ACME Bunker Begins

[Zack]

The white noise created from a skateboard's wheels was one of the few truly beautiful sounds to Zack Monaghan. He spent much of his youth figuring out how things worked, computer systems, robotics and languages were easy, but learning to tune your body to extract balance in a variable environment was something even more evolved... it was physics and athletics all rolled into one. Besides, chicks digged a guy who could do a Cabellerial.

As the gleam of Accolade Tower caught his eye, Zack took another long and loud sip from his cup of Korean Bubble Milk Tea before slowing the skateboard and kicking it up to his hand. While the massive tower served as smoke and mirrors, the real gem in ACME was a bunker buried under nearby parkland. At least, that's what Zack thought. Who cared about offices and accounting when you had a company's darkest secrets and an entire test lab to toy with?

Zack waited outside the recently unearthed, and rather unassuming blast doors. He pulled out his communicator, a new test-model which synced flawlessly to his personal phone, and messaged a select list of people under the group name: "Bunker Boys".

[Text: I'm here, where you all at?]

 

[Bran]

Glass shattered. Tiny shards flew across the room, striking the concrete walls before falling lifelessly to the ground. Furniture and tables were tossed around by an unseen force. Any peace which rested upon the room was now gone. The lab had been thrown into chaos. A lone figure, pinned to one side of the room, struggled to reach a remote which lingered only inches away from his desperate grasp. The compression like waves that rocked the lab slowly hammered on the man’s chest squeezing the air from it. Just as his fingers came in contact with the remote type object, a crashing blast knocked it farther to his left.

Suddenly a glint caught the man’s glance. A knife like piece of glass came flying across the room towards him. Quickly the man planted his feet directly against the wall and pushed off and up while curling his body into a ball, effectively performing a midair somersault away from the danger. Before he could complete the acrobatic movement, the force knocked him back into the wall; only this time he was upside down and facing it. Luckily his evasive tactic had placed himself within arm’s reach of the remote. Snatching it up, he hurriedly pressed a button. All movement in the room abruptly ceased. The man’s legs fell away from the wall and he landed squarely on his back with a crash.

For a few seconds, the man didn’t move. Then, unexpectedly, a soft, short buzz filled the room and was quickly followed by another one. Struggling to reach into his pocket, the man pulled out the source of the sound, a phone. Its screen showed him that two new text messages had arrived from two different senders. The first, from someone named ‘Felicity’, he saved for later. The second, from '@Zack', he opened. Upon reading the message, he typed and sent a reply.

[I will be there STAT]

 

[Eugene]

"Alright Mike, that's enough for one day. Take it in on..." Whipping out his phone, Euge quickly consulted the local weather. "Take it in on 25." With his acknowlegement, Euge scrunched into his side of the DA-42 trainer in order to give the cadet shoulder room. While he kept one watchful eye on the cadet's performance, most of Euge's attention was given to the poker tournament on his phone. As the plane circled around to line up on final, his phone chirped with three new text messages. The first, from a number he didn't recognize, was thanking him for a wonderful night and inviting him over for another massage. Clearly Sarah, or whatever her name was, felt something more special than he, and Euge quickly binned the message.

Message number two, from @Ivy, caused Euge's brow to furrow with confusion and anger. The woman had been violently opposed to him from the moment they had met, yet she now had the gall to give him orders to cover her class? Gritting his teeth, Euge set the message aside for the moment and proceeded to the last text.

The final message was from @Zack, who paradoxically became one of his best friends upon joining ACME, much to the chargin of his sister. He was being oddly secretive about his latest pet project, only giving those assembled over a Domino's pizza last night a location to muster at today. Barely glancing at the text, Euge tapped out his generic response.

[Groundside in five.]

Pocketing his phone, Euge smiled when he saw runway 13 ahead and relized the trainee had listened to the weather closely enough to call his bluff and land into the wind. Wiping the smile off his face, Euge scribbled a small note into his log. Some extra credit was in order.

 

[Gunnar]

The Swedish athlete was, of course, found at San Francisco's Kezar Stadium, tightening his laces between situps. That was when the faint ping of a sonar detector announced the arrival of an incoming text message. Who sends him text messages?

He picked up his mobile phone and read the digital note. It was a brief reminder of where he was supposed to be, sent by @Zack. Keypad dexterity obviously lacking, the sprinter slowly typed and returned a response.

[An eyeblink]

Gunnar had met with Zack on occasion after his CQC Strategy classes, which were instructed by the sk8er boi's redhead sister. Following the combat courses, the Swede would take part in basketball matches with some other students. This apparently presented an opportunity for Zack to tell him about an inventory project underway in a bunker located on the ACME campus. While the foreigner did not often volunteer his 'free time' to much of anything besides track and field, 'bunker' was enough a magic word to retain Gunnar's attention.

The young man sighed as he switched shoes back to his trainers. Running spikes and towel stuffed back into his bag, Gunnar shouldered the pack and jogged off to catch a bus.

 

[Nevon]

Nevon Blair was in North Korea, tracking down a missile that was stolen from Russia. It was a one-man mission and the job needed stealth and precision. Dressed in black, Nev inched his way towards a door and inserted a tiny digital camera underneath to look for signs of the enemy. Of all the luck, a guard was right there, and he was walking Nevon's way to open the door. Blair panicked, quickly retrieving the sensors and planning a different tactic. He could kick open the door now and knock the enemy out. So he did.

BLAM!

But his timing was off and Nev thought he was going to die.

"What? Who opened this door?" The enemy's limited AI failed to detect Nevon or the loud door slam. Relieved, Blair moved slowly out of the way.

"ONE message from... Zack," his phone read out loud:

[Text: I'm here, where you all at?]

Oh shoot! The bunker!

He turned off the XBox and rushed a reply.

[woe close alarmist there inna sec]

 

[Zack]

"I love the smell of fresh Science in the morning," Zack said to himself as he made his way down the cavern.

It was quiet, with everything still bubble-wrapped and smelling of fresh paint. His path was a concrete slab anchored along solid rock walls. Flanking the path were dual submarine engines. The two high powered motors would provide ACME's Bunker (and the technology labs within) a flow of redundant power to keep them running in case of any unforeseen emergencies.

This would fork off into a suspended glass walkway above the servers that ended in a circular meeting space. On lower floors, a natural cave opened up to San Francisco Bay. Zack thought it would probably make a great escape hatch if they could ever secure the funding. For now though, he could live up his geeky bond-villain dream by sitting on one of the identical swivel-chair and waiting for his friends to arrive. He kept his eye on his phone so he would know the exact moment they make it across the glass bridge.

There were a few false alarms, until he finally saw their shapes on his high-definition phone screen. Turning his back to them, he waited until footsteps on the glass path could be heard.

Spinning back for the most dramatic effect he could muster, Zack spread his arms wide in greeting, "Welcome Bunker Brothers, I know you're all wondering why I called you here today..."

He always wanted to say that.

 

[Eugene]

Thanks to one of ACME's constant ferry of helicopters between Alameda and Accolade, Euge was deposited upon the rooftop pad of the tower, 46 floors above the concealed entrance to the bunker. Ten minutes and two desolate freight elevators found him at the blast door, poorly disguised as a mechanical room. Well, it was half right, Euge found when the motorized door slid into the wall and he was hit with the stench of diesel.

Following the path past the generators and their accompanying banks of batteries eventually saw the concrete give way to glass and steel, and suspecting Zack's flair for the dramatic, Euge followed the more poorly lit branch. Emerging in a bank of servers underneath a glass room proved his hunch wrong, and he quickly surveyd the darkened caves branching off before backtracking to the fork in the road.

Grabbing a seat which placed the exit at the corner of his eye, Euge armed himself for the inevitable dramatic reveal with several rubber bands.

"Welcome Bunker Brothers, I know you're all wondering why I called you here today..."

Fighting the urge to roll his eyes, Euge instead loosed one of his rubber bands which quickly found its mark on Zack's forehead before ricocheting off and coming to rest against a display case, the contents of which quickly drew Euge's attention from Zack's rehersed speech.

"Yeah, that's great Zed, but is that a wingsuit in there? A real honest to god wingsuit?"

 

[Bran]

Bran arrived at the tower fifteen minutes after he had received the summons. He had quickly exchanged his shredded shirt for a long sleeved black buttoned one, and then, putting his Daytona motorcycle to good use, made his way to the ACME campus. Upon securing his bike, he entered the tower, dropped to the basement floor, and found the blast door that guarded the bunker.

The bunker was a second home to Bran. He had spent many long nights here grueling over paperwork and, on occasion, various experiments. While it certainly wasn’t as homely as his penthouse apartment, the artistic glass and the inelegant boxes created an unforeseeably pleasant environment. As his long strides carried him across the clear glass bridge which led to the circular room at its end, Bran spotted @Zack and @Eugene who appeared to be, at that moment, flipping a rubber band towards the former. Entering the room, he greeted each with a handshake and an inquiry into their well being. He then found a chair of his own and waited for the arrival of the few remaining members of this meeting.

 

[Nevon]

Nevon Blair rode his bike from the dorms and parked it right in front of the construction areas. ACME compound was heavily secure and there are at least 8 guards that make round in any given square foot inside 24 hours, so his bike was totally safe.

Arriving just in time to hear @Eugene Grovington's comment on the wingsuit, Nev wondered what he missed.

After a few more seconds of gawking at the new fixtures in the bunker, he turned his attention back to Zack.

"Mr. Devineaux okayed the budget for a wingsuit?"

 

[Gunnar]

Gunnar had never been inside the Bunker before, but he knew he liked it as soon as his feet clopped across the polished concrete. The entire layout felt Swedish, somehow--Scandinavian modernism that made him feel almost at home.

He knew the he might be late for the meeting if he did not quicken his pace, but the young man obstinantly took his time to notice all the details of the underground hideout. It was cool inside, air conditioning running extremely efficiently through the blasted stone shafts, maintaining an optimal environment for the servers the hidden facility contained somewhere deeper. As he approached the main chamber room which housed these electronic workhorses, Gunnar thought he recognized the faint sounds of water trickling through one of the tunnels.

A moment later, he entered a glass-enclosed catwalk which bisected the central 'cavern'. Ahead were gathered four other ACME employees, including Zack, the arranger of this mysterious convention.

Apparently he had just missed a very bad joke, but the crew's attention had been diverted to something more interesting.

"Mr. Devineaux okayed the budget for a wingsuit?"

The Swede huffed. "Which is this? Batman?"

 

[Zack]

"Gah!" Zack exclaimed as the rubber-band hit him.

Recovering with a smile he unrolled a map on the table.

"Gentlemen... Bunker Brothers... It has come to my attention that there is an opposing group in our midsts! A sorority of women, trying to overthrow our sacred brotherhood with an even fancier get-together. I have irrefutable evidence from this invite pilfered from my sister's coffee table."

Zack proceeded to place down a card for a Spring Break Garden Party hosted by Sophie Conrad and Gudrun Nygård.

"As you can see, they're gathering at the Park Chalet. Our goal is to crash this party and get our hands on their delicious, delicious food."

 

[Chase]

The rotors of an aircraft hovered above San Francisco bay, slowly approaching Accolade. The building was a recent ACME project completed as part of a greener initiative -- an initiative that started literally 'out of the blue'.

"Has she landed?" Chase spoke into the radio while gliding down a flight of stairs to the basement Security levels just above the parking garage.

"Affirmative, Skylar's on target," command replied remotely.

Skylar, or Sky-Low-Aerial-Resource was a recently developed helicopter drone close to officially leaving lab environments. She was completely programmable, voice directed, and seated 6 agents at maximum capacity. Before the titanium stealth unmanned aircraft was considered field worthy, she had one more test to complete -- and since Chase was known for shooting multiple birds with one figurative stone -- he enlisted Zack to find some clever volunteers for this last leg of Skylar's practical training.

After getting the 'okay' prompt, Devineaux made his way into a nondescript broom closet and flicked a button to activate the vacuum elevator that took him down to the bunker below. Arriving just as rubber bands were stretched and released, he exhaled as soon as Zack unveiled the map secured from his sister's not-so-prized possessions.

"Park Chalet Garden Restaurant," Chase voiced as he marched across the glass bridge, "It's an impromptu operation, you have three seconds to opt out."

He didn't wait three seconds.

"Wingsuits, new drone, start changing and let's test both out. We'll cover tactics on the way."

Singling out Nevon, he briefly nodded, "I can trust you to get the van out now, meet us there as our getaway ride?"

((BBs, you can write yourself leaving the bunker here, but we're merging with the girls' Spring Break post after this.))