Project Demi-God

Chapter 7: The Lost

Zinc woke with a start, everything was shaking, the bed, the room, the planet, everything was shaking as if being thrown around, alarms started blaring, cracks shot through the facility reverberating throughout the halls and the door to his room opened. He didn't know what to do, what should he do? What if it was just an earthquake? If he left the room and attempted an escape the staff would destroy him, but S would fix him if that happened, he always did, he promised to always keep them safe and even said that soon they'd be free, maybe S caused the quake? Maybe he was destroying the facility? No matter, this was a once in a lifetime chance, he had to get out.

Zinc sprinted from his room and started running down it, escaping was pointless if he abandoned his sister. He ran and ran seemingly endlessly, but it was just the panic, it was his mind playing tricks on him, he reached her room, the door was loose and he ripped it open, hiding in the corner was Melody, she jumped and ran at him upon his entrance, he held her close, she was safe.

He lifted her into his arms and ran, they had to get out, for all they knew the facility would soon fall on top of them, they couldn't let that happen. As he ran he passed more drones, workers and subjects both, they all knew what to do, they all knew to run, but why could they run? The humans were very much in danger but they weren't dead yet, Asimov's hadn't affected them, why? He didn't have time to think about it long as they reached the stairs and began to run up them. The elevator was dangerous, with the building unstable it could fall or even stop working half way up, the stairs were most reliable.

Cracks spread through the stairs as they neared the top, but the stairs held steadfast, they were built of the same stuff as the facility yet held stronger than the walls, maybe because of the more compact size? They reached the top and humans ran around in a panic, they didn't know what was going on and couldn't figure out what it was, they ran out the doors and down the stairs, some even trying to use the elevator to get somewhere safe in the facility, the drones from down below ran out the doors, everyone ignored them as they ran, too focused on saving themselves to notice the escapees, they reached a good distance from the facility before the shaking stopped, every drone and human froze, stuck in place, the catastrophe was over, wasn't it? Would they soon be recaptured and taken back to the labs, destroyed and beaten to death for their attempted escape?

But then an explosion rang out, everything was knocked over, and a shockwave ripped through the planet, humans burned up and turned to ash, drones went offline, not dead but unconscious, and then it hit him, and he fell into the dirt to sleep until his time came to walk once more.

Uzi's findings in the lab had been less than impressive, she didn't find anything about what caused the core collapse nor anything about the 'test subjects' that were there once, she was about ready to give up until she had an outlandish thought (she really needed to stop staring at her conspiracy ceiling all day) What if she asked her dad? Sure he wasn't the best dad and she hated talking to him, but he was there when the core collapse happened, surely he'd know something and maybe he'd even have info on the drone that she learned about there.

She left her room, adjusting the the lighting outside of it and searched the place for her dad, if he wasn't here then he was likely at the entrance to the colony which would be troublesome but luckily (was it lucky?) he was in the main room staring off into nothing, lost in thought, until Uzi spoke.

"Dad, I need to ask you something."

Her dad, now broken from his thoughts, looked at Uzi.

"Why of course! You can ask me anything! And if it's about doors then buckle up cause I've got hours worth of knowledge on em!"