Keep on Keeping On

“Life is very short and anxious for those who forget the past, neglect the present, and fear the future”.

– Seneca

The route we are taking now is far less straight than the original one. It feels like moving in a labyrinth of wide and narrow hallways, large and small rooms. We've even passed through a couple of bathrooms which led to more hallways. After 5 minutes moving through this route the aesthetic turned back to be the efficient brutalism of the rest of the central building. The repeating gray walls of practicality and efficiency makes each area and hallway harder to differentiate from one another.

Since the incident we've been jogging for more than 20 minutes. “Seriously, just how big is this thing” I exclaimed out loud without wanting to with a tired voice. Marina lets out a shuckle and, although I can’t see his face, I have the feeling Captain Liu also laughed. At least that relaxed the mood. We've been in silence since we saw that thing and it was starting to physically tire me.

A little after I made a fool of myself, we heard noise coming from the speakers on the walls. Initially it was impossible to understand but then, it started to sound like several voices were being mixed. I’m not sure who it was, but someone in front of me said “what the hell now”, and I couldn’t agree more. I ask Captain Liu “is it possible this is a message from someone in danger?”. While never stopping he remained silent for a while then replied with “That would be very unlikely. Normally one can send messages like that only from the security room we started from. Besides that only automated messages are played through there and none of them sound like this”. I could swear I can physically feel the stress and fatigue from everyone. All of us are so tired in every sense of the word that even small irregularities set us on edge.

The more I heard it the more I was starting to understand, and not only me I could see how Marcellus started looking up at the speakers with a worried face. First, I realized the noise was caused by different voices overlapping one another, then little by little I started getting some of the things that were being said. One of the sound sources sounded like a choir of deep voices chanting in a language I don’t understand. Another one sounded like a recording of an Italian man talking nonsense in english. The few things I could understand were “.. the egg has been broken my Lord…”, “...we’ll be able to kill the demi…” and “lies, lies everywhere in the house of …”. The last sound source was an older man talking in Spanish which I could only identify due to my partner speaking it. God I wish I had done as she said and learned her language.

After 7 minutes the noise stopped completely. What on earth is going on in the compound, first a quake in a part of the world where there shouldn’t be any, then all the electronics malfunctioning and now there are the events I can only explain as hallucinations. I can’t help but think that the explanation for what is happening is far more straightforward than whatever crazy conspiracy I’m creating in my head. Also, I feel there is another piece to this puzzle I’m forgetting as I’m too focused on the bad things that have happened to us, making me miss an important detail.

Just as I’m starting to feel like I’m trapped in an infinite labyrinth, Captain Liu tells us “we should be near the final stretch, hang on a little more”. Even though at this point everything looks the same to me, just him saying that lifts a lot of the stress I had in my mind, making me believe we have actually made progress. Sadly, my body is another story entirely with my endurance at its limits, including my leg. It is constantly aching and although I can tolerate it, from experience I know that soon enough it will force me to move nothing faster than a light walk.

As Marcellus opens a red metallic door Captain Liu says with a celebratory voice “We have arrived!”. Although we are all happy we can stop jogging, we don’t look half as happy as him. Personally I would love to, but I’m more worried about recovering my breath to avoid passing out. Then I notice that, under my heavy breathing, I can hear a beeping similar to when we entered the freezer room. The length and sound of the beeps is different but it feels like it is coming from inside my head. I ask in a loud-ish voice, or at least as loud as I can be at the moment “does everyone hear the beeping sounds”. All the people in front of me nod in agreement with a few soft “yes” floating in the air. Captain Liu was the only one to then add more to his answer “That's probably because we have entered the final room before the drone control room”.

As I’m trying to breathe Marina says “Captain, what's the plan? Is there some secret door or elevator in here? Because I don’t see any way forward”. As a rare occurrence Captain Liu produces a brief smirk on his face and replies “Miss Marina, you are standing on it”. She raises an eyebrow, spreads her feet somewhat and looks down. Below her there is a 2 by 2 metallic trapdoor with a large hole for what I assume is a key. For the first time in a while I see her eyes shining with the excitement and happiness that is so usual to her. She has always enjoyed surprises and stories of secret bases and missions. I guess finding a stereotypical trap door hidden at the end of nowhere with an old style physical lock and key feels too much like her fantasies to ignore. She steps out of the door and says, trying to control her enthusiasm “What are you waiting for Captain? Let's open it!”. She wasn’t very successful at hiding it.

With the trapdoor now open, we see a spiraling staircase going downwards, illuminated only by faint fluorescent orange lights. Just as we are about to enter, Marcellus, who is still the first on the line, says “hey everyone, truth be told I think I heard the voice of a friend of mine and the noise we heard coming from the speakers a while ago. After we are done with this I’m going to go and search for him. He is a Valentinian priest so he should be inside the main Valentinian temple. I’m sorry I won’t be able to stay with you any longer but I can’t ignore my friend after hearing him”. I tried to think of something to say to make him stay with us; I don’t want my team to disband in a situation like this nor do I want to lose the one other person who can use a gun. Even if we stop the drones there still are far too many unknowns to deal with and the more hands we have the better. Marina opened her mouth and said “if that’s the case, then go and find him later but for now keep your mind in the present. We need you focused on what is going on right now, we can worry about the future later”. He smiles and proceeds to enter the staircase under the trapdoor. I don’t know if that was the correct answer but for now we are kept as a cohesive group, which given the situation is all that matters.

Only one person at a time could fit on a step so we sent Marcellus first, followed by Captain Liu, then Marina and the two other engineers. I’m placed at the very back as a defense in case something enters behind us. The descent is longer than I expected, taking us around 5 minutes of going down to reach the bottom. All that time everyone stayed silent with the tension growing more and more each second we got closer to our objective.

Without any fuss or fanfare we arrive at the drone control room. Looking around I notice just how big it is, putting to shame any other room I have seen in this place yet. I would actually wager it is wrong to call it a room but rather a sector, as there are smaller rooms to the sides with their own entrances. Behind us is the main entrance to the sector, which thank god is closed at the moment. In front of us is a wide descending staircase leading to a huge circular open area. To our right and left are a set of ascending staircases to the small rooms on the sides. It seems those rooms lead to other ones as well, based on what I can see through their large windows. All the windows have a direct look at the central circular area, the walls and floor are clean white. The space in general gives a sterile vibe.

The Captain interrupts my thoughts and says “The control console is in the last room to the left. We are almost there but keep your eyes open in case there are any straggler drones or any drone whatsoever”. I can only think to myself “Let's end this nightmare”.