One of the guardians tried to mollify the situation by speaking to them. “Did you two really think you could break into a restricted area, assault a security guard, steal a very powerful and expensive piece of equipment, and just walk out of here?”
Milo shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly and said, “Yeah.”
“You are both under arrest.”
There were at least a dozen guardians in front of them and Milo certainly was not going to use his Kung Fu on them.
“Got any plans?” Milo whispered to Alex.
“Yeah, just one… run.”
Alex turned around and ran back inside the Facility. Milo was right behind her.
“I don’t suppose you brought an extra invisibility cloak for me?” he joked.
“Come on, down here,” Alex instructed.
The two ran down several flights of stairs and ended up breaking off in separate directions. Fortunately for them, the Facility was a big place and since they had spent their whole lives there, they knew every inch of it. In a fight between lions and sharks, the winner is determined by where the fight takes place. The guardians chasing them were lions in the water – they were completely outmatched. Trying to keep up with Alex and Milo would be difficult.
Alex locked herself in a storage room, climbed up the shelf, and penetrated the ceiling. She could hear guardians stampeding passed her as she remained perched in darkness above the storage room. She was somewhat relieved she was able to lose them; however, she still needed to escape with the device.
She activated the flashlight on the access pod, which she still had from Milo, and it provided just enough light for her to see. With the entire floor plan committed to memory, she quickly devised the best route for escape. A network of pipes led her to a ventilation system, where she was able to crawl through. For over twenty metres, she shuffled along at a snail’s pace trying to be as silent as possible. The metal of the vent crinkled under her weight, but she kept moving. As her knees dragged across the dusty vent, it irritated her sinuses. She felt a sneeze coming and knew there was nothing she could do to prevent it. A powerful sneeze blasted out of her nose and mouth, echoing throughout the vent. A mixture of blood and mucous sprayed out, reminding Alex of her debilitating condition. Despite the loud sneeze, she was thankful that no one discovered her presence.
Still feeling faint, she continued on until she found an exit to the ventilation shaft. She pushed the grate out, causing it to crash down on the floor below. It was much louder than she had anticipated and she hoped no one heard it. She popped her head into the room and took a deep breath. It was not exactly fresh air, but it was much better than the stuffy air she had been inhaling in the confined space of the shaft. When she was convinced no one was coming, she gripped the edge of the vent opening and flipped her body out of the shaft like a ninja. She hung for a second before dropping down in another miscellaneous storage room.
The room was pitch-black; the only light was coming from the access pod on her forearm. She dusted herself off then made her way over to the door. With both hands, she pried the door open so just a sliver of light entered the room. As she peered out, she did not see or hear any guardians.
She wondered if Milo was okay. Just as she thought that, there was a loud crash behind her. She was so startled that she nearly hit the ceiling. She quickly turned around and shone her light in the direction of the noise. The light lit up Milo’s face, causing him to squint.
“Milo, what are you doing here? You scared me half to death!” she said in an excited whisper; her heart was still pounding uncontrollably.
“Oh hey, Alex,” he said clutching his knee.
“Let me guess, you downloaded a copy of the floor plan?” she asked.
“Yeah and you?”
“I already had it.”
“You picked a good room. You can see many different angles from here,” he said.
“I know, that’s why I picked it.”
“Same,” he winced, clearly in pain.
“Are you okay?”
“I’ll be fine. Evidently, I wasn’t as successful with the dismount as you were.”
“Don’t go injuring your legs, those come in handy in escapes.”
“Alex…”
“What is it?”
“Listen, I’m not feeling well, I think I might be dying.”
“Come on, don’t say that. You’ve just been breathing in that stuffy air. I felt the same way.”
“No, I’m serious. If I collapse on the floor, I want you to just leave me.”
“Alright.”
“Alright? That was quick, I was expecting at least of bit of resistance.”
“Milo, you’re talking nonsense and I just wanted to shut you up. We have an important mission ahead of us. Pull yourself together.”
“But if I do die, I want you to know how I feel about you.”
Milo hesitated a bit, but then just blurted it out, “I don’t know what’s going to happen to us, if the world is going to end or we all die from some crazy illness or we get arrested, but I just want to let you know that I love you.”
“That’s sweet, Milo, I love you too.” The words deflected off Alex as if she did not even hear them. It was not how he had pictured the conversation going, but he figured Alex was too focused on the task at hand to engage in such a meaningful conversation. As it was, her feelings toward Milo remained a mystery.
“Okay, I think we’re in the clear, let’s move,” Alex said.
Before Milo had a chance to respond, Alex was already halfway out the door. He quickly ran after her and met her at another exit.
“Ready to try this again?” she asked.
Milo nodded.
The final set of doors slid open and this time, there were no guardians waiting for them.
Chapter Forty
Aris searched high and low for an access pod charging dock, but could not find one. While the device mostly obtained power from the sun, Aris had not seen the sun in over two days and it was not about to rise for another six hours. He had exhausted all options in the office and did not have time to search the entire mansion.
What would Alex do? he asked himself. Alex would most likely think outside the box and not look for a technological solution. What is the non-technological solution in this instance? Aris thought while spinning around in his chair. His eyes fell upon the large portrait hanging behind the desk.
Aris rose from his chair and pulled the large-framed picture of Trevor Morrison off the wall. The resolution of the photo was so high, to him the resemblance was a perfect match. But there was a big difference in fooling him and fooling a retina scanner. It was time to find out. Aris held the picture up to the retina scanner and a thin blue beam of light scanned the surface of the image. Aris crossed his fingers as the computer analyzed the result.
“Retina match confirmed,” a voice said. He smirked as he admired his ingenuity. The next thing Aris was looking at was the home-screen of the Leader’s computer.
Aris spoke some key phrases pertaining to the ship and within seconds, the computer populated a list of results. Aris was now staring at a hierarchy of glowing orbs – each one a file awaiting his selection. He reached out and chose the first orb on the list – a three-dimensional scaled version of the ship. As the hologram spun slowly, Aris marveled at the technological achievement. The design was a vast improvement from the preliminary sketches that Mara had. Using his hands, Aris disassembled the craft piece by piece. The ship had two massive cargo bay areas, an antigravity scrambler, two twin-turbo thrusters, several mini-exploration pods, two fully functional labs, and he had yet to explore the main deck. It was a very impressive craft to say the least – paid for by the citizens of Earth. He was also impressed at how the Leader was able to keep the construction of the craft under wraps for so long, especially with the ubiquity of information and communication available. Where would the Leader even hide something like this? he asked himself.
Out of the co
rner of his eye, Aris saw a section of the ship that intrigued him so he reached into the hologram and held the room in his hand.
“Isolate,” he instructed. The computer discarded the rest of the ship except for that one selected portion he was holding.
“Enhance,” he commanded again. The hologram expanded, allowing Aris to get a better look at it.
“Analyze.”
A soft computer-generated voice began to disclose the specifics of the unfamiliar region of the craft. “Matter Transporter. Location: rear quadrant of the main hub—”
“Repeat,” Aris said before it had a chance to finish.
“Matter Transporter. Location….” the voice said again.
Aris was speechless. He had never heard of a fully operational matter transporter before; that was something out of science fiction.
Without interruption, the voice continued speaking in the background as Aris comprehended this discovery. “Last Transport: Maxim Morrison. Status: Successful.”
Aris sat there almost in a hypnotic trance as the glowing hologram slowly revolved. In theory, for a matter transporter to work, there would need to be two of them – a transmitter on one end and a receptor on the other end, he reasoned. Therefore, if the Leader transported himself to the ship, the transmitter was likely somewhere in this house. If I had to guess, it would be somewhere in this room.
“Locate matter transporter,” he said on a hunch.
Much to his surprise, a series of pneumatics released a soft hissing sound from across the room. Aris immediately looked over as a portion of the wall split apart, revealing a strange-looking contraption inside a small nook. He slowly approached the room and was in awe at what was inside – a tall, off-white cylindrical machine with smooth contours and glowing areas.
Aris studied the machine with interest and then stepped fully inside. We’re all going to die someday, he thought. He stood there a moment, contemplating what he was about to do. In his excitement, he had forgotten to notify the others of his discovery, though not that it mattered since his access pod was completely drained.
“Transport to last coordinates,” he instructed with a slight hesitation.
He stood up straight and remained still as the machine powered up. What started off as a mild vibration continuously increased until it became a loud hum that rattled his bones. His ears popped and he was blinded by an intense light. Following that, he felt a burning sensation rip through his entire body as if he had swallowed an atomic bomb and it had detonated in his stomach. It was too late to scream. Every fibre of his being separated as the bright light consumed him. The machine howled loudly and with an intense jolt, it blasted him into another space and time.
Chapter Forty-One
After leaving the Facility with the device – a micro particle accelerator, Milo and Alex took refuge inside an abandoned warehouse. It was a perfect spot to hide because it was completely random and allowed them enough room to work on the proper modifications.
They started by dismantling the device completely. Within minutes, there were parts and gismos laid out all around them. To the untrained eye, it would appear to be a huge disorganized mess, but each component was thoroughly examined and catalogued in Alex and Milo’s minds.
“You know, we haven’t heard from Aris in a while, maybe we should check in with him,” Alex suggested as she released the access pod from her arm and handed it to Milo.
“His status is offline,” Milo said.
“Try him anyway.”
Milo stopped what he was doing and called Aris. Aris’ customized dial tone buzzed in Milo’s ear for a while until the voicemail kicked in.
“There’s no answer, should I leave a message?”
Without losing focus, Alex looked up and gave a quick nod.
“Hey, Aris, it’s us. We want an update so give us a call back.”
Alex began to reassemble the device, but in putting it back together, she added a few important modifications.
“Need any help?” Milo asked.
“No thanks, I’m fine.”
Alex was a whiz with electronics and had the entire project planned out in her head. She had taken apart and was reassembling a highly complex device that only a handful of people in the world understood. Even with the proper data downloads, the micro particle accelerator was still too intricate for most people to comprehend. For the most part, Alex relied on her existing knowledge, but downloaded new data on occasion. However, what she was manufacturing had never been created before so most of the data she needed did not exist.
“Milo, I need to affix your pod to the device. The good news is that if this doesn’t work, you won’t be needing it anyway.”
“And if it does?”
“I’ll get you a new one.”
“Sure, it’s all yours, but I don’t think there’s much battery left.”
“It’s okay, I can hook it up to the main power source.”
“Where’s the main power source?” he asked, studying the design.
“It doesn’t have one, yet. I intend for it to draw its power from the sun.”
Before she committed the pod to the device, she checked if Aris had responded to them.
“Hey, there’s a message from Aris here. I’m not sure how we missed it,” she said.
“He’ll have to forgive us, we’ve been a little preoccupied.”
“This message is from over an hour ago.”
“What does it say?”
“It says: I’m at the house and there doesn’t appear to be anyone here. I have a strange feeling about this.”
“So if nobody’s there, why would he not be answering?” Milo asked.
“I’m not sure, maybe the battery on his pod died… or better yet, maybe he died,” Milo said under his breath.
“I’ll try him again,” she said.
The call went through, but just like the other times, there was no answer. She didn’t want to admit it, but it was not a good sign.
“I guess we’ll just have to proceed without him.”
“How’s the device coming along?”
“I just need to calibrate the sync pins so the bismuth 209 particles bombard the alpha particles to create astatine 211.”
“What’s astatine, I’ve never even heard of that?”
“It’s an extremely rare radioactive element – its name derives from the Greek word astatos, which means unstable.”
“Great, what are we doing with it?”
“Don’t worry, the process hasn’t begun yet, but when it does, the instability will be a good thing. Since it only has a half-life of about eight hours it will—” she paused mid-sentence. “On second thought, I don’t have time to explain it. You’ll just have to trust me.”
“I trust you,” Milo said sincerely. “So is it ready?”
“I think so. Of course, there’s no way to really know for sure without testing it.”
“Should we test it?”
“Not yet. First, we have to make sure Aris is okay.”
Chapter Forty-Two
Aris opened his eyes and was relieved he had made it to the other side in one piece. He slowly stepped out of the matter transporter, checked his pulse for any irregularities that may have occurred during the transport, and made sure no one was coming after him. Everything seemed to be normal and as far as he could tell, his presence was unknown.
His mind was a little foggy at first as he was still collecting his thoughts, but after a few deep breaths, he re-established his mission objectives.
The ship was enormous, and despite only having looked at a smaller scale of it for a brief moment, Aris was confident he could find his way around. Based on his memory of the 3D schematics, he was able to recall enough of the layout to orient himself. Leaving the matter transporter room, he began to explore the craft.
The lack of personnel struck him as odd. He figured there would be dozens of maintenance crew workers or scientists walking around, but there was no one. It was remi
niscent of the Leader’s palace.
Nearly every fifty metres was an elevator and a stairwell. As much as he would have liked to take the elevator, he did not want to risk what could be waiting on the other side when the elevator doors eventually opened. He also did not want to take the stairs because there would be no place to hide once inside the stairwell, but the stairs seemed to be the better of the two options.
“Sir, our security system has detected recent activity with the matter transporter,” Agent Archimedes said.
“Did you check the video feed?”
“It has been disabled, sir.”
“Have we been breached?”
“That has yet to be confirmed.”
“Then confirm it.”
“Yes, sir. I will get to the bottom of this immediately.”
Aris descended down several flights of stairs and aimlessly walked down a lengthy corridor, inspecting rooms along the way. He passed by a few people, but he kept his head up and walked with confidence as if he belonged there, and no one bothered him.
Once at the end of the corridor, he came across a cargo area. He felt snooping around the cargo area would provide him more insight about the mission. Plus, he felt like it would be the last place he would encounter any personnel so he would be left to his own devices.
Aris placed his hand on the scanner box and the door slid open. When the doors opened, they revealed a warehouse-sized room that contained several large marine tanks. Aris walked slowly throughout the room and peered into the various vats of water. Inside the different tanks were brightly-coloured tropical fish, large squid, dolphins, and some other species that he could not identify.
“What the heck is this place?” he muttered to himself.
Suddenly, Aris felt someone grab him by the back of the neck and lift him off the ground. He was startled and tried to squirm, but Agent Archimedes’ powerful hands gripped tighter, constricting his air passage. Aris’ feet desperately searched for footing as they dangled in midair. When Aris’ face started turning purple, Agent Archimedes decided to let him go. Aris dropped to the floor, gasping for breath. Once on the floor, he rolled under one of the large aquatic tanks. This maneuver did not please Agent Archimedes as he was too large to fit underneath the tank. The agent hurried around to the other side, but Aris was nowhere in sight.