We hadn’t walked five more minutes when we reached the entrance to what Chloe called the Bunker, letting me know that we were about to enter a labyrinth of shadowed halls and creepiness but not to worry because she had been this way before.
When she was eight.
And with her dad.
After receiving this little tidbit, I said, “Sure thing, sweetheart. Why would I worry about getting lost in a labyrinth of shadowy halls in Russian-occupied America wearing Nazi memorabilia?”
Whether Chloe didn’t hear me or just decided to ignore my awesome wit, I wasn’t sure. Either way she didn’t answer. She squatted down in front of me and started fanning her gloved hands around on the concrete of the alley, brushing away the snow to reveal a manhole.
Together, only after I’d let her try herself for almost a whole minute, we pried the lid up. I was expecting the smell of a sewer but instead received a full blast in the face that smelled like Lysol and lots of the stuff.
“You never said anything about breaking into a Dollar General,” I said, covering my nose. “Seriously, I think my nose hairs just burnt off.”
“Stop being a baby, Jericho. It’s just sterilization,” She told me before dropping into the blackness.
“I actually plan on having kids one day, Chloe,” I called down into the dark. “I mean, were I a chic we wouldn’t have this little hiccup.”
“Not that kind of sterilization, idiot,” I heard her say, her voice echoing.
Hoping she was right, I dropped in behind her. Upon landing, Chloe then told me that the manhole had to be closed. I peered up at the opening almost eight feet above us and said, “Sure thing. I’ll get on your shoulders.”
I was joking of course and Chloe realized this, stating that if I couldn’t hold her she’d understand. “Shut up, woman,” I said, lacing my fingers for a handhold, to which Chloe accepted and in a few seconds she was sitting on my shoulders.
I tried to take this opportunity to get a good smell of Chloe. I’d picked up on her lovely scent once before when I tackled her back in Rome. Trying to pick up the same smell was impossible right then due to the fact that we were both wearing some dead guy’s musty duds.
Chloe stopped whatever she was doing up top and suddenly said, “You did not just try to smell me.”
“Don’t flatter yourself, Chloe,” I told her, too quickly, actually. “The cold makes me sniff a lot and I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but it’s freakin’ ten below out here.”
Once the manhole was back in place it was dark. Like, severely dark. Like, darker than black type dark.
“Haven’t been in a dark underground hallway with a chic in a while,” I stated sarcastically, still mad at myself for trying to smell Chloe.
“It’s like riding a bike,” Chloe said, climbing down from my shoulders. “Just be glad it’s summer or else we’d have to worry about ice spiders.”
“Just how cold is the wintertime?” I asked, a little shocked that ten below was deemed summertime.
“Almost negative ninety most of the time. Access to the surface is only done with mechs and even then only for short periods at a time because they will freeze up.” I heard her rummaging around in the darkness before hearing a slight crack and seeing that Chloe had produced an almost foot-long glow stick.
I fell in step behind Chloe as she started making her way down the damp underground tunnel. “And what’re ice spiders?”
I saw her silhouette shrug, “Just big spiders that normally live above until it gets too cold. Then they move down here for the winter.”
I was surprised, shocked, astounded and frankly, a little scared. I mean, I’d killed as many ice spiders as anyone else who has played any standard role-playing game, but I always hoped that if any fantasy creatures were ever real, giant man-eating spiders wouldn't be one of them.
“How, uh, big are we talking, here?” I asked as nonchalantly as possible.
“Depends,” she said, “Up top they can range from four feet across, which is an infant and not at all a danger, to the big ones which can get up to ten feet across.”
I was very glad that Chloe didn’t see or hear me gulp. I mean, call me crazy, but four feet wide spiders sounded pretty darn big to me.
“Whatever,” I said, stepping around a puddle. “I’m just glad we won’t be running into any. Just so you know, spiders we in 2012 classify as big are, like, ten inches across. And those are the monster ones.”
Chloe just nodded and I was glad she didn’t decide to tell me that there were also killer snakes bigger than redwood trees or cockroaches the size of German shepherds lurking around here in the dark.
I don’t remember how long we walked then, with Chloe making the occasional right or left turn and me close behind just in case she was wrong about the great ice spider migration. After what seemed an eternity, with my mind playing tricks on me with shadows and my mind also showing me vivid pictures of having the flesh torn from my face by savage spiders, I opened my mouth to ask Chloe if, by any crazy chance, summer was almost over and if winter was coming--then I ran into her because she had stopped walking.
Normally I would have said something, anything, really, if I’d bumped into anyone. But since I thought she’d stopped because Shelob herself was blocking our path, I silently peered around Chloe, and then sighed with relief when I saw that it wasn’t Shelob but only a dead end.
Wait, what the heck?
“A dead end, really?” I said to Chloe, “Please tell me you saw this coming.”
Chloe dropped to her knees and began brushing away at the floor like she’d done in the alley and within seconds had found yet another trapdoor.
The two of us went to work to get it open and did but with a lot more effort than the time before. Once we were done we both ended up sitting back and panting a little.
“Geez, but this hatch has been shut a while,” I said, trying to catch my breath.
Chloe nodded and got to her knees. “Since I was eight,” she confirmed, looking down the hole, “This one has lights so we won’t need the glow stick,” she said, putting the said green glow stick inside her coat, “We’re almost to where they’re keeping my father. He’s only guarded by two guards which change every twelve hours.”
“So we just walk in and bump the guys on the head?” I asked, hoping that wasn’t the plan.
“More or less. We need to get in their armor. The problem is the surveillance cameras. Three exactly, actually.”
I peered at Chloe in the dim light. I could tell she hadn’t thought this part of the plan through. Or if she did, she hadn’t thought about it too hard. “I saw a movie once where the guys trying to evade the cameras cut the power.”
“Won’t work,” Chloe said, shaking her head. “The guards will be able to see us in the dark with their helmets.”
I stood, and offered a hand to her. “Well, I’m all out of ideas.”
Chloe accepted my hand, getting to her feet. “We’ll try to draw the guards into a dead zone and subdue them. It’s possible, just more dangerous.”
I held up my hands. “After the mammoth mech in the streets I’m ready for some normal dudes. And I know tai-jutsu, nin-jutsu and jiujutsu. Just saying.”
“As do I,” Chloe said. “Haven’t used them much, though. Just had them implanted just in case. I prefer to shoot people.”
“Too bad the gloves are out of commission.” I said, glancing at my dead glove that I was wearing. “Bet we could’ve shocked the crap out of those guys.”
Chloe started explain to me about the closest dead zone that didn’t have any cameras which was close enough to the guards to get their attention and draw them away. One would probably stay behind but after we knocked out his pal we hoped he’d run to his rescue.
Chloe’s final hope was that whoever was watching the screen the camera was feeding to would see two guards leave and two return. Easy peasy.
We dropped into the opening and landed quietly on the marble floor. Yeah, yo
u heard right. Marble floor. It looked like we’d just dropped into a fancy hospital with the same sterile smell in the air. It took a while for our eyes to adjust to the brightness before Chloe gave me the sign for silence and we began creeping down the brightly lit hallway.
It felt kind of stupid to be sneaking down a bright hallway, actually, but hey, I wasn’t about to question Chloe’s motives. She had been here before, after all, whereas I was just the handsome tag-a-long. Before long the hallway made a sudden right and Chloe squatted down and motioned me down beside her. With our backs to the wall a few inches away from the edge, Chloe produced a pocket mirror and checked around the corner.
After she’d finished her cliché’ reconnaissance she glanced at me, seeing my look that said her little mirror move was, in fact, if she hadn’t already known, really, really cliché’. Then she grabbed my head softly and pulled my ear against her lips, “They are both there.” She whispered, her words vibrating on my right lobe and her breath feeling extremely hot, like, degrees hot, against my frozen ear.
Since she wasn’t exactly worrying her pretty little head about the closeness, and also since this seemed like as good a time as any to get that good whiff of Chloe that I’d been trying to get ever since Rome, I leaned in and pressed my lips to her ear. “Then go ahead, girl scout,” I whispered, “I’m right behind you.” Then, because I really wasn’t caring about blowing my cover at that point, I said, “You smell really good. Just saying.”
Chloe pulled away, checked her mirror one last time, glanced at me then pulled my ear to her lips again, “Thanks.” She said and I could feel the smile on her lips, “You don’t smell so bad yourself.”
Then, before I could tell her thank you, she stood suddenly, pulling me up with her. Taking a few steps back, Chloe then proceeded to stomp really hard, the noise echoing down the hallway like a gunshot.
It took a few fractured seconds for me to realize that she had just alerted the guards to our presence and that we should probably run. Darting back the way we’d came, our footsteps rang out almost as loud as Chloe little heel stomp, so if there were any question the guards might have had about intruders, they were now confirmed.
We heard them discuss something for a second before hearing two sets of footsteps coming our way and, call me paranoid, but I’m almost positive I heard them cock their rifles.
Chloe flipped off a light switch when we ran into the last stretch of hallway that led to our ceiling entrance. The rest of this little scene didn’t take too long and, honestly, not to sound like the snail that was mugged by the turtle-
But it all happened so fast…
The future was a dangerous place, on the real. Of course, now that I look back on it, I suppose you could argue that breaking into any maximum security facility could get you shot no matter what year it was. This place wasn’t exactly Langley, or anything, but I was thinking these guys weren’t playing around.
And neither was Chloe.
The first guard to round the corner received what I could only discern as a perfect ten hurricane kick to the side of his helmet, causing him to stagger and crash into the opposite wall. I was so mesmerized by Chuck Norris’ daughter that I forgot about the other guard, who hadn’t forgotten about me and had grabbed me up in a painful bear hug and started squeezing the life out of me before I knew what was happening.
Normally, grabbing someone and squeezing them really hard wasn’t exactly one of the best moves a guy could try. I mean, he could get his eyes gouged out, his ears bitten off… you know, rough stuff. Unless, of course, the hugger happens to be wearing a super advanced battle suit, then the hug is pretty much lethal and his head is protected by a helmet.
I was glad I couldn’t breathe or else I would’ve screamed like a little girl for madam ninja to save me. Not that it would’ve made much difference considering I saw that Chloe had somehow gotten the other guard’s helmet off and was pounding his face with it.
I struggled against the strong arms clamped around me and kicked my feet around like crazy. I managed to somehow swivel a little, just enough to plant both my boots against the wall and push off as hard as I could, tripping my attacker and landing on top of him as we both fell to the hard marble floor.
Feeling air rush into my lungs when he lost his grip on me, I rolled off of him quickly and mounted his chest, grabbing at his mask in a desperate attempt to remove it so I could bludgeon his fat head like Chloe had done.
I was guessing the guard wasn’t exactly digging the idea of my bludgeoning him with his own helmet because all it took to remove me from his chest was for him to grab my coat collar and throw me into the air.
Okay, I know you guys out there are probably realists. I mean, I know you probably want to hear this awesome action-packed story about my awesome feats and stuff. But, I also know that you guys aren’t going to take a lot of what I say to heart. Mainly about all the wild, crazy, gravity defying things that have happened already (and are going to happen later).
But let me go ahead and tell you that everything is completely true.
Alright, moving on. Just figured you needed to know that before I tell this next part.
The guard sent me flying into the air like a badminton birdie and crashing through the thin ceiling. Pain shot through my left leg as the thin aluminum panels that made up the ceiling bit through my pants and into skin. My ride wasn’t finished as I cart wheeled three times in the open attic space, yelling like an idiot, before crashing through the ceiling again almost ten feet away from where I’d ripped through first.
I landed on all fours, which resulted in my face planting the marble floor from the force. I laid there for a few seconds, with my check against the cold floor and noticed that it was quiet. Groaning, I rolled over to check on who was winning.
The guard that’d just thrown me like a ragdoll was laying lifeless on the floor, his helmet removed and a pool of blood seeping out from under his head. Chloe was standing between the two downed guards with a helmet in each hand. “You alright?” She asked.
“Never better.” I said, “But I think I may have just crapped my pants.”
Chloe crossed over to me, smiling, “These suits are pretty tough. I guess maybe I was expecting less action, though.”
“Sorry to be the burden of high-flying action,” I muttered, extending a hand. Once I was pulled up my head started spinning. I told you that I cart wheeled three times because that seemed more logical, but to be honest, I’m not sure how many times I really spun in the air before my landing.
Three. Yeah, we’ll say three.
Chapter 19