Never As It Seems

The Other Base

Adam, Rick, Flames, and Annmarie quickly found they couldn't really do anything to help out with the procedure. In the span of an hour, the ninety-seven people at the base worked with maximum efficiency to make sure everything was completely shut down, whether they were familiar with the equipment or not. First to go were the computerized guns - the missiles had the highest priority and as such were the greatest amount of guns taken away, but there were quite a few high-tech guns that even Adam didn't know the names of. All were carefully shut down and put away where the Fuzzy Guys could not access them, if they wished to do so. Next was everything that was electrified - not the electricity itself, as that would come last, but the fence encircling the base (which, Annmarie had found out from Lights, was only turned on during night hours for extra protection) and most of the security operations. Lights had confessed she felt a little iffy about turning that unit off so soon, but was quickly reassured once she found out there was nobody within a twenty mile radius of the place, and with all the still-activated guns inside they were well protected. Next was the tricky part: the computers. Going along with most buildings and operations in the planet, the base was almost entirely dependent upon the hundreds of computers that monitored every move of every person in the building (an act that Lights had hastily explained was not as creepy or “stalker-ish” as it sounded), regulated the air, water supply, and even parts of the electricity, tracked the outside of the building, scanned for impostors, transmuted communications, and, as computers are supposed to do, solved problems the user put forth. The main issue at stake was not shutting them down - that was simple enough - but having to shut down so many in such little time. However, with the sheer number of people who volunteered to go through with the job, it was completed in less than fifteen minutes. In their last minutes of electricity power, the people still remaining in the building grabbed as many useful objects of both destruction and protection as they could find, most of which fell under the artillery category. Finally, everyone began to head outside to where they would gather one last time before heading off, save for the last remaining technicians, who were taking great care to shut the electricity down.

Throughout this process about twenty or so cars had been prepared for the one hundred and one people that would be transported to the other base. Extra guns were loaded and each car was being appraised for a sort of efficiency exam that the base went through every time they were planning to leave (which wasn't too often, but it had happened once or twice in the past). A crew of ten people was ardently going through with this inspection, and they appeared to be much more exhausted than the rest of the people at the base had been once everything had finally been picked up and put away. Every person at the base site gathered around these cars and awaited further instruction from Lights.

The group of four, meanwhile, had been waiting around outside since nearly the beginning. Rick had struck up a conversation with one of the car examiners - something about mechanics - while Adam, who was still feeling an edge of confusion to the whole endeavor, had started a sort of questionnaire with Flames and Annmarie about what they had been doing and what their lives had been like for the past three years (for them; for Adam it had been about four months, a much lesser time away), etc. They hadn't minded; in fact, they had been quite eager to answer the many questions he had had and talk about their lives, which had been tough, but nice enough. 
Finally, the last person, one of those who had been given the task of shutting off the electricity, walked forward into the group. Lights took her place in front of the crowd and held up her megaphone once again.

"Officers and staff," she began. "First of all, I would like to congratulate you on a quick and thoroughly completed job well done. You have truly and effectively managed to make this place inconspicuous, and for that I salute you." She put the megaphone at her side and raised her arms in a salute, and then ended the gesture and held the megaphone up again. "Now comes the tricky part. We have to get ourselves over to the other base, and fast."