course, sir. I fully understand, I will prepare a couple of my men for the drill, and as far as you know it will happen sometime this week and not at night. And I will also be sure to let you know if for some reason we cannot perform the drill, but plan on it this week, sir.”

  “Alright then, let’s make this as real and accurate as possible. I don’t want anyone to be underprepared or not ready for a real emergency. Alright, so I will speak with you after the drill and go over our strong and weak points of the evacuation so we know what we have to work on in the future, okay?”

  “Excellent, sir, I’ll get right on the preparation, and we’ll go from there. Have a nice evening, sir.”

  “You too.”

  A few days go by and John tries feverishly not to think about the drill or anticipate when it will happen. He just concentrates on trying to be close to his family as much as possible so he can help them out when the time comes. He should have known this would make Kate suspicious. Kate looks at her cards then puts them down and cranes her head toward her husband.

  “Okay, John, what is going on? You’ve been acting strange these last few days, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen you spend so much time with me and the kids. So what’s up? What is going on?”

  John prudently responds while throwing a card on the pile, “What are you talking about? Can’t I spend time with my three wonderful children and lovely wife and not raise suspicion?”

  “She’s right, Dad, you have been acting strange lately, and you have been spending a lot of time with us lately,” Erica replies as she picks a card from the deck.

  “Well, sorry if I just want to spend a little quality time with my family. That’s all. Geez!”

  “Oh, nice try, honey. I know something’s up, so you may as well just tell us.” Kate puts her cards down and gives him a look of skepticism.

  “Alright, fine,” John crosses his arms and pouts a little. “All I can say is that something is going to happen pretty soon, and I want to be around you guys when it does happen. Okay? That’s all I can tell you, so that’s that. “

  “I knew something was up. I’ve known you long enough to know that, so just tell me what it is. You know I don’t like surprises.”

  “I can’t because I don’t even know the details myself, just that something will go down at some time, any day now, okay, and that’s all I’m telling you.” John grins at Kate.

  “Oh, fine, just don’t be surprised if you’re sleeping on the couch when it does happen, okay?” Kate says playfully as she picks her cards back up.

  “Whatever, you’ll be thanking me afterwards.” John shakes his head and rolls his eyes. He kisses his wife on the cheek and throws in the rest of his cards.

  Suddenly, an alarm sounds in the house and throughout the town with a bone-jarring effect. John jumps up from the table and shouts, “Let’s go! Let’s go!” As the lights go out in the house, the alarm is accompanied with a voice alerting everyone on what to do. “Attention! This is not a test. Please proceed to the nearest evacuation point immediately. This is not a test.” The alarm keeps sounding as John grabs his youngest child, Markus, and picks him up and grabs one of his daughter’s hands. Kate grabs their other daughter’s hand as they make their way to the basement.

  John yells for their dogs, Irma and Edmund, and their chocolate lab and golden retriever run after them. Only dim emergency lights and glow-in-the-dark arrows light their way as they rush down the stairs. A hatch opens up and reveals a hole in the ground with a slide attached. The basement door closes behind them and seals itself off. They get to the evacuation point, and John yells, “Honey, you go first, followed by the kids and the dogs, and then I’ll go last. Okay?”

  Kate nervously responds, “Okay.” As she sits down and slides down the shoot and then lands on a seat in a cart, a bar lowers over and secures her. Immediately after she hits the seat, the cart bumps forward so the slide is directly over the second seat.

  “Okay, girls, one of you is next.” John grabs Erica who is closest to the slide. “Okay, honey, just sit down and slide down the slide. Your mother is waiting for you. Okay?”

  “Daddy, I’m scared.” Erica starts to cry as she nervously sits down.

  “It’s okay, sweetheart. Don’t be afraid. We’ve talked about this. Remember it’s fun just like the slide at the playground,” Kate yells from down below.

  “Okay, I’ll go.” Erica d
oes her best to stop crying. She lets go of her daddy’s hand and slides down the slide and into the cart, which bumps forward as the bar lowers.

  “Okay, sweetie, you’re next.” John takes Ashley’s hand and helps her to the slide. She says nothing and slides down the slide and into the cart.

  “Alright, little man. You’re up. Are you okay?” John takes Markus’s hand. Markus nods his head and then sits and slides down into the cart. John grabs Irma by the collar and pushes her down the slide and into the cart. It bumps forward, but the bar only lowers halfway. After pushing Edmund down the slide, John jumps on the slide.

  The alarm voice announces, “No human life detected above. Please hold on.” The hatch closes, and the cart rockets off like the start of a rollercoaster toward the Ark.

  Meanwhile, John imagines how everyone in town is going through the same evacuation procedure. Each household is set up the same, so everyone should evacuate in a timely manner. Over at the school, each classroom has an evacuation hatch, and the teachers and staff should be assisting in evacuating every child. Many of the children are probably scared and afraid and most of them crying, John believes, but everyone must practice getting into their carts safely and quickly.

  As the carts arrive at the Ark, only seconds after leaving their departure points, security personnel is there waiting to assist them with getting off. The safety bars lift up once the carts come to a complete stop. John jumps out and helps the children get out of their seats.

  “Please exit the carts promptly, and proceed to the holding area,” The alarm voice repeats over and over again as people file into the large room adjacent to the unloading area. Carts continue to arrive, carrying several people each and often pets. The holding area quickly begins to fill up, and everyone chatters together somewhat nervously. Many of the children are crying and holding onto their teachers’ or aids’ hands, at least the ones that are available.

  The alarm voice sounds, “All citizens accounted for, thank you.” John makes his way to the front of the room with his family and steps up on the raised platform and taps on the microphone.

  “Can I have everyone’s attention? Please, everyone quiet down!” The nervous and confused crowd starts to settle down. “Thank you all for your cooperation, and can I just congratulate you all on your first and very successful emergency evacuation drill. You can all give yourselves a round of applause for doing such a great job.” The group claps and cheers in elation.

  John then welcomes everyone, especially those who don’t know they are now inside the Ark, explaining that this is a heavily fortified giant bomb shelter in the heart of the mountain that they all play and live on. It is similar to the military base, NORAD, in Colorado Springs, only much more high tech and advanced. Once John tells them that in the event of a natural disaster or nuclear, chemical or biological attack or another world war, this will be their home for however long the threat lasts, the crowd quiets down.

  He assures them that this has been built with an air and water purification system and a full sanitation system. He assures them there’s enough food to last them for years, along with a giant hydroponic growing system so they can grow their own food. He assures them that there are enough apartments and housing for everyone, along with recreation areas and such.

  He quickly changes subjects by letting them know that they will all be gathering in the mess hall for a feast to celebrate this kind of the grand opening of the Ark. After dinner, they will conduct tours for everyone to check the place out and see what it’s like. He closes things out by saying that he prays to God that they will never have to use the facility and that he hopes it will never be necessary. But he then reminds them that with the way the world is going, it almost seems inevitable, so they can all feel a little bit of comfort knowing that this place is here to protect all of them.

  “So, once again, I want to thank you all, and we will be conducting these drills periodically so that everyone gets used to and gets good at the evacuation. Now, let’s go eat!” John jumps off the riser and takes his family’s hands as the crowd starts to walk toward the LED screen that displays ‘Mess Hall.’

  The entire town eats in a massive dining hall on a feast fit for a king, and they are shocked when they are told that everything they are eating was grown or raised on the mountain with some even produced in the Ark. After dinner everyone is invited to tour the entire complex. They are assigned an apartment that is adequate to the size of the family. The majority of people are pleasantly surprised by how nice everything is for what is basically a concrete bunker, and they are also shocked by how clean and fresh the air is. After the tour, everyone is encouraged to give feedback and suggestions on what they think should be changed or added to the Ark, but not much is mentioned, hopefully meaning that they are, overall, very happy and impressed with everything.

  After the tour and orientation is over, everyone is thanked and congratulated for a near perfect emergency evacuation and then dismissed. They all leave the Ark and walk down the mountain base to their homes, jubilant and overjoyed by the experience.

  John kisses the kids and Kate and says, “I have to go speak with Adam on how the evacuation went from security’s perspective. Are you okay with getting the kids back to the house yourself, or do you want me to go with?”

  Kate responds, “We’ll be fine. I can manage. You go ahead, and we’ll see you back at the house in a little bit.”

  “Sounds good. I’ll see you soon, and by the way great job, you guys. I’m so proud of you girls and my little man!” He raises his hands and gives them all high fives.

  “Thanks, Daddy. See you soon,” Ashley replies. Kate and the kids start to walk down the mountain as John walks back into the Ark and into the security office.

  John walks into the room and starts clapping as everyone turns their chairs around. “Excellent job, everybody. I was very impressed with how everything turned out. It was well planned, well executed, and from my perspective, damn near perfect!”

  Adam walks over to John and shakes his hand. “Thank you, sir. On behalf of all of us here, we appreciate that. Now if you’ll follow me into my office, we can go over the details of everything.”

  “Lead the way,” John waves his hand in the direction of Adam’s office and follows him in.

  “Please have a seat, sir.” Adam sits down at his desk as John sits across. “I wanted to go over the statistics and trouble spots we encountered from the drill.” Adam begins going over the details of the evacuation by first stating that he felt that, overall, everything went great, and he thought that the evacuation times were stellar across the board. He points out that the only problem areas were in the places they already expected, which were the orphanage, the school, and the zoo.

  He tells John that some of the younger children were pretty scared and very upset and reluctant to go down the slide and into the carts. The teachers’ thoughts on how to speed up the process in the future are just getting the children more used to everything by increasing their practice time on lining up and going down the slide and into the carts. They also thought that the number of teacher’s aides should increase or else that they might possibly train some of the older kids to help out. But they were afraid in the heat of the moment, and in a real emergency, they may freeze up and buckle under the pressure.

  Adam moves onto the other issue of the zoo animals. The reports from the trainers, vets, and vet techs were that, generally, everything went well. But, even though not all animals would enter the secondary blast doors at first, eventually they did. Adam adds that the trainers had some ideas on how to get them in quicker. After he finishes with saying they should leave it up to the experts, John is quick to agree. Their conversation is cut short when the intercom beeps, interrupting them.

  “Excuse me, sir. I need to take this.” Adam presses the intercom button. “Yes, what is it?”

  The voice on the other end says, “Pardon the interruption, sir, but you need to get in here. We have a situation.”
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  Chapter 7

  Adam and John rush into the control room and over to the radar specialist. Adam says, “What is it, Chris?”

  Chris pulls up an aerial camera feed of a caravan of cars on the screen. “Sir, I’m tracking a large caravan of four vehicles about three miles out traveling at a high rate of speed and moving this way. What you’re looking at is a camera feed from the service road. Heat signatures from each vehicle estimate about half a dozen bodies per vehicle. I’m pulling up the sat feed now so we can get a better look. Would you like me to deploy a drone, sir?”

  Adam hesitates then says, “Yes, get a drone in the air for recon, and bring up the sat feed on the big screen.”

  John nervously stares at the screen, eyes glued to the image. “What the hell is going on? Are we in any danger?”

  Adam breaks his concentration and turns to John. “I’m not sure, sir, but I think good old Uncle Sam is paying us a visit. I had a feeling this might happen when we didn’t hear anything further from them.”

  Chris displays the satellite feed from his computer. “Sir, I’m bringing up the sat feed now, and the drone has been deployed. It appears to indeed be a four-vehicle caravan of most likely ATF agents. They are about two miles out. What are your orders, sir?”

  Adam hesitates for a moment, contemplating his options, and then responds, “Give me armed guards around the perimeter but out of sight. Use the tunnel system, and have them stand by in their fox hole. We don’t want to seem aggressive, so give me incognito snipers on the mountainside overlooking the perimeter. I want everyone on high alert, and they are not to use force unless fired upon. Is that clear, everyone?”

  Multiple voices in the room respond, “Sir, yes, sir!”

  Chris continues to type on his computer while he displays various camera feeds on multiple screens. “Sir, I’ve also detected a small unidentified flying object entering our airspace. Looks like it’s one of their drones out for recon, as well. Would you like me to electronically disable it?”