Kin of Exile

by Tyler Bunyard

  A few more minutes of rapidly sneaking their way through the halls, and the group eventually found themselves standing in front of two metal sliding doors. They had been following the layouts provided by the security station they had previously destroyed. If those records were correct, on the other side of the doors there should be an express elevator, capable of taking them to any floor. Alice found a button to the side and pressed it. It brightened to a red color, and the group stood, exposed in the middle of a three-way-intersection of the halls.

  Usually waiting for an elevator was one of the most monotonous tasks on the face of the planet. This time was an exception. At the intersection, there were three different locations that the group could be ambushed from, and that was not counting an attack that could eventually come from the contents of the elevator itself. Everyone was warry of this information, and the group remained alert, fronting at least one gaze against every possible area of ambush. Still, the button remained red, and the surrounding area stayed vacant.

  Ding, a light sound was heard, and the red button returned to its silver color. The group faced the elevator. The twin sliding doors slid to their respective sides and revealed a small, vacant area.

  Angel relaxed slightly before gesturing to the inside of the elevator. “Ladies first,” he insisted.

  Alice pushed Angel into the elevator, accompanying him only after letting out a mildly annoyed sigh. Krystalyn and Karrel followed. Just to the side of the entrance, an enormous array of round, silver buttons covered the wall from almost top to bottom. Each of the silver circles were labeled from 1 to 300.

  “Perfect!” Karrel announced. He pushed the button labeled 150, and the doors shut in front of him. From what they had learned from the security room, the power stations were located on the 150th floor. It made sense that they would want to bury their power stations deep inside of the complex, and from the security room’s layout, they had learned that the building they were ascending into was not only tall, but enormously long as well. Once they got to the correct floor, there would still be quite a bit of distance to be covered.

  The elevator shot upward. The feeling was reminiscent of the underground hideout’s elevators. They were ascending at a rapid pace. A number in the middle of the elevator, just above its doors was quickly growing: 23, 35, 48, 54… In a half-a-minute they had gone up sixty floors. Suddenly their ascension was brought to a grinding halt. The elevator shook, and Karrel was forced to prop himself against one of the walls to stay balanced before, with a loud thump, the elevator stopped moving. He looked up toward the floor-counter. The large red number eighty-two flashed above him.

  “Why’d we stop?” Karrel addressed the group.

  “Relax,” Angel calmly stated, “you didn’t think they’d just let us ride all the way to the top, did you?” He started to investigate the elevator’s ceiling. “We actually got further than I was expecting.”

  With a quick blast of dark energy, Angel blew the top hatch of the elevator off. The smell of dust and unused air filled the room, and there was now a square hole in the middle of the lift. Angel promptly helped Alice hop up on top of the metal contraption, before climbing upon it himself. Karrel sighed and placed himself beneath the hole.

  Staring at Krystalyn, Karrel positioned his hands into a “boosting” position.

  She cocked her head to the side. “You and Angel realize we have claws, right?”

  Karrel rolled his eyes before expressing his irritation, “Just get over here.”

  Shaking her head, Krystalyn placed a foot upon Karrel’s hands. Karrel lifted as she pressed against his palms. A guilty glee came over Karrel as Krystalyn realized that, with no footing, the task was a little more difficult then she had surmised. She struggled to get up through the tiny elevator hatch, eventually giving in, and using Karrel’s shoulders as a stepping stool. It took her a few seconds, but eventually she was standing next to Alice and Angel.

  Suddenly, as if a cannon had been fired, a loud noise echoed down the elevator shaft. A few inches in front of Karrel’s feet, the metal sparked violently, and a small puncture appeared along the floor. Karrel immediately jumped away from the open hatch, and a series of similarly loud noises burst down towards the metal box.

  He heard Angel shouting from outside of the elevator shaft, “Okay! I’ll admit it. I wasn’t expecting this!” Another explosion rocked the elevator, and Angel swore. “For the love of– Looks like stealth’s out of the question now!”

  Karrel needed to get eyes on whatever was happening to them. He pulled out his green book and positioned it a meter off of the ground, underneath the elevator hatch. He released his grasp and let the book levitate in place. Once again, a series of loud thumps went off, and a spread of sparks seared every corner of the elevator. Karrel tried to cover himself, but some of the flying lights hit him, causing small burns over the various parts of his exposed flesh. Karrel leapt upward, placing a foot on top of his green book, which did not budge an inch as it hovered in the vacant air. With a quick one-two step, he hopped through the hatch, and on to the roof of the elevator, amongst his friends.

  Calling his book back to his hand, Karrel could now see what was happening. The sides of the elevator shaft were lined with metallic figures as far up as Karrel could see. From what he could tell, the robotic creatures that were crawling down upon them were a smaller version of the x-bots that they had faced before. They were around a foot shorter and carried only two dissimilarities from the regular x-bots: they crawled on all four of their appendages, and their headpiece was located in the exact center of the body, where a small turret was attached. The turrets were firing small projectiles, which seemed to be encompassed by a red energy, down at the elevator.

  Angel was doing his best to shield his friends, creating shadowy walls of his smoke above the elevator to block the oncoming fire. With every few hits, the black shields would crack and shatter, forcing Angel to replace them. He looked toward Karrel. “A little help?” he requested.

  Karrel nodded his head and quickly flipped through the pages. “Make a platform above us when I tell you!” he ordered. Angel seemed to be confused at the demand, but he did not question it. Karrel began focusing on his green book, and the runic symbols of the variable “Geyser” began to wrap themselves around his hands.

  The small metallic crawlers continued their descent. A barrage of shots rang down upon the elevator. Angel attempted to shield everyone from the blasts, but a few of the shots bypassed his defenses. Alice and Krystalyn were forced to dance around the lightning-fast projectiles. Krystalyn, who noticed a new hole in her cloak, shot a concerned look at Karrel. “You want to hurry that up!?” she shouted.

  Karrel ignored her. He focused all of his attention on preparing his next attack. A few more moments and several red projectiles passed. Karrel glanced up, and shouted to Angel, “Now!”

  Angel waited for a brief pause in the enemy fire and then weaved a thin circular platform just above the entire group. Karrel slammed his hands to the ground. A familiar blue symbol began to draw itself upon the top of Angel’s makeshift platform. After a short delay, a tower of azure flames burst upward out of the newly formed symbol. The flames were barely contained within the elevator shaft. They slammed against all four of its sides, incinerating everything in its path. There was no room for the crawler robots to dodge. Bright blue flames slammed into them, sending them flying until their metal eventually bent, broke, or snapped from the sheer heat.

  Karrel held the attack for as long as he could, but eventually the power he felt within him faded, as did the azure symbol on Angel’s platform. The tower of fire dissipated, and all that was left was the bright red walls of the heated elevator shaft.

  Alice and Krystalyn stood wide-eyed at what they had just witnessed. Angel, having helped Karrel with his last application of that attack, simply smiled and let out a relieved chuckle.

  “No words…” Krystalyn softly vocalized her disbelief, “I honestly can’t believe you
did that.”

  As she finished her sentence, the elevator shuttered violently, causing everyone to stumble with their balance. Simultaneously, everyone looked toward the center of the lift they were standing on. Until now, no one had noticed that the coils above them, which were holding the elevator in place, were also red hot from Karrel’s attack. One of the strands had broken off from the stress of the heat. The elevator shook violently once more.

  “No words!” Krystalyn screamed this time, trying to keep her balance. “I honestly can’t believe you did that!”

  “Uh, right…” Angel’s mind raced. “Backup plan!” The elevator let loose a terrifying moan as it shook from the stress caused by losing some of its supports. Angel, however, was already working his solution into play. Black smoke coalesced in his hands, and he lashed out at the side of the elevator shaft. The shadowy mist spread itself vertically, painting the chamber. Thick, dark blotches began to protrude, and within mere seconds, they had formed themselves into handle-like structures. Angel had created a ladder. “Everyone grab hold!” he shouted.

  The elevator let loose a final screech before its supports snapped and it began to plummet downward into the dark void of the elevator shaft.

  “Great…” Krystalyn moaned, hanging from Angel’s creation. “How many floors did we have left?”

  For a brief moment, the group thought that they were safe. It would take them a while to ascend the remaining height, but they would get there eventually. Unfortunately, the fight was not yet over. They were rising a lot slower than before, and this gave them time to see the elevator doors above them be forced open floor by floor.

  With every level, the doors would be slammed open, flooding light into the elevator shaft and allowing the group to see several x-bots aim their gauss rifles down upon them. Krystalyn and Alice jumped into action immediately. Their claw-like nails exposed themselves, and with every floor that they passed by, they sliced and diced the x-bots that were guarding them. The two demon-sisters would jump, kick off the side of the elevator shaft, propel themselves toward the doors where the x-bots were firing, slice the metal guards into pieces, and grasp back onto the makeshift ladder. Rinse and repeat. Karrel and Angel did their best to keep up with the demon-sisters’ speed, but the majority of their effort went into dodging any of the stray gauss rifle projectiles.

  The rainfall of severed metallic arms and legs lasted for a several minutes before the action died down. They were past the hundredth floor now, and the elevator doors above them had ceased being pried open. An eerie silence had followed the battle, and it was unsettling to the group.

  “Why’d they stop?” Angel panted.

  “I don’t know,” Karrel responded, “Maybe they didn’t expect us to continue using the shaft, once they halted the elevator?”

  Angel shrugged, “And here I thought we were gonna be fighting our way all the way up to the cores.”

  Satisfied that they had avoided a potentially much bigger battle, the group continued to ascend toward the 150th floor. The climb was much tedious but much more peaceful than before.

  “On the bright side,” Krystalyn began, “I doubt that they have any sort of extra security in the elevator shafts. Considering they stopped the elevator, they won’t know which floor we will be getting off at.”

  Krystalyn seemed to be proven correct, as when the group reached the 150th floor, and forced their way through the elevator doors, they were met with no resistance. Yet another pristine white hallway awaited them. Its vacancy reassured the group that they had regained the element of surprise.

  The hallways were similar to the ones they had just traversed one hundred-fifty floors down, with one shining difference: now there were windows. Several glass pieces were attached to the wall throughout the length of the halls. They were almost as big as the walls themselves. Karrel walked up to one of the transparent frameworks and looked outside. What he saw was beautiful.

  A myriad of enormously long, and impossibly tall structures decorated the inside of the superdome. The artificial sky above everything masked the fact that they could easily reach to the top of the dome. Wherever there were not skyscrapers, there was lush green grass, or trees. Roads were perfectly placed in an orthogonal pattern, and only the few necessary cars occupied its space. There were parks and fountains among all of the other recreational areas. Karrel had never seen so much green in his life. It was more than any paradise he had imagined.

  However, Karrel slowly felt a rage fill him. Though they looked like ants from the height he was at, Karrel could spot a few of the humans walking around. There were not many. As he scanned the entirety of the superdome, and then back to the minority of government officials on the ground, he felt his rage grow. He had known for a long time that the UWP officials had been abusing the superdomes, keeping them for themselves. It was one of the main reasons why many civilians tried so desperately to get elected to represent their local areas. But this was ridiculous. The super-city could easily fit several million people inside of its borders. Yet, by Karrel’s count, there was a maximum of twenty people walking on the ground. He had seen ghost towns with more people around.

  “What an unbelievable waste…” Karrel whispered.

  Angel put a hand on Karrel’s shoulder. “Yeah, it gets to me too.”

  “Why hasn’t anyone rebelled? Why hasn’t anyone done something about this?” Karrel looked at Angel. “Why haven’t we done something about this?”

  “One problem at a time,” Angel replied. “First, we deal with the demons.”

  Karrel didn’t like the idea of waiting. He wanted to punish the corrupt bastards in any way that he could, as soon as he could, but he knew that what Angel said was true. Besides, they were stealing the cores from the UWP, so that would have to suffice for now.

  “Alright everyone,” Angel called out to the group, “there are two cores and they are in opposite directions. Let’s pair off, grab the suckers, and get the hell out of here. Karrel, you’re with me.”

  Karrel turned to leave. Angel attempted to follow after, telling Alice to be careful, when he felt a tug on his sleeve. He stopped and turned around to see Alice, holding onto his dark attire. She had a blank stare in her eyes, but she was not budging.

  The shadowy mask Angel had covering his mouth and nose faded, and he shrugged his shoulders as he looked at Alice. “I suppose this isn’t the kind of mission you want to run on an empty tank,” he conceded. Angel leaned down slightly and planted his lips firmly against Alice’s.

  A strangely vibrant hue could be seen running down Alice’s body, starting at her head and working its way down. It was as though a dim light was slowly traveling through her veins. Her posture started to change as well, and if there were any signs of fatigue on her before, they slowly dissipated away.

  This was a strange sight for Karrel. It was the first time he had seen Angel and Alice, or any of the others for that matter, kiss. He had always known that Alice, Prisca, and Jessica had to feed the same way as Krystalyn did. He had just never witnessed it. Nor, had he witnessed the slight glow that occurred in their bodies, as his view was particularly obscured when he was the recipient.

  Karrel gave a look toward Krystalyn, who took notice immediately. She held her hands forward, as if to push the air between Karrel and herself away, and gave an almost disgusted look at him. “Hey, don’t look at me, I’m still full,” she remarked.

  It took Karrel a moment to realize what she meant, after which his cheeks immediately turned red. “No, wait– I didn’t–” he tried to diffuse the misunderstanding, but Angel had stepped behind him and was now tugging him along. Embarrassed, Karrel began to follow Angel, but he swore that as Krystalyn turned away to follow Alice in the opposite direction, a slight smirk had formed in the corner of her lips.

  “Hey! Are you listening?” Angel’s voice snapped into Karrel’s mind.

  Karrel shook his head and regained his focus, “Yeah, yeah. I’m good.”

  “Now isn’t a
great time to get distracted,” Angel remarked. “We only have each other watching our backs.”

  It was true, and Karrel had only just realized the pressure he was feeling because of it. Originally the group had consisted of eight people, all whom were easily trustworthy in a bad scrape. However, after they had split into two groups, and now that the girls were heading in the opposite direction of them, their forces had effectively been cut into quarters. It was a necessary evil, to obtain as many fusion cores as possible, but it meant that fights were going to be a lot more difficult now. Even though he had Angel by his side, Karrel knew that dropping his guard could very well result in a causality.

  Their surroundings however, did not justify the caution. As the two friends jogged through hall after hall, following the route they had selected in the security room, they found themselves alone. The hallways were utterly vacant. Even as they passed by the occasional door or office window, the rooms showed no signs of life. The quarters were as clean and presentable as every other location inside of the complex, but no robots, or humans for that matter, were present. The eerie silence was only broken by the footsteps of Karrel and Angel themselves.

  They did not know how to feel about the vacancy of the floor. What did it mean? Was it good or bad that no guards had been posted on this floor? Should they travel more slowly as to avoid a trap, or take advantage of a possible tactical error their enemy had made? Regardless of their own thoughts, they continued down the hallways, a curious fear still in the back of their minds.

  It felt like they had been jogging for a half an hour, when Karrel and Angel finally heard something that wasn’t their own footfalls. A distant voice was coming from one of the nearby doors. The two friends halted their pace, and crouched low to the ground, attempting to mask any of their movements. The voice sounded as though it was having a conversation with someone, though at this distance it was hard to make out what they were saying. As Karrel and Angel moved closer to the entrance, they could see that the door had meant to be closed, but was left only slightly ajar. A small amount of light flowed out of the room.