A Crumbling Society

Part 3-18

My senses haven't gone off yet, which is a good sign, but the sinister atmosphere makes it a bad one. Walking with my ear in the lead, listening for any sign of the Omega Legion, but there was silence. It was disgustingly cold down here; I couldn't see much but knew that my breath was wisping back in my face. Out of precaution my hands stayed ready to cast if necessary. The green floor marquee ended, and the room felt larger, placing my hands together I got started on a light source. Feeling the matter pull itself together like a magnet it produced atoms. Then they created energy emitting light, it was so bright the entire room was visible. Taking my hands apart allowed the light to move about and take place above me. It looked like there were small suns around the ceiling but no heat. The small orbs from the other room were flowing around as well. A central command desk was in the center of the room but looked like it wasn't operational. Several hallways led out to other areas, the part about the hidden wing was true then. Something better than that fake expired hospital waiting area, if I can just get this thing on, I could see more. Standing right in front of the computer I imagined enough power to bring it to life. With that single thought it sang back to life with a small grunt. Fans were turning for the cooling systems and after a minute there was beeping. White lines crossed the screen before shaping themselves into an octagon, it sat here a little bit longer. Once it was completely on the actual lights in the room cut on, snapping on and moving down the hallways. Power was being restored and the computer said "welcome back" in the center of the screen. I cut out the lights I made, and they disappeared with a pulse. With the power active it might be possible to figure out where Obliterator was and if he's moving around or not too. The welcome message still remained in display, and I couldn't click off of it. It had been five minutes, and nothing was happening. Five more minutes and it felt like the whole system was frozen, of course things got inconvenient. While I was still trying to understand why it wouldn't do anything I heard a small noise. Feint knocking, or kicking, enough to hear but just barely.

Leaving the control desk, I turned down the hallway to my right. The same design with the green lights extended to the end with more in an adjacent path. I'm still cold but not as bad as it was earlier, the power must have also restored heat. Reaching the end of this hallway my head took turns seeing left and right. The right side was a dead end, the left continued further. The knocking was coming from the left, so I chose that direction. Entering the hallway, you could see each turn was angled specifically, when I got to the next there was the same turn. Extending down about two hundred feet each the hallways seemed to go on forever. I put together that the octagon on the screen was the shape of this entire enclosure. The knocking grew louder and when I got to the end of this current stretch, I could see them. Standing in front of a green light at the end of the hall was the Omega Legion. "Hey!", I called out to them, there was excitement that made me move quicker. "Don't touch that door!", they turned to see me and started waving me over, "you guys are alive", I said as I caught up. "What do you mean?", asked Phaser giving me a look over the knocking. "Oh right, you weren't in the hall with the others when I stayed", I started. "Queen Eclipse told me that Obliterator is down here, and that this was basically a trap. I'd say if there's a noise coming from here it has to be him, don't even touch it. The slightest response to the knocking could tell him we're down here". He and the others formed the same looks of "huh", and they each backed away. "That was close", Fire-Soul said in a "we almost all just died" voice. It was a good thing they didn't, and it allows us to escape. "Are you okay though", she asked afterwards and a few of them looked back to check my reaction. "Uh, yeah I'm okay, thanks for asking", I told her, I'm always weird about talking about things like that. This was also when I noticed Vortex and Stargazer were holding hands, my staring got them to catch on. "We weren't able to use our powers down here", Vortex let out, and Stargazer nodded with the others. "I can fix that", I told them and felt for what was causing the problem. Something about the air, and something else about the computer being operational was coming to me. My hand hovered barely in front of them, and I was able to make the connection. Stopping the dampening from the mainframe allowed them to use their powers again, "that should fix things". They got a bit cheerful but then looked back at me as if I was supposed to pick back up where we left off. Standing there I said nothing as I felt awkward. Personal things make me feel weird, even talking to Liza was hard and I won't get that chance again. "I think we should head back", I changed the topic quickly and began walking, they all followed. When we returned to the central room I was talking about the computer and went to show them what was displayed. Since I got it on, I figured I'd share, only this time it had a different message on it than when I left it. "Would you like to activate the cells, yes or no", was sitting where the old one had been.