Chapter 60 - Callahan

Too many questions will get you in trouble.

W e stood in the elevator, staring at the figure half-hidden in the shadows. I blinked rapidly, trying to process what I was seeing.

How did Eleanor get here?

"Something's not right," Boone said low, from beside me. He raised his gun. "It must be some kind of mimic."

The body in front of us raised its hands and stepped out of the shadows fully.

"Don't shoot. I'm not Eleanor. I'm Myrtle, her mother."

She stepped further out. The party relaxed and we left the elevator. The differences in their appearances were clear in the light.

"I thought you were dead," I said, still cautious.

"I faked my death. It was the only way I'd be truly free. You know Eleanor?" The woman's brown eyes lit up. "Is she safe?"

Growing closer, I studied her face. She didn't appear any older than us and yet, she claimed to have an 18 year old daughter. She didn't look like her mother, they could pass as sisters. They had the same skin tone, hair color, and eye color, only Myrtle's lips were thinner, her nose slightly longer, and her eyes were… cold.

I remembered what I'd read in her file. She'd been given a drug to prevent her from aging. She was forever stuck in her 20-year-old body.

Just like Eleanor would be in two years.

"She's safe. We left her with Riot," Cherry answered. "So you're Myrtle?"

"I am. What are you doing here? Why did you leave Eleanor behind?"

"We're here to figure out how to open the bunkers. We want to liberate the people from their cages. It wasn't safe for her to come," I told her.

Myrtle nodded, but her face was filled with irritation.

"That's an understatement. It's not safe for you, either. You shouldn't have come. There's no point. You can't save them."

"Why are you here?" Bonnie asked her. I could feel the energy in the party. No one trusted her.

"I wanted to know the truth about Bunker 237. You only get half the story in the files they keep. This was the only place to know what was actually going on." Myrtle straightened her Young Lady dress. If she'd been gone for so long, why was she still wearing the uniform? And it looked to be in mint condition. How?

"What did you find?" I asked.

Myrtle laughed and turned away. She motioned for us to follow her past the lounge and down the hall, where the units were. There were ten doors, each labeled with numbers 230 - 239.

"I've found a lot. I've actually explored all of the floors and units. They were themed, did you know that?"

I nodded. "The bunkers were tests. Experiments run by the rich."

"Yes, but each level was themed as well. It was how they organized things."

"What was the theme for this floor?" Soda asked from the back of the group.

"Sexual perversions." Myrtle dropped on the group. "Pick a door."

No one spoke for a moment. What did she mean, perversions? She looked at us expectantly, and Cherry piped up.

"230."

We made our way back to the front of the hall, and Myrtle typed in a code into the lock. It beeped three times and released; the door opening. She went first and the rest of us slowly filed in, with me leading our group.

"Bunker 230 was all about muscle worship. They were encouraged to bulk up as much as they could, in hopes of getting as close as they could to exploding. Only the biggest people were then allowed to breed, in hopes that they'd create a new type of human," Myrtle explained, taking us through the apartment unit. There was a kitchen, bathroom, two bedrooms, and a large living room with a giant table. She took us to it, and motioned to the model on it.

It was a miniature bunker.

"What happened to the ones that didn't make the cut?" Bonnie asked, picking up a figurine of a muscular man in just his underwear. He was orange, and flexing proudly.

"They ate them," Myrtle said flatly. "Used them as fuel. It was common to eat them alive. It was a point of pride, eating someone who lived long during the process."

Ate them?

Cherry's face paled and she stepped away from the table.

"How could they do such a thing?"

Myrtle wasn't phased. "They gave them steroids. Most of the bunkers injected their people with various things. This wasn't even one of the more intense ones. Not even on this level."

Eating someone alive wasn't the worst thing here?

Myrtle took us from unit to unit, showing us the horrors of what each one did to their residents. Each one seemed to get worse and worse.

"And you know Bunker 237," she laughed dryly at the door to it. "Home sweet home."

"Is that how you… had Eleanor?" Bonnie asked.

Myrtle turned and glared.

"Do you mean to ask, did my Daddy rape me and then I gave birth to his child? No. My Daddy was one of the few that didn't give into what they wanted all the Daddies to do. I was implanted like a good Young Lady, and Eleanor was born via cesarean like protocol dictated."

"If you were one of the safe ones, why did you want to leave so badly?" Cherry asked.

Myrtle blinked.

"Because I wasn't ever safe. I was still a caged bird." She looked at me. "I wanted the same thing you do. I wanted to save everyone. I was naive." She put her hand on the handle. "Now, do you want the tour?"

"Myrtle," I started. "If you've been up here this long, how did you get past Gary."

She frowned.

"Who's Gary?"