Page 67 of Call Sign: Thunder
Zach didn’t know who Gopher was, but the next minute played out as Ryder had suggested. The alarm went off the second the infrared lasers detected he’d passed through the now open door and it took Ryder that long to enter his authorization to get the loud ringing to stop.
“Who the hell are you guys expecting down here? It’s like you’re trying to keep out the most sophisticated bad buys on the planet,” he said, mostly in awe of the measures.
“Yeah, well that’s the idea. We’ve already made a lot of powerful enemies. Keeping the team safe is my top concern. The entire team could survive in the underground bunker without contact to the outside world for up to a year if we had to. We might kill each other being cooped up together, but that’s a different problem.”
Good to know.
Zach looked around while the men waited for Wrath and Doc to badge through the security check. Surprisingly, there was no command center like at The Bunker. Instead, a twenty-foot wide well-lit white tunnel stretched out for as far as Zach could see. Every fifty feet or so there was a heavy door on each side of the hallway, but that wasn’t even the thing that surprised him the most. That would be the souped up six-passenger golf cart that Ryder had jumped into the driver seat of.
“Hop in. It’s a good quarter-mile walk and so we usually take the gator.”
“Em… okay,” Zach said as he got into the passenger seat.
Except Ryder didn’t take off. A minute passed. Two…
“Fuck… I should have had Axel badge through first.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s back there giving Doc a hard time. He’s smart enough to know not to give her shit in front of me, but these rooms are sound proof.”
Another minute passed before Ryder jumped out of the driver’s seat and started stomping back toward the door. “Goddammit, we don’t have time for this bullshit,” he groused, prepared to go back to rescue Doc from the ass-chewing he suspected was underway.
He didn’t quite make it to the entry when it opened and a furious looking Axel barged through the door, stomping past Ryder and demanding, “Let’s just get the hell out of here.”
Zach heard Ryder’s exasperated sigh all the way back at the gator. He looked forward to avoid making eye contact with the stewing Axel who jumped in back as Ryder resumed his place in the driver’s seat.
“Well?” Axel said. “Let’s go.”
Ryder threw him a dirty look before adding, “We aren’t leaving without Doc. I already made her run all the way from the far parking lot to the plane in DC. I’m not going to make her walk to the Command Center too.”
“You should have left her in DC. There’s no reason for her to be here.”
“If you don’t want her to come down for visits, maybe you should try taking her phone calls. The only reason she’s here is because you stopped communicating.”
“That’s because she’s a quack. I don’t need another damn shrink to tell me to stop being sad.”
The security door had opened in the middle of his rant, allowing Doc to catch the tail end of his complaint.
“I don’t call you names, Axel. I’d appreciate it if you’d give me the same courtesy. And for the record… I don’t want you to stop being sad… I want you to find some peace. There’s a difference.”
Doc had settled into the bench seat next to Axel while she spoke.
“Not in my book. Can we get moving now?” Axel complained.
Ryder pressed the pedal to the metal and the modified golf cart went from zero to twenty in no seconds. By the time Ryder took the only curve in the hallway, Thunder was wishing this vehicle had a roll-bar like Axel’s jeep because he felt the need to hang on for dear life.
He lost track at counting ten doors along the long tunnel. He shouted over the engine to ask, “What’s behind all these doors?”
Ryder hesitated before answering. “Supplies. Lots and lots of supplies.”
It was Axel who warned him from the back seat. “And my advice is don’t take so much as a pen or a box of ammo without letting Gopher know. He’ll have a meltdown if his inventory is off by even a tiny amount.”
Doc shouted over the engine next. “Howard stopped taking my calls too. This visit is going to be productive. It’s like a twofer.”
Ryder was grinning and Axel encouraged her. “That’s a great idea. Gopher needs all the help he can get. You stay busy with him.”
They had arrived at the opening to a much larger room and another locked door. Ryder turned off the engine just as Doc reassured Axel. “I’ve cleared my calendar so I can stay in Texas indefinitely. Never fear, I’ll have time to spend with both of you.”
