Star One: Tycho City Survival (29 page)

-

Trace was
eating a light meal in the underground bunker thinking about what needed to be
done for the day. The bunker was laid out along a long corridor that branched
off into a T at the end. Sixteen small eight-by-ten rooms off the T served as
bedrooms. There were also four large storage rooms, which contained enough supplies
for several years. There was a large dining room with half a dozen long tables
where everyone could eat if they wanted or spend time playing games. On one
side of the room were several large couches, which faced a wall with a large TV
screen on it where movies could be watched.

Emily had
checked and been pleased at the large selection of videos that were available. Several
of her favorites were included as well as some that Trace enjoyed. There were
also several game consoles against another wall, which helped to occupy the
younger kids. Their son Nate and Stew Donaldson spent a lot of time on the game
consoles competing against one another.

“Do you have
to go outside today?” Emily asked with anxiety in her voice. “It always makes
me nervous when you do.”

“You know I have
to,” replied Trace, putting his arm around his wife. “I have to check the air
filters in the generator room.”

While most of
their electricity was furnished by the two wind generators, the wind did not
blow all the time. A small concrete blockhouse behind the hill that contained
the bunker had two large diesel generators inside. When the power from the wind
generators dropped too low, one of the generators would automatically kick in.
There was a large, open window on each of the four walls of the generator room
to allow air in. In each window was a double air filter to keep contaminants
from getting in and fouling the generators. The filters had to be changed at
least once per week.

Trace looked
over at the Donaldson kids. They were still having a hard time adjusting to the
loss of their parents. All three of them were currently over at a game console
playing a video game with Nate. There were other children in the bunker and
sometimes life almost seemed normal when you heard them laughing. The three
Donaldson kids kept to themselves for the most part. Emily and Trace’s mother
were spending a lot of time with the kids helping them to adjust.

Later, his
father helped him put on his containment suit. For now at least, oxygen tanks
were not needed, but a special breathing mask was. Once the suit was on Trace
opened up the inside door of the bunker and stepped into the cellar. The cellar
had a shower and drain installed where he could rinse the suit off once he
returned. He stepped over to the cellar door and, opening it, stepped through
and shut it securely behind him. He was surprised to find himself standing in
several inches of volcanic ash.

 “Crap,” he
muttered as he looked around, taking note of the change in his surroundings.

It was the
middle of the afternoon and normally you could still see quite well in the
reduced light caused by the heavy cloud layer. But not today. It was almost
dark outside. He went back inside the cellar, opened a small cabinet on the
wall, and took out a large flashlight. Flipping it on, he went back outside.

He could see heavy
gray ash falling from the sky. A volcano had erupted somewhere close by, or a
massive one farther away. He wondered if it could be Yellowstone. He had read somewhere
that the ash cloud from a major eruption at Yellowstone could even reach this
part of Northeast Oklahoma.

Taking a deep
breath, Trace closed the cellar door behind him and secured it. He then trudged
around the hill toward the generator building. Looking down at the ground, he
guessed the ash was nearly six inches deep in places. If this was indeed Yellowstone, he would hate to think what it was like closer to the volcano.

Reaching the
blockhouse, Trace opened the door after using his feet to clear the ash that
was piled up in front. Stepping inside, he closed the door behind him. Reaching
over to the wall, he flipped on the light switch and a light on the ceiling
came on, illuminating the two large diesel generators. Trace knew there were
two, ten thousand-gallon diesel tanks buried just outside which furnished fuel
to the generators. Currently they were both off as there was just enough wind
blowing to turn the wind generators.

Trace checked
all four of the large window air filters, finding two of them completely
clogged with ash. Opening a large cabinet, he took out two replacements and
soon had the filters changed.

Satisfied that
everything was as it should be he went back outside, making sure the door was
securely shut behind him. He then walked the long distance to the house to
check on it. This was something Trace did each time he came out to check on the
filters or the wind generators. Fortunately, the wind generators were sealed
units and hopefully the ash would not affect them.

Coming around
the corner of the shed, he was surprised to see that one section had collapsed
from the weight of the ash that had accumulated on the roof. Glancing at the
house, he saw with relief that the steep roof was still relatively clear of a
buildup of ash.

A few moments
later, he climbed up on the porch and, after checking the door, was satisfied
that no one had been snooping around. Since the incident at the Donaldsons,
there had been no signs of anyone else prowling around the property.

After walking
around the house, Trace began making his way back toward the bunker. He could
still see ash falling steadily in the beam of his flashlight. If this
continued, they would have to check the filters in the blockhouse more often.
They couldn’t allow the generators to become fouled with it.

Reaching the cellar,
Trace spent some time clearing the ash from around the cellar’s entrance.
Finally satisfied that he had done as well as he could, he went back inside. He
would tell the others about the ash. For weeks now, they hadn’t been able to
pick up anything but static on their radio receiver. Trace hoped there were
other survivors, but this ash would make surviving for some even more
difficult.

-

Mase was
standing inside the most recent addition to their ecological habitats. Linda
and Karen were with him as they listened to Jolene explain what they had done.

“This is the
newest ecological habitat we have built,” she said with a big pleased smile on
her face.

“What’s going
in this one?” Linda asked as she gazed down the length of the cavern. She knew
they were growing more dependent each day on the food that Jolene and her
people were growing.

“We’re putting
in two more fish ponds and the rest will be fruits and vegetables,” Jolene
replied. “In sixty days we will be harvesting our first crops.”

“Is this the
last habitat you’re going to build?” Linda asked. She knew this was the fourth
one.

“One more is
planned,” answered Jolene, brushing her thick black hair back behind her
shoulders.
We are building one more for the larger animals.”

“The pigs and
cows,” explained Karen.

She knew this
would make Anthony happy. That’s all he talked about anymore when he came by
the new larger apartment the girls had all moved into. He constantly complained
that he hadn’t had a steak in over two months.

“We will also
be putting more chickens in also,” added Jolene with a nod of her head.

“More
chickens,” commented Karen, with a frown. She and four other girls had just
finished cleaning one of the chicken houses the day before. She had not
realized how bad something could smell until then.

Jolene laughed
with a smile spreading across her face. “Karen got to help clean out one of the
chicken houses yesterday,” she explained. “It’s not a popular job, but it has
to be done and the waste is used as fertilizer for our crops.”

“At least I
haven’t had to clean out the pig pens yet,” Karen added with distaste. “Those
really smell! I never knew an animal could smell so bad.”

Linda laughed
and patted her younger sister on the shoulder. “Just look at everything you’re
learning.”

It was at that
moment that a sudden sharp tremor struck, throwing Linda and Karen painfully to
the ground. Karen screamed loudly, her face covered in fear. Mase braced his
feet, feeling the ground trembling beneath him and then, after a few moments, it
stopped. He could now hear loud alarms sounding. His heart quickened as he
realized the significance of those alarms. They signaled a drop in pressure in
the new Tycho City cavern. The alarms were a signal for everyone to report to
their emergency stations and for those not needed to go into the underground
sections of Tycho City and seal themselves in until the all clear was sounded.

“What is it?”
Karen spoke with panic on her face as she stood back up, wiping the dirt from
her pants. She stepped over closer to Linda who was also back on her feet.

“An oxygen
leak,” Mase explained as he started making his way toward the exit. “You should
still be safe in here; I don’t see any of this cavern’s warning alarms
flashing. It’s the main cavern that has suffered damage.”

There were
special alarms set every one hundred feet to monitor the air pressure in the
caverns. If the pressure dropped, the alarms would go off and the attached
lights would start flashing red. The alarms they were currently hearing were
placed at the air lock to indicate a drop of air pressure in the main Tycho City cavern.

“I hope it’s
not serious,” Linda said with obvious concern in her voice. She also hoped no
one had gotten hurt. This was the first time these alarms had sounded.

“So do I,”
Mase replied as they reached the exit. At the exit there was a phone, which he
could use to contact the Control Center.

Picking it up,
he quickly reached Major Daniels. “What’s the situation?”

“That last
moonquake cracked a support beam in the new cavern, causing damage to the
roof,” Daniels reported. “Steffan is already on it. We’re showing a slight
pressure decrease also. “Isaac is in the process of taking a work crew outside
to see if they can seal it up from there. He thinks there might be a small
fissure that has opened up.”

Mase nodded.
“I will be there shortly.”

-

Steffan looked
up at the ceiling two hundred feet above his head. He could see a jagged forty-foot
hole that ran across the roof. Looking back down at the floor, he gazed at the
large and heavy Luxen support beam that was lying there. This was going to be a
big job to fix it, set it back up, and then repair the roof.

He looked over
at one of his assistants. “Get a Luxen welder and cutting torch. We’re also
going to need the big crane.”

-

Isaac looked
at the large fissure that had opened up above the new Tycho City cavern. He estimated it was a good three hundred feet long and twenty feet wide. He also
knew that it was deep enough to allow oxygen to escape from the rip in the roof
of the cavern below them.

“Get the
bulldozers out here,” he ordered as he assessed the situation. “We will use
them to shove dirt back into the fissure and seal it back up once Steffan has a
patch on the ceiling.”

Two hours
later six bulldozers specially designed to be used on the lunar surface were
busy pushing dirt back into the fissure. Isaac knew this job was going to take
a while. He was aggravated that the roof of the new cavern had been damaged. He
knew that it should have held up to the quake.

Isaac gazed
off looking around the crater. Everything seemed the same. Looking up, he could
see the Earth. It was covered in a thick dark cloud layer. He knew much of what
he was seeing was ash from erupting volcanoes. He shook his head; even if the
neutron star and black hole left the Earth and the Moon intact, nothing would
ever be the same again.

Mase was
standing next to Steffan as he watched the repairs being done. Already the hole
in the ceiling had been repaired and the Luxen beam was in the process of being
put back up.

“We were
lucky,” said Steffan, looking over at Mase. “The hole didn’t go all the way
through, but it exposed just enough of the overhead rock to allow some air to
escape. Isaac reports that the fissure above the cavern is about three hundred
feet deep at its deepest. He’s using the bulldozers to fill the fissure back
up.”

“That was
close,” replied Mase, knowing it could have been a whole lot worse. “Let’s plan
some disaster drills over the next few days so our people will get used to
going to the underground shelters. I wouldn’t want to lose anyone if we did
suffer major damage to the ceiling.”

“There’s a lot
of air in this cavern,” Steffen informed Mase, agreeing with him about the
drills. “Even with a large hole, everyone would have some time to evacuate.”

“I know,” Mase
responded taking a deep breath. “I worry sometimes about us becoming too
complacent. We have become so used to moonquakes that, at times, we scarcely
notice them anymore.”

Mase watched
as Steffan’s crew finished the repair and then he left to go to the ecological
habitat to let the girls know that everything was safe. He knew that all three
had been quite frightened when the alarms had sounded. It had shaken him also
as it was so unexpected.

As he walked,
he heard the all clear signal being sounded to allow everyone to come out of
the underground shelters. Looking over at Tycho City, he marveled how it looked
almost identical to the old one. The only difference being that the buildings
were much larger. There was still an amazing amount of greenery about. Jolene
had made sure that every available space had been filled with plants.

In the distance,
he could see several birds flying through the air. It had been a good decision
to add the birds to the cavern. Mase knew that eight different species of small
birds were now free in Tycho City. It made everything seem more normal. Jolene
had also added a number of helpful species of insects as well as butterflies
and honeybees.