Doomsday Pillars

Chapter 10 - The Main Base

Finally, they arrived. This is where everything will start. The location where one of the Pillars will drop is here. 

Alex was already familiar with the surrounding terrain, he spent many years fighting in this area during his past life. 

In his past life, he hadn't come to this place until a few months after the Doomsday pillar had dropped. By that time, the Pillar had been surrounded by a lot of refugees. Many of them had come here after being chased by hordes of zombies and monsters. It was such a disaster and the people didn't have a real leader. There were many infighting and chaos among themselves. But Alex, this time, planned to build a better safe haven for the survivors.

Alex and the group were standing in front of an open field, he looked ahead and all he saw were tall grass and weeds without end. Although Bali was a tropical island, where it's normally humid and hot, but this part of the island was in the highlands; close to the mountain where the clouds were low and the air was quite breezy..

Its time for work, Alex brought the group to discuss his plans. As for the land acquisition, he left it to Benny. Alex didn't necessarily have to purchase all the land, but only the area that needed to be built right away. The area where the central base will be located. After a few designs and sketches, while considering the land's condition, Alex came up with his grand design.

The central base will be strategically surrounded by the natural terrain. The north side will face Mount Agung, the west side will be next to a small river called the Tukad River. The east side will be the area where the Pillar will drop, so the east side will be somewhat protected by the Pillar in the future. Lastly, the south will be the main entry point, it's also the one closest to the main road leading to Bay city and other Bali areas.

Alex started sketching in front of other people. It has been more than 15 years since he last practiced architecture. He didn't expect his degree would be needed again, especially in designing a base that could save the world. Best use of a degree ever.

The central area would cover 100 hectares of land. It will have a rectangular size, 4 km in length and 2.5 km wide. The plan was to build a 2 layered fence around the compound. The inner fence will be a 4 meter tall prefabricated concrete wall while the outer wall will be a 2 meter high stone berm with a 2 meter deep ditches.

For the buildings inside the compound, there will be the command center, storage supply building, the research center, the training hall, hydroponic gardens, and, of course, housing. Alex planned for the main base to house a minimum of 50,000 people. The more survivors, the better the outcome for the future. 

However, there will not be enough time to build standard houses for the survivors, so the only viable solution was warehouse structures. It will be built with a prefabricated steel structure. Each warehouse buildings will have a standard size of 200 m x 20 m, which could fit around 500 people. The plan was to build 100 of such structures, but that didn't include the supplies storage, the hall, and the hydroponic gardens. 

For all of this to be possible, Alex planned to employ another batch of 2,000 workers. This batch would all be experienced steelworkers, so he also needed to set up a mini steel factory onsite.

Just to make sure he got everything covered, he brought the design to his team and asked them for additional input and opinions.  "So what do you guys think? Anything else we should add?"

The group looked at each other confused. Then, Tony, Alex's construction manager, said, "Actually boss, if you want us to be involved in the design, it would be better if you tell us a little bit about the purpose of the design. For example, who will use it and what will be its purpose... I'm really sorry boss, at the moment we are at a loss about what you are trying to make here."

"…"

Alex then slowly said, "Actually, we are preparing a doomsday shelter..."

"…" More awkward silence.

Alex suddenly wished his past life and reincarnation had made him more intelligent to answer a question such as this. But then, he thought of something. "Tony, how long have you been working for me?"

"9 years, boss."

"What have we built in the past 9 years?"

"Houses, apartments, shopping areas… almost everything, boss."

"And who are we building it for?"

"For our clients, boss."

"Exactly. This is the same thing, our client paid us a lot of money to build a doomsday shelter like this one. Do you understand?" 

This group didn't know that their client was actually their boss. 

One of the managers then said, "Oh that's right boss! I actually saw on youtube that doomsday shelters are very popular in the west. Although, I've haven't seen anything as big as this one."

Then, another one said, "If that's the case, then we should add an underground tunnel for safety and an outside post." 

They actually bought it! Alex thought. Then he just needed to go along with it.

The ideas just kept on flowing. Some ideas were actually usable. Alex then fell into contemplation about life before the Doomsday. Everything is just so peaceful; people have too much extra time for TV and fantasy novels...

Alex then let Tony begin the construction. Some materials had already been ordered before, so he just needed to add things according to the new design. Alex also gave him the authority to buy extra supplies and asked him to coordinate with Nina about the funds and deliveries.

The designs were finally done, but it would take days to see some progress. 

Alex couldn't just sit around and wait here, he still had many things to do. The next thing on his list couldn't be completed with just money. It will be dangerous, so to succeed, he needed to retrieve one of the artifacts from a ruined temple to help him first. Alex then left alone and drove with the gears and equipment he needed on the trunk of the car.