The Secret of Atlantis (Citadel World Book #2)

by Kir Lukovkin

  They went down into the hall and walked towards the glass wall which had several exits, but never managed to reach it.

  In the space of a second, there was a barely perceptible change around them. Either the mass of air moved or some invisible force touched his mind, but Rick and everyone with him suddenly stopped when they felt it.

  Squat figures stepped out from underneath the flying machines. They appeared silently out of the dark, moving out onto the balcony and sneaking out of hidden passages in the gloom. Dozens of emaciated, hairy and filthy creatures in human form with ash-gray hair and shining pale eyes that only expressed the feeling of hunger.

  Rick's hands went up by reflex to protect Black Ant, while the other people clustered together in fear. They did not make any sudden moves as there was nowhere to run. The possessed slowly converged from all sides, closing the distance to the people more and more. There were two hundred of them or more and Rick clenched his fists so hard that they hurt as he regretted that there was no way to reach the core anymore and that Black Ant does not deserve a death like this.

  All of a sudden, the possessed halted, as if some invisible barrier had stopped them, leaving a narrow passage into a small corridor with an exit onto a railway platform by the side of shining rails at the end.

  The twisted and dead faces of the creatures suddenly had a very subtle change to them, as curiosity was added to their animalistic pain and anger. They stopped and seemed to be waiting for something.

  Somebody hiccupped loudly behind Rick's back and then giggled. Klaus reacted to this very quickly and calmly, as he turned a shook a clan-mate who had almost lost his sanity to bring him back to his senses. This was when Rick made his decision.

  “Follow me,” he whispered. “And no sudden movements.”

  Their group carefully set off towards the passage into the corridor. The possessed stayed in their places, only turning their heads after them, stretching their neck as if they were trying to smell them.

  With Rick at its head, the group passed through the corridor to come out onto the platform and stepped off onto the rails that led into a wall with a massive pair of gates after fifty paces with a gigantic letter A inscribed upon them.

  This was the way to the core! Only a little remained. Rick turned around and froze with the rest of them when one of the women slipped on the stairs and cried out as she fell on the rails.

  For a minute, everyone tensely stared through the corridor into the hall full of possessed, but they stood there without moving, with their heads turned towards the people and their necks stretched out.

  They got away with it. Rick whispered for everyone to be as careful as they can and avoid making noise and sudden movements for any reason. They had to open the gates, no matter what. It was only now that he noticed that the stress had made him sweat profusely. He wiped the sweat from his face and headed towards his ultimate goal.

  The gate control panel was nearby, its terminal awakening and shining pale green under a coat of dust as the people approached. Rick blew at the screen and touched it with his fingers, activating the menu.

  “You need more than the key,” Klaus whispered as he came to stand by his side. “See, they require a unique code!”

  He pointed at the scanner where a hand had to be placed.

  “I'll manage.”

  Rick slid the medallion into the slot on the device and the words “confirm identity” appeared on the screen.

  “But you're an outsider...” Klaus looked genuinely scared. “Margaret warned that machines of this kind can kill an outsider if the code doesn't match.”

  Rick placed his palm upon the scanner and nodded, without looking at Klaus.

  One second...

  And then another...

  “Code recognized” the screen informed. With a rumble and a creak, the ancient mechanism turned and the gates slid open.

  That was close. Rick went to pull the key out of the slot on the reading device, but nothing happened. The key was stuck and a warning appeared on the screen about the gates being blocked within thirty seconds.

  “Let's go.”

  Rick looked over his shoulder. The possessed stood still. Then he stepped into the opening and decided that he would not stop anymore. The tunnel ahead was brightly lit and led them to a glass bridge over a gigantic pool full of water, with huge gears breaking the surface. He had come across them on his way to the tower. It was probably these gears that were responsible for the movement of the shift mechanisms of the city segment above. Wisps of steam rose upwards to be sucked in through wide ventilation grilles by the sides of the bridge.

  Rick looked up and saw the distant sky. This was why it was so light, even though they were almost at the bottom of yet another deep shaft.

  The gates closed behind them with an echoing rumble and Klaus could not resist asking, “Are you sure that you did the right thing?”

  “Yes.”

  “But the key has been left behind there!” he waved backwards with his hand.

  “Don't worry, this is how it must be.”

  “And what if we get stuck in here?”

  Rick turned abruptly, looked Klaus in the eye and told him harshly, “If we remained, we wouldn't have survived.”

  He did not waste any more time on conversation and strode off. There was another tunnel beyond the bridge and another pair of gates with a terminal that required a key and a unique code.

  Klaus stood there, open-mouthed, observing how Black Ant took out the medallion key that he had hidden in the folds of his clothing to put it into the slot on the device and how Rick placed his palm on the scanner yet again and a repeat of what happened before.

  They went through. They did it at last. Rick wanted to shout for joy, but he did now show it. The people following him were whispering to each other and thanking fate for sending them these outsiders that saved their lived. Black Ant looked proud of himself as he felt the attention and friendly eyes upon him and smiled.

  They soon entered a transport hub similar to the one they left. The same railway platform and corridors were here, but there was no hall full of flying machines. They were not even needed, as Rick worked out where they were by shining his torch at the signs and took everyone to the stairwell.

  Half the job was done. He was tired, but proud of himself and happy that he did not have to die and the rest of the people with him were safe too. He just felt really good — it was a feeling that he had not felt for a long time.

  “Let's go upwards,” he declared.

  His followers nodded their approval and chorused their support.

  It started to get dark when they reached the surface. His companions were noticeably tired and almost all the women were out of breath. Only Black Ant smiled, showing the way nothing could faze him.

  “We need to hurry.” Rick was thinking well — if they did not manage to find shelter in a place that was not open to the wind, they would freeze. It would be good to find somewhere where the generators worked and they could turn on the light.

  Soon enough, luck smiled upon them again as the first terminal they came across accepted the code from Rick's palm and let them into a squat boxlike metal structure with buzzing transformers inside where they could turn on the light and where there was heating, which was the main thing.

  “We are too tired to walk on,” the women immediately voiced their concerns, having noticed that Rick stayed by the doors and was about to leave.

  “Stay here,” he nodded.

  “And you?”

  “I have to go.” He understood why they were worried, so he added, “but I will be back soon.”

  Black Ant was about to follow him, but Rick shook his head, bent down towards him and whispered, “Not this time. Look after them, I have no one to entrust these poor people to.”

  Black Ant nodded and cast a questioning glance at Rick, motioning with his head towards the exit to ask him why he was leaving.

  “Don't worry,” Rick smiled. “I need to
quickly find the archive, the place where ancient knowledge is stored. I am the only one of you that knows how to read and understands the language of the Ancients.”

  Black Ant nodded again. Rick looked at Klaus who was helping to sort through the few items that they managed to bring with them.

  “Keep watching him,” Rick warned Black Ant. “All right?”

  The boy hit himself on the chest with his fist and waved his hand for Rick to leave.

  “Lock yourself in from inside,” Rick ordered as he stepped out onto the street.

  He could not waste time now. If he managed to get here then the gray ones would be able to overcome the same distance. His only relief was that they would have several hundred of the possessed, darkness and the cold night to overcome. However, he still felt unease deep down inside. Rick switched on his torch and gathered his pace.

  He walked along the street and read every sign that he saw along the way one after another until he found the sign he needed. Once he got his bearings and memorized the street that he came from, he took a turn in the direction of the sign and entered a square after passing through a quarter where the hemisphere of the core informatorium was located.

  Rick had not problems finding the entrance, which had no terminal by its side, to his surprise. The stood around by the sliding doors, touched them several times and even tried to break them with a kick but all of his attempts to get inside the building were in vain. The transparent material was as hard as steel and was not affected by his ministrations.

  A stupid thought that someone was watching him and deliberately not letting him in crept into his mind. Rick looked around himself, shining the torch around the street, found what he was looking for and went towards the drainage well.

  It took a long time to get the grille open, but once he managed to get inside he descended to the bottom of the well using the handholds built into the wall, walked around a dozen paces underground towards the hemisphere and then climbed back up, using the handholds of another well. He found himself in the basement of the informatorium where the well was also covered by a grille, but he did not have to scratch up his fingers this time as the basement was not so cold and the grille had not frozen to the floor.

  His eyes immediately found an evacuation plan hanging on the wall. Rick worked out the plan of the basement and climbed up, entering a spacious hall.

  The moonlight reflected off the walls. The space around him was empty apart from the bundles of rags that lay on different sides of the exits. Rick walked up to one of them and shook his head with a loud sigh. What he thought was a bundle of rags were the remains of a person. He did not approach the one on the other side. The sight reminded him of what he saw in his native Thermopolis — these dead people had lain there for many years.

  He walked up to a wide staircase that led to the upper floors and flinched when the lamps started to blink weakly under the ceiling. An unobtrusive flat panel stand came to life to his right. Rick wanted to come up to it, but then a human figure appeared behind it, making him step back and clench his fists.

  “Who are you?” Rick exclaimed.

  “Hello,” the stranger replied with a sonorous voice and smiled.

  He was clean and well presented, with dark hair, blue eyes and milky white teeth.

  Rick took a closer look at the stranger and lowered his hands. This was a hologram, similar to the one they came across with Paul on the way here. Something he already knew but he could not get used to.

  Rick sighed when he thought of Paul and a second later, the hologram started to speak.

  “Welcome to the informatorium.” The light above became more intense. “I am glad that you have decided to visit us at such a late hour. May I ask if you have a permanent pass?”

  “No,” Rick breathed out.

  “No problem,” the hologram smiled. “Would you like to use a single-access pass?"

  Rick nodded and immediately heard, “What are you interested in?”

  The program offered him to use the informatorium only once. He needed to select the correct section.

  “History,” Rick answered at last.

  “No problem. Which period are you interested in?”

  “The period after the hibernation of Thermopolis.”

  “Forgive me, but I don't understand. There was no hibernation.”

  Rick frowned. He had to make his requests more carefully. However, the program came to his aid.

  “There was a reconstruction.”

  “Exactly!” Rick grasped at his chance. “That's what I wanted to say.”

  “What format would you like to receive the materials in? Text, interactive files or artifacts?”

  This time Rick did not get confused.

  “I would like to watch documentary films on the subject. Choose the most informative ones as I don't have much time.”

  “I understand,” the hologram smiled. “Time is a valuable commodity.”

  Rick nodded in reply. The stand hummed quietly and a small plastic rectangle with a black strip on one side and a five figure number on the other slid out of it.

  “Cubicle 1005, floor five, right wing,” the hologram told him. “The instructions are attached. Happy watching!”

  Rick took the card, muttered some words of thanks and hurried over to the stairs, ignoring the offer to use the elevator.

  He did not want to take risks and use a mechanical cabin at such an important moment as it could break down. Once he had climbed up top, Rick found the right cubicle and slid the card into the terminal, lowering himself into a soft armchair. He slid the interactive helmet onto his head and lowered the visor.

  The world disappeared.

  Q

  “THE RECONSTRUCTION PERIOD was one of the most important periods in human history,” a pleasant and calm voice sounded in Rick's head. “All that you hear and see is only educational material reflecting the part of the past selected by the user.”

  Rick felt like he was flying through a dark sky full of stars. He did not feel his body at all and there was nothing in the space around him to orient himself, only his own being and a disembodied voice.

  “Man, so great in his power,” the voice continued, “had to face the most serious challenge of recent times. It was not a world war or a natural disaster. It was not even hunger or socioeconomic issues. Humanity was under the threat of annihilation as a result of a virus which was unknown to science. A virus which was called “Mindstorm”.”

  Rick suddenly found himself in the middle of a clean and brightly lit street full of pedestrians. He would have jumped in surprise, but he still could not fell his own body, so he could just observe and listen. Buildings of glass and concrete towered around him, flying cars raced through the sky and the people hurried along somewhere on their own business, almost never looking around.

  “It took only a few days for the epidemic to engulf the planet. It was not possible to establish the source and origin of the virus. Mindstorm symptoms included memory disorders, dyslexia, attention deficit disorder, reaction slowdown, headaches, depression, fear, aggression, hatred and complete insanity at the terminal stage, expressed through the complete loss of sentience. The affected person would enter an animalistic state. They would become a beast, driven by the most primitive instincts and requirements.”

  One of the passer-by in the street suddenly fell to one knee and grabbed his own head, twisting around and tearing out his own hair. He then bounded up and threw himself at Rick...

  “Sometimes, the symptoms would manifest themselves strongly, with a terrible migraine that blocked the neocortex and causing an explosion of the hormonal system and the creation of large portions of cortisol and noradrenaline. The patient would be engulfed with anger that they expressed through aggression towards those close to them. Such patients were overcome by an unstoppable desire to crush and destroy everything around them and kill any living being if it happened to get in their way. The afflicted also displayed excellent reflexes, unbelievable s
trength and a heightened pain barrier. There is a great number of documented incidences of immediate Mindstorm affliction.”

  Rick watched them one after another, standing in the street among a crowd which had gone insane and letting the possessed through himself one after another as well as those that were still alive and trying to save themselves.

  “The infected were studied. However, all attempts at finding the harmful virus failed. The mindless infected also did not react to the effect of synthetic physical activity blockers, but did exactly the opposite, with miraculous feats of inventiveness. They would break free, unite into groups and attack humans again. The medical practitioners built up an image of the appearance of a Mindstorm carrier — accelerated breathing, a high heart rate, explosive reactions to irritants, unexplained aggression and a wandering gaze.

  At first, the epidemic spread through the cities, then the provinces, then the entire countries and eventually, it consumed entire continents. The number of healthy humans was falling rapidly. Enclaves numbering thousands rose and fell. The Mindstorm virus was everywhere. It was then that they remembered about the Thermopoli of the architect Spanidis. Thousands of those who were still sentient set off to hide away in the gigantic towers. However, the entrances to these shelters were closed to them.

  It was then when the great architect made his address to humanity, before the storming of the Citadels.

  “Citizens of the world,” a familiar old man with sad eyes was looking at Rick. “The Mindstorm virus is affecting the citizens of Thermopolis just as much as the other people that live upon this planet. This is why you should not look to us for salvation. The disease will take you if that is your fate. And now, I would like to talk about the ultimatum from the Secretary of the Security Council of Nations. My answer is no. Please, don't try to take the citadel by force. You will fail anyway. We do not want to do evil against anyone and would only like to ask to be left alone. When I was constructing the first Thermopolis, the whole world was laughing at me. Now that you look at me with hope, you must know that nothing will save us.”