“When everyone wakes up, they'll need to contact the survivors. The ones in shelters will be contacted by radio and given instructions regarding where to go. The few who manage to survive outside of the shelters will be located by satellite or aircraft able to track their heat signatures, and leaflets will be dropped to them from aircraft the sleepers will have. There's no way of knowing how many people will survive, so we want to make sure they have the ability to produce a million or more leaflets if necessary,” Fitch explained.

After what seemed like an eternity, the elevator stopped, and the doors opened. They stepped out and walked straight down another long hall. There was considerably more noise in this area and Fitch led them to the computer center. After the doors parted for the General, they stepped inside and noticed the temperature was much cooler than it had been in the hall. The room was one hundred feet long and at least fifty feet wide and contained row after row of computers in tall racks. Most of the equipment, Cowan couldn't identify.

“We plan to have web-based applications which tie into the databases here. We want to have as much information as possible available for the sleepers. Whatever they need to know, we want that information readily accessible. Everything from the chemical composition of Viagra to how to build a Zamboni. It'll all be in there and readily available when the time comes. These systems will also monitor everything during the sleep and will be responsible for sounding alarms and initiating the wake-up sequence. These systems will have as much redundancy built into them as possible. We want each system to be able to experience multiple component failures before the system has to go down” Fitch explained.

An Air Force Major and Army Major approached them. “General, are these your team leaders?” one of the men asked.

“Yes, they are. Can you get them taken care of?”

“Of course, Sir. Can you two come over here? We have all your information. We just have to assign your clearance. Sorry you had to come down here for this, there will be a security station up top, just off the main tunnel, that can do this in the future, but it's still under construction,” explained the Air Force Major.

Cowan responded. “No problem, we're getting a quick tour anyway.”

'I just need you two to place each of your hands against this when I say.”

He held up a small square box. In the center was a Plexiglas plate similar to the one that was seen by the doors. There was a cable running out to the back of the box, and it plugged into the USB port in a laptop computer.

“Captain Travers, when the machine says your name press one hand then the other on the reader.”