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personal escape capsule that could only be accessed from his own room, via a private elevator. Sealed in a rooftop chamber over the bunker entrance, a chamber that he could enter by using keypad codes, the white, bullet-shaped capsule was just large enough for one person, and contained emergency food and water supplies, along with storage compartments holding a small quantity of the most important seeds in the world—enough to give plant life a new start somewhere.
    It was his fallback plan, the one he didn’t want to use, because it would mean abandoning the seed repository and giving up his life’s work there, in favor of something smaller and more focused, of far less consequence. Of an ingenious design, the capsule would pierce the seemingly ever-present cloud cover and convert into a jet plane high in the air, an aircraft that anyone could operate, since it could be programmed to fly to any number of destinations and land safely. Once above the cloud cover, Benitar had the fuel range to reach the farthest points in the world, wherever he needed to go for the best chance of saving a sampling of the on-board seeds, and ultimately forming a new agricultural planting program.
    After satisfying himself that the capsule was intact and in proper working order, he went down and made his normal rounds of the bunker, checking on the humidity, inspecting the seeds, tubers, roots, and bulbs, monitoring graphs and readouts … all the while feeling a sense of grim pride. He even smiled at two of the workers, and relished in the surprise that registered on their faces.
    Yes, Benitar would save the precious stores, even if he had to deal with a slovenly crew of employees who didn’t understand his methods. Entering Section D, he struggled to control his anger. His prime suspect, the bearded Jimmy Hansik was tending to the machines, intently making slight adjustments to the temperature and humidity settings. Five months ago, Hansik had been careless about this, causing some of the precious seeds to dry out. Now Benitar thought back and remembered the angry exchange between the two of them, with him yelling and Hansik standing there, looking defiant and defensive. At one point, the insolent employee had even said, “Benitar, don’t blow a circuit over this. We have backup seeds for all of the ones we lost. It’s not the end of the world.”
    Fuming and red faced, with his fists balled, Jackson had retorted: “It’s exactly that if we don’t protect the seeds, you fool, if you don’t pay attention to our duties! Can’t you comprehend what’s happening to the weather, all the cities and towns that are being destroyed, the people that are being killed?”
    To this, Hansik had just shrugged, asserting that the Director paid too much attention to the weather news. The employee’s attitude had been so enraging that Jackson would have shot him on the spot, if he’d only had a gun with him at the time.
    Now Benitar was ready for another confrontation with the man, more than ready for it, despite the sedative he had taken. “Did you hear about the tornado that destroyed Los Angeles?” he asked, and added, pointedly, “including your precious Hollywood? I guess you’ll never get your big break in the movies now, so you won’t get a chance to flex your overdeveloped muscles on the screen.”
    “I gave up on that long ago,” Hansik said.
    “Oh, really?”
    “Yes, really .” Hansik continued working as he spoke, went to his small desk and retrieved an electronic clipboard.
    Smiling to himself, Jackson knew from eavesdropping with surveillance camera audios that this former body-builder had never given up the foolish hope that he would become an action hero one day. In one long, recorded conversation with Belinda, he had poured his heart out to her, over a bottle of wine.
    “That’s pretty funny what happened to my bulletin today,” Jackson said.
    “What’s that?” Hansik looked up from the clipboard.
    “Surely you