They moved slowly back through the underground redoubt, stopping twice to punch in the codes to open the door after Sarah looked them up on the paperwork. Sarah kept shuffling through the maps, seeing if there was anything that might be of use.

"Whatcha thinking?" Charlie asked Renee, who was chewing on her thumbnail as she walked through the hallways.

"Trying to figure out where the best place is to shelter up," she said, wiping her thumb on her pants. "We need somewhere with heat

Kevin chose that moment to sneeze violently, wiping his face and looking miserable.

"And good enough to keep the rain off of us. We can live for a couple of days without food, we can't survive out in that storm," Renee finished, making a motion toward Mike, who sneezed again and wiped his face on his sleeve.

Charlie nodded. "Don's not doing good either."

"I'm also trying to figure out a place that we don't have to worry about Kull the Monkey Killer charging out of the jungle and killing us all for invading his sacred ancestral land," Renee added. She shook her head. "Something about him bugs me."

The klaxon went off as the door code was accepted.

"Like what?" Charlie asked as the door slowly opened.

"Why him? Why here? What's going on that required him?" Renee asked.

"You don't think it's just coincidence?" Charlie asked.

Renee shook her head. "No. No way it's coincidence. He was coming here. I don't know how, I don't know why, but my gut tells me he was coming here for some reason. I already thought that he might have been sent here to open it up, unlock the doors, but the more I think about it, the more I'm pretty sure he was sent for a reason."

"That's dark thoughts," Charlie said.

"This is a dark place," Renee said softly as the door to the locker room slid open.

"Did you find food?" Lori asked from where she was sitting on a bench, holding the baby, who immediately held her arms out to Sarah.

"No," Raincloud said, his voice thick with disgust. "It's all bullshit in there. Nothing we can use. This whole thing is bullshit."

Lori shook her head. "Not all of it. I'm glad we came in here."

"Why the fuck are you glad?" Raincloud frowned at the woman and she flinched back.

"I just... I just changed my underwear," she said, her voice full of a mixture of fear and pleading. She held one hand out toward Raincloud in a motion that was both pleading and as if to hold Raincloud off.

"Leave her alone," Charlie said, stepping between Raincloud and Lori.

"I didn't... what did I do?" Raincloud asked, Lori's body language suddenly dawning on him. "I mean, I wasn't..."

"It's OK," Lori said, sitting back down and holding the baby close while staring at the floor.

"She's got the right idea," Sarah said, moving over to one of the lockers with FEMALE on the top of the locker door. She opened it up, looking at the stack of cellophane wrapped underwear on the top shelf. "We've been wearing our underwear for several days. I don't know about you guys, but my nipples are starting to get a little raw."

"Plus we need to air out a bit in some clean panties," Renee said, moving over to another locker and opening it.

Sarah turned and looked at everyone, clapping her hands. "All right. Everyone, pay attention," She said. When everyone turned and looked at her she smiled. "We've been dirty, wearing the same clothes we were wearing when the plane went down, and none of us have bathed. We'll go back to the other locker room first. Then we'll find a locker with clothing and underwear your size, then we'll shower, change, and leave."

Everyone nodded, Lori wincing slightly. Her husband had hated it if she didn't shower in the morning and before she came to bed. He'd hated baths, claiming that all it was was sitting and stewing in your own filth, and had forbid her from taking them. To be honest, she felt absolutely filthy and extremely self-conscious that she could smell herself as well as the heavy greasy feeling to her hair.

"Who put you in charge?" Raincloud asked.

Kevin sneezed then looked up, wiping his hand on his pants leg. "Sounds solid to me."

"I don't hear any ideas from you, Chief Shitting Bull," Mike said, then sneezed.

Raincloud snarled at Mike, who sneezed again, then coughed.

Charlie stepped forward, putting the back of her hand on Mike's forehead. "You're running a fever, Mike," she said, shaking her head. "How long have you felt sick?"

"Last night. I started coughing last night," Mike said. "I kept waking up cold. I swallowed a lot of water after the crash, I figured it was because of that."

Don looked at Sarah. "We need to get everyone somewhere warm or Mike's just going to be the first," he told her, rubbing his chest.

"Then let's get a move on," Sarah smiled. She moved over to the door, checking the clipboard and flipping through the papers till she found the part of the map with the door listed. She cross referenced the number on the door on the map to get the code. Sarah noted there were three  sets of codes per door, one marked 'mil' one marked 'civ' and one marked 'sup'. She punched in the 'sup' code, hoping it stood for "supervisor" and stepped back.

The door opened without a klaxon going off, revealing the short hallway beyond that was labelled "exterior decon hallway" on the map. Everyone filed in, waiting for the water to start when the door closed but nothing happened.

"Why no water this time?" Richard asked, looking up at the ceiling.

"I put in the supervisor code," Sarah admitted.

"There any code like that for the military door?" Renee asked hopefully.

Sarah shook her head. "Nope. The door itself isn't on the map," she said.

Once the door on the interior side shut she moved over and threw the bar for the other door. It rumbled up slowly, quietly, locking into place with a dull thump. They all filed through and Renee noticed that the bar moved itself back into the original position right before the door started closing.

"All right, find clothes, take a shower, get changed," Sarah said, trying to keep her voice upbeat and chipper. She pointed at one of the lockers. "They've all got soap and all of that, so don't forget to take care of yourself."

"One little problem, oh fearless leader," Renee said.

"What?" Sarah asked, still smiling.

"The showers are all against the wall with no dividers," Renee pointed up at the corner. "And a camera watching them."

"I doubt anyone's at the camera," Richard said moving to a locker and opening it. "Besides, we can take turns sitting on the other side of the lockers, that way we can't see each other. It'll just take a little longer if we each take turns."

"God, didn't any of you take gym in school?" Renee asked, shaking her head. "I don't care if the rest of you girls see me shower."

"We'll sit on the other side of the lockers," Don said, getting up slowly. Renee noticed his face was red by the time he was standing up and he moved slowly around the lockers.

"I hope the water's warm," Lori said, her voice small.

"Either way, I need a shower," Renee said. She moved over and turned on the shower, stepping back.

The shower head hissed a moment, then spit out rust colored water for a minute before spitting a few times and coming out clear. Steam immediately billowed out from the water on the shower floor.

"Watch it, it's really hot," Renee said, yanking her hand back from where she touched the water. She turned the other knob, playing with it till the water was hot but not scalding. "I'll turn them all on."

Sarah moved over to the lockers, going through a few female ones till she found a locker with panties her own size.

"No uniforms, just the haz-mat suits," Renee said.

"We could go back to the other locker room and get some uniforms," Mike suggested before he sneezed again. He groaned and coughed for a moment.

"No," Renee said, turning from the locker she was standing in front of. "We do not want to wear uniforms with Sergeant Conan out there."

"Why the hell not?" Raincloud asked. "They're clean and dry."

"Because we don't know how he'll react," Sarah said. "For all we know, he'll freak the fuck out and then it'll just be him on the island with out skeletons."

"Good point," Don said, sitting back down.

"Besides, I think the rain is going to wash our clothes out pretty well," Mike said.

"We'll figure it out," Charlie said. She hefted the pack of panties and smiled. "I'll just be glad to have clean underwear."

"Who's going to take the baby?" Richard asked.

"I will," Lori said.

"No," the baby yelled, struggling to hold onto Sarah until Lori got the baby's arms unhooked from around Sarah's neck.

The women washed first, Renee closing her eyes and smiling at the luxury of using the harsh smelling shampoo in her hair, feeling herself get clean under the hot water. They dressed and walked around the lockers, letting the men take their turns.

Once they were done with that, they moved up the stairs to the Postal Office.

"Still going strong," Kevin said after sneezing. The thunder boomed and Renee noted that nothing shook. No sound of windows rattling, no rattling of doors, just the muffled sound of the thunder outside. Sarah had disappeared into the Post Master's office.

"It's going to last for days, maybe even a week or two," Don said. "My father talked about fighting the Japanese through them. Talked about how the Marines didn't wait for good weather, they just looked at the monsoons as a 'minor obstacle' compared to the Japanese on the shore."

"We can't survive in those little shelters. We'll die of exposure if we try," Raincloud said. "It's going to be bad enough without food."

"Who wants to go back and get the others?" Don asked, sitting down in one of the chairs that had been left on the sorting floor.

"Do we want to stay here during the storm?" Charlie asked.

"At least here to start," Don smiled. "We can figure out if there's food somewhere else, or a better shelter close by. But this building seems to be built to handle the monsoons."

Raincloud nodded, sitting down on one of the roller conveyor belts. "There's got to be food here somewhere and a better place to stay than this place."

"No cots, no chairs, no privacy," Charlie noted, looking around.

"Who wants to come with me to get the others?" Mike asked, then sneezed.

"I'm going to stay here with the baby," Lori said.

"I will," Richard said, looking at the door to outside. The older man shook his head. "It's really coming down out there."

"I'll go," Kevin said, then sneezed.

"Neither one of you sneezing gets to go," Charlie said, putting her fists on her hips. "I'll go with Richard. We'll get the others and come right back."

Thunder crashed outside as Richard nodded, moving over to the door.

"Wait!" Renee said, spotting something she'd missed before.

"What?" Richard asked, turning.

Renee pointed at the wall. "There's genuine actual US Postal Service rain gear right there by the door. Wear that," She grinned.

Richard laughed. "I've looked right at that at least a dozen times and it didn't dawn on me what it was," he said. He moved over to it and lifted it up. "Pants, jackets, even a hat."

He started putting on the pants, looking at Charlie. "You gonna suit up, Madame Postal Worker?"

"Neither rain nor snow nor plane crash nor monsoon," she laughed, moving over next to Richard. She grabbed the pants. "At least we won't be too wet."

Everyone sat quietly as Richard and Charlie got dressed in the cold weather gear and went through the door, heading out into the pouring rain.

"Think they'll be OK?" Lori asked quietly, gently patting the baby on her lap. The baby was face down, sleeping.

"They should be," Renee said.

Sarah chose that moment to come out of the Post Master's office with a smile. "Guess what I found," Sarah smiled.

"What?" Lori asked.

"A map to the town," Sarah said. "Guess what's marked on the map!"

Renee frowned. "What?"

"The High School, which is also marked as an emergency storm shelter for civilians," Sarah grinned. "I looked on the paperwork, there's an inventory sheet that reads cots, blankets, emergency supplies."

"So more empty cans?" Raincloud said, his voice snide.

"Nope," Sarah smiled.

"And how would you know?" Raincloud scoffed.

"Because there's no reason for there to be inventory numbers, last inspection date, initials of who inspected it, as well as a breakdown," Sarah said. "I sincerely doubt that something labelled 'Meal, Ready to Eat' with a reinspection date of 1990 is fake."

Renee nodded. "Makes sense."

"Once we're all here, I say we move to the High School. At the very least there will be different rooms so we can have privacy. There's cots and blankets and other stuff we need there," Sarah said.

"If it's actually there," Raincloud scoffed. "What makes you think it's there?"

"By the signature on the inspection form," Sarah said. She turned to Renee. "You remember Tarzan's real name?"

"Anthony Stillwater," Renee said.

Sarah's smile got wider. "Think that's the same one Private Anthony Stillwater who signed the inspection logs in 1983? It makes sense."

Renee smiled, ignoring Raincloud's huffy noise.

"Things are starting to look up," Renee said. She turned and looked at the shutter covered windows. "When we all get here, we'll head for the High School. Your map tell us where it is?"

Sarah nodded, finally feeling like things were going right for change. "Yup.Only twenty-three blocks. We can do it easy."

Lori frowned.

Outside the thunder boomed as the monsoon's fury increased.

She had a bad feeling, but didn't want to say anything.

She knew better than to bring everyone's mood down.