The Dying of the Light: Interval Read Online Free PDF Page A

breath of fresh air.”
    I looked over at Kim, raising an eyebrow questioningly at the mention of fresh air. We hadn’t had that in a year and had no way of getting it. Kim shrugged and shook her head. Clearly, she didn’t know what was going on, either.
    “All right, it’s settled, then. Be at the Observation Deck elevator in ten minutes, everyone,” said Gates.
    There was some general chatter as we dispersed, taking the opportunity to stretch our legs, grab some coffee, or make our way to the restroom.
    Kim and I started toward the door to the hallways at the same moment, and I hesitated and stepped back to give her room—a dead giveaway that I wasn’t feeling too close to her right at the moment. Of course, that made her tense up, and that just made me even more uptight. She put a hand on my arm, but like the bastard I occasionally was, I shrugged it off with a mumbled, “Later.” I knew I didn’t have it in me to talk right then.
    A few minutes later, Kim and I were both all business once more as we approached the elevator to the observation deck, where the other seven members of the advisory board had gathered and were waiting for us to join them. The governor’s assistant, a short, quiet man named Daniel, held a whispered conversation with her as we approached, then nodded and left, smiling at us as he passed.
    I liked Daniel, even though he was eerily quiet, sometimes. I had nicknamed him “the ninja assistant” for his ability to show up exactly when needed without being called.
    Kim nudged me in the side and I turned my attention back to the governor, who was just answering a question from Orville Seward, head of Logistics.
    “We’re not talking about that right now, Orville. We’re here for some fresh air,” said Gates as she turned to the side and inserted one of only a handful of keys that opened the doors for this particular elevator. “We’ll get back to the meeting afterward.”
    Seward grumbled a bit, as he was wont to do, but stayed quiet as we all piled into the elevator. It wasn’t a tight squeeze, as the elevator was designed to accommodate classes of schoolchildren on occasion. The mechanism hummed a little, barely audible over the sound of the air rushing by.
    Several minutes passed, and after a muted ding, the doors opened onto the observation deck. With the protective shutters closed, the room was lit like the rest of the base, with the long, thin bulbs that were supposedly designed to exactly replicate the wavelength of natural sunlight. I had laughed when I found out about them. Which sunlight is that? I had wondered. Sunrise? Sunset? Dawn over the mountains or are we talking the sweltering heat of a Georgia August?
    I shook my head to clear it as Gates asked us to take seats on the comfortable benches spaced around the room. I sat next to Kim, and didn’t object when she slipped her hand in mine. In fact, it made my heart melt a little. Maybe we’ll be OK faster than I thought .
    “As I think all of you know, this room was designed to remind us that there is, in fact, a world up here,” said Gates, pressing a button on the room’s remote she had retrieved from a cabinet. The shutters receded into their alcoves, and the room was flooded with the soft warm light of a Washington sunset. From our vantage, we could see as far as Puget Sound. There was a gasp from one side, but I didn’t turn. My attention was riveted on the city.
    Or rather, where the city had been .
    “It’s gone,” came a quiet whisper from one of the women. “Just… gone.”
    She’s right , I realized. That’s why we can see all the way to the Sound . There was almost nothing standing between the bunker and the water. Tacoma, Auburn, Edgewood… everything south of SeaTac airport was razed, like the fires of Hell had consumed it. Nothing over a story stood, and most of that was charred, blackened from whatever hellish firestorm had swept through the area. I hadn’t been up here since Z-Day, but I found