Woodstock Rising. Tom Wayman
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moved toward the gate. “Sounds like a solution.”
I had to admit Jay’s suggestion did seem a plausible excuse to offer if things went terribly wrong. The cops might get down on law-breaking partiers, but were unlikely to be as heavy if they tagged us as spies or saboteurs sneaking into a national defence installation. The rest of us must have reached similar conclusions, since our group pressed forward after Remi.
Willow paused a few feet inside. “Shouldn’t we leave a lookout in case the Highway Patrol or somebody drives up?”
“You want to stay out here?” Phil asked.
No one relished the idea of remaining behind in the dark.
“This is where Alan would’ve come in handy,” Willow said.
All but Pump and Jay laughed. The image of our pudgy friend lurking among the rocks keeping watch was comical. Except when Alan was drunk and belligerently confronting the Laguna cops at our parties, he was notorious for being sedentary.
As we stepped cautiously inward from the fenced perimeter of the site, we approached a low mound, roughly circular, about twenty feet in diameter and three feet high. Jay all at once ran up onto it and struck a heroic pose. Pump began to circumnavigate the structure, his flashlight beam traversing back and forth across an area several feet out from the mound.
“What are you looking for, Pump?” Phil called. Despite Pump’s and Jay’s insistence that we were alone on the mountain, his voice was low.
“Personnel entrance.”
“Don’t we go in through the silo?” Willow inquired.
“What does the entrance look like?” Phil asked.
Jay dashed down the mound to rejoin us. “A hatch. Like a manhole. When the sites were operational, there were walkways that led to it. They’ve been —”
“Found it!” Pump called.
We assembled where he was crouched, his flashlight illuminating his right hand whisking gravel to one side. Parts of what looked like a city sewer manhole cover were appearing.
“That’s how we get in?” Edward asked.
Pump grinned. “Dig it — the Revere silos were pretty primitive. They built them fast and declared them obsolete fast.”
“Minuteman installations are a lot more elaborate,” Jay concurred. “They’ve got outbuildings with elevators you take down to your station. Some sites have clusters of birds, every one a MIRV.”
Willow frowned. “MIRV?”
“Equipped with more than one warhead.”
Pump straightened and added, “Multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicle.”
I could see that the exposed cover was padlocked to a metal staple set into the encircling concrete.
“Where’s the jimmy?” Jay asked.
Pump was already struggling out of his pack.
“Weren’t we going to ditch the crowbar?” Edward demanded.
“I figured we might need it for something else,” Pump said. “Once we pry the entrance open, we’ll stash it.”
“Useless fucking hippies,” Edward said. “Can’t trust a word they say.”
Pump extracted the implement. “Lighten up, man.”
“Gloves,” Remi reminded him.
Pump pulled the gloves out of the pack, and a second later was easing the hinged manhole cover upward. He put the sprung-open padlock beside the concrete and disappeared toward the fence with the crowbar. The underside of the cover bore a notice:
WARNING
Entrance to this facility
without proper authorization
constitutes a felony under
the National Defense Secrets Act.
Severe Penalties.
By the time Pump returned, Jay was already clambering down into the opening. Remi followed, with Pump close behind.
“Let’s go, Wayman,” Edward said, lowering himself into the tube.
I gazed around the dim and desolate landscape. When I peered into the manhole, I could make out flickers of light some distance below and the top of Edward’s head receding down the shaft. Phil and Willow were bunched behind me.
My nervousness about the entire venture had swelled at the prospect of climbing underground. Spelunking had never been my thing. “I don’t know about this,” I managed.
“Want me to go next?” Phil asked.
I briefly considered volunteering to remain topside to serve as lookout.
Then a muffled shout from Edward floated out of the hatch. “Way-man! Come on!”
I hoisted a leg over the rim and onto the first rung of the vertical ladder. Clutching the concrete, I located the second rung with my feet and then the third. I bent so that my hands grasped the metal of the topmost rung. Then I was smoothly descending, with Phil’s bulk blocking the stars above me.
“About ten feet more,” Edward’s voice directed.
“We should have lights in a minute,” I heard Pump call out.
My foot touched a steel plate. I stood beside Edward at the foot of the ladder.
“What do you think, Pump?” Jay asked.
They had removed the cover of a metal electrical box on the wall of what appeared to be a concrete antechamber. The flashlights were throwing strange shadows as Pump fussed with something deep inside the box. Phil stepped from the ladder.
Fluorescent light flooded down. Blinking, I could see we faced a featureless steel door resembling an institutional fire door. The same informative sign as on the manhole cover was affixed to the metal. The shaft leading to the surface — which Willow’s jean-clad legs currently were descending — and the small room I was in were lined with cables of various thicknesses.
Pump and Jay remained with their faces in the electrical panel. “We’re going to have to short-circuit the damn door,” Pump announced. “It’s keyed to an electrically conducting security card, which of course we don’t have.”
Jay rummaged in the pack and passed Jay a long screwdriver. “We think we can bypass the system by zapping the door circuit.”
“You think you can get it to —” began Willow.
A shower of sparks shot out of the electrical box, causing Pump and Jay to jump back, bumping into Edward, who had crowded in to observe them. A puff of smoke rose along the edge of the door frame.
“You sure this isn’t wired to some detection apparatus that will alert somebody we’re here?” Edward asked.
“If they had such a device, we’d have installed it,” his brother said, dismissing Edward’s concern.
The door had opened inward an inch. Jay pushed it wider with the plastic handle of his screwdriver. He and Pump, who again had donned the backpack, preceded us through.
The concrete passageway extended about fifteen feet. To our left was a glass window with the legend SECURITY painted on it. Behind was an empty office with desks, telephones, filing cabinets, and a framed photograph of Lyndon B. Johnson. Pump flicked a wall switch to activate additional overhead fluorescents. Jay was shifting massive bolts on a door blocking the hall ahead.
“Blast doors,” Pump explained as he and Jay heaved the thick bulk of the door ajar.
An identical portal was visible farther along the corridor, the floor of which now noticeably sloped downward. We followed the