Chapter 18:

Aftermatch and Camera Feed

Idolatry


The entrance to the main labs was sealed with its metal shuttles after the escape and the ground could now rest.

Although rest was said, only Amy had plopped herself on the floor when they left the labs while Zhelya and Richard hushed to treat the wounded guards.

Half of their numbers were unconscious and most were wounded, but the mission was a success still.

Even with the emergency treatment that was applied, though, some of the guards were still at risk of losing their lives.

“Is she going to be fine, buff guy?” Asked the idol that was currently unable to get up from her leaning position close to where Lily was.

“I’m not a doctor, but I don’t think Lilianna is at any risk now that I finished the first aid procedures. We have to hurry with the other ones though…”

Bandaging, with whatever they could, wasn't that hard, but it wasn't as if some pills and bandaging would be enough to save all of them.

Richard had removed most of his armor and had bandages covering a good chunk of his body too, by the way.

Lily also had most of her wounds covered and almost no armor, but in her case, it had been destroyed and not removed.

“Then move on. You should have fled when…” The idol said with an unusual coldness even if she got cut mid-sentence by Richard.

“Hey, you idol or whatever, what about explaining what happened back there first, eh? It's getting a little too dangerous for me to keep ignoring your weirdness by now... You could at least explain why an unrelated performer is so keen on protecting a cop while you’re at it.”

“She is my friend, so…” Amy answered with a hint of annoyance fleeing through the cracks of her smile.

“It's not an answer at all.”

Amy and Richard got locked in a staring contest with neither of them willing to break the deadlock until they were both called out by a mature voice.

“Could you two leave the lovingly stare for later, my dearies? That guy is reaching his limits already and I don't want someone attacking me in this closed space."

As Zhelya pointed out, one of the security officers was in a barely alive state that was only being kept by one of his companion's limited medical skills.

The other two weren't at risk of dying, even the one without legs, but their captain had received too much damage.

Seeing how obvious was their time limit, Richard didn't take much to cut the conversation while focusing on a way to move everyone.

“Right… Can you carry one of them, Zhelya?”

"If we remove the extra weight, I think I can."

"Good. We'll do so and continue this later, Ms. Singer."

“I would prefer not to if you will” Amy answered as she somewhat recovered strength in her body and got up.

Ignoring the quip remark from the idol, Richard ordered the remaining guard to move his worst wounded comrade and started to carry Lily and the remaining one.

Of course, no one mentioned why the suspicious idol wasn't asked to help.

Without time to delay, and with Zhelya carrying a legless mercenary, the group started their march to the 500th floor.

As it would be obvious due to their power armor though, Richard and his subordinate soon overcame the two females walking behind as they rushed up.

And with enough space to not be heard that easily between them, both Amy and Zhelya got side-by-side and started to talk.

“You seem tired, cute one. Pushing yourself too much is dangerous, you know?” The cat-eared scientist warned while looking at the fake calmness on the idol’s face.

“What are you talking about, cat lady? All I did was a little typing around, you see? Nothing tiresome or even dangerous...”

“I don’t think this tower’s security is weak enough to be cracked by a pub singer in fifteen minutes. I’m also sure that no one would send something big like whatever was cleaning the drones outside without a call, so I don’t buy your little tale.”

“All I did was open a small stream and call help from my fans, you see? They did all the work while all I had to do was force a connection, even if only in a limited way…”

As usual, Amy was using the lack of definitive proof to force her claims to pass through just with good-enough excuses.

It was, in the end, impossible to prove that she was lying, so creating a more complex lie was unnecessary.

In fact, Amy's lies were much more sensible than the idea that an idol could manage any of what she was accused of, so there was that too.

"What about this..." The scientist continued with a smile on her face. "I tell you something nice and you answer me how you knew about the ruin's technology. Is that good enough?"

Amy had shown a lot earlier to attract Zhelya's questions since she was a suspect at the time, but she never expected a direct approach like this one.

"Technology from the ruins? What are you talking about?" She feigned ignorance while looking around the bland rows of stairs.

"Your probing is so cute, you know?" Zhelya smiled even more. "I'm talking about the devices in the VR machines and how you fixed that destroyed machine, of course. One of them is a top-secret technology we managed to adapt and the other is one we're trying very hard to, so..."

"I see... I have, indeed, information about these, but you will not like them."

"That's beyond the point. All I want is to know more, no matter the cost."

It wasn't that hard to notice the glimpses of mania in the eyes of the cat lady, and Amy could sympathize with that.

"Understandable." She nodded still looking away. "What about telling me about these ruins in exchange then...?"

"Just this much?"

"Yes."

Zhelya was suspicious of the small price, in her eyes, of the information, but she was happy to accept this much.

"That's easy then!" The cat-woman exclaimed and then started to recount what she knew. "I'm not sure how it happened, but someone found this hole in the undercity that led to this massive cave. The walls were way too resistant to be broken by any common tool and the cave gave way to an abandoned facility..."

Until now, all she was being told wasn't anything new, and neither answered her question, but the information matched for sure.

"This facility was mostly broken down as if a big fight had happened there, but not everything. The president couldn't take everything and hide the place since we have some... Well, some nosy people that wouldn't react well to monopolies, so..."

"You hid it for as long as possible and took copies of most things, right? I can deduce this much, so skip it please."

"You're... Nah, it doesn't matter. In summary, we got a few devices and a lot of data, but we barely could make a few of them work and it was almost impossible to read that data. The whole thing was too old and too weird for some unknown reason..."

"This much is the expected..." The idol said in a soft voice that was hard to hear but soon changed her tone back to normal. "My turn then. You could maybe read that data, but most of it is about something that is not there anymore, you see? And even if you took what is about the technology itself, most of those devices work on rules that this world does not follow anymore..."

"What do you mean, cutie?"

"I do not mean much actually... By this point, I would not be surprised if those devices worked with magic, but I have no idea what I am talking about..."

There was a weird amount of confidence in the idol's cryptic words, which in turn rose the scientist's curiosity about the girl.

“I find it amusing how some people can use lies so skillfully that anyone would have a hard time staying suspicious of them... It is not a skill I have though.”

“I agree fully with that…”

Both females of greatly different heights exchanged smiles while saying so.

Their climb continued in silence after that since both had things to think about, but even this much was broken when a call from above came.

“Amy! Get up here. Fast.”

The idol with blue eyes sent a less than amused glare to the woman close to her and she answer with a confused one.

Amy had no time to mind it though and just started to skip through the steps until she reached the front of their caravan.

There, she closed on Richard and the still groggy, slightly limping and with a closed eye, but already awake Lily.

She was also wielding a different small weapon this time, probably one of the side arms of the guards, which was beyond the point either way.

“Lily! You should not...” Amy protested the moment she noticed how the wounded detective already trying to walk around, but she wasn't allowed to finish her phrase.

“Someone already told me that! I’m fine as is, so stop it.”

“But still…”

“You should give up too, girl... I tried to at least keep her leaning on, but you can see it didn’t work too.” Said an apologetic Richard and he tried to explain himself to the surprised pink girl.

“Pay attention to what’s important, you two.”

“What are you talking about?” Amy asked as she looked around where they had stopped.

All she could see was the still locked but unsealed door leading to the 500th floor above them, empty stairs around, and the sealed door 499th floor below the group though.

Her head was cutely cocked to the side due to the confusion and her eyes were squirming while changing colors just to be sure.

She could bet no details had passed through her, but Amy still couldn’t point out what her friend was trying to say.

It seemed that Richard had already realized what was the problem though, so she wasn't happy with it.

“We seem to have a problem in hand.” The big man commented, which only furthered Amy’s discomfort with the situation even if she was failing to find why.

“I still cannot say what you two…”

“Sigh… The guards, Amy. The guards that should be here, aren’t! And the door itself isn’t even locked down as we left it.”

“Oh, you are right… Wait! You are right?! What is happening here?”

Amy’s lack of focus and then sudden surprise weirded out the two less wounded members of the fighter team, but they just ignored it for now.

“Those guys wouldn’t leave for no reason, so they may have been called inside and we’re just worrying about ghosts.”

“I would love to trust in this, but after all that happened…”

“Should we consider that they were attacked just like we were down there?”

“Hmmm… Can you check the cameras, Amy?”

“I do not have sound, but the video is manageable.”

“It’s enough.”

“Accept my call then, please. It shall be streamed to you both.”

It wasn't as if they could make long-range calls, but Amy had dealt with the interference enough to share data between people close by.

The only abnormal detail was how the videos were being sent directly from the storage of the building, but none would notice it.

The recording wasn’t much.

In fact, it not being much was already a problem since a group of scientists should have passed through here, but it was beyond the point for now.

For now, both Lilianna and Richard were skipping through most of the recording as it was just two guards killing time.

At some point, the door was unlocked and one of them passed through it, returning less than five minutes later.

And then more empty time passed by.

They only left the fast-forward when the clock was just a few minutes away from their arrival, which was when the seal on the door opened by itself again.

The guards noticed the change without much problem and exchanged a few words between themselves.

Probably having decided what to do, they both shouted something to the door and, after a few seconds, entered the floor.

After they vanished inside though, they never returned.

“The corridor has no cameras, but I have the feed from the two working ones on the floor, they don't have much, but... Wait…! This is…? You better see this.”

The image changed from the empty emergency stairs to the inside of the security room.

At first, it was just some mundane recording with the two civilians who stood behind having a discussion.

Dr. Shia left the room with a displeased look and then, a while later, Mr. Herman snickered to himself and took some beverage from the machine on the wall.

This much kept on for what should be a good while until the lawyer decided he had enough and also left the room.

Nothing happened for a few minutes after that, but the middle-aged man suddenly returned after a while.

His white clothes were covered in blood and all he was doing was cower in the corner after locking the door though.

“What in the…?” A confused detective muttered while watching the scene that should still be happening right now.

She was stopped from asking anything more by the pink girl feeding them the scenes though.

“There is more, Lily. Wait a little more…”

Once more, the scene changed as the camera switched to the other working one on the floor.

This one was displaying Richard’s office.

It was a simpler and more packed room than the president's, but it was still a high-class office.

It even had an area for visitors, emergency supplies, and stands for a weapon and a power suit.

The most interesting detail was the deluxe VR machine set by the side of the main desk though.

Just like the other ones, this recording also started with an empty room and continued as such for a few minutes.

After a while, almost matching the time Dr. Shia left the security room, one of the guards entered and left a frail gown-wearing man on the device.

A little while after the guard had left, Dr. Shia herself entered the room with several pieces of equipment that she left by the side of the VR device.

She started to connect them to the young man and, after injecting something into his, left the room again.

Nothing of much happened for a while until the unconscious man suddenly got up and started to look around.

As if possessed by something, he walked to the bookshelves of the room and fiddled around them for a few seconds.

As if answering his fiddling, one of the pieces of furniture moved away and a hidden vault appeared on the wall of Richard’s office.

The young man went inside said vault and, after some searching, took what seemed to be an old-fashioned revolver.

He checked the gun and turned around without even closing the vault, leaving through the door soon after.

“That son of a…!”

“You should not say that about your brother, Lily.” Said Amy before Lilianna could curse her mother.

“Shut up, you!”

“Sorry to interrupt, but we should head in then. From what we could take here, the guards aren’t here because we have a hostage situation inside…”

Possibly due to experience, Richard was very calm and understood the situation without much problem.

He seemed a little frantic beneath his calm thinking, but it was most likely because he could easily have lost three of his five VIPs.

“Yes, it should be so, but damn…” Lily was quite calm too, but she was having a hard time making sense of the situation.

“Is someone who just left a VR tank capable of taking hostages?” Amy, on the other side, didn't seem to care much at all and was simply confused.

“Makes more sense than having him take down the two guards, so we’ll go with it for now.”

“It’s good by me.”

“I still…”

The logic seemed right and Richard had already accepted the plan, but the idol was feeling weird still.

Either way, Richard gave some orders to his subordinate and scientist closing into them by now, all of them leaving their luggage by the side for now.

After doing so, he returned to Lilianna, who was already formulating a plan with a hostage situation in mind.

“We enter quietly to avoid causing trouble and find the other guards first. If all goes well, we can negotiate and avoid a direct conflict..." Her plan was very simple, but it wasn't as if they could do much more than trust the only member of the group trained to deal with this kind of thing. "Amy. You’re staying here with our cat scientist though.”

"No, I am not." Refused the idol with some stone determination.

"Amy!"

“I shall follow you both. My idol senses are telling me something is wrong.”

As she was saying so, the pink girl went to one of the wounded men and stole his sidearm, moving around as if she had any idea of how to use it.

“’Idol sense' is some new word to ‘it makes no sense, but I can’t explain batter’?”

Amy couldn’t answer right away as she was questioned, and there were already moving soldiers when she managed to gather a decent answer, so she was forced to step back and let them sneak inside the room.

“Just let her come, Lilianna. We don't have the time...”

"Fine..."

“Good. Follow me, ok?”

With a silent confirmation, Richard moved towards the door and started to pull it open.

As he was slowly moving forward to avoid making any noise though, it didn't even take him much to notice that they had no hostage situation here.

All there was in front of the chief security officer was a murder scene.

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