Project 863: The fifth Subject

Chapter 16: Smoke Screened

~Pearson's POV. March 15th, 2021~

Matt had uploaded the video saying that we're taking a break, he sat in the theater chair as I walked by.

"Hey, what's up?" I asked as I leaned against the doorframe, he looked up from his phone and smiled.

"Oh, just enjoying the little break from our hectic schedule called Project 863." He chuckled, "Hi!" Sam suddenly said from behind me

"Hey, we just uploaded the video saying that we're taking a break, how does that make you feel?" Matt asked, "Excited... a little nervous, but excited." Sam said.

"Yeah, I'm definitely nervous. I've never not uploaded for a long period of time, but I'm not sure how everyone's going to take it." Matt nodded.

Suddenly the room went pitch black, "Did you bump the light switch?" Matt asked.

I turned around, the power was out in the whole base, "No, it looks like everything went out." I stated.

"My chair's dead, I'm stuck." Matt said, I walked over and extended my hand. Once he grabbed my hand, I pulled him out of the chair.

We made our way out to the common area where Woods and Bailey were, "Can we make sure editors are on battery backups?" Matt requested, "I'm pretty sure all of our editors have been backed up." Sam stated as Bailey stood from her desk and went towards the breakroom.

"So umm... What was the last thing we did when we had a power outage?" Matt asked, "You guys had a Nerf battle, I remember watching that video." I responded.

"We absolutely had a Nerf battle." Matt smiled and nodded, "We also went home." Woods said.

"Umm... what if the power comes back on soon-ish though then we can get back to work?" Matt stated.

"What's that smell?" Sam questioned, "Do you guys smell that?" Matt asked.

Glancing around the base, I didn't see anything. That was until I looked up at the air vents. "Guy's, there is smoke coming out of the air vent." I pointed out.

"That's smoke! Okay um... if there's smoke coming out of the vents, we need to get out." Matt said.

"Woods, you go upstairs and get everyone out while Matt and I get everyone out down here, we'll grab some gas masks and we'll open both doors then we meet outside front." I told them, "Got it!" Woods nodded, then we ran our separate directions.

The smoke had worsened just from me talking out the plan, I turned on the flashlight from my phone and passed it to Matt as we maneuvered through the smoke.

Suddenly Shenelle appeared in front of me, so I grabbed her hand and guided her through the desks.

"Do you see the lights?" I asked, she nodded and made her way to the front of the base.

"It doesn't smell like normal smoke." Sam stated as Matt guided Mike outside.

"Kevin?" I called out as I walked towards the breakroom, "Yeah, right here." Kevin said as walked towards me.

"Just gather with everyone out front and call the cops." Sam told Kevin as he walked outside.

"Is there anyone else here?" Matt called out into the smoke, Bailey appeared from the smoke so I guided her out.

I opened the door to the warehouse to grab some gas masks, I passed one to Sam and Matt before securing on my own.

Matt made his way to the back door and opened it to let the smoke out, "I can't see in front of me!" Matt stated as he held one hand out to make sure he didn't bump into anything.