Chapter 0.5: System Failure: Re-Initialization P2

Continued from Part 1

There was little he could do to soften the impact between his torso and the crumbling ground except pray that his lab coat was thicker than he gave it credit for. His front collided with the concrete and sent a harsh burning sensation through the uncovered patches of skin on his hands and arms. He vehement curses to the obsolete gods of the Senex Tempora were muffled as the air was flooded with the ear-shattering blasts of energy disassociating from the Coils to the Gate.

Energy pulses ripped through the thick window, the glass becoming like burnt paper against the raw, uncontained power that beat against it with furious rage. Not even splinters remained as every fragment of glass was vaporized before it could even reach the floor. Both scientists felt the star-like heat of the violent reaction occurring mere feet above their backs. Their lab coats were drenched with sweat that evaporated instantly and their skin on the verge of boiling.

Their vision was completely white, their eyes unable to process even the smallest wavelength of the searing light flooding the room. Doug felt Henry push down on his side, trying to get both of them closer to the ground. He could only imagine the agony the older man felt being just a few inches closer to the incinerating radiation of the energy, if Henry hadn’t irradiated to the point of certain death already.

Doug was vaguely aware of the ground heaving underneath him, only noticing the wounds fatal of the foundation opening in the concrete skin when it was far too late to run. Metal crunched, rock splintered, wiring snapped, and electronics died as the entire floor achieved the structural integrity of a stick of melting butter.

What happened in the next ten seconds would become a complete blur to both scientists forevermore. All Doug knew was that when he woke up exactly ten and a half seconds later, he was laying haphazardly across a shattered flatscreen monitor in the subsidiary control room for the water, gas, and power lines that sat directly underneath the observation deck like a weary adventurer under a tree.

The evacuation and cessation alarms never stopped even as they were melted by heat found usually in the deep geothermal vents of the Mare Fervens trench near the ancient caldera in the western islands. Dust and sparks choked the air like smoke, forcing Doug to cover his mouth with his dirtied sleeve as he struggled to free himself of the tendril-like electrical cords. His feet and legs were constantly attacked by the debris of fallen concrete chunks and broken metal that penetrated his clothing and scratched at his skin.

When he finally managed to break through the cloud of raining dust and heat, he could hardly believe his eyes. Henry had, despite his age, managed to already free himself from the wreckage without too many visible lacerations and cross the auxiliary computer-lined room.

“Screen shows radon gas contamination in the access passage. There’s masks and RNS’s in this storage closet, though, so we should be able to make it through to the transfer sector easily,” Henry noted as he commanded a severely cracked flatscreen to power down with a wave of his hand.

Doug stumbled over the last of the piles of wreckage listlessly, unable to force himself to be concerned with his own safety. He slowly glanced at the hole in the ceiling that they’d fallen through. Somewhere through that, was the stellar fireball that was the Infinity Gate --it had been the best of the dimensional transversing technology they had available that revolutionized the use of the Dimensional Coils as a conduit for the energy flow -- now, millions of government credits and even more precious resources were burning through the floor and containment unit.

Doug couldn’t break free of the overwhelming wave of guilt that threatened to crush him. He tried to tell himself there was no way they could have prepared for this. That machine needed days to charge up, not a few minutes, and they didn’t have that time. There was no possible way they could have known about the coup, the infiltration, and the brutal operation.

He let out a hard laugh as he pressed his hand against the steel-plated walls of the lab. There was no justification for this. No amount of his persuasive argumentation would stay the consequences of his actions. It had been him who put in the order. It was him who deactivated the safety procedure. And it had been him who refused to give up until his inane plot was set in motion. Heat pulsed like a vile organ above them, beating down on him as he stared up at the ruins of the increasingly decaying experiment chamber.  

“I killed him, Henry. He’s gone. H-he didn’t even have any say in it! I just killed him! And he watched me do it!” Doug’s voice grew from a hushed whisper and then broke into a yell. Red-hot fragments of metal dripped down from the hole in the ceiling, sizzling on the cooler concrete and electronics on the floor. Henry apparently ignored the younger man’s outburst as he slipped the clear, plastic mask over his nose and mouth and opened the microfilter shortly before snapping a watch-like machine on his right wrist. He then grabbed another mask and walked over to the grieving scientist.

“Doug ... Weren’t you the one to tell me that ‘he was better off dead’ rather than returning to the surface? So what if he’s dead, then? We have no visible proof that he is dead as neither of us saw the results. So, even if he is gone or the Gate, by some miracle, actually worked, then either way, he is in a better place. Now, unless we want to die ourselves, you’d better get your sorry rear over here and take a mask,” Henry stated, giving Doug’s shoulder a strong shake. The wizened man held a mask and watch-like machine out, indicating for Doug to take them.

“He watched me murder him. He saw me sedate him and then pull the damn switch. Oh, God, what have I done?” Doug’s voice dropped again to barely above a whisper as a huge glob of molten metal dripped down from the ceiling. A small fragment flung into the air and zipped through his coat, burning a clean hole through it, and passed onto the floor. Henry sighed and firmly grasped Doug’s shoulder with an unoccupied hand once again.

“Doug. Listen to me right now. You did the right thing. Just imagine what the soldiers would have done to him. If anything, you gave him the most humane way out possible. Now, we have to go right now! Take a mask and RNS and let’s move it!” Henry reassured as he clapped Doug hard on his shoulder blade. Doug took one final look at the hell seeping through the ceiling above and swiped both apparati from Henry’s outstretched hand.

Doug looked at the plastic piece of technology, anything to keep the guilt away. The mask was nothing impressive. Covering just the nose and mouth, their eyes would be suspect to anything the dying facility outside the bulkhead could throw at them. At least the filter is up to code, Doug noted as he strapped the mask over the lower part of his face and switched on the filter. The next device, however, was on the bleeding edge of safety equipment.

The Radiation Nullification Shield was exactly what it said it was. A weak field of stable electrons that projected over the area of a human body like a jumpsuit, held in place by the minor gravitational pull the human possessed. Alpha, beta, and gamma radiation was immediately absorbed and neutralized by the massive amount of free valence electrons within the field. Doug strapped the RNS to his wrist and tapped the glowing screen. Instantly, a flash of translucent, electric-blue enveloped him and spread entirely around his body --completely covering his shoes and the mess of black hair on his head.

Once he had both safety features activated, he gave Henry an affirmative nod that he was ready. The other man nodded himself as he keyed in the access code on the holographic pad on the side of the heavy, metal door. The bulkhead shuddered as the minimal power still present in the system sluggishly deactivated the electric locks and anti-surge field. As the door groaned along the tracks in the floor towards the wall, both men rushed out of the small command room, the smell of burning electronics swiftly filling the air.

The hallway was carved out of the mountain stone and lined with steel pipes, wiring, and monitors. Glancing down the darkened corridor, Doug hoped that there wasn’t anyone laying in ambush within the pitch black areas of the dimmed passage. Although invisible and virtually undetectable to them, their RNS’s flickered blue around their bodies as the overwhelming presence of radioactive radon came into contact.

Unhindered by the debilitating gas, the two jogged down the hall, passing scores of abandoned metal supply crates and various forlorn gadgets strewn along the path. The ground shook violently again, sending both men into the smooth rock walls. As soon as the core had subsided enough, Henry shook himself off and took the lead. Doug tried to keep his mind in check and focused as they shoved aside wayward boxes and kicked away wreckage. The guilt from earlier hadn’t been completely removed by Henry’s encouragement, it only festered inside him and began to snap at his insides like a ravenous beast.  

The corridor ended abruptly at a locked door. The access panel flashing red in alarm that signaled immediate and present danger was just on the other side of the six inches of metal. Unfortunately for them, their only means of escape was also in that direction. Not daring to even breathe, Doug aligned the floating numbers, and watched as the barrier slid into the wall, trailing sparks as it ran along the tracks.

The room ahead was a perfect picture of the pits of hell. The gates leading to the many elevators were smashed open, the transports themselves spouting small tongues of demonically burning fire, sparks leaped through the air from ruined computer modules and severed electrical cables, and radiation alarms blared and flashed green on the ceiling. Though neither men paid much attention to any of those details as they looked at the floor.

Bodies, both of men and women. At least a dozen were slumped against the wall, ugly black burn marks from the soldiers’ plasma weaponry scarring each of them. The overwhelming smell of smoldering flesh struck Doug even through the filters. He felt his head start to spin as he nearly vomited inside his mask.

This wasn’t a sudden onslaught, Doug realized clutching his dazed head, They were executed while we were hiding in the chamber. He saw another body laying on the opposite of the room. Based on the complete set of armor and visored helmet that adorned it, Doug could tell it was one of the soldiers that had been sent to slaughter them all. A pool of blood sluggishly widened underneath the helmet, the front of which was smashed inward, cracks appearing in the strong plastic visor. A bloodied pipe wrench was cast aside on the floor nearby.

At least they put up a fight, he grimly thought as he shut his eyes to the sight and smell.

“Doug! Come quick! Hurry!” Henry shouted. Opening his eyes, Doug pushed through the horrifying smell and saw the greying head of his friend crouched near the line of bodies. He waved his wrinkled hand and yelled for him to come quickly.

As Doug approached, he saw exactly what Henry was bent over. It was the body of a man that Doug estimated to be even older than Henry by the looks of his completely greyed hair. The only problem was that this body was still moving and talking.

“Oh, God ... Thank God someone found me at last...” the man whispered before a violent cough ripped through his weakened form. Doug knelt down on the man’s left side opposite Henry. Despite the flickering light, Doug suddenly realized that he knew this man. Through the blood spattered clothes and bruised skin, he remembered his enthusiastic director of the Dimensional Studies Department, Matthew Gideon. The man who had given him his job the very day he graduated from the University of Phenac, and who had assigned him to his post as Assistant Researcher under his colleague Henry Hall.  

“Mr. Gideon, sir. Are you alright? What happened?” Doug knew the first question was an obvious ‘no’, but he had to ask.

“N-no, Douglas. I am not quite at one-hundred percent as you can possibly see. I would be better off if you could remove that weight from my chest, though,” Matthew wheezed as Henry obediently reached down, hefted the “weight” off the downed scientist, and carefully laid the male body on the floor away from the director.

“Much better ...” Matthew groaned as he leaned up against the wall to examine the damage to himself. Doug’s head was getting woozy again from the thick odor of burnt skin, but it immediately cleared up once he laid eyes on the injured man’s torso. A wide circle of charred skin was located about the spot where his stomach was supposed to be.

“Damn. That’s going to need more than a first aid kit to sew up,” Matthew cynically observed as yet another cough shuddered through him, breaking open some of the hardened, burnt flesh in his wound, allowing fresh blood to flow once again. “Those soldiers weren’t taking any chances with any of us.”

“Save your energy, Matt, please. Let’s try to move. The wound isn’t that bad,” Henry urged as he tried to get his arm behind Matthew’s back.  The old man was met with a swift slap to his arm by the even older director. Doug watched with slight bemusement at seeing someone put his stuffy co-worker in his place.

“Leave me be. My eyes still work just fine, thank you. I can see that I’m not going to get out of this one.” Henry was about to interject when Matthew held up his hand. “No. You both will listen to me now. I have one question that I demand an answer to first and foremost: Did you get rid of it?” Henry’s gaze shot over to Doug for a moment as he cleared his throat.

“Sir, Doug did it. But, please, let us help you u-” Henry admitted. Matthew slowly turned his fatigued head over to Doug.

“Shut up, Henry. Doug. You used the Gate, didn’t you? Good, good. Now that’s cleared up, I want both of you to know something,” Matthew whispered, raising his arm to catch his cough. Specks of blood peppered his sleeve once he pulled it away. Both Doug and Henry leaned slightly closer.

“The exits are all patrolled, Eliza and the others already took the last tram out, and the hanger has been sealed off. You both will have to go through the administrative areas and get to the delivery bay at Gate A. Those are locked down, so you’ll need my access card to get in,” he explained all in one breath as he brandished a sleek, plastic card from the tattered pocket of his coat.

Henry reached forward to take the card, but the older man suddenly jerked it away, the sudden action causing him to grimace in pain.

“Not yet. I need something in return. Doug, would you be so kind as to grab that pistol and bring it here?” Matthew requested calmly, as he clutched the outside of his gaping wound. Doug immediately knew what the director was planning on doing, but nevertheless, slowly got to his feet and shuffled the three yards across the floor to the fallen Mainland Defense Soldier. The plasma pistol was still firmly in the dead man’s grasp. Doug took a deep, reassuring breath of filtered air as he crouched down and pried the stiff, gloved, fingers off the weapon.

“Gideon! What do you think you’re doing? We can still get you out of here!” Henry shouted as Doug solemnly returned with the gun. “Doug, don’t give it to him!” Henry’s panicked protests were immediately silenced as he was met with bitter stares from both men.  

“Henry, you told me the same thing back there about the boy. It’s your turn to let go,” Doug angrily snapped as he gave the handle of the pistol to the dying man, who in return handed over his card.

“It’s my time, Henry. Not much will be able to change that. Just get out of here. Go back to your family and tell Charline I said hello, would you? The other facilities should have gotten the distress signal by now, so hopefully someone will be around to rescue you two once you get out,” Matthew sighed as he grasped the weapon and eyed it curiously. The ceiling above them groaned under the pressure as cracks laced through it.

There was little more Henry could do to sway either of them of their convictions. Doug pulled Henry to his feet by his arm and motioned towards the door that lead to the access stairs across the room.

“Goodbye, Mr. Gideon. Thank you for giving us a chance to escape,” Doug tersely said as he pulled Henry away from his old friend. The aged man pushed against Doug’s grip, but calmed as Matthew spoke for the last time.

“Henry, thank you for everything. It’s been a one hell of a run between the two of us. Now, you’ll have to finish without me,” Matthew wheezed as he switched the safety feature off on the weapon.

The walk to the stairs was completely silent as Doug ushered Henry inside the stairwell. Doug looked back once more at the fallen man before sliding the thin, metal door shut. They waited one moment before a bright light flashed through the small, ash-coated window of the door and the muffled sound of a single discharge echoed through the crumbling facility.

As if sharing its lament over the loss of its employee, the massive building groaned as the concrete ceiling caved in on the transport chamber, giving Matthew at the very least an impromptu burial underneath several tons of the facility he had loved.

Doug looked back at Henry; the older man was leaning over the metal bar of the stairs whispering a prayer into his gas mask for his friend. Whether the omnipotent being in the sunless sky above would hear his prayer was up to debate, but Doug respectively waited until he was finished to suggest they move upwards.

The next few moments passed relatively quickly. Without words, both men sprinted up the creaking, welded steel, staircase. With every floor that they passed, the danger only increased.

“Warning: Electromagnetic containment fields discharging. Seventy-two and one half percent change remaining. Seventy-two and one third charge remaining. BZT!” the voice chimed before cutting out again. The announcement only spurred the men even more. Despite Henry’s age and brief exposure to the radiation, he was keeping pace with Doug’s sprinting up the countless flights of stairs. Adrenaline and the threat of instant death kept fatigue away as both men flew through the twenty underground stories to the surface floors.

They dashed past more execution sites with eyes closed, not letting anything else distract them from their task. The hallways of the office were completely deserted except for the occasional battered body of a burnt scientist or bludgeoned soldier killed during the invasion.

Matthew’s card had proved useful as they swiftly barreled through the double glass doors of the administration area, narrowly avoiding the automated plasma bolts of the turrets placed in the lobbies. The bolts sizzled in the blast-resistant glass as both men caught their breath for one moment before moving once again.

Together they vaulted over desks and office computers, Henry losing little ground to Doug even with his age. Hallways and offices blurred together as the two kept following the directional signs. Rogue Industries prided itself on efficiency, a virtue Doug was glad it had as the paths were straightforward even as the facility entered its death throes.

Quicker than they imagined, they were pressing the access panel to open the miraculously unguarded Gate A. Red alarms continued to flash and flood the air with a loud klaxon as the metal door screeched away into the walls. The delivery bay was completely empty except for the smoldering remains of three magnet trams and the looted bins of cargo they possessed. Henry and Doug climbed over the large metal containers as they drew ever-closer to the wide exit of the Gate.

Nodding to each other from atop a crate, both men suddenly leaped. Doug managed to tuck in his shoulder and roll over it upon impact with the ground while Henry jarred his legs painfully when he hit the pavement. Once he completed his maneuver, Doug ran back to assist his companion who was struggling to get to his feet.

Henry winced in pain as Doug put his hand around his back and made the limping man lean on his shoulder. The older man attempted to counter by saying he didn’t need help, but Doug refused to let go as they slowly but surely inched away from the Celestic Range Facility.

The ground suddenly quaked violently as the muffled voice blared that the containment field had only ten percent charge left and was draining fast. The unchecked reaction in the nuclear fusion core would blast through the facility in no time at all once the electromagnetic field failed. Panic began to set in as both battered scientists immediately picked up the pace of their limp, despite the immense pain it brought Henry.

Cragged, majestic mountains surrounded them and offered the promise of a safehaven if only they could reach it in time, their lofty peaks pointing towards the orange tinted skies of the darkening horizon away from the heinous crimes against the heavens occurring below. Both men heard the humming of the electric motors long before they ever saw the gunships they belonged to as the graceful, steel birds flew around the base of the mountains in a tight formation.

Hoping against hope that their tiny forms wouldn’t be picked up by the military radars within the craft as they stumbled haphazardly across the gritty pavement that lead out of the delivery bay. Though, their concerns hardly mattered, for at that moment, the world seemingly leap six feet into the air and a roar akin to a host of demons breaking free of the chains of hell exploded through the mountains.

Doug and Henry were violently thrown ten feet forwards, the blast and quake slamming into their backs like a Magna-Tram and kicking their feet out from under them, leaving the men little protection from the insane whims of the explosive force. Doug flew in a graceless arc through the air, his limbs loose and flailing as he tried to stop the world from spinning.

His wish was granted soon enough when the rough pavement rubbed the skin on his legs and arms raw with the impact. The angered giant of sound shook the earth as it marched from the epicenter of the reactor deep underground. Doug barely had time to focus on his own immense pain as he heard a soft thud beside him as Henry was thrown into the base of a lofty pine tree.

It was then that the fallout hit. A hellish mixture of debris and radiation rained down upon them from the tumultuous clouds. Sections of concrete walls slammed into the ground like drops of water, flash-burned masses of half-melted metal flew further from the erupting facility and stuck to the sides of nearby mountains, and the giant blades of the turbines impaled the rock as if it was a knife through bread.

Their RNS’s began beeping erratically as the volatile atoms broke free of their unstable forms within the core and sped through the countless layers of lead and rock up to the surface. The watch-like machine flashed red as the field was pelted with an assault of thousands of radioactive particles, yet the shield did its job and maintained the barrier between the lethal dosages of radiation and the two battered and broken humans depending on them. Heated metal shattered once it connected with the cooler rock, sending razor-esque shrapnel slashing through the air.

Doug weakly lifted his head as the roar gradually died down, the beast responsible content with its show of force and ready to slumber in its den once more. Considering he had not been flash fried by the intense heat of the uncontrolled reaction, he could only assume that the containment had held it long enough to mitigate the apex of the blast so that it would be cancelled out by the sheer volume of concrete, steel, mountain rock, and lead.

He gave a low sigh, again, Rogue Industries had seemingly prepared for nearly every possible scenario and a way to either counter or alleviate the effects of said scenario. Doug raised his head up, weakly pushing with his arms. The downpour of lethal hail seemed to have subsided except the gentle snow of papers somehow not scorched in the fireball. He turned to the side, gazing a few feet away where his companion was groaning.

Henry had, in a show of sheer will, pushed himself up and was now leaning against the base of the spindly evergreen. The old man was breathing heavily and clutching his right knee while ignoring the plethora of angry, red abrasions along his arms, legs, and under his tattered labcoat. Other than those issues, however, he seemed to be alive and that was what mattered now.

Doug gingerly flipped himself over so he was lying on his back. He felt a shooting pain travel through his chest. There was something a mess in his ribs, he knew that fact well enough based off the immense agony associated with moving. Doug was so preoccupied with his injuries that he did not notice the increasing volume of a static hum and rotating blades from the sky.

The metal birds had not been scared off by the beast’s roar, and had quickly reformed and were diving in fast towards the ruined facility. The flock sliced through the dust cloud that settled in the mountainous valley, their bright searchlights scanning systematically over the rocky plateau until they came into focus over the two scientists on the outskirts of the military occupation zone.

They might as well have been loaves of bread to the hungry flock of metal raptors as one of the gunships swiftly descended into the radiation cloud from the dusk-colored sky. Thoughts of immediate self-preservation ran through his head and became a painkiller of sorts as the fatigued young researcher leaped to his feet. The metal vehicle settled on a patch of ground not punctured with fragments of offices and laboratories and only kicked up the dust further as its engines died down with a whine.    
The gangway doors flew open with a mighty swing that blasted the dust away. Like parasitic fleas, soldiers in the very same uniforms both men had encountered inside leap from the interior of the diseased bird. Their tinted visors glinted in the dying light of the day as the five men swung their weapons about the clearing leading from the wrecked delivery bay.

Doug could only watch in silence as the men swiftly surrounded both him and Henry. Not even the threat of death could get him in a state to outrun the speed of plasma bolts. Doug gave a low groan as one of the armored men walked up to him.

“Your identification beacon says you are Doctor Douglas Strickland. Is that you?” he inquired, his voice sounded like it was being forced through a radio. It wasn’t a question that could be avoided, not with two other men holding him within their aim the entire time. Doug shot a quick glance towards Henry, who was receiving the same treatment from two other MDF soldiers.

“Y-Yes. I am,” he squeaked, his fear-laced voice barely escaping his bone-dry throat. The soldier simply gave a quick nod to his two squadmates and turned away. Before Doug had a chance to react, he felt the heavy butt of the plasma rifle smash into his back and again into his skull. Stars exploded in front of his vision as the combined forces of exhaustion and the blows made his body fall like a rag doll.

Only one thought persisted in his mind as his body failed and the soldiers jeered: You made it out. I know you did. Good luck. Doug’s body then went limp and his head fell against the rocky ground.

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“This one ... This one ... This one ... ... ... Just might work ..."
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In a world far away from the chaos. Separated from the radiation, the violence, and the torture by a great web of dimensional energy. Within this world, a sudden blast of blue lightning enveloped a dying wheat field outside of a small village.
   
The ground shuddered as blue-colored electricity flashed through the dried stalks of swaying wheat. For an instant, dimensional singularity was reached and a harsh sonic boom echoed throughout the lands. A thud was heard as something soft impacted with the dried and cracked earth.

A pained groan in the darkness was heard as the soft thing weakly raised its head. He attempted to push up on his right arm slightly, but as soon as he contracted the muscles in said arm to move it, a sharp pain sparked from his chest to every single nerve ending in his body. Spots danced before his already blurry eyes as pure pain lanced across his entire being.

Unconsciousness threatened to overwhelm him. His vision tilted and twisted as memories and thoughts evacuated his traumatized mind. His childhood, his family, his friends, his home, all vanished in an instant, replaced by a desperate yearning to remember.

Flashes of light, someone calling out to him, fire, a ruined city, a destroyed world, a key to the barrier, and a phrase whispered from somewhere far away and long ago as his vision died and head slumped to the ground:

“He is no one, not anymore.”  
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End Chapter 0.5
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