Ahead, Henri charged forward, trailing a swirl of peeled paint, rust and debris. Michael raced after him, kicking up the dust as more Havoc bots rained down on our position, colliding with the ceiling and falling into my path.
“They’ve gone berserk,” I remarked, ducking to avoid another shower of white plastic.
Jumping over the broken casings, dipping to miss a direct hit, I watched as the other two pulled away from me, as Michael glanced back, slowing his pace.
“No. Keep going as fast as you can. I will catch up,” I shouted, as Henri came to a halt at the closed door ahead. “He has an access card built into him,” I yelled. “Just push him toward the control panel,” I explained, hoping I was right.
“But--”
“Just try it!”
“No,” I shouted, as Michael reached out toward the bot, “use your shoulder--”
A scream resounded about the facility, and the old Havoc bot clattered into the control panel. A green light illuminated, and Henri backed away from the wall, spinning to face my little brother, crouched on the floor, his hands clamped together and pressed into his stomach.
“Are you OK?” I asked, skidding to a halt behind him, as he looked up to me, his eyes red with tears.
“Come on,” I declared, pulling him to his feet. “We’ll get you fixed up,” I explained, pulling open the door. “Just not right here.”
My little brother wouldn’t budge, opening his hands to inspect his palms.
“Come on,” I replied, frustrated. “I can’t do anything about it right now. There’s nothing here I can use to help you. You’re not burned. You have to keep going and I promise--”
A white orb struck my jaw, snapping my head to the side. Dust and flakes of paint scattered into the air as I hit the floor.
“Alex?” Michael screamed, as time seemed to slow allowing all light to ebb away with it.
I could hear the beating of my own heartbeat about me as each slow and heavy breath reverberated.
I needed a moment to rest. To sleep. To close my eyes a little.
Chapter 26
What Lies Beneath
“…Alex?” the familiar voice asked.
“What?” I gasped, woken, struggling to form the words in my swollen jaw, “What do you want?”
“You must help Alex get to Gate 13,” the voice explained.
“What?” I wheezed, willing my eyes to open.
“It is imperative you get Alex there,” the familiar voice instructed. “Do you understand, Michael?”
“Wait, I don’t,” I coughed. “Michael?”
“Yes,” my little brother replied, addressing the familiar voice, as I opened my eyes.
The room was enormous; so big the light couldn’t penetrate the walls. I couldn’t see where it ended, all I could see was Michael sitting crossed legged on the floor, his face lit up by the screen in front of him. This wasn’t like the other screens though; this one was as tall as a house and as wide, a single image without frames or borders. The face displayed there was uninterrupted and complete. I’d never seen a screen this large.
“You must promise me,” the familiar voice requested, my vision settling and focusing.
“Yes, I will,” Michael replied. “Yes, Daddy.”
“What?” I coughed, staggering to my feet, spitting the blood from my mouth.
My little brother’s face snapped to my position, as the eyes of the face on the screen honed toward me. I stumbled forward. The image split and the man disappeared.
“What is going on?” I gasped, the screen switching to a pale white light with the Autonoma logo displayed in the middle. “Where are we?” I asked.
Michael stood to his feet as Henri hovered behind him. “Come on,” my little brother declared, stepping forward to steady me. “We have to get to Gate 13.”
“Wait, I don’t understand.”
“It’s OK, come on.”
“But your hands, and the door,” I responded, confused, “and the man?”
A black line split down the center of the screen, dividing the Autonoma logo in half.
“Wait,” I insisted, digging in my feet. “What happened, and where are we?” I demanded, as the two halves of the screen drew apart.
Michael stopped and stepped back, his eyes fixed on mine. “Henri dragged you in here,” he explained.
“Dragged me?”
“Yeah,” he replied, “you wouldn’t stand up. So, he dragged you in here.”
“And where is here?”
“The room on the other side of the door.”
“What about your hands?”
“They’re fine now,” he explained, holding up his palms to show me, the skin sore, but unbroken.
“Henri fixed it,” my little brother remarked.
“And the man?”
“What man?”
“The man on the screen?”
“Daddy.”
“What? How long was I out for?” I asked, trying to remember something, anything.
“A while,” Michael replied.
None of this was making any sense. The familiar figure couldn’t be Dad. What the hell was going on?
A clatter at the door resounded about the room like a clap of thunder.
“They are here,” Henri remarked void of his prim and proper tone, addressing my little brother. “We must go.”
“I don’t understand,” I replied, patting the bloodied graze on my cheek.
“Gate 13 is through here,” Michael responded, placing his arm behind me and willing me forward.
I looked about the dark expanse of the room as the two halves of the screen came to a halt, revealing a passage through the middle. “But I need to--"
“Let’s go home,” my little brother replied, as I stared into his eyes filled with sincerity.
“OK,” I responded, sensing I’d find no answers no matter how much I asked. “Let’s go home.”
I glanced back as the screens closed, sealing our path forward and perhaps our fate?
“We shouldn’t follow him,” I declared, sneering at the old hoverbot taking the lead.
“Why?” Michael asked.
“We just shouldn’t.”
“Well, it’s not like we can go back, is it?” my little brother remarked.
I knew he was right, but I didn’t like it, as Henri’s casing radiated the light from the last spotlight, disappearing into the darkness ahead.
“Are you sure you want to follow him?” I asked.
“What choice do we have?” my little brother replied, starting to sound like me.
A green light ahead illuminated, basking the side of Henri’s casing in an eerie glow.
“You really believe this leads to Gate 13?” I asked.
“Yeah.”
Monitors, hundreds of them, were positioned on both sides of the narrow room. A simple control panel sat beneath them on one side, and in front of them, a single chair. The light cast by the flashing blue button at the center of the console radiated into every corner of the room and was impossible to ignore.
Michael looked to me.
I shrugged my shoulders. “I can’t see this day getting any worse. If you truly believe it’s the right thing to do, do it.”
My little brother positioned his hand over the button and hesitated. He looked to me once more and slapped his palm down. Each of the monitors woke from their slumber.
Triathics nesting, strutting about their enclosure and preening their blue feathers filled one screen, as another next to it illuminated with the image of Michael and I sitting on the back of another of the creatures; the shadow beast looming behind us.
A spider leapt from the tree, snatching me, as the owl struggled to free itself on another monitor. The PodSled came to rest against the concrete as Henri watched nearby, returning the end of the metal cable to the starting position. Everything we’d touched, everywhere we’d been in the park was displayed before us. I turned to the screens behind us as they showed us the true ext
ent of our actions.
Sitting upon the seat of a contraption as grey cubes blew air into our faces. A wheel in my hand as a white cube rotated and jostled me about on another screen. Cubes, blocks and pistons working together to create the mixed reality of our adventures. Everything, the true underbelly and workings of Autonoma, were shown in all their unpolished reality.
Two monitors in the bottom corner showed something far different, something more familiar. One was the dock we saw before entering the A.M.I. with the enormous ship moored there. Above the monitor, written in pen, ‘Gate 13’, had been scrawled onto the grey plastic. The true location of it dawned on me as my attention was drawn to the screen next to it. The last monitor showed me standing in a room staring at monitors.
I looked about me, checking back to the screen. Henri’s painted-on eyes glared back, and I stepped back from the old hoverbot, the monitors flicking to a black screen, one by one.
“Was that us?” Michael asked, turning to face me.
“Yeah,” I replied, my eyes fixed on the stained and dirty casing of our assigned companion.
“I wonder if we can get it on video to take home,” my little brother replied, innocence radiating through every word.
I broke my focus from the old hoverbot as Michael stepped away from the console, standing before me, like he was waiting for my next command.
“Let’s get out of here,” I declared, taking his hand, turning toward the door, glaring at the red light on the control panel.
A thud hit the locked door behind us, and I stepped aside, allowing the old hoverbot to hover toward the panel. The light turned green.
“Thank you, Henri,” Michael remarked, glancing back to me, as I nodded and he opened the door.
To my pleasant surprise, we were not back in the power plant. The grey cubic walls either side of us brought an uneasy mix of feelings born of knowing we were back where we started, or at least, judging from the concrete floor, near to it.
A rumble charged the air, like thunder being carried by the wind. I braced against the wall, and so did my little brother, as Henri scuttered on ahead.
“What is it?” Michael asked, the sound, all be it intermittent, growing louder.
“I don’t know,” I replied, following the old hoverbot through a series of smaller rooms, each with their own wires, hoses and lines, drawing ever nearer to the source of the thunderous rumble.
An air compressor discharged beside me, and I leapt aside, covering my face. A hose drew upward as air escaped from the compressor into the line. I unraveled my arms as the compressor fell silent and the hose drooped back to its original position.
“What is all this stuff?” my little brother asked.
“I think it’s for the experience blocks,” I replied, following the lines as they charged up to and into the ceiling. “We must be under the park,” I declared, listening to the bird song from the speakers above us, skipping and playing the same one-second loop, as they did on the Severed Seas ride.
“Yeah,” I declared, “we’re underneath Autonoma. Well, the park bit anyway.”
“How do we get out?”
“Just keep following Henri, for now.”
“Look!” Michael exclaimed, pointing into the next room, running on ahead, as I gave chase.
A machine, larger than a car, passed overhead. With seats attached to a frame suspended from a track above, it was like nothing I’d seen before. The car size contraption raced across the room, almost like an up-side-down train, running at tremendous speeds, as the cries of the shadow beast resounded from the grey, cubic walls. From the other side of the room, a Triathic bellowed out a warning call, and Henri hurried toward it.
“Wait,” I shouted, as Michael chased after him.
The contraption flashed past, missing me by a hair’s width, as I ducked to avoid it. “Wait up!” I yelled.
“How do we get up there?” my little brother asked, looking up the eight-foot wall between us and the triathic creature above us.
“Here,” I replied, cupping my hands together, crouching. “Can you reach?” I asked, straining to stand, as my little brother stood onto my interlocked fingers and bounced up onto my shoulder.
“Almost,” he replied, stretching his hand forward. “Got it.”
As I tried to think of a way for myself to get up, I noticed Michael’s info bubble return to my visor. At first the location text was red with the word ‘LOST’, but after a moment it updated to ‘Michael Jolski - Flight of the Triathics’.
“Need a hand?” Michael called down.
“Well, yes, obviously,” I replied.
“Will a feather do?”
“A what--”
The large puffin like beak of the triathic poked out over the ledge and the eyes of the beast scanned the room, shaking the long feathers on top of its head with each jagged movement. Shaking the floor as it landed, the beast hopped down to the concrete floor as the thunder of the larger machine charged around us.
“Get on,” Michael shouted.
“And how do you propose I do that?” I asked. “It’s not that much smaller than the wall, you idiot.”
“I am not an idiot,” my little brother chanted back, peering over the edge of the bird, as the blue feathered beast lowered its belly to the floor, offering its wing out to me.
“Are you sure about this?” I asked.
“No,” Michael replied, shuffling across, grabbing at the feathers in front of him.
“Great. Thanks,” I responded, heavy on the sarcasm, climbing onto the wing.
The creature’s head snapped to the opposite corner of the room. Drawn by the panic in the animal’s eyes, I glanced across to the swarm of Havoc bots erupting from the PodSled room.
“Oh for--”
The bird snapped shut its wing, throwing me sideward onto its back. I landed with a thud, belly down, behind my little brother.
“Quick, quick,” Michael chanted, willing the bird to move.
The creature turned its head toward me, scanning across the feathers and exchanging a glance with me. It snapped its head back toward the growing swarm in the corner of the room, and with determined strides, charged toward it.
“What are you doing?” I screamed, trying to right myself.
Pulling on a clump of feathers, I drew myself up, flopping over and onto the creature’s back. I grabbed another selection of the nearest feathers and braced for impact with the horde of Havoc bots streaming into the room.
“What the hell were we thinking?” I asked, releasing one hand to shield my face.
The thunderous roar of the suspended machine charged the air and the Havoc bots were scattered aside, smashing to pieces against the grey cubic wall. The blue feathered beast released a mocking laugh, extending its four wings.
With a tremendous pull, the triathic climbed into the air, soaring above the tracks of the machine as Michael hollered with delight. I glanced behind, as the smashed casing of the Havoc bots settled on the concrete floor, for more to pour from the PodSled room to take their place.
A distressed call from the bird snapped my attention forward, the creature tucking in its left wings, halting its momentum, and we fell, twisting as we descended. The cry of the shadow beast resounded about us, filling my earpiece.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I remarked, as the black wings of the beast discharged a clap of thunder with its powerful beat, emerging from the shadows.
Red lit eyes honed on our position as each Havoc bot rotated toward us, climbing into the air as we tumbled. Several curses slipped my lips.
As the concrete floor, peppered with red lit eyes, drew closer, I pulled back as if somehow it would will the feathered creature to obey. Michael released a blood curdling scream, as he too appeared to realize we were drawing closer to the floor.
The blue feathered creature extended its wings, crying out as it cut our descent. Scattering the dust on the floor, the triathic skimmed across the surface, dispersing Havoc bots in all dire
ctions with the edge of its wings, wincing with each strike, beating its wings to gain height.
We soared over the ledge and into the nest of the triathics, as the creatures gathered there snapped their eyes toward the commotion trailing behind us. As the Havoc bots charged in, followed by the shadow beast, the nesting creatures leapt to their feet, panic evident in their green eyes.
Our feathered beast flapped its wings, racing toward the narrow passage of a cave. With seconds to spare, the creature retracted its wing, and we soared into the confines of the next room. The familiar music of the Autonoma park returned, stuck in a one-second loop, as we burst into the welcome area of the ‘Flight of the Triathics’.
The triathic landed on its feet, running forward, as around us, the flaming torches illuminating the cave remained static, like images stuck in time. The creature tucked in its wings, lowered its head and charged for the entrance.
“Duck!” I shouted, pointing to the narrow gap, as Michael’s eyes snapped forward.
Chapter 27
Gate 13
“Well, at least we don’t have to worry about that damned shadow beast anymore,” I joked, trying to raise a smile from my little brother’s terrified face, as we charged toward the grey castle.
Grey cubic panels burst from the mountain side behind us, snatching the attention of all three of us. Henri scuttled from the ride’s entrance as the black wings of the beast broke through the cloud of dust above the bot.
Swarms of Havoc bots cascaded from the hole in the mountainside as the twisted cubic panels skidded across the floor toward us. The shadow beast ascended into the air as the illuminated blue sign indicating the entrance to the ride sparked, extinguished and fell to the floor.
“What the hell is that?” Michael screamed.
“Go!” I shouted to our feathered ride, “Go!”
The triathic returned its attention forward and charged toward the castle. With wings tucked in tight, we skidded into the corridor and our feathered creature came to a halt, glancing behind.
“No,” I demanded, “keep going. Don’t stop.”
The eyes of the triathic flashed to me, resuming its charge forward.
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