Super City

8 - Area 6

Hover's V-Pager rang and she pulled it up. It was breakfast time.

"Aha! Finally got it!" She rejoiced.

"Got what?" Rocky and Battery asked at the same time.

"Invensor's message!" She said. "I asked my brother to tell him to send me some intel on area 6. I finally got his message!"

"What's his intel so important for?" Rocky asked.

"He used to study here a long time ago." Answered Mech, casually. "He's an important guy. Sort of."

"Oh, so you decided to show up!" Battery said, surprised.

Mech was in the desk beside them, playing a game. His V-pager was creating a 3d image of a board and many pieces for him. Rocky, of course, asked what game was that.

"3D Chess. It's pretty fun."

"Sounds pretty boring" Battery said.

"Better than Barty's analytic geometry class." Mech replied.

"Touche." Battery agreed.

"Talking about Barty, did any of you guys do his homework?" Said Rocky. "I've got a few questions about it..."

Battery rolled his eyes.

"You always do." He said.

"We can answer those later." Hover interrupted. "Now I can't wait to hear what's in that message Invensor just sent us."

She was about to play the video, but the bell rang.

"What subject do we have now?" Rocky asked.

"Basic programming, upstairs." Hover said, annoyed by the timing of the bell. "Invensor's message will have to wait, then."

"Let's go," Mech said. "I wanna share with you guys one thing I just found about the weird readings."

And, same as every other class they had over the last week. Hover, Battery and Mech spent the whole class researching about area 6. Rocky's job was to keep them updated on what the professors were teaching while they worried about their personal quest.

They kept their research hidden from the professors. "If the University wants to keep it hidden, we can expect no help from the professors." Battery had said, and so, they agreed to do it on their own.

However, the speed on which they made progress had gone down over the last days, because most of the information the internet and the books had about that place had already been searched. They were starting to run out of sources and still couldn't tell which of those were reliable. Nothing seemed to be telling a believable story, unless you wanted to believe that an invisible and intangible being was living over that specific area of the university.

The bell rang again. As soon as they could, they raced to the cafeteria and played Invensor's video-message.

"Dear Hover, White told me about your question about area six." Invensor said. "To be honest, the question surprised me, because I had never heard of such a thing. I've never seen it either in my time as a student, nor at my visiting to the university, when I was invited to teach there.

"However, I went ahead and researced the possible changes to the campus and, as it seems, this place is exactly where what, in my time, was called the "Gamma Grounds".

"The Gamma Grounds were the place where we went to test atomic and radioactive substances without the risk to harm the rest of the school.

"Students were expected to only walk into that area wearing protection gear.

"However, by the time I was graduating, a few strange things started to happen at the Gamma Grounds. "Students, even those who the professors assured were wearing their protection gear, developed strange mutations and sicknesses. Some of them were related to radioactivity and some were related to an unknown factor.

"That, of course, weighted against the university, that was heavily sued and had many problems. In the end, the headmasted decided to close the Gamma Grounds for good and clean the area.

"The rest happened while I was away, so I don't know the details for sure, but, from what I've researched, they demolished the buildings and got rid of everything that existed in the area. Finally, they decided to close the area completely and end the studies in atomic technology in the university.

"Apparently, they renamed it Area 6 only a few years ago, to get rid of most of the bad rumors.

"I hope that answers your question. If you need my help again, just send word."

"Ah! So that answers our questions!" Rocky said. "Why are you all with such puzzled faces?"

"Yyyyyyyyeeeeeeeaaaaahh..... It answers some of our questions"! Mech said.

"He's right." Hover said. "He answers a lot of questions, but some things in that story still don't make sense."

"Like what?" She asked.

"Readings from a nuclear accident from decades ago should not be that strong, unless people kept the residuals around." Battery explained. "And if they kept the nuclear residuals there, it's a crime and a danger to us all!"

"Not only that," Mech continued. "But some readings are he wrong type. Some waves our equipment read are definetly not from atomic or nuclear materials."

"And there's also that thing that Invensor said:" Hover completed. "People being affected by nuclear material even while wearing suits is weird. And even weirder is that some of the victims had diseases that no one knew where they were from."

"Should we message him back?" Battery asked.

"No." Hover decided. "He gave us a great lead in discovering things already, but he has his own business to mind. The rest is up to us."

"So, where do we go now?" Bettery said.

"Maybe if search for the 'Gamma Grounds' we might find something."

"Ummm... there is a secret passageway from the administration room to the remains of the underground buildings of the Gamma Grounds, does that help?" Rocky said. Everyone glared at her, wide eyed. "Errr... Barty said that in one of his boring Analytic Geometry classes..." She said.

"WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL US SOONER?!" The other three said.