Escape

“Where do we go from here?” I asked, looking around the dimly lit office. The four of us stood silently as my father worked at his desk.
“Underground,” my dad replied with a smirk, his fingers already flying across the keyboard of his computer.
Before I could question him further, the lights flickered off, plunging the room into complete darkness. The ground beneath us rumbled, and the air filled with a deep mechanical hum.
“What is going on?” Gaku asked, his voice tense.
“Don’t worry about it,” my dad said casually, not even glancing up from his computer.
The shaking continued for five long minutes, and then, just as suddenly as it started, everything went still. The lights flickered back on, revealing the room looking the same as before—but somehow different.
“Huh… What just happened?” Gaku asked, glancing around warily.
“Ooh, I know!” Nagumo chimed in, his face lighting up. “I read about this online. One of the city’s escape routes is hidden in this office. The entire room is a lift that descends deep underground.”
“Why do I not know about this?” I asked, glaring at my father.
“You should pay more attention to what I do,” he said, chuckling.
I sighed. “Alright, you two geniuses,” I said, crossing my arms. “What’s next?”
“Through the door,” my dad began, his tone suddenly playful. “Then all the way down the long hallway, take the door on the right, keep going straight, do a 360, run back, turn right, jump up, make a 90-degree turn to the left, punch the air, then turn 90 degrees to the right—”
“Are you making this up?” I interrupted, raising an eyebrow.
“Well… yes,” he admitted, grinning sheepishly.
“Now is not the time for jokes!”
“Sorry,” he said with a shrug. “I just forgot the way, hehe.”
I facepalmed. “Nagumo!”
“Huh? Yes?” Nagumo said, snapping to attention.
“You probably know the way, right?”
“Of course,” he said, sounding confused. “Why are you asking?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” I said, glaring at him. “Maybe to lead the goddamn way!”
“Haha, okay, okay, I got it,” Nagumo said, holding up his hands in mock surrender. “Follow me.”
With that, we started moving, heading toward whatever lay deep beneath the surface.
Leaving my father’s office, we stepped into a long, sterile white hallway. The fluorescent lights buzzed faintly overhead, and our footsteps echoed as we walked in silence. It felt like the walls themselves were holding their breath, watching us.
Finally, Gaku broke the silence.
“Hey, Rui…” he said softly, his voice barely above a whisper.
“Yeah? What’s up?” I asked, glancing at him.
“Is anyone sane here?” Nagumo interjected, his tone deadpan.
“Haha!” I laughed dryly. “Absolutely not.”
“Really?” Nagumo asked, raising an eyebrow.
I shrugged. “Let’s see—my dad here isn’t a genius, but somehow owns the biggest company in the city. My best friend over there spends way too much time on the internet. And the sanest person I thought I knew? Turned out to be a robot. Oh, and let’s not forget, my real mom from this timeline didn’t even know who I was. So, yeah, she’s probably crazy too.”
“I’m… sorry,” Gaku said, frowning slightly.
I shook my head. “By the way, Gaku, on the phone you always sounded so confident and serious. But now you look scared. Are you okay?”
“It’s just…” he hesitated, his voice dropping. “The fact that the AI could attack us at any moment—it’s terrifying.”
Before I could respond, Nagumo suddenly stopped walking ahead of us. His back was to us, his robotic hand clenched tightly into a fist.
“Why did you trust me?” he said, his voice colder than I’d ever heard it.
“What?” I asked, confused.
“With the whole war going on,” Nagumo continued, “and the AI able to infiltrate anything, anytime they want, why would you trust me? For all you know, I could be one of them. I could be an AI just waiting for the perfect moment to kill you all. And now, you’ve all walked right into my tra—”
Before he could finish, I moved. My chipped sword was out of its sheath and at his neck in seconds.
“Why the hell do you have a chipped sword?!” Nagumo screeched, his voice cracking in fear.
“If you’re an enemy,” I said coldly, pressing the blade closer, “I’ll kill you right here, right now.”
“It was a joke!” he yelped. “Please, put the blade away!”
I didn’t move. “Now, continue leading the way,” I said, my voice low and steady, “before I stab you a thousand times.”
“O-Okay, okay!” Nagumo stammered, turning and walking ahead once more.
I turned to Gaku, my blade still in hand, and gave him a knowing look. “See? Nobody here is sane.”
Gaku let out a small, nervous laugh. “Layla should’ve come instead of me…”

***

After what felt like an eternity of walking, we arrived at a massive steel door. My father confidently stepped forward, his grin wide.
“Alright, it’s time for me to take over again!” he declared, puffing out his chest.
He raised his hand theatrically and shouted, “System! Under the name of the Ohashi family, activate lab!”
A moment later, a robotic female voice responded, smooth and emotionless: “Welcome, master.”
The lights flickered on, and the space before us was revealed—a sprawling, high-tech laboratory that stretched farther than my eyes could see. Machines hummed quietly, and glowing monitors lit up with streams of data.
“Wooooow!” Gaku and Nagumo said at the same time, their jaws practically hitting the floor.
“This is exactly like the videos,” Nagumo added, his robotic hand twitching slightly in excitement.
“Wait, there are videos of this?” my father and I said in sync, both of us utterly baffled.
“There’s no time to think about that now,” I said, shaking my head to focus. “Dad, how do we get out of the city?”
Instead of answering, my father suddenly bolted across the lab, weaving between massive machines like an excited kid in a candy store.
“Oi! Hold on!” I yelled, chasing after him with Gaku and Nagumo close behind.
My father skidded to a halt in front of something large and mysterious, covered by a thick cloth. Turning to us with a gleam in his eye, he grabbed the edge of the cloth and yanked it off with dramatic flair.
“We’re going to ride this work of art!” he announced triumphantly.
The sight left all of us speechless.
“Is that… the Hoshino Spaceship 2000?” Nagumo shouted, his voice nearly cracking with excitement.
Gaku froze in place, his mouth hanging open as if his brain had short-circuited.
“Awesome, right?” my father said, clearly proud of himself.
“Oi, Gaku, you alive?” I asked, waving a hand in front of his face.
“T-T-That…” Gaku stammered, finally finding his voice. “That’s Layla’s spaceship!”
“Huh?” Nagumo blinked in confusion. “Wait, what do you mean it’s hers?”
Gaku turned to Nagumo, suddenly fired up. “Do you even know who I am? I’m Hoshino Gaku, physicist and future husband of Shirogane Layla, the rocket scientist who designed this ship!”
“HUH!?” my father and Nagumo shouted in sync, their eyes nearly popping out of their heads.
I groaned, pinching the bridge of my nose. “We really don’t have time for this. Can we just get in the damn ship, leave the city, and start looking for the Russian civilization?”
“But isn’t this thing, like, a thousand years old?” Gaku asked, clearly still in awe.
“You’re damn right it is,” my father said, patting the side of the spaceship affectionately. “But I come here pretty often to make sure it stays in perfect condition. It’s still fully functional and ridable.”
Gaku sighed and nodded. “Well, if you say so, we should get going.”
Without wasting another second, the four of us climbed into the spaceship, settling into the surprisingly sleek and modern interior. My father began prepping for takeoff, his hands moving with practiced ease across the control panel.
“Strap in,” my father said with a grin that was equal parts excitement and insanity. “This is going to be one hell of a ride. System! Shut down the lab and get the road ready!”
The lab lights dimmed one by one, casting us into brief darkness before the front wall of the lab began to open. A set of sleek, glowing tracks emerged from the floor, lighting up in sequence like a runway, leading into a long, pitch-black tunnel. The spaceship began to hum, a low vibration that resonated through the floor and into my chest. Slowly, it started to move forward, its massive engines warming up.
We were picking up speed, fast.
“Y’all ready?” my father asked, glancing back at us with a wide grin.
“No…” Gaku muttered, gripping the armrest of his seat like his life depended on it.
“Yes!” Nagumo shouted, practically bouncing in his seat with excitement.
“Yes,” I said, my voice steady but my pulse racing.
“Then let’s get going!” my father roared.
Suddenly, a deafening explosion echoed around us. My heart jumped, but it wasn’t the sound of an attack or a malfunction. I realized what was happening.
When something accelerates faster than 343 m/s—the speed of sound—it creates a sonic boom. And with a ship this size, the repeated explosions we were hearing were caused by our continuous breaking of the sound barrier.
The pressure slammed us back into our seats as the ship surged forward, the g-forces pulling at my body like invisible hands. The walls of the tunnel blurred into streaks of light as we hurtled through the underground track at a mind-bending speed.
And then, in an instant, we shot out of the tunnel and into the ocean.
The water barely had time to resist us. At our velocity, it was like slicing through air. The ship carved through the sea without slowing down for a moment, the roaring engines forcing the water to part around us.
Then we broke free from the ocean, launching into the sky like a bullet.
I pressed my face against the window, my breath catching as I saw it—the massive dome that housed our city. It was still visible in the distance… but only for a moment.
An enormous blast rippled through the dome. It crumbled like glass, massive pieces falling into the ocean below. Swarms of AI robots poured into the remains, their metallic bodies glinting in the sunlight as they claimed what was left of the city.
My stomach churned. That was our home.
“Dammit,” I muttered under my breath, my fists clenching.
The ship continued to climb higher, leaving the destruction far behind. But the image of the collapsing dome burned in my mind.

To be continued…