Survival Bunker System Developer

City Lock Down

The armoured turtles of death rolled in with men marching into the city with rifles in their arms. The army was finally here and Caleb watched as twenty helicopters made their way towards Manhattan to find and evacuate survivors they could find.

The verdict was out. Those who wanted to join the army will be evacuated by the helicopters and those who didn’t will remain in bunkers within the city. To cope with the shortage of food and supplies, the helicopters and army frequently distributed help packages to the subway bunkers. Soldiers patrolled the city frequently and shot any ghouls in sight.

Under the efficient management, the number of ghouls decreased significantly for the first time in a month. Caleb rejoiced at the news that never happened in his previous life. The World Health Organisation had put together a ghoul testing kit to identify those who were still healthy and those who were infected with PXE22. A list of symptoms was circulated and notices were put up. Doctors and nurses were assigned to safe camp sites to treat survivors and test them for PXE22 before they were allowed to leave the city.

The testing kit was a result of the recent discovery that Helen found. Caleb only spread the word over the forums in the dark net. He knew where the higher authorities liked to lurk and deliberately cast out the bait so that it would cause a huge ripple. With the testing kit, countries were now able to set up proper safe zones outside of severely affected cities. Unfortunately, that was the best they could do or now. Already, half of the world’s population had succumbed to PXE22. If they weren’t dead, they were wandering ghouls.

Some countries have issued a mandatory order for ghoul bodies to be burned to prevent the further spread of the unknown disease. However, Caleb didn’t hear anything similar in America. The army didn’t want to take on more jobs than it already had so ghoul bodies started to decompose in the middle of the streets. Watching the situation from his window, Caleb grimaced. If the ghoul bodies were not taken care of properly, it would encourage the birth of intelligent ghouls. Caleb wanted to spread that rumour over the dark net but knew that he couldn’t do it just yet. Nobody would believe him because he hasn’t built up enough credibility.

June was usually a joyous month for Caleb but for this year, it was a dreadful one. It was only the start of June but already, Caleb didn’t know how many people would be able to see the end of June. His death in his previous life was two days too short to reach August. Who knew what would happen this time even though he was changing history little by little.

Paul did his best to deliver the firearms daily and Caleb watched as the ghoul kill numbers increased. Right now, he was able to purchase all the needed upgrades for the first group of bunkers. The automated assistants were doing well and Caleb went ahead to purchase basic bunkers for the second group of basic bunkers without upgrades for now. Today, he was driving around to scout for the locations of his third group of bunkers while putting the Area Reservation ability to good use.

While he was at it, Caleb took some time to study different areas. For now, he wasn’t going to do anything about the water filtration issues. There was still a month left before the government cut the power and water supply for him to figure out what was good. For now, Caleb wanted to level up the Survival Bunker System and unlock a new slot for an automated assistant.

According to his past memory, within two weeks after the army stepped in, the number of ghouls will reduce for a while. However, due to the poor handling of the ghoul bodies, a new wave of ghouls will surface from within the army. At that stage, the government had to pull out from the city to curb their losses and protect the army meant to protect the citizens.

When that happened, Caleb knew that he couldn’t rely on the bunker survivors to continue fighting ghouls for him with supplied weapons. A good number of able-bodied survivors will sign up with the army. It wasn’t forced conscription but the government will make an announcement soon that those who didn’t sign on with the army to fight ghouls will not be able to leave the city.

Many men and mothers will sign up with the army to have the right to bring their children away from Manhattan. The areas outside of Manhattan that were heavily affected like Astoria and Williamsburg will be cordoned off by the army. Nobody will be able to travel in or out of the cordoned off areas until they pull out. The army will continue to patrol these heavily affected areas to kill ghouls but the survivors will not be given any external help. Most of the bunkers built by survivors of those heavily affected areas will start turning to other sources for help.

Caleb knew that he should start updating his blog regularly to share tips for these helpless survivors abandoned by the world. This time, he wanted to include something more. He wanted to start dropping hints about where his bunkers were that victims can migrate to. At the same time, Caleb wanted to register the survivors and collect information about what kind of strengths they had.

For the next stage of Caleb’s plan, he needed manpower to work for him. Automated assistants could only do so much and Caleb couldn’t possibly be going around gathering resources and killing ghouls while setting up bunkers. He had a greater responsibility than that. He had to save humanity. The bunker system is merely a tool to help him achieve that.

To level up the system, Caleb had to start accepting refugees into his bunkers. He needed a total of ten thousand bunker residents. For now, Caleb was still tapping on the city’s water source to supply his bunkers with water.

The Benz swerved sharply to the left as Caleb avoided hitting a child who ran out to the middle of the street. He didn’t know whose child that was but it wasn’t uncommon to meet desperate survivors trying to find a place to hide. Ever since the army stepped in, they only concentrated on heavily affected areas and left the ghettos to their makers. Many victims living in poorer areas either died or became ghouls. The remaining survivors like that child ran from one place to another, hoping to find a shelter to hide in.

He cursed. The situation wasn’t looking very good and he was glad that he made the right decision to set up bunkers in the poorer areas as the first priority. The army was taking care of the survivors in the subway bunkers so Caleb decided to stop taking care of those people for now. Instead, he diverted the resources and weapons to the ghettos and encouraged them to bring as many survivors as they could to his bunker location.

“Stop!” a military officer halted Caleb’s car outside a newly set-up barricade.

Caleb wasn’t expecting this. The barricade wasn’t here yesterday. This wasn’t a badly affected area. In fact, it was one of the few better neighbourhoods that many survivors depended on to get their supplies. Caleb was about to pass by the area and drop off some items before he got stopped.

“State your purpose,” the officer demanded and Caleb raised a brow. He didn’t wind the window down all the way, still careful about the wandering animal ghouls.

“I’m here to pick up supplies like usual. Why is there a barricade here? It wasn’t here yesterday.”

The soldier sighed. “I guess it’s hard for news to reach everyone in the apocalypse. The government declared that the army will be doing an area ghoul cleaning. We’re barricading the area now to comb it for ghouls today before moving to a different one tomorrow. The idea is to reduce the number of ghouls and bring back as many healthy citizens as we can. The survivor bunkers built by city folks won’t last long against the ghouls. The higher-ups are also pressed to recruit more people to make up for the losses and casualties. You should leave for today and come back tomorrow. Also, you seem like you will qualify if you want to join the army. Here’s a form you can fill it out when you get back and hand it in to any of the soldiers on standby near the Manhattan barricade.”

Caleb took the form and thanked the soldier before asking him for a little more information.

“I don’t know much about the operation but the higher-ups announced that they are combing the city for ghouls to bring back samples for lab testing. If anyone has any information about PXE22, the government wants them as well. To be honest, I think the reason why we’re combing New York is for a certain scientist who was involved in Project PXE22 before she disappeared. We’ve already captured ten women with red hair for interrogation in the last few days.”

Hearing that, Caleb swallowed. It was a good decision to have Helen move into his lab bunker as soon as possible. No wonder the army came in and pulled out so quickly in his previous life. They were not here for the citizens. They were here to steal information about Project PXE22 from Rockfeller University and to find Helen. In his past life, he was able to find limited information about Project PXE22 in the hacked government files so he assumed that Project PXE22 was an initiative by the government, assigned to Rockfeller University.

“I understand. If I see any red-haired woman I will alert the authorities. Say, do you know if the army has plans to comb through Brooklyn? I heard Brownsville and Williamsburg were badly hit.”

The officer shrugged. “Can’t say I know much but we’re not stirring the hornet’s nest in Williamsburg or Brownsville. Sources say that the scientist is in Queens and Manhattan so we’re starting the search here. We might comb through the north of Brooklyn if we have the time but no promises. If you want to be safe I suggest you sign on with the military and move out of there.”

Caleb nodded and thanked the officer before turning back. Whatever the army was doing didn’t look good for Caleb.

With some spare time left for the day, Caleb decided to drive out to the borders between Queens and Brooklyn. He was going to find a solution for his water problems and after hearing Helen’s suggestion last night, he was wanted to check out a sewage treatment plant that was near the East River. If what the scientist said was true, Caleb would be able to convert treated wastewater or water from the river into distilled water.