We Aren't Alone

Yuri managed to pick a safe enough path to the power plant, leading us right up to a layer of very thick fencing. Contrary to the durable metal, a small portion of it had already been cut away, allowing us to slip right through. If I had to guess, we weren’t the first people to try and enter this place.

Once we were in, we cautiously inspected the perimeter for any potential danger, as well as got a lay of the land. The biggest threats were simple drone bots patrolling around. They didn’t know we were here, but it was clear the explosion had put them on high alert. Getting around them wouldn’t be easy.

“I can knock out the drone control tower and turn em’ off for a bit,” I suggested, wanting as little resistance as possible while we were on this rescue mission.

“It’s on the other side of the plant,” Yuri commented. “We could go there, but I fear the longer we delay the rescue…”

His brother had been in that chemical accident a long time, so this was already a fifty fifty shot. But the sooner we helped him, the more his chances of survival increased.

That wasn’t taking into account trying to drag any survivors out of here with bots watching every corner. We had to do something about them too. That control tower was a priority too.

“You want to split up?” I suggested. “I can take the control tower down, then meet up with you to help rescue your brother.”

He wasn’t happy about that, but it was our best shot. Just so we could keep in touch on our separate objectives, he handed me a walkie talkie and I stuck it to my backpack strap.

“Stay strong. Contact me if anything goes wrong,” he said as we split up.

It was a simple job sneaking around the outside of the plant and locating the control tower. The Feds didn’t make much effort to hide its smooth, curved aesthetic. If that wasn’t enough to make it obvious, large antennas were strobing blue and red every few seconds, sticking out like candles on a cake.

Since it was the most important structure for the bots to stay operational, they had a high concentration of drones protecting it. I was lucky there weren’t any juggernauts. If I popped any of those bots, they’d find me in a second. I had the upper hand, and needed to exploit that properly.

The best option was to distract them, then sneak into the tower.

I pulled out three little mouse contraptions called Yu-Yu pets from my backpack. Alongside sick battle armor made from tin cans, small brick cellular phones had been crudely taped to their backs. I turned on each of the cell phones and a countdown began to tick down on the screens.

“Alright, Moukia, Moumsung, Moutarola, keep them off my back.”

“Squeak!” went the little toy mice in response to my voice.

I placed down the three of them and watched them race away. Once the timers hit zero, the phones let out an ear piercing screech. The sound hit a very specific frequency that pulled in the attention of all the bots.

The bots surrounding the tower chased the toy mice around, trying to catch them. That gave me a chance to run up to the control tower door and start working through the security lock on it.

I had a bot eye in my backpack. With a little power from a battery, the red eye turned on. I held the eye up to the door's retinal scanner. As I hoped, scanning the bot eye allowed me passage into the tower.

The interior was cramped, almost impossible to squeeze through for the average person. Did they expect a midget to fit through here? Fortunately, leaving my backpack outside allowed me to squeeze in and get all the way up to the tower's control terminal. That room was a little more spacious, something like one of those airport traffic tower things. It was ridiculously hot though, so I was getting cooked.

I wasn’t an extremely tech savvy person. I had enough knowledge to get by, but computers were a bit rare to find back home, much less working ones in the outside world. Hacking into these advanced systems was a lot easier thanks to my phone app, but easier didn't mean simple.

“Alright… Wait, why is someone already logged in?”

I was fully expecting to have to hack into the system, but it appeared that someone was already logged in. It would have had to have been really recently too, otherwise the session would have timed out.

That made for a great opportunity to turn things in our favor, at least temporarily, but the fact that another person had been here and logged in just minutes prior to me made me really uncomfortable.

“Yuri…” I pressed the button on my walkie talkie, getting in touch with him. “You hear me?”

“I do. Have you disabled the drone control tower?” he asked.

“In a second… I wanted to let you know that we might not be alone here. Someone was logged into the terminal just before I got here. Watch your back.”

We had no idea who this was or if they were hostile to us, but the fact that they had a login at all meant they must have been associated with the Feds. I didn’t dismiss the idea that this could have been a scientist who happened to escape, but it was always better to be safe than sorry.

Plus, if some egghead was leaving his friends behind, clearly that person wasn't very trustworthy.

Regardless, I had control thanks to that person, so I temporarily made the bots go into idling mode. In case whoever was here would get suspicious of all the bots suddenly dropping like flies, I just made them stay still and steady, unwilling to attack anyone even if provoked. That way we could just pass by them without any trouble, and the Fed boy wouldn’t see anything strange around him.

Finally I left that boiling hot tin can and ran back into the facility. Seconds before I was through a side door, I heard some squeak coming up behind me.

“Squeak!”

Moukia, Mousung and Moutarola were returning to me. For a kids toy, they were made seriously well.

“Badass, little dudes,” I flashed a horns sign, then picked them up and carefully put them back in my bag.

“Squeak squeak!”

***

I met back up with Yuri in the science wing of the power plant. He had a frustrated look on his face and was glaring at a sliding glass door. Beyond it was another pair of doors, but those looked more rigid and metal.

“We have a problem,” he said as I approached. “The scientists are trapped in the next room, but it’s filled with argon gas.”

Aside from the obvious toxic sounding nature of breathing in a gas called argon, I wondered if that was what blew up in the first place.

“Do you think that’s what caused the explosion?” I asked.

“No,” Yuri shook his head. “The argon is preventing the room from starting on fire, so it's the complete opposite. The issue is that we can’t breathe it.” He opened up a metal locker next to him. “There aren’t any hazmat suits here, so I think the people inside are using them. That means there’s a chance they’re alive, but we can’t go in to find out.”

I suggested using my gas mask, but Yuri said it wouldn’t help here. I needed a respirator. Unfortunately, the only one left here happened to have about a mere three minutes of air left in it.

“Doesn't look like we have much of a choice,” I gathered up the respirator and any other items that might have been useful protection.

“No!” he held my shoulder. “You can’t go in there. There isn’t enough air left in the tank to get anything meaningful done.”

The more he discouraged the idea, the more I wanted to do it. I didn’t come all this way just to be told some dumb gas was going to keep me from getting what I want.

“Don’t tell me what to do.” I put on the respirator along with some goggles. Then I wrapped up any exposed skin in a thin layer of plastic wrapping I kept in my bag. “I’m going in there. So just keep me updated on things, understand?”

By the mix of expressions he was making, mainly anger and concern, I could tell he knew I was the best chance to save his brother. He could have pulled a heroic stunt on his own, but I was much more seasoned to dealing with harsh environments.

“Are you sure about this?” he asked. “Remember, you’ll only have 3 minutes to get in and out. I can’t promise that will be enough time to do this.”

“It’ll have to be.” I said, locking the respirator in place and stepping up to the door. “By the way, if you lock the door behind me, don’t think my dead ass won’t haunt you from the grave.”

His face cringed with a disapproving frown. “I won’t try to kill you. Please, be careful, and good luck.”

I was going to need all the luck I could get to be in and out in three minutes. Why the hell was I doing this again? These guys better be hard workers, because this was nuts.