“Armory,” J.B. said. “Quite a way off, up three levels, behind the guard section. Close by what looks like the main sec control area.”
“Any food anywhere?” Dean asked.
“Yeah.” Krysty tapped her finger on a green hexagonal area. “Dining hall and supplies. That’s where it would’ve been. But it seems certain that the whole place was swept just before skydark. I’d be surprised if we found anything worth having anywhere in the whole redoubt.”
“Entrance there.” Jak pointed. “Two levels up.”
Ryan was trying to work it out. “The way in and out of the complex looks like it’s above us. Mebbe there’s another set of those emergency stairs, but I can’t see any.”
J.B. had polished his glasses again, putting them back on to peer at the plan. He traced their route from the gateway. “Guess you’re likely right, Ryan. It must” He glanced behind them. “Over there. Short way along that tunnel.”
The sec door was there.
Like the other one, it proved safe to use, and they left it tripped, ready to get back down toward the mat-trans section of the redoubt.
RYAN LED THE WAY UP the iron stairs, his boots rasping on the serrated treads of the steps. He guessed that there was probably a bank of elevators that they could have used to reach the ground level and the way out of the place. But he had a well-founded dislike and mistrust of elevators. At least nobody could jam a staircase with him on it. Or cut the cables and send him plummeting a thousand feet.
He looked up, seeing the silver-painted steps spiraling for at least another hundred feet. But that didn’t give him much of a clue to how many floors that distance might mean, as all of the redoubts in the network were built to incredibly high-security defensive specifications.
The rest of the group was strung out below him.
The Trader had always insisted that any patrol should stick to the best pace of the slowest member of the unit. A situation where someone was being pushed that little bit beyond his or her limits meant danger for everyone.
Doc was the slowest.
“I don’t suppose we might stop when we reach the top of the stairs, Master Cawdor?” Doc’s plaintive voice bounced off the sec-steel walls of the shaft.
“I think we could take five after we get through the next door, Doc.”
“Then you are truly a saint in human form, my friend.”
THE THIRD DOOR was treated the same as the previous two, left open, ready for them to make their exit.
“One more floor and we should be up at ground level,” Ryan stated, studying the new plan.
“Anyone smell anything?” Jak asked.
“What?” Krysty sniffed the air. “Can’t pick anything up. What is it?”
“Cooking meat. Faint and far. Mebbe outside redoubt. Main doors could be open.”
“Yeah,” Dean said, turning his head from side to side, shuffling his feet with excitement. “Jak’s right, Dad. Someone’s roasting meat.”
Nobody else had a good enough sense of smell to catch the elusive scent, but Ryan believed Jak and his son, though he didn’t share their enthusiasm over the discovery. Not if it meant that a section of the sprawling military complex had been infiltrated and taken over.
It could mean trouble.
A WINDING CORRIDOR was marked on the plan as being only for Alternatively Abled Personnel.
“Wheelchairs,” Mildred said.
“Cooking’s stronger,” Jak said when they’d gone about halfway up the gentle incline.
“Think I can smell it,” Mildred stated. “like a barbecue on a Pleasant Valley Sunday. Yeah, I’m sure of it. Can you smell it, John?”
The Armorer stood still, pushing his battered fedora back off his forehead. “Not sure. Mebbe I can only smell what you’ve said I should be able to smell.”
“It’s strong,” Dean said.
“Must mean someone’s inside the redoubt.” Ryan rubbed at the stubble on his chin with his thumb and forefinger while he considered the implications. “Odds are, they’re going to be hostiles. Get our shooting in first, if we have to.”
The outer wall of the circling ramp was badly scuffed at about eighteen inches from the dark brown carpet tiles. And at one point they found that the white plastic handrail had been pulled loose from the wall.